Jim Allister
North Antrim · Traditional Unionist Voice · Northern Ireland
“<BR /> <BR />Last week, a 'News Letter' editorial rightly drew attention to the fact that there is a chorus of demand that it is up to the British Government to pay for that, but no pressure whatsoever on the GAA — the primary beneficiary — which still persists that its contribution will be a miserly £15 million.”
“Public money, we are constantly told, is in short supply and scarce. I am sure that it is, and will continue to be so. Yet, while many in the House pay lip service to the need to prioritise health, there seems to be a majority here who would prioritise public spending on a sporting facility, namely Casement Park.”
“That editorial stated that the DUP "should make clear" its view on the Casement Park costs. Yet, yesterday, we had the launch of the DUP manifesto and not a mention of Casement Park. We have a Minister — Minister Lyons — who has ruled out clawback for non-GAA use of that stadium.”
“Therefore, the Minister comes to the House with a proposal that, effectively, has been written in Brussels, because it tells us how much we can give to our fishing industry in Northern Ireland.”
“The Minister told us that this is a scheme under the Fisheries Act, which it is, whereby all the devolved regions and England and Wales can make their own provision.”
“Rather than removing the green lane, the introduction of the new customs border arrangements will further advance the development of the green lane, thereby helping to make the Irish Sea border and our alienation from the rest of the UK more firmly established.”
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“Has the Member read article 9 of the Public Order (Northern Ireland) Order 1987? It states:”
“Does the Bill not, in fact, do the very opposite? Instead of weeding out the sinister and that which needs to be dealt with, it equates the very basic issue of lobbying and influencing with the more sinister acts. Clause 6(2) lists "influencing" as something that is now to be a criminal offence. We are going to criminalise the attempt to influence people, no matter how mildly, meekly, lawfully and orderly that is done. Is that not the real pernicious inroad of that clause?”
“I am much obliged. I do not understand the distinction that the Member is making. Proof of any criminal offence takes time. There has to be a complaint, an investigation and a prosecution, and that prosecution will not be any quicker regardless of whether it arises under the Member's clause 6 or the harassment Order. There is nothing in the point that the Member is making about the need to get more instant remedy. The law is still the law; it still has to take its course. You cannot short-circuit it.”
“Will the Member take one more intervention?”
“Surely, under the harassment Order, there is the capacity upon conviction — indeed, it does not even require a conviction — to have a restraining order. Therefore, that area is covered in respect of future activity. I struggle to understand why the Member is bringing a Bill to duplicate the law that already exists.”
“Will the Member explain why clause 6 is at all necessary? Under legislation that presently exists, most notably the Protection from Harassment Order 1997, harassment is already a criminal offence, and under the Public Order Order 1987, disorderliness and all that goes with it is already a criminal offence. Where is the necessity to duplicate in the Bill?”
“It is just another basis upon which to take a hit at Brexit.”
“I refute entirely the core contention of this opportunistic motion and throw it back to those who say, wrongly and disingenuously —.”
“It wants to help and assist the importation of the cheapest labour that it can find, instead of addressing the real causes of HGV driver shortages across the EU, such as the EU's own mobility package; the lack of infrastructure and facilities, particularly for female drivers, that should be there across Europe; and the low pay that contributes to all that. <BR /> <BR />In Northern Ireland, a contributor to HGV driver shortages is the protocol. I have talked to many drivers who say, "I have stopped going to GB because I do not know whether I will be held there for 24 hours waiting for paperwork. I do not know if my lorry will be called in when I get back because of the protocol." The protocol itself is an aggravator in this situation.”
“What an appalling situation from those who call themselves "socialists" and boast of their alleged socialist credentials.”
“It is a fallacy and a concoction to say that they are the consequences of Brexit. <BR /> <BR />Statistics show that, before Brexit, there were 45,000 EU nationals driving HGVs in the United Kingdom. Since Brexit, that figure has fallen by only 3,000. There are still 42,000 EU nationals driving HGVs in the United Kingdom. It is clear that it is not Brexit that has stoