Northern Ireland (Executive Formation and Exercise of Functions) Bill

Jim Shannon Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 24th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Emma Little Pengelly]

I thank and agree with the hon. Gentleman.

I came in to work for and with Government back in 2007 on the restoration of the Northern Ireland Assembly. I was an adviser in the office of the First Minister, and I worked closely not only with our DUP team, but with the Sinn Féin team. Back in 2007, that was challenging, because the office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister is a joint office. Part of my job was to advise the First Minister and try to get agreement on a range of issues to be signed off by the Ministers in the relevant Department. What did that mean in practice? It meant that every letter and every policy—everything that went out of the Department—had to be agreed between the DUP and Sinn Féin. I was one of the people charged with seeking those agreements for ministerial sign off.

I say this today not because of any blind hatred or opposition to Sinn Féin, because we worked the system, and we worked it hard, to try to deliver on behalf of everyone in Northern Ireland. We had to make very difficult compromises, decisions and agreements to make devolution work in order to try to stabilise the peace.

It was therefore particularly disappointing when the collapse happened, and I recognise all those people across all parties, including Sinn Féin, with whom we worked to try to make Northern Ireland work. It is in that context that everyone here, including on the Labour Benches, should be clear about who is causing there to be no government in Northern Ireland today. We would go back into government tomorrow morning. We are willing to turn up, and we are not asking for anything. One party is saying to every other party in Northern Ireland, “You are not going into government unless we get our demands.” That is blackmailing not just the other parties in Northern Ireland but the people of Northern Ireland who want to see issues addressed such as health, health transformation, education, necessary infrastructure and the fantastic projects happening on the ground to foster good relations—those things cannot happen.

In the main, the Bill gives unaccountable senior civil servants the power to make some decisions, and it has been acknowledged that most of them will be routine, non-controversial, low-level decisions. As my right hon. Friend the Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) rightly said, the vast majority of the 200 decisions that have been listed are not controversial, but they cannot be taken under the terms of this Bill. That is why, right from the outset of this process, we expressed disappointment, because the time has now come that, if Sinn Féin will not move on and if they want to boycott the Northern Ireland Assembly, they should allow those who want to work to work. There need to be ministerial decisions on a whole range of important issues.

New clause 7 has received some coverage and has caused some controversy because of the two issues relating to Northern Ireland. I echo the comments of many on both sides of the House that we recognise these issues are of deep concern to many people in Northern Ireland. These issues are of deep concern to many people in my constituency. We have heard the experiences of women, particularly in relation to life-limiting conditions and fatal foetal abnormalities. We have listened to their stories and experiences, and they are incredibly difficult. I challenge anyone not to feel empathy for the very challenging circumstances in which those women find themselves.

I spoke on behalf of the DUP in the Northern Ireland Assembly just prior to the collapse on a report we commissioned, and I urged people to wait, to let us see the report and to approach the situation with compassion and care. That report has been received, and I honestly believe that, if the Northern Ireland Assembly were re-established, the report would be debated, considered and decided on where it rightly should be dealt with. The only thing holding that up is the lack of a Northern Ireland Assembly, and there would be no impediment to the Assembly getting back to work tomorrow if Sinn Féin dropped their red line.

Yes, there are some concerns about the Bill, and I conclude by addressing some specific issues for Northern Ireland. The historical institutional abuse inquiry has been mentioned, and I have frequently met victims and victims’ groups over the past seven to eight years. I have put on the record, and wish to say again, that we in the Democratic Unionist party are hugely sympathetic to what those people experienced, particularly as children, in those institutions. That is an example of an issue that needs to be addressed. A huge amount of work needs to happen on a possible redress scheme—a support scheme— and who would be eligible for it and what mechanism could be used to introduce it. But that can happen at the moment, in preparedness for a decision to be made; my understanding is that under the terms of this Bill and guidance that is the type of decision that cannot be made.

