John McCallister
South Down · Ulster Unionist Party · Northern Ireland
“She did whatever needed to be done and nothing seemed to be too much trouble or too difficult for her to overcome. <BR /> <BR />It was very much to her credit that she was able to work and find a solution to an issue that, as we go forward, will allow us to look at different things.”
“Sometimes, one of the downsides of being in politics is that social media exposes all our lives to some really quite harsh and unkind things. I certainly am delighted that things have improved in that regard, not only with getting the Bill passed but with your father's health improving.”
“Like colleagues, I welcome the Final Stage of the Licensing Bill. Following on from Mr Ross, it is a shame that Mrs Cochrane is standing down because we could desperately do with her back here to continue the reform of our licensing laws, although that is looking like quite a big job for anybody to take on.”
“It would have been such a shame to have to have him removed on his last day. <BR /> <BR />Mr Speaker, I will begin by paying tribute to you and the respect agenda you have set in your time in the Speaker's office.”
“<BR /> <BR />In this term, I am particularly proud of the private Member's Bill to reform the way that the Assembly does its business, and I hope that the messages from all of the political parties seem to be that there is a will to have a much more collective and cohesive Executive on the other side of an election.”
“While there is partly a disappointment in some regards about what the Assembly and Executive have achieved, the one thing that they have achieved is to have got people talking from very different and difficult backgrounds. As Mr Hamilton said, it is much better having a robust debate in here than division on our streets.”
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“We need to get into a proper place of having a functional Government and a robust opposition holding them to account, as well as being an alternative for voters. <BR /> <BR />Reducing the number of MLAs does not provide a great cost saving. According to Mr Allister's special advisers (SpAds) Bill, the £92,000 cost of a special adviser is almost the salary of two MLAs. It is only £4,000 short of what two MLAs are paid. Bar a few, most MLAs are elected; SpAds are not elected and are unaccountable. Those are the types of reforms that we should be looking at. <BR /> <BR />I welcome the Bill as part of the package on that, but it should be going through a Committee Stage. The Bill should have been the first item of business when the new Assembly returned in May.”
“Boundaries should be set up on a much more stable basis and not dictated by outside events that could change. If the Assembly is saying that 90 Members is the figure that we think broadly gives us the safeguards that Mr Hazzard talked about, with representation in most constituencies built in, that is what we want to see. It will be automatic: if we reduce Westminster seats under this, we will reduce the number of Assembly Members because those constituencies will not exist. We should be looking at all those issues. <BR /> <BR />In the broader scheme of things, reducing the number of Members is a reform that I welcome, even if it is slow and painstaking. However, it is not the panacea for all our problems.”
“It is just unnecessary to accelerate a Bill, debate it and have Consideration Stage next week when the Bill will not take effect until a 2021 election, especially when there is a broad consensus in the Assembly. Yes, this is making some changes that are tied in with the changes in the Departments Bill. It is making changes, albeit cautious ones, but it is making changes nonetheless. There is broad agreement on this, so why are we rushing it at this late stage? <BR /> <BR />Whatever boundaries are eventually agreed should be there for a much more stable and longer-term future. In the 1982 Assembly, by the time the new boundaries were introduced in 1983, there were Assembly Members and MPs and possibly those in council areas all over the place and so, to use the old phrase, it was very much a dog's dinner.”
“<BR /> <BR />If you were to align the boundaries with local government, the council area that I live in — the Armagh, Banbridge and Craigavon area — would probably need more MLAs than some other councils like Fermanagh and Omagh because there is a significantly larger population, but all those numbers could be quite easily worked out. If we were to elect 72 members in the way that Mr Allister suggested or from a different constituency make-up, should we be using a list system to encourage others into it and to help encourage more women into politics? Our Scottish and Welsh colleagues also do those things. We should have been looking at those issues in doing this.”
“<BR /> <BR />Whether we set up separate constituencies or take Mr Allister's point about local government, there are merits in looking at that. A proper Committee Stage would have been very useful to examine thoroughly what size the Assembly should be. The Welsh Assembly has 60 Members. There has been a campaign for a number of years to increase the numbers in the Welsh Assembly because, as it gets more powers and devolution takes hold, that Assembly sometimes struggles with 60 Members to carry out all its functions and properly scrutinise the areas of government that it wants to scrutinise. There is an argument that the Welsh Assembly should be bigger despite Wales having a more powerful local government than we have.”
