Northern Ireland

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

Let us be clear what we are debating here today: we are debating a lock, or a brake, that is necessary because the Government have allowed the EU to impose its law on part of the United Kingdom. The result is that we now have a border between one part of the United Kingdom and the other part of the United Kingdom, a border that is going to be reinforced very shortly by the building of physical posts that will be used to monitor trade between Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Goods that are going into Northern Ireland purely for consumption in Northern Ireland will be checked—100% will be customs checked, and one in 20 will be physically checked. Of course, that can be varied by the EU. What is the Government’s answer to it? That Unionists can make a protest about it and sign a petition of concern. By the way, if there is anything that will destabilise the Northern Ireland Assembly, it is the constant use of the petition of concern. Members from other Northern Ireland parties behind me will confirm that.

First, there is a limit on what can be done and, secondly, despite the Secretary of State saying that he would be bound to listen to petitions of concern from Unionists, in fact he would have no option to. Whole sections of the framework tell us the grounds on which he can refuse a petition. Even if he does accept it, he then has to go to the Joint Committee and exercise a veto, which he knows will lead to material impacts for the United Kingdom, and of that we can be absolutely sure. If it is a choice between disrupting relations with the EU or accepting legislation—ironically, this Windsor framework is presented on the basis that it will normalise relations with the EU—how likely is it that we are going to pick a fight with the EU over the implementation of some EU law in Northern Ireland? The truth is that this is not a Stormont brake; it is a Stormont fake. It should be rejected by this House. It does not protect the Union, it does not protect democracy in Northern Ireland, and it will not get the Assembly back and running again.

[Mr Speaker]

With 20 seconds, I call John Redwood.

Northern Ireland (Executive Formation) Bill

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 22nd February 2023 Commons Chamber

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

I will say at the outset that the Bill going through the House today is an illustration and example of the futility of trying to use political blackmail to move my party from its principled opposition to legislation and to an agreement that is designed to take us out of the United Kingdom. I say to the Secretary of State that, to protect his own credibility in Northern Ireland, he had far better not listen to the anti-Unionist voices in the Northern Ireland Office, but use his political antennae to know what is the right thing to do.

This Bill illustrates that on four occasions the attempt to blackmail my party back into the Assembly by the threat of an election did not work, because the issues at stake are far too important simply to cave in to the threat of an election in which we might or might not have damage done to us, or to go back into an institution where, as Unionists, we would have been required to collaborate with an arrangement that was designed to, and will—as we have absolutely no doubt and as we have warned time and again—separate us from the country to which we belong. I hope the Secretary of State learns that lesson. We are not moving on an issue of principle.

The Secretary of State said in his remarks that he is disappointed that the Executive has not been re-formed. He should not be surprised. He and I campaigned to leave the European Union. We did so because we believed it was important that, as a country, we had the ability to make choices about the laws we had, the direction we took and the partnerships we made on trade, to do the best for the citizens of our own country. Yet, as a result of the protocol, Northern Ireland—and he knows it—has not gained the benefits that he and I campaigned for and that those who voted for Brexit wished to have. We are still left within the embrace of Brussels because of the imposition of EU law.

That fundamental problem is at the heart of the action we have taken. I have heard many hon. Members say today, as we will hear time and again, that this must be done to protect the Good Friday agreement. The fact of the matter, now clearly illustrated, is that the protocol and the Good Friday agreement cannot sit side by side. Indeed, one of the authors of the Good Friday agreement, the late Lord Trimble, made it quite clear that in order to keep the protocol intact, the Government would have to rip up the Good Friday agreement—and that, in effect, is what has happened. The leader of our party, my right hon. Friend the Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson), has made that quite clear.

The consent principle of the Good Friday agreement has been removed. Even the voting mechanisms that are allowed to make decisions about whether the protocol applies have had to be manipulated and changed, and the provision in the Good Friday agreement for cross-community support on that particular issue had to be removed. The Good Friday agreement and the protocol cannot sit in place side by side. One of the two goes. That is why, as a party, we have said there must be changes to the protocol.

Why is this Bill necessary? The Secretary of State made it clear that he did not believe that an election would change anything. Why would an election not change anything? It is because he knows in his heart, even if the officials who advise him do not know it, the suppressed anger within the Unionist community at being pushed out of a country that many Unionists died, during a terrorist campaign, to remain part of. Thousands of them refused to be intimidated by threat of violence to vote in the way Sinn Féin and the IRA wanted. He knows that that anger and that determination have not changed.

All the talk about the impact of the Assembly’s not working on the day-to-day lives of people has to be measured against whether the Assembly was functioning to deal with those issues anyway. No, it was not: we had a black hole in our budget during the time the Assembly was sitting. Some of the increases in waiting lists in the health service occurred while the Assembly was working, and many of the other problems have not emerged since February last year; they are long-term problems that were not dealt with even when the Assembly was working.

Even with some of the decisions that people would like to see made, the majority of the Unionist population now realise what is at stake, and they would not find it acceptable for their Unionist representatives to go back into an Assembly even under the threat of calling an election. We have had a lot of different threats. We were told that the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill could not progress in this House unless we got a Speaker. We were told the electricity payments could not happen unless Stormont did them. All those threats have been made in the past. I must tell the Secretary of State that this problem is not going away, and this party is not going to collaborate in an Assembly where we are expected to implement that very protocol until there are changes made.

What kind of changes could avoid legislation such as this having to be made again? I think that is very clear. Some people have presented this as some kind of trade problem, saying, “If only you could do away with the trade issues and have trade flowing freely, the issue would go away.”, but it is much more fundamental than that. The trade issue only occurs because there is a different law applying and a different lawmaking body in Northern Ireland from those in the rest of the United Kingdom.

We are not subject to British law anymore—we are not subject to laws made by institutions set up in the United Kingdom. We are subject to laws made in Brussels. Those laws are imposed on us; we have no say on them, and if they are detrimental to our country, we cannot change them. If we try to not implement them—if we try to ignore them—there is a foreign court that will drag us into the dock to make sure that we do.

[Ian Paisley]

Would my right hon. Friend agree that the issue is not only about the laws? A raft of regulations is coming upon Northern Ireland daily and impacting on our principles and the practical issue of how we do business. For example, at the end of this week, regulations that affect the organic seal on eggs will put our egg industry effectively out of business. Those regulations will cut off our market here in Great Britain. We will not be able to market those eggs in GB, because a regulation from Europe says our organic egg products must be produced in a particular way that appeals only to the European market, where we do not have any sales.

[Sammy Wilson]

There are lots of different examples of that happening.

[Claire Hanna]

Would the right hon. Gentleman mind saying what he thinks the specific impact will be on the dairy industry, and the many producers that sell about a third of their milk to the Republic of Ireland? What would be the environmental impact of having to dispose of a third of the milk produced in Northern Ireland? Where would that be sold if we did not have our privileged access to the single market?

[Sammy Wilson]

The hon. Member should think about the issue the other way around. What would be the impact on the food industry in the Irish Republic if the EU and the Irish were so bold and so stupid as to cut off a third of the milk that they need to make cheese, butter and everything else in the factories there? There are always ways of working around these issues. There is an idea that, somehow or other, if we do not conform to EU law, we cannot trade with the EU. America does not conform to EU law; it does not have EU laws imposed on it. China does not have EU laws imposed on it, but it can trade freely, and its trade with the EU is worth billions. Of course there are ways of addressing the issue.

[Stephen Farry]

I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman would recognise that the difference between Northern Ireland and China or the United States when it comes to access to the European Union is that Northern Ireland currently has unfettered access to the European Union market for goods, whereas neither China nor the United States does. They have access, of course, but not on the same trade terms.

[Sammy Wilson]

The cost of that is fettered access to trade with GB, our biggest trading partner. When I look at the balance, the choice I would make, as a representative of Northern Ireland’s consumers and businesses, is to have unfettered access to, and supply of goods from, GB. I would rather have that than have to pay the cost of fettered trade with GB simply to have unfettered access to the Irish Republic, when we know that there are other ways around the issue of trading with the Irish Republic.

[Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)]

Does the right hon. Member recognise that of all the goods coming from other countries into the EU, an average of only about 1.3% are physically checked? How could it be right for there to be checks on a greater proportion of the goods moving within the United Kingdom? That cannot be right.

[Sammy Wilson]

The hon. Member is right, and that illustrates just how much trade with GB is fettered in order to get unfettered access for a small amount of produce in the Irish Republic. Nearly 50% of the border checks for the EU were done for goods coming through Northern Ireland, even though we account for 0.4% of trade with the EU. That is the price being paid. Leaving aside the political and constitutional issues, there are huge economic issues from that unfairness.

The Secretary of State cannot and should not be surprised or disappointed that, as a Unionist party, we refuse to take our part in an Executive who would require by law—the courts have ruled on this—that our Ministers administer and impose that kind of arrangement on the people of Northern Ireland. That is not to mention the unknown future: there is a whole raft of EU law that we cannot even see—it is over the horizon at moment—that will cause us to diverge further from GB. That will make us a colony of Brussels—that is how it has been described—and will damage our economic, political and constitutional relationships with the UK. The Secretary of State cannot expect that of us.

That brings me to the point that I want to make: how do we get out of this situation? As my right hon. Friend the Member for Lagan Valley has mentioned, we welcome any changes that have been made. We have not seen the detail of them—nobody has—so it is really hard to assess exactly the extent of the changes on trade, checks, VAT and state aid, and what exactly they mean. Until we see them in writing, we are certainly not going to take the word of those who brief us. Even if their intentions are honest, everyone will have their own interpretation of those things. We need to see the changes to measure them.

A central question needs to be addressed; if it is not, there cannot and will not be a positive response from my party. What do we do about the 300 areas of law—not 300 laws, but 300 areas of law—to which Northern Ireland is currently subject that are being determined in Brussels? Do they come back to the devolved Assembly? There are three parties represented in the Chamber today, and some of them have already said that we should go with the deal, even though they have not seen it. We have not turned the deal down because we have not seen it in its entirety; we have simply given guidelines on what we expect to see in it.

I say this to all the parties here who send representatives to the Northern Ireland Assembly: what kind of public representative wants to be, and would support being, part of an Assembly that has no say over a whole raft of the laws that impact on businesses and consumers in their constituency? What kind of representative would accept sitting and working in an Assembly, and perhaps acting as Minister, if it meant implementing laws that they did not initiate and cannot amend, but have to implement, even if those are detrimental to their constituents? That is the democratic deficit, and it affects not just Unionists, but every party and every public representative that sits in the Assembly. That issue has to be addressed.

The only way to address the issue is to ensure that when laws are made for Northern Ireland, they are made either in this place, if they are on retained issues, or in Stormont, if they are on devolved issues. That is the ultimate test. Once that happens, we will not need to worry about trade barriers and everything else, because we will have a seamless market within the United Kingdom. I hope we get that outcome, because I support devolution. In fact, I was a member of the Executive at a time when they worked at their best; I am not taking any credit for that. I can think of legislation that I took through the Assembly that has been copied in other legislatures across the United Kingdom. The Executive were innovative, and able to respond to local issues. I can see the value of devolution, but it can work only if it is based on the principle of consent from both sides of the community—especially in a divided society such as Northern Ireland.

I take issue with the shadow Secretary of State’s questioning whether there is any need for the protocol Bill. I believe that in these negotiations, the EU has to understand that there is an alternative. Not to proceed with the protocol Bill would be wrong, because there must be a fall-back position if the negotiations do not succeed.

