Brexit: UK-Irish Relations

Lord Carlile of Berriew Excerpts

Tuesday 5th September 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Carlile of Berriew (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow my noble friend Lord Hannay, and I agree with everything that he said with such force. Like other noble Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Jay for the perfect clarity with which he introduced the debate and join the felicitations to the noble Lord, Lord Boswell.

Because of the delay between the report and this debate, it has now become part of a process, but it is an important part of it because it is evidence-based and contains solid analysis. Another part of that process is the letter that we received from the Minister. It reached my inbox at 3.09pm this afternoon. I think that your Lordships are entitled to be more than mildly irritated by the fact that that letter arrived then, when there were months or certainly weeks in which it could have been delivered, and when we have known that this debate was taking place for quite a long time. But I have now read it, and would like to raise a particular point with the Minister about bullet point 6 —and, frankly, I would like an answer from him tonight, not at 3.09pm before the next 4 pm debate.

Bullet point 6 refers to a “time-limited interim period” that is linked to implementation arrangement and allows for a “smooth transition”. I invite the Minister to unpack that very dense sentence. What are the implementation arrangements that he expects? Would he tell us and define what they are? How does he expect that smooth transition to be negotiated? Is there any evidence of negotiation of a smooth transition, and does that sentence really make transition and destination an unintended synonym? What destination does he predict is realistically achievable—or, as appears to be the case with a lot of the current phase of negotiations over Brexit, does he simply not know?

I want to speak about my experience of Northern Ireland and Ireland. I was the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation for an indecently long time—from 2001 to 2011. Subsequently, I continued to visit Northern Ireland very frequently in some non-statutory roles that I carried out. I had the opportunity to meet all the political parties on a fairly frequent basis; sometimes they spoke to me and sometimes they decided not to speak to me, but on the whole they were very co-operative and I learned a great deal about their mindsets. On one occasion, I went to South Armagh not long after it had been described as “bandit country” with the elected Sinn Fein Member for the relevant constituency, and I saw with him the extraordinary developments that had taken place—the fact that there was an active and representative democracy taking place in an area where, if I had gone there on my own 10 years before, I would almost certainly have been shot at.

I believe that Northern Ireland has become a good place to live and run a business, a very good place to educate your children—it has an outstanding education system—as well as a good place to have social housing. The government funding made available to Northern Ireland has been substantial. At least two, and maybe more, Secretaries of State in this House contributed to those developments, to their great credit.

I am terrified of the possibility that what has been achieved in Northern Ireland will in any way be lost. I refer briefly in particular to three of the conclusions of the report that we are debating. The one at paragraph 142 says:

“Political stability in Northern Ireland depends on the confidence of both communities that their interests are being respected”.


That is said with particular reference to the land and sea borders. The report concludes at paragraph 152:

“Brexit has profound implications for the current high levels of crossborder police and security cooperation between the UK and Irish authorities”,


and at paragraph 183 states:

“The peace process is supported by a majority of people from across the communities, and it would be irresponsible to overstate the threat posed by Brexit”.


Nevertheless, Brexit is already proving politically divisive and all sides must remain vigilant to ensure that the momentum behind the peace process is maintained. I regard those three principles—from my viewpoint, as somebody who has been concerned with counterterrorism and observing the effectiveness of the peace process—as absolutely non-negotiable and crucial.

This brings me to the role of Parliament. I thought Keir Starmer spoke very cogently on behalf of the Labour Party last week when he said that we must respect the outcome of the referendum, and I do. However, I also agree with him that Parliament continues to have a role. We cannot hand over to Government a discretion to do what they like. Equally, if the negotiation does not reach a conclusion, or reaches a bad one, that is not a trigger for a new referendum—that would be irresponsible. It is the trigger for this House, and Members elected to the other place, to say, “I am sorry. This will not do and we are not going to allow it to continue”. One of the key issues in that exercise of parliamentary responsibility in due course is what has happened in Ireland, particularly in relation to the peace process in Northern Ireland and the continuity of the beneficial developments there. We surely have to resolve this quickly. This is one of the most obvious questions, with the most obvious answers, of anything in the Brexit negotiations. If we and the European Union cannot sort this one out quickly, what hope is there of resolving any questions?