Mike Nesbitt
Strangford · Ulster Unionist Party · Northern Ireland
“Think public service, wisdom, generosity and courtesy. Think integrity, insight and curiosity, the lack of which is a key criticism of the two public inquiry reports of recent days.”
“I spoke during Members' statements earlier about the untimely passing of the Western Trust's chair, Dr Tom Frawley CBE. I repeat my condolences to his family, his friends and his many admirers.”
“I absolutely share the Member's ambition to see people living in the community. The trusts provide a range of evidence-informed programmes for individuals who are awaiting assessment. For children and young people, early intervention teams deliver proactive needs-led programmes that are neurodiversity-affirming and trauma-informed.”
“Thank you, Mr Speaker. The Western Trust has assured me that it has undertaken a comprehensive early engagement exercise with stakeholders, involving all political parties, local businesses, service users, community groups, the Patient and Client Council (PCC), local media, community planning partners and Departments, including mine and D…”
“The role played by social workers in delivering safeguarding and family support interventions is complex and challenging. The work frequently pivots on multidisciplinary collaboration, with parents and carers positioned as partners in the formulation and delivery of safeguarding and support plans.”
“I fully recognise the impact of the current delays on individuals and families. The situation has arisen due to a combination of factors, including funding that falls short of objectively assessed need and previously missed opportunities to reform health and social care delivery.”
The complete record
Every one of 5,312 lines we hold for Mike Nesbitt, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 76 of 107.
“There are 12 policy objectives. The first is:”
“I thank the Member. He, obviously, agrees with me that money is an important issue. Whether we are making it easier for the ordinary person to take action is a question that needs to be considered by the Finance Committee, but it is one of the policy objectives of the Bill. Moving on to that, the aim of the Bill is to reform the law of defamation and ensure that a fair balance is struck between the right to freedom of expression and the protection of reputation.”
“I am thinking of those statements by one politician about another. Yet, because money is more important than the law under our current regime, both those politicians who were claimants got an out-of-court settlement. That just does not add up for me. <BR /> <BR />I will let Mr Weir in after reminding the House that we are a bit like foxes with the keys to the chicken coop. We have absolute privilege; we can say whatever we like in this Chamber. We cannot repeat it out there, 20 yards away in the Great Hall, but we can say what we like in here. Yet, we are also making decisions about whether or not we bring in a fairer, more modern regime for defamation.”
“Let me complete the point, if I may. In one of the cases, we were right to apologise because we had misinterpreted the difference between naming somebody and identifying somebody. We had not named them but we had given enough information for people to identify who they were, so we had defamed them and we were right to settle. <BR /> <BR />In the other two cases, it was one politician taking offence at what another politician had said about them. Currently, under the law, it is defamatory only if right-thinking, ordinary people think less of the person because they have heard that communication. I do not believe that there is any way that you could prove that in court. Under my proposed legislation, the bar becomes, "Prove that there has been serious harm?" There is no way that you can do that.”
“It was about the money. They would say, "We will not cover you if you go to court. Settle it out of court". <BR /> <BR />Interestingly, politicians were involved in all three cases. Statements by a politician led to the three writs, and two of the three writs came from other politicians.”
“That was not because of the merits of the argument; it was because of the likely financial implications in comparison with how much settling out of court would cost and how much we would risk if we allowed a trial by jury to continue. Let us remember that, under our current laws, it is a jury trial. The judge will respect the status of the jury and will not say whether a statement is defamatory. He or she will simply declare whether it is capable of being interpreted as defamatory. If he or she says that it is capable of such an imputation, the trial will begin, the jury will decide, and it will decide the quantum of damages in the event that it decides that it is a defamatory statement. The money is key. The two gentlemen whom I referred to who had flown in from London were the insurers. Their position had nothing to do with the law.”
“Therefore, he suggests very strongly that the current law is not about the law. It is about the money. It is about who has the deepest pockets, and they win. <BR /> <BR />I have personal experience of three cases of defamation from my time as a broadcast journalist at Ulster Television. All three were settled out of court. The process was as follows. We were issued with a writ, and we would gather in the Ulster Television boardroom — the production team that made the programme, senior management, UTV's legal advisers and two other people who had flown in from London and who would sit in the corner away from the table and listen to the whys and wherefores. When the internal debate was finished, those two people would come to the table and instruct us to settle it out of court.”