It seems that all the wrong choices have been made. For a couple of years now, the EU has wanted access to important commercial data, and before we have even made an agreement with the EU, we have surrendered and said that we will make that data available. The EU has been complaining about there being no physical border posts, and what have we done ahead of reaching any agreement? We have agreed that, since Stormont will not do it, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs will take responsibility for building those border posts, which are quite extensive. When I look at the size of the post in my constituency, I wonder whether everything will go through the green lane, because we have a massive 10-acre site, which DEFRA intends to develop with a huge building that would do Dover proud, for dealing with east-west trade. Those kinds of signal do not help us to reach a solution and agreement with the EU.

We wish the Government well. We think that their approach to these negotiations, as I have tried to illustrate, will not make it easy for them to get the concessions required from the EU. They have an alternative, whether that is the dual regulation alternative in the Northern Ireland protocol, or the mutual enforcement proposals that my party has put forward. The one thing I would say is that this requires radical change, not tinkering. What we have seen so far appears to be tinkering.

[Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance)]

I rise to support the Bill, and to confirm to the Secretary of State that he is doing the right thing in moving the election timetable; as things stand, that is probably the Bill’s sole purpose, even though the debate has ranged far and wide. That said, I welcome it as a potential vehicle, and appreciate that there are procedures to go through to enable Dáithí’s law to come into full effect. I join colleagues in paying tribute to Dáithí and his family for their campaign, and thanking the British Heart Foundation for its kind support. I also place on the record our collective thanks to House officials, who have worked very creatively over the past few days to facilitate this provision, and of course to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and to Mr Speaker for your engagement with this issue. I am sure the teddy bear will be greatly cherished for a long time.

I think it fair to say that an election will not achieve much in the short to medium term; if anything, it could be counterproductive, especially given that we are at a delicate stage in the negotiating process. Of course, there is a mandate from May last year, which is still unfulfilled, and there are a lot of restless MLAs who are unable to do their full job. We talk about how there is a democratic deficit around EU law, but I cannot avoid making the point that by far the biggest democratic deficit is the failure to have an Assembly in Northern Ireland that can take control of devolved issues. At the moment, we have issues that are stuck, and while civil servants are doing their best to fill the gap, it is not a tenable situation. If some quarters put as much effort into addressing that as is put into creating an artificial battle over EU law, we would be in a much better place.

I respect the fact that we are at a delicate stage in the process. The intention is that if we get a deal that has cross-party buy-in, we will see the restoration of the institutions in the very near future. If we do not see that happening, we have to avoid a political vacuum being created. People will say that this Bill creates space, but space can be a positive or a negative thing, and it can also be a vacuum. If there is no restoration in the near future, we need to address reform of the institutions and, in particular, the situation whereby parties can veto power-sharing, never mind decisions that cut across communities and create difficulties. Power-sharing has been vetoed in the past and is being vetoed today, and that is not a tenable situation.

This is not about excluding any party; it is about a situation where, if a party is determined to exclude itself, that will not bring the whole show down or prevent other parties, which are willing to govern, from proceeding. However, my preference is for all parties that have a mandate to work together in Northern Ireland for the collective good of our society.

[Sammy Wilson]

Can the hon. Member explain why, in the three years when Sinn Féin excluded itself from the Executive and we had no Executive, the Alliance party not only did not propose, but refused to support any move that would have excluded Sinn Féin?

[Stephen Farry]

I am grateful to the right hon. Member for that intervention because it enables me to reinforce my point. My party has been seeking reform of the institutions since the passage of the Good Friday agreement. We have been consistent in highlighting that the particular form of coalition Government that applies is too rigid and has the potential for deadlock. I have to say that that is something the DUP also consistently pursued over those years, until fairly recently. With reference to the period in which Sinn Féin brought the institutions down, I encourage the right hon. Member to go on our website and look through the succession of conference speeches by our party leader, Naomi Long, in which she regularly called out the blockages in the system and called for reform of the institutions. My party has been extremely consistent on this point.

I do not want to spend too much time talking about the protocol, because that is not why we are here today, but obviously it is the backdrop or context for our discussion of the Bill and there are a few points it is important to reinforce. First, most people and businesses in Northern Ireland want to see an outcome, and they are pragmatic about the protocol; they understand why it exists and that it needs a measure of reform to work more effectively. In essence, they want to maximise the opportunities that come from it while addressing its deficiencies. That is where most people are in their headspace.

It is worth stressing, particularly in this Chamber and throughout Great Britain, that Unionism represented by the DUP is only one part of the equation of Northern Ireland society. Obviously, the DUP has an important view, which has to be taken into account, but it is far from being the majority viewpoint in Northern Ireland. It is important that commentators and others take a balanced view on what is being said in Northern Ireland and the interests being advanced by the people of Northern Ireland. For me and, I think, some others, the key test of the way forward is essentially that we preserve market access, both to the wider European Union market and to the UK economy as a whole. That is the key test for most pragmatic people and businesses.

Northern Ireland Budget Bill

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 23rd January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Baker]

There is no question of admitting any kind of fallacy. What I was saying with the quote the hon. Gentleman referred to was really a reflection of the DUP’s position. In a sense, I am grateful for his party’s clarity about what it requires to go back into government. From my engagement with its voters in Northern Ireland, I think they know that a price is being paid by not having the Executive up. It would be churlish of me not to admit that those voters—it was a small section—wanted to pay that price, but others will be devastated by the consequences of not having the Executive up. It is only fair that I, as a Government Minister, reflect the full spectrum of opinion, and people in Northern Ireland very much want the Executive back and dealing with the issues before it.

As for a magic wand, I would be the first to admit that government is difficult, whoever is in power. All these decisions are difficult—they are difficult decisions in difficult times—and there is no question of a magic wand. However, everyone in this House is aware of the devolution settlement, and I am sure everyone here would want Northern Ireland Ministers to be taking decisions in an accountable way locally. However, there’s no question of a magic wand, and I would be the first to be realistic about the conditions the hon. Gentleman and his party have set out for going back into the Assembly.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

rose—

[Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Baker]

I will give to the right hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) and then to my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), but then I will try to make a bit of progress on the principles.

[Sammy Wilson]

I am glad the Minister accepts that there is no magic wand, but does he also accept that, given the nature of the Executive, which is a mandatory coalition, we have had a Sinn Féin Finance Minister, and no Sinn Féin Finance Minister has, I think, ever succeeded in presenting a Budget that other parties could support? That is one reason why we face the deficit that we have at the moment. Indeed, the restoration of the Executive would make things difficult, given that some Ministers do not even attempt to reflect the spending wishes of the other parties in the Executive.

[Mr Baker]

The right hon. Gentleman makes some legitimate points. The particular point about mandatory coalition is of course an important part of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement strand 1, which we completely respect. We are open to hearing suggestions for institutional reform that will deliver more stable government. Members on the Opposition Benches will know the difficulties in reforming the institutions. The Government are clear that any conversation would need to be led by the political parties of Northern Ireland and would need, in the end, to enjoy cross-community consent to be viable.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

First, I too join the Minister in expressing sympathy on behalf of my party to Alex Easton, one of the MLAs for North Down, whose parents died tragically in a house fire today. Our thoughts and prayers are with him. He has lost both elderly parents today.

[Stephen Farry]

Alex Easton lives in my North Down constituency and, to echo what the right hon. Gentleman has said, the community in Bangor is extremely shocked by what happened overnight. Regardless of politics, the entire community across Northern Ireland will want to give their full support to Alex and his family at this most difficult time.

[Sammy Wilson]

I am sure that feeling will be widespread across the constituency, as Alex—a former member of my party—is well known and loved there.

I share the Minister’s view on at least one point he made at the start of the debate—namely, I would have preferred it if this Budget had been discussed in the Northern Ireland Assembly, and if decisions about priorities and spending had been made there. Unfortunately, that has not been possible because the Northern Ireland Assembly cannot function, because the very basis of the Northern Ireland Assembly has been destroyed. The Assembly has to work on the basis of consensus, but that consensus has been destroyed by the protocol. We hear ad nauseum from the hon. Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), who chairs the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, that we should all be back and we cannot have any more Northern Ireland exceptionalism, but Northern Ireland has been made exceptional by decisions that he has supported—namely, that Northern Ireland no longer remains fully part of the United Kingdom as a result of the protocol.

Furthermore, even though I, my party and our representatives, as Unionists, believe that the protocol is damaging to Northern Ireland’s position in the United Kingdom and to our economy, had we been sitting in the Assembly today, we and our Ministers would have been required to implement the very thing that we say is damaging us, making us exceptional, removing us from the rest of the United Kingdom, causing huge economic burdens—I will mention some in a moment—and being a drain on the Northern Ireland Budget. Yes, we would like to see this legislation debated and these decisions made in the Assembly, but until the basis of the Assembly is restored—that is, until there is cross-community consent for decisions that have to be made—that will, sadly, not be possible and this House will be required to intervene.

It is quite right that the Minister has taken a decision. I do not criticise him for leaving it so late, because he could not have done it before. Indeed, this Budget crisis originated not in October last year, but at the very start of that year—ironically, when the Assembly was fully functioning, and we had a Finance Minister in place, an operating Executive and Ministers who could make decisions about priorities—when, for the second time, Sinn Féin failed to present a Budget that could have the support of any party in the Assembly. There have been only two Sinn Féin Finance Ministers, Máirtín Ó Muilleoir and Conor Murphy, and neither has ever been able to bring forward a successful Budget. There is this idea from the Chair of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee that these things would be resolved if only the Assembly were functioning—but the Assembly was functioning, and this was not resolved.

[Simon Hoare]

I understand why the right hon. Gentleman is trying to say what I said, but I am afraid he is missing the mark. What I actually said, if he had heard me, was that I appreciate entirely that a functioning Stormont would not be able to solve all the problems, but that surely solving some—or at least playing an active part in trying to solve some, even if they cannot do all—is better than nothing.

[Sammy Wilson]

For any problem to be resolved, as the hon. Gentleman knows full well, we need a Budget that Departments work from. The Northern Ireland Assembly has collapsed twice in the last four years. On both occasions, it collapsed without a Budget; that is a fact. It collapsed without a Budget because the Finance Minister could not present a Budget that people and other parties could sign up to. On both occasions, the Ministers responsible were Sinn Féin Ministers. All I am saying to the Chairman of the Select Committee is that we could not have had a functioning Assembly. Leaving aside the principle of consent, we could not have had a functioning Assembly because the Assembly did not have the authorisation to spend money on Departments because of the failure of Ministers.

[Colum Eastwood (Foyle) (SDLP)]

Of course, the right hon. Gentleman is a former Finance Minister, but we should not go into his record in that Department if we want to get through the day. He knows that I am no supporter of Sinn Féin, but has he noticed that Sinn Féin has said that it would take the Department for the Economy if an Executive were formed tomorrow? Given everything we have seen over the past 25 years, that would likely mean that the DUP would get the Department of Finance. Surely that is an incentive for the DUP to go back into government and put a Budget in place very quickly.

[Sammy Wilson]

I do not want to get into history, but I would point out that in the first year I was Finance Minister, we had a 5% cut in the Budget in the middle of the financial year as a result of decisions made here, and we agreed a Budget. Furthermore, we agreed a Budget not just for one year but for three years, so it is possible for the Assembly to make decisions. All I am saying is that, in its current form and with the current party holding the Department of Finance, that has not been possible. The point I am trying to make is that rather than lay the blame at the feet of the DUP for not operating an Executive—in which its views were excluded anyway—we should lay the blame for this situation at the feet of those who could not make an operable Budget even when the Executive was functioning.

