European Union (Withdrawal Arrangements) Bill

Debate between Allison Gardner and Jim Allister

2nd reading
Friday 6th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Jim Allister]

I will be dealing with that, but the hon. Member invites us to think that it is appropriate that those elected to the Northern Ireland Assembly should turn up on Tuesday of next week and vote to disenfranchise their own constituents—to say, “You, our constituents in Northern Ireland who sent us to the Northern Ireland Assembly, we are not worthy to make your laws. We must bow to the superiority of a foreign Parliament, and we must surrender to that foreign Parliament the right to make these laws in hundreds of areas of law.” The hon. Member might think that is admirable and is the very epitome of democracy, but I happen to think it is the very opposite.

[Dr Allison Gardner (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)]

The Bill would create a democratic deficit that the hon. and learned Member has already referred to, and the Windsor framework has addressed that with the Stormont brake, which allows the Northern Ireland Assembly to review all laws applied.

[Jim Allister]

I respectfully suggest that the hon. Member reads a little deeper. She will discover that the Stormont brake is farcical. The previous Member for North Antrim in this House aptly said it was like someone sitting in the back seat of a car and saying to the driver, “Would you ever be so kind as to pull the brake?” That is what the Stormont brake is: a request to the British Government to pause the imposition of an EU law. The British Government do not have to do it—there has been one request to date and nothing has happened about it—so it really is a fiction, and an insult to the democratic mandate of the people of Northern Ireland.