Pat Sheehan
West Belfast · Sinn Féin · Northern Ireland
“I thank the Member for giving way. Does she agree that the Minister's School Uniforms (Guidelines and Allowances) Bill was poor legislation and a missed opportunity?”
“The last point that you made reminded me of one of the witnesses — a young girl — who came to the Committee. During the winter, she wore her own overcoat, but she had to take it off 100 yards from the school gate because she was not allowed to wear it into the school.”
“Agus iad ag ullmhú le haghaidh scrúduithe GCSE agus ard-leibhéil, féadann an imní agus an éiginnteacht sin drochthionchar a imirt ar a n-oideachas agus ar a bhfolláine.”
“Is scannalach go deo an foréigean ciníoch a chonaic muid le seachtain anuas. Tá ionsaithe ar theaghlaigh, ar thithe agus ar ghnólachtaí doleithscéil, agus tá siad dochosanta. Níor cheart eagla a mbáis a bheith ar dhaoine neamhurchóideacha mar gheall ar a gcine, a gcúlra ná a gcreideamh.”
“One of the reasons, Daniel, is that, if we were to have blocked the Bill at the Executive, the SDLP would be saying tomorrow morning "This place is dysfunctional. You're blocking legislation. Sinn Féin is blocking legislation, and the DUP is blocking legislation". No, we are not blocking legislation.”
“I have not once today argued against inspections. Not once. The Bill is about one thing and one thing only: intimidating and punishing teachers.”
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“Will you confirm whether I have five or 10 minutes, Mr Deputy Speaker?”
“Go raibh maith agat, a Cheann Comhairle. Certainly, I will try to be as temperate as possible. <BR /> <BR />There is a fundamental issue. The English Tories do not care about here. That is reflected in what Dominic Cummings said and in the jingoistic English nationalism that has driven the whole Brexit debate. I say this genuinely and honestly to unionists: the English Tories will never consider you as their equal, never. I say this to you, as a friend and a fellow countryman: join with us. The ground is shifting under your feet. Join us to build a new country, a country of equals where we will all have the same rights and freedoms. Let us join together. Let us forget about the unvarnished liars and the other people who yank your tails. Let us — all of us together — build a country where we can all live as equals.”
“That is the man you are dealing with. That is the man you are kowtowing to”
“Who did they send to the United States to convince Americans that the IM Bill protects the Good Friday Agreement? Dominic Raab. Dominic Raab is the man who appeared before the NI Affairs Committee and admitted to Sylvia Hermon that he had not read the Good Friday Agreement. He was sent out as some sort of expert to explain to Americans. Luckily, the Americans are more learned than Dominic Raab. They understand the repercussions of the Internal Market Bill for the Good Friday Agreement. <BR /> <BR />I say this to unionists: try to break away from the Stockholm syndrome that you are caught up in. It is sad to see once proud unionists like Gregory Campbell and Sammy Wilson on their hands and knees, with their ears down and their tails between their legs, licking the boots of people like Johnson and Cummings. It was Cummings who said:”
“They actually turn things on their head and say that the Internal Market Bill protects the Good Friday Agreement. This is a Government that would tell us that black is white and that night is day. They are a bunch of unvarnished liars.”
“I welcome the opportunity to speak in the debate. The Internal Market Bill is a full-frontal assault on the Good Friday Agreement. I do not think that there is any doubt about that. The actual problem is Brexit, however. When the Members opposite were supporting with gusto the campaign to leave the European Union perhaps they did not have the foresight to see what the repercussions were going to be. Brexit was going to undermine the Good Friday Agreement. There was no doubt about that. We had the protocol as a far-from-perfect solution to the problems that Brexit was going to create for the Good Friday Agreement. <BR /> <BR />Now we have the Internal Market Bill. Everybody believes the Internal Market Bill undermines the Good Friday Agreement. Even the British Government understand that, but, of course, they say otherwise.”
“Go raibh maith agat, a Cheann Comhairle agus gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire as ucht a fhreagraí. I thank the Minister for his answers so far. Given the deteriorating situation, North and South, has the Minister had any communications with his Southern counterpart to coordinate measures and restrictions? Has the Minister any plans to publicise the new daily cases per 100,000 in the North?”
“Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire as ucht a freagra. I thank the Minister for her answers so far. Brexit will probably mean the loss of access to some of the important EU justice and security cooperation mechanisms. I wonder, in the light of that, whether the Minister has had any meetings with her Southern counterpart. If so, can she detail what those meetings have been?”
“Thanks very much for giving way. The Ulster Unionists should not get too defensive about the allegation that was made earlier on. It was a light-hearted comment. There is no need to get so defensive. Robin has done a reasonably good job. I would be the first to say that. I congratulate him in particular on his decision to call a public inquiry into the events in Muckamore. That was a very good decision, so well done.”
“He took his temperature, and it was 40°. He said, "Right, I had better phone for a test", and that is what he did — he booked a test. At 10.00 am he took his temperature again, and it was back to normal. What he said was that, if he had waited until 10.00 am when his temperature was back to normal, he probably would not have gone for a test. He would have thought it was some aberration — that he was warm during the night, had too many blankets on the bed or whatever. That is one of the reasons why testing is so important and needs to be streamlined so that, when people need a test, they can get a test.”
“I thank the Member for his intervention. <BR /> <BR />I made the point at the outset that I think the regulations are part of a contract. As political leaders, we have to provide a proper system for testing and for ensuring that we prevent the spread of this disease as much as possible. There is a problem with the testing, and it needs to be sorted. If people do not have confidence in the system —. I had to jump through hoops, but I know that there are other people who would give up at the first hurdle, or the second hurdle, or the third hurdle. People are just not going to get tested, but it is important that they do. <BR /> <BR />I will just give you one other example. One of our councillors had been out socialising the previous weekend. The next weekend, he woke up at 8.00 am and had a high temperature.”
“Of course it was negative, as I expected it to be, but the upshot of it all was that, first of all, my four-year-old child missed over a week of school. My eight-year-old child also missed over a week of school, and my wife and I had to self-isolate, with all the difficulties that go along with that. What I am telling you is not unique. There is a problem in the testing system.”
“Anyway, to get back to my own story, everything I have told you so far happened on the Monday. I could not get anything. I went back on on Tuesday morning and was able to order a home testing kit. The kit did not arrive until teatime on Wednesday. The guidelines in the kit tell you to , first of all, that you are to post it in a priority postbox — I did not know that there was such a thing until this — but that you cannot post it unless it is in the box at least an hour before the last collection. The last collection in the area where I live was at 4.45 pm, so it was too late. I had to do the test the following morning, which was Thursday, and then post it. It was going to Glasgow; presumably it was not arriving until the Friday. We were then into the weekend and, to cut a long story short, the result did not come back until Tuesday.”
“Absolutely, I agree with that. As you make that point, I visited a community pharmacy in my constituency on Friday and spoke to the staff about a number of issues, including the provision of the flu jab. The community pharmacy is providing the jab to health workers free of charge, and, for others, it is charging £12. I asked whether there was capacity within the community pharmacy system to carry out COVID tests, and the staff in that pharmacy felt that there was. With a small amount of training, they could carry out testing or at least deliver home testing kits, or some system, to deal with the difficulties in the current system.”
“I put it up on twitter that evening and got a boatload of responses from people who were also being sent to Stranraer, some were being sent to Wales and one was being sent to Telford in Shropshire. A lot of people were experiencing the same problems. <BR /> <BR />In our WhatsApp group this morning, one of our MLAs shared that a constituent of theirs in Newry and Mourne has been offered a test in Stranraer today. Now, I know that it is not possible and people are not going to travel to Stranraer, but it exposes the problems in the testing system.”
“<BR /> <BR />To get back to my story, I phoned the GP surgery and was advised to phone 119 and book a test. I went on the phone and I stayed on the phone and I stayed on the phone and I stayed on the phone and then the phone cut out. I went back on the phone and I stayed on the phone and, eventually, I just gave up. I was on the phone for nearly an hour and a half trying to get through. I said, "OK, I will go on the website and try to book a home testing kit." I went online and, lo and behold, "no home testing kits available at this time". I decided that I have started this so I may finish it. I went online to try and book a drive-through test. It came back with availability in Stranraer. This is not an isolated incident.”