Moving on to my second point, the Minister has made great play today of the fact that Northern Ireland gets treated more generously than the rest of the United Kingdom. I accept that, but so do Scotland and Wales. One of the important things about being part of the Union is that there are fiscal transfers from those parts of the country that have geographical, economic and infrastructure advantages that other parts do not have. I do not believe that it shows a begging-bowl mentality when people in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland—or indeed the north of England—say, “Look, there are parts of the country that are richer, but one of the benefits of being part of the Union is that those parts help the areas that are in difficulty.” Indeed, the Government’s own philosophy at the moment is what? To level up, and to accept that there is a responsibility to transfer resources to those areas that, for whatever reason, face disadvantages.

I would point out to the Minister that the increase in the money we have had to receive is partly due to the protocol, which his Government signed up to. There is nearly £500 million a year in the trader support scheme, as well as the resources behind the extra sanitary and phytosanitary checks—the people who have had to be employed, the computers that have had to be installed and the buildings that we now find are going to be built, but not as a result of a decision made by Ministers in the Northern Ireland Executive, because of course there could not be agreement on that.

Ministers at Westminster have now taken over the power to deliver at least a £47 million investment in border posts within our own country. There are questions—not for today, but at some other stage—about who authorised civil servants to start the work on those before Ministers in Westminster took responsibility, even though it was controversial. The Minister has talked about the difficulty of civil servants taking decisions, but it seems that when they want to, they can even make controversial decisions—decisions that split the United Kingdom and put border posts between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom. Nothing can be more controversial than that, yet civil servants seem to have been able to take those decisions.

The Bill allows Departments to spend until the end of this financial year, and then into the middle—I think it is June—of the next financial year. That is not unusual. Indeed, if the Assembly had been functioning, that power would have to have been given to give the Departments the ability to spend that money on account until the Budget was finally agreed—it usually was agreed, but it was not agreed in some cases—in the Assembly in June of this year.

There are aspects of the Budget that are particularly difficult: one, which has already been mentioned in interventions, is the expenditure on education. Once education and health are taken out of the Northern Ireland Budget, we do not have a great deal left, because they account for over 60% of spending between them. However, education has been specifically targeted by Ministers to face a reduction, even though education spending in Northern Ireland is at the lowest level per head in all parts of the United Kingdom. The difference between Northern Ireland and Scotland, for example, is £1,200 per pupil. I know that these things are not always solved by money: although Scotland has the highest level of expenditure per head when it comes to education spending on pupils, its outcomes are actually falling, so let us not imagine that there is a direct correlation all the time between spending money and getting outcomes.

I am sure the Minister will make the point that that is why it is important for Government Departments to make decisions about performance, efficiencies, productivity and so on. Some of the decisions that the Assembly has made have not been helpful in that regard. The Integrated Education Act (Northern Ireland) 2022, which was passed just before the Assembly collapsed, gives preference to one particular sector of the education system. I think that Act is going to make it much more difficult to rationalise education and, therefore, to ensure that money is better spent. While I do not want to go into the detail of the Act today, that is what the other sectors of education believe as well—that it is going to make that whole process of efficiency and spending in education more difficult than it is at present. Again, that is an example of where just having a devolved Administration, which should know local needs, does not always ensure that the most efficient decisions will be made.

On health, leaving aside the money that is spent directly from Westminster—annually managed expenditure —we are now spending nearly 45% of the total Budget that the Executive has to spend on health, yet outcomes are falling and waiting lists are increasing. I get letters from constituents and angry letters from doctors all the time, saying, “We need to spend more on health. We are under- resourced; we are underfunded.” I do not know how much of the Budget we can continue to take out and give to one particular sector—there are other areas, as Members have mentioned, including policing, infrastructure, education, universities, training, agriculture and industrial promotion. All those things are in competition, and we cannot simply say, “Here is one part of the Budget that we will keep pouring money into.”

Of course, as I mentioned, some money could be released for the trader support service and the other expenditure around the protocol—nearly half a billion pounds every year. As the Government now accept, the reason why that money is spent is that the protocol is such a big disadvantage and a burden on business that they need to help those businesses overcome the bureaucracy, and the barriers and impediments to trade between GB—our biggest market—and Northern Ireland.

The other point I wish to make on the Budget this afternoon is that when it comes to looking at priorities, even in the absence of devolution Ministers could do more to look at where we need to spend the money and direct civil servants. Despite what the Minister has said, civil servants now have the power to have greater flexibility in how money is spent. I know it is difficult for them and that some of those decisions are political, but there have already been political decisions made about the priorities that the previous Executive and the Assembly wanted. Surely those things should be guides to civil servants in making decisions about how money could be more effectively spent. As I have said, they make some controversial decisions in relation to the protocol, so there is no reason why we should not have tweaking of the Budget.

The last point I wish to—

[Mr Steve Baker]

The right hon. Gentleman has mentioned this a couple of times and I mean to come to it as I close the debate. We have to insist that it is Ministers who decide, and officials who advise. He will know that the protocol is the responsibility of the Foreign Office. I am highly confident that Foreign Office Ministers will have taken a decision and taken responsibility for it. Of course, it is not Northern Ireland civil servants who are responsible on the protocol, but the Foreign Office. I want us to respect the fact that the Foreign Office is taking this matter very seriously.

[Sammy Wilson]

The point I was making—the Minister knows this, because we have raised it here on a number of occasions—is that the responsibility did lie with the Northern Ireland Executive. The Foreign Office did not like the decisions that Democratic Unionist party Ministers in the Executive made on the protocol infrastructure and only recently have taken over the responsibility to implement that. Even before that happened, civil servants—I do not know whether they did this at the prompting of officials or Ministers in the Foreign Office—were already making decisions about clearing sites in my constituency to build border posts.

The last point I would—

[Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson (Lagan Valley) (DUP)]

Surely it is even more serious than that. The reality is that the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly are now in a position where they have to administer laws that are not even created by this Parliament, never mind by the Assembly itself. This applies in more than 300 areas of law; the way we administer, for example, our ability to trade with the rest of the UK is now determined by a foreign polity, the EU. It imposes laws on Northern Ireland, on which we have no say; there is no scrutiny and no accountability for those laws. So the democratic deficit in Northern Ireland is very real to the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive and is one of the fundamental reasons why we do not have functioning political institutions, because our party is not prepared to tolerate a situation where we are treated like an EU colony.

[Sammy Wilson]

Until that situation is revolved, we are going to be faced with the kind of situation we are discussing today. What amazes me is that other parties in the Assembly, which equally will have no say on those laws, meekly accept those powers being taken from them and not being available to them. I have heard many debates in this Chamber about the Government snatching power from devolved Administrations on various Bills, yet we find that some parties in Northern Ireland are happily accepting that they should not have the ability to make decisions on matters that will greatly influence the lives of ordinary people.

[Simon Hoare]

The point about the democratic deficit is important, as everybody would understand. Does the right hon. Gentleman share my understanding that both Westminster and the EU are very alert to this, and that the EU is keen to find ways, such as Norway has, whereby the views of directly elected Northern Irish politicians, business organisations and others will be taken into account and canvassed in order to shape rules, which may apply to businesses, standards or whatever it may happen to be within Northern Ireland? I appreciate that that does not hit the sweet spot that he would like to see, but we should all draw comfort from the fact that everybody recognises that there is an issue with the democratic deficit and that there are models whereby it can be addressed.

[Sammy Wilson]

I am amazed at the hon. Gentleman’s intervention. As far as I know, he is a member of the Conservative and Unionist party, and as a Unionist, he should be interested in that sweet spot. Simply to hand over power and then find some complicated mechanism to ensure that maybe someone’s voice is heard and considered, while laws from outside are still imposed in our country and a foreign court adjudicates on whether they have been applied properly, does not hit the sweet spot with me, and it should not hit the sweet spot with him; otherwise he should take “Unionist” out of the title of his party membership.

Let me make one last point, about the size of the Budget. Unless there is a radical movement in the EU’s position, the situation could continue for some time. It is important that Ministers consider some of the points that have been made by the education sector, especially in Northern Ireland. Youngsters have fallen behind as a result of covid, and have been locked out of schools. Many of them—and I know this from my own constituency—are youngsters who are most disadvantaged in education anyway, and there should be a discussion with the education sector about what can be done to introduce additional help, especially for youngsters who have fallen behind as a result of the covid closure of schools.

There will be further discussions after the Bill progresses, and I hope that many of the priorities articulated in the Chamber today will be considered. I understand that there are certain sides on a cake, but I do not believe that the cake is big enough. If we consider the existing pressures—teachers, wage increases for public servants, the cost of energy and so on—some of them are universal and apply across the board in the United Kingdom, but given the size of the public sector in Northern Ireland even a Barnett consequential does not fully compensate for the increase in costs that the Northern Ireland Administration faces. Those are the kind of issues on which I hope we can have continued discussion with the Minister in future.

--- Later in debate ---

[Colum Eastwood]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right: we would not be where we are today were it not for the actions of the DUP. And where are we? We have people dying in their homes because ambulances are not coming in time. We have people on trolleys for over 24 hours in every hospital in Northern Ireland. We have an Education Department that is being cut to ribbons by this Budget. We have people from my constituency emigrating every day because they cannot find work. Will that all be solved by the Executive in the morning? No, it will not, but it is our job to try. That is the whole point of representative democracy. That is the whole point of devolution. That was the whole point of the Good Friday agreement—that people who disagree with each other can come together and thrash out agreements to get things done. It is difficult and it is tough, but it is what we are supposed to do.

I welcome the conversion of the right hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) to levelling up areas that need it most. I will extend an invitation to him now to visit Foyle, because my experience of previous Executives is that they did not do an awful lot of levelling up there.

[Sammy Wilson]

The hon. Gentleman continually raises this issue—sometimes taking a whining approach as well—but under the Executive I remember money going to the airport at Londonderry, Altnagelvin hospital getting the cancer centre and money being allocated for the road from Londonderry—

[Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson]

And for the university.

[Sammy Wilson]

I am thinking only of my own experience. Actually, the road was cut because the Irish Government said they were not going to make their contribution to it.

[Colum Eastwood]

It is interesting that people in Derry are entitled to some Government funding—thank you very much! My constituency has the highest unemployment, the highest claimant count and the highest household overcrowding, and it has five of the 10 most deprived areas in Northern Ireland. Maybe some work was done, and maybe some money was spent outside the Greater Belfast area, but it has not had the impact that some might claim.

If people think it is good enough or acceptable just to say that we will throw a few quid at people in Derry—people who have been left behind—after many decades, they are absolutely wrong. The New Decade, New Approach agreement was referenced earlier, and this Government have a responsibility for some of the commitments in it. I think of the expansion of Magee—there is still no funding for that from the Government. There is the Brandywell stadium—there is still no funding for that from the Government. And there is the Northlands addiction centre—we have had promise after promise, but the money is still not in a bank account.

Frankly, I find it difficult to watch people jumping up from their seats and giving excuse after excuse as to why it would not make any difference if we were in government, when people are literally dying on trolleys right now because they cannot get access to the health service. We are abdicating our responsibilities as elected representatives for the people.

Northern Ireland (Executive Formation etc) Bill

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 29th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Campbell]

I thank the hon. Member for that intervention. I think she knows full well that that is not what I am suggesting. I was quoting the exact reference from the Secretary of State in introducing the Bill: “full remuneration from the public purse”. That should apply equally to Sinn Féin’s allowances and representation money. Action should be taken on that. It has been requested and sought for many years. I will leave it there and hope that the Leader of the House will introduce such a change. It would be entirely unacceptable if she were not do so.

