Northern Ireland: Political Situation

Lord Reid of Cardowan Excerpts

Tuesday 8th September 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dunlop]

I very much agree with the noble Baroness that the Police Service of Northern Ireland needs the support of the community in pursuing these investigations. If people have information that will help the police with their inquiry, we would certainly encourage them to come forward.

[Lord Reid of Cardowan (Lab)]

My Lords, there is very little in this Statement that anyone here would disagree with and I thank the Minister for it. However, I think the reason there would be very little disagreement is that there is actually very little that is new in it. As my noble friend Lady Blood pointed out, these events have been going on for some time now. There is, however, one significant new element, which is the expressed intent of the Government to, as they put it, as a last resort be prepared to legislate here at Westminster. For those of us with a sense of déjà vu—I declare an interest, as I was involved, I think, as Secretary of State in three suspensions—this is a profound statement wrapped up in rather quiet words. Can the Minister therefore confirm to us that what this actually means is a suspension of the legislative powers in that area at Stormont, or is there another way of legislating here on a subject which is, after all, devolved?

The second question relates to the predication of that intention not on the political differences per se and particularly not, as the Statement makes clear, on the murder of Mr McGuigan, but on the real prospect that the Executive will start running out of money, not least in the public services and no doubt starting with health. In view of that link between the Government’s intention, presumably, to suspend Stormont—or at least to take legislative powers here from Stormont—and the running-out of money, the Government must have carried out some estimate of how imminent that is. Given that Parliament will rise next week, this is an important question. I notice that the Minister said that the situation is already difficult, but is he in a position to be a little more specific and tell us whether we are talking about a period of a week, a fortnight, a month or two months? As I have said, these innocent-seeming words have a profound implication for those of us who have lived through such a situation before if it results in the suspension of power-sharing at Stormont.

[Lord Dunlop]

I thank the noble Lord for his question. The first thing that I need to make clear is what I said earlier: that the Government do not think that suspension of the devolved institutions is right in the current circumstances. The noble Lord is absolutely right to say that the budgetary situation is acute. That is why these talks will be intensive, urgent and focused, and will last between three and four weeks.

On welfare reform, as I said earlier, if all other options have been exhausted and given the acuteness of the budgetary situation, the Government would be prepared as a last resort and extremely reluctantly to legislate here in Westminster on welfare reform.