“Under normal circumstances, she would have gone into school on Monday morning. However, after discussion with the wife, we decided that, because she has one of the symptoms, we should seek some advice. So we phoned 111. The advice that we got was that they do not give out advice about children as young as that and I needed to phone the GP the following morning, which I did. I got through to the GP, which was good because a lot of people at the moment are saying that they cannot get through to GPs. In fact, we recently did a survey in the Whiterock area to see how many people usually get the flu jab but are having problems this year. A large number of the people that we spoke to told us that they could not even get through to their GP on the phone. So there are problems there as well.”
“I thank the Member for his intervention. I do not disagree with anything that he said. I am not here to criticise the Minister as such, but I will relay my experience. I made the point that we have entered into a contract with the population, and one aspect of that contract is that we are going to provide testing and provide a system whereby people do not have to jump through hoops to get tested. I will tell you about my personal experience from Sunday fortnight ago when my four-year-old daughter developed a temperature. It was not a very high temperature and she had a bit of a runny nose. If COVID was not here, I would have said that she has a bit of a head cold. She started into primary 1 the previous week and she has picked something up. She had not lost her appetite or stopped running about; she was OK.”
“In order to help you, this is what we are going to do: we are going to test; we are going to trace; we are going to ask people to isolate; we are going to support those who have to isolate; and we are going to make facilities available to treat people who contract the virus. I am not going to be too critical about the regulations because I appreciate that it is difficult to get things right. I have to say that I admire the loyalty of the members of the Ulster Unionist Party in circling the wagons around the Minister, and I have to congratulate Alan on his sterling work in the Committee.”
“We have been here before: we have discussed all these coronavirus regulations. This set has, by and large, already been overtaken by other regulations. I want to make a couple of important points about all the coronavirus legislation that we have brought forward in the Assembly, most of which has been draconian. Under normal circumstances, we would not be bringing legislation such as this to the House, and most of us certainly would not be supporting it. <BR /> <BR />There are two important aspects to all this. Paula just made the point that there needs to be clear, easily understood messaging that people can act on and that can be easily enforced. The other aspect to all this is that we are effectively asking the population to enter into a contract. We are going to introduce draconian legislation, but it is for your own good.”
“On that point, I know that people like to grandstand at times about that and say, "We should have come in over August. We should have come in over the summer". The agreement that we all made was that the staff in the Assembly also need a break. They had been working extremely hard from the time when the Assembly got back up and running. It is the case that many of them can take leave only when the Assembly is in recess. So let us forget about the grandstanding. Deal with the issues as they exist.”
“A higher than average number of those carers take antidepressants. We need to address the issues. We need to deal with it, and we need to deal with it urgently.”
“I do not disagree with that. <BR /> <BR />It is difficult to provide care home staff with the training and the skills that they require when trying to deliver and provide complex end-of-life care to patients who are, literally, going to die. It is important that proper resources are put into our care sector. It is important that our carers are supported. It is also important that the people who care for those who, fortunately, are able to remain at home get the proper support that they need and deserve. There is a high incidence of mental ill health among carers. Often, carers are elderly, not in great health and they face —.”
“In fact, often, carers in the care sector are on the very bottom rung of the ladder: there is no career progression; they receive the minimum wage and so on and so forth.”
“For example, in care homes — I think that Joanne Bunting mentioned it — up to 70% of residents are suffering from dementia of one degree of severity or another. Many people in care homes are seeing out their last days there, and the staff need the appropriate training and skills to deal with people at the end of their lives. We all know of excellent care homes that are doing that, but, of course, there are other care homes that are not so good. There is not a universal level of care across the piece. That is no great surprise given the high turnover of staff in the care sector. Often, staffing levels are inadequate in the first place. Staff lack the access and time to take up training, and, of course, there are always funding issues.”
“<BR /> <BR />It was also mentioned that, back in 2018, almost 15% of all deaths were attributable to dementia. Of course, dementia is an incurable, progressive neurodegenerative disease. As I say, there is no cure for it yet. I am sure that plenty of research is going on, but, to date, nothing has transpired that will cure it. Symptoms may start off quite mild and progressively get worse or, in cases where it is an aggressive strain, the deterioration can be quite quick. As the condition deteriorates, there is a need for greater care and greater support for people who are caring for those who are diagnosed. It is critical that we address the deficiencies in care as a matter of urgency. <BR /> <BR />A lot of the problems have already been touched on.”