We have discussed this Bill on many occasions and also the need to get back into Stormont, which all of us share. My party is a devolutionist party. I have served for many years in various capacities under the devolutionary settlement of Stormont, so I want to see Members back doing their jobs. However, it is a mistake to keep referring to a variety of problems and say that they could be solved if Ministers were back at their desks. Ministers were at their desks when hospital waiting times got worse. The A6 dual carriageway in my constituency is almost finished, but it has been almost finished for a year, and that has been mostly under devolution. Unfortunately, the road remains unfinished. I hope that no one will suggest that we should get back into devolved Government so that the roads can be finished. I hope that no one will suggest that we should get back into Government because the waiting times in various hospitals are getting worse. They were getting worse under devolution. Yes, I want to see devolution work, but let us not create straw men for others to knock down.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

Does my hon. Friend also accept that the £670 million hole in the budget occurred when the Executive were sitting and that, this time last year, the Sinn Féin Minister could not get agreement from any party—not one party—in the Assembly to his budget?

[Mr Campbell]

Not only is my right hon. Friend right, but the Secretary of State alluded to that. He was extremely critical of the overspend that the devolved Government had achieved. I just think that we should be more circumspect when we talk about getting back into devolved Government. We come back to the point that my good friend the right hon. Member for Beckenham made just before I rose to speak, which was that there is one issue that prevents devolved Government from returning—with all their faults, which must be remedied—and that is the protocol.

Again, I hope that the Secretary of State, the Minister of State or anyone else will not use the other straw man, which is preventing the return of a hard border, because everyone knows that that will not happen. It was never going to happen. It was raised to pressure our Government; that is the reason that it was raised. That is why Leo Varadkar, when he was Taoiseach, threw down the front page of The Irish Times, which showed a border post ablaze in the 1970s, and said to Messrs Macron and Merkel that we cannot go back to that. Our Government took fright and would have agreed to anything rather than this false assertion that violence would return.

A hard border is not on the equation. It will not be implemented. Everyone accepts that that is the case. The Government have to deal with the one thing that prevents us from getting devolved Government back up and running—the one thing that has introduced the Bill that we are discussing today—and that is the protocol. Sort out the protocol and we will get back into government.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance)]

I cannot say that I welcome the legislation, but I recognise that it is sadly necessary. It is shameful and disgraceful that the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive are currently not in place. We continue to maintain that they should be established forthwith.

We are facing twin governance and financial crises in Northern Ireland, and huge damage has been done to our economy and public services through delayed or missed decision making. That comes at a time when there is immense pressure on Northern Ireland’s public finances. I have made the point that mistakes were made in the past and the roof was not mended when the sun was shining and we had better opportunities, so difficult decisions are now required. Indeed, our health service in particular is going through tremendous difficulties. Necessary reforms to our public sector are being delayed, which means that the budget crisis gets ever tighter as we try to balance the books on an ever-declining, burning platform.

I will touch on the key areas of the Bill, mindful of your guidance, Mr Deputy Speaker. First, I will touch on the revised deadline for the formation of an Executive and, by implication, the resumption of the duty on the Secretary of State to call an election within 12 weeks if those deadlines are not met. The Secretary of State took the right decision to defer an election after 28 October and to seek further flexibility. In the current climate, an election would have been counterproductive and would have made the task of restoration and the wider negotiations with the European Union more difficult.

My difficulty lies with the revised dates. I appreciate that the Government have to try to move the process along and put in place some kind of deadline to get people over the line, but there is a disconnect between the timescale that the Northern Ireland Office is setting out and the reality of the pace of negotiations with the European Union. Evidently, we have seen a change in the mood music over the past few weeks, which is extremely welcome, but we have not yet seen real progress in the substance of those negotiations. I earnestly wish that we reach a conclusion as quickly as possible, which will require flexibility from the UK and, may I say, the European Union. The UK Government need to take a view on exactly where they will land on these issues; I will refrain from going into the detail of those discussions, given the nature of the Bill.

The shadow Secretary of State has already alluded to the fact that the first deadline in the legislation of 8 December is next Thursday, which may in practice be only a couple of days after the Bill gets Royal Assent. What seemed to be a reasonable deadline a few weeks ago is now, I suspect, fairly meaningless, so we are focused on the second deadline of 19 January, which I note is essentially only seven weeks away. In theory, that is ample time for the negotiations with the European Union to reach a conclusion, but based on the rate of progress that we have seen in recent weeks and months, we need to be realistic that that may not be the case.

We could therefore be in a situation where the Secretary of State has a restored duty to call an election after 19 January. At that stage, perhaps progress will have finally been made in the negotiations or we might be in or about to enter the metaphorical tunnel of those negotiations. In that context, I venture that the prospect or actuality of an Assembly election would be at best counterproductive and at worst extremely damaging. The talks could grind to a halt because of that potential election, or a certain political party or others could harden their red lines about those negotiations, which would make compromise, or the acceptance of a compromise deal, more difficult.

Obviously we need strong leadership from all quarters to ensure that we can get something workable over the line. I suggest to the Secretary of State that this Bill is too inflexibly framed. I appreciate the need to focus minds, but if after 19 January it is manifestly not in the interests of the people of Northern Ireland, the negotiations or the wider public interest to have an election, the only recourse available will be the Secretary of State’s coming back to Parliament seeking a further Bill. I imagine it would go down like a lead balloon if we were in that situation. I urge the Secretary of State to take the time between now and consideration of this Bill in the other place to reflect on the way forward—to keep us focused on the job in hand but to give that bit of flexibility if it proves necessary.

Secondly, I want to talk about the guidance. I welcome the publication of the draft guidance today, but the Bill is at best a stopgap in terms of governance. We have a major hole in that regard. What we have before us is neither tenable nor sustainable beyond the shortest possible periods. There are many difficult, pressing, urgent decisions that need to be taken, and it is right that civil servants are reluctant to take significant decisions that are normally left to be taken at the political level. There are particular difficulties in taking budget decisions: it is one thing keeping a budget ticking over on a care and maintenance basis, but if the books need to be balanced in a tighter budget situation, any decision to cut something is inherently political and will be subject to some degree of challenge. The civil servants are placed in an unenviable situation, but a balance must be struck between recognising that reluctance while at least enabling critical things to be taken forward.

We must have some further discussion on the guidance. I understand it could be clarified in due course, but what type of consultations will happen over a short period of time to get the draft guidance turned into final guidance whenever this Bill receives Royal Assent? I also seek an assurance that the guidance will be flexible enough to enable—rather than direct—civil servants to implement any pay body recommendations, because that is clearly a pressing issue for many public sector workers in Northern Ireland, who perhaps at this stage have not received what has been made available in Great Britain, never mind the legitimate concerns around additional pay that many are making.

On MLA pay, I declare a previous interest in that I was an MLA whose pay was deducted under a previous Assembly. It was difficult, but it was the right thing to do, and I recognise that cutting MLA pay is the right thing to do today. I say slightly flippantly that it should be directed primarily at those who are blocking restoration of the Executive, but I appreciate that is difficult to do. I recognise the remarks from Members of other parties that this might not in itself force a change of minds, but as the Chair of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), recognised, there is major disquiet at MLAs receiving their full salary in the current environment, and that must be recognised inside this Parliament. Most MLAs recognise that; certainly my party colleagues do so. Notwithstanding the fact that they cannot perform their full job description as set out, they are working extensively every week to act on behalf of their constituents, to make representations and work with other groups in Northern Ireland. But they are also massively frustrated.

Finally, I want to talk about what will happen if this Bill fails, and indeed if there is no outcome from negotiations with the EU or we have an outcome that most common-sense people would accept but is none the less rejected by some Northern Ireland parties, and we therefore have continued blockage. As I have said, I do not believe the current stopgap approach to governance is sustainable. Decisions should be taken by locally elected people in Northern Ireland on behalf of their constituents. If we are in the situation of defaulting to direct rule, that is problematic in many respects. As there has been some talk of joint authority being an alternative, I want to take this opportunity just to make it very clear that for my party, joint authority is outside the context of the Good Friday agreement and outside the principle of consent. None the less, if we are to talk about direct rule, that would have to have an Irish dimension of some description, and that has been understood going back to the Anglo-Irish agreement of 1985.

That is basically what we are looking into, but short of that, we should be looking at reform of the institutions. I am not going to go into the detail of that, except to reiterate my party’s very strong commitment to allow those parties in Northern Ireland that wish to govern to do so. That is by far the next best alternative to the current arrangements. I would prefer that to be done on an inclusive basis, but the point is that some parties have the opportunity to take up places in government, and it is they who are self-excluding.

[Sammy Wilson]

When did the Alliance party have this Damascus road experience? For three years when Sinn Féin was holding up progress and holding up the Assembly in Northern Ireland, I never heard once that the Alliance party believed that the Assembly and its structures should be changed to facilitate that.

[Stephen Farry]

I am grateful to the right hon. Member for his intervention because it gives me the opportunity to reiterate that my party has consistently advocated reform of the Assembly structures. It has been in our party manifestos going back to 1999. In particular, in the period between 2017 and 2020, my party made numerous comments publicly on the need for reform. I will gladly forward copies of speeches made by my party leader to party conferences to the right hon. Member so that he can read them with a great deal of interest.

Northern Ireland (Executive Formation etc) Bill

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 29th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson]

The implementation is the problem. The negotiation, hopefully, will deliver the solution. Therefore, we cannot divorce the Assembly from the impact the protocol is having, and it is simply unrealistic to do so.

[Sammy Wilson]

It is surprising that the Chair of the Select Committee has so little knowledge of something that we would expect him to be able to talk about with some degree of clarity. Does my right hon. Friend accept that it would be totally unreasonable to ask Unionists—who are opposed to the protocol and who believe it damages the constitution and their position in United Kingdom and hurts the economic standing of every citizen in Northern Ireland—to implement the thing to which they are so opposed?

[Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson]

Not only would that be unreasonable, but those Assembly Members were elected on a mandate not to do so.

Oral Answers to Questions

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Wednesday 9th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

Both the trader support service and the movement assistance scheme provide support to traders moving goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland. By the end of this year we will have spent £340 million helping traders to process 2.3 million customs declarations through the trader support service for trade between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, but we very much hope that we can find a negotiated solution to the protocol issues that will mean we do not have to spend this money in the future.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

The Northern Ireland protocol has resulted in the ripping up of the Belfast Agreement and the principle of consent, and the fall of the Assembly. It has also imposed EU law on part of our country, and that law will be imposed by the European Court of Justice. Does the Minister accept that we cannot improve on that and we have to remove it?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question. Actually, I think there is a negotiated path where we can completely change how we deal with the protocol, which would mean that it dealt with the issues of governance and trade and all the other practical issues that are causing legitimate concerns to the communities he represents.

Northern Ireland Elections

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Wednesday 9th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

The hon. Gentleman is wrong and he needs to move on.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

I agree with the Secretary of State that we need to get devolved Government restored to Northern Ireland, although he must understand that the basis of restoring devolved Government is that the terms for that Government to be restored have to be adhered to, namely, that the principle of consent is adhered to and accepted, and of course, no Unionist who would have to implement the agreement in the Assembly is prepared to do so. I do not share the Secretary of State’s optimism, by the way, that it would solve all the economic problems. The £600 million hole in the budget was caused by the Assembly when it was sitting and could not agree a budget, so I would not be too optimistic about that. However, can he give me an assurance about the promise made by the Prime Minister? He said:

“Under my leadership, the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill will continue to make its way through Parliament. If negotiation with the EU doesn’t deliver what we need it to, the bill will become law.”

The Bill required that European Court of Justice jurisdiction in Northern Ireland be removed, that EU law would no longer apply in Northern Ireland, except for those firms that volunteered, and that the trade restrictions would be removed. Can he assure us that that is what he needs to see from the negotiations with the EU?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

The very simple answer is to say yes, but, as we were reminded by my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Aaron Bell) just a moment ago, as Chief Whip, I used to enjoy my weekly conversations with the right hon. Gentleman and we talked about these points a great deal, so he knows and would understand that I will always prefer to have a negotiated outcome. I believe that that is possible, but what the Prime Minister said about the Bill remains so.

