Northern Ireland (Stormont Agreement and Implementation Plan) Bill

Debate between Gavin Robinson and Mark Durkan

Monday 22nd February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

I join my right hon. and hon. Friends and colleagues in acknowledging the presence of the hon. Member for Tewkesbury (Mr Robertson), who is diligent as the Chair of the Select Committee. He has suffered a close personal loss in the untimely death of Mark Calway and he has the sympathy of all of us. I also acknowledge the message of sympathy from my hon. Friend the Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie), which I will pass on to my sister.

This Bill takes forward aspects of what has been called the fresh start agreement. I said at the time that an undue amount of political Febreze had been attached to that particular agreement, because it was not as widely agreed as the photograph on the front of Library briefing paper for this Bill would suggest. It implies that all the parties were agreed, but we and the Alliance party have made it clear that we see most of the agreement as being between Sinn Féin, the Democratic Unionist party and the British and Irish Governments.

That does not mean that the rest of us did not make significant contributions to the discussions. My hon. Friend is right to point out that, while other parties said a lot in front of the cameras about how the issue of paramilitarism had to be brought to a head, mine was the only party to make substantive contributions, on paper, on how to progress. We suggested a whole enforcement approach, because many parties and people believed that a blind eye was being turned to different levels of criminal activity and that bye-balls were being given to particular people. There was a feeling that the Governments were happy to allow some crime to continue, essentially on the basis that it related to personal assets. Even if those assets and criminal activities derived from former paramilitary activities and associations, they were somehow deemed not to be political any more.

When we asked the relevant authorities about those assets and activities in the past, we were told that they were being treated as personal and family issues, not as political or organisational matters. Many parties have raised that issue and it has been discussed in previous debates in this House, including by some hon. Members sitting behind me. It relates to fuel laundering, various aspects of smuggling and, indeed, environmental crime, which involves significant quantities of illegal and hazardous waste. Clearly, there are vestiges of former paramilitary associations and a hangover or nexus of certain paramilitary groups or people who were formerly associated with such groups.

Although we advocated a whole enforcement approach, I acknowledge that both Governments were adamant in the negotiations that no blind eye was being turned and that all the relevant agencies, both individually and collectively, were pursuing everything possible. The Governments accepted, however, that perhaps there needed to be even more visibility and that they needed to be more vocal. That is why the commitments emphasise the role of the cross-border taskforce and similar efforts.

We also advocated a whole community approach, because that is what is needed if the north is going to achieve a wholesome society free of all the abnormalities of paramilitary traces and the other divisions that are a hangover of the past. In fact, our paper said:

“Political parties ought to be showing coherent and consistent shared standards which recognise and repudiate nefarious paramilitary interests and involvements. This should reflect a shared approach which is about rooting out paramilitarism and its trace activities, not just singling out particular groups or given parties.

Parties should unite in adhering to a whole-community approach to achieving a wholesome community free of sectarianism, communal division and vicious vestiges of ongoing paramilitarism. A whole community approach should entail more than challenging paramilitary practices or presences in our own constituency or highlighting them in someone else’s. It should mean that we all see pernicious paramilitary activity in any corner of the north as an affront to the wholesome democratic society we should want as this generation’s legacy to the next.

Deep cleansing the spectrum of residual orbits and habits of paramilitarism should be a key dimension in any programme for cohesion, sharing and integration in a healthily united community.

The converse is also pertinent. We cannot eradicate the recurrence of, or recourse to, paramilitarism in given settings without overcoming divisions, tensions, apprehensions and grievances which paramilitaries convert to their own utility.”

In calling for that whole community approach, we posited the idea of parties making new declarations and suggested something along the lines of the Mitchell principles or the Nolan principles of public life. We wanted every party to make meaningful pledges and to adhere to clear commitments, but, as my hon. Friend has said, the Bill does not provide for that. There is no guarantee that the representatives of all the parties will unite around and adhere to any pledges. Instead, the Bill adds to the pledge of office for Ministers and creates a parallel pledge for Members of the Legislative Assembly.

Whenever there have been controversies regarding whether parties have been consorting or engaging with paramilitaries, the allegation has related not just to MLAs or Ministers, but to councillors. Are councillors not bound by the standards of the pledge in the same way as they are to their commitment to non-violence? We are debating this proposed legislation, so should it not also apply to MPs, or are they free of the standards? They apply to MLAs and to Ministers, but not to others. We need a more articulate approach than the pledges as they appear in the Bill.

The hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon) is right to point out that there is no way of enforcing or arbitrating with regard to any dispute or controversy. That applies not just to the pledge taken by MLAs; it applies very directly to the pledge of office taken by Ministers, because there is no means of arbitrating on alleged breaches of the ministerial code. The Executive have no means of doing that. The First Minister and Deputy First Minister have still not suggested a clear way of investigating and making judgments on alleged breaches of the ministerial code. People can take each other to court alleging breaches of the ministerial code, but the Executive have no sensible, clear or credible mechanism to address the issue, even though that is what is needed.

A similar mechanism is also needed for the Assembly in order to decide whether an issue should go to the Committee on Standards and Privileges or elsewhere. It is not good enough to leave the decision to Standing Orders. The issue should be subject to a higher-order political decision, rather than be decided by the Assembly’s Committee on Procedures when it considers Standing Orders. That was the mistake made many years ago in the original Northern Ireland Act 1998. The provisions around the petition of concern in paragraphs 11 to 13 of the Good Friday agreement were very particular about how limited the use of petitions of concern was to be. Petitions of concern were to be used selectively in instances where people alleged that there had been a breach, or that there was an issue of human rights or equality. A mechanism would be set up on the basis of petitions of concern to test that issue, and then things would proceed.

Unfortunately, rather than providing for what was in the Good Friday agreement, the legislation simply stated that Standing Orders would provide for the devices that were mentioned in paragraphs 11 to 13. That was never done right, which is why we have the situation that the hon. Member for Tewkesbury complained about. We have a wide open, drive-by, veto-style petition of concern, which has been used on a tit-for-tat basis and often frivolously.

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

The hon. Gentleman has made a strong point about the principles that should be in play in public life. Is there not a certain irony in the fact that his colleagues in the Northern Ireland Assembly have, alongside Sinn Féin, this evening signed a petition of concern to retain and enshrine religious discrimination in the selection of teachers in the Province?

[Mark Durkan]

My colleagues have signed a petition of concern against a current proposal. [Interruption.] It is a matter of trying to protect existing laws and not change them rashly before an election. The DUP has cited that in relation to other matters. It is about defending the existing equality provisions. What happens with a petition of concern should be what was decided under the Good Friday agreement. Rather than that being the end of the matter, it should be the subject of an investigation by a specially appointed committee to see what issues of rights and equality are involved, to test those issues and to allow the matter to proceed. That is how it should have been, as per the agreement. That has been our consistent position on how petitions of concern should properly be dealt with; they should not be abused as they have been.

I turn to the pledge of office by Ministers and the undertaking by Members of the Assembly. The commitment is confined to Ministers and Members of the Assembly, and does not extend to other party politicians. In addition, the pledge of office requires Ministers

“to work collectively with the other members of the Executive Committee to achieve a society free of paramilitarism”.

I would hope that the Ministers’ commitment would extend much further than simply to working with their ministerial colleagues. Similarly, the commitment of Assembly Members should extend further than just to working with their Assembly colleagues.

There is also the question of what some of the terms mean. The hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) was right to point out the final sub-pledge in the pledge of office by Ministers and the undertaking by Assembly Members, which is

“to accept no authority, direction or control on my political activities other than my democratic mandate alongside my own personal and party judgment”.

In the same pledge of office, Ministers pledge to be bound by decisions of the Assembly and the Executive Committee. The final sub-pledge appears to contradict that, so there is potential tension there. In addition, if we fill the gap that the hon. Member for North Down mentioned by creating clear standards and sanctions, people will have to accept some trammelling of their political conduct, because they will be listening to others as to what the due standards of behaviour and engagement should be. I think that there is a problem, which the hon. Member for Gedling was right to identify.

I want to take up the point that my hon. Friend the Member for South Down mentioned about the second to last of the sub-pledges, which is

“to support those who are determined to make the transition away from paramilitarism”.

That might seem to be fair enough as a general statement of support, but what does it mean in practice? Are there potential tensions between that and other parts of the pledge, such as the commitment

“to challenge paramilitary attempts to control communities”

and

“to challenge all paramilitary activity and associated criminality”?

The right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Mr Donaldson) earlier questioned whether some of the former paramilitary personalities who have talked a lot about their positive contribution to the peace process have been more laggardly in relation to certain standards and practices, and whether they have turned a blind eye to certain things.

The question therefore arises of whether or not, when we criticise or challenge such people, we will be accused of not supporting those who are determined to make the transition away from paramilitarism. Many people use as a justification for their demands for funding for particular schemes—jobs for the boys, set-ups and all the rest of those things—that they are all about weaning people away from paramilitarism. Other people in the community sometimes challenge that by questioning why they were not interviewed for posts that had become available in community organisations or whatever, while other people were interviewed. We need to look at such issues.