In the absence of such decisions, if there is no restoration of the Assembly, I urge the Secretary of State and her team: be a little braver, step up and make the decision to say, “It has gone on long enough.” Victims, those suffering, those in need and those sitting on waiting lists need decisions, and they need to be ministerial decisions. Although that needs to happen now and in a couple of months’ time, it needed to happen yesterday—it needed to happen a year ago. This is now urgent across such a wide range of issues.

Briefly, I wish to touch on the issue of the definition of a “victim”. I mentioned in an intervention that this week marks the 25th anniversary of the Shankill bomb, an incident that demonstrates so acutely the grotesque nature of the definition of “victim” in Northern Ireland. Under that definition, which is holding up issues such as the victim’s pension and other support, the nine innocent victims of that atrocity—that IRA act of terrorism—are gauged to be the same as the IRA bomber who blew himself up and killed himself planting that bomb on that day. That is grotesque and appalling. People right across all the political parties, here and in Northern Ireland, have a number of issues they are really concerned about and care deeply about. I recognise that many care deeply about the Irish language Act, but there are many other issues to address, such as the one I mentioned. What a wrong to turn around and say to the families of those who were murdered and injured on that day, “That bomber is treated the same under victims’ schemes and victim support as the people he went out to murder.”

Connected to that is the point relating to our veterans. We do need our covenant—we need full implementation of the covenant. Northern Ireland has 3% of the UK’s population, but we contribute 7% to the Army, which is vastly higher in terms of proportion across the United Kingdom, and we do deal with the legacy. When people come back, they have done their duty and have seen some terrible things, not because they chose to go there, but because that was their job and duty. We therefore have a responsibility to do what we can to support them. We need the full implementation of the armed forces covenant in Northern Ireland. We also need to address the issue of the disproportionate and grotesque attempts to pursue soldiers and police officers who did their duty, stood up to protect and were only there with a gun in that situation because they were placed there to protect people. We need to get that addressed urgently, and with that I will conclude.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

rose—

[Paul Girvan (South Antrim) (DUP)]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Shannon]

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to make a comment. First, let me thank the Secretary of State for introducing this legislation. We know that the people of the Province have been held to ransom by the wiles and machinations of an obstinate, intransigent and downright petulant Sinn Féin for too long. Other Members have said that and I want to reiterate it. It seems Sinn Féin is happy enough to be the party of absenteeism at home as well as in the UK, happy to take the Queen’s notes and not legislate, and happy to leave our country tottering on the brink. It is about time that we in this place reminded Sinn Féin that if it does not and will not do its job in Northern Ireland or here, we and the British Government will do that job for it.

My personal opinion is that we should be implementing direct rule in this legislation if an Assembly Executive are not formed within the next six months. I believe it is time we did that. For too long, we have pandered to Sinn Féin and gotten nowhere, except for in Northern Ireland Departments that are afraid to allocate money. I want to make some comments about that. Clause 3(4) states:

“The absence of Northern Ireland Ministers is not to be treated as having prevented any senior officer of a Northern Ireland department from exercising functions of the department”.

Subsection (5) makes reference to something

“not to be treated as having prevented the exercise of that function”.

That all sounds right and proper, but the fact of the matter is that, although it gives permanent secretaries some function in terms of where they are, it does not go far enough. The difficulty for me came when I read the guidance on decision making. Although the principle of the legislation is to ensure that the decisions that should be taken are taken, the framework for decisions leaves a lot to be desired. The guidance says that

“the absence of Northern Ireland Ministers does not prevent a senior officer of a NI Department from exercising a function of the department if the officer is satisfied that it is in the public interest to exercise the function”.

Surely that translates into, “If an official wishes to stick their neck out, this will not stop him or her.” How many officials are prepared to do that? I suspect that there are very few. It is all very well, but where does the Bill say that decisions must be made unless there is a reason not to make them? We all know the issues clearly. It is important to encourage permanent secretaries to make decisions that have been in the pipeline for too long.

