Northern Ireland (Executive Formation and Exercise of Functions) Bill

Lord Trimble Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 30th October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Trimble (Con)]

My Lords, I have a lot of sympathy with the suggestion made by the noble Lord that we could have benefited from a procedure that allowed a more thorough examination of the legislation. However, we are where we are, and we are dealing with legislation which at the moment has to be acknowledged to be necessary. It is necessary because, for a long time now, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has been vulnerable to a judicial review, and while that has not matured, she does need the provision that is in here to protect her against that.

Another factor that has been mentioned is with regard to doubt over the capacity of civil servants to take decisions in these matters, and here I just do not understand the problem. The Government of Ireland Act 1920 is quite clear: Section 8 puts executive powers in departments. Very clearly, the devolution is to departments. We could have a long argument about how this came about, because it flies against normal British practice, but this happened. There are hypotheses about it, but I am not going to go into the question of how it came about; I am simply saying that is the law, and that is the law that civil servants are exercising. Civil servants may find it embarrassing, but the law is as it is in the 1920 Act.

Clause 4 has been referred to, and I agree with a lot of the negative comments made with regard to it, but I have to say there is again another misunderstanding of what the law is. With regard to the law in Northern Ireland, the only substantive difference between the law in Northern Ireland and the law in England and Wales on abortion is the question of foetal abnormality. On all other matters the law is the same, in terms of the substance of the law. What is different is that the law in England is in statute law, but in Northern Ireland it is in common law: judicial decisions, including the Bourne decision in 1938. The problem then lies with the lack of a clear process and a way of proceeding. It is all very well to say, “Go and see your GP and he should arrange an abortion for you”. I do not think that that happens very often, but that is basically what should happen under our law. Rather than people having to go to England and spend thousands of pounds, they should be able to go to their GPs. Unfortunately, some doctors do not display the courage or constancy that is required. A further problem has been that various people put the health service under pressure to produce guidelines, which resulted in the Civil Service producing guidelines that were overly cautious and narrower than the law. Those guidelines should be dumped and we should have a clearer understanding of the law. Again, I do not want to spend too long on this point, although it has to be made. I am afraid that I disagree with some noble Lords—indeed, some noble Lords who are highly learned in the law—but I am confident that the situation is as I have stated it.

We should focus on the political problem in trying to resolve the difficulties. I agree with a lot of what my noble friend Lord Empey said. He gave a very clear description of the problems and of the way in which, unfortunately, the Government have not been able to progress matters in the way that we would like. However, that is understandable as we have so much on our plates at the moment. I can well understand someone saying to the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, “Don’t bring me any new problems”. I am sure that that is the sort of thing that is being said there, but it is unfortunate that we do not have a viable political process to bring about a restoration of devolution.

There would be difficulties with that, because it is quite clear that Sinn Féin does not want to see Stormont restored. We need to find a process analogous to that which happened way back in 1997, when Tony Blair became Prime Minister and made his first speech outside London, in Belfast, in which he said to the republican movement, “A settlement train is coming. I want you to be on the train, but it will be going with or without you”. That put pressure on Sinn Féin to come into the process. We now need to find a way of exerting that kind of pressure on Sinn Féin to get things moving, because it will not move without pressure. One likes to think that, once Brexit is resolved, it might be prepared to look at things, but I am beginning to have doubts about whether it will really want to do that.

So the question is: how do we exert the necessary pressure? I have put forward proposals on these matters on previous occasions, but nothing has happened, probably because those proposals were too ambitious. This time, I am going to the opposite extreme and will table an amendment later today which is as cautious as I can make it. In fact, I cannot think of anything that could be more cautious than what I am about to propose, but it might start something moving, which is what we need to happen.

Finally, there have been a number of unkind comments, particularly in the debate in the other place, about Northern Ireland MLAs drawing salaries when there is no Assembly for them to participate in. That is not their fault—unless they are Sinn Féin Members, in which case I think they have to bear some responsibility. They are trying to do their best in their own way, and I shall give a little plug for my own MLA in Lisburn, Robbie Butler. One of the things he is doing to try to keep politics alive is that normally, on a weekly basis, he transmits videos that deal with various issues, and they are very effective. In September, he issued a video on suicide awareness and it has had 34,000 viewings, which is incredible in the current context. I declare an interest in this matter. It is not just that Robbie is my MLA; he has had the good sense to employ my son in his office. I mention that to show that MLAs are doing the best that can be expected of them in the present circumstances. However, it is our responsibility, and particularly the Government’s responsibility, to put them back into the circumstances they ought to be in—in a functioning Assembly.