Trevor Lunn
Lagan Valley · Independent · Northern Ireland
“I know what I am going to do: I am not quite sure what he is going to do. <BR /> <BR />In discussion at the Committee, we had submissions from the Council for Catholic Maintained Schools (CCMS) and the Catholic Schools' Trustee Service.”
“They are relaxed about this. I know that they have some concerns about the Catholic ethos of their schools, but I cannot believe that the admission of non-Catholic teachers into Catholic schools will change the ethos of those schools at all. There is more of an obligation on teachers coming in to accept that ethos and run with it.”
“All that I can say to that is that the women, mostly, and couples who go to an abortion clinic, advisory service, hospital or private hospital are also entitled to freedom of movement and freedom of action. They are entitled to that under the law that was brought in by the British Government.”
“. Not yet, anyway. We have had this Bill from Chris, two Bills from the Green Party, and I forget the others. It has been a good day and, as others have said — yes, Pat Catney, of course, my constituency colleague, as well — it indicates what the Assembly is capable of.”
“The other day, we talked about the Brook advisory clinic and all the shenanigans around it. Most people here are too young to remember that, but it was effectively the same issue. <BR /> <BR />We are where we are. I hope that the Bill will pass; I am sure that it will now, judging by the tenor of the House. It will be another step.”
“<BR /> <BR />Back in 2015, I decided to visit the Marie Stopes clinic. I wanted to find out exactly what it was about. That year, the police had been called to the front of the clinic 200 times.”
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“I commend your initiative, Mr Speaker, in setting up the reference group. I will contribute in any way that I can to the work of that group, as I am sure that Steven Agnew will, although he is not here today.”
“You caught me on the hop, Mr Speaker. On International Women's Day, I am very pleased to be the first man — perhaps, the only man — to speak in the debate. As a member of your reference group, I am very pleased to do so, and to speak in favour of the motion, of increased female participation in public life, and of the Assembly recognising that we have a problem of unequal representation and that we have an obligation to do something about it.”
“I thank the Minister for his answer. That is a welcome change in policy and practice. Once again, Northern Ireland leads the way in employment and learning. What outcomes does the Minister envisage under that welcome change in practice?”
“I do not have a difficulty with the Minister's duty to "facilitate and encourage" the Irish-medium sector and the integrated sector, but I ask him to comment on the fact that, for the shared education movement, he has an additional duty to "promote" as well as "facilitate and encourage". Does he think that that is equitable? Go raibh maith agat.”
“I am fascinated by all this but, for clarification, is Mr McCartney saying that he does not think that an opposition model is desirable? Is he also saying that he thinks that the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee should be a member of a Government party, given the amount of scrutiny required?”
“I think there is a lot to be proud of in the Bill, and I say that directly to the sponsor. He has done a good job to take it this far. The financial assistance and, of course, the transfer of responsibilities motion will bear fruit, I guess, down the line. <BR /> <BR />I am not going to speak at length about this. It is a good day for the Assembly, it is a good day for the sponsor and it is a good day for democracy in this place. Thank goodness we cannot petition a Bill at this point because I think that probably would have happened again. But we will see what happens if we have to move to a vote. I really hope we do not have to divide on this; there does not seem to be any point at this stage in the cycle.”
“Of course, the very first day I was here I discovered that was not the case and that the two major parties could do whatever they liked. They decided to keep the chairmanship of the Public Accounts Committee with one of them — with a Government party. They have continued in that vein ever since. So, there are many reasons why the establishment of an opposition system here will have beneficial repercussions for this place. <BR /> <BR />Clause 6 is about the first and second questions during topical questions to the First Minister and deputy First Minister coming from the leadership of the opposition. That is an excellent idea. The speaking rights and enhanced speaking rights for the opposition, which are in clauses 7 and 8, and even the membership for the opposition on the Business Committee, is a very good idea.”
“But for all that, we are where we are, as they say, and we now have a Bill that will lead to the establishment of opposition systems here. I think that is a good day. I must also say that I would prefer to see it done this way rather than through Fresh Start because, frankly, I have more faith in this process than I do in Fresh Start. <BR /> <BR />Just to run through the Bill but without going into any great detail, where the formation of the opposition is concerned, the 8% threshold is a major success and addition. In no particular order, the opposition will have a right to chair the Public Accounts Committee. When I arrived here nine years ago, I thought it was the convention that a non-Government party would be selected to chair the Public Accounts Committee.”