Identity and Language (Northern Ireland) Bill [Lords]

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jim Shannon]

I accept that. The hon. Member for Belfast South (Claire Hanna) explained very well where her party stands on this issue. I will speak from my Ulster Scots point of view and from the Unionism that I represent in this House and in the constituency of Strangford.

The fact is that a large proportion of people in Northern Ireland feel that this Bill is nothing more than a sop to Sinn Féin, and that the losers will not be simply the Unionist population, whose culture and heritage will be in second place legislatively; people will lose financially, because the money for this could be used to pay for an additional midwife on shift to assist the safe delivery of babies, an extra surgeon to perform a cataract operation, or an extra classroom assistant to help a special needs child to achieve their potential.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

The Bill does not reflect the terms agreed in New Decade, New Approach—in fact, it goes well beyond them. The Sinn Féin hand in the Northern Ireland Office is all over this. The NIO’s default position is always to give Sinn Féin what Sinn Féin cannot get in negotiations. It is unfortunate that when Ministers are appointed to the NIO, they seem to accept that default position, so that the NIO seems to be an extension of the Department of Foreign Affairs in the Republic of Ireland and a voice for Sinn Féin.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his intervention. I believe that he is absolutely right.

--- Later in debate ---

I think the Bill that my hon. Friend the Minister is piloting through the House today follows in the tradition of being so confident in our Unionist skins, and in the underlying strength of the Union, that we see it neither as a sign of weakness nor as a ceding of territory when we champion and provide such platforms for Ulster Scots and for Irish. I would also love to see the Scottish Government do far more in this regard for Scotland—you are looking at me in a very frowny way, Dame Eleanor—and I would like to see additional support for Cornish, which is the only language on mainland GB that has had no real intervention and support.

[Sammy Wilson]

Anyone listening to the speech that the hon. Gentleman has made so far might get the impression that somehow the Irish language is given no status in Northern Ireland at present, that this Bill is requires for that, and that Unionists have been reluctant for that to happen. Does he not accept that hundreds of millions of pounds are already spent on Irish language promotion in Northern Ireland—from Irish language broadcasting to Irish language education, Irish language street names and Irish language festivals? We already spend money on a whole range of things, so it is not right to give the impression that there is not promotion or facilities for people to speak Irish, learn Irish and appreciate their Irish culture.

[Simon Hoare]

I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman enjoys all of those things that he has set out to the Committee that relate to the Irish language, but that was not the point I was making. It was about official recognition, status and the underpinning via the commissioners in this Bill, which I hope will not be amended—I say that to the supporters of all the different amendments. I hope the Bill goes through unamended and that they will not press those amendments to a vote. This is about the status and the role of the commissioners, which I think will help with the delivery of New Decade, New Approach. This Bill is important to a lot of people, and I support it.

Let me close by reiterating this point. The hon. Member for Strangford can make many criticisms of the Bill—this is a democratic House, and we are entitled to support and criticise as much as we like. However, the Committee will know that my hon. Friend the Minister and I are not necessarily known for being on the same page of the same hymn book at the same time—very often, we are singing entirely different hymns in entirely different keys, but at precisely the same time during the same service—so when unanimity breaks out between us, I am not quite suggesting that the bunting should be put out, but I think it is something we should note.

Frankly, I think it is unfair of the hon. Member for Strangford to say that my hon. Friend the Minister does not understand the Bill. If there is one thing we know about my hon. Friend, it is that he reads every document put before him, as a Minister, as chairman of the European Research Group and as a Back Bencher. He is annoyingly knowledgeable about the minutiae—my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr Walker), who served with him in the Department for Exiting the European Union, nods in a way that shows the scars are just about healing. To suggest that the Minister does not understand the legislation he is bringing to the Committee is a totally unfair attack on him.

--- Later in debate ---

New Decade, New Approach had a very wide scope—I will elaborate on this—on Ulster Scots. For example, the commissioner would have powers to extend his or her full remit over the human rights treaties that have been agreed. Essentially, there were no restrictions on what the commissioner could do—they could protect the heritage, the culture and the identity of a community. But that has now been watered down to deal only with certain issues to do with language, arts and literature. The Bill does not address the real depth and detail that was specified in New Decade, New Approach. Why is that, Minister? Please explain. Why is the Bill so narrow when the expanse of the negotiations was so broad? It is as if the only thing that matters is a couple of wee poems that an Ulster Scot person has written, or a nice piece of art that will not really offend anyone, or a mural. But the heritage, the culture, the thing that makes us a people? “Oh, you’re not having that protected—your rights. If you ever become a minority in Northern Ireland”—as some people say we are—“see if that happens, but you’re not having that protected. But you have your wee artwork and your wee bits of language. Well, that’s okay.” That is the essence of why this breach is the point.

[Sammy Wilson]

Even those are not protected. The powers of the commissioner are to give guidance, not direction, as is the case with the Irish language.

[Ian Paisley]

I thank my right hon. Friend for making that very important point about the powers of the commissioner, which was going to be my next point.

Far be it from me to hand out any advice to nationalists, but if I was a nationalist, I would want to try to satisfy Unionists on this point. I would not want to laugh at them, as appears to be the attitude—

--- Later in debate ---

[Carla Lockhart]

At a significant cost, no doubt, to the ratepayer.

Ultimately, in the delivery of visible and frontline public services, the measure will mean substantive added cost. The new Prime Minister has been elected on his handling of the public finances; let us have some management of public money in this Bill.

The last amendment I will address is amendment 29. This amendment would revise and expand the functions of the commissioner for the Ulster Scots and Ulster British tradition. The commissioner would be responsible for developing the language, culture and heritage associated with the tradition, reflecting the body of established work and existing human rights law. It is clear that all of the 70-plus public authorities engaged by the legislation provide services using a language and that the bilingual objective of an Irish language commissioner is such that they could all logically receive guidance from the Irish language commissioner. By contrast, the fact that there is no objective or duty for the 70-plus public authorities to operate bilingually using the Ulster Scots language means that the comparative engagement by the Ulster Scots Ulster British tradition commissioner will be far less. The addition of “arts and literature” is likely only to result in a slight increase in guidance for Ulster Scots. Thus a fundamental inequality remains. In this context, the case for widening the scope of the Ulster Scots Ulster British tradition commissioner to “heritage and culture” is very strong. Such a function is more likely to cut across the 70-plus bodies and have a more substantive impact for the Unionist community.

Colleagues have addressed other amendments and I am sure some will be picked up in the winding-up remarks. I urge the Government and the Minister to take heed of our desire to make this Bill better by making it consistent with NDNA, and consistent with the principles that lie at the heart of our political process around cross-community consent. I ask the Minister to seize the opportunity and to support our amendments.

[Sammy Wilson]

First, I want to make it clear that, although the Bill was part of the NDNA agreement, the priority given to this issue at this time will bemuse many in Northern Ireland, and I suspect many in this House as well. A Government who say we have to tighten public expenditure and cut the number of quangos then promote a Bill which will have substantial costs attached to it and will set up three more quangos. At this particular time, people will ask whether that is a wise move.

I could understand it if the issues we are addressing today were being totally ignored in public policy in Northern Ireland, but they are not. As I pointed out in an intervention, the Irish language already attracts substantial public funds, and those who wish to speak the Irish language have lots of opportunities to learn it, speak it, promote it and enjoy it in Northern Ireland, running to the tune of hundreds of millions of pounds.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Steve Baker]

Just let me say to the right hon. Gentleman that he should not worry about it; we will talk about it over a cup of tea.

[Sammy Wilson]

I assure the Minister that I am not worried about it, just in case he thought I was. But he must ask why and how did this get changed? Who changed it? Who took the initiative to change the terms of the Bill we now have before us? I have to say that I stand by the points I have made, because I have made them time and again, and Unionists are frustrated with the Northern Ireland Office, whose default position seems to be that if Sinn Féin wants something, it has got to be given, for whatever reason.

What we can be sure of is that some of the changes have been made not at the behest of Unionists, not even in compliance with what was agreed during New Decade, New Approach, but because of the whisperings that something that could not be achieved in negotiations should be delivered in another way. That is why I take exception to this, and I am angry at the Minister, because he has had spelled out to him the dangers and the imbalances that lie in the Bill and the way in which it is going to promote not unity or harmony but further division—division that he himself is now accepting and that he might well have to referee and adjudicate on. That is why he has included powers in the Bill that were never originally intended.

[Mr Baker]

I will deal with the things that the right hon. Gentleman is raising when I come to my remarks, but I think it has to be said for the benefit of the Committee and the public that, just as he is accusing us of doing whatever Sinn Féin suggests, we are accused of pandering to the DUP by Sinn Féin. I think everybody should take stock and remember that, as was said earlier, this Bill is an attempt faithfully to implement New Decade, New Approach in good faith, and we are only doing it in this House because the Assembly is not up and running. When I get to my remarks, I hope that I will demonstrate to him the sincerity with which I have engaged with his and others’ passionate pleas on this point, and if he would leave just a little room in his rage for me to respond at the end, I would be grateful.

[Sammy Wilson]

I would be interested to hear how the Minister has pandered to the DUP on this Bill. We have highlighted that what was agreed in New Decade, New Approach is not in it and we have shown him where the imbalances are, and I would like to see where he believes he has balanced towards the point of view that we have expressed in this debate or in the discussions we had with him earlier.

Those are the introductory remarks I want to make. Let me come to some of the amendments and explain why they are necessary. We have asked for an amendment to clause 1, in amendment 27, to ensure that the views of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister are taken into account by the commissioners. Why is that necessary? It is necessary for one particular reason: once commissioners are appointed, if there is no accountability and no restraint or rein on those commissioners, they will be able to do what they want without any political accountability. They could recommend and introduce measures that could have huge political consequences and cause massive political division, annoyance and costs. If they are not subject to the First Minister and Deputy First Minister acting jointly, there will be no restraint on them.

One thing the Minister can be absolutely sure of is that he is not going to get anyone applying for these posts who does not feel strongly about these issues. In fact, these posts are going to attract people who are zealots, who believe in what they are being asked to do and who want to promote what they are being asked to promote. If they are left unrestrained, he can be sure that they will be making recommendations, giving guidance and making demands that will cause difficulties to the people who have to adhere to them. And of course they will want to build their impact. That is why it is important that there is some accountability and some political restraint on them. For positions such as these, we cannot allow somebody to be appointed who has no curtailment upon them.

The second amendment I want to address is the one about the powers of the commissioner. It follows from the first amendment that I have spoken about, because not only are we going to have commissioners who will have no political accountability if we do not require them to act in response to the First Minister and Deputy First Minister acting jointly, but when they obtain those positions, there will be an unequal balance in their powers. The Irish language commissioner can issue guidance, look at best practice, listen to complaints about what people want and then make recommendations to which public bodies will have to show due regard. It is not that the public bodies should do so or might do so; they must do so. They must show due regard to the issues that come from the commissioner’s office. In the case of the Ulster Scots commissioner, there are no such powers. The Ulster Scots commissioner can issue guidance, to which public bodies may or may not show due regard. They might decide to act on it, or they might not. If they do not decide to act on it, people can complain. What will the commissioner do? The commissioner will write a report to say that they have not acted on it.

This becomes even more important when one asks who the chief offenders are when it comes to ignoring and abusing the likes of councils or public bodies and discriminating against the views of one side or the other. The leader of my party has already given examples. At Stormont, when we wanted to celebrate the Queen’s jubilee, we could not even plant a rose bush. When we wanted to commemorate the anniversary of Northern Ireland, we could not even put a stone in the ground. That was a result of a decision by a bigoted Sinn Féin Minister who had control of the grounds of Stormont and refused to give any recognition to what Unionists regarded as their heritage and their culture.

