Proceeds of Crime

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Wednesday 20th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

It is a pleasure to make a short speech in this short debate. The Minister for Security, the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes), gave us a Yeatsian introduction to what is actually a fairly prosaic set of statutory instruments, and I would not want to provoke him any further in that direction. I just want to use this opportunity to make a couple of points clear. We support these measures, which will properly even out a number of anomalies and inconsistencies. We need to ensure that we have proper codes of practice and guidance on the use of these powers, and that is what the statutory instruments will provide.

In Northern Ireland, there has at times been sensitivity when the Home Office has introduced legislation here. An example would be the introduction of the National Crime Agency, when not enough attention was paid in advance to the Patten architecture or to ensuring that any additional policing systems and powers were consistent with the Patten principles. It took time to get that right, but it has now been got right. The statutory instruments before us tonight to build on that work that has already been done. They do not transgress the principles and they will not trigger any of the Patten tripwires in any way.

Most people in Northern Ireland will welcome the fact that there is to be full, even and consistent pursuit of the proceeds of crime. During the last set of negotiations at Stormont House, paramilitarism was a vexed issue among the parties. There was an impression abroad that not all the proceeds of crime were being fully pursued, and that some of those in possession of assets that were deemed to derive from years of paramilitary activity were being allowed to enjoy a life of ease and economic largesse that would otherwise have been discomfited by the relevant authorities. It was also thought that some of those assets were treated as personal rather than organisational, because some of those persons were deemed to be friends of the peace process. Both Governments, north and south, tried to reassure parties that that was not the case, and they undertook to ensure that in all legal measures and in all future practice, there would be a clear working assurance that no bye ball was given, no blind eyes were turned and there was no acceptable level of criminal enterprise, current or historic.

In so far as these statutory instruments add to that suite of reassurance to everyone and are compatible with the very important architecture derived from Patten in relation to the policing environment in Northern Ireland, my party is happy to endorse these statutory instruments.