“I think it is a good day for the Assembly that the Bill will finally pass today. Mr Kennedy said he hoped that the sponsor would not be disappointed. There is absolutely no reason why he should be disappointed. I know the Bill has been well shredded since its inception, but, as the sponsor said, the opposition part of it is largely intact. That is perhaps the most important part of the Bill and perhaps the bit he would have selected if all else had to fail. <BR /> <BR />I must say that there have been times in the passage of the Bill when I did not expect it to go any further than the point it had reached at various stages. We had the unedifying spectacle of Sinn Féin voting against every clause in the Committee, and the DUP was not helping much by abstaining. There was then the removal of the schedules through a petition of concern.”
“It has always been a marvellously well run system in the North of Ireland, and I am sure that it will continue to be so. I have no doubt in credit unions' ability to continue to invest and lend wisely under the benign hand of the Financial Conduct Authority — we will see how they manage with that organisation. All in all, it is a good day for the movement and the sector. I wish them well for the future and welcome the passage of the Bill.”
“Not being a member of the Committee, I have not been as close to the Bill as I would have liked, but I welcome and support its passage at Final Stage. <BR /> <BR />As the Minister said, the Bill will extend the remit of credit unions and give them operational freedoms and commercial opportunities. That is grand, because nothing stands still these days. The Chair of the Committee said that the Bill would enable credit unions to become full players in the financial services sector. As I have said before in these debates, that comes with a bit of a health warning. Frankly, the more you imitate banks, the more you become like banks and the more you become susceptible to the same pressures and regulation as banks; and we all know what has happened to them. <BR /> <BR />I hope that the sector continues its progress.”
“I am very grateful to the Minister for giving way. The enshrinement in law for the integrated sector falls short of what is enshrined for the shared education model: that is the difference. The word "promote" is not there. The amendment that we propose today would effectively have included an obligation on the Department to include the word "promote". The Minister and others have said that this is not the right place to do this, but, frankly, I would like to know where the right place is. It fits with this Bill, even though some people say that it does not. Where would we do it otherwise?”
“I do not want to damn the Minister with faint praise, but I will acknowledge that he has done more than any of his predecessors for the integrated movement. He can take that as a compliment.”
“I thank the Minister for giving way to me again. I fear that I might be setting myself up for him to have a go at me as well. The £500 million for shared and integrated education is proof of the fact that the two sectors are linked, and it is difficult to separate them from each other. There is no point in talking about the controlled sector and the maintained sector in the same breath when you have £500 million of specific investment for shared and integrated education. There is a fear at the moment that most of that will go one way and not the other. <BR /> <BR />The other thing that the Minister said was that nobody in the Chamber had done more for the integrated sector than him — well, apart from the two of us.”
“I am sorry about this, Minister, but I want to take you back to amendment No 3 before you finish. Does the Minister actually think that our amendment No 3 would in any way stifle the ability, or preclude the possibility, of Protestant and Roman Catholic children forming a sharing agreement within the regulations? To develop that, where is the harm if a group of Roman Catholic children and a group of other children from another school come together on a project for their mutual benefit? It depends on how you read it. I am sorry, Mr Principal Deputy Speaker. It does not mean that you have to have something from all three. This amendment was also put together by people who have a legal brain; it is not just the Department that has the monopoly on that.”
“We do not have to constantly take the same attitude to these things; we could be a bit more flexible and perhaps provide some reassurance to people out there who see things differently, particularly the equality between the shared and integrated movements. I know that there is to be a strategic review of integrated education and I was very pleased when the Minister announced that some time ago — before Christmas, I think. That is good, but I do not see why that should put a stop to anything to do with integrated education, particularly a fairly simply amendment like this, which would not harm anybody or damage the Bill. I will leave it there.”
“I will certainly support his amendment, and I congratulate him for showing support for fairness, equality and the principle of educating children together as a key to the shared future that we all nominally aspire to. <BR /> <BR />I have no problem with amendment No 12. Amendment No 13 relates to the purposes clause and appears to be a lot simpler than what it replaces, so we will not argue about that. I have already touched on amendment No 14. I wonder how we did not realise before this stage that such wording existed, given that it looks pretty satisfactory. For that reason, as I said, we will not move amendment No 2. <BR /> <BR />In conclusion, I again make an appeal to the House.”
“That seems like a warning to the Department not to extend the powers that it has. I wonder whether it is necessary. I also wonder what harm it could do. I do not expect the Department to try to exceed its powers. We will not die in a ditch over it. <BR /> <BR />I have already talked about amendment No 8. Amendment No 9 appears to take out three or four provisions and replace them with perfectly sensible provisions from the 2014 Act. That is fine; it is a good "tidy up", you could say. <BR /> <BR />Amendment No 10 is from Mr Agnew — oh, he is here now; that is good — and is identical to our amendment No 11, with the same words in a different order. Maybe he will make more progress with amendment No 10 than I will with amendment No 11.”