“<BR /> <BR />Members have talked about efficiencies and some have mentioned removing some of the scaffolding around this. Changes are happening. Reducing the number of Departments has an impact on the d'Hondt calculation and will change that, and reducing the number of MLAs will have an impact. There is a wider implication. I was opposed to accelerated passage because, given that a five-year mandate is starting in May, there are many other things that we could have looked at, including Mr Allister's point about where you align your boundaries. Is 90 the figure that we will agree? If so, let us stick to 90. Let us not be buffeted by outside forces or by the very likely reduction in Westminster seats, which then cuts the Assembly down to 80 Members. We should guard against those changes.”
“In Scotland, local government employs something like 100,000 people, compared with maybe 10,000 in Northern Ireland. Even allowing for Scotland having over twice our population, that is still significantly bigger, because it has different functions. Some local authorities in England are in charge of education, and virtually all of them in Great Britain are in charge of social care. Local government here is not. Recently, the Department for Social Development did not devolve certain powers to councils, so you are not always comparing like with like, and each devolved settlement across the UK involves slightly different powers. This is one of the most powerful devolved institutions in the UK, with powers over welfare, albeit we handed that bit back for a brief time to get that done.”
“After that bit of a spat between old friends, I am not seeing much sign of a reunification. <BR /> <BR />Like others in the debate, I have no issue with the number of Members being reduced to 90. I take Mr Allister's point that, whatever the number of Members is — whether it be 108, 90, 72 or 64 — that is not causing our dysfunctionality. Basic things such as not having a properly worked out and agreed Programme for Government or collective ministerial responsibility make the Executive look dysfunctional and all over the place on every issue. <BR /> <BR />Other points have been made in the debate. People always tend to compare the size of the Assembly with the Scottish Parliament or the Welsh Assembly. We also have to bear in mind that local government in Great Britain is a very different model from what we have.”
“I am grateful to the Minister for his reply. I am concerned about the delay. It was originally said that the report would be published last November; we are now in late January, and that has not happened. Is he concerned that the Executive's failure to build in a wider reform of the public sector is making any of those things very difficult to deliver? In the voluntary exit scheme, he is probably going to take out of the public sector only about 10,000 people as opposed to the targeted 20,000. Across sectors like health and education, getting the reforms that he needs and linking those in to the report is proving very difficult. Is that a major concern for the Minister?”
“Again, I am grateful for your guidance, Mr Speaker. At least Mr Allister's well-made point is on the record. I am opposed to accelerated passage. It is overstretching the Executive's power always to ask the Assembly to do it, and it is completely unnecessary.”
“The clear message that he is sending out is that we need to accelerate the passage of the Bill because we do not have the confidence that we will survive the next term. That is the message. I have consistently been against accelerated passage, where the Executive ask the House to agree to accelerate legislation with no good reason. There is ample time. Goodness knows, after 5 May, we will have five years to legislate for this. Mr Poots's argument is that we need to accelerate the Bill because it gives clarity to those seeking election, but it gives them no clarity beyond having to face party selection or the electorate in five years' time.”
“This would have been a good one to start off with.”
“Broadly, the main argument for accelerating the Bill seems to be that we do not know how stable the next term will be. It is not a tremendous vote of confidence in the Fresh Start Agreement if we think that, after the election in May, there will be another one in the autumn or the following year. I have been a Member for almost nine years, and the Assembly has teetered on the edge for a long time. I am talking about elections. Elections have never actually come early. In fact, during this mandate, we put the election off for a year. So why the rush? I agree with Mr Nesbitt's point that this could easily be the first item of business in the new Assembly. What tends to happen is that there is a rush to legislate in the last few weeks and months of a mandate and then we spend the first two years of the next mandate debating motions.”
“I am grateful to the Member for giving way. I think that is an incredible statement. Yes, you could make an argument for borrowing to invest in capital projects but not for borrowing just to pay your way or, indeed, at times, to make people redundant. Mr Nesbitt's point was that it will cost £60 million to service the debt each year, and we are going to push up borrowing from £2·1 billion to £3 billion. That is an incredible figure when you look at the scale of Northern Ireland's finances.”
