Political Process in Northern Ireland

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

Tuesday 4th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

I am well aware of the decisions that need to be taken. My focus is on restoring government in Northern Ireland so that decisions can be taken by those elected by the people of Northern Ireland.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

The Secretary of State, when questioned by the press, has talked of the need not to jeopardise the talks, but does she accept that, by refusing to answer questions and giving that role to the Foreign Minister of the Irish Republic, she is allowing the impression to be given that these talks are driven by the Irish Republic and are not in the hands of the UK Government? That is in breach of the three-stranded approach there should be when it comes to these talks.

[Karen Bradley]

It is my view that the more speculation there is in the press and elsewhere about these matters, the less chance we have of restoring devolved government. I am not prepared to do anything that jeopardises the possibility of restoring government in Northern Ireland. The approach that other politicians take to dealing with the press is a matter for them. I have the utmost respect for the press—when I was Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, I was an absolute advocate of press freedom—and the press are welcome to scrutinise and question me at length, as they regularly do. But on these matters, I am not prepared to do anything that makes it harder for the right hon. Gentleman’s party and others to do what I know they want to do, which is to go back into government.

Northern Ireland: Murder of Lyra McKee

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

Tuesday 23rd April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

I will be very happy to take that matter up with the Home Secretary. The hon. Gentleman’s words and sentiments are absolutely right.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

There has been a typically selfish, self-centred and “we’re the only people who matter” response from the republicans who have tried to justify the murder this weekend, describing it as a “difficult time for republicans” and blaming it on the PSNI by saying that it would never have happened if they had not been there. Will the Secretary of State give this House an assurance that, despite the fact that these people can rent a mob, rent a riot and everything else to try to disrupt life, there will be no let-up in police activity to search out the arms of these people? Will she also assure us that the police will not let up in pursuing and bringing to justice those who spread poison and hatred through social media or at graveside speeches, or who strut around the streets in illegal paramilitary parades?

[Karen Bradley]

My conversations with the police officers of the PSNI, including at the Strand Road police station on Saturday, have given me absolute reassurance that the PSNI is determined to take those steps, and that there will be no let-up.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

Wednesday 10th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

The hon. Gentleman refers to a number of issues that may be making it more difficult for parties to find an accommodation to enable them to restore devolution. I know that he is a supporter of devolution, and therefore I suggest to him that the best way that we can all help on that is to vote for the deal.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

More than two years ago, Sinn Féin collapsed the Northern Ireland Assembly. Since then, rather than looking for its restoration, it has been fixated on getting a border poll and on stirring up sectarian tensions in Northern Ireland at the expense of people who want decisions made on education, health, infrastructure, job promotion and so on. In the face of Sinn Féin opposition to setting up the Assembly again, what plans has the Secretary of State considered to get decisions made in Northern Ireland?

[Karen Bradley]

The right hon. Gentleman knows that the best thing for the people of Northern Ireland is devolved government in Stormont, with local politicians making decisions for the people who elected them. That is what we are all determined to see, and I am as determined as anybody to make sure that I put the conditions in place so that we can enable that to happen.

Northern Ireland (Regional Rates and Energy) (No. 2) Bill

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

2nd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 6th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

That is why a buy-out scheme is available: so that boiler owners can choose individually. I cannot say exactly what the rate will be, because it will depend on, for instance, the subsidies that have been received to date. The calculations will be individual, but a buy-out will be available to boiler owners who do not believe that the subsidies now available will enable them to continue in business.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

rose—

[Gavin Robinson]

rose—

[Karen Bradley]

I do want to make some progress, but I recognise that many interests are involved. I will give way to the right hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) and to the hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson), but then I will conclude my speech.

[Sammy Wilson]

Does the Secretary of State accept, first, that the terms of the buy-out scheme are not clear and, secondly, that a large number of people—probably those who are most affected by these changes—will not be able to avail themselves of it?

[Karen Bradley]

I will now give way to the hon. Member for Belfast East.