“Amendment No 6 simply leaves out a subsection. <BR /> <BR />Amendment No 7 inserts:”
“For the life of me, I cannot understand the objection. Some people are reading it as meaning that you could satisfy the requirements of the Bill by having a reasonable number of Protestants and others, or Roman Catholics — Catholics — and others. That is not how I read it. I remember the Minister indicating that this could be left reasonably loose. It was, I think, in a letter to me that he indicated that we did not need to be too prescriptive and that the regulations that followed would deal with the situation. It is my amendment, and I find no fault with it, but I wish that others would see it the same way as I do. <BR /> <BR />Amendment No 4 is OK. I think that others have queried amendment No 5, which takes out the word "ancillary". The Minister may be able to expand on that. I see no particular difficulty with it.”
“What we would like to do is to recognise, as I said to Mr Weir in an intervention, that the number of others in this country now is significant. I cannot put a figure on it, but, if you take out the Protestants and Roman Catholics — sorry, Kieran, Catholics — there are an awful lot of people who do not qualify under either description, and they deserve to be taken into account.”
“We will not pursue amendment No 2. <BR /> <BR />I will move on to amendment No 3. At the last stage, we suggested "Protestant, Roman Catholic and other". The other parties did not feel able to accept that because it appeared to indicate that you need representation from all three groups, which is not our intention.”
“That is what the integrated sector has been trying to do for the last 40 years. We will accept amendment No 1. <BR /> <BR />Amendment No 2 ties in with ministerial amendment No 14. I am slightly amused by this. At the last stage, Mr Weir, the Minister and I agreed that we would withdraw amendments so that we could have another look at this. What I have done is move towards the Minister's point of view, because that is what he wanted the last time. I find it slightly odd — I continue to find it off the wall, frankly — to have to say that religious belief includes an absence of religious belief. The Minister has come up with amendment No 14, which relates to previous tried and tested legislation. I think the definition in the Fair Employment and Treatment (Northern Ireland) Order 1998 is pretty reasonable for what we are trying to achieve.”
“We have no problem whatsoever with this amendment, but I will happily make the point that, if you were to take out the word "shared" and put in "integrated" in that purpose clause, you would find that it would fit perfectly well. The clause would say:”
“What harm would it do to use the word "integrated" in the clauses I highlighted? It would certainly not harm the shared education movement, but it might give some reassurance to the thousands of good people who have spent the last 40 years trying to bring children together in education and who feel a bit threatened and feel that there is a lack of equity and equality across these two — I cannot call them sectors — movements. Even at this stage, I urge the House to accept amendment Nos 8 and 11. I am not receiving much body language feedback that says that will happen, but I will continue to ask because I think it is the right thing to do. <BR /> <BR />Turning to the other amendments, amendment No 1 proposes a purpose clause.”
“The duty on the Department to "encourage, facilitate and promote" shared education has, as I have often said here, gone beyond the use of the word "promote". The same Department has a duty for integrated education. We have reservations about that. <BR /> <BR />Where amendment Nos 8 and 11 are concerned, the absence of the word "promote" in the Department's duty can be remedied quite easily by placing it on the record in the Bill. It would be an acknowledgement. I hear people say that the Bill is the wrong place, but, frankly, the Assembly has recently had a proud record of trying to tack things on to Bills in the wrong place. Sometimes they pass, and sometimes they do not. It is not without precedent; it does happen. This may be the wrong place technically, in some people's terms, but it is a suitable place.”
“It has been said many times in the House, even at the last stage, that some people who might not feel as strongly as I do still see integrated education as the end of a continuum that starts with shared education. I continue to hope that that is the case and that this legislation and movement will lead people to realise that, frankly, if you can share, you can integrate eventually. That is my hope for it. <BR /> <BR />That is the reason for our amendment Nos 8 and 11. There is a perception that integrated education is being put on the back-burner and sidelined by all this — by the weight of political pressure and of finance, which is being directed towards the movement. That may be at the expense of integrated education.”
“I could say, first of all, that it is good to see that we have managed to achieve a level of consensus between Mr Hazzard and Mr Weir. When Mr Hazzard says that he agrees with almost every word that Mr Weir says, I think Mr Weir should watch how he is going. I do not particularly disagree about the ministerial amendments. The main difference between those two and me is that I happen to support my own amendment as well. <BR /> <BR />I welcome this stage of the Bill. It is not a secret that the Alliance Party has had some reservations about the direction of travel in all this, and the emphasis that this place has on shared education, possibly at the expense of forcing people to take their eye off the ball in terms of what I consider to be the purest form of sharing, which is the integrated movement.”