“<BR /> <BR />Is reform required? Again, the best answer comes from Dr Scott at paragraph 1.05 of his report, where he states that the former Northern Ireland Law Commission consultation paper suggested:”
“I suppose that the first question is whether we should simply replicate the Defamation Act 2013. I believe that that makes the greatest sense. However, there were two appendices to Dr Scott's report: the first contained his proposed draft Bill for reforming defamation; the second contained mine, albeit before we put in the two technical amendments that were recommended by the Bills team. Should we replicate it? I believe that we should. We would, for example, have much more case law and legal precedence if we were in tune with England and Wales. It would also mean that we would not place unnecessary complications in the way of publishers who intend to publish in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. However, it is a judgement call. Today, all that I am asking is that the Finance Committee looks at the options and comes to a conclusion.”
“He also recommended that we should adopt section 1, which deals with the serious harm test; section 9, which deals with action against a person not domiciled in the United Kingdom; and section 11, which deals with the presumption in favour of trial by a judge alone. Therefore, he either recommended or strongly recommended the adoption of the vast majority of the Defamation Act 2013. In fairness, he recommended some variance, particularly regarding the reform or abolition of the single meaning rule. I will touch on that later in my remarks.”
“Furthermore, in his report, under the headline of "Recommendations", he says that he strongly recommends that we should adopt, from the 2013 Act, section 2, which is on the defence of truth; section 4, which is on the defence of publication on a matter of public interest; section 6, which is on qualified privilege for peer-reviewed scientific or academic statements; section 7, which is on the extension of existing qualified privileges; section 8, which is on the single publication rule; section 12, which is on the power of the court to order publication of summary of judgement; section 13, which is on the power of the court to order takedown of statements; and section 14, which is on the updating of the law of slander. He strongly recommended that we adopt all those sections.”
“<BR /> <BR />Dr Scott made clear, back in 2016, that the majority of respondents wanted to replicate the 2013 Defamation Act, as passed by Westminster, for England and Wales. I will quote Dr Scott:”
“So here we are, after the Bill's First Stage, back in June, having the first debate on defamation that I can recall during my time here. In fact, I believe that it may be the first debate on defamation since devolution in 1998 and also the first time that Dr Scott's report will really be touched on in any sort of detail since he published it in June 2016. <BR /> <BR />I should add, for the record, that I very much welcome Dr Scott's engagement. He was not just a neutral compiler of responses to the consultation, nor was he merely an academic performing some sort of statistical analysis of responses, such as, "x% thought this, and y% thought that". No, he was a player. He was a man with opinions about how we should reform our defamation laws, and I very much welcome that. It is not a criticism; it is very positive.”
“I am pleased to report that, on 14 May this year, Robin Walker, the Minister of State, confirmed, on behalf of the Secretary of State, that he was content to grant consent to the consideration of the Bill by the Assembly. In fact, he went further and said:”
“Much as I think defamation is important, I certainly could not classify it as essential business, so, again, the pause button was pressed. <BR /> <BR />In recent months, I have revived my interest. I was required to get you, Mr Speaker, to deem the Bill competent, and I thank you and the Bills team for your efforts and support. Two very minor technical changes to the language were required for you to deem it competent, but more importantly, or significantly perhaps, my clause 5 deals with the operators of websites, and that takes us into the area of telecommunications, which is a reserved matter under the Northern Ireland Act 1998, so I had to seek the Secretary of State's consent for this House to consider legislation in this area.”
“When the Law Commission began its work, I was asked to meet its representatives. I met Judena Leslie, the chief executive, and Dr Andrew Scott, who was the academic who was to conduct the consultation and the review. They asked me to pause my private Member's Bill, the justification being that there might well be understandable confusion if there were two parallel processes in play, so I agreed and paused, and, of course, that pause continued through the three years when the Assembly was down. While I revived my interest when we returned, we very soon hit the pandemic, and we were encouraged by many, including the Minister of Finance, whom I welcome to the Chamber, that we should focus entirely on essential business in the House.”
“The report is dated June 2016 and was released to the public by the then Finance Minister, Máirtín Ó Muilleoir, on 19 July 2016. That, of course, was during summer recess, and, by the time that we got back in the autumn of 2016, it would be fair to say that the House was not going through a golden period. If we were not hurtling towards collapse, we were certainly on that trajectory.”