“They run events in-house to raise money to reinvest in their facilities and equipment to keep the team going. We all know the enormous cost of keeping four or five teams out on the road and playing in tournaments. That is a real drain on any club's resources. How can we help? Is there something that we need to look at to extend it to rugby clubs? At the minute, one of the downsides of this might be that we do a lot to help a great many clubs and that is to be welcomed, but we leave rugby — a major component of our amateur sports sector — without the help and support that it would otherwise qualify for. <BR /> <BR />On the whole, I welcome the Bill and its progress to date, but with that one issue around rugby clubs and whether we can look at other ways to mitigate that or bring them into the bracket.”
“<BR /> <BR />The Minister's dilemma is probably how he finds the balance between what is affordable and what we can do to support genuine community amateur sports clubs and, on the other hand, how we make sure that that does not disadvantage businesses in towns that are paying rates at full value and may be struggling in some cases to meet their rates bill. <BR /> <BR />I am supportive of where the Minister is going with this. My one big concern, which, I suspect, he will know — Mr McKay touched on it as well — is around rugby clubs. Recently, I have been in a few rugby clubs, even in his constituency. I urge him to see if there is anything we can do to give more support to the 46 or 47 rugby clubs that may get only limited benefit from the changes. Those clubs are very much in the community amateur sports clubs bracket.”
“I turn to community amateur sports clubs. In Committee, I was supportive of some of the early contributions of Mr McKay on his private Member's Bill. I am very supportive of the concept, because of the work that our community amateur sports clubs do. Tens of thousands of people give of their time and talent every week to coach, work and support, whether it is cutting the grass, playing or whatever, to build a club. The benefit that that gives to our communities is enormous. On the Health Committee a number of years ago, we looked at suicide and self-harm. The link between good physical health and good mental health is long-established. Community cohesion and health and well-being are things that we should support.”
“We and they can then change the policy and identify where it could make an impact. From listening to the debate, there certainly seems to be widespread support for that being how we improve. I am sure that the Minister's constituency is no different from mine. <BR /> <BR />With the revaluation and the change in councils, rates have been a major issue across my constituency over the past 18 months and there have been concerns about the amount to be paid. Businesses in small towns like Rathfriland or Kilkeel are struggling with rates and now see them as a major burden. We will have to continue to look at that. I am very supportive of what the Minister proposes for vacant shops and shop windows and how we can do that to support small businesses.”
“I had almost forgotten that Mr Swann was an avid follower of pigeon racing, but I am sure that my constituents will be glad to hear his comments as I have quite a few who are involved in it. <BR /> <BR />In welcoming the Minister in one of his first appearances in his new role, I will use a sporting term. I am not sure whether he views it as promotion or a relegation, but, being a member of the Finance Committee, I view it very much as a promotion. It does not get any bigger in politics than being on the Finance and Personnel Committee and being Minister of Finance and Personnel. <BR /> <BR />Issues raised by the Buttercrane centre gave development to a policy area in the Minister's Bill. It is one great example of how responsive the Assembly and Executive can be when businesses identify a problem and lobby and campaign.”
“I am grateful to the Member. I heard her speak about the statutory duties. I represent a large rural constituency. Would she care to comment on what impact proceeding with the savage cuts to the Fire and Rescue Service could have on constituents involved in the like of large animal rescues, when the lives of farmers and farm families might be endangered in rescue attempts?”
“I am grateful to the Minister for her reply. It is something that we all hope for and want desperately to see happen. It would be a brilliant spectacle for the entire island. Does she acknowledge that, when the rugby football union looks and takes all the factors into account, it will judge our ability to efficiently and effectively deliver on a major event and that will be a consideration?”
“I am minded to support Second Stage, but with the comments made by others, particularly the Chair of the Agriculture and Rural Development Committee, in mind.”
“I am not sure that I see the Minister as one of the great liberators of fishing and farming. Who knows? We shall see what later this year brings. It would be a huge challenge if we had to start to think about what a policy should look like. What would we do? What would we want to be done? I would like Europe to give more autonomy to this House and Executive when looking solely at fishing policy so that we did not have to pass legislation that, effectively, only reflects demands made on us by others and makes sure that we stay on the right side of infraction proceedings. <BR /> <BR />That said, if we are now set to look at only one clause, the Bill becomes much narrower. I will wait to hear what the Minister's response is. I apologise to the Minister for missing her opening remarks.”
