Gregory Campbell
East Londonderry · Democratic Unionist Party · Northern Ireland
“I begin my contribution by thanking all the staff in this Assembly and in previous Assemblies, whom I found to be extremely courteous, diligent and helpful at all times. <BR /> <BR />I spent yesterday morning in the Senate Chamber at an event for victims, and I sat beside one of our youngest councillors in Northern Ireland.”
“We took the right decisions when it would have been easier to take the wrong ones, and, for that, we make no apology. For our stance, our statements and our comments since then, we make no apology whatsoever — none. <BR /> <BR />Over the last five years, people yearned for delivery, which has begun under the guidance of the DUP.”
“The Minister referred to the £6·7 billion that would be required over 30 years. He, obviously, had an exceptionally difficult task when determining whether an increase would be due in Housing Executive rents.”
“If a large sporting arena is close to a residential development, it is paramount that the organisers of the events liaise closely with residents, if there is a formal residents' structure in the area, to make sure that access to and departure from an event are done promptly and in a manner that does not give rise to concerns among residen…”
“The 9.00 pm threshold, which has been alluded to several times, was the subject of some scrutiny by the Committee, particularly in respect of the games — quite a few games — at the Kingspan Stadium that commence around 7.00 pm or 7.30 pm and therefore run close to the 9.00 pm threshold.”
“I will start where the Chair left off and append my congratulations to Carl Frampton. It was certainly clear on Saturday night that the Ulster boys were making all the noise everywhere they went. We wish him every success for the future.”
The complete record
Every one of 278 lines we hold for Gregory Campbell, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 3 of 6.
“Yes, Mr Speaker, I am happy to clarify and expand.”
“No, I will not. What did he do? He went to the dying David McClarty and persuaded him to allow him to get onto the Committee for —”
“<BR /> <BR />We come to Mr Allister, the man who came onto the Committee in September 2003. He took no interest in DSD issues or Housing Executive issues until a member of the Committee was not just ill but so seriously ill that we all knew that he did not have long to live. What was the contempt that Mr Allister had for the House when he went, in the teeth of a report to the Assembly, and asked the late Mr McClarty whether he could take his position on the Committee?”
“No, I will not give way. <BR /> <BR />Attempts were made to imply that the DUP made representations alone on the Red Sky issue. Not one person has mentioned that the former MP for East Belfast also wrote about Red Sky at the time. That was an Alliance MP, but I noticed that Mr Dickson did not refer to it, and neither did anyone else. Spurious claims have been made about what went on during the run-up to the actual programme. <BR /> <BR />Then, of course, we had a series of attempts to rewrite what actually happened in relation to the Red Sky issue. No one has had the bottle, if they believe that Mr McCausland misled the Committee or exceeded his authority, to say why he did it. Not one of them is prepared to say why, because there is and was no misleading.”
“Months before the programme went out, the BBC was aware that there were other companies whose workmanship was shoddy. Did they include any of those other companies? No. Did the Committee ask them to? No, not one, because they wanted a scapegoat, and the scapegoat was Nelson McCausland. That is what they wanted.”
“Thank you. <BR /> <BR />A number of bogus issues have been raised. There have been repeated attempts to lambaste Red Sky, but there has been no mention whatever in the entire debate of the disgraceful sectarian attacks on the property of Red Sky when it operated in west Belfast. There were repeated attempts to praise the BBC. Dolores Kelly said that we owed the BBC a debt of gratitude, and Alban Maginness said that the BBC did a good political service with this programme. This is the BBC that, despite repeated attempts by the Committee to get them to come before us, refused to come and answer questions — great at posing questions, not great at answering them. That is the BBC that the SDLP wants to praise. <BR /> <BR />The BBC knew about other companies apart from Red Sky.”
“I take it that that intervention will be allowed for in my minutes; I hope so anyway.”
“I begin by paying tribute to the staff, who were of great assistance throughout the marathon of the inquiry. The inquiry has gone on for an inordinate length of time and, contrary to the claims of some, there were those of us who repeatedly tried to get the Committee to speed up, but there were attempts, repeated attempts, by some to delay matters. We now know why, given the leak last week. I am prepared to give way to anybody man enough to say that they leaked it. Does Mr Allister want me to give way to him? I thought not. I will carry on from that.”
“Given the success of the signature project, has the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister turned its mind to how that success can be replicated?”
“On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I wish to raise a matter of security. In this debate, which has lasted an hour and a half, nine Members spoke from the Benches of Sinn Féin, the SDLP, the UUP and Alliance. On all sides, there was mention and criticism of my colleague the honourable Member for South Down Jim Wells. That Member has been subjected to the most severe online intimidation and harassment since the events of the past four days. Not a single Member mentioned or condemned that harassment and vile abuse that he has received not just for himself but for his family, and some of it used his seriously ill wife's name as well. I hope that you will agree, Mr Speaker, that it is a shame and disgrace on every Member who spoke but did not refer to it, let alone condemn it.”
