Northern Ireland (Executive Formation) Bill

John Penrose Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 8th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (John Penrose)]

Amen to that, Mr Speaker. I think that is the only way to follow that one. It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound). It is perhaps not his swansong—in theory, he has another couple of years before the end of this Parliament, should we run to full term—but he has been a wonderful adornment and one of the funniest Members of Parliament for a long time. We also heard tributes to the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey). She is a member of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee and was temporary Chair while my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) was being selected and elevated to his place. Incidentally, it is good to see him, in his first legislative outing in that place, making a contribution today. But it will be sad to see the hon. Member for Ealing North go. We can see from his comments today why it will be sad.

This is a very short Bill. It is only three or four clauses long. It is a very simple extension of two dates and that is all it does. That has not stopped us from going on at quite some length about Brexit, hard borders, or not, in Northern Ireland and all sorts of other related matters, but at its heart it does something very simple indeed. It just extends the existing Northern Ireland (Executive Formation and Exercise of Functions) Act 2018 by two dates: an initial period and then, at Parliament’s discretion, a potential further short extension.

It is good to know that speaker after speaker and party after party has expressed their support for the Bill. I would like to put on record the Government’s thanks to everybody, right the way across the aisle, for their support. It does matter, particularly when it comes to Northern Ireland, that we have cross-party support and, ideally, cross-community support. That support, however, is not unqualified or open-ended. As the hon. Member for Ealing North and many other Members have said, this is, frankly, wearing thin. We have been here before, and there is both frustration and a great deal of concern about the missed opportunities in all sorts of areas in Northern Ireland, including on health, education, suicide prevention and even potholes. These things are not being done and decisions are not being taken. As many different Members said, this cannot continue for very much longer. In fact, I think the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Nigel Dodds) described it as the endgame and he was absolutely right.

[Lady Hermon]

The Minister just used the phrase “wearing thin”. I assure him and the Secretary of State that what is wearing thin is the patience of the people in Northern Ireland with the fact that we do not have a functioning Assembly, and adding to that and intensifying the annoyance is that MLAs continue to be paid. Will the Minister therefore commit this evening that, if the Assembly is not functioning again when we get to these dates in the Bill, the Secretary of State will use her powers to cut MLAs’ salaries?

[John Penrose]

I agree absolutely with the first half of the hon. Lady’s sentence. The sense of frustration and concern is not confined to Members on both sides of the Chamber this afternoon and evening, although that has been palpable; it extends right across all communities in Northern Ireland and she is absolutely right to make that point.

On the pay of MLAs, I gently remind the hon. Lady that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has already cut MLAs’ pay not once, but twice. They are now down 27.5% from their initial level. That does not mean that further cuts might not be possible. I am sure that my right hon. Friend, who is in her place, will have heard what the hon. Lady said and will consider it carefully. I am afraid that I cannot give the hon. Lady any stronger a commitment than that, but she has made her point.

The concern and frustration that I mentioned were palpable from speaker after speaker during the debate. Again, this point was made by the hon. Member for Ealing North: that frustration and concern are twinned with a fear of the erosion of faith in the Stormont Assembly and the Stormont Executive, and in devolved government and democracy in Northern Ireland. Underlying everything that we have been saying is a worry that, if the democratic institutions in Northern Ireland are not working effectively, a peaceful opportunity to give vent to and give effect to differences of opinion and to make collective decisions in Northern Ireland is lost. If those opportunities are lost, that lends help and gives succour and energy to those who say, “Well, democracy is not the answer in Northern Ireland, but other forms of expression are.” We all know where that can lead and where that has led in Northern Ireland’s tragic history, and we do not want to go there again, so it is very good to hear people saying that on both sides of the Chamber.

[Bob Stewart]

I ask the Minister and the Secretary of State whether there is the slightest scintilla—the slightest glint—that Sinn Féin will come to an agreement in the next three months, or are we just hoping that they might come to some sort of compromise?

