Northern Ireland (Executive Formation etc) Act 2019: Section 3(5)

Lord Adonis Excerpts

Tuesday 7th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Adonis (Lab)]

My Lords, the great majority of the Members of both Houses of Parliament supported the legalisation of abortion and same-sex marriage in Northern Ireland, and I applaud the Minister’s early remarks about the steps, including the preliminary steps, that the Government are taking to make it possible for women there to access abortion rights. The noble Lord, Lord McCrea, referred to democracy, but of course at the moment we are facing the absence of a devolved Assembly, and it cannot be right that human rights and the capacity to resolve burning injustices in Northern Ireland are simply suspended because no political institutions are operating in the Province.

Another area where we face a similar crisis is higher education, and I wish to press the Minister somewhat further on that. We had debates last year on higher education provision in Northern Ireland, with which there is a general problem. There is far too little of it at the moment. There is a big outflow of students from Northern Ireland simply because there are insufficient higher education places in the Province. In the last year, 17,440 Northern Ireland students—28% of all students there—studied in England, Wales and Scotland. As I know from my conversations in Belfast and Derry, many of those students study outside Northern Ireland not by choice but simply because they cannot access the places that they want in Northern Ireland. This is doing huge damage to the society and economy of the Province. Two-thirds of students who study elsewhere in the United Kingdom do not return after graduation, so this situation is leading to a systemic outflow of some of the most talented people in Northern Ireland. They never come back simply because the politicians there have not been able to agree on a satisfactory level of higher education provision.

The situation in Derry is particularly serious because there is no dedicated university for the second city in Northern Ireland. As your Lordships know, the big debate about higher education provision in Derry goes back 60 years. However, far from getting better, the situation is getting worse. Commitments given in the last 10 years have not been met. The number of places available to students in Derry at the Magee campus of Ulster University is pitifully small. There are only 3,429—barely more than were available 10 years ago. The medical school, which we have debated in the House several times, is not proceeding. What now needs to be done to give it the consent required to make it possible for people to undergo medical training in Derry, which does not happen at present?

The finances of the University of Ulster are clearly in a shambolic state. The proposed new campus in Belfast, which is almost certainly located in the wrong place anyway, is more than £100 million over budget and more than three years late in delivery. To cap it all, the vice-chancellor of the University of Ulster has just announced that he is departing for Canberra after only four years, so the university is now without a strategy, without leadership, with a massive deficit, and not providing places in the second city of Northern Ireland, which desperately needs them.

Given the enormous damage being done to the life chances of young people in Northern Ireland, particularly in the city of Derry, I consider this situation as big an infringement of human rights as the issues relating to abortion and same-sex marriage about which we legislated last year. I do not believe it is satisfactory for Parliament, which is responsible for safeguarding the human rights of the people of Northern Ireland, to allow it to continue. I seek a commitment from the Minister that, if devolution is not restored in the immediate future, as we all hope it will be, the Government will come forward with concrete proposals for boosting higher education provision in Northern Ireland in general and, in particular, for an action plan to ensure medical places this year in the Magee campus of the University of Ulster in Derry, and proposals for a dedicated university for that city.