Northern Ireland Budget Bill
Wednesday 30th October 2019
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Northern Ireland Budget Bill
Wednesday 30th October 2019
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
Before I invite the Secretary of State to move the Second Reading, I must announce the Speaker’s decision on certification for the purposes of Standing Order No. 83J (Certification of bills etc. as relating exclusively to England or England and Wales and being within devolved legislative competence). On the basis of material put before the Speaker, the Speaker certified that in his opinion the Bill does not meet the criteria required for certification under that Standing Order.
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Julian Smith)
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
As the House well knows, Northern Ireland has now been without a functioning Executive for almost three years. Since May, the Northern Ireland parties have engaged in a series of cross-party talks focused on getting Stormont back up and running. It remains my assessment that the issues preventing the restoration of Stormont are few in number and soluble in substance, and I stand ready to facilitate further talks if and when political parties are willing to move forward. However, until such time as they are able to reach an agreement, the UK Government and this Parliament have a duty to ensure good and functional governance in Northern Ireland. We have a duty to ensure that public services can continue to be provided for all citizens of Northern Ireland. This Bill upholds that duty by placing the budget published in February 2019 by my predecessor on to a legal footing and enabling the Northern Ireland civil service to access the full funding for this financial year.
Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for allowing me to intervene so early in his speech, on the issues of public finance and the ability of our services to respond appropriately. I do so because I am mindful of the comments you have made, Madam Deputy Speaker, about the ability to table amendments. The Secretary of State knows that I have a keen interest in pursuing a legislative fix that would allow our Co-Ownership housing association in Northern Ireland to be able to avail financial transactions capital. The organisation would then be redefined so that it would not burden the public finances. Billions of pounds in housing association loans would not be on the public balance sheet. What commitments and assurances can the Secretary of State give that would assuage me from my desire to amend this Bill?
Julian Smith
The hon. Gentleman has been precipitous in his intervention, as he often is. I will address that point shortly.
Since January 2017, Parliament has legislated four times to secure the public finances of Northern Ireland. These were not interventions that the UK Government wanted to make, but they were necessary to ensure the continued provision of public services in the absence of an Executive.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
I am extremely grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way again. I had a stab at making this point earlier today during Northern Ireland questions, and I wonder whether he will indulge me just one more time.
I assume that the part of the budget that is covered by schedule 1, relating to the Department for Communities, covers welfare mitigation payments in Northern Ireland up until March 2020. In the September 2019 joint report of the Select Committee on Northern Ireland Affairs and the Select Committee on Work and Pensions, entitled “Welfare policy in Northern Ireland”, the Committees point out that ending the mitigation payments after March 2020 could make some 35,000 households in Northern Ireland worse off by hundreds of pounds a month. Is the Secretary of State aware of that?
The Department for Communities cannot extend these payments because, in the absence of the Assembly, that requires ministerial action. This is urgent because the Department is saying that it will need to start advising claimants by this autumn of significant cuts to their welfare payments next year, unless the Government act.
Steve McCabe
May I have just one second more? I am very grateful, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am sure the Secretary of State does not want an unintended consequence in Northern Ireland, so will he look at this issue and act now?
Julian Smith
The hon. Gentleman tackled me on this issue in the Tea Room earlier. I will refer to it, and my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, will also refer to it in Committee. We are aware of this welfare challenge. It is indeed a responsibility of the Northern Ireland civil service; civil servants do have a power that they can use with regard to the discretionary housing payments. However, I assure the hon. Gentleman that I will spend time on this issue over the coming days and weeks, because it is an important one.
Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Ind)
This is an immensely important issue for some of the very poorest people in Northern Ireland. Might the Secretary of State go back to the Department and ask his permanent secretary what powers he can draw the Secretary of State’s attention to that will allow him, before the week is out, to take action to prevent people from falling off the cliff into greater poverty?
Julian Smith
I am in the process of working through how we can move forward with this. It is a devolved matter, but I will be speaking to the Northern Ireland civil service over the coming days and weeks. As has been alluded to, these are funds and mitigations that help the most vulnerable citizens in Northern Ireland. I take these matters seriously, and I will come back to the hon. Gentleman and the right hon. Gentleman in due course.
Frank Field
Given that we do not have devolved government in Northern Ireland, surely there are powers somewhere that will allow the Secretary of State to act while we are waiting for ever and a day for devolved government.
Julian Smith
Indeed, the Northern Ireland civil service has a power, but if I can leave it there, I will come back to this House and come back to the hon. Gentlemen about this matter.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
Does the Secretary of State accept, however, that even with the powers that civil servants have, the cost of these mitigation measures is such that budgets will have to be rejigged—quite substantially rejigged—and that that can be done only if a Minister makes a decision? Is this not yet another example of the Secretary of State burying his head in the sand and pretending that the Executive will come back when he knows that they are not going to come back? This can be dealt with only if civil servants bring forward a report saying, “This is the money that is required and this is how we see it being reallocated.” Someone has to make a decision, and it will probably be a Minister here.
Julian Smith
The right hon. Gentleman makes an important point. However, I go back to the fact that it is, I think we all agree, in Northern Ireland’s best interests that the Executive are reformed and the Assembly gets back up and running. Any idea that it is a better solution to take powers here at Westminster is false, and we have to focus on that.
Julian Smith
I am going to make some progress.
I would like to pay tribute to the Northern Ireland civil service. It has the most dedicated civil servants who are continuing to deliver public services in the absence of political leadership and political decision making. Hon. Members from across the House have approached me today raising legitimate concerns about the future of public services. While today’s debate is not the place to tackle these issues—this Bill simply makes the necessary authorisations for expenditure for this year—those Members are right that they need to continue to be monitored carefully, and that is what we will be doing. However, we are up against a lack of a local decision making.
Julian Smith
Could I continue to make a little progress?
There are some significant challenges to reflect on, such as housing associations and welfare reform, but there are opportunities, too. The £163 million growth deal announcement to Northern Ireland shows what can be achieved when politicians of all backgrounds, local businesses and community leaders come together to shape the economic future for their local area and for Northern Ireland as a whole. That is why we want to see these issues taken forward by a restored Executive.
To my frustration, however, it is necessary once again for Westminster to intervene to provide the necessary authorisations for expenditure in Northern Ireland in the continuing absence of an Executive and of a functioning Assembly. The finances of Northern Ireland Departments are in a critical state. The legal authority for the Northern Ireland civil service to spend is currently capped at approximately 70% of the opening position of the previous financial year’s budget—a spending cap that was approved by this House in March 2019. The Northern Ireland Audit Office and the public services ombudsman have already reached their cash limits, and the Department of Finance has been forced to issue two Departments with contingency funding. This temporary financial measure can be used on a very short-term basis to manage the smaller Departments running out of cash, but it is just not tenable for a significant number of Departments.
Lady Hermon
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for allowing me to intervene. He reminded the House in his opening remarks that we have not had a functioning Assembly for almost three years. I am astonished and disappointed—and I am sure that the vast majority of the public in Northern Ireland will be extremely annoyed—that the Bill mentions the remuneration of MLAs yet again. I had a horrible feeling when the Secretary of State mentioned a review, when I challenged him about the continuation of MLAs’ salaries in Northern Ireland questions today. We have had a review. We had a review two years ago by Mr Reaney, who reported in December 2017. Two years on, we do not need more long grass dressed up and disguised as a review. Why does the Secretary of State hesitate in getting on and doing the right thing by the people of Northern Ireland, by cutting MLAs’ salaries? It is so obvious that he should be doing that.
Julian Smith
The hon. Lady raised that issue with me earlier today. I spoke to her three days ago about this review. I am on it, but as I said, I want to ensure that I balance the need to ensure that public expenditure is reduced with the fact that I want the Assembly up and running. I am not going to stand here and accept the premise that this Assembly and Executive cannot get up and running.
David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)
As I mentioned in Northern Ireland questions today, many of our MLAs are doing a fantastic job through their offices. It is important that we keep that representation for the general public.
Julian Smith
It is indeed. There is so much more that they could do if they were in the Assembly, and we need to hang on to that over the coming weeks.
If Royal Assent is not granted by the end of October or as soon as possible thereafter, there is a risk that the Northern Ireland civil service will assess that the only way to continue to deliver public services in Northern Ireland is by exercising emergency powers under section 59 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998. Using those emergency powers would constrain the Northern Ireland civil service to spending 95% of the previous year’s budget, effectively delivering a significant real-terms cut to the funding of public services. Northern Ireland Departments would have to consider their current budget allocation against their identified priorities and their available cash, which could put at risk essential services such as those within the health service.
James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)
I know that my right hon. Friend will be taking these steps very reluctantly, as I remember doing when I was in his post. He has highlighted the deals and the investment in various parts of Northern Ireland. I am conscious of investment in the north-west and promoting economic activity and opportunity in that part of Northern Ireland. Can he comment on the plans for a graduate medical school at the Ulster University Magee campus in Derry/Londonderry, which could promote a sense of skill and opportunity and secure the positive outcome that we would like to see for the north-west?
Julian Smith
I thank my right hon. Friend for his intervention. He has worked hard to promote the merits of the Magee campus, as have others. I visited it only two weeks ago. I am extremely committed to making that work, as I know he is. I think that we are close to a position where we can move that forward. It is a devolved matter, but there are things we can do, and we will continue to do them.
The Bill upholds our commitment to good governance in Northern Ireland by preventing the Northern Ireland civil service from having to rely on emergency section 59 powers. It is a budget set by the UK Government, but one that the Northern Ireland civil service must plan and implement. If Stormont gets back up and running within the financial year, the new Executive will be able to adjust the budget as they see fit and amend the legislation at the end of the financial year. The Bill does not authorise any new money. In the absence of a functioning Executive and Assembly, it simply authorises spending money that has already been allocated by this Parliament in the UK estimates process, together with locally generated revenue.
Paul Girvan (South Antrim) (DUP)
I want to ask the Secretary of State about Barnett consequentials from money that has been ring-fenced for special projects. One example is the high streets fund, to help our town centres in the United Kingdom. We got our Barnett consequentials in Northern Ireland, but that money has been swallowed up by the Departments and used to plug holes in their budgets. We have not been able to ring-fence that money and ensure that money coming from the Exchequer is used for the intended purpose.
Julian Smith
My hon. Friend raises an important point. The Barnett consequentials, whether of the spending review or of other allocations from this place and from Whitehall, are very difficult to attribute due to the lack of an Executive. We are seeing a sort of constipation in the system, as we have cash arriving but no decision making to spend that cash.
I shall now briefly turn to the Bill’s contents, which largely rehearse what the former Secretary of State set out to this House in a written ministerial statement earlier this year. In short, the Bill authorises Northern Ireland Departments and certain other bodies to incur expenditure and use resources for the financial year ending on 31 March 2020.
Clause 1 will authorise the Northern Ireland Department of Finance to issue £5.3 billion out of the consolidated fund of Northern Ireland. The sums of money granted to Northern Ireland Departments and other bodies are set out in schedule 1, which also sets out the purposes for which the funds are to be used. The allocations in this budget reflect where the key pressures lie in Northern Ireland, building on discussions that the UK Government have had with the Northern Ireland civil service, the main parties in Northern Ireland and broader stakeholders, and, where possible, reflecting the previous Executive’s priorities.
Clause 2 will authorise the temporary borrowing by the Northern Ireland Department of Finance of about £2.6 billion to safeguard against the possibility of a temporary deficiency in the consolidated fund of Northern Ireland. If used, this money would be repaid by 31 March 2020.
Clause 3 will authorise Northern Ireland Departments and other specified public bodies to use resources amounting to about £6 billion in the year ending 31 March 2020 for the purposes specified in schedule 2.
Clause 4 will set limits on the accruing resources, including both operating and non-operating accruing resources, that may be used in the current financial year. The Bill would normally have been taken through the Assembly. Clause 5 therefore includes a series of adaptations that ensure that, once approved by both Houses in Westminster, the Bill will be treated as though it was an Assembly budget Act.
Alongside the Bill, I have laid before the House, as a Command Paper, a set of main estimates for the Departments and bodies covered by this budget Bill. These estimates, which have been prepared by the Northern Ireland Department of Finance, set out the breakdown of resource allocation in greater detail than the schedules to the Bill.
This is a fair and balanced budget that provides a secure basis for protecting and preserving public services, with a real-terms increase in health and education spending and protections for frontline Departments delivering key public services, but the budget is not an easy one. It requires savings and efficiencies to enable Departments to live within their means, and it will fall to the Northern Ireland Departments to plan and prepare to take decisions to do just that. As I hope right hon. and hon. Members will agree, this is very much a minimal step to ensure that public services can continue to be provided in Northern Ireland for the full financial year.
As I conclude, I will set out once again a point that I have made several times before to this House. The UK Government are steadfastly committed to the Belfast agreement. Legislating on Northern Ireland budgetary matters at Westminster is not a step that I or my ministerial colleagues want to take—nor is it one that I would wish to take again. I am determined to restore the political institutions set out in the 1998 agreement and its successors at the earliest possible opportunity. On 14 October, the people of Northern Ireland had gone without a power-sharing devolved Government for 1,000 days. The continued failure to restore the Executive will bring extremely difficult choices about how to ensure effective governance in Northern Ireland.
Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)
May I say to the Secretary of State that we well understand why the fast-track process has to be used for this legislation as we approach the general election? Obviously, the needs of the people of Northern Ireland require that there is a budget to provide the vital services on which they depend. It does however make it all the more paradoxical—and, I think, shameful—that the same fast-track process was not available for the Historical Institutional Abuse (Northern Ireland) Bill to make its way through Parliament. I hope that even at this late stage those words are echoed from the Secretary of State, who I know is sympathetic to the case, to the business managers, who have so callously let those people down. It is an embarrassment for him, but it is extremely difficult to justify the decisions of the business managers when everyone in the House would be prepared to make time available for that legislation.
The right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire) is in the Chamber. I remark on that simply because he was the Secretary of State when Stormont collapsed. Since then, we have recycled Secretaries of State and the paralysis in decision making in Northern Ireland continues.
There are some technical issues that we ought to address. One of the questions in any budgetary process ought to be an account of value for money. However, there is almost no capacity for any form of scrutiny of the efficiency of the spend from this budget. That is as unacceptable to hon. Members from Northern Ireland and taxpayers in Northern Ireland as it is to taxpayers anywhere else in the United Kingdom. Value for money is fundamental to any form of Government spending or public spending, and the scrutiny required for that is not available for this budget.
Sammy Wilson
The shadow Secretary of State is making an important point about the inability to scrutinise the efficiency of the spend. Does he also accept that we do not even have a chance to look at the relevancy of the spend? Much of the spending that goes on in Departments is determined by decisions made by an Executive four years ago, and new priorities that are emerging in Northern Ireland do not get a chance to be considered because civil servants cannot initiate new measures.
Tony Lloyd
I have enormous sympathy with the point made by the right hon. Gentleman. One thing we do know is that there has been significant demographic change in Northern Ireland in the last three years. The population is growing increasingly elderly and the number of young people, in relative terms, is decreasing. Therefore, the decisions made by politicians those years back may still be relevant in some areas, but in others they are beginning to be stretched.
Emma Little Pengelly (Belfast South) (DUP)
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that there is currently not only a lack of scrutiny and reactiveness, as outlined, but a lack of transparency? I have written to the head of the civil service on numerous occasions to ask about the additional money that goes into the Northern Ireland budget—I accept that it is by way of unhypothecated Barnett consequentials, which is not ring-fenced, and decisions must be made on where it goes—and I get a fairly stock response simply to say, “This is not ring-fenced. We will have discussions and civil servants will decide.” Civil servants have done nothing to open up their processes to scrutiny and transparency. It appears that they are still unaccountable to anybody. We now see this Bill, which outlines their decisions, rushed through this House with very limited scrutiny. It is letting down the people of Northern Ireland.
Tony Lloyd
Again, I have real sympathy with the point made by the hon. Lady. It is similar to the point made earlier by the hon. Member for South Antrim (Paul Girvan) about ring-fencing of moneys for the high streets and the inability to trace those moneys. In fact, some time back I raised with the previous Secretary of State whether it would be possible to have an accountability mechanism whereby the Northern Ireland civil service would respond to questions from Members of this House so we could scrutinise its decisions for exactly those reasons and provide at least transparency, even if that would not necessarily lead to proper accountability of the spend made.
These are really important issues, and they would be important even in an annual budget. If this was the budget for a large local authority—the Greater Manchester Combined Authority budget or that of the London Mayor are, I suppose, equivalent to the budget of Northern Ireland—we would be astonished if we did not have the capacity to scrutinise it. I say to the Secretary of State that I think the time is coming when we will need to look again at how the scrutiny process takes place; that will not be resolved today, but clearly we have to look at it.
I have some questions for the Secretary of State. I should say that we do not intend to block the Bill in any way, shape or form. It is vital that it goes through, and the amount of time available does not allow for any rarefied debate about more than the general outlines. However, there are some issues that we must begin to address. I nearly quoted the permanent secretary at the Department of Health, but I shall paraphrase: he said that Northern Ireland has the money for a world-class health service, but it just does not have the money for the health service that Northern Ireland has. In that, he was referring to the fact that the Bengoa reforms, which would and could have transformed the health service in Northern Ireland, had not been implemented.
There are issues about areas where we know the spend is no longer adequate. We know, for example, that Northern Ireland now has longer waiting lists than any other part of this United Kingdom. We know that mental health provision is unacceptably poor in Northern Ireland; I have to say that it is poor in my own constituency, but it is nevertheless particularly bad in Northern Ireland. The chilling fact that more people have committed suicide since the end of the troubles than people died during the troubles gives some indication of the need for improvement in those services.
We know about social care and the demands on it—again, this addresses the point made by the right hon. Member for East Antrim. We know that the number of elderly people and the dependent elderly is growing all the time in Northern Ireland, just as it is in my own constituency, but the capacity of the budget to deal with those issues has remained largely unchanged. We know that education spending is no longer appropriate: Northern Ireland still has a high standard of results in its educational system, but too many people are now being left behind because of the inappropriate nature of the education service.
I would particularly like to continue the questions raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Frank Field), which my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol South (Karin Smyth) raised in Question Time earlier. The Minister of State has used words like “the same refrain” when saying that the answer lies in getting devolved governance back. I understand that that is the long-term answer, but we are going to face a crisis for some individual families because of the exhaustion of the welfare mitigations. It is not simply about housing: it cuts across other areas of spend where those mitigations are protecting families now. The Secretary of State’s response was that he would look to see what could be done by him and the Northern Ireland Office. We have to look very closely at the Secretary of State and Northern Ireland Office working with the Northern Ireland civil service, and that is important.
Let me ask a specific question. Does this budget contain money for the Stormont House bodies? Those bodies ought to be set up imminently, of course, so money has to be made available for them. We need to know that the proper provisions are there. Equivalently, and this is also important, if the historical institutional abuse Bill is not going to come before Parliament immediately, I hope it will be introduced rapidly by whatever Government take their place after the election so that that legislation can come into operation. That means we need to see within this budgetary framework, resource available for HIA victims, who deserve not simply our compassion but our recognition and our financial support.
I need in that context to ask the following question. The Secretary of State has been very specific: he has undertaken to see whether it is possible in terms of welfare spend to use imagination around the powers that do exist. I wonder whether he will now begin to apply the same kind of imagination to see whether it is possible to create within the framework of the existing spending operations something that begins the process of reconciliation, even if it is just the simple acknowledgment of payment to victims of institutional abuse. Money clearly is not everything in that context, but if it is possible, even without the legislative framework, to find an imaginative way of making some form of payment, that would at least go some way to showing the willingness of the Government and the Secretary of State, which I know is there, to try to rectify the failure of the system and get this Bill through Parliament.
This Bill is important—I think everybody accepts that. Nobody is going to want to block the capacity for the structures to operate within Northern Ireland over the coming three months, so it is important that this is passed today before Parliament is dissolved. We will support the Secretary of State in moving it through Parliament, but there are some issues that he and his Department need to begin to look at and see whether there are at least some patches that can be applied that can make a material difference to those who would most suffer if we do not get the answers right.
Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)
That was a quicker speech than we thought it would be.
May I begin by briefly putting on the record that I think the House should have enormous appreciation for the hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound)? During my time in this place since 2015 he has been the steadfast rock with regard to Northern Ireland. I occasionally see him as the political equivalent of the Giant’s Causeway—nobody quite knows why he is there or why he is that shape, but we know that things would not quite be the same if he was not there. The House will miss him, and his interest in and knowledge of the affairs of Northern Ireland and the politics of the island of Ireland will be missed. [Interruption.] Yes, he is going to be a tourist attraction in his own right—and is already listed, I believe, as an ancient monument.
Our thanks should also go to the Minister of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (Mr Hurd). The idea of the Northern Ireland Office not having a Hurd somewhere near it is depressing and dispiriting, and I wish my right hon. Friend well. Although she is not in her place, as Chairman of the Select Committee I ought to repeat what I said in Committee this morning and express my eternal thanks to the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey), who has done so much on behalf of the communities of Northern Ireland over so many years.
I obviously support this budget. I echo entirely what the hon. Member for Rochdale (Tony Lloyd) said, and I also echo the concerns of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) with regard to the welfare cliff that we canter towards in a slightly unguided, uncontrollable way.
I will not read it out, but page 5 of the explanatory notes to the Bill sets out clearly why fast-tracking is necessary. We appreciate the reasons why, and we can rehearse and rehearse and rehearse in a rather odd political version of the film “Groundhog Day” the comments, “I wish Stormont was back up and running…Ministers are doing all they can to achieve that…Parties stand ready to come back”, yet we never quite get that over the line.
While we fiddle with that issue, everybody is aware of the problems in Northern Ireland with regard to welfare, the downturn in education and the acute issues with healthcare. If we are serious, and if talking about Northern Ireland as a part of the Union is something beyond words and some sort of abstract, we should worry that we have allowed the eccentric to become the norm and allowed a mindset to develop whereby emergency legislation, sticking plasters and ad hoc solutions have to be found. If this was taking place in Scotland, Wales, North Dorset or any of the counties of England, we would be up in arms. Front-page articles would be written about it and questions would be asked all over the place. The fact that they are not is a cause for concern. How can we ever hope to make the politics of Northern Ireland and public service to its taxpayers as normal and as mainstream in Ballymena as one might find in Blandford Forum in my constituency? We are never going to make the progress on peace, reconciliation and confidence building that is so desperately required.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
I agree with what the hon. Gentleman says. He mentioned welfare a few moments ago. That is of particular concern to many people in Northern Ireland, particularly with regard to welfare mitigation payments, which were negotiated by a member of my party when he was Minister. They give rise to great concern, because in four short months, those mitigation measures will fall away. We need to take steps immediately and urgently to deal with that problem.
Simon Hoare
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. People in communities in Northern Ireland today will be worrying about the impacts of the end of the mitigations. They will be among the most vulnerable in the community, who have the least opportunity to ride even a temporary blip or gap in service provision, and they will be the hardest hit. We understand that we are adding to their justifiable reasons for concern and anxiety, because as well as Stormont not sitting, Westminster will not be sitting either. The ability of right hon. and hon. Members to hold the Secretary of State and his ministerial team to account on the Floor of the House, in a Select Committee or in Westminster Hall will be removed from us. A democratic deficit—an accountability vacuum—will be created for five or six weeks, and that presumes that on 12 December, there is a clear-cut result that effectively allows something to resume on Monday 16 December.
We do not know what the result will be; we could be in for weeks of horse trading, with the usually happy time of Christmas and the new year elongating the window when no decisions are taken into early in the new year. Those who can least afford any hardship are likely to be facing it, and having their burden of woe added to, without having any democratic forum in which their concerns can be expressed and the decisions—or lack of decisions—taken by Ministers can be questioned and challenged. That is the icing on the cake of the democratic deficit that is now becoming the norm, and of the tendency to deal with Northern Ireland as a perpetual emergency, which is subliminally, if you will, undermining the path of peace and civil stability that we all wish to see. We have to be careful: we are allowing this psychologically to become the norm.
Bob Stewart
I do not feel very gallant.
I seem to recall that two Secretaries of State ago I sat in this House and heard that direct rule would have to be imposed very soon, and here we are, 18 months later, still not there. The people of Northern Ireland must be really fed up with the fact that we cannot give them proper governance. Please, let us have direct rule if we cannot get the Executive working again.
Simon Hoare
I have enormous sympathy with what my hon. Friend says. Again, if these were normal times, that would probably have happened, but as we all know, when it comes to the delivery of politics and services in Northern Ireland, we push one and we pull the other, and it is a bit like water in a balloon: it moves around and alters but the shape remains vaguely identifiable. In theory, direct rule would be a good thing, bringing decision making and delivering policy change in real time for real communities, but of course that would provide grist to the mill of those, including some in the nationalist community, who like to castigate the British Government and say, “This is just the big imperial mother Parliament flexing her muscles and exerting herself”. So it is not, I am afraid, as easy as just deploying direct rule, as desirable as that would be for service output.
My hon. Friend is right, however, that at some point somebody will have to take a decision, and how we mitigate things would then depend on that decision, because this perpetual coma, limbo, purgatory—call it what you will—is not sustainable. These are citizens we should consider equal to ourselves on the mainland. This disruption in the delivery of governance, which we would not support or sustain for more than three weeks were it an English county division, cannot be allowed to become the norm any more. At some point, somebody will have to be brave and take a decision, knowing full well that we can please some of the people some of the time, but not all of the people all of the time.
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson (Lagan Valley) (DUP)
While we welcome the Bill, in so far as it is necessary, we most certainly do not welcome the circumstances in which Parliament has to legislate. I listened to the hon. Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), and he made some very important points. It is ironic that Members of Parliament elected to this House from constituencies in Northern Ireland who refuse to take their seats, and therefore do not involve themselves in the process, are the very people responsible for the fact that we are dealing with this legislation today and that we have limited ability to scrutinise it. There is only one party in Northern Ireland refusing to form a Government, and that party is Sinn Féin.