“<BR /> <BR />We seem to have got to the stage of examining only one clause. That leads to the question of whether this would have been better left until after an election and the start of a new mandate. Would five or six months make that much difference to it? I fear that, if the Committee looks only at clause 6, some of the good things that we might like to see in other parts of the Bill will be lost, in that a second fisheries Bill will not be tabled later in the year. Will those other things be included in the Bill or will it become very tightly focused? <BR /> <BR />One of the big challenges was raised by Mr Allister. If we were to leave the EU, that would mean that the House and the Executive had to come up with their own policy on fishing. That might be a frightening thought.”
“From listening to colleagues, it seems to me that we have managed to bring to the Assembly not only this Bill but almost a raft of legislation in the dying weeks and months of the mandate. That is not a particularly satisfactory way of doing our business. I have the privilege to represent a constituency where sea fishing, quite rightly, has a major impact. It is a major employer and a major contributor to the economy of South Down, with two of the three key sea fishing ports, Kilkeel and Ardglass, in the constituency. Any changes made or decisions taken will have a major impact. I welcome the fact that 2015 was an improved year for the fishing industry, and I welcome the fact that, at the December Fisheries Council, a higher quota and catch were permitted by the EU.”
“The challenge is to end the "us and them" in our politics and right across our society, and I wish Mrs Foster and Mr McGuinness well in addressing that. In their contributions, they talked about their unionism and republicanism respectively. I say to both of them that the key, in doing all this, whether unionist or republican, is to make Northern Ireland work.”
“<BR /> <BR />I offer my warmest congratulations to Arlene Foster as First Minister. For somebody of my generation, she brings huge ministerial experience. I am not sure whether she wants to be reminded that she is a couple of years older than me. It is interesting that there is now a generational shift in that most DUP Ministers were born in the 1970s. That is a shift in age that tells us that Northern Ireland is progressing and moving and that a great deal of what has gone before is being put in the past, and we are looking to a brighter future.”
“I will begin by paying tribute to the outgoing First Minister and wish him health and happiness for a long and prosperous retirement. I am sure that his successor will, from time to time, want his wise counsel and advice. As I said during the former First Minister's last Question Time, in all my personal dealings with him, whether seeking meetings for constituents or progressing my private Member's Bill, he extended time and courtesy to me, for which I am grateful. <BR /> <BR />Reference was made earlier to a speech of the former First Minister. One of Peter Robinson's speeches that most struck a chord with me was, I think, his 2011 party conference speech, when he said that we were going to end "us and them". That remains the big challenge for the new First Minister and the deputy First Minister: to get to work in ending those divisions.”
“I am grateful to the Member for giving way. Are you making the absolute assumption that, if water charging was brought in, you would want to do it by metering? Originally, it was going to be based on the rating system or on some sort of capital value. Are you committed to the idea that it should be done on a meter?”
“<BR /> <BR />Colleagues have highlighted that record-keeping is important as well, including issues such as how long records will be kept, who will have access to them and whether they will reflect on people's future employment. We need some reassurance that they could not find their way into the public domain at some future point, because it is a fair comment that government sometimes does not have a great track record of keeping information in a sensitive way. We have had some dreadful experiences over the years. Other than those reservations, I look forward to the passage of the Bill tonight, and I hope that it makes a tangible difference to rates of bullying in our schools and in wider society.”
“Important changes may need to be made to the Bill and it will possibly have to be improved, but that is always part of the scrutiny process. <BR /> <BR />I am glad that the Bill is being debated because, quite frankly, the issue is too important for the Assembly and Executive not to address and look at how to help address the various issues. Bullying can have an impact on young lives and, I dare say, on rates of mental ill health, and very extreme cases can lead to suicide and self-harm. We should want to do all that we can as a society. The Assembly, Executive, families and communities should want to make sure that we have an appropriate response so that schools can and do deal with bullying effectively and give support to people.”
“Mr Craig brought up the issue of how we handle a situation if a teacher is on the other end of bullying. That can be particularly difficult for new teachers who are starting out on a career. I am sure that many of us can think of examples of people who left the teaching profession because of bullying or not being able to cope with a class and the pressures that that put on them. We have always had to address issues right across our workforce, and it is about what behaviour is now acceptable, whether in schools or in a workplace, compared with what was acceptable 20, 30 or 40 years ago, if it ever was deemed acceptable. There is important work for the Committee to do. I expect that the Bill will be passed to the Committee.”