We should remember the very glaring example involving my hon. Friend the Member for South Down. When she was a Minister, she decided to cease her Department’s funding of the conflict transformation initiative because the Chief Constable and other senior police officers made it very clear that those in the Ulster Defence Association, which was essentially funded and supported by the conflict transformation initiative, were up to their necks in a series of high-profile crimes. The Chief Constable made that clear, and high-profile criminal activity was taking place at the time. My hon. Friend brought that to the Executive, which told her she had to decide because it was a matter for her Department. However, when she made her decision, they changed their ideas. Members of other parties said, “Oh, no. The conflict transformation initiative is supporting people who are trying to make the transition away from paramilitarism,” while as far as others were concerned, the money was going to support and indulge people who were up to their necks in crime at that time. Which was it?

There are potential tensions in how any of us might interpret the pledge and the undertaking in clauses 7 and 8. We could take them in very different directions, so work is needed to refine them and define them better. We must also ensure that somebody else can arbitrate, because otherwise there will be a lot of arguments between the parties on such issues. The one thing we do not want is for parties to end up arguing with each other about who opposes aspects of paramilitarism either now or historically. The more united and coherent the parties can be seen to be, the better.

We want to make sure that that applies at all levels to resolve many of the existing issues. If there are controversies about party politicians turning up at particular events or protests that paramilitaries are also attending, we need to be able to deal with such issues. We must ensure that the pledge governs what happens when there are other controversies, such as the naming of the play park that has often been mentioned in this Chamber. It should be clear that we have an absolutely coherent pledge relating to paramilitary practices, either historical or current, and that we all have the same yardstick. That would provide protection for all individual politicians put under pressure at community level to get involved in this, that or the other, or to lend their presence to an event. A proper, articulate and robust pledge could give us a lot in that respect.

There are other issues about the Bill that I want to mention, before I touch on what is not in it. As hon. Members have said, the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister will appoint members of the independent reporting commission. In the fresh start agreement the reference was to the Executive, but the Bill makes it clear and explicit that the power lies with the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister. I share the view of other hon. Members that that needs to be the subject of wider consideration and consultation. There are also issues to consider about the Secretary of State’s powers in respect of the commission. The fact that the Secretary of State will be in charge of defining and possibly changing many interpretations means that more work and consideration is needed.

I want to make a few points about clause 9, which is about draft budgets. The Government say they have included the clause because they want to ensure greater transparency and sustainability in relation to the budget. I am all for transparency in budgets, as I was when I had the job of the Minister of Finance and Personnel. In various talks, the Social Democratic and Labour party has advocated going much further on budget transparency. As well as designing the whole procedure for a fairly transparent process of draft budgets that are fully considered in the Assembly, open to public consultation and then subject to the revised budget procedure, we have advocated in various talks, going right back to Leeds castle, the idea that after the revised budget is approved by the Assembly, each departmental Minister should, within a number of weeks, make a statement about their own spending plan and be fully answerable to the Assembly on how they will deliver it. We thought that that would add to the transparency, but it was not to the taste of many of the parties that were talking a lot about transparency. I remember Peter Robinson telling me, “We don’t want that much transparency—that would be just too much.” I think there should be transparency in how the Assembly follows up on budgets.

Under clause 9, a statement will be laid before the Assembly about the amount of UK funding to be allocated. Will the Secretary of State consider accepting an amendment to take that further by saying that the statement should specify exactly how the Northern Ireland Barnett allocation was calculated? That would allow people in the Assembly, and Members here, to see exactly how the spending amount for Northern Ireland had been determined on the basis of spending commitments here and, possibly, on the basis of legislation and legislative requirements that had gone through this place. We would be able to see whether the two correlated.

A key argument that the Scottish National party and my party made in relation to English votes for English laws was that England-only or England and Wales-only legislation that goes through this place will inform the spending plans for England or England and Wales, and will, in turn, be factored into the Barnett formula. Therefore, let us have transparency. The Government tried to tell us that no legislation has those sorts of spending consequences. That is funny, because the same Government usually say, when they reject amendments to Bills, that they are doing so because there would be budgetary consequences. So they will not take amendments to legislation because there would be budgetary consequences, but with English votes for English laws they pretend that legislation does not have budgetary consequences.

The Government might be right, or we might be right. The way to prove who is right and to establish the facts in the future is to take the transparency provision a bit further. It should not be hard to colour in the budget statement a bit more. Rather than being just a brief outline statement, it should be well coloured in, whether in respect of the draft budget or the subsequent statement that comes with the revised budget. If people want transparency, that would be a good addition to the Bill.