“Eventually, with four kids about the house, it was impossible for my mother to look after her, and the decision that Alan talked about, when families have to decide to put their loved one into care, had to happen. <BR /> <BR />I also had a friend, not much older than me, who was a great athlete in his youth. He played soccer for Distillery and was one of their top strikers in the 1970s. He was also captain of the Antrim Gaelic football team. He was diagnosed in his early 60s with a very aggressive form of dementia, and, as it turned out, he died a few months ago from COVID. We need to take account of that fact that it appears that dementia is one of the significant risk factors in contracting COVID. Those are some things that we need to take account of.”
“The only disagreement during the debate so far has been about the number of people in the North who have been diagnosed with dementia. It has varied between 15,000 and 22,000-plus. One thing is for sure and I am sure that we all agree that, given our ageing population, the number of people diagnosed with dementia will increase very significantly over the next number of years. We will all take account of that. <BR /> <BR />Everybody here has had some experience with dementia. Some very close family members have been diagnosed with it. I remember that, when we were youngsters, my mother's aunt had to come to live with us because she had dementia.”
“Mo bhuíochas leis an Aire as ucht a freagra. I thank the Minister for that answer. What is the Department doing to address the backlog in driving tests?”
“Was there any discussion of scoping out the possibility of a high-speed rail link between Belfast and Dublin?”
“Does the Minister agree that full buy-in and participation from local communities is essential in tackling all these issues?”
“Will the Minister tell us what her plans are to expand cycle paths in general as a key element of the active travel infrastructure?”
“On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. Yesterday, we heard intemperate and inflammatory language from the Member who was speaking there. I see that, today, he is back at the same old lark, talking about "rogues" and so on. Is there any chance he could be asked to restrain his intemperate language, please?”
“They are sitting in the Infrastructure Minister's in tray, which is probably overflowing at the minute. We need to get those projects going, get people back to work and get the construction industry back to work. For that reason, I support the Bill.”
“Go raibh maith agat. Thanks for both interventions. Mr Wells's intentions are to spook the horses. They are simply that. The question was answered clearly, so I do not have to answer it. <BR /> <BR />We needed accelerated passage for the Bill. That has been an issue, and I accept that some Members here are opposed to accelerated passage as a general principle. I also accept that accelerated passage does not allow for the depth of scrutiny that would normally be the case. We are, however, in a crisis situation. We are in the middle of a pandemic that has, of course, affected the health of our citizens, but a consequence of that has been the damage done to the economy. We need to get the economy going, and one way in which we can do that is that through major infrastructure projects.”
“The advice from the Departmental Solicitor's Office and the Attorney General is crystal clear. <BR /> <BR />I will give way.”
“I agree with the Member who spoke previously that all the arguments have been rehearsed and ventilated in the Chamber in a number of debates. I will not detain the House long, but I will reiterate where we came from and how we have arrived at this point. <BR /> <BR />The Buick judgement, which no one expected, has made the potential of people bringing the Executive or Ministers to court an ever-present danger in its context. That needs to be changed. There is no point in having Ministers end up in court over practically every decision made. As has been pointed out, the Bill is short, but it recalibrates the legislation back to what, everyone believed, it was prior to the Buick judgement. The safeguards are there. If a decision is significant, controversial or genuinely cross-cutting, it is for the Executive to deal with.”
“In my haste to get two questions in the first time around, I probably did not frame my question around urgent and emergency care too well. What I was asking is: does the Minister have a date when that review will be published? That was the last question. This question relates to plans for care homes in the event of a second surge. In your statement today, you outlined plans for extra testing in care homes, but are there other plans in place to deal with a second surge?”
“Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire as ucht a ráitis. I thank the Minister for his statement. The foundation stone of any changes to our health and social care system must be co-production and co-design. Anyone who has a stake in our health service must have a voice in it. I acknowledge that the Minister has said that the rebuilding plans are based on co-production principles, yet we hear from many stakeholders, including trade unions and patient advocates, that they are being marginalised and excluded from the process and are being consulted only after decisions have been made. Can the Minister explain that anomaly? Also, can he explain why he did not mention a review of urgent and emergency care in his statement?”