“There is no doubt that there is a gulf of difference between some of the parties, not least between Sinn Féin and us. The Committee went through the motions to arrive at the conclusion that that gulf exists. I do not see that there is a problem with admitting that to be the case. However, the Stormont House Agreement — AERC investigated some of the issues therein — addressed some of those matters, and we are very slowly, at a snail's pace, doing likewise. I do not accept the pace, and many people outside do not accept it either. I want us to make much more significant progress. What people want to say to us, and what I say today, is that we need to get on, address the matters, get the size of the Assembly down, get the number of Departments down and let us see a fully functioning, effective Government in place.”
“I welcome the report, such as it is. A series of issues have been at the heart of matters since 1998, through the St Andrews Agreement and the Stormont House Agreement, about the size of the Assembly and the number of Departments. Those issues concentrate the minds not just of the Assembly and Executive Review Committee but of the wider public. In all seriousness, I share some of Mr Lunn's concerns, because, at times, the Committee goes over ground that we all know that we will not reach consensus on. Some critics need to make up their minds — I am not referring to Mr Lunn — in that, if we do not agree, they criticise the politicians and members of the Assembly and Executive Review Committee, and, if we do agree, they criticise us for agreeing. They cannot have it both ways.”
“I am little bit confused by Mr Lunn's concluding remarks in that he almost excoriated the report and welcomed it at the same time, but such is the Alliance Party.”
“I thank the Member for giving way. I understand what she is referring to. However, with regard to certainty or uncertainty about the future of the hospital, would she agree that the recent very welcome clinical appointments to the hospital — and, as I understand it, further appointments to be made in the forthcoming weeks and months — are hardly an indication of a lack of commitment to the hospital, but rather the reverse?”
“I recommend the Adjournment debate to the Minister, and hopefully he will be able to respond positively to it.”
“The staff at the hospital are magnificent, as they are in each and every unit across Northern Ireland, and we need to offer them our unstinting support. I look forward to hearing from the Minister what his reaction and response is to the debate and to keep repeating the assurances of the commitment to the site and to develop it. Of course, as health provision changes into the future, the hospital's staff, the Department, the current Minister and subsequent Ministers will have to adapt to the changing needs.”
“Over a period of time, thankfully, with work done on that, that concern has receded, although not disappeared entirely. I know that a number of us have been in regular contact with the trust and the Health Minister to try to ensure that this hospital is not just retained in the services that it currently provides but builds for the future. <BR /> <BR />On this occasion, I concur again with Mr Dallat — I will make sure that this will not be a repeated offence in that I will concur all the time with Mr Dallat — about the need to build the relationship between Altnagelvin and Causeway. So much can be done about that, whether it is maternity services or other services that I know they are looking to develop between the two sites. This is good and is positive for the future.”
“It has the capacity to deal with many, many more minor injuries, and it has to do that over a five-month period that other hospitals do not have to deal with. <BR /> <BR />There has been a continuing concern, since within two or three years of the Causeway Hospital opening, about its future. About four or five years ago, for a prolonged period of time, possibly about 12 months, there was a concern that the hospital's future as an acute hospital at all was in considerable doubt. Campaigns were launched to ensure the retention of the hospital, and, of course, that moment passed. After that, again for a prolonged period, there was a concern and a fear in the locality that, while the hospital's future was secure, the A&E in the hospital also might be under threat.”
“I think that it was a good move to get the Minister-to-be to come to the hospital and to get him signed up to the future of the Causeway Hospital. We are glad that he was able to do that. <BR /> <BR />Mr Dallat referred to a number of issues, and I may refer to one or two of them along with other issues. One of the things that sets the Causeway Hospital apart from other acute hospitals is the fact that, between now and September, the catchment population for the Causeway Hospital increases by about 70%, which is not applicable to any of the other acute hospitals across Northern Ireland. Of course, that is because of the coastal resorts, the thousands upon thousands of caravans that are located on the Causeway Coast and the holiday homes and the second homes that are based on the coast.”
“I join in acknowledging Mr Dallat's getting the Adjournment debate on the Causeway Hospital and his concluding remarks about the need for a consensus in dealing with this issue, which has been the case ever since the Causeway Hospital opened. I am quite certain that it will continue to be the case as we move on. <BR /> <BR />There were a number of us who, before the present Minister became the Minister of Health, had either the foresight or the advanced knowledge that he would become the Minister of Health. We invited him to the Causeway Hospital anyway, to ensure that he would see at first hand the great facilities that there were and that he would be able to speak to the staff and the officials there and indicate his support not just for its retention but its development as a first-class facility.”