There is a question over whether one intention behind the statement is that it can be used, in effect, as a budget cap. The Government say that it is about transparency and sustainability. However, when the Corporation Tax (Northern Ireland) Bill was debated, the Financial Secretary to the Treasury said that the switch-on power would be activated only when the Treasury was satisfied that there was a balanced and sustainable budget. Some of us asked in the Bill Committee whether the Treasury would use that power to make a judgment on the spending plans of the Executive in relation to other matters, such as student finance, water charges or prescription charges. After all, the Treasury was using the Assembly’s failure to pass the welfare reform legislation to make the judgment that there was not a balanced and sustainable budget. The Financial Secretary said, “We will judge a budget on the sum of its parts.” He did not rule out the Government using the power to involve themselves in those other matters.

One reason why I welcome the provisions of clause 9 on draft budgets is that they settle a point that arose after the Assembly budget in 2008, when Peter Robinson was the Minister for Finance and Personnel. We tried to amend that budget and the programme for government, and we voted against aspects of it. A few months later, Peter Robinson announced that because the budget had contained indicative figures for 2009 and 2010, draft budgets did not need to be tabled before the Assembly in the subsequent years. The procedures that were laid down in the 1998 Act were clearly predicated on an annual financial exercise, but he said that he had received legal advice that the requirement for that exercise before each financial year had been discharged by covering the figures for all three years in the 2008 budget.

We challenged that at the time and took it to the Speaker of the Assembly. Unfortunately, he did not rule but said it was up to us to make a legal challenge. The flaky advice given by Peter Robinson was followed by that of his successor as Minister of Finance and Personnel, the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds), who said that the draft budget exercise was not needed. Clause 9 is clear that it will be an annual exercise. There is absolutely no ambiguity or doubt in how it is framed: it is an annual exercise. A draft budget has to be tabled and debated fully every year, with an additional statement made ahead of it. We are glad that that is set out in the Bill. It may restore the Assembly’s role in transparency, which needs to be amplified. The Assembly should be doing much more scrutiny of budgets and spending; that should not just be left to bodies outside the Assembly.

Members have raised issues not covered in the Bill, and the Secretary of State, in her opening remarks, addressed issues relating to legacy. Like my colleagues, I regret that, rather than our ending up with an all-party agreement, welfare reform was agreed by the three amigos of Sinn Féin, the Tories and the DUP—the austerity alliance. This Bill is now being brought forward, and we await the legacy legislation. It is important that it is not rushed. It is also important that we give some issues full consideration again. I recognise that the Secretary of State thinks the measure of agreement apparent around the table at Stormont House was the highest degree of agreement there has been. I would make the point, however, that Eames-Bradley offered a much better prospectus for dealing with the past. So did the Haass proposals, although not as good as Eames-Bradley. They were watered down in the Stormont House agreement, and they have been watered down further in a number of respects.

Victims’ groups have their own concerns, upsets and apprehensions about some of the issues involved. I ask them, and all parties, to consider all the issues in the round, not least with respect to the potential to deal with what have now been called “thematics”. It is hugely important that the historical investigations units is set up to undertake the work formerly done by the Historical Enquiries Team and the work on the past done by the police ombudsman, but we should recognise that the HIU will be confined to looking at killings. We should also recognise that it will work, a bit like the HET, on the basis of reports being provided to the families. Those reports will then be treated as the private property of the families.

Many cases, however, are linked. There are wider patterns, themes and issues at stake, not all of which relate to killings, and many of them need to be scrutinised and given an airing. In many ways, we think that would help to answer some of the questions put by the right hon. Member for Lagan Valley. He says that there is an unbalanced approach to the past, and that those who are seeking the truth and want the past to be investigated are concentrating entirely on what the state did and not on what paramilitary actors did. The whole question of thematics and patterns in those investigations could lead to more balance, which is why we in the SDLP in particular put such emphasis on that.

I recall that in the Haass negotiations, Richard Haass himself replied to points that the right hon. Member for Lagan Valley made about a failed market in relation to the past, whereby people with the means and the motives were pursuing the aspects of the past that interested them, while others were being left aside. He argued that thematics was one way of evening the situation up and ensuring that other pictures and other concerns were looked at.

Northern Ireland (Welfare Reform) Bill

Debate between Gavin Robinson and Mark Durkan

Monday 23rd November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mark Durkan]

Several of them were. Some would have had cost implications, but many were cost-neutral. That was one of the arguments that the Minister made at the time. We checked whether the British Government were consulted by the Minister or anybody else and asked whether there would be a problem if the amendments were passed, but the British Government made it clear that they were not consulted and that they had not acted against our amendments in any way. They were not saying that our amendments would have threatened to derail the Stormont House agreement or were in any way in breach of it. It was entirely the decision of Sinn Féin and the DUP to veto our amendments by the petition of concern and by voting against them.