Let us contrast that with what happened when the Gaelic Athletic Association wanted to commemorate its 125th anniversary. I have great reservations about the GAA, especially given the fact that it names clubs after murderers. I was in the same position as Conor Murphy was when the GAA asked to plant a tree in the grounds of Stormont to commemorate its 125th anniversary. I did not agree with the GAA and I had many reservations about the way in which it behaved, but I accepted that it was part of the nationalist tradition and the nationalist sporting culture and without hesitation I gave it the permission to do so.

It is the same across Sinn Féin-dominated councils and nationalist-dominated councils in Northern Ireland—in some cases the SDLP went along with Sinn Féin rather than stand up against it—where money was refused to community groups to celebrate the Queen’s jubilee and the anniversary of Northern Ireland, statues were taken down, windows were removed and emblems were taken out of council chambers. What would the purpose of a commissioner have been in those circumstances, if they had been afforded the same powers as those being afforded to the Irish language commissioner? That commissioner would have had the ability to go to those councils and require them to recognise the Unionist culture and heritage and then require them to behave in a way that gave recognition to it. This Bill does not give the commissioner for the Ulster Scots and Ulster British tradition the power to do that, but it gives the Irish language commissioner the power to go to Mid and East Antrim Borough Council in my area, for example, and dictate that it must spend money on the Irish language even if that is not wanted by the council or by residents.

[Paul Girvan (South Antrim) (DUP)]

My right hon. Friend mentions putting up a stone or memorial, or planting a rose bush, to commemorate the centenary of Northern Ireland. A complaint was lodged by those working in the Northern Ireland Office about a picture of the Queen hanging on the wall, asking that it be removed. The Northern Ireland Office, a Department run by this Government, actually wants to remove the Queen’s painting or photograph from its work environment, which proves how unfair it is.

[Sammy Wilson]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. That controversy might indicate the political colour of some of those who populate the Northern Ireland Office, which bears out the point I made earlier.

How does the Minister believe that this Bill protects the heritage, culture, language and interests of Unionists, especially Unionists living in nationalist-dominated council areas, when the commissioner is not being given the powers to do that? Why will the Irish language commissioner have the power to require public bodies to have due regard?

[The Chairman of Ways and Means (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I hesitate to interrupt the right hon. Gentleman. I have not set any time limits or restrictions, but I had hoped for co-operation to make the Committee work well this afternoon. He has now been on his feet for 19 minutes, which is a long time. I hope that he will now draw his remarks to a close, because I would at least like to call the leader of his party before the wind-ups. I hope he will show some consideration for the rest of the Committee.

[Sammy Wilson]

I will, of course, obey your request, Dame Eleanor.

Can the Minister show how that discrepancy in this Bill will give Unionists the same protection? He is welcome to get involved in the quagmire, the chaos, the complaints and the friction that this Bill will cause. He may say that the Bill will be light-touch, but I suspect he will be dragged into controversies over it time and again. A requirement to impose rather than reach agreement is not a good way to proceed. With the powers the Bill gives to the Minister, he can be sure that the default position will always be that is for him to decide. Rather than reaching a resolution on these issues, it will become yet another focus for controversy.

[Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson]

I thank the hon. Members for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), for Belfast South (Claire Hanna) and for North Down (Stephen Farry), my hon. Friends the Members for Strangford (Jim Shannon), for Upper Bann (Carla Lockhart) and for North Antrim (Ian Paisley), and my right hon. Friend the Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson), for their contributions this afternoon.

I will not rehearse the arguments that have been made very effectively by my colleagues, but I will touch on the politics of all this, which is very important and needs to be understood by those on the Government Front Bench. I was present during the negotiations on New Decade, New Approach, and the hon. Member for North Down is right that the negotiations on identity and language were tortuous, detailed and lengthy, because these issues are very sensitive in Northern Ireland. We know that, and we know some of the trouble we have had in Northern Ireland on issues arising from identity, culture and so on.

We want to get to a new place where we mark our diversity of culture, identity, language and so on through respect. That is the landing zone for us. When I look at this Bill, I recall clearly what was agreed in New Decade, New Approach, and I understand clearly, as a senior member of the DUP negotiating team, what we signed up to. I remember the detailed arguments that took place within our party about NDNA and the detailed consideration we gave this aspect of that agreement, and I am clear that the Bill does not reflect what we agreed.

My colleagues have made reference to the other draft Bills that were published and the difference there is in respect of NDNA. I wrote to the Minister—I am not going to repeat what I said in a very lengthy letter to him—setting this out in detail. He asked us on Second Reading to explain where we were able to highlight a disparity between what was in NDNA and what is in the Bill, and we have done that in detail. I was disappointed with his response to that, because I do not think the Northern Ireland Office understands fully the strength of feeling on these Benches about this matter. That is important, because we cannot support the Bill in its current form, which means we cannot go out to promote it to the communities we represent. The Bill will therefore fail in its objective, which is to promote respect in Northern Ireland, because the Unionist community—those of us who come from an Ulster British, Ulster Scots background—do not feel that it adequately respects and protects our identity.

Our identity is much wider than just the question of language. I will not repeat what I said to the hon. Member for North Down, but let me say that if nationalist parties wanted to use this vehicle to achieve what they have sought to achieve on language, we were clear that our objectives and aspirations were much broader than the issue of language. My hon. Friend the Member for Strangford made that point clear. I therefore believe that the Bill fails adequately to offer the protection we wanted for our identity, culture and heritage, and so the Bill is not adequate.

I say to the Minister that we on this side of the House have watched closely the actions of the NIO in the past week. We are coming up to an Assembly election, we are told by the Secretary of State. The draft Order Paper for business for this week did not include this Bill. I was told by the then Government Chief Whip that the legislation would not come until after any Assembly election, in order to avoid any perception that there would be an attempt by the Government to influence the election. Yet here we are, with the Bill fast-tracked. All of a sudden it is on the Order Paper and we find that the Government are putting a tick in the Sinn Féin box. Sinn Féin can go out after today and say, “We achieved what we set out to achieve.”

Identity and Language (Northern Ireland) Bill [Lords]

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 12th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his wise counsel on this matter. I was having a conversation earlier today where I was reminded of the large number of Hong Kong Chinese who also live in Northern Ireland, contribute to the economy and are assimilated into different communities. So I completely understand the wise point he is making.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

As the earlier intervention pointed out, while we agonise over an Irish language commitment there are more Chinese speakers and Polish speakers in Northern Ireland than Irish speakers. The Secretary of State quickly glossed over the role of the two commissioners, which is one of the ways in which this Bill does not faithfully reflect what was agreed in New Decade, New Approach. The Irish language commissioner will have the power to direct other public bodies, which will have a significant impact, especially on some Unionist-controlled councils, depending on the decisions he makes. The Ulster Scots commissioner will have no such power to direct. How does the Secretary of State explain the disparity between the treatment of those who are looking for the protection of Ulster Scots, where there is no power to direct, and the treatment of those looking for the protection of the Irish language?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his contribution. This serious subject was well debated in the other place and I am sure he will be tabling amendments to probe the Government further on these matters, which we will have a long time to discuss. I go back to what was said in the other place by the Minister, which was that we are trying to reflect honestly and truthfully what was agreed at the time of New Decade, New Approach. As I have detailed, the two commissioners have distinct jobs—they are slightly different. I will be happy in Committee to go through with him in great detail where those levels lie and why exactly the level of detail is as it is.

[Sammy Wilson]

The Secretary of State is right to say that the two commissioners have distinct jobs, but the important thing is that we must make sure that both these people have the same ability to deliver what they are expected to deliver when they do their job. If we give a power of direction to one commissioner but not to the other, although they may have distinct jobs they do not both have the ability to respond and to deliver for the people they are meant to represent.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I would never like to disagree with the right hon. Gentleman, but I would like to think that when we get to debate the detail of the responsibilities of each commissioner and how those duties could be implemented, I would be able to allay some of the concerns he has just outlined. However, I will go into some more detail now, having I hope given the House a broad picture of what this Bill does. Let me go through the clauses and schedules in turn, to try to put a tiny bit more meat on the bone.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his contribution. I have some statistics that back up his point, from the 2021 “Knowledge and use of Irish and Ulster-Scots in Northern Ireland” report, which is published annually by the Department for Communities. It states that 17% of adults have some knowledge of Irish, 8% can read in Irish and 5% can write in Irish, whereas 16% of adults have some knowledge of Ulster Scots, 4% can read Ulster Scots and 1% can write in Ulster Scots.

I completely understand my right hon. Friend’s main point, but I hope he will understand that we have faithfully lifted from what was agreed at the time of the New Decade, New Approach agreement. That is what I am currently talking about, and I am quite sure that we can go into detail in debate in Committee about why that needs to remain as it is, but if he will allow me, I shall now move on a tiny bit.

[Sammy Wilson]

rose—

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I will give way one final time.

[Sammy Wilson]

The Minister is being very generous. Does he understand the point that has been made? As far as the Ulster Scots community is concerned, the attack on that community, especially by Sinn Féin-dominated councils in the west of Northern Ireland, has meant the stripping out of any of the symbols identified with the Unionist community. If the role of the Ulster Scots commissioner is to look at the whole remit of culture, and if there is already known to be a problem in Sinn Féin-dominated councils that ruthlessly try to stamp out any of the Unionist tradition, surely that is the most compelling reason to give that commissioner the ability to stop that kind of cultural destruction through the power to direct.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for making his point with strength and passion. I will not go any further on this particular point today, as I believe I have outlined the case that I would make, but as I said to my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison), I would be very happy to listen to, and hopefully explain and debate, various amendments that might be brought forward on the matter in Committee.

If the House will indulge me, I shall race through the final piece of my speech, because I do not want to take all the time, which is rapidly running out. Of the various other clauses, clause 8 is a new clause inserted by Members of the other place following a further set of amendments from the Government. That clause, alongside the amended clause 1, relates to the establishment of the Castlereagh Foundation. The Government are committed to fund the establishment of the Castlereagh Foundation, as Members will see from paragraph 25 of annex A to the New Decade, New Approach agreement. It was envisaged that the foundation would explore identity and the shifting patterns of social identity in Northern Ireland, and more detail will obviously come to the fore during further debates.

Taken as a whole, the Bill is a hugely important milestone when it comes to identity and language in Northern Ireland. Communities in Northern Ireland have long been awaiting progress in this area. The Bill celebrates Northern Ireland’s different identities and cultures, which contribute immeasurably to the strength and character of our Union, and demonstrates the Government’s commitments to all parts of it. Having followed the debate in the other place, I am cognisant of the fact that not all right hon. and hon. Members, from across all parties, will like everything in this Bill. I accept and respect that, and my door, and indeed that of my hon. Friend the Minister of State, is always open.

However, the Government are determined to see the Bill through this House in a timely fashion, given how long it has taken to get here. We owe it to all communities in Northern Ireland to do that. Indeed, it is our sincere and genuine hope that the parties in Northern Ireland will form an Executive in the not-too-distant future, to make the necessary appointments, oversee the implementation of this important package and maybe deal with some of the issues raised by hon. Members in today’s debate. Until then, the Bill is a reminder that the UK Government will always deliver on our commitments to Northern Ireland and care deeply about its people of all communities, and I commend it to the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

On behalf of our party, I offer our deepest sympathies to the families who lost loved ones in the horrific incident in Creeslough—it is heartbreaking to see those scenes and the funerals that are taking place. Our thoughts are very much with the families.