“How is the Minister going to address the confusion about, and differences in, the travel advice? I am not just talking about North/South but also east-west, where there seem to be a lot of anomalies in the advice that is being given out.”
“On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. It is that kind of intemperate language that, in the past, has led to the killing of members of the GAA. I ask you to insist that the Member desist from that type of intemperate language.”
“We need to deal with the health crisis and the crisis in the economy. This is a sensible and pragmatic way forward, and, for that reason, I will support the Bill and oppose the amendments.”
“Again, I thank the Member for his intervention. I am not sure what relevance it has to the debate. I did not keep a note of all the decisions that the Member made when he was a Minister. I am not sure how that relates to this particular debate, but we can discuss that outside the Chamber, if the Member wishes. <BR /> <BR />In any event, as I was saying, we need to get the economy up and running. We need to get people in the construction industry back at work again. One of the best ways to do that is to get big infrastructure projects moving along. We do not want any further delays. Under normal circumstances, accelerated passage is not the best idea. However, in the circumstances that we find ourselves in, in the current emergency, there is a crisis there, and we need to deal with it.”
“I thank the Member for his intervention. I am always amazed when the Member opposite intervenes on issues of propriety in government. Given his party's long record of being in government here, the words "neck" and "brass" come to mind, but we will leave that for another time.”
“The Infrastructure Minister's in tray is probably overflowing with a number of major infrastructure projects that need approval. The planning process is already a two-tiered system. We have the councils and the Department. To add another layer of bureaucracy to planning would, in my view, only increase that bureaucracy, slow down the process and make it much more difficult, at a time when we want to —.”
“Under normal circumstances, none of us would support that type of draconian legislation, but we all understand that it is necessary and, for those reasons, we acquiesced in that type of legislation passing through the Assembly. <BR /> <BR />We are still in a crisis, a health crisis. There is also an economic crisis and emergency. We need to deal with that as well. It is not just a matter of the health crisis. We need to get our economy back up and running. We do that by, first of all, dealing with the health crisis, by eliminating coronavirus from society, and ensuring that our economy can open up again and move ahead. <BR /> <BR />One of the most important cornerstones of our economy is infrastructure, particularly major infrastructure projects.”
“That is not genuinely cross-cutting, as we all know. However, if, for example, the Health Minister decided to bring forward legislation in regard to mental health in prisons, it is inconceivable that that would not be cross-cutting with the Justice Department. That is an example of an issue that is genuinely cross-cutting. <BR /> <BR />The crux of the discussion is the issue of accelerated passage, and why we have rushed the Bill through. Consider that, since the Assembly got back up and running, we have dealt with numerous pieces of legislation that received no scrutiny whatsoever, as a result of the pandemic, the crisis, the emergency in which we find ourselves at present.”
“Prior to the Buick judgement, all Members believed that, if an issue was significant, controversial or genuinely cross-cutting, it would be called into the Executive for decision-making. The Buick judgement, of course, changed all that and any issue in which another Minister had even an incidental or peripheral interest had to be called into the Executive. The rationale behind the Bill is to ensure that the legislation is recalibrated back to where we all believed it was, prior to the Buick judgement. <BR /> <BR />For example, if we moved ahead in the context of Buick, practically every decision made by a Minister would have to go to the Executive. The argument has been made, previously, that the Finance Minister has an interest in practically every decision because he is the one who resources it.”
“It is welcome that there was a memorandum of understanding (MOU) a few months back, but that in itself is not enough. There needs to be constant contact between the Executive, the Dublin Government and both Chief Medical Officers and Chief Scientific Advisers. <BR /> <BR />That is what we need to do. We need to continue to find, test, trace, isolate and support. That is what will keep the virus suppressed. That is the message that needs to go out.”
“We should listen to the advice that we are getting from people such as Gabriel Scally and Devi Sridhar, who advises the Scottish Parliament, and that advice is that, for the purpose of public health, we should treat the island of Ireland as one unit. We should coordinate, North and South, all the moves that we take in relation to the virus.”