You will not want me to anticipate the Committee stage too much, Madam Deputy Speaker, but the fact is that the amendments we have tabled for the Committee stage capture some of those same amendments. I ask people to read those amendments in the light of what my hon. Friend the Member for South Down has said because they would not derail or damage the Bill.

On the wider politics of this matter I can perhaps reach some agreement with the hon. Member for North Antrim, because they involve a strange change of position on the part of Sinn Féin. All along, Sinn Féin said that it was going to oppose welfare reform completely. All along, it said that no claimant—now or in the future—would be a penny worse off as a result of any changes. SDLP Members said that we could not subscribe to that position. We said that could not pretend that we could guarantee by any tactics, in the Assembly or here, that we could protect every last penny of benefit for any existing claimant or any new claimants into the future. We were very clear, honest and honourable about that.

Sinn Féin election posters this year were on the theme of “Stop the Tory cuts”. Some of us said that Sinn Féin was in no position to stop Tory cuts unless it was in a position to stop a Tory Government, and, as a party that does not take up its seats, that was not going to happen. It was nonsense, but that is what Sinn Féin said. We were told by Conor Murphy:

“The Tories have no mandate in the north for their cuts agenda. The local parties need to make it clear that Tory cuts to public services and the welfare state are unacceptable.”

Now, apparently, those Tory cuts to the welfare state are acceptable to Sinn Féin. Martin McGuiness told us:

“I am not prepared to preside over the austerity agenda that the British government are inflicting on our executive. My conscience would not allow me to do it.”

Well, he has got over his conscience now, and he is quite happy; perhaps he is pretending to himself that he is not presiding over it by virtue of having handed the power to Westminster. I may now receive a voice-activated intervention from the Minister, who will tell us that the power has not been handed over and that Westminster will have a parallel, or concurrent, legislative power, which Stormont will also have. There will be a power switch on both walls, but only the power switch on the Westminster wall will be activated and used for the next 13 months during which, after the Bill is passed, a series of orders and regulations will be made.

We have been told about the sunset clause. Sinn Féin seems to be allowing some people to suggest, in social media, that it is a very clever thing, and that a big line is to be drawn in the sand at the end of 2016, because many of the more nefarious and controversial aspects of the current Welfare Reform and Work Bill are meant to kick in in 2017. The sunset clause, however, will apply only to the decision-making powers that are now being taken by the Secretary of State. It will not apply to the content or effect of any of the decisions that are made by him or her. All the changes that are made in direct rule legislation here, in Orders in Council and in other instruments, will still apply in 2017 and beyond.

We have heard many references to the Assembly’s legislative consent motion. We should bear in mind that it includes the words

“approves the welfare clauses of the Welfare Reform and Work Bill as initially introduced at Westminster”.

Some of us did not approve those clauses as they were initially introduced; we argued against them, and voted against them. I recall members of the DUP expressing concerns about some of those clauses, voting against them, and voting for amendments. Unusually, the legislative consent motion did not even make provision for amendments. Other such motions have not just allowed Westminster to pass a Bill, but allowed amendments to be tabled. For some reason, this motion precluded that.

Many of us are in difficulty because we are being asked, on Second Reading, to approve matters on which we have already voiced and recorded our disapproval. That applies not just to the SDLP, but to a number of other parties. We are being told to do that because it will be the great deal that will move everything forward. Members have touched on other aspects of the deal, but my concern relates directly to the Bill.

I am certainly not saying that we should set aside the mitigations and the other measures that have been so carefully agreed to. Indeed, I think that we should have done more work on those. I also think—I raised this at Stormont House in 2014—that we need to think, collectively, about whether there is the proper demarcation between Westminster and the Assembly in relation to welfare reform.

Perhaps we should look at what has been happening in Scotland. I am not suggesting that we should adopt an exact model of the Scotland Bill, but I think we should take account of some of the issues and ideas that have flowed from those debates. I think we should look to the longer term, and ensure that we do not fall into the trap of either allowing karaoke legislation to be pushed through the Assembly as a result of “budget bullying”, or creating the potential for political crises. There is a different delineation in the scope of the devolution of welfare in Scotland. I think that we may need to examine what is happening there, given the emphasis that many Members here have placed on some of the most sensitive benefits in Northern Ireland, relating to disabilities and other long-term conditions including mental ill health.

It was part of the original Stormont House deal in 2014 that parties would be prepared to look at how wider issues of devolution—not just tax, but benefits—were being handled elsewhere, with the aim of securing a more sustainable adjustment for the future. If we want to avoid the spasmodic crises in which parties end up trying to find a brink on which to teeter every time there is disagreement about important issues such as these, we may need to do something else.