Northern Ireland Budget (Anticipation and Adjustments) (No. 2) Bill

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

2nd reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 5th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

I understand the hon. Gentleman’s concerns, but we have to be aware of the constitutional precedents that are set by changing the way we scrutinise these Bills. The way this Bill should be taken through is not as primary legislation; it should be an estimates process done in Stormont, in the same way as we vote on our Budget in this House. We do not have scrutiny of the Budget resolutions upstairs; we have a Finance Bill that puts them into legislation, but we vote on Ways and Means resolutions on the Floor of the House. Unfortunately, we do not have the ability to do that in Stormont, for well documented reasons. What I want is to see those politicians in Northern Ireland doing the right thing, coming back to Stormont and forming the Executive, so that all those proper processes can be applied. We should not kid ourselves that some substitute arrangement will offer a different approach; we have to see devolved government restored in Stormont.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

rose—

[Karen Bradley]

I know the right hon. Gentleman wants to come in, but I want to make some progress, because I am conscious that others want to speak and we want to make sure everyone has a chance to be heard.

Let me go back to the work we are doing today. Like last year, the draft budget sets headline allocations only. It will remain for Northern Ireland permanent secretaries to use the powers of this budget legislation and the draft budget position to take decisions to maintain public services and live within their means. Also like last year, the Bill does not propose any new moneys to be voted on for Northern Ireland. The totals to which it relates are either raised locally or have been subject to previous votes in Parliament, most recently in respect of the Supply and Appropriation (Anticipation and Adjustments) (No. 2) Bill, which has passed through this House and is now in the other House. Instead, the Bill looks back to confirm spending totals for 2018-19, to ensure that the Northern Ireland civil service has a secure legal basis for its spending in the past year. Taken as a whole, it represents the minimum necessary intervention to secure public finances at this juncture.

Let me turn briefly to the Bill’s contents, which largely rehearse what I set out to the House in spring last year when I introduced the Northern Ireland Budget (Anticipation and Adjustments) Act 2018. In short, the Bill authorises Northern Ireland Departments and certain other bodies to incur expenditure and use resources for the financial year ending on 31 March 2019—this month.

Clause 1 authorises the issue of £16.8 billion out of the Consolidated Fund of Northern Ireland. The allocation levels for each Northern Ireland Department and the other bodies in receipt of the funds are set out in schedule 1, which also states the purposes for which the funds are to be used.

Clause 2 authorises the use of resources amounting to some £20 billion in the year ending 31 March 2019 by the Northern Ireland Departments and other bodies listed in subsection (3).

Clause 3 sets revised limits on the accruing resources, including both operating and non-operating accruing resources in the current financial year. All are largely as they appeared in the Northern Ireland Budget Act 2018. The revised totals for Departments appear in schedules 1 and 2.

Clause 4 sets out the power for the Northern Ireland civil service to issue out of the Northern Ireland Consolidated Fund some £11.8 billion in cash for the forthcoming financial year. That is the vote-on-account provision that I have already outlined. It is linked to clause 6, which does the same in terms of resources. The value is set at around 70% of the sums available in both regards in the previous financial year. Schedules 3 and 4 operate on the same basis, with each departmental allocation simply set at 70% of the previous year, and clause 5 permits some temporary borrowing powers for cash-management purposes.

As I have already noted, all these sums relate to those that have already been voted for by Parliament, together with revenue generated locally in Northern Ireland. There is no new money in the Bill; there is simply the explicit authority to spend in full the moneys that have already been allocated.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sammy Wilson]

May I take the Secretary of State back to where she started, before she began going through the departmental allocations and the detail of the Bill? The whole point—it has been made time and again by Democratic Unionist party Members—is that there is no scrutiny of how the departmental allocations were reached. She is right that that scrutiny would normally be done through Stormont, but Stormont is not operating. A mechanism is available here, but there seems to be reluctance to use it because of the possible reaction from Sinn Féin. Not only is Sinn Féin stopping scrutiny in Stormont; the fear of how it will react is stopping scrutiny here. When will the Secretary of State realise that Sinn Féin cannot block the scrutiny of how money is spent in Northern Ireland by keeping the doors of Stormont shut and causing fear here about how it may react when we try to do the job in this place?