Mr Gregory Campbell
My right hon. Friend is drawing attention to a matter that has been raised numerous times. Does he agree that, to add insult to injury, what does not get mentioned very often, in the House or outside, is the fact that the House pays those Members not to attend and represent their constituents and gives them expenses for office costs, flights and hotel bills?
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
I appreciate that intervention. I know that from time to time Members express concerns about the pay of Members of the Legislative Assembly. I rarely hear a concern expressed about the paid lobbyists of Sinn Féin who are omnipresent in the coffee shops or outside on the Green but are absent from these green Benches, failing to fulfil their responsibilities to their constituents. Yet they alone are responsible for Northern Ireland’s not having a functioning Executive.
On 21 October—this month—the Assembly met, and representatives of a number of parties turned up. Shamefully, representatives of Sinn Féin were not among them. They absented themselves, and I have to say with some regret that the Alliance party also absented itself. This is the party that describes itself as the bridge builder, the party to bring people together, but on an occasion when we were bringing our elected representatives together at Stormont to try to break the logjam, the bridge builders were nowhere to be seen. They were absent without leave.
I hear lectures from some Alliance party representatives about how we should be doing this and that and restoring Stormont, but when they had an opportunity to show their presence and highlight the fact that Sinn Féin alone is holding the people of Northern Ireland to ransom, yet again the Alliance party gave Sinn Féin political cover by absenting itself from Stormont.
Emma Little Pengelly
Does my right hon. Friend agree that this is an issue about which many people in all communities in Northern Ireland care very deeply? People are very concerned, because they do not know about the details that have led the Secretary of State to present regulations relating to the termination of pregnancies. Those who did not turn up, or who refused to go into that Chamber, did not just deny any democratic accountability in respect of that decision; they even closed down basic debate because they disagreed with another party’s stance, and some other people’s stance, on the issue. That is shameful. They should have at least facilitated debate, because the people of Northern Ireland wanted that.
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I have said this before, but I will keep putting it on the record because it needs to be said, lest the perception be created that somehow this is a problem that goes beyond Sinn Féin. Yes, there are difficulties in Northern Ireland that need to be resolved. Yes, there are issues that need to be addressed. But the people of Northern Ireland elected their Members of the Legislative Assembly to go to Stormont and sort those issues out. The place in which to do that is the forum that was created under the Belfast agreement for the very purpose of resolving our difficulties.
For our part, the Democratic Unionist party wants to see Stormont functioning properly. If the Secretary of State, or the Speaker, or whoever, wants to convene the Assembly on any day, we will be there. We will appoint our Ministers, we will elect an Executive, we will play our full part. But our Assembly Members are being penalised, and I have to say, with the greatest respect to the hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon), that there is not a single Democratic Unionist MLA in Northern Ireland who does not want to be doing their full work at Stormont. In fact, we are losing good people because they cannot do their job.
I have a concern—others may not, but I do—about what this means for the political class in Northern Ireland. If we are dissuading people from becoming involved in politics, that is not good for the future of Northern Ireland, and it is not good for the development of the political process. I understand the sentiment that leads people to say, “Cut their pay”, but I think it a little unfair for all the Assembly Members to be punished because one political party refuses to do its duty and play its part in that political process, and is holding the rest of us to ransom.
Bob Stewart
I seem to recall that the Belfast agreement was fully signed up to by Sinn Féin, which should have guaranteed that it would be present in the Assembly.
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention and for his continued interest in Northern Ireland matters, which is deeply appreciated. We wish him well in the election.
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
Thank you. We will be back.
It is frustrating that we find ourselves in this situation, and I have a lot of sympathy for the Secretary of State for having to perform these functions, but I want to echo the comments of the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart), who made the point earlier when he intervened on the hon. Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) that this cannot continue indefinitely. This is not how democracy should function.
Emma Little Pengelly
Does my right hon. Friend not agree that the issue about the pay of MLAs is ironic? We have raised an issue about political donations many times with the Secretary of State, and it is that Sinn Féin fundraises huge amounts of money outside the United Kingdom—in the United States and in other places—which it can use to sustain its operation, but it is the party that is preventing every other MLA from getting back to work. This needs to be addressed urgently.
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is an impact on the political process in Northern Ireland when we have one party that receives funding from international sources, which skews the political system. That is something that we have consistently pressed the Government to address, and they have not yet done that.
Sammy Wilson
Does my right hon. Friend not find it ironic that when Sinn Féin raises those funds in America and other parts of the world, they can be used for the purposes of promoting the party in the United Kingdom but not in the Republic of Ireland? That is because the Government of the Republic of Ireland have had more guts in dealing with Sinn Féin than this Government here at Westminster have had.
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
It goes further than that. In response to the point made by the hon. Member for Beckenham, I believe that we have not had direct rule reintroduced because Sinn Féin objects to it. On the one hand, it will not allow us to function as an Assembly and an Executive; on the other hand, it says that we cannot have direct rule. There is surely an irony there. The party that calls itself republican and objects to so-called British rule in Ireland is the party responsible for this Parliament having to exercise its authority to agree budgets and take legislative decisions. That is entirely down to Sinn Féin. It speaks out of both sides of its mouth. On the one hand, it is the ultimate republican party demanding an end to the British presence. Incidentally, that includes myself and all my right hon. and hon. Friends. It does not want us to be British. It does not want our British identity to be exercised, despite the fact that it has signed up to agreements that supposedly respect that. It does not respect this Parliament. Just this morning I heard Sinn Féin say that one of the slogans for this election will be to ditch Westminster. So, we have ditched the Assembly, and we have ditched the Executive—let’s ditch Westminster! What are we going to be left with to provide government within Northern Ireland? This is a ridiculous situation and it cannot go on.
I say to the Minister and to the Secretary of State that in the next Parliament we cannot continue with this situation with the absolute minimum of decisions being taken to pass budgets, when we do not have proper scrutiny of government in Northern Ireland. It is not right, and my colleagues have made that clear. I shall give one little example, and it relates to the education budget in Northern Ireland. I think there would be cross-party support for more funding going into special educational needs in Northern Ireland, yet we are frustrated in being able to influence those kinds of decisions, because we do not have an Assembly. There are parents in my constituency—and, I am sure, in those of all other right hon. and hon. Members from Northern Ireland—who are desperate to have adequate educational support for their children, but we cannot change the way in which the budget is spent because we do not have proper opportunity for scrutiny. That is just wrong, and it cannot continue.
I am proud of what the Democratic Unionist party has delivered in this Parliament for Northern Ireland: additional funding for public services, reform of our health service, and more money for our schools and for infrastructure projects. All those things are important, but it is extremely frustrating that we are not always able to influence how that additional funding is spent. That is difficult to explain to my constituents, because they expect their Member of Parliament to be able influence those things. We are neither one thing nor the other. We do not have direct rule from Westminster, and we do not have devolution in Northern Ireland. We are in this kind of—
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
Limbo; the hon. Member for North Dorset described it as another thing earlier. I cannot accept that for my constituents. This is not British democracy functioning for the people of Northern Ireland. I have every sympathy with the Secretary of State, and I commend his and his team’s efforts to bring the parties together to try to get an accommodation and to try to restore devolved government. We do not believe that the fault for that lies at the foot of the Secretary of State; it lies at the door of Connolly House in west Belfast, the headquarters of Sinn Féin, which is responsible for us having no Government.
I will briefly touch on two particular aspects of the budget, both of which speak to public safety in Northern Ireland. The first is the Police Service of Northern Ireland. One of the successes in recent years has been the progress in the level of public support for policing in Northern Ireland and the transformation of the police service. However, having met the Chief Constable recently, I am worried about police numbers. I know that the Government have said that they are recruiting more police officers—it is a big part of their platform for the general election—and I know that the PSNI is engaged in some recruitment, but the demographics and the turnover of experienced police officers are not being matched by recruitment. We will want to sit down with the Government after the general election to look at that, because there is a need to increase the number of officers available for community policing, which is crucial for the continuation of public confidence in policing in Northern Ireland.
Mr Gregory Campbell
The Police Federation for Northern Ireland gave evidence at the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee this morning, and I asked a series of questions about the required number of police personnel. Does my right hon. Friend agree that, looking at policing both in the past and at present, we appear to need in excess of 1,000 additional personnel?
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is what the Police Federation for Northern Ireland and the Chief Constable have been saying, so we need to consider police officers and the recruitment process.
My final point on public safety relates to the Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service, which is headquartered at Lisburn in my constituency and comes under the remit of the Department of Health. Of course, the Department has enormous pressures on its budget and on how it manages staff, so I have every sympathy, and the priority in the Department must be the health service and health service reform. However, I am nevertheless concerned about the downwards trend in funding for the Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service. In 2019-20, the budget for the fire and rescue service is £74.1 million, but it was £81.6 million in 2011-12, so there has been a significant cut.
Earlier today, we had a debate on the report on the tragic circumstances of the fire at Grenfell Tower. None of us wants to see that kind of situation, but the cuts in the Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service leave me concerned, as a public representative, about its capacity to respond to that kind of emergency situation. I will not go into all the detail of how those cuts are having an impact, but they are.
We have seen whole-time crews cut in Northern Ireland, which means that in many locations crews cannot deploy without part-time firefighters being available to provide them with the full complement they need to attend an incident. That is a matter of concern. That is in no way to question the professionalism of part-time firefighters—far from it—but it is an unsatisfactory situation for the fire and rescue service to be in, because it can result in delays while full-time fire crews wait for their part-time colleagues to arrive before they can respond to an incident.
That is a having an impact on response times for fire crews in Carrickfergus, Portadown in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Upper Bann (David Simpson), Omagh, Enniskillen, Newtownards in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and Armagh. The cuts are also having an impact in Londonderry. It concerns us that the capacity of the fire and rescue service to respond to major incidents is being diminished in Northern Ireland.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
My right hon. Friend has outlined a number of towns where fire services will be cut. Does he share my annoyance and concern over the reductions in the fire service in towns that are growing, with a population growth of some 10%, 15% or even 20%?
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
Indeed I do. I have made the point that the population of Northern Ireland has increased in the period I quoted.
We welcome the progress that has been made. The Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service does a great job at fire prevention. Its fire safety talks in schools and to community groups have been very successful. Nevertheless, I am concerned that if we have major incidents in Northern Ireland, like we had at the Primark building in the centre of Belfast, the capacity of our fire crews to respond and the specialist equipment that needs to be deployed will have been diminished as a result of the cuts.
Gavin Robinson
My right hon. Friend is right to mention critical incidents. Although he did not refer specifically to cuts in my constituency, the Knock fire station is one of those that houses an aerial appliance, which is crucial for high-rises in the city of Belfast and for Belfast City airport in my constituency. It is important that we not only plan for critical incidents, but have the crews available to resource the appliances that are required.
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson
My hon. Friend makes an important point about the capacity and ability of the fire and rescue service to respond to major incidents such as one—though we would never want it to happen—at Belfast City airport.
I give that illustration simply to make the point that I would like my Assembly Members and those who represent the towns and cities that I have mentioned to be able to scrutinise properly how our budgets are being allocated and spent, and to consider the impact on public safety as they do so, as any legislator or political representative would. They are denied the opportunity to do that, and we cannot do it on their behalf properly or effectively. This is not a criticism of any Department or of the civil servants who are making the decisions, but the civil servants themselves would say that the absence of that political input is harmful. It is to the detriment of the people of Northern Ireland.
We cannot go on like this. The current situation is not fair on the people of Northern Ireland. If the Government are returned after the general election, I hope that we will be able to sit down, and if there is not the basis for restoring devolution—if the political parties cannot reach an accommodation—we will take some tough but right decisions to give a degree of accountability and scrutiny back to the political process in Northern Ireland through this Parliament.
Sir Michael Fallon (Sevenoaks) (Con)
I shall be extremely brief, Mr Deputy Speaker, because I am very conscious that some of our colleagues from Northern Ireland also wish to speak and we have a time limit.
I want thoroughly to endorse the contributions of the right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson) and the hon. Member for Rochdale (Tony Lloyd) as to the difficulties the House is placed in now by this process, whereby we are not able to scrutinise properly the expenditure of the Northern Ireland Departments. When we had the equivalent legislation 18 months ago, I tabled amendments seeking to curtail the expenditure on the prosecution of our military veterans. In the 18 months since I withdrew those amendments, we have seen those prosecutions continue and, indeed, accelerate, in quite an arbitrary way and, as usual, in a very unfair way, in that members of the armed forces are being put first in the firing line.