It would be remiss of me not to point out at the outset that this matter is devolved to the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive, and it therefore ought not to be a matter of decision for this place. The deliberate move by the Government to bring the legislation through this place is yet another example of how the devolution settlement is set aside at the whim of the Government of the day if doing so is deemed politically expedient. It appears that this Government increasingly believe that the Northern Ireland Executive are best suited to performing a management-board function rather than acting as a democratically elected decision-making body. That weakens local democracy and, indeed, the very reason for a return of devolution in already very challenging circumstances.

[Sammy Wilson]

Does my hon. Friend also notice a correlation between matters being brought to this House and out of the hands of the Northern Ireland Assembly, and the demands made by Sinn Féin for that to happen? Even though Sinn Féin Members refuse to take their places in the House, they are quite happy to lobby the Government to get the things that they want through the House. In most cases, the Government simply ignore things that concern Unionists, such as the protocol.

[Carla Lockhart]

Absolutely—kowtowing to the demands of Sinn Féin is often the way that it goes. For those reasons, we will vote against the Bill on Second Reading and table amendments. Should those changes not be made, we will continue to oppose the Bill.

Many Members have referred to New Decade, New Approach. It is almost as if that document consists of one issue—namely, that of language and identity. It does not, and I could list a range of commitments that the Government have given that are yet to be fulfilled. One, of course, relates to the UK internal market and Northern Ireland’s place in it. That remains unresolved, and I remind the Government that the Prime Minister has given quite explicit commitments to the House on the essential components of any solution to the protocol issue. Those commitments must be delivered upon.

Language and identity are extremely sensitive issues in Northern Ireland because they mean a lot to sections of our population, whether they cherish the Irish language and identity, or their Ulster Scots identity and language is fundamental to who they are and how they express themselves. It is of deep regret that there have been times when language and identity—whether Irish or Ulster Scots—have been denigrated, abused by derision or abused by the weaponising of such language and identity by those for whom they are simply vehicles to pursue an overtly political goal.

It is my belief that, rather than addressing the facilitation and respect for language and identity, the Bill is, in fact, a reward for those who have weaponised the Irish language for decades. Those people have neither love nor learning when it comes to the Irish language; rather, their motive is to use it as part of a wider cultural war. Indeed, imposing the legislation on Northern Ireland society will only result in language and identity being a more potent weapon that causes greater damage to community relations and cohesion at a time when many of us wish to see a more united community focused on healing divisions, not aggravating them.

When talking about the political dynamic of Northern Ireland in this House, it is very rare that we do not hear words such as “consensus” or phrases such as “cross-community support”, which are deemed the cornerstone of the political process and progress made to date. Yet the legislation removes that cornerstone, and the self-proclaimed guardians of the Belfast Agreement are those behind its removal.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gavin Robinson]

Coronavirus. I am not sure whether the hon. Member was aware, but there was a pandemic in our country and around the world, and normal government was set aside in the interests of public health and public safety.

The Bill even envisages a situation—I think it is one of the subsections of clause 6—where an issue has been raised with an Executive Minister and brought to the Executive, but agreement has not been found. Sorry? Leaving aside our own personal political aspirations for this or any other Bill, where the Executive collectively decide not to do something but the Secretary of State, at the request of a one-sided aspiration, can decide to supersede them, what is the point in devolution? The presentation of the Secretary of State’s powers in the Bill makes it incredibly difficult for somebody who can stand here and openly and honestly say that he thinks the agreement two years ago was worthwhile, and should have been reached. It is causing support to crumble, because what was agreed is being set aside for things that could not, and would not, have been negotiated or agreed at the time.

[Sammy Wilson]

Does my hon. Friend also accept that the Secretary of State then brings himself into the quagmire of disagreement in the Executive, and will increasingly find himself—as has happened on a number of occasions when legislation has come to Westminster—put under pressure by one particular political party, with all the threats of “If you do not act in the way that you are enabled to act and we want you to act, there will be consequences”?

[Gavin Robinson]

It is the antithesis of democracy; it has applied to a couple of other issues over the last number of years, and here we see it again. The Secretary of State and his colleague the junior Minister, the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker), will today—as they did yesterday and will do tomorrow—implore that devolution be restored in Northern Ireland. That is a laudable idea, and I would like to see it, but the Minister cannot stand up today with a straight face and say, “I would love to see devolution restored so that we can get on with these issues, even though I am proposing through this Bill provisions that would mean that when you do not do what we like, we will do it for you anyway.” That is not the way in which we should proceed.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gavin Robinson]

If there was—and I cannot doubt the veracity of what the Minister says about the intention the Government may have—there is absolutely no need for the power in circumstances where the Executive is functioning. There is no need for the power in circumstances where the Ministers who are responsible for these issues are in office. If what he says is genuine, that should be an amendment that I trust he will engage with fully.

[Sammy Wilson]

Would my hon. Friend accept that, while it may not be the intention—and we accept the word of the Minister in his intervention—the reality is that once the power is in this Bill, there will be pressure, when somebody does not get their way, to go to the Secretary of State and demand that he or she exercises those powers, and if they do not then there could well be consequences? That is the whole point: put the power in the Bill and someone will expect it to be used.

[Gavin Robinson]

Now, and if not now, probably more purposefully in the future when circumstances change, personnel change and Government change. It is a road down which this Government should not have trod.

I started by indicating what I believe was right in the NDNA. I am culminating, having canvassed on the issues where I think the Government have erred in the presentation of the Bill, and it cannot have our support if it remains in this state. The Government have got themselves in a position where, having engaged with parties across the spectrum and with various aspirations, that is now crumbling, and I think that is hugely regrettable. I do not want that to be the end to this process, so I do hope that after Second Reading there will be a willingness to engage in a way that there has not been over the past four, five or six months, when officials and Ministers have ignored, baulked at or just fundamentally disagreed on what they think the Bill means and what we believe it means. We cannot proceed on that basis.

In asking whether the glass is half full or half empty, and highlighting the question of what is in the glass, I want to be in a position where we can raise a glass to the provisions in this Bill. It is the same position I was in when I stood in this Chamber, worked on and brought through—having brought in a private Member’s Bill myself—the provision about the statutory duty for the armed forces covenant. I brought that forward myself, we got it into the NDNA and it was delivered by this Government. Similarly, other provisions were secured in the NDNA, and we want to see them delivered. So I hope that we will be in a position where we can raise a glass, with a fully functioning Executive, to the progress that has been made. However, given the way the Government have brought forward this Bill and are advancing the aims of it, I am sorry to say that I do not see that happening any time soon.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sammy Wilson]

Does my hon. Friend accept that the hon. Gentleman has actually got it wrong? It is not one quango, but three quangos. There will be a commissioner for Irish language, a commissioner for Ulster Scots, and the office of identity and cultural expression. This will be a costly exercise.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank my right hon. Friend and colleague for his intervention. Yes, there is no doubt that there could be a number of bonfires, not just on 11 July, but at other times as well.

In conclusion, how do I look my constituents in the eye and say that all of this money is spent not to make a difference to the quality of their lives, not to make a brighter future for their children, but as a clear, blatant and horrifyingly expensive sop to a political agenda. I want to look them in the eye and know that I have done all that I can to bring the right legislation through this Bill at the right time and for the right reason. The promotion of culture and heritage is not a bad thing, but the politicisation of language and the use of it as a weapon must be prevented. In its current state, this Bill simply enables that politicisation and therefore requires urgent changes. I look forward to the Minister of State giving us that meeting so that we can make the changes that we all want to see for the people of Northern Ireland, and especially for the people that I represent.

Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Bill

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 4th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Conor Burns]

I agree with my hon. Friend, and I am grateful to him for what he has acknowledged. He has been in the position that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I are in, that of a Minister making very finely balanced judgments. We believe that we have got those judgments right, and we are happy to explain the rationale for the decision-making process that we have undertaken. I acknowledge, as my hon. Friend has acknowledged, that this will be difficult for some people to accept, but there must be a point at which the new body becomes the sole body to deal with these matters.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

Does the Minister accept that those who are engaged in the Kenova process want not information recovery but prosecutions? They want an outcome that will ensure that those who committed a crime are found guilty of committing a crime. Moving this to information recovery is not doing justice to those who, for many years, have engaged with the process hoping for an outcome. Will the Minister at least encourage the Public Prosecution Service to ensure that it makes a decision on these cases before the deadline on the Bill?

[Conor Burns]

The right hon. Gentleman makes an entirely valid point. As I think the Committee acknowledged when we talked about these processes last week, there is not a consensus among the families or victims on a single route that they want to take. They want different things: many want prosecutions, many want just to know, and many want a wrong acknowledged. He makes an entirely fair point that I am sure will be heard outside this Chamber and that I know has already been strongly heard by different bodies, lawyers and families in Northern Ireland.

The body will be established after this Bill enters into force. We are only at Committee stage in this place, and the Bill will hopefully leave here this evening and go to the other place, where I am sure it will receive detailed and expert scrutiny. In the meantime, a lot of decisions can be made. The processes can carry on, and we have been very clear that processes that are in train by the time the Bill comes into force will continue. That is why we listened carefully after publishing the Command Paper last year, when we heard the strength of feeling about ending all ongoing inquests. That is why clause 39 sets out that inquests—inquiries in Scotland—that have reached an advanced stage by 31 May next year or by the date on which the ICRIR becomes operational, whichever comes first, will continue to their conclusion. The clause states:

“An inquest is ‘at an advanced stage’ if the inquest hearing to ascertain—

(a) who the deceased was, and

(b) how, when and where the deceased died,

has begun before the relevant day.”

--- Later in debate ---

[Sammy Wilson]

In the interests of getting balance in this whole memorialisation process, does the Minister not accept that already in the Bill there is a clear indication that balance will never be obtained? The records that are held are mostly held by the state. The records of state activities are going to be given to the researchers and the body to tell the story and so on. He has indicated that some of the intelligence on terrorist organisations will be given as well, but that in itself is incomplete and the terrorist organisations, we can be sure, are not going to play the same and give the same access as the Government are going to give in this whole process. Therefore, how can the Minister ever hope that this will be other than a one-sided process that will not produce a balance, but will be used and abused to rewrite the history of the troubles in favour of terrorists?

[Conor Burns]

The right hon. Gentleman is, in a real sense, right to raise those concerns, but the way the process is being set up in the Bill provides more than a possibility that we can find a way of doing this in an inclusive sense—in a way that creates a complete picture of the troubles for future generations to understand—and that will certainly not involve the glorification of acts of terrorism. He is right—and he is right that I alluded to this—that the state holds not just significant information about what the state was responsible for, but significant intelligence-based information on the actions of others that may not ever have been acknowledged before. That will be part of the oral history—the official history, if you like—of the troubles.

Under clause 48, the cross-community, cross-sectoral advisory panel, which will consist of a range of organisations with a defined interest and expertise in this area, will include representation and voices from the victims’ sector. That should provide some reassurance that there will be voices in there making sure that this is not a one-sided account of the history of the troubles.

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[Johnny Mercer]

I am afraid I know the Stakeknife case intimately, which is why I said what I said at the beginning of these remarks. Obviously, I am not going to talk about individual cases, as that would be wrong. I totally understand where the hon. Gentleman is coming from on this issue, but there is a difference in the English language between collusive behaviour and collusion proved in court. To go over that line is a disservice to those who served, but I am sure we will continue this conversation for many years to come.

There was another point about people not engaging with the information recovery body in Northern Ireland

[Sammy Wilson]

Before the hon. Gentleman moves away from the point about balance, he and I share the view that there must be a mechanism to ensure that the history of the troubles is not rewritten, and that those who stood up against terrorism are not made the equivalent of terrorists, or have their name blackened by the imbalance of information. On disclosure of information, the Bill lists state institutions that can be instructed and given guidance by the Secretary of State about the kind of information that ought to be provided. There is no equivalent—there cannot be—on the terrorist side, and that is where the imbalance will come from.