[Karen Bradley]

I know how strongly the right hon. Gentleman feels about that point, which he has raised on several occasions. He will know that we consulted on the process with all five main parties in Northern Ireland, with the Opposition and with the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee to allow some prior scrutiny of the figures. All parties had full sight of the figures that we published in last week’s written ministerial statement. He is absolutely right that normal scrutiny procedures are not in place—they will be in place only with the restoration of devolution—but I caution him against trying to create artificial scrutiny processes that might well set a precedent for the future across all the devolved nations. The right scrutiny processes are available to respect the constitutional arrangements across the whole United Kingdom and all the devolved Administrations.

Civil servants are taking decisions—not major policy decisions, but the decisions that the Northern Ireland (Executive Formation and Exercise of Functions) Act 2018 enables them to make and that we want them to be able to make. We have to be very careful about the civil service’s separation and independence from scrutiny by political masters. It is the political decisions that need scrutiny, not the decisions of civil servants. We would like to see Departments given full scrutiny in Stormont, as happens in this House, but we have to be very careful about the constitutional arrangements.

That brings me back to my point that the Bill would ordinarily have been taken through the Assembly. Clause 7 therefore includes a series of adaptations that ensure that, once approved by both Houses in Westminster, the Bill will be treated as though it were an Assembly budget Act. That will enable Northern Ireland public finances to continue to function, notwithstanding the absence of an Executive.

Alongside the Bill, I have laid before the House, as a Command Paper, a set of supplementary estimates for the Departments and bodies covered by the budget Bill. Those estimates, which have been prepared by the Northern Ireland Department of Finance, set out the breakdown of resource allocation in greater detail.

Northern Ireland: Security Situation

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

1st reading: House of Commons
Monday 21st January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

The current Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, has overseen a deterioration in cross-border relations because of his belligerent behaviour towards Britain during the Brexit negotiations. Notwithstanding the hysterical reaction of the Irish Government to Britain’s decision to leave the EU, can the Secretary of State assure us that, not just at a police level but at a political level, security co-operation continues?

[Karen Bradley]

All I can say is that relations between the Police Service of Northern Ireland and An Garda Síochána are at an all-time high and continue to be good. They work towards the same ends: to thwart the terrorists wherever they may be operating.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

Wednesday 31st October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

This Government have never shied away from the need to ensure proper funding for policing in Northern Ireland. Together with our security services, the PSNI does incredible work to keep us all safe. However, the threat level remains severe, which is why it is vital to ensure that proper funding for the PSNI continues.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

The funding application now rests with the Treasury, so will the Secretary of State ensure that it is treated quickly? Will she also assure us that recruitment to the PSNI will not be blocked as a result of Sinn Féin’s closing down of the Northern Ireland Assembly?

[Karen Bradley]

I speak regularly with the Chief Constable, the assistant chief constable and others, and I am as committed as the hon. Gentleman to ensuring that the PSNI has the funding it needs. The bid is going through the proper processes, as it rightly should, and I am determined to ensure that the PSNI can continue to recruit as necessary.

Northern Ireland (Executive Formation and Exercise of Functions) Bill

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

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

[Owen Smith]

rose—

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

rose—

[Karen Bradley]

I will give way to the right hon. Member for East Antrim, but then I must make progress.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sammy Wilson]

Does the Secretary of State accept that while there may be some grandstanding today by Members who want to force into the Bill policies that they particularly want to be implemented in Northern Ireland, against the wishes of the people of Northern Ireland, the Bill will not enable any public official to pursue such policies, regardless of whether an amendment goes into the Bill, because the Bill is not designed to give the powers that would rest with politicians and public representatives to civil servants, and, indeed, it would be unfair to do so?