When I raised the need to ensure that we were in a better position in the future and suggested ways of dealing with the medium to longer-term issues, I did not receive much support from members of other parties. The First Minister merely said that my problem was seeing around too many corners too early, and that perhaps we should just let some things go and they would be all right when we got to them. The fact is, however, that we anticipated a great deal of difficulty with welfare reform, which is why we argued for a different approach in the Assembly all those years ago, as well as here. We have been proved right, to the extent that, if we had all taken a different course together, we might be in a better position.

The Bill gives the Secretary of State power not just to translate the rules in relation to benefits from the 2012 Act, but, as the Minister has indicated, to prepare an Order in Council to translate proposals in the Welfare Reform and Work Bill. The legislative consent motion refers to “the welfare clauses”. I note that the shadow Secretary of State did not receive an answer to his very fair question, which my party colleagues also asked in the Assembly last week: what exactly is meant by “the welfare clauses”? Some Members seem to believe that they do not include tax credits, but the Treasury now counts tax credits as welfare for many purposes, including the welfare cap. We have different notions of welfare, and the welfare measures in that Bill are not restricted to conventional social security benefits; they extend to tax credits as well. We have a right to more clarity, and I hope that the shadow Secretary of State will receive a clear answer to his question.

This has been a bit confusing. When my hon. Friend the Member for South Down pointed out that not all the tax credit losses would be covered by this package, we were told that tax credits were nothing to do with it because they did not constitute devolved welfare. At the same time, however, DUP Members have claimed that the mitigation on tax credits has been the significant part of the deal, and the main justification for accepting it. They cannot have it both ways. They cannot say that it must be counted for the purpose of one side of the argument, but not for the purpose of another side.

In response to the challenge presented by the fact that some are not prepared to work for consensus, the Secretary of State may well confirm that in the Stormont House talks we made it clear that we wanted all the parties to agree that the Institute for Fiscal Studies should be invited to provide us with a quick regional analysis of the implications of the Welfare Reform and Work Bill and the tax credit changes. That would also test the Secretary of State’s argument at the time that the Welfare Reform and Work Bill was a good deal for Northern Ireland—she used exactly the same words she is using for this Bill for the Welfare Reform and Work Bill, before the Government were moved to say they would amend it or mitigate it in some way. On these measures, she said that we needed to take account of the changes in terms of the tax thresholds and the national living wage that would make good the loss. We were saying, “Let’s get the IFS to do this so we’re not just relying on figures from our own officials in the Department for Social Development or anywhere else.” Again, however—surprise, surprise—the SDLP put forward an idea for all the parties to go with, that was informed and would have been neutral and constructive, but it was not supported. That was not for lack of action by us to try to take a consensus approach and make sure all parties have a better-informed approach in that regard.

We were being told by the Secretary of State—Sinn Féin and the SDLP in particular were being told this—both publicly from the Dispatch Box and in the talks that there would not be a deal on the past if there was not a deal on welfare reform. It was said that welfare reform had to be settled and move forward or else there would be no progress on the past. But now we have a deal that gives us welfare reform moving forward in the way the Government want—entirely in the Government’s hands—and we do not have a deal on the past moving forward. People want to know how that came about; it is not only the victims who want to know that.

When we listen to Sinn Féin on this, it tells us, on the past, “No deal is better than a bad deal,” but then we ask them about welfare reform, and they tell us, “A bad deal is better than no deal.” It is a complete contradiction; the only consistency is Sinn Féin’s inconsistency and lack of principle. Of course Sinn Fein might well try to tell us, “Oh no, we’ve delivered on our promise,” because Gerry Adams’s big promise was, “No one will have a reduction to any benefit under the control of the Assembly or the Executive.” So how does Gerry keep his promise? He removes it from the control of the Assembly or Executive and hands it to direct rule.

We must remember that it is direct rule we are giving; it is going back to the old Order in Council position. Such measures cannot be amended—indeed, the sponsoring legislation for the system we have tonight cannot even be amended either, unfortunately, because of the way the allocation of time motion works. That is what we are stuck with; that is the choice Sinn Féin has made and it has yet to explain adequately why.