“I have seen it even with colleagues in here over issues such as equal marriage and because of how they voted in such debates. There were some quite unsavoury comments made that did not add up to a proper debate, which is what we should be having on various issues. <BR /> <BR />It is good that we focus on bullying to see how we can improve the situation. I take Mr Allister's point about where to place the duty. Do you place it on boards of governors or should it stay with principals? If we move it to boards of governors, do they have enough operational oversight to make a real difference? That is something to bear in mind and to look at.”
“However, the examples, the lessons and the encouragement that the Minister should take from that is that, when resources are focused on those issues, things can change. The culture can change, and people can change when they reflect on and realise the harm that they are causing. <BR /> <BR />The issue of cyberbullying has to be addressed, because it follows people everywhere. There has been a huge change in the past 15 or 20 years. There is no escape from it. There is no getting away from it, and that extends to many walks of life and even, dare I say, to Members here. We saw some very unsavoury comments on Twitter about Labour MPs, because people happened to disagree with the way in which they voted in the Syria debate.”
“I suppose that that is one example of why you should never google yourself. <BR /> <BR />I commend the Minister for bringing forward the legislation. I accept from the debate that there are issues that the Committee will need to look at, and changes will need to be made. In other areas, it has been shown, particularly with homophobic bullying and homophobic crime, that, when the police get an understanding of the issue and really start to focus on it, you can change the culture, you can encourage people to report it and you can make sure that something is done about it. I am not saying that we are there on homophobic bullying, racist crimes or homophobic crimes, because we are not there, and I suspect that we probably never will be fully there.”
“I welcome the Bill and the Minister's commitment to tackling smoking in cars. I will watch the progress of the legislation through the Committee with great interest and see what comes back to us at Consideration Stage.”
“There is a huge debate to be had about tackling sugary drinks, fast food and obesity; you might well say that it is a battle that I myself am losing. The Health Minister will know more than most the cost of all those issues and the strain that they put on the health service. That is the reason why the Public Health Agency was set up a number of years ago: to change the nature of the debate about people engaging with their own health. Anything that we can do on that front should be examined seriously and looked at as a way of encouraging the drive in that direction.”
“<BR /> <BR />We did it before when we banned smoking in pubs and clubs, which others said could not be enforced and would be ignored. However, few pieces of legislation have ever gone through here that have been more widely adhered to. That is why we should quite rightly use the Bill as the vehicle to do it. That in itself will be a huge win for children and young people and for public health in Northern Ireland. I welcome the debate, and although I am not a member of the Health Committee, I will follow with great interest how those ideas develop and the debate on the amendments to be put forward by the Minister. I want to leave the House and the Minister in no doubt of my continuing support for that campaign. I look forward to following the progress. <BR /> <BR />As for other amendments, Sinn Féin put forward the idea of a levy.”
“The fact that it takes at least an hour for cigarette smoke to clear from a car and for levels to get back down to what they were is also a huge reason to act. As much as anything, it sends out a message to the public that the Executive and the Assembly are determined to drive home a public health message, over and above people's concerns about the nanny state having gone mad. The nanny state, or any state, has a duty to protect its children. If that means banning smoking in cars, that is what we need to do; if it means making children wear seat belts or get into child seats, as we did years ago, that is what we need to do because it helps to save lives. The Minister has to drive home the important message about the dangers and risks of smoking and second-hand smoke.”
“<BR /> <BR />I would like to thank, as colleagues have done, Neil Johnson, from Chest, Heart and Stroke, Nessie Blair, from the British Lung Foundation, Jayne Murray, from the British Heart Foundation, and all the cancer charities, because they have worked tirelessly with all the political parties to bring us to a point where we are going to seriously debate with the Department bringing forward an amendment to ban smoking in cars. <BR /> <BR />All the arguments as to why we should do that are well rehearsed and include the health implications for children; the lack of choice for them; and the fact that their immune systems and bodies are not fully developed. The harm is exponentially worse for a young child than for one of us sitting in a car, for example.”
“<BR /> <BR />Also, as the Minister has long known, I have had some contact with him, his special adviser and departmental officials about banning smoking in cars and his intention to amend the Bill on that. I tabled a debate on that in November 2011, and, in January of this year, I wrote to the Department to outline a way that we could look at it. I would be grateful if the Minister, when responding, could say whether he intends to follow that approach and suggested method or whether he will take a different approach to amending the Health Act that is more or less the same as the method used in England, whereby the Children and Families Act 2014 was used to amend the Health Act 2006.”