[Karen Bradley]

The Bill will enable civil servants to act within the law as it stands today. It will not give them the ability to become lawmakers and to change the law. That is a very important point.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

Wednesday 5th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

The people of the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union, and that means that we will regain control of our laws, our borders and our money. We will also ensure that we will meet the commitments that we made in the joint report in December to ensuring that there is no hard border on the island of Ireland and no border in the Irish sea.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

Collecting duties on trade across the border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic currently happens and does not present any problems. The real damage to Northern Ireland and to the integrity of the United Kingdom would be to have regulatory alignment between Northern Ireland and the Republic, giving the EU, rather than London, control over our laws in Northern Ireland. Will the Secretary of State give an assurance that in no circumstances will she agree to the backstop arrangement demanded by the EU, which would split the United Kingdom by having laws—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. We are immensely grateful, but that was far too long.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

Wednesday 20th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sammy Wilson]

The Chief Constable in Northern Ireland has expressed some concerns about cross-border security in today’s Belfast Telegraph. Will the Secretary of State give us some assurances about what discussions she has had with the Irish Government to allay the concerns that the Chief Constable has raised?

[Karen Bradley]

As my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary has already said, I have had conversations, including this morning, with the Chief Constable about these matters, which I also discuss with Ministers in the Irish Republic and other politicians there.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

Wednesday 21st March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

Specifically on the budget, I made sure that all the main political parties represented in Stormont had sight of it before I announced it, because I sincerely hope that they will be the parties that will actually deliver that budget. The right hon. Gentleman will also know from my statement of 12 March that I have had a number of representations and that I continue to receive suggestions about how we might get some form of functioning Assembly working in Stormont, and I am considering all those approaches.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

Does the Secretary of State realise that so long as Sinn Féin refuses to enter the Stormont Assembly without laying down pre-conditions and continues to create a toxic political atmosphere in Northern Ireland, there is little chance of restoring devolved government, and that she must consider ways of ensuring that Northern Ireland is governed properly in the meantime?

[Karen Bradley]

As I have said, several suggestions and representations have been made to me about what the next steps might be, and I am considering all of them. I am looking at what we can do to ensure that we get something that gets us back on the road towards having a fully restored devolved Government.

Northern Ireland Finances

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

Monday 12th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

I would welcome representations from all. Trevor Reaney’s work and recommendations, for which I thank him, are very valuable and helpful, but it would also be helpful to hear the views of all parties and all sides on this matter.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

We welcome the fact that the Government have now announced a budget for Northern Ireland. Does the Secretary of State recognise that hundreds of decisions about how that money is spent require some input from a Minister? Will she give a commitment that those issues will be addressed by the promises she has made to the House today to look at further measures?

[Karen Bradley]

On the budget I have spoken about today, I am confident that the direction is there for civil servants to deliver as required and as wanted by all parties. The right hon. Gentleman is right that many decisions are awaited. It is frustrating for all of us, as it is for him, that in the absence of devolved administration in Northern Ireland some of those decisions have not yet been taken.

Northern Ireland

Debate between Karen Bradley and Sammy Wilson

Tuesday 20th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

Some Opposition Members were Ministers during the previous period of direct rule—the right hon. Member for Delyn (David Hanson) will be asking a question shortly—and it was clear then that there was no role for Members of the Assembly at that point.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

It is clear from the talks and their failure that the structures of the Belfast agreement have given a power of veto and blackmail to Sinn Féin. Given that there will be no giving in to that blackmail, will the Secretary of State recognise that, in the absence of the ability to set up an Executive, the only way forward for proper governance in Northern Ireland is for her to start taking some of the decisions that are important for the day-to-day running of Northern Ireland?

[Karen Bradley]

As I said in my statement, I want to see devolved government in Northern Ireland, I want the politicians elected by people in Northern Ireland to be able to take their places and represent them in the Assembly, and I want an Executive in place. That is what I am focused on trying to deliver as best we can, as I think Members on both sides of the House have stated.