I am therefore extremely pleased by the progress that has been made by the new Government since July. The consultation has finished and we have had the commitment in the Queen’s Speech to legislation, a commitment repeated again by the Prime Minister today. I urge my right hon. and hon. Friends to continue to make progress on that, to see whether it is possible to construct some presumption against prosecution in cases that were too long ago, in cases that have already been investigated and in cases where there is no new evidence. I would add a fourth criterion: where a member of the armed forces genuinely believed he was doing his duty. None the less, I welcome the progress that has been made and I very much hope the Minister will reassure me that we will soon proceed to early legislation, because, as I said when I spoke in the House 18 months ago, this issue is not going to go away, however difficult and complex it is. From my time in the Ministry of Defence, I understand the difficulties that the Northern Ireland Office is faced with in trying to resolve it, but this issue will not go away and I hope the Minister will reassure me that progress really will be made at the beginning of the next Parliament.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. Before I call the next speaker, may I say that I must bring in the Front Benchers at 5.40 pm?
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
First, let me say that the Secretary of State is being very optimistic if he thinks this is the last time he will be bringing such a Bill to this House. I have listened to every Secretary of State over the past three years who has brought the budget Bill to the Floor of the House say that they hoped it would be the last time. They have even had the same Northern Ireland Office line in their speech that, “We are close to getting an agreement on the restoration of the Assembly.” I really do think it is time that instead of listening to the Sinn Féin spin that comes from the NIO, he looks at the reality on the ground, which is this: despite the fact that the absence of an Assembly hurts Sinn Féin’s constituents greatly, Sinn Féin still refuses to go back into the Assembly.
We have heard here today about the mitigations on welfare reform. A recent survey found that most of the people who will be hurt will be in Sinn Féin constituencies, yet Sinn Féin is still happy to plough on and face the end of this financial year, when people will be hit with huge bills because housing benefit will be reduced and some of the other mitigation measures that were put in place will no longer be there. Yet still Sinn Féin says that we are not going to have the Assembly.
We have heard here today about something that would benefit a Sinn Féin constituency. I happen to think it is a wrong decision, although I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for East Londonderry (Mr Campbell) will disagree with me on this—I am referring to putting a medical school into Londonderry. There are good arguments—including the economies of scale and other benefits—for saying that we should just enlarge the one at Queen’s University. I guarantee that had Ministers been in place in the Assembly, we would already have the medical school in Londonderry, yet Sinn Féin are quite happy to sit it out and see a Sinn Féin constituency without that important facility that would bring a lot of benefits to that constituency, although it might not be the best thing for Northern Ireland as a whole.
We have heard time and again in this place about the victims of historical abuse. Martin McGuinness drove that work forward, yet the closure of the Assembly has denied those people the justice and support that they thought they would get. Sinn Féin are still unmoving and will not go back into the Assembly.
Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
The right hon. Gentleman is making a powerful speech. It will not come as a galloping shock for him to hear that I have been campaigning for the medical school in Londonderry. Does he agree that what Sinn Féin are really worried about is having a whole new electorate that would not vote for them in a tight marginal seat?
Sammy Wilson
That may well be the case. On the face of it, Sinn Féin say they support the idea, but they are quite happy to sit out the Assembly so that no decision is made on it.
As my right hon. Friend the Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson) pointed out, the Assembly met recently because of the whole issue of changes in respect of abortion law, which exercises tens of thousands of Sinn Féin supporters who come from a Catholic tradition, yet Sinn Féin sat out the Assembly rather than go in to address the issue. If the Secretary of State thinks Sinn Féin are just on the brink of going into the Assembly then, to use a Northern Ireland colloquialism, his head is full of sweetie mice. It is not going to happen. They have shown time and again that they are not prepared to make that decision, even when it is unpopular with their own electorate.
That brings me to the inadequacy of what we are doing today. The Secretary of State has made it quite clear that there is no additional money for Northern Ireland; the Bill will simply ensure that, of the money allocated in the budget, the remaining part that was not allocated when we last debated these issues will now be made available to see us through to the end of the financial year.
The Bill does, though, have a substantial impact on Northern Ireland. People have mentioned the lack of scrutiny. Of course, this is not the only way in which the budget is scrutinised. Had the Assembly been up and running, the permanent secretaries, Ministers and officials of each Department to which money is allocated in the Bill would have been brought before committees and asked about how the money was being spent. Is it being spent efficiently? It there the transparency mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast South (Emma Little Pengelly)? Is the money being spent on things that are relevant, or should it be allocated in different ways? But none of those committees is meeting.
We then find that, for example, in the Department for Communities, there are at a rough count 51 different heads of expenditure. Are they all necessary? Have changes occurred in Northern Ireland over the past four years that mean we perhaps should have focused spending in different ways? In the Department for the Economy, there are more than 60 different heads of spending. Some of those may have been relevant four years ago, but are they as relevant today? Should some of them not be raised in priority and some dropped in priority? That scrutiny does not happen. The global sums are given, and the civil servants will spend them as they see fit.
Of course, the civil servants do not have the decision to make and cannot make decisions on huge changes. All they can do, even with the legislation available to them, is spend money on the basis of decisions that were made four years ago. Any new initiatives cannot be taken by civil servants. For example, the £140 million that went on mitigations in welfare reform would have to be found by cutting back on other programmes. Civil servants are not going to make those decisions; Ministers must make those decisions. The Minister cannot run away from that. He must accept that those changes and that stepping in will be necessary, which is why we must get a grip on this.
The one point that the Minister had promised to make during his speech and did not make—this has been raised time and again by my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson) and myself with Treasury Ministers and with the Secretary of State—is to do with the whole issue of housing associations and the fact that they cannot currently access financial transactions capital of which the Northern Ireland Executive does have surplus, but cannot spend, because there is no outlet for it.
Have we not yet had the legislation because various Northern Ireland Departments—the Department for Communities, the Department of Finance or the Northern Ireland Office—have been dragging their feet? Or does the problem remain here at Westminster, with the Treasury not taking this matter forward? It is important that we find out, because this issue will affect capital spending in Northern Ireland.
I know that you want me to finish, Mr Deputy Speaker, but let me just say to the Secretary of State that the Government cannot dodge the issue. If we do not have an Assembly, or any prospect of an Assembly—Sinn Féin have no intention of allowing us to have an Assembly—decisions will have to start being made here.
Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)
It is a source of great sadness to me and, I think, to everyone both inside and outside the Chamber tonight that such an important piece of legislation is being discussed so briefly. It is also a source of sadness that we have to legislate in this House for matters, which, entirely, should be the province of Northern Ireland. I am also concerned that we are probably failing in the scrutiny process. I am not sure that we reach the highest standards. I understand the need for fast-track legislation, but I was intrigued to see in the explanatory notes that, because of the urgency, there was no opportunity for the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee to consider the matter in full; instead it has received an informal technical briefing from the Northern Ireland Office. I think that we should place on record our concern that this form of consultation, by way of a technical briefing, is something that we should resist except in extremis.
I pay credit to the officials in the Northern Ireland Office for producing an extraordinary, well-made piece of work here. The amount of effort that has gone into this is quite remarkable and it does bear examination. It is extremely interesting that, over and again in the Bill, we see that expenditure is required as a result of the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union and related services. Some of them are quite extraordinary. The Northern Ireland Assembly Commission requires a modest £11 million, which has to go towards
“enhancing public awareness and involvement in the working of the Assembly”.
That is money well spent. Then we have £3 million for the Northern Ireland Audit Office, and £868,000 for the Northern Ireland Authority for Utility Regulation—I wonder whether there might be a quango in there for me somewhere in the months ahead. Who knows?
The fact remains that this is crucial stuff, and in the extraordinary, passionate and well-informed speech of the right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson), he absolutely put his finger on it. We should be talking about the issues that matter to the people of Northern Ireland. We should not be allocating funds to the Assembly Commission; we should be talking about the health service, about social services and about education.
Mike Kane
Talking about being passionate and well-informed, I think the whole House will join me in paying tribute to my hon. Friend, as he is at the Dispatch Box today for possibly the last time. He has been one of the finest Members to grace this House and a friend to many. He will be sorely missed once he finally leaves this Chamber.
Stephen Pound
I am not entirely sure that I accept that. I am obviously grateful to my good friend and colleague. However, I was slightly knocked back by the extraordinary comment of the hon. Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), who compared me with a prehistoric ruin on the North Antrim coast. I am quite proud to be compared with the Giant’s Causeway, but if I were to be any feature of the Northern Irish landscape, I prefer to think of myself as Carrickfergus castle, a doughty defender of Northern Ireland. That would also enable me to keep an eye on the right hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) on a regular basis.
Time is very short. We have heard excellent contributions, not just from the Chair of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for North Dorset, but also from the right hon. Members for Sevenoaks (Sir Michael Fallon), for Lagan Valley and for East Antrim.
As has been intimated, this will be the last occasion at which I stand at the Dispatch Box. I am delighted that it is on an issue that means so much—an issue that has come to dominate my life in many ways, but one that I willingly allow to so do. If there is one thing that typifies what could be best about this House, it is the way in which we are so often united on this subject. Equally, this issue typifies the House at our worst, because we seem to be incapable of resolving it. I would have hoped that my last appearance at the Dispatch Box would have been to say that a restored Assembly and Executive are now taking the lead in Northern Ireland. It may be said that I have my head full of wee sweetie mice; I do not know. I like to think that I am an optimist, and I like to think that the great people of Northern Ireland can respond to that optimism, step up to the mark and show what they can achieve.
My colleagues and I will not oppose this Bill tonight. Reluctantly, we support it. We pay tribute to the Ministers who have brought this legislation forward, all the Northern Ireland Members and particularly the officials and officers of the NIO, who have done such an extraordinary amount of work. May they soon be able to return to the work that they should be doing, where they should be doing it. In the meantime, all I can do is to say thank you and goodnight.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr Nick Hurd)
May I start by paying tribute to the hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound)? I previously served for a long time with a shadow brief, and I would say the key thing is to care about it, and the hon. Gentleman does deeply and that comes through. He has earned a great deal of respect across the House in that position. Tonight he has been compared to on historical monument—listed or listing, I was not sure—but of course he also represents a constituency that has the magnificent Ealing pyramids. Surely this may be time for the good people of Ealing to consider commissioning a statue to sit alongside them. I thank him for his service and for his very kind remarks about officials, who often do not get the appreciation they deserve.
I thank the Labour Front Bench and the DUP for their constructive approach to the Bill. Whatever we feel about the circumstances of why and when we are here, it is recognised that this Bill is necessary—otherwise, emergency powers will have to be used that will see the people of Northern Ireland short-changed in terms of their public services, and we cannot allow that. This Bill is absolutely necessary, and I thank Labour and the DUP for their recognition of that. However, the debate did reflect a great deal of frustration across the House about the state of democracy in Northern Ireland at this moment in time. The Secretary of State expressed his frustration, although of course I will never be able to look at him in the same light now that I know his head is full of sweetie mice.
Stephen Pound
I think it would be appropriate at this time to mention the debt of gratitude that the House owes to the right hon. Member for South Ruislip and Northwood, who is also leaving the House. I just want to place on record the Opposition’s appreciation for his work. In the short time that he has held this brief, he has immersed himself in it and has won the respect of Members on both sides of the Chamber. We wish him well and thank him for his service to date.
Mr Hurd
I am really grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I do not want to appear churlish, but in fact I am the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner, although I am sure that the current Member for South Ruislip—the Prime Minister—will be grateful for the appreciation shown.
The central theme of this excellent debate was one of profound frustration at the state of democracy in Northern Ireland. This was reflected by the Secretary of State and the shadow Secretary of State, who raised important issues about the quality of scrutiny available—a point reflected passionately on the DUP Benches, not least by the right hon. Members for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) and for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson). My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart), who I have heard speak passionately about his tour of Northern Ireland, again expressed frustration about direct rule. The Chairman of the Select Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare), spoke really well in warning against tolerance of a new norm around the listless process of decision making that we are in. That is not to denigrate in any way the hard work of civil servants in Northern Ireland. I could not have higher regard for David Sterling and his team there. They are in a very difficult situation and they do a difficult job.
In the time remaining, I should respond quickly to some specific and very important points, particularly around mitigation of welfare reforms, which was also touched on in oral questions. There is a significant issue approaching in terms of the so-called cliff edge in March 2020. That is a very serious matter, given that we are talking about mitigations that help to support many thousands of the most vulnerable people in Northern Ireland. There are powers available to the relevant Department, but they present administrative challenges and are sub-optimal as a response. The best response is through the law, and the best way of doing that is through the Northern Ireland Executive. I hope that the shadow Secretary of State heard the response of the Secretary of State and is willing to lean in on that.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)
That is very good. I would say that the shadow Minister will be missed in all parts of the House.
Northern Ireland Budget Bill
Wednesday 30th October 2019
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Chairman of Ways and Means (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)
I can inform the Committee that one amendment to the Bill has been tabled. Copies are available in the Vote Office. I have not selected the amendment for debate.
Clause 1
Issue of sum out of the Consolidated Fund for the year ending 31 March 2020 and appropriation of that sum
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
The Chairman
With this it will be convenient to consider clauses 2 to 7 and schedules 1 and 2 stand part.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr Nick Hurd)
In speaking to clause 1 stand part, I will also try to address very briefly the issue of housing associations, which I did not have time to do in my closing speech on Second Reading.