“In welcoming the Health (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill, I will talk at the outset about the approach that the Minister took in his opening remarks to dealing with e-cigarettes. They are something that we probably do not know enough about. We have not had enough experience of the health implications. I think it is right and proper that we have legislation in place, as well as the ability to move, change and adapt as the evidence perhaps unfolds about how we deal with them and about what is the best approach to take to e-cigarettes. They have certainly become very popular over the last few years, and not to have any clear legislative framework or regulation to deal with them would, I think, be a huge gap in our legislation. The Minister is absolutely right to be looking at that.”
“I am broadly sympathetic to what the Member and his colleagues propose around a levy on sugary drinks. Would he want to see any money raised like that being kept and ring-fenced within Health?”
“The Health Minister is now in the Chamber: if he goes to make a decision under Transforming Your Care, how many other Ministers will protest against him? That is why, when you move to a smaller number of Departments and you have fewer parties in the Government, you will help to bring in a collective Government, a disciplined Government and government policy that makes sure that, when Ministers speak, they do so on behalf of the Government of Northern Ireland and not just on behalf of their Department. There would be no solo runs in Departments. That is where we have to move to, and I very much hope that that will be the direction of travel set out in the Bill. I do and will support the broad principles outlined today.”
“That is what is interesting about the current reform, in moving to nine Departments and looking not only at how we get a functioning Executive and a robust Assembly and opposition holding that Executive to account but at how we build in purpose and direction and that challenge to political parties to come up with policies, costed ideas and an idea of what they want to do, what they want to get into a Programme for Government and what they want to do if elected to serve in the Government. <BR /> <BR />Being in the Government comes with huge privileges, but it must also demand huge responsibility when making decisions. This is something that we have not seen. Under our current model, we have no idea about what is government policy.”
“Once you bring in junior Ministers to look at things such as social care or at rights and protections for our elder population, you start to question whether we need a Commissioner for Older People or a Commissioner for Children and Young People. Should those responsible not, in the idea of representative democracy, be under the control and scrutiny of this Chamber?”
“Perhaps there could be a junior Minister in the Department of Education looking at early years and early intervention and how we can really raise our game on that subject. Certainly, there should be one in the Department of Health specialising in social care and how we can deliver on that. I would also like to see, possibly, a junior Minister in the Department for Communities looking at some of the impacts of welfare reform on social mobility and what could be done there. This gives the sense of a broader set of reforms that I would like to see flowing from a Bill like this. <BR /> <BR />Once you start down the road of change, there are things that, naturally, should flow.”
“The ultimate aim of all of this has to be delivering good governance. The fact that we are changing the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister, which has been described by many as the most dysfunctional Department in government — to the Executive Office and to a coordinating role is to be welcomed. That is why I supported Mr Allister's SpAds Bill. It is important that with these changes we set limits on how many special advisers there should be. For example, the new Executive Office will clearly not need eight SpAds and two junior Ministers. I look forward to the junior Minister responding to this. A much more sensible use of junior Ministers would be to have one in the Department for the Economy to make sure that we did not take our focus off skills and universities, as could become the case.”
“However, you are relying very much on a culture change to deliver that. <BR /> <BR />Mr Lyttle talked about needing a statutory duty to cooperate. What I have proposed and what I would like to see in the Departments Bill goes much further than a statutory duty; it will enshrine that collective Cabinet responsibility. It goes significantly further. <BR /> <BR />On some of the issues around the Bill and the transfer of functions that will come, I note the change in intention to move the Fire and Rescue Service to the Department of Justice. That is probably welcome: the last thing that we need is our Fire and Rescue Service coming into some political mess, which there was a risk of with it coming into the Department of Justice.”
“If you put in a threshold? Absolutely, it would be. You change that by improving collective responsibility. Not everybody who is in government honours those principles. Look at yesterday's debate on a legislative consent motion: two parties in the Government voted one way, and the other half of the Government voted against them. You cannot continue with that, as I have often said about government policy. If this Bill helps to deliver more cohesive government with nine Departments, you start to build in some of that. We cannot continue with a Government in which half the parties vote one way and half votes the other. That is where collective government comes from. I make the point that, if having nine Departments starts to move us, even slightly, down that road, it is to be welcomed.”