“The Minister will be aware of the particular skills that were deployed by personnel in car parking under the prior arrangement. Is he aware of councils having requested similar training arrangements to ensure that that is replicated in the new system as the councils take control?”
“Will the Minister just doubly reassure us, on a belt-and-braces basis, about special education tribunals? Are there to be no changes at all to any provision that might be made through legal aid that is administered by his Department to people who will use that process in the incoming year?”
“I thank the Member for giving way. If I can, I will bring him back to the debate about water charging. He said that he has no ideological opposition to water charging and was outlining the almost affluent perception that he feels Northern Ireland has, as opposed to the reality. Can he outline what net benefit he thinks there might be from the introduction of water charging, if you exclude all the marginal and vulnerable communities that would have to be protected if you were to go down the route that most of us do not want to go down? What would the net benefit be if he does not have an ideological opposition to the introduction?”
“The Minister said that there was no quick-fix solution and that, over the past 30 years, economic inactivity had remained very high. What will he do about ongoing monitoring, especially of those very hard-to-reach communities where economic inactivity has been even higher than the average higher-than-normal rates throughout Northern Ireland?”
“The Minister referred to educational underachievement, particularly in Northern Ireland, and the work on literacy and numeracy. Did the subject of the signature project come up? It is about to end in the next few weeks. Given the success of that project, has the Minister given any thought to a replacement for it, particularly to enable our working-class young people to get better numeracy and literacy skills?”
“Mr Deputy Speaker, I was indicating that I do not take any wage. That is an accurate account rather than the inaccurate account made by Caitríona Ruane.”
“— that seeks to ensure that Sinn Féin escapes and does not acknowledge its part in what it has done over the course of many years could spend time going to the Speaker's office to complain about someone yawning?”
“— that a member of a party that seeks to excuse punishment beatings —”
“So you are not taking a point of order, Mr Speaker.”
“I look forward to being told how one can yawn in Irish; I do not know how that will work out. The Commission member outlined the numbers that came to Parliament Buildings in the course of each of the three years. What intention is there in the course of the next 12 months to ensure that numbers continue at that high level in future, particularly for young people to see and get a feeling for what goes on in Parliament Buildings?”
“I, too, welcome the intention to recruit the three new staff. Will the Minister indicate, for example, the change that there has been at the A&E, compared with four years ago, in the number of people waiting 12 hours or longer?”
“Sexual abuse is a horrible crime. Can the Minister join me in expressing the hope that people who have any information about sexual harassment or sexual criminal activity, particularly if it was at the hands of illegal terrorist organisations and given the fear around coming forward, will receive whatever reassurances, succour and support they need from his Department to get to the truth of any allegations that they may have?”
“The Minister will be aware that, last year, the air show moved from one side of Portrush to the other in an attempt to develop and expand, and it did so successfully. How confident is she that it will receive the necessary support to continue to develop this year and in the forthcoming years?”
“The Minister will be aware that there was a jobs fair in Limavady hosted by the North West Regional College, which I alluded to at the last Question Time. It looked to me, as a person who was asked to go along and help to launch it as the MP for the area, as if it was outstandingly successful, given the numbers that were there. Can the Minister indicate what analysis is done after the event to ensure that future events are equally successful and can be built on in the future?”
“I also join in the condolences to the family affected. Hopefully, the Minister will be able to respond to the written question I tabled today regarding the Glenshane Pass. In covering it over 30 years, I have never experienced delays like those that thousands of motorists faced this morning, even though we have had much worse weather in the past. <BR /> <BR />Will the Minister be able to give us an indication within the next two months of whether the alternative route that he is considering is a viable runner, or are we back to plan A?”
“On dealing with the past, can the First Minister outline what his view is of the former junior Minister Martina Anderson MEP, who, last week, talked about the killing and secret burial of Cypriots by the Turkish military being wrong, given the context that she was in an organisation that killed and buried people like Jean McConville, Columba McVeigh and others and would not tell people where they were for 20 or 30 years? Is that not brass-necked, 24-carat hypocrisy at its worst?”
“Just now, the Member said that the other parties which have not tabled amendments seem content to implement the welfare cuts as rolled out by the Conservative/Lib Dem Government. That is essentially what he said. Does he then dismiss all the concessions and flexibilities that my honourable friend the former Minister negotiated over the course of the past two-and-a-half years?”
“How confident is the Minister that a level of maturity exists within the local councils to reach planning decisions that will affect the entire community? I ask that, given the level of immaturity that has been displayed in some councils in trying to arrive at the name of the council. I am particularly thinking of the nationalist councillors who seem to 100% oppose unionism in Londonderry and Strabane, and in one or two other councils.”