Clause 1 authorises the issue out of the Consolidated Fund of Northern Ireland the sum of just over £5.3 billion. The allocation levels for each Northern Ireland Department and the other bodies in receipt of these funds are set out in schedule 1, which also states the purpose for which the funds are to be used. The authorisations and appropriations in this clause are a balance to complete in addition to the vote on account previously authorised in section 4 and in column 2 of schedule 3 of the Northern Ireland Budget (Anticipation and Adjustments) Act 2019.
I will now address the issue of housing associations out of respect to previous comments made. The Government, to be very clear, recognise the absolute importance of housing associations as the main mechanism for delivery of social and affordable homes. We agree 100% that classification as public sector has serious implications for their funding stream, for the reasons cited in the debate. We completely agree, therefore, that action must be taken, and the Government are committed to taking forward legislation to facilitate reclassification as soon as parliamentary time allows. I hope that the hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson) will realise that standing here today on the brink of an election I do not feel I can give a guarantee of a specific time, but I can say that this will be a priority for this Government, if re-elected, and that officials are continuing to work closely with officials in Northern Ireland to facilitate it.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
Perhaps the Minister could give us some clarity. In the past, we have been told that the reason why the legislation could not come forward is that it had not been properly prepared by either the Department for Communities or the Department of Finance in Northern Ireland. Then we were told that it had to come through the Northern Ireland Office. Has the legislation been prepared by the appropriate Department in Northern Ireland? Has it been approved to come forward to the Treasury here in Westminster? If it has reached that stage, when did it reach that stage? If it has not, what are the impediments?
Mr Hurd
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question. I am informed that officials have been making preparations to facilitate its introduction. I can confirm that a draft Bill exists and has been translated into the Westminster format, and NIO officials continue to work closely with officials in the Department for Communities and the Cabinet Office to make further progress towards introduction. I have spoken to the permanent secretary in the Department of Finance in Northern Ireland, and I know that she is extremely enthusiastic to see this through, as we are. I regret that I cannot give an absolute guarantee of an exact time when this will happen. The hon. Member for Belfast East will know why that is the case, but I am clear that the good will and the commitment are there, because we recognise the fundamental importance of the issue raised and the ramifications of the existing classifications.
Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)
I want to repeat something I raised earlier. I do not necessarily expect the Minister to give a response in this debate, but perhaps we could get some kind of response today. Once again, this relates to the situation of the victims of institutional abuse. If we are not going to see the Historical Institutional Abuse (Northern Ireland) Bill brought through the House of Commons, is there any capacity in the Consolidated Fund to make some form of payment, to at least acknowledge the fact that those victims of institutional abuse exist and that they suffered? It would be, we could say, a down payment. Is there legal capacity for the Secretary of State, the NIO or the Northern Ireland civil service to authorise that kind of payment?
Mr Hurd
I thank the shadow Secretary of State for his question. He asked about that on Second Reading, and I apologise for not having the time to respond directly. On his broader question, I can confirm that this budget is putting on a sound legal basis the draft budget debated earlier for this financial year. The short answer to his question is that it does not include provisions for the implementation of the Stormont House agreement institutions, and it does not include consideration of the consequences of implementing the Historical Institutional Abuse (Northern Ireland) Bill. I wholly agree, as I know the Secretary of State would, that that Bill must be a priority for Governments of any colour. The hon. Gentleman asked for some creativity or flexibility in terms of a down payment. I am not authorised to put something definitive on the record, but I know that the Secretary of State and the team have heard that and will look to discuss it with the Northern Ireland civil service. I do not have a black and white answer to that question, but it is certainly noted.
I want to acknowledge the point made about the Police Service of Northern Ireland. The right hon. Member for Lagan Valley is right: the PSNI is a success story, and we cannot afford for it to go backwards. As a former Minister for police in England and Wales and a former Minister for the fire service, I found myself largely in agreement with the sentiments he expressed about the need to ensure that the police service has the resources it needs and about the challenges of the recruitment process in the modern age.
Sammy Wilson
I want to come back to the point about housing association classification, because the Minister was not clear in his answer. The legislation has been prepared—I got that bit—but is it still being held by the Northern Ireland Office and therefore not transferred to the relevant Department that has to take it through here at Westminster, or has it been transferred to the relevant Department at Westminster and there simply has not been parliamentary time? That is important.
Mr Hurd
With respect to the right hon. Gentleman, if I was not clear enough before, I am not going to get any clearer now. The language in the document in front of me tells me that this is an extremely co-operative process. I do not think that the legislation is stuck in the NIO or the NICS, which is his concern. Everything here tells me that officials are working closely with the Department for Communities, the NIO and the Cabinet Office to make further progress towards introduction. I will go away and take further advice on that, but there is nothing here that tells me there is a hard impediment; it is just that I cannot, with any good faith, stand here and give a firm timetable under the circumstances we are in.
Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)
The Minister will be aware, because we had Northern Ireland questions before Prime Minister’s questions earlier today, that the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Nigel Dodds) asked the Prime Minister directly for a commitment about the legislation to compensate the victims of appalling historical institutional abuse in Northern Ireland. We have a moral responsibility to compensate those victims, and we cannot allow the five weeks of a general election to prevent them receiving the compensation that is long overdue to them. I am alarmed at the response the Minister gave to the shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland because he seemed to be ambivalent about that legislation coming through before the general election. I want the Minister to give a clear, unequivocal commitment to the victims of historical institutional abuse that that legislation will—will—come through this House before this House is dissolved next week.
Mr Hurd
I do not think I can give that hard guarantee to the hon. Lady. I know exactly why she is pressing me for it, and I have huge sympathy with what she is saying—and I know sympathy does not cut it—but she will know that parliamentary time is now extremely limited. It may well be, as I think Lord Ashton has indicated in the Lords today, that there is not time for the Bill to pass through both Houses. However, the hon. Lady certainly has my assurance—and I believe I speak on behalf of the Secretary of State; the hon. Lady knows how passionately he feels about this—that this will be tested very hard by us.
The hon. Lady will also know, given the importance and the sensitivity of the Bill, that we must obviously make sure it is properly considered so that victims of institutional abuse in Northern Ireland get the redress they deserve as quickly as possible. That is not a light consideration; it does require some proper scrutiny. I do not think anyone in the House is happy either that we are in the situation we are in with this Bill or about the absence of the HIA Bill, but we are where we are with the parliamentary time being extremely limited.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Will the Minister just clarify this for us if he can? If the HIA legislation is not brought forward and this Parliament finishes on Tuesday, as it probably will, does that mean all that legislation falls, and are we just to start again next time around? If so, that is appalling.
Mr Hurd
I agree that it would be extremely regrettable, but if that is the situation, it is for the new Government, of whatever colour, to establish their priorities. What I can say, having spoken to the Secretary of State about it, is that we have a deep commitment to doing this. It is a priority for all the reasons that we have stated. The hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon) talked about a moral responsibility, and of course she is absolutely right.
Emma Little Pengelly (Belfast South) (DUP)
Given what the Minister has said, may I urge him to do two things? First, will he try to get clarification about this issue as quickly as possible? Right now, the many survivors of terrible abuse will be deeply upset and worried, and they need to have clarity. If we can get that tonight, that would be good. Secondly, we have heard reference to an interim payment, and if it is not possible to put forward the detailed legislation, would it be possible to take through a much simpler piece of legislation with an accelerated passage, as is being done with this Bill today? That would at least give the Secretary of State or somebody the ability to make payments—simple payments —and then, after the election, the detailed process could kick in, because many of these victims are in desperate need.
Mr Hurd
I understand completely the points being made from various people in the Committee and the underlying reasons and motivation. I have a huge amount of sympathy, and I give an undertaking to try to establish some clarity this evening or first thing tomorrow morning, so that everyone knows where they stand, and we will do that through the normal channels.
The Chairman of Ways and Means (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. I am always very lenient because I want to allow Members to broaden the debate a little, but I do not want to diverge from where we should be at the Committee stage; hence I want to save time for Third Reading to allow Members to broaden it further. I believe the Minister is giving way to Gavin Robinson.
Gavin Robinson
Thank you, Sir Lindsay. When the Bill to make restitution payments in some part to victims of HIA passed its Second Reading in the House of Lords, was there an associated carry-over motion? Is there any certainty that the Bill will be resurrected in the new Parliament? Can the Minister give us some clarity on that?
Gavin Robinson
I will be brief, given the need to move on to Third Reading. You mentioned, Sir Lindsay, that an amendment to the Bill had been tabled, and I want to place on record my thanks for the positive and dextrous way in which you and the Public Bill Office considered it. I also thank the Minister for his response on Co-Ownership.
I recognise that the Minister is constrained in giving a definitive timescale for passing legislation, but I want to make it clear that the commitment he gave this evening was given to me in exactly the same debate a year ago. A promise and commitment was given then to rectify this small, discrete issue. Of course, the Ministers who gave that commitment are no longer Ministers. The Minister realises that I hold him in high regard, but with the greatest respect, he will not be here to follow through his pledge.
We need certainty. I asked whether there would be a carry-over motion for the HIA Bill because HIA victims need certainty. It would be an appalling dereliction if the House of Lords did not, in passing Second Reading of that Bill, associate a carry-over motion with it, because otherwise we must start again. In the run-up to Christmas, we will simply sign in, then in the immediate aftermath of Christmas and the new year, we will get another Queen’s Speech. Then for another week or two we will discuss the Gracious Speech and the Humble Address, so there will be no progress on that legislation, which cannot be brought back or reintroduced until the end of January at the earliest, subject to the business managers. That is completely substandard.
The issue of co-ownership, which I have been pushing, must be resolved by the end of the financial year—legislation must be passed by 31 March. I know it is small, but we as Members just piddled about this place whenever the Supreme Court asked us to come back, and we did nothing. No substantive business was put before us, yet we had a commitment on co-ownership legislation a year ago and that was never brought before us.
I must say that the Secretary of State has been good on HIA. His predecessors did not move at all; they said, “I’m sorry, this is a matter for the Executive. The report must go back to the Executive, and it is for the Executive to decide how to go forward.” I am grateful for the injection of progress he has brought, but sadly, given how this Parliament has evolved, it is too little, too late.
I make those points in gratitude to you, Sir Lindsay, for the consideration given to the amendment that was tabled, to the Public Bill Office and to the Minister for the commitment he has given. I recognise the constraints, but this issue cannot wait indefinitely.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 1 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clauses 2 to 7 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedules 1 and 2 agreed to.
The Deputy Speaker resumed the Chair.
Bill reported, without amendment.
Third Reading
Mr Hurd
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I thank the House for the debate that we have had on this important Bill and recognise the frustrations attached to it because of the timetable, the pace and the lack of resolution on some extremely important issues, not least to do with the passage of the Historical Institutional Abuse (Northern Ireland) Bill 2019, which, I can confirm to the hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson), did not have a carry-over motion in the House of Lords. I will direct the frustrations of the House about that to the Secretary of State and, through him, to the business managers. I also recognise the frustration, now I am better informed about the background, about the questions on the housing association issue that have clearly dragged on for a long time. That perhaps explains the line of questioning, but I am where I am, at the Dispatch Box today, and I think there is a genuine commitment. I am not aware of any serious impediments. I hope that that gives Members some reassurance.
We see this as a defensible, limited and sensible intervention at this time, and one that is in line with the approach taken since the collapse of the Executive in January 2017. We take very seriously our commitment to good governance in Northern Ireland and this Bill, vitally, does not preclude a new Executive, should they be formed within the financial year, from making budget adjustments if they see fit and amending legislation in the usual way at the end of the financial year. Crucially, we have heard that the impact of not passing this legislation would be Northern Ireland Departments being unable to access the full Northern Ireland block grant for 2019-20. Of course, that would have a very serious impact on the delivery of public services in Northern Ireland. The absence of legislation to underpin departmental spending would quickly become a systemic risk that would be unacceptable to all sides of the House. I thank the House for its consideration of the Bill, despite all the frustrations attached to it.
This is my last appearance at the Dispatch Box after almost nine years as a Minister and almost five years before that as a shadow Minister. I am delighted that this Bill is making its passage so that we can ensure that Northern Ireland has the budget it deserves, and so that the public services that the people we serve and represent rely on can continue to be delivered in the best possible way under the most difficult, frustrating and trying circumstances. Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
It is very sad that this is the Minister’s last time at the Dispatch Box and in the House, and it is very sad that so many distinguished parliamentarians will not speak again from these Benches. This House will be the poorer for their not being here. I thank the Minister for the way he has conducted his business today and throughout his career in this place.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Let me put on record my thanks to the Minister for the help he gave my constituents, Sophia, Darren and Danielle Gibson in Newtownards, in relation to medicinal cannabis and the related methodology—working, in all fairness, with the Department of Health in Northern Ireland to make that happen. He will have received the card that we all got to say thank you, and he has the one with wee Sophia’s photograph. I am sure he still has it; I have one in my office, too. I thank him so much, and wish him well as he moves on.