“It is, and we are lucky that that deep dive has been completed. <BR /> <BR />When Simon Hamilton was the Minister of Finance, he spoke to his Executive colleague David Ford, the then Minister of Justice, and between them they commissioned the now defunct Northern Ireland Law Commission to conduct a deep consultation process and produce a report with recommendations.”
“However, the platforms that we use to disseminate our communications — the media, as it were — change dramatically on occasion. Think of Gutenberg and the printing press in the 15th century, Alexander Graham Bell with the telephone and Marconi with the radio in the 19th century, and John Logie Baird with television in the 20th century. Also in the 20th century came probably the most single dramatic change of all: Tim Berners-Lee's invention of the internet. If we are looking for a medium where reputations are trashed, not on a daily, hourly or even minute-by-minute basis but on a second-by-second basis, it is on the World Wide Web on social media sites. As our laws of defamation predate the invention of the internet, is that not a prima facie case for a deep-dive review of our laws?”
“In this case, there are two qualified rights: the right to freedom of expression on the one hand and the right to protect our reputation on the other hand. They are qualified, and I have heard Members talk about the qualification on the freedom of expression in these terms: it does not give you the right to go into a crowded theatre and shout, "Fire, fire, fire", when there is no fire. Indeed, the right to protect your reputation is only a right to protect it from untrue, unwarranted or unfair imputation. We have to balance those two rights, and that is what I would like the House and the Committee for Finance to form a view on. <BR /> <BR />Since the beginning of recorded time, we have not really changed how we communicate: we draw, we write and we speak.”
“Thank you very much indeed, Mr Speaker. I can well imagine that there are those not only in the House but further afield who will jump to conclusions about my motivation for bringing forward this Bill. They will say, "It's jobs for the boys. Here is a man looking after his erstwhile colleagues and chums in the media". I assure the House that that is not the case. My interest in defamation was generated by my years as a broadcast journalist, but my motivation can be summed up in one word: rights. This is about rights: your rights, my rights and, most importantly, the rights of the people whom we are elected to represent. <BR /> <BR />As is often the case when we debate rights, we are not discussing one absolute right but rather a number of qualified rights that to some extent compete and between which there is some tension.”
“If you substitute "people" for "country" — people first, party second, individual third — you know all you need to know about Pat and John Hume. We are losing a golden generation. We can do nothing about our common mortality, but we can commit to not letting the legacy go. If you think of the challenges faced by Pat and John Hume and by Daphne and David Trimble and of the challenges that we face today, you can only conclude that we have it pretty easy. Perhaps part of that legacy will be to use this untimely death as timely encouragement that we all must do better.”
“Of course, Pat Hume did not simply operate in the background. Some years ago, the UK Government, recognising that they had not done enough for the victims and survivors of our conflict, asked Pat, along with Daphne Trimble, to head up a memorial fund that would provide support in recognising that many victims had lost opportunities in education, employment, health and social inclusion. Recently, I read a wonderful newspaper report about their first trip to the United States. It was a 12-hour flight to California, and there they were, in the spotlight for the first time and on stage within an hour of their arrival. In that week, they raised an enormous amount of money for the victims and survivors of our conflict. <BR /> <BR />The Ulster Unionist Party has this credo: country first, party second, individual third.”
“They would say, "Woe is me" and "It's the other fellow's fault". However, John and Pat Hume preached something different: the positivity of the fact that, as human beings, we are diverse, and we should tap into that to our mutual benefit.”
“I am speaking on behalf of the Ulster Unionist Party but I also declare an interest as a director of the John and Pat Hume Foundation. On that basis, I extend my condolences to fellow directors, to the Hume family, to the people of Derry and beyond and to Nichola Mallon and her colleagues in the SDLP. I will not pretend that I knew Pat that well; obviously, John was the front man in that particular combination. However, it is clear that while he was away, as he often was, here in Belfast or in Dublin, London, Brussels or Washington, he needed a rock back in Derry. He needed somebody to mind his back, and that person was his wife, Pat, who ran the constituency office in his absence. <BR /> <BR />In my many years as a broadcast journalist, politicians came into broadcast studios and bemoaned the fact that we were a divided society.”
“— challenged us to jump together. Let us restore some dignity to the victims and survivors and some respect to devolved politics.”