“There is nothing like being prepared. The Minister will be aware that the Open is due to come to Royal Portrush in the next few years. Hopefully it will be a very successful event for all of Northern Ireland. Will she plan not just for the preparation for the Open, which I know is well under way, but for the success that would follow such a magnificent event?”
“I do not know. <BR /> <BR />The Member is going through a series of amendments, not just his party's amendments but the SDLP's. Has he given any thought to the cost of the amendments if they were carried? Will he elaborate on those costs at some point in his speech?”
“It was when he was away. He had walked away.”
“I thank the Member for giving way. He alludes now, quite properly, to the reduction in the budget to various Departments, including the one that he intimated. Why did he not intimate that reduction in the press release at the weekend? Why was that accurate information about the reduction that the Minister already negotiated and agreed on not referred to in his original press release on Friday?”
“First, I congratulate all the Departments involved in a similar event this morning that I left about four hours ago in Limavady, County Londonderry. I will ask the Minister the same question that I asked some of the organisers of that event: what emphasis is put on the evaluation after the events? This morning's event seemed to be exceptionally successful from the numbers that I could see. What lessons are learned once the evaluations have been received from the event?”
“That body is wrong, and it needs to be confronted about the wrong and its error. It needs to be met and rationalised with and needs to have its budget reduced, as the Finance Minister has succeeded in achieving.”
“Nothing. The man was silent. <BR /> <BR />The proposition here is that we have to deal with the Equality Commission, and, thankfully, OFMDFM and the Finance Minister have looked at the general Budget and concluded that there is, as has been alluded to, a need for a general reduction and that the Equality Commission should not be excluded from that general reduction. Therefore, we must turn our minds to what action needs to be taken post the vote today and post the Vote on Account and beyond the headlines and the press releases to get a public body to do its duty and to get it to stop doing what it should not be doing. It should not be doing what Mr Allister, myself and others have talked about. It should not have been doing those things down through the years. This is not the way to deal with the Equality Commission.”
“Mr Allister came into the Assembly and there was an Equality Commission-supported act of discrimination against my community and his. It did not provoke an amendment then or the year after. Mr Allister mentioned in his speech the staffing of the Equality Commission, and he was quite right. Some of us have raised that issue year on year, both when Mr Allister was here and in the years when he was not, when he had gone off and walked away from the confrontation. Yes, we raised those issues and will continue so to do. Was there an amendment then? Was there an amendment last year that, on the basis of the imbalance of staff in the Equality Commission, there should be a reduction? No, there was not. Was there one the year before? No, there was not. Was there one the first year Mr Allister appeared back from the wilderness? No, there was not.”
“Well, if exposing Mr Allister's proposition to the wider public is "smarting", I am happy to be smarting. <BR /> <BR />This is what we have today: a proposition that cannot be passed. He knew when he tabled it that it could not be passed. I am glad that he concedes now that there is a reduction in the Equality Commission's budget. There is one; a factual one, not a press release or anticipated one that can never become a reality. <BR /> <BR />Mr Allister arrived in the Assembly some four years ago, immediately on the heels of 10 years of 50:50 recruitment in the police, which the Equality Commission supported every single year. I have checked to see if there was an amendment. No, there was not an amendment because it could not achieve its objective, just as today's cannot achieve its objective.”
“If Mr Allister was saying that, then fine, we could live with that, but that would bring us on to another contention —”
“Yet Mr Allister does not allude to the fact that, in the Finance Minister's statement, there is already a reduction in the money that is going to the Equality Commission. Hopefully when we get the vote through and get this done, that reduction will be a factual one. It is a reality of a reduction; not a press release or a headline, but a real reduction. Mr Allister preferred to go down the press release route to get a headline that he knew could not achieve anything. He knew when he tabled this that there would automatically be a petition of concern. He knew that, but he went ahead anyway. <BR /> <BR />I have no objection to a proposition being put, even in the knowledge of a petition of concern, because sometimes you have to do what is right whether or not the objective will be achieved.”
“The answer is of course that we should not have to do that, but we do. <BR /> <BR />The question that Mr Allister poses is one of whether this is the way to get the Equality Commission to do its job properly. I would contend that it is not. The Equality Commission and indeed its predecessors were engaged in a number of failings between 1985 and 2003, when Mr Allister had walked away from confronting both the commission and its predecessors. In that 18-year period, he left confrontation not just with Sinn Féin but with equality bodies. Of course, some of the rest of us kept on and did not walk away. I am sure that we will come back to that at a future date. <BR /> <BR />The amendment gets down to a cash transaction; a punishment for the Equality Commission through OFMDFM.”