“I thank the Member for giving way. I am curious to know what he thinks the status of "others" is in our society. This society is not entirely composed of Protestants and Catholics, far from it. I do not need to quote the figures as we all know them. Do "others" have no place or say in the question of shared education?”
“As for amendment No 14, I know that the Minister referred to it in his opening remarks, but it is not always easy to hear down here sometimes, and I am not quite clear as to why he wants to remove the definitions. Perhaps, if he sums up the debate tonight, he could explain that to me. <BR /> <BR />Having said all that, I do not need to say any more about this. It is a good Bill. It has almost total consensus. We have one more stage to go, and I hope that there will not be any surprises when we come to it. I am happy to support the amendments, subject to dismissing amendment No 2.”
“The Minister says that we do not need amendment No 13, but the Committee feels it is useful, and I cannot see any harm in it. It is one of those things, "You pays your money; you takes your chance." On balance, we will probably support it. As it is a Committee amendment, we probably supported it in Committee.”
“For example, "religion or belief" is being changed to "differences of religious belief", and, "race" becomes "racial group", which seems far more correct to me. "Marriage" becomes "marital status". Again, that is probably a better description for what we are trying to achieve, so I am quite happy with amendment No 12.”
“That is probably as far as we can go. It does, at least, set some ground rules for it. <BR /> <BR />Amendment No 9 is technical as well. It leaves out, "or alleged incidents of" and inserts, "of bullying or alleged". Amendment No 10 relates back to amendment No 5. We are happy to support amendment No 11. I think that it is a useful addition to the clause. <BR /> <BR />Clause 3 says, "motivation may include". We originally wanted something along the lines of "may, but not be restricted to" — something like that. I think that the Minister has got it pretty much right with amendment No 12, which says, "may, for example, relate to". There are subtle differences even in the descriptions of what it could relate to.”
“The point about it is that it is an attempt to deal with the problem of cyberbullying. We heard different interpretations and assessments of what that meant at the Committee. I think that one figure that was quoted was that around 16% of all bullying was, in fact, cyberbullying in some form or other. Anecdotally, having spoken to heads, principals and so on, I think that the scale of the problem is miles in excess of that; much, much more. This is an attempt to deal with it. It involves the use of electronic communication that:”
“That is good wording. <BR /> <BR />With regard to amendment No 6, I really do think that that interval of "no more than 4 years" is probably a better effort than "from time to time", which does not sound very legalistic when you look back at it. We have no problem with amendment No 6. <BR /> <BR />As for amendment Nos 7 and 8, it appears that we will all go with amendment No 7. On the basis that it would have been the first one that we vote on, I suppose that it would have happened anyway. There is not much difference between them. There are just very slight differences. One says, "as it thinks reasonable" and the other says, "as is reasonable", and, "taken at the school", rather than, "taken by the school". I do not think that there is any big significance in that.”
“They extend the lawful custody of the school:”
“We may have to disagree about that, or agree to differ; let us put it that way because we are such good friends. I still say that it is not really necessary. It is adding another condition to what is already a good set of conditions. It is supplementary to them. It appears to me that you have to satisfy the original meaning of the Bill plus an imbalance of power, so I do not think that we will accept that. <BR /> <BR />The Minister referred to amendment Nos 3 and 4 as minor and technical amendments, and so they are, but they are actually quite significant because we are moving from a plural situation to a singular situation. That is significant. Instead of "registered pupils", we have "a registered pupil". Any possible ambiguity there has been ruled out by that simple turn of phrase. <BR /> <BR />Amendment Nos 5 and 10 are to be welcomed.”
“We have a pretty clear definition, so I do not think that we need —”
“means that it includes single acts, or has the potential to include single acts, which was a bone of contention for the Committee for a while. I am perfectly happy with the rest of amendment No 1. <BR /> <BR />I may as well deal with amendment No 2 straightaway. Mrs Overend said that the notion of an imbalance of power came from Ontario. I had the Ontario version on my phone, but I do not need it now because Mrs Overend read it out. It is too hard to define, is it not? Is it physical? Is it mental? Is it strength of character? The Ontario wording is quite lengthy, but, as far as I can tell from the Ontario information, it is guidance, not legislation. I may be wrong about that, but, be that as it may, it seems to me that it is still possible to identify an act of bullying without being able to identify an imbalance of power.”