“David Trimble did it for my party a quarter of a century ago. He also —”
“I did, as a victims' commissioner: brother and sister in a family room at war with each other about whether they should pursue truth and justice. <BR /> <BR />Paragraph 20 confirms that the Government will disclose fully the information they have and adds the expectation that others will do the same. Did they never listen to Martin McGuinness at Saville or read the report of Mr Justice Smithwick, who concluded that the IRA evidence with regard to the murder of the officers Breen and Buchanan was not credible? The proposals are dangerously naive. <BR /> <BR />Maybe, instead of total success or failure, we should pitch our ambitions at partial success. I have long thought that everybody involved should acknowledge their part in creating the toxic legacy that challenges us again today.”
“I agree with the Member in that assertion, but I also think that it is about fulfilling the other obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights. Article 5 offers the right to liberty. The names of Jean McConville and the rest of the disappeared spring to mind. Article 6 is the right to a fair trial. How many Máiría Cahills were subjected to kangaroo courts? Article 17, by the way, makes it clear that the articles apply to groups and persons, not just to the state. <BR /> <BR />Let us not sign up to any statute of limitations. It would be wrong morally, ethically and politically, but also practically. Paragraph 11 of the Command Paper states that, where a family does not want to dig up the past, we do not need to. Have they never sat with a family divided?”
“I remember all the people tied to lamp posts, put through the public humiliation of tarring and feathering or subjected to kneecapping or so-called punishment beatings. I remember the words of the late Bobby Storey, who famously talked about subjecting prison wardens to, and I quote, "intense psychological moments".”
“I suggest that our other peace laureate came a lot closer to his vision of success than did Mr McGuinness. I declare an interest as a trustee of the John and Pat Hume Foundation. <BR /> <BR />Many say that, when somebody dies, we must fulfil our obligation under article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights: I agree, but what about our other obligations? Article 3 prohibits torture and:”
“That acknowledgement does not compromise our view that nobody needed to die or be injured to get to where we are today, but it is an acknowledgement that unionism played a role in creating the environment in which people made bad choices, supporting or, indeed, carrying out acts of terrorism. Who else in the House is prepared to make a statement of acknowledgement? <BR /> <BR />When I debated the past with the late Martin McGuinness, he was at pains to point out that I did not grow up in Derry, as he did, with, the implication was, discrimination in employment, housing and voting rights — things that, he seemed to think, left him no choice but to join the IRA. It is true: I did not grow up in his Londonderry, but John Hume did. He chose not to pick up a gun. He chose not to detonate a bomb. He chose non-violence as his way forward.”
“No, it was not. That tweet also asserted that the past is "literally" that: the past. If that is that person's truth, they are lucky. For thousands in our community, the past is "literally" the enduring present, measured by lost opportunities in employment, education, social inclusion and family life. It is a present of physical and mental suffering. <BR /> <BR />The honesty that I talk about was demonstrated by our peace prize laureate David Trimble when, in 1998, he used his acceptance speech to acknowledge that:”
“That is not true. Another contributor, currently aligned with the Alliance Party, posted the same untruth on 14 July:”
“If we are to make progress, we need to be honest. There have been some shocking examples of a lack of honesty in recent days. Mr Kelly, sitting opposite, posted a video on Twitter last Thursday in which he said:”
“They may also wonder what happened to collective responsibility, when the Minister refuses to comment on the NIPSO report and PIP delivery through the Department for Communities. Perhaps she can address those issues.”
“It would be entirely and deeply regrettable if this session were to undermine the faith and confidence of those who have waited years, decades and, in some cases, 49 years for this scheme to come forward. However, there are legitimate concerns. The Minister appears to be focusing on the design of the scheme, whereas the concern in the House seems to be about its potential implementation. Victims may wonder about the Minister commenting as a constituency MLA on her experience of Capita assessing PIP claims.”
“I welcome you to your post, Minister, and wish you well. How would you assess the toolkits that are being produced by the likes of Pure Mental and Include Youth, representing a bottom-up approach to the issue?”
“I noted that Ms Ennis said that we need to bring the assessments back in-house. How many millions have we spent on the recent voluntary exit scheme to reduce the headcount of our Civil Service? Are we now going to say to the Executive, "Spend millions more on a recruitment campaign to boost the headcount yet again"? Absolutely not. There is a very simple answer for the Department for Communities: get your act together and sort it out.”
“The question of whether someone can prepare and cook a simple meal is judged crudely on the physical ability to open a can of beans, put the beans in a pan, put the pan on a stove, turn on the gas and heat the beans. People can do that, but they do not have the mental capacity to continue to concentrate. They may dander off and start watching television, and they then wonder why the fire brigade is at the front door. We need to do things an awful lot better.”