Sinn Féin does not have the protections it says it wants, therefore, and it now tries to pretend that we are in a completely new situation because of 8 July—because the Chancellor announced a Budget on 8 July that changed everything and threatened a lot more people. We all knew there was going to be a Budget on 8 July. In fairness, Sinn Fein, like ourselves, pointed out during the election, and even back last year at Stormont House, that whatever package we had, if the Tories got back into government other cuts could be sought. There was speculation: sums of £12 billion or £16 billion were mentioned. We also knew that, even if Labour returned to government, it was committed to applying the welfare cap on a UK-wide basis. So we knew there were going to be difficulties. Therefore, for Sinn Féin to pretend that a completely new situation that nobody could have predicted came about with the return of the Conservative Government and the Budget of 8 July is completely wrong.

Sinn Féin’s argument back in July was that all parties should work together in facing the Government and we should join forces with Scotland and Wales as well. When some of us looked for that approach at the recent Stormont House talks, we found there were no real takers for it, not even Sinn Féin, which had advertised itself as the main sponsor and advocate of that way forward.

People will want to know why we have come to this position, therefore. They will want to know why Sinn Féin has used the so-called threat of collapse of the institutions to collapse its own position. We have known for some time that the DUP has been in something of a roll-over mode in relation to welfare reform legislation, because the DUP position has been that once the legislation went through Westminster—[Interruption.] The DUP position has been that, once the legislation went through Westminster, we have no choice but to go along with it; that has essentially been the line it has pushed in the Assembly. It also never objected to the fine and never raised any argument against it. One would think that it was almost in on it at the beginning as a tactic. The threat of a fine was never used before in relation to welfare changes, which were not always reflected in Northern Ireland on the basis of parity, but it was used this time. But essentially, the DUP’s position has been to say, “We weren’t really for that legislation when it went through Westminster”, even though there were parts of it that they did not really oppose. DUP Members actually voted down amendments from the House of Lords, including measures to protect child benefit from the benefit cap. The DUP’s position has been to say, “We have to comply with this”, whether in the name of parity or to avoid fines. It has adopted a roll-over approach.

[Gavin Robinson]

I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman is making every effort to build consensus on this issue. He has said on a number of occasions that this is “karaoke” legislation. Is he really saying that, while he is happy to follow the substance of what is being asked of him, he is having difficulty in striking the right tune?

[Mark Durkan]

The karaoke legislation is the legislation that goes through the Assembly. The Assembly is told that, in the name of parity, it has nominal legislative power, but it has to stick to the words and music set down by Whitehall; otherwise, there will be fines, penalties and threats. That kind of budget bullying would rightly not be accepted in relation to the new devolved procedures in Scotland. I am sure that the Treasury would think twice before daring to apply penalties and fines in relation to the concurrent decision-making powers that will apply under the Scotland Bill. The Minister talked about parallel powers. The Scotland Bill contains measures referring to decisions being made concurrently. Some decisions are to be made by the Secretary of State for Scotland and others by Scottish Ministers, but the clauses refer to decisions being made concurrently and to consultation. There is no suggestion that a disagreement between a Secretary of State and Scottish Ministers would result in the kind of budget penalties that have been invoked in the context of Northern Ireland. That brings me back to the point that we shall need to look at this in a wider context after we get over this particular episode.

I was making the point that the DUP has been in an acquiescent, roll-over mode for some time. The bizarre thing is that Sinn Féin is now in hand-over mode in this regard. Its best way of holding on to its position is to hand over power to the British Government—the Tory Government—and to give them direct rule in relation to these matters for 13 months. Some of us have tabled amendments that would provide a middle way, even though the DUP and Sinn Féin have already got a legislative consent motion through the Assembly. The effects of that could be mitigated if we were to pass amendments to better delineate the powers that the Secretary of State could exercise, as well as the other powers that we are told will remain seated with the Ministers in the devolved Assembly, not least those relating to the vexed question of sanctions. The hon. Member for North Antrim mentioned that in his speech.

Many people in this House have fundamental concerns about how the sanctions regime that stems from the 2012 Act operates. I have even heard Conservative MPs saying that, although they have no problem with the rationale behind the benefit changes in the Act, they have serious questions about the sanctions regime. I believe that Members from Northern Ireland and elsewhere share those concerns. Having listened to the debates on the Welfare Reform and Work Bill and the Scotland Bill this year, I know that Members have concerns about how the sanctions would apply in Scotland and elsewhere.

That is one reason why some of us are making decisions in the name of consensus. We think we are putting forward concerns that other parties have expressed, and we are trying to create a legislative answer to them and have trust in ourselves. After all, I heard the right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Mr Donaldson) saying that we should not be talking down Northern Ireland and its institutions. Some of us are trying to maintain the democratic institutions there, even if Sinn Féin and the DUP have to let some of these matters go, and we should at least ensure that we hold on to our responsibilities relating to sanctions, among other things. We have to do more than have a form of devolution that says, “Yes, we have all the power and we are making all the decisions, but this one we didn’t want. A big boy made me do it.” Sinn Féin’s answer this time is, “A big girl is going to do this for us.” I refer to “Tough Theresa”, or whatever the hon. Member for North Antrim is going to call her. That is not good enough, because if we are to give people confidence, we have to show that we are serious about using our powers when we have them and not let them go. That applies to the corporation tax power as well as to other things that other people talk about.