This morning, the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee heard about the need to recruit some 600 police officers before the end of the year. There are some plans to try to do that to bring the figures up. We also have to address paramilitarism. The Police Service of Northern Ireland is clear about what it is doing and wants to do. I am happy with the PSNI’s commitment, but will the Secretary of State say how the Bill addresses it?

Last week, I met the Unison representatives of the health workers at the Ulster hospital in Belfast. They are as annoyed as I am that in Northern Ireland we cannot access some of the drugs that we can access on the mainland. Compared with some parts of the United Kingdom, we have second-class access to cancer care in Northern Ireland. For some people, there is a backstop down the Irish sea when it comes to healthcare for those in certain parts of the mainland compared with us in Northern Ireland. I express great concern about that. Why is it that agency staff cost the health service in Northern Ireland £150 million? I suggest that that is lazy management. It is not cost-effective to spend £150 million this year on agency staff when the staff could be employed full time at a much lower cost.

What about the pay for nurses—the 6.5% over three years for the nurses? There is a backstop down the Irish sea when it comes to the nurses in Northern Ireland getting their 6.5%. Perhaps the Secretary of State will listen to this question, if that is possible: when will the nurses in Northern Ireland get their 6.5% pay increase? Will the changes in this legislation make that happen? We have been very involved with community pharmacies and we understand the issues clearly. We need to help the permanent secretary to enable the changes to take place.

Let me refer to the food-processing grant scheme and the lack of an appropriate scheme. I had a meeting with the Minister of State on this matter, which affects three of the largest employers in my constituency. When I attempted to engage the permanent secretary on the issue, I was given the following response—I quote the Minister of State, who is sitting there writing furiously:

“You have asked for a reconsideration of a decision to restrict the availability of grant to SMEs in Northern Ireland. If the measure was to be extended beyond the SME sector and the available evidence, that would require a direct Ministerial intervention. There are no plans to launch this new scheme in the absence of a DAERA Minister.”

Will the permanent secretaries be able to legislate on the scheme to enable three of my large local business to take advantage of a processing grant scheme that is available on the mainland? It is available in Scotland, Wales and England, but it is not available in Northern Ireland.

On fishing, Brexit will bring us some access to our own waters again, which is good news, but we also need fishing harbours in Portavogie, Ardglass and Kilkeel that can take up the opportunities and make sure that they happen. For that to happen, we need someone in the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs and the permanent secretary to be responsible, take those decisions and ensure that we get the second slipway at Portavogie, the large scheme at Kilkeel and the improvements needed at Ardglass, which are currently on hold.

We will always talk about our own constituencies, as I have done, but I just want to plug a project in my constituency that is still sitting in the system—the Ballynahinch bypass. Why are we unable to get progress? The bypass is ready to go and the plans are in action, including the acquisition of land, but we are unable to move the scheme forward. A Northern Ireland Water sewerage scheme for new builds is also on hold in Saintfield in my constituency. There are lots of new builds in Newtownards and Comber, and we may have to upgrade those systems as well, so I am very conscious of that issue.

I will soon draw my remarks to a conclusion, because I want to ensure that my hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim (Paul Girvan) has the opportunity to speak. Just before I do, I will mention the education system. Many schools across my constituency have not been able to step forward as our allocation of pupils increases. We are looking into having a new build for Glastry College, or perhaps an amalgamation of Glastry College and Movilla High School. We will have to see where that goes, but we need someone in place to make the decision. We also need someone in place to make the decisions about children’s road safety outside both Grey Abbey Primary School and Abbey Primary School in Newtownards. These are real bread and butter issues for people who want to see change.

We are frustrated with a system that unfortunately does not bring accountability. With respect to the Secretary of State and the Minister of State, who are both sitting on the Government Front Bench, this legislation does not deliver the accountability that I want to see. I challenge the Government to show that it will deliver on the education and bypasses that we need, and on nurses’ pay. We want to see accountability and responsible action from the Ministers and the Department.

I agree with the spirit of the Bill, but it is not forceful enough and will mean that decisions can be avoided. The people of the Province have lived in limbo for far too long. We deserve better; and the DUP deserves and demands better.