“You do not have to look at the file or the medical evidence to realise, within seconds, that you are dealing with a very vulnerable person, who does not understand the system, who may find some of the technical language entirely foreign and who is simply looking for somebody to show a little empathy in the first place and to help. I have gone to many appeals, and I have come to the conclusion that Capita does not give sufficient weighting to mental capacity.”
“I very much welcome the report from the NI Public Services Ombudsman. I also note that it is an own-initiative report. Members may recall that the office of NIPSO was created by the Committee for the Executive Office. It is the only Committee ever to bring forward legislation on its own. The five parties of that Committee agreed that it was important to give the NIPSO the power to initiate his or her own investigations when a pattern of maladministration was suspected in any area of devolved government. The ombudsman has, indeed, concluded that there was systemic maladministration with regard to the PIP system. I welcome that. <BR /> <BR />Speaking on behalf of my constituents, I am no different from the other 89 MLAs. We have constituency offices, and constituents come in.”
“Will the Minister tell the House how many similar illegal dumps have been identified in recent years and whether those identifications have led to any successful prosecutions?”
“Two people phoned UTV and demanded that I be sacked for speaking Irish.”
“<BR /> <BR />Mr Buchanan said that anybody can speak in any language that they want: yes, they can, but, if it is time-limited to five minutes, by offering their own translation, they get only two and a half minutes. You could say, "Well, we will have longer sittings", but what is the cost implication on longer-sitting days for the staff, the security, the restaurant staff or the work-life balance that Sinéad Bradley mentioned? <BR /> <BR />I was in a Portakabin that was the UTV studio outside Castle Buildings on the day that we heard that, if there was going to be an Assembly, Members would be able to speak in any language of their choice. As we went into a commercial break, I said, "Un momento, por favor".”
“I thank the Member for her intervention. If she checks the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement of 1998, she will see that that is the exact language. She is arguing against words that are in the agreement that she supports. <BR /> <BR />The third test is this: does it do harm? If a Member stands up and speaks in Irish for five or 10 minutes, it does not do me any harm. I might not understand it, but, if they can deliver it as lyrically as Michael D Higgins does, I will enjoy it. That is no slight on you, Mr McGlone, because your style is pretty agreeable too. <BR /> <BR />We need to do this, but we need to do it sensibly. That is why we propose the amendment.”
“Indeed, "value for money" is mentioned no fewer than 36 times in 'Managing Public Money Northern Ireland'. <BR /> <BR />The amendment is not intended to create some sort of new obstacle or hurdle to leap. It is intended to be faithful and true to the obligations that we have accepted from the Department of Finance in 'Managing Public Money Northern Ireland'.”
“<BR /> <BR />There is another consideration, and it is the one that has basically provoked and inspired our amendment: we have a responsibility to deliver value for money. In fact, the Department of Finance has published a document that is fundamental to how we do business. It is called 'Managing Public Money Northern Ireland'. In it, there is a section on the Assembly — section 1.3 — that makes it clear that we approve "Requests for Resources", which is exactly what we are debating. It goes on:”
“What I mean by that is that you do not horse-trade culture. You can horse-trade the others, particularly in a coalition Government. I get that. A unionist can sit down and say, "Carál or Patsy, if you support me on x, I will put my hand up when you propose y". That is the day and daily business of the Executive, but not on culture. Culture is part of our identity, who we are, where we come from and where we want to go. We have to respect each other's culture. Some people think that they are a pure Gael and others that they are a pure Brit. I think that I am a hybrid — Northern Irish, Irish, British and European — and, as John Hewitt said, "Deny me any part of that, and you diminish who I am". Am I out to diminish anybody's identity or culture in the Chamber? Absolutely not.”
“I am looking at the debate as defining how we, as individuals and parties, view our society. Are we divided, with all the associated negativity, or are we a diverse society, with all the potential for positivity to come out of that? Do we realise that, in five, 10 or 15 years, there will still be Irish nationalists and republicans, British loyalists and unionists and people who describe themselves as "none of the above" sharing this little postage stamp on the world map, which none of us owns and where none of us is in a majority, and that we need to get along? <BR /> <BR />There are some principles or considerations to be applied to the proposal. The first is that culture is not like some of the other issues that we debate in the Chamber on a daily basis. It is not like health, housing, infrastructure or the economy.”