The final point I wish to make is about the wider aspect of the fresh start. Some of us made strong contributions about paramilitarism during the Stormont House talks. We emphasised, and shared papers with other parties about, a whole community approach to rooting out all traces and vestiges of paramilitarism in our society—not just singling out groups and singling out parties. We suggested a common declaration that should be taken by everybody. We put forward those proposals—we did not see proposals from other parties. We are glad that some of our proposals have found their way into the fresh start, but we think the proposals there could be better, stronger and more amplified. Similarly, we proposed a whole enforcement approach, covering all the policing agencies and the Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs pursuits that should be undertaken, including those on a cross-border basis. We sought a whole community approach and a whole enforcement approach.

My hon. Friend the Member for Belfast South (Dr McDonnell) has said that he was disappointed about the wider economic aspect of the package, and we see the reason for that when we compare what is in the package with the range of proposals and ideas that my party put forward and shared with other parties. I hear Conservative Members talk about the importance of reducing corporation tax so that we can compete with the south, and somebody was quoting a recent newspaper headline. We need to remember that our task in the north is not just to compete with the south with a comparable rate of corporation tax; we need to recognise that the south has built up because of its huge investment in further and higher education and in skills, and a very significant investment in infrastructure, and we are not matching that in the north. It is not there in the current programme for government and it is still not there in the vision after the fresh start. We need to be moving a lot further on that.

It is not only the south we need to be competing with; we need to recognise that as a regional economy, localities and city constituencies such as mine are having to compete with cities and city regions on this island, too, which are benefiting from things such as city deals and various other packages and measures. Although I do not buy all of the bluff and guff that goes with the whole northern powerhouse idea and so on, the fact is that significant drivers for economic growth are being given, and they are allowing cities and regions to shape things for themselves and we are leaving ourselves out of them in Northern Ireland. We should have had something in the class of city deals as part of this package, too.

Where there are positive things that allow us to move forward on issues, my party is prepared to recognise them. We are not going to be in denial about those things where there are difficulties. As ever, we need to build on what we have. We might not like exactly how we got here and we might not like the detail, but we always have to build forward—that remains our approach. As we build forward, we have to remember that the Assembly is meant to take on its responsibilities and to meet them, and it should not have been sliding over as handily as it did just to spare the blushes of Sinn Féin. The hon. Member for North Antrim says we are being too light on Sinn Féin, but we must recall why the motion has been put through here in the way it has been. We must remember why it is all being done so fast and why no amendments can be tabled. That is all designed to minimise the difficulty and the embarrassment for Sinn Féin. The timing of all this is not just to convenience the step-down by the First Minister; it is to cover and convenience the climbdown by Sinn Féin.

English Votes for English Laws

Debate between Gavin Robinson and Mark Durkan

Wednesday 15th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Robinson]

I am grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for his intervention. I was impressed and encouraged by some of the remarks that were made.

I started my speech this evening by asking the Leader of the House to convince me that I should not be fearful of this proposal, to show me that he does not believe in two tiers of MPs by removing the second tier that we already have, and to go some way to convince me as a Northern Ireland Unionist that if votes come up that are reserved because of particular Northern Ireland issues—parading was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson)—Northern Ireland will be able to have its own say. That could be an extension of the principle, but it is the same principle. If the Government were prepared to give me the same opportunity that they are seeking for themselves, I might be prepared to consider the issue further.

Scotland’s representatives will make exactly the same request: will there be Scottish votes for Scottish laws that are reserved to this House? The London Assembly has also been mentioned. Non-London MPs have the opportunity to vote on London issues, but London MPs cannot vote on issues that have been devolved to the administrative Assembly. Where does the principle end? I would like a response to those issues.

[Mark Durkan]

The one bit of reassurance that the hon. Gentleman has been offered by the Leader of the House relates to participation in Committee stage. However, if we look at the Heath Robinson model that accompanies the proposals, we will see that, in a little box and marked with an asterisk, it says:

“England-only Committee stage for England-only bills”,

which is contrary to the assurance given by the Leader of the House.

[Gavin Robinson]

I realise that I am pushing on for time, but I would be happy to allow the Leader of the House to intervene yet again, should he wish to clarify that issue, because as the debate trundles along, concerns continue to rise.