This is not the first time that I have spoken on Third Reading of a Northern Ireland Budget Bill debate and bemoaned the state of finances in Departments in Northern Ireland. We find ourselves in the difficult situation of having no functioning devolved Assembly. We have a seriously limited local council system; its powers are not on a par with those held by councils throughout the rest of the United Kingdom—that is a fact of life. We have a Westminster Parliament that has intervened only when legally necessary—other than to impose abortion against the will of the people of Northern Ireland. I find that disturbing, and my constituents in Strangford and people across Northern Ireland find it unacceptable. As I have said numerous times in this Chamber, either direct rule in its entirety should be implemented or legislation to call for an Assembly election should be introduced with the prerequisite that anyone who stands must take their seats and nominate accordingly.
Emma Little Pengelly
As my hon. Friend is outlining, there is currently very limited decision making in Northern Ireland. However, he will have been very pleased, as I was, to hear the announcement just this week that, through Northern Ireland’s active participation in the English and Welsh negotiations for Orkambi and other drugs, that will be made available at a better price, as I understand it, for Northern Ireland and England than the Scottish deal. Does he agree that that is a very good announcement? I also highlight the hard work that he and many people in Northern Ireland have done on this campaign.
Jim Shannon
I thank my hon. Friend for what she said. There has been a joint campaign to have the Vertex drug available for those with cystic fibrosis. I am thankful for the decision, but we need to move this a stage further. As she said, it would be better if we had the legislation in place to make sure that we get it in Northern Ireland— we should do. We met Jen Banks and her wee boy here in the House. I also have a constituent in Newtownards who suffers from the same thing and who needs the drug immediately, so it would be great if that happened.
I am glad that the election has been called. I am happy to put myself before my constituents knowing that I have consistently done what I believe to be right in this House, yet I am disheartened by the conduct in this place. We seem to have lost our sense of honour and of being people of our word and doing the right thing—we in the DUP corner of the House certainly feel that way. I still continue to do that and should I be re-elected, I will continue to do so. Only a few weeks ago, it was remarkable that across the House, everybody could turn up, when they were putting the backstop in place, to do us over, yet where are they tonight? When it comes to being honourable people and doing the right thing, I find that I have seen less of it in this House over the last period. There are many in this House who I am good friends with, and I intend to be good friends with them forever, but I do feel let down and I want to put that on record.
The Northern Ireland Budget Bill will enable day-to-day life to continue in the Province. We have come through a number of years of austerity. Although I can comprehend the rationale behind that, it is difficult to watch the daily effects of it. Our streets are untidy, because Transport NI can no longer afford to address the weeds, never mind resurface the roads, but I am pleased to note from my most recent correspondence with Transport NI that the spend allocated for Strangford in 2018-19 is just over £11 million, which is almost a combination of that for 2016-17 and 2017-18.
I am reminded of a song from when I was a wee boy—that was not yesterday, by the way. We probably all know it from our childhood: “Four wheels on my wagon and I’m still rolling along”; “Three wheels on my wagon and I’m still rolling along”—then two wheels, then one wheel, but do you know something? When there are no wheels on the wagon, you do not roll along at all. What we find with the Northern Ireland Assembly is that we are not rolling along. What a disappointment that we are not doing anything the way we should be. There are no wheels on my wagon—or no wheels on the Assembly’s wagon, I should say, and we are not rolling anywhere. [Laughter.]
Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)
“You can watch those Cherokees go galloping by”—it is a great old song. I get the point that the hon. Gentleman is making by using that song as an example. No wheels on his wagon, he is not rolling along: the Cherokees have captured him, but he is still singing a happy song.
Jim Shannon
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. It is the Assembly that is not rolling along. I am rolling along very well actually, just to let you know—no problem with me. Even though I am a diabetic—type 2—I can still keep going, and the Duracell battery is what I have to keep me going. The rest of the batteries fail—Shannon still keeps going. Just remember that. [Laughter.]
More money has been allocated to my area, which can only be a good thing, as we are in desperate need of basic infrastructure. There is huge potential in my area and local towns for international investment and so much more. We have state-of-the-art office space, UK-wide connectivity and low business rates. The long-term goal is to show the world that Northern Ireland is the place to invest in business. It is the place to produce television shows—scenes from “Game of Thrones” were filmed locally and supplied by local people. We can provide a high-class graduate labour force and an abundance of admin staff as well.
One of the key components to unlocking local investment is the ability to connect easily, and that includes good roads and transport. I will seek additional funding to improve connectivity to Belfast airport for those looking for the perfect place to invest. With due respect to my colleagues, the perfect place to invest is Newtownards and the surrounding areas. Infrastructure has a massive role to play. I have said it before, but I will say it again—this is the end of term: we need the Ballynahinch bypass. That town is being held back from growing the way it should because it does not have a bypass. The land is acquired and the scheme is in place, but the go-ahead needed from the Northern Ireland Assembly is not there.
Spending on the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs rose from £13.6 million in 2016-17 to £50 million in 2018-19, but our upcoming exit from Europe means that more funding must be allocated. I was pleased to read that additional funding has been allocated specifically to address Brexit issues, not simply for DAERA, but across the Northern Ireland Departments. I am pleased with what DAERA has done in my constituency. It has allocated and committed significant moneys to the Northern Ireland countryside management scheme. The money allocated to tackling rural poverty and social isolation—something else I am particularly interested in—has increased for the last three years. The substantial money for the rural development programme in the last year has also been great. This money has addressed many of the issues that are prevalent in the countryside. DAERA is doing that. It could do better if we had a Minister in place, but it is doing very well.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
On DAERA, does my hon. Friend agree that the issue of the veterinary school in Coleraine has been going on too long and needs to be processed, alongside the medical school in Londonderry? There are so many projects sitting there waiting for approval, but we need ministerial intervention to ensure they proceed.
Jim Shannon
My hon. Friend makes a most helpful intervention. It would benefit the whole Province, not just his constituency.
Education needs a massive injection of sustained funding, not one-off projects. Schools have not received the correct inflation-based moneys they need. I have been liaising with the Education Authority and the Secretary of State to ensure that schools have enough funding to sustain the high-level quality education expected in Northern Ireland. We must also find a solution to the union issue. I look to the Minister, as we always do, to outline how he intends to ensure that teachers and staff are happy and being appropriately paid and correctly treated. I gently ask him to intervene so that after-school clubs, which often round out social education, can continue without teachers having to break through the picket line.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson) referred to the importance of special educational needs provision in schools. The hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon) and I have constituents who attend Clifton Special School in Bangor—60% of its pupils come from my constituency—but it needs investment, as does Killard House School. Our teachers and staff do a phenomenal job with finite resources that are not rising in line with inflation or the increased expectations from parents. It is past time we resolved the union issues. Although the Education Authority has been working on this, perhaps ministerial intervention is needed to push it over the line. Information I have shows that, although more money has been allocated this year, the fact that the 2016-17 allocation was so low means that all we are doing is playing catch-up.
We need to address those things. The money available to individual schools may have increased since 2016, but it does not make up for the two years of underfunding. We are nowhere near where we need to be. I feel frustrated, but I look forward to a new Parliament and a new opportunity to push for appropriate funding for Northern Ireland. In the meantime, however, I have no option other than to support the Bill so that we can keep ticking over until direct rule or a fit-for-purpose Assembly does the right thing and takes its seat.
When I met the Chief Constable, Simon Byrne, just over a month ago, I raised two issues with him. I asked him to ensure that a police training system was in place, and to give me a commitment, if the funds were there and he had the wherewithal, to train 1,000 officers in order to increase the number to the necessary 7,500. He gave an important commitment on community policing, in which I am a great believer: I think that every one of us who represents a constituency anywhere in Northern Ireland understands how important it is.
Our hospitals need more funds. The money allocated to each trust area is not adequate. I want especially to thank the permanent secretary of the Department of Health in Northern Ireland, Richard Pengelly, who has said this:
“it costs £26 billion a year to run Northern Ireland but only £17 billion is being raised. The amount needed to maintain the health service goes up each year. At the moment to run the same service this year as we did last year and next year, it’s about 6% increase per annum. If we continue on that trajectory, within about 20 years the health service will need virtually all the money that’s available”
—in the block grant—
“to the executive.”
Richard Pengelly thinks that we need a new health strategy in Northern Ireland that will focus on diabetes, heart, stroke and cancer services and occupational therapy, and on the fact that the waiting lists for operations are getting longer and longer.
Let me make three final points. There will be a greater need for health services for an ageing population that is growing dramatically. In mid-2018, 308,200 people were 65 or older, and 37,700 of those were 85 or older. Given that we are producing fewer children, the pressure will be on healthcare for that ageing population.
I want to say something about cancer care, because cancer affects so many people. So many of my friends have contracted it recently, or, unfortunately, have passed away as a result of it. It is a major issue, especially in an ageing population. The most common cancers in men are cancers of the prostate and lung, and the most common in women are cancers of the breast and lung. Successive one-year budgets are impeding planning and investment in Northern Ireland’s health and social care services; we need the money to ensure that those things happen.
Early diagnosis and care at the outset are extremely important. A significant proportion of cases in Northern Ireland are diagnosed at a late stage: 20% are diagnosed at stage 3, and 26% at stage 4. Late diagnosis can be due to a number of factors, but what we need is earlier diagnosis, which will save lives, help our health service, and, in particular, help those with cancer. We also need a system that will shorten the timescale between the visit to the GP and referral to a consultant.
My last point is about mental health. My right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Nigel Dodds) has fought the case for mental health treatment extremely well in the House. We all have constituents with mental health issues, and I am very conscious of the need for funds to address them. There is a particularly high level of mental health issues, such as post-traumatic stress disorder, among those who have served our Province in uniform—in the police, the Army and other emergency services. Another issue that I face every day is the mental health of children, especially those at primary and secondary school level.
I thank you for your patience and your time, Mr Speaker. I just wanted to put on record how many things need to be done in Northern Ireland, and how many things could be done if we had a working Assembly that could respond to all the people there—and who is holding that back? Sinn Féin.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.
Northern Ireland Budget Bill
Thursday 31st October 2019
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and Northern Ireland Office (Lord Duncan of Springbank) (Con)
My Lords, sadly, this Bill is necessary. Although cross-party talks continue, the United Kingdom Government must take forward certain essential legislation to maintain the provision of public services. The legislation before the House today places the budget published in February 2019 on a legal footing and enables the Northern Ireland Civil Service to access the full funding for this financial year. Royal Assent is necessary to avoid the use of emergency powers under Section 59 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998.
I shall now briefly turn to the Bill’s contents, which largely rehearse what the former Secretary of State set out to the House in a Written Ministerial Statement earlier this year. The Bill authorises Northern Ireland departments and certain other bodies to incur expenditure and use resources for the financial year ending on 31 March 2020.
Lord Hain (Lab)
My Lords, I apologise—for the second time this week—for interrupting the Minister so early in his speech. However, I would be very grateful if he could give the House any information in respect of the costs presumably incurred under this Bill as a result of the compensation paid under the Historical Institutional Abuse (Northern Ireland) Bill. Will that legislation go through the Commons as it will do through this House later today—speedily and without amendment, as I understand it? Does the Minister, or the Chief Whip, have any information on that, please?
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I do not mind being interrupted by the noble Lord. The sum total of the expected costs under the historical institutional abuse Bill—this is an early estimate—is around £237 million, which will come from the Northern Ireland block grant. Money has been set aside and it will be met in full; of course, it may be higher than that depending upon circumstances. I believe that the historical institutional abuse Bill will pass through this House swiftly and, I sincerely hope, without amendment, today. I would like to believe that it could pass through the House of Commons in exactly the same fashion, but while I would like to make that so, I cannot guarantee it. But I hope to be able to report back with more information during the discussions we will have on the HIA Bill. That should help the House be aware of what we are facing.
Lord Hain
I thank the Minister very much for that response. I know, and the whole House knows, that he has been fully supportive of the Bill, and I am grateful for that. But in any intervening discussions that might be had with the Chief Whip here or the Chief Whip down there, can it be made clear that there is no reason at all why the Commons cannot do the same? The victims of historical institutional abuse will not understand if that does not happen.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I believe that the victims of historical abuse are watching us right now, not just in this House but in the other place. The noble Lord is correct in assessing what their view would be if that Bill fails to pass through both Houses. I will return to this during discussions in Committee on the historical institutional abuse Bill, to bring further matters to his and the House’s attention. If I may return now to the Bill before us, I shall talk briefly on its contents.
The Bill authorises Northern Ireland departments and certain other bodies to incur expenditure and use resources for the financial year ending 31 March 2020. Clause 1 authorises the Northern Ireland Department of Finance to issue £5.3 billion out of the Northern Ireland Consolidated Fund. The sums of money granted to Northern Ireland departments and other bodies are set out in Schedule 1, which also sets out the purposes for which the funds may be used. The allocations in this budget reflect where the key pressures lie in Northern Ireland, building on discussions we have had with the Northern Ireland Civil Service, the main parties in Northern Ireland and other stakeholders. Where possible, they reflect the previous Executive’s priorities.