[Johnny Mercer]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right, but as he said, there cannot be an equivalent. So what do we do? The situation is grotesque. There are no winners here at all, but as he said, there cannot be that mechanism on the other side. All I would say to my hon. Friend—Northern Ireland Members probably do not consider me that these days, but they are my friends—is that while I totally understand why they go on to a narrative about “We must have justice for this particular murder, and that one”, which everyone agrees, they must also accept that the price of that is the experience of people such as Dennis Hutchings, who they have stood up and spoken against as well. The two things cannot co-compete in this space.

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[Richard Thomson]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. To speak to his wider point, the right of access to judicial review is a fundamental right for any individual against an overreaching Executive or Government. It is only right that that route should remain open to people, notwithstanding the Bill. To incorporate that right in the Bill would provide a very important safeguard for people. I urge the Minister to ensure it is there, so that that right is not in question at any stage after the Bill is passed.

[Sammy Wilson]

First of all, we understand how sensitive the whole issue of legacy is: we live with it every day in Northern Ireland. We get representations from our constituents about it and there are varying views, but the one thing the Government have to be aware of is just how much opposition there is to the proposals on the table tonight. We have tabled amendments that we believe would improve the Bill. Would they make us vote for the Bill? No, they would not. But at least they would improve the way the Bill operates for victims and how it addresses the unfairness that those who involved themselves in terrorism will now be able to walk away free.

If we look at the terms of the Bill and what victims get out of it, we can see why there is so much opposition to it. We welcome the fact that the Government have now accepted the proposals put forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson) on ensuring that those who were involved in sexual crimes do not use the cover of the troubles and their involvement in paramilitaries to be granted immunity, but there are other proposals that I believe are equally compelling, and the Government ought to look at them. First of all, from the victims’ point of view—this was mentioned in the last point made by the SNP spokesman, the hon. Member for Gordon (Richard Thomson)—those who want to take civil actions can now no longer do so. Those were the only avenue open to many people. Indeed, in the case of the Omagh bomb and others, we saw how people were able to at least try to overcome the deficiencies in the police investigation. What is on offer for those who are victims?

Terrorists who co-operate and tell the truth, at the end of the day, after they have admitted their role, will walk away with no sentence at all—no time in jail. They are free; they are immune. Those who do not co-operate can still be subject to an investigation, but there will be no outcome at the end of it, other than if they are successfully prosecuted. Their crime will be highlighted but they will not pay any price for it.

For those who, laughingly, go into the process and tell lies, and hurt the victims more, there will be no sanction either. One amendment we have tabled will ensure, if the Government accept it, that those who knowingly lie in the process at least know there will be a sanction on them. It is a reasonable amendment, and the Government should accept it. Otherwise, there is no incentive for people to go into the process and tell the truth. The Government may well argue, “Why would you go into the process if you don’t intend to tell the truth?” The fact of the matter is that here are people who engaged in murder and terror for so many years. It may well be that simply to avoid the prosecution process, they are prepared to go in, hoping that nobody actually knows and has sufficient information to expose the lies they are telling. But if they knew there was always the chance that, having been caught in those lies, some sanction or penalty would be imposed on them, then we may well get at least some indication. They would know there was some penalty involved at the end of the day.

On the amendment on the glorification of terrorism, this is a big danger. We have seen it already with members of the IRA, some of whom are now MLAs in Northern Ireland. They committed crimes, escaped from prison with a prison officer killed and now go around boasting about it. It is how they pack people into their dinners for fundraising. They write about it in books and make money out of it. The real danger of the Bill is that once they have been granted immunity, they will be totally free to do that without any comeback at all and with no sanction imposed on them.

[Johnny Mercer]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, particularly on those seeking elected office who have been convicted of horrendous crimes in Northern Ireland. Does he agree that the converse problem is that we have individuals in the justice system and so on who also have interests on different sides of the argument? They get to a different position, such as a prosecutorial position, and then make a decision based on that. So the whole system has the challenge of individuals within it who hold views on different sides of the debate, and that is why the Government have to act.

[Sammy Wilson]

I really do not understand the logic. The Government must act to deal with the hurt that victims have been caused, not increase that hurt in the ways I have outlined in my speech so far by making it possible for those who have involved themselves in terrorist activity to walk away with no prosecution. They can lie and still walk away with no prosecution, or they can engage and walk away with no prosecution, and at the same time not even leave a civil remedy open to the victims. Furthermore, once those people have been granted immunity, the Government are allowing them to make money out of it—or worse, allowing them to encourage another generation to engage in the same activities by boasting about what they did, why they did it and the outcome: “And by the way, you can walk away at the end of this process. Here am, able to tell my story and encourage other people to think that I did a good thing, and here has been no impact on me at all.” That is why the amendment about the glorification of terrorism is so important.

There are people who never even lived through the troubles who now think that nothing wrong was done during the murder campaign. Why is that? Because they go to events where they are told, “What we did was the right thing. We are proud of it!” Furthermore, even play parks are named after those who engaged in that. The lesson for children is that the terrorist, sectarian campaign was totally legitimate.

[Jim Shannon]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. The prison officer who finally died as a result of the breakout from the Maze was one of my constituents. His wife still lives in my constituency, but his son is dead. The grief of such families has not in any way dissipated over those years. Yet prominent Sinn Féin MLAs and former IRA terrorists glorify those events as if they were part of a great “Roy of the Rovers” story. They were not: they involved the murder of innocent people, who gave their lives for this country. My right hon. Friend is absolutely right: the hurt, pain and soreness that my constituents in Strangford feel will last for all their lifetimes, until the day they die.

[Sammy Wilson]

The problem is that we do not know how many other Gerry Kellys are there, lurking in the background, who have not yet faced prosecution or got over the whole legal process, been sentenced and had sanctions imposed on them. Once that has happened, of course, he thinks he can go and boast about it, but there are probably a whole plethora of people within the ranks of terrorist organisations who currently fear that if they did that they would be opening themselves up to prosecution. Once they have been granted immunity, of course, they will be free to do so.

I hope that the Government will accept a number of the amendments that have been put forward. I hope that they will not allow a situation to develop in which, having been granted immunity, the terrorist can rub the victim’s face in the dirt by boasting about their actions.

I still have huge concern that the Bill has the seeds of an unbalanced narrative about the troubles. I listened to what the Minister said, but the truth is that when it comes to that narrative, the main source of information—the Bill makes clear the range of public and Government bodies that will be given directives to reveal information—does not have the equivalent on the terrorists’ side. I accept that the Minister says that police intelligence can also be revealed, but the very fact that so many people were not prosecuted and so many thousands of murders were never solved is an indication that the intelligence that the police, Army and state hold about terrorist organisations is incomplete. They are not likely to complete it, yet there will be an obligation on the state to reveal what it knows about the activities of the security forces.

That will, I believe, lead to an imbalanced report of what happened and will leave the door open for the information to be exploited by those who, as we have seen, are masters of the manipulation of public information. That is another huge flaw in the Bill, and one that I think we will live to regret.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for allowing me to intervene, and I utterly agree with him about the narrative. What sickens me is the fact that when history records what happened—the troubles, all the murders and the terrorism—the narrative will be, in the end, “Well, the Government decided that we did nothing wrong.” That is what really worries me about the Bill. I will vote for it, but I will sup with a very long spoon.

[Sammy Wilson]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He is quite right.

The Minister said that the Bill is not about equivalence between terrorists and those who bravely fought them in Northern Ireland, but the truth of the matter is that it is. The mechanism open to terrorists is the same as the one that those who were in the security forces have to use. There is equivalence here. No matter how the Government try to twist on this one, I believe that the Bill does a huge disservice not only to victims but to those who fought bravely and sacrificed in Northern Ireland—the very people who many Government Members have rightly sought to defend as constituents, and who have been unfairly dragged through the courts not once or twice but, in some cases, three times. Yet the mechanism open to them is the same as the one open to terrorists. That does those people a disservice.

The victims, the security forces and the people who suffered through the terrorism in Northern Ireland have all had a disservice done to them. If some of the amendments that we are debating were accepted, that at least might ameliorate some of the deficiencies, but it would not make the Bill acceptable.

[Gavin Robinson]

I follow on from my right hon. Friend’s point about the frailties of the Bill. We have been consistent in our position that it is a corruption of justice. For me and my colleagues, one of the most disappointing things about the process is that here we are, on day 2 of Committee, and we should be discussing the merits of amendments that try to do what is in the best interests of people who have suffered through years of conflict in Northern Ireland, but all we get from the Government is that they cannot—or will not—accept amendments; they refuse.

I heard the hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer) indicate his support for our new clause 3, which looks at sentencing issues, and I have heard warm support from Labour, the SNP and others around the Chamber about the merits of our amendments on glorification. Yet still there is this intransigence. We, the representatives democratically elected to come to this Chamber and make laws that actually work for the people we represent, are told that it is really not our business because the amendment might involve a write-around or bureaucracy, so we should just leave it all to the Lords.

What are we doing? What have these two days of scrutiny been for if our scrutiny amounts to nothing? It is even worse when people in the Chamber accept the very points that we are making but say, “Ah, but our hands are tied. It would be far better if Members of the House of Lords dealt with it.”

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[Conor Burns]

The consequence for lying, as the hon. Gentleman knows, in the first instance is that if the body determines that the account is false, the body will not grant immunity. I was referring to the amendments he has tabled to incentivise people to come forward and participate with the process, both in terms of the sentencing and the financial stuff, and I reiterate to the hon. Gentleman that we have undertaken to take that away and look at it.

[Sammy Wilson]

rose—

[Conor Burns]

I think we need to make some progress. We have talked about this extensively, and the Bill will move now beyond this place to the other place, and then we will have an opportunity. [Interruption.] We do not need any facetious remarks from my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger). We are dealing with very serious matters indeed.

The hon. Member for Foyle (Colum Eastwood), the leader of the Social Democratic and Labour party, said that unless we investigate properly, we will never get to the truth. The point is that the commission will have full police powers and will be able to carry out article 2 compliant investigations. It has the power to compel witnesses. In response to something else that was said, it has the power to arrest and detain under clause 6(3). It has the right to use biometrics, but the primary purpose of these investigations will be to get information to the families.

Amendment 114 and new clause 2, tabled by the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Hove (Peter Kyle) regard individuals profiting from the conduct for which they received immunity and the point around glorification. It is our view that the Terrorism Act 2006 already makes it illegal for the encouragement or glorification of terrorism, whether in the past, future or generally. Nothing in this Bill will prevent the prosecution of individuals deemed to have committed an offence under the 2006 Act, and it is incorrect to say that an individual gaining immunity through this body for a specific troubles-related event would then have immunity if they went on to commit a separate offence under the 2006 Act. It is very clear that section 1(3)(a) refers to any act that

“glorifies the commission or preparation (whether in the past, in the future or generally) of such acts”.

That is clearly an offence under the law of the land, unaffected by the legislation before the House tonight.

We have had two days of intense scrutiny of the legislation so far. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I have shown a willingness, a determination and a desire from the Front Bench to engage with parties across Northern Ireland. I accept absolutely that there are deep reservations about the Bill, but we have been clear in legislating that we will listen, and we are open to constructive ideas that improve the potential for this Bill to have a positive impact on the people of Northern Ireland. I note that there was some criticism at the beginning that we were not giving sufficient time for scrutiny in Committee, and I note that we look likely not to use the allocated time in full tonight. I thank the Committee for the courtesy and intelligence of the debates we have had.