King’s Speech

Lord Caine Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Caine (Con)]

My Lords, I join in welcoming the noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General to his post and congratulating him on a superb maiden speech. I also welcome the noble Lord, Lord Khan of Burnley, to his post. It was one of the great honours of my life to serve for a little over two and a half years as a Northern Ireland Minister in this House. After some 36 years of involvement, I will continue to be an active participant on all Northern Ireland matters both inside and outside the House.

In the short time available, I will make three points. First, the election result in Northern Ireland does not in any way indicate that constitutional change is imminent or inevitable, let alone desirable. Yes, Sinn Féin now has the largest number of seats in the other place and, for the second election in a row, there are more nationalist MPs from Northern Ireland than there are unionists. But that tells only part of the story. In fact, nationalists returned exactly the same number of MPs at this election as five years ago. The two main nationalist parties, Sinn Féin and the SDLP, won 38.1% of the vote. For context, it is worth recalling that in the 1998 Assembly election those two parties had 39.6% of first preference votes. The question that those who advocate the end of the union ought to be asking themselves, therefore, is why, after an agreement that they claimed would deliver a united Ireland by 2016, and despite demographic changes, nationalism is in roughly the same place as it was a quarter of a century ago.

The big shift from 1998 has been the decline of the unionist vote, probably exacerbated at this election by events that could not have been foreseen, and the rise of Alliance as an electoral force. However, as I have said before, I do not believe that too many people are motivated to vote Alliance out of a burning desire for constitutional change, and in the constituency won by Alliance at the election, Lagan Valley, more votes were cast for unionist candidates than in any other seat in Northern Ireland. Those predicting or hastening the end of the union are being decidedly premature, so I welcome the reaffirmation by the new Secretary of State—incidentally, my local MP—Hilary Benn that a border poll is not on the horizon. The circumstances that would require it to be called are nowhere near satisfied.

My second point is that this creates both challenges and opportunities for those who want to see Northern Ireland’s place within the United Kingdom strengthened. I count myself among their number. The most obvious point is that unionism has to find a way of co-operating rather than constantly tearing itself apart. It needs, as one unionist put it recently, to start finding new friends rather than constantly seeking out Lundys and traitors and fighting yesterday’s battles.

What form this takes is primarily for unionists in Northern Ireland to determine, although my noble friend Lord Godson set out a number of suggestions in a typically erudite speech in Limavady earlier this year. Unionism cannot afford to appeal to an ever-decreasing base. There is a broader constituency out there that needs engaging about the long-term economic and social benefits of the union, which remain considerable.

My final point is for the Government. I welcome the pledge in the gracious Speech to

“support the political institutions and devolved government in Northern Ireland”.

The restoration of Stormont in February was the culmination of intensive efforts by my colleagues in the previous Administration. It was achieved as a result of the changes we set out in the Windsor Framework and the Command Paper Safeguarding the Union to address the serious defects in the original protocol.

The Government’s manifesto states that they are

“committed to implementing the Windsor Framework in good faith”.

However, it does not mention the Command Paper, which was also vital in getting Stormont back. The Command Paper contained a number of positive and practical measures to strengthen the union—the East-West Council and Intertrade UK, to name but two. I hope that the Government will faithfully implement all those commitments in the Command Paper that are designed to strengthen the union.

As my noble friend Lord McInnes of Kilwinning reminded the House, in 2021 the then Leader of the Opposition stated:

“I believe in the United Kingdom and I will make the case for a United Kingdom”.


However, on his visit to Belfast, days after becoming Prime Minister, he said that he would be an “honest broker” on the issue, intimating incorrectly that this was somehow a requirement of the 1998 agreement. I hope that this does not herald a retreat back to neutrality on the union and Northern Ireland’s position within it. No UK Government should ever be neutral on the union. The Prime Minister should stay true to his commitment to make the case for the United Kingdom and for Northern Ireland’s enduring place within it.