[John Penrose]

My hon. Friend raises a very important point. At the moment, the talks are still ongoing. There is still breath and life left in the negotiating room. Again, it is worth while recording that everybody here, in different ways and at different points during this debate, has made the point that they want those talks to succeed. This is not just confined to one side of the talks or the other. Everybody is still in the room and it is absolutely essential that, while there is still hope and breath left in those talks, they must continue, because the alternative is far, far worse. That is the only legitimate reason for any kind of extension to the EFEF Act: there is still a glimmer of hope that this can be done.

It would give nobody greater pleasure than my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for this Bill to be one that never needed to come into force. As she mentioned in her opening remarks, she will be delighted if this Bill never needed Royal Assent because it was unnecessary, because the talks had succeeded and because devolved Government had been reinstated in Northern Ireland. With the possible exception of the hon. Member for Ealing North, who has promised to crash the party if it happens, nobody would be happier at the success of the talks than the Secretary of State, who has basically been locked in a series of meeting rooms in and around Stormont for the last several months, seeing very little of her family, in an attempt to get the thing to work. I am sure we all wish her well.

There were two main types of contribution to this debate. One was from colleagues prefiguring amendments they have tabled for tomorrow that they hope to catch your eye on and debate, Mr Speaker. They included my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) and the hon. Members for St Helens North (Conor McGinn) and for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy). All of them, often from very different sides of the same issue, want to make sure that broader issues around the governance of Northern Ireland can be raised and debated tomorrow, in an attempt to move forward issues dear to their hearts.

The second type of contribution was much broader and more numerous. It came from people who said it was not wrong but it was sad that the Bill had to be used as a vehicle for these kinds of issues because it would be far better if Northern Ireland were being properly served by a Stormont Assembly, which could deal with the issues in the amendments to be discussed tomorrow in Committee and with many of the other issues raised, in many cases by Northern Ireland Members themselves, but by others as well, and which are much broader than the cultural issues—if I can put it like that. They are concerned with health, education, potholes, and everything else—the more mundane but absolutely essential warp and weft of government and of keeping the good governance of Northern Ireland up to date. Because decisions have only been taken in a very limited way under the existing powers and the EFEF Act, that has meant that Northern Ireland’s public services have gently but steadily become more and more out of date. As a result, in many cases those services have become less efficient than they would otherwise be if they had been kept up to date, and more expensive and less productive in the way they are delivered.

That was the broader thrust of many other people’s contributions. My hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield), a member of the Select Committee, gave a tour d’horizon with three options that we must all consider. I will happily pick them up with her when I have a bit more time to discuss with her how we can take them forward. We also heard from the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands), the right hon. Member for Belfast North, plus a whole slew of other Northern Ireland colleagues, including the hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley), the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), the hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson), and on and on.

The one thing I can promise is that this is not being rushed. We have two full days of debate—today and tomorrow—and then three days in the Lords, so there will be plenty of opportunity to debate this in more depth.

[Gavin Robinson]

I think I heard the Minister say the hon. Member for Belfast East goes on and on, but he knows the issue I want to raise. It is specific and discrete and concerns co-ownership. The Bill is ready and I understand that it rests with the Treasury. Has he got good news?

[John Penrose]

I did not say that the hon. Member for Belfast East went on and on, and nor would I ever do so. He is right to remind me of the pledge I was able to make from this Dispatch Box a month and a half to two months ago. I am afraid that I do not have a date for the introduction of the Bill for him, but he is right to say that the Bill has moved forward dramatically and is now in the necessary format for Westminster introduction. We do not have a date yet, but he is also right that the Treasury has a strong interest in moving this forward because it is to its financial advantage to get this change done, and where the Treasury wishes to lean is always a good place for any Minister to begin.

With that, I draw my remarks to a close. We have an entire day of this tomorrow when we can debate the amendments prefigured during this debate. Again, I thank all sides and all concerned for their broad support in principle for the Bill.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Committee tomorrow.