“The parents had to take the matter into their own hands. The fact that the school had "zero tolerance of bullying" posters on every wall in every classroom made it all the more ironic that the parents had to do that, but it does happen. The effect on a child's well-being, mental health, concentration and ability to work also come into play. <BR /> <BR />I do not have very much to say about any of the amendments. I agree with them, except for one. Amendment No 1 is a very good tidying up of the wordings that we have gone through. By implication, I take it that:”
“It is surprising that a Bill with only five clauses should generate so much discussion, but it has been constructive. The Committee took a lot of evidence, and I think that we have arrived at the point at which there is great consensus. That is credit to the Committee, the Minister and the Department because it did not look that way six weeks ago, and I thought that other amendments might come through, but we are where we are. <BR /> <BR />The point is that we all know — Members referred to it — the destructive effect that bullying can have. The Bill now refers to "a detrimental effect", but it is the same thing. We could all quote an anecdote or two. I saw a situation in which two children were removed from a primary school because it would not acknowledge that there had been a problem.”
“I regard the Ulster Unionist amendments as timely and worthy. It is a pity about the petition of concern — it is a pity about all petitions of concern, frankly — but here we have another one. I still do not understand why Sinn Féin wants to petition this or why, not to let them off the hook, the SDLP is assisting them; it makes no sense. If the time has come to remove this then remove it. It will not be any less legal or less valid if we do it under this legislation instead of trying to persuade OFMDFM to do it. Let us get on with it. We will certainly be supporting amendment Nos 26 and 27.”
“There does not appear to be anybody left to oppose this. It would be possible for the Catholic system to retain the Catholic certificate; they do not have to retain the exception at the same time. They could, of course, perhaps make it a bit easier for others to obtain it.”
“OK. <BR /> <BR />The exemption continues, along with the difficulty in training for the Catholic certificate in religious education, which acts as a key aspect of institutional separation in education. It acts as a barrier to the efforts to bring about a shared future in Northern Ireland. It is a measure whose time has passed; really, we do not need it. I am glad to hear such unanimity across the House to the effect that we do not need it. I wonder who is pressing for it to be retained. I do not know.”
“Is it really the case that non-Catholic teachers cannot be trusted to respect the traditions and ethos of Catholic schools as they do their job? Do we really not trust them to do that? I certainly trust them — I have no problem whatever. <BR /> <BR />I listened with interest to what others said here today. I remember that, when Jim Clarke and Mr O'Neill came to the Committee, they announced that they had no problem with the removal of the exception. Mr Hazzard appears to have confirmed that Sinn Féin has no problem with the removal of the exception. However, if I read it right, that is because you think that that is down to OFMDFM rather than the Department for Employment and Learning. It is the same removal. If that is your only problem, why on earth would you petition it? Here is an opportunity if you want to explain it.”
“I am getting heckled by my own party and being told to forget about the "Roman" part.”
“We certainly supply too many teachers, particularly those coming out of the Catholic training system. What is the reason for that? Is it really the case that non-Roman Catholic teachers — I am sorry to keep using the terms "Roman Catholic" and "Protestant", but that is what we are talking about”
“The exception is also in line with section 75 of the Northern Ireland Act, which does not include schools. The question is this: is it still necessary, if it ever was? It seems odd that legislation designed to prevent discrimination is causing discrimination to this day. <BR /> <BR />It is a fact that there are reasonable numbers of Protestant teachers in Catholic schools. I can think of one in north Antrim that Mr Swann will know very well: Dominican College has a Presbyterian headmaster, but that does not appear to be causing any damage to the Catholic ethos of that marvellous school. <BR /> <BR />Does the exception contribute to the annual oversupply of teachers from our training colleges? That question links to this debate, although not perhaps directly.”
“There is certainly something strange going on here today. I will happily give way to Mr Hazzard at some point, if he can explain what on earth the Sinn Féin position is. We will not support amendment No 23 on blacklisting, but I will leave it to the Minister to speak to it. I will speak briefly to amendment Nos 26 and 27, which we will, of course, support. <BR /> <BR />The exception granted to schools has been a long-term bone of contention, as we all know. At the time, Roman Catholic educationalists were concerned that the Fair Employment Act would lead to a non-denominational system with a loss of Catholic ethos, and Protestant educational interests were concerned that Protestant teachers would be placed in an unfavourable position, as, indeed, they were and continue to be 40 years on.”
“I thank the Minister for what was, effectively, an announcement. It will be very good news for all users of that junction, particularly those who try to turn right from the side roads. In view of the accident history at that point, it is very welcome news indeed. In fact, I can hardly think of a question to ask her. You set out the progression, but when do you expect construction to start? Have you any idea of the timescale?”