Clause 2 authorises the temporary borrowing by the Northern Ireland Department of Finance of around £2.6 billion, to safeguard against the possibility of a temporary deficiency in the Northern Ireland Consolidated Fund. If used, this money will be repaid by 31 March 2020. Clause 3 authorises Northern Ireland departments and other specified public bodies to use resources amounting to some £6 billion in the year ending 31 March 2020 for the purposes specified in Schedule 2. Clause 4 sets limits on the accruing resources, including both operating and non-operating accruing resources, which may be used in the current financial year. Since this Bill would normally be taken through the Assembly, Clause 5 includes a series of adaptations that ensure that, once approved by both Houses, it will be treated as though it were an Assembly budget Act.
Alongside the Bill, the Government have laid a Command Paper; a set of main estimates for the Northern Ireland departments and bodies covered by the budget Bill. These estimates, which have been prepared by the Northern Ireland Department of Finance, set out the breakdown of resource allocation in much greater detail. I commend the Bill to the House.
Lord Lexden (Con)
My Lords, although this House is strongly averse to fast-tracking, there can be no doubt that this budget, essential to the well-being of the people of Northern Ireland, must be passed before the Dissolution of Parliament. I want to address just three matters to which the budget is relevant. All were raised during our important Northern Ireland debates at the start of the week, but without eliciting full responses from the Government.
The first is the renewable heating incentive scheme, which went so disastrously wrong. As the noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, pointed out on Monday, the report of the independent inquiry, chaired by Sir Patrick Coghlin, was completed some months ago. When I last asked in a Written Question when the report would be published, I was told rather curtly to get in touch with the relevant Northern Ireland department. That has not proved a profitable line of inquiry. Are the Government able to provide some indication of when the report will appear, particularly now that the sorry episode has been described in a book by a leading Northern Ireland journalist, Sam McBride? It is a report which will provide vital lessons for the future.
The reforms that have recently been made to this unfortunate scheme have created hardship among a considerable number of participants who joined it in good faith in its original form. This House discussed at some length the need to provide relief to those enduring hardship at the time the Northern Ireland budget was last before the House. Widespread support for action was expressed across the House in an impassioned debate on 19 March. We were assured by my noble friend Lord Duncan that a hardship scheme would be constructed. He said that he would lay a written report before your Lordships’ House so that your Lordships could see what it would look like in practice. He added, perfectly fairly and reasonably:
“There is no point in pretending that this can be achieved in a fortnight”.—[Official Report, 19/3/19; col. 1408.]
Well, a number of fortnights have passed since then and it would be good to have news of progress.
Secondly, perhaps I may touch on the severe crisis in the health service with which Northern Ireland is afflicted. It is truly shocking that in Northern Ireland someone in need of treatment is 3,000 times more likely to have been on a waiting list for a year or more than his or her counterpart in England, as my noble friend Lord Empey told the House on Monday. Over the past year or so, my noble friend has put a number of suggestions for improvement to the Government, including the appointment on a purely temporary basis of a Minister of Health. We have been given no indication of a positive response to his imaginative ideas. It should be remembered that in Northern Ireland, unlike other parts of the country, there are no elected local councillors to assist in overseeing health services, since Stormont is both an upper tier of local government and a devolved legislature.
I come finally to welfare and the deeply troubling point raised on Monday by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, who cannot be in the House today. She drew our attention to the fact that arrangements that have been made to mitigate the effect of welfare reforms on the very poorest will expire in March next year unless action is taken swiftly to extend them. She pointed out that some 35,000 low-income families would be made worse off overnight unless the Government deal with the issue. It has now been agreed, I think, that a report will be laid before Parliament by 1 December under the 2019 Act. That report should contain the firm commitments that the noble Baroness and others are seeking.
I draw from these three issues one general conclusion, which I will put in the form of two questions. Should not this Parliament endeavour to devise more effective arrangements to safeguard the interests of our fellow country men and women in Northern Ireland in circumstances where their own democratic institutions are suspended for a protracted period? Should we perhaps seek, through constructive constitutional thought, to make provision in these circumstances for some form of halfway house between full devolution and full direct rule, to which so many people are ill disposed?
It would be rash to think that the prolonged impasse in Ulster’s affairs, which has not yet been resolved, will not recur after a better dispensation has finally been made. For wholly understandable reasons, we made devolution in Northern Ireland dependent on the willingness of parties with diametrically opposed constitutional objectives to share power together. I was struck by some words of my noble friend Lord Empey last Monday:
“As a Parliament, we have an obligation to protect our citizens which supersedes parties and all issues”.—[Official Report, 28/10/19; col. 822.]
These are words, I think, on which we can usefully reflect.
Lord Morrow (DUP)
My Lords, it seems that we are again on the merry-go-round as we come to Northern Ireland. We on these Benches have said it umpteen times, but we want to keep repeating that we feel the best way forward is for the Northern Ireland Assembly to be making these decisions. Alas, there is no prospect of the Assembly sitting any time soon. There was an honest attempt to have the Assembly recalled just over a week ago, but that attempt was also squandered because Sinn Féin, again, stayed away and was not prepared to participate.
The noble Lord, Lord Lexden, made reference to the RHI, which was allegedly the reason that the Assembly was brought down, but those of us who live in Northern Ireland know perfectly well that that was not the reason; it was the excuse. A judge-led inquiry was established, which has now completed its report and its findings will be made public very soon, we hope. Therefore, if the RHI had been the reason, the inquiry would remove all the alleged obstacles to the return of devolution, but those of us who sit on these Benches and who live in Northern Ireland are not as naive as that. We know that the prospects of the Northern Ireland Assembly returning any time soon are very remote. Indeed, I suspect that we will be going through the same process again this time next year, so the Government have some responsibility to bring energy and urgency to the whole task of restoring devolution in Northern Ireland. I accept that you can take a horse to the water but you cannot make him drink. That is the situation that we find ourselves in today.
What we should be debating and discussing today are the issues that affect people’s everyday lives. Our health service is in dire straits. Why is no urgency applied to look at those who need urgent health services? Why are they ignored? Our education system is in urgent need of attention. Again, it is ignored. Our infrastructure in Northern Ireland is creaking at the hinges.
Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown (DUP)
Does my noble friend agree that there was no hesitancy in this House in legislating concerning same-sex marriages or divorce over the heads of the people, while a large portion of the people of Northern Ireland did not desire such legislation to be passed? It was raced through this House, yet people are allowed to die and there is no haste for legislation or for a Minister or anyone else to take responsibility for doing something to allow them to live rather than die. As for the RHI, is it not time that we had the fulfilment of the promise made by the Minister and mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Lexden, for a chairman to be appointed to look at those enduring hardship through no fault of their own?
Lord Morrow
I thank my noble friend for making those very succinct points and I agree entirely with him. He has raised the hardship cases with the Minister before, and we need the Minister to come back on this. Perhaps this will be the day we hear a reply from him on those pressing issues. What about the hardship cases? I think he gave a clear understanding that each one would be looked at individually, that this would not just be taken in a bland way, that a chairman would be appointed, a report would be forthcoming and the Minister would come back and respond to it.
My noble friend mentions the issues that were steamed through; namely, the redefinition of marriage and abortion. Those were two of Sinn Féin’s demands—of course, the other one is the Irish language Act. It seems to me that it has moved far past that: another string of demands will surface and be announced soon, and those will have to be delivered if we want a return to Stormont. Really, the people of Northern Ireland deserve to be governed and no single party should be allowed to hold all the people to ransom, including some who actually support it and who fail to understand why they cannot have a health service that functions properly, an education system that is up to the demands of the 21st century, and an infrastructure. All these will not hurt anybody but will enhance their lives, so can the Minister today give us any assurance? I know where we are in the timetable of things. We are in the mouth of another election; that will take us on through to next year before we can get anything done, and then we will rattle on through Easter and on through the Summer Recess, and on and on it goes. There always seems to be some reason why Northern Ireland cannot be governed like any other region of the United Kingdom.
Lord Caine (Con)
The noble Lord will be aware that one of the reasons that Governments are reluctant to take decision-making powers is the reaction of nationalist parties within Northern Ireland. However, does he share my assessment that if the Government did take steps in this direction there would be a gigantic sense of relief across the whole community that decisions were actually being taken at long last?
Lord Morrow
I could not agree more with the noble Lord, Lord Caine. It seems to me that the Government will not do anything that will ruffle the feathers of Sinn Féin—they cannot disturb it. We have had this constant threat, and the noble Lord, Lord Caine, has said it: if some decisions were made of importance to people in their everyday lives, there would be a sigh of relief across the whole of Northern Ireland, irrespective of what community background they might come from. We have to get to the stage where Sinn Féin can no longer dictate the pace.
I know, and I have heard it in this House, that the Belfast agreement is sacrosanct; it is the holy grail and cannot be touched. Let me say to your Lordships’ House that the Belfast agreement has had a coach and horses driven through it and it is time that the Government suspended it and took over temporarily. I want the Northern Ireland Assembly there, I served as a Minister there on two occasions, I served in the Assembly for some 18 years, I see the merits of it and the positives that can come out of it, and it is time that it was restored. But please, do not allow our having to move at the pace of the slowest in Northern Ireland to continue infinitely. Others are being penalised here when they should be allowed to get on with their lives. Government should be supplying the necessary governance to allow that to happen.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD)
My Lords, I think that all of us, including the Minister, will agree that this is a very inadequate substitute for proper debate and decision-making by the elected representatives of the people of Northern Ireland. However, this is a necessary Bill that has to pass before the dissolution of Parliament if services are to be maintained in the Province.
My understanding is that this will maintain spending at the pre-agreed level. When the former Secretary of State Karen Bradley initiated the beginnings of this year’s budget, she said that there was a real increase in funding for health, yet the noble Lord, Lord Empey, has on many occasions—although not today—given us quite a lot of detail on the waiting lists, shortfalls and problems in the health service. Can the Minister explain how that is consistent with the assurances of the previous Secretary of State that the resources have been increased—or is it just that the increase is not adequate to the challenge?
The noble Lord, Lord Hain, has already sought assurance, which the Minister has given, on funding for the Bill that we hope to get through later this afternoon. Assuming it all goes through, we hope that it will enable interim payments to be made in very short order.
The noble Lord, Lord Lexden, mentioned the RHI situation. There are two issues here: one is the hardship which Mr Buglass was appointed to try to address—it would be interesting to know when he will be able actually to take action—and the other is the lack of a report. There is some suggestion that both of these things should be happening together, because clearly there must be some explanation of who is to blame and why it happened. At the same time, people facing financial crisis need assistance now, not at some time in the indefinite future.
We are rushing this through because we are on the verge of a general election. It is also taking place in Northern Ireland, and it may well be interesting to see whether it will reflect any indication of a change of mood there. I am certain that in hustings across the Province many of the questions that we have returned to time and again will be on the lips of the voters in Northern Ireland, who will be challenging all their politicians on why they are in this situation.
I think the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, knows that the prospect of direct rule has very serious implications. He says that, as far as he sees it, the Northern Ireland agreement has had a coach and horses driven through it, and it is certainly the view of these Benches that the agreement which the Prime Minister claims to be a new deal—it is actually the original deal that the EU offered and Theresa May rejected—is totally incompatible with the Good Friday agreement. The election may well flush that out, both in the Province and across the rest of the UK.
Perhaps the elephant in the room, which I think the Explanatory Notes and the Library Note say has nothing to do with this Bill, is Brexit. Although technically it has nothing to do with it, there are clearly serious implications for Northern Ireland if anything similar to this deal goes through—which could happen within the timeframe of the money that we are currently voting. My only question to the Minister is: if it becomes apparent that there are significant costs borne by the public purse or adding to public pressure in Northern Ireland as a result of any decisions that may be taken relating to Brexit, will there be a recognition that some additional measures may be required? It would be not just adding insult to injury but putting pressure on an already overpressured budget to try to cover contingencies which, by definition, cannot be fully anticipated.
That said, we all recognise that the simple logic is that, if we did not comply with the accelerated passage of the Bill, Northern Ireland would be left with no funds whatever, which of course would be totally unacceptable. The reality is that, as long as there is no Assembly and Executive in Northern Ireland, this House—rather more than the other House, I have to say—will spend more and more time debating more and more aspects of policy issues that affect the people of Northern Ireland and may well have to make ad hoc decisions again and again, as we have done.
I understand the argument of the noble Lord, Lord McCrea, that we have enacted certain measures and not others. That, I suppose, is the nature of where we are in reality. It is not a satisfactory scenario, but my guess is that other issues, some of which may not be quite so contentious, will eventually reach such a critical situation that it will not be possible to make decisions without the intervention of UK Ministers. However, we are not there yet and, in the meantime, it is absolutely imperative that we get the Bill passed.
Lord Empey (UUP)
My Lords, there is no question that this process is any substitute for proper scrutiny. In normal circumstances, this budget would have gone to departmental committees of Stormont, it would have been scrutinised, and Assembly Members would have made decisions based on their priorities and what they felt was in the best interests of their constituents. But, as the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, has just said, there is no alternative to dealing with it in this way today. However, a number of things need to be highlighted.
First, on the intervention of the noble Lord, Lord Hain, both today and yesterday, I can say to him that, after the proceedings here I took myself down to the other place. It was clear, during a Statement made by the Leader of the other place to the Commons, that Members were getting information from the Front Bench that was out of date; it had been superseded by the proceedings in here that had not been transmitted to the Members there. There was overwhelming support in the other place for dealing with the Bill. I got the impression that the Leader of the House had listened to Members there and that perhaps something could be done. If it is not done, it will be the greatest kick in the teeth that this Parliament could possibly deliver to a group of victims. I sincerely hope that we will be able to dispatch the Bill later today and get it down to the other place for its deliberations.
My noble friend Lord Lexden raised a number of issues in his contribution. It goes back to the debate earlier this year when we were looking at the question of the RHI and the scheme that was to be in place. The Minister will be aware that I moved amendments, which I withdrew only on the basis of the undertakings that he gave to the House at that stage. That centred around the report and the scheme that was to be put in place to provide compensation for those who had in good faith availed themselves of the scheme but found themselves penalised effectively at the end of the process by having made economic decisions based on an anticipated income. They had sought loans from banks to do other things on the basis of that, and then discovered that their whole economic and business plans were completely frustrated when the scheme was arbitrarily changed part-way through.
The Minister will also have to be aware that similar schemes have now been introduced in the Republic of Ireland, and the scheme has gone on here in Britain unabated.
Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)
I remind the noble Lord, Lord Empey, that he has a very authoritative voice on this subject, but he is effectively speaking in a gap which we have created for him, so perhaps he could draw his remarks to a swift conclusion.
Lord Empey
I will just say to the Minister, regarding the mitigation that was raised, that I put an amendment into the Act which required a report to be made by 1 December. Given that Parliament will not be sitting on 1 December, can the Minister tell us when that report will be published and what effect the gap of the election will have in regard to the process of ensuring that those mitigation measures are put in place? Otherwise, very significant hardship will be inflicted on many thousands of people. I would be grateful if the Minister could do that in his response.
Lord Murphy of Torfaen (Lab)
My Lords, obviously, the Opposition will support the Bill, albeit reluctantly, because we know why it is in front of us and why it is being dealt with so swiftly. I regret that we have to do this—I think the whole House does—but without it, there would be no money and so we must pass it today, as the House of Commons did yesterday.
Members of your Lordships’ House raised a number of individual issues which I am sure the Minister will address in his wind-up speech. The mitigation of welfare reforms was raised extensively yesterday in the other place, as it has been by my noble friend Lady Lister in this House. We would be grateful for the Minister’s views on something that affects some 35,000 people in Northern Ireland.
The noble Lords, Lord Lexden and Lord Empey, both raised the issue of the RHI. We look forward to the Minister’s comment on that difficult issue. My noble friend Lord Hain raised the issue of progress on the historical institutional abuse Bill. We look forward to the Minister’s comments, and later this afternoon we will have a bit more detail on that.
One issue mentioned yesterday in the other place which has not been touched on today is that of Barnett consequentials. As the Minister knows, if, during the course of a year, the Government decide to spend money which they had not planned to spend, the devolved Administrations get a proportion of that and it is up to the Administrations themselves to decide how to distribute that money. As there are no Ministers, it cannot be distributed. What has happened to that money and what plans are there to deal with Barnett consequentials?
There is also the absence of proper scrutiny of billions of pounds worth of expenditure in Northern Ireland. We will have spent half an hour on it, and the other place spent about an hour. An hour and a half to deal with the expenditure of billions of pounds is not good enough. The reason for all this, as every Member who has spoken has said, is that there is no Assembly or Executive in Belfast. There were pleas of a sort today for direct rule. That would be an answer, but it would be an inadequate one because, as I have said many times in this Chamber, it is easy to get into direct rule but very difficult to get out of it.
What we have now is a halfway house: semi-direct rule via remote control from London, with no Ministers with direct control over the Northern Ireland Civil Service or decision-making, but a sort of control here in Westminster. That is not good enough and it cannot carry on. Northern Ireland is the only part of our country which is inadequately governed because of what has happened. In the next 10 or 15 minutes, we will consider the statutory instrument regarding further progress in the talks. We must accept the Bill: we have no option but to agree it, but, as I said in my introduction, we do so reluctantly.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
My Lords, I welcome the support from across the House for the Bill. However, I have no wish to be standing here moving it and I recognise that your Lordships have no wish to be sitting here listening to me doing so. I fully appreciate that this will not be possible again.
The Executive formation statutory instrument that we shall consider shortly hereafter reminds us that there is a period until 13 January for the formation of an Executive. If we are unable to do that, I think that this House and the other place will be very reluctant to extend the period further. That will bring us into new territory in terms of what needs to happen next. I should have thought that, at that stage, there will then be an election in Northern Ireland. A lot will depend on its outcome: if an Executive can be formed, we are out of a hole; if it cannot, we are in a hole. Noble Lords here recognise what direct rule would look like and why it is not a preference that we wish to explore. None the less, we are discussing a budget, and certain questions were asked regarding both the budget and more broadly. I will try to answer them in turn.
Touching on comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Empey, both today and in the past, the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, asked whether there has been an increase in funding for the health service. There has been an increase of 3.8% in that funding. However, as the noble Lord conceded, the reality is that that amount of money has not been adequate to address the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Empey, which require more than a 3.8% increase in funding. Although we have put a further £17 million into an in-year monitoring exercise, that too is inadequate to address these significant problems. Only an incoming Executive, or government by other means, can truly address these issues. The shocking statistic presented yesterday by the noble Lord, Lord Empey, and echoed again today by other noble Lords, is chilling to consider. That alone should be reason enough for the parties in Northern Ireland to give due consideration to expediting their ability to get that Executive back up and running—I hope that it is. None the less, this budget must go forward.
I want briefly to touch on the renewable heating incentive. In March, I made statements in the light of a heated but sensible debate in this place about the need for independent assessment of the hardship in Northern Ireland as a consequence of the subsequent and serious failures in developing a workable approach to RHI. I made a number of commitments then. I am reminded of the quotation from the Duke of Wellington when he chaired his first Cabinet meeting. He said that he gave them the orders and discovered that they wanted to discuss them. I said very clearly what I felt was appropriate for the Northern Ireland Civil Service to move forward with, but I cannot order the Northern Ireland Civil Service to move forward on that basis. A protracted discussion then ensued on how to move this issue forward. Steps have been taken, some of which I will rehearse now, but I commit to writing to my noble friend Lord Lexden and placing in the Library a full and detailed assessment of this issue by tomorrow. I will share that assessment, because noble Lords deserve it and should have had it before now.
Let me put on record where we are on this approach. The responsible department in Northern Ireland held a call for evidence between 17 June and 10 July to examine the issues that should be brought forward for discussion. It published the responses to the consultation on 10 October. It has appointed an independent energy consultant by the name of, I think, Andrew Buglass. His responsibility will be to develop relevant definitions of “hardship” and engage directly with the participants, so that each case will be examined to ensure that we have that information. We expect that that will be responded to before the end of the year.
I will put all this in a detailed response to my noble friend Lord Lexden, to make sure that he has the information. I put on record an apology for this not happening beforehand—he deserved it before now. I should have informed the House of the steps being taken before the debate, rather than doing so now. I hope that noble Lords will accept the apology in the manner in which it is given.
Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown
Can the Minister tell the House whether there is any clarity on the differential between the tariff proposed for Northern Ireland and the tariffs in England and the Republic of Ireland?
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I believe that there is clarity there. I have answered that question before but, again, for the benefit of all, I will make sure that that information is included in my answer to ensure that there is an appreciation of how the tariff in Northern Ireland sits alongside tariffs in the rest of the British Isles, so that it can be understood. The noble Lord will recall that when we discussed this issue, we looked at different elements which created the need for differential tariffs for particular time periods and baselines. Rather than explaining this at greater length, I will put it in the response that I will lodge in the Library tomorrow.
Yesterday, the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, asked about welfare and I believe that I gave a positive response. She has subsequently written to me and I will respond in a similarly positive manner. I do not wish to see a situation develop in Northern Ireland where those who are experiencing these challenges and facing potential hardship suffer in any way—I repeat, in any way—as a consequence of the absence of an Executive. I will happily share that letter with noble Lords. I will put a copy in the Library, so that they can see what I believe we should be doing to ensure not only that we address this matter expeditiously but that the people of Northern Ireland can appreciate that it will be done, so they will not face the hardship which might indeed have been on the horizon had we not been able to move forward in this regard.
On the role of an incoming Executive, it is not going to be easy for them because in truth, a number of the bigger problems—not least in the health service and education—stem from before the collapse of the previous Executive; they did not start with the collapse of this one. There are long-standing issues which have not been addressed for a range of reasons, and there will be a serious challenge for any incoming Executive or whomsoever has to administer governance in Northern Ireland. For obvious reasons, I hope that it is an incoming Executive, but I am aware that there is only so long that this can continue. I have made a number of statements about this in the past and events have made a liar of me. I do not wish to repeat those statements, but I shall repeat a simple one: the people of Northern Ireland deserve much better than they have got, and we have to move forward in a sensible manner.
The noble Lord, Lord McCrea, asked why certain issues have been taken forward in this place and not others. The only thing I would note is that if we end up with direct rule, I am afraid that this House and the other place will decide which issues are going to be taken forward and in what order. I do not believe that that is the right way forward at all, and it may well be that they do not marry up with the situation in Northern Ireland, even though I would wish it to be so. That is a portent and a warning.
The noble Lord, Lord Murphy, raised the question of the Barnett consequentials. I do not have the exact answer but I will find out and report back to the noble Lord if he will allow me to do so.
If I have failed to address any particular issue, I will happily write to noble Lords.
Lord Lexden
Can my noble friend give the House any information about the publication of the independent report on the inquiry?
Lord Duncan of Springbank
My noble friend has reminded me of something that I could not find in my written notes. I cannot give an exact date, but he will be aware that we published our own report on that. I shall use the word loosely, but I hope that its publication is imminent. I think it has reached the stage where it can be published and that now, it is just a question of when. The moment I am aware of the publication date, I will ensure that noble Lords are given it so that they are aware of it. I do not want to keep it a secret; it is just that I do not have the information.
Lord Hain
Perhaps the noble Lord would follow up on our previous exchange, and I apologise to noble Lords for briefly pursuing this. It is my understanding, based on recent discussions I have had at the Bar of the House with Members of Parliament, including MPs from Northern Ireland, that business managers in the Commons are telling them that there is no time to take the remaining stages of the Historical Institutional Abuse (Northern Ireland) Bill. If that is the case, perhaps I may put two things on the record. First, that is not right. To use the excuse of electing the Speaker on Monday as a reason not to take through the Bill is unacceptable. If it means MPs sitting for a few hours more on Monday, they must do so in order in to protect the victims of historical institutional abuse because they have suffered horrendously.
The other procedural option—I have checked this, and I am a former Leader of the Commons—is that a First Reading in the Commons could take place. It could then go into the wash-up period. I have been told for a fact by Members of the Labour Opposition that they will support it, as will the DUP, Lady Sylvia Hermon, the Liberal Democrats and, I am sure, the SNP, so it could receive Royal Assent. The information that MPs have been given that there is no time for Royal Assent is nonsense. Royal Assent could be given at any time before Dissolution formally takes place. I am sorry to burden the House with this, but it is important to put it on the record.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
The noble Lord brings information to the House that I am not privy to. I have not had a chance to speak with business managers in the other place. I will be disappointed if his recitation of the details is correct, but I can say only that I do not know the answer because I have not had an opportunity to find out. We will return to that Bill later on this afternoon, when I will have more information. At that point, time having allowed me to have the necessary discussions with the other place, I will be in a better position, I hope, to answer the very questions that he raised.
Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown
The Minister will accept that, if what the noble Lord was told by the other House is put into operation, that will be totally unacceptable to the people of Northern Ireland and to both Houses. I listened to the debate in the other House following a question to the Prime Minister and I have read the debates in this House on the issue, and there is unanimity on getting this matter resolved. Where there is a will, there is always a way. If there is not a way to push this through, it is because somewhere in the system, whether in the other House or within the Government, it seems there is not the will.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I do not doubt the resolve of this House in any manner, nor do I doubt the resolve of the cross-party approach to this matter. That was made very clear yesterday and in the exchanges thus far in this debate, and I expect it will be made clear in the debate to follow. On that basis, all I can say is that I will go away, find out more and bring back to noble Lords information that I hope will help everyone to appreciate what is going on.
Lord Murphy of Torfaen
The Opposition is entirely behind my noble friend on this, but could the Minister look at the point that he made about the wash-up? As long as we pass the Bill later and First Reading is taken in the other place—nothing happens; it is simply received—it could go into the wash-up and be given Royal Assent. That is the specific thing that we are asking the Minister to do between now and 4.30 pm.
Lord Duncan of Springbank
I am happy to take on that commission from the noble Lord. I will report back on the question of the wash-up and provide any information that I have at that point.
Returning very briefly to the Bill before us, I beg to move.
Royal Assent
Thursday 31st October 2019
(4 years, 5 months ago)
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