Northern Ireland (Interim Arrangements) Bill

Debate between Lord Murphy of Torfaen and Baroness Hoey

2nd reading
Thursday 18th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murphy of Torfaen (Lab)]

My Lords, obviously, I join the Minister and other Members of your Lordships’ House in referring to the work of Lord Brooke. Peter Brooke was a man of huge decency and integrity. He was a colleague of mine in the House of Commons, and obviously a very effective Secretary of State in the sense that he actually progressed the peace process. Also, and sometimes forgotten, he was a very effective chairman of the Northern Ireland Select Committee. He will be missed. He played his part in Northern Ireland history; there is no question about that.

We of course agree with the necessity of the Bill. It has a very innocuous name, the Northern Ireland (Interim Arrangements) Bill. What it actually means is that we are going to carry on with a sort of direct rule until we can resolve the problems with regard to the restoration of the institutions. That is not good, of course—we deeply regret it and I will come to that in a second—but with regard to the Bill, particularly on the issue of finance, there are important questions that the Government have to address. They have been raised by the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, and others. There is a case—I speak as a former Finance Minister for Northern Ireland—for a re-look at, reform of and rethink of how the Barnett formula applies to Northern Ireland.

The noble Lord, Lord Morrow, quite rightly referred to Northern Ireland, in the formula sense, being underfunded. He referred to the position of Wales, which I know a little about. It is quite interesting to reflect that the settlement changed for Wales because of the work that was done and the pressure that was put on the Government by the Welsh Assembly and the Welsh Government. Would that have happened without devolution? It might have done, but I doubt it. A sitting Government in Cardiff and a sitting Parliament could address these issues in detail and then negotiate with the United Kingdom Government. Therefore, the issue which the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, referred to is best addressed in the context of a restored Executive and Assembly in Northern Ireland.

I do not agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, that we could exist without an Executive and an Assembly in Northern Ireland. If we completely forget about the Good Friday agreement and the peace process, with a Parliament in Edinburgh and a Senedd in Cardiff, it would be impossible not to have a devolved Parliament in Northern Ireland, irrespective of the peace process. We must live with that, and we should, because it is the only answer to the problems of Northern Ireland. Every time a Member from Northern Ireland gets on their feet in the Commons or in this House, ultimately it is not good enough. Those people in the Assembly in Belfast are elected directly by the people of Northern Ireland to address the specific issues which are devolved to Belfast. The Minister knows that there are dozens and dozens of huge decisions which cannot be taken by civil servants. It is totally unfair, in a modern democracy, to put on the backs of people who are unelected the burden of having to make huge decisions which only politicians can decide, particularly regarding finance.

Obviously, we still understand the problems that the Democratic Unionist Party has with the settlement in Northern Ireland regarding the European Union. However, the Windsor Framework is a real step forward and should be the basis of proper negotiation to arrange a settlement. This morning I was looking, yet again, at Section 1 of the Northern Ireland Act1998, which I had the privilege of steering through the House of Commons a quarter of a century ago. It says specifically that Northern Ireland is a part of the United Kingdom and will only cease to be so if the people of Northern Ireland so decide by a majority. I cannot see that happening for some time to come—who knows?—but that is what it says. The principle of consent—

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

I thank the noble Lord for giving way and I agree with that part of the 1998 Act. I am sorry for going on about a very simple thing, but it is the kind of basic thing that makes people in Northern Ireland feel very left out: duty-free. Why can people flying from Belfast to anywhere in the EU not get duty-free, when you can fly from the rest of the United Kingdom to anywhere in the EU and get it? I got an answer recently which almost implied that part of the reason was because you could fly from Northern Ireland to the Republic of Ireland. Of course, as the noble Lord knows, you cannot fly from Northern Ireland to the Republic of Ireland, but that is just a simple thing that sets us apart.

[Lord Murphy of Torfaen (Lab)]

I do not think that in any way alters the position that Northern Ireland is a part of the United Kingdom. The noble Baroness will recall, because she comes from Northern Ireland and lived the early part of her life there, that there has always been a difference between Northern Ireland and the rest of Britain in certain respects. For example, livestock and agriculture have always had to be checked as they came across the Irish Sea, for various reasons. There was a separate Government for decades in Northern Ireland which imposed various restrictions, but that in no way affected the fact that Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom, so long as the people in Northern Ireland decide it should be. I do not underestimate the problems that have arisen, frankly because of Brexit. Without Brexit, this dilemma would not be in front of us, but we have to live with it. It seems to me that the Windsor agreement is a good start.

There are elections today in Northern Ireland. We will not know the outcome for another day or so. The marching season will soon be upon us. The recess is not far away. However, that should not stop the Government from planning for proper structured negotiations with the political parties in Northern Ireland and the Irish Government, so far as they affect the agreement. There should be a big role for the Prime Minister in the weeks and months ahead to work with parties in Northern Ireland to get a settlement. Despite the problems which we have had in Northern Ireland over the last two years regarding the protocol and the difficulties about the suspension of the institutions, there is no doubt from when we celebrated the Good Friday agreement some weeks ago in Belfast and elsewhere—and I do mean celebrated—that there has been a huge change. The noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, said quite rightly that, tragically, there have been 150 deaths in Northern Ireland over the last 25 years, mainly as a result of terrorism. However, that must be set against the 3,500 people who perished in the 25 years before the Good Friday agreement. That is the real measure of where we are in Northern Ireland.

Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill

Debate between Lord Murphy of Torfaen and Baroness Hoey

Committee stage
Wednesday 29th March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

The noble Baroness is absolutely right; that is happening on all sides of the community. However, if you become an integrated school, you get a lot of extra money. A lot of schools now are becoming integrated—of course they have to sign up to the whole ethos of it. I am just putting in a slight point that integrated education is not this panacea that it somehow gets taken for. Particularly for the diaspora from Northern Ireland in England, that is the sort of thing it gets involved in, calling for integrated education.

The amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, are important and I hope that when we come to the next stage of the Bill, the noble Lord, Lord Caine, will have found a way of getting this into the final Bill.

[Lord Murphy of Torfaen (Lab)]

My Lords, obviously I have a lot of sympathy with the amendments. I have never really agreed with the phrase that one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. There is never any sort of justification for killing innocent people, particularly women and children and people going about their business. The only killing I suppose you can justify—and even that is doubtful—is in wars, if you have to do it in self-defence or whatever. There is no justification for the wickedness that accompanies such terrorism—none whatsoever. It offends both my human and my Christian principles; you cannot glorify these things.

However, I accept that there is a generational problem, as the noble Baroness, Lady Foster, said, for example. Just after the Good Friday agreement, there was a different feeling about the place, and as the generations go on and they forget what everybody has talked about today, things change and people’s attitudes change. Perhaps they ought to look at some pictures of the mayhem, murder and destruction caused by terrorism. I have said it before in the Chamber that one of the worst times in my political life, if not the worst, was when I had to go to Omagh two days after the bombing and talk to the relatives of the children who had been killed there. How on earth can we justify that sort of activity? There is no justification.

My own amendments refer specifically to people making money out of glorifying terrorism and that they should not be allowed so to do. The issue that the Minister faces is that, although everybody agrees that this is the wrong thing to do, how we then incorporate that into law and at the same time ensure that we all take into account what the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Eames, said to us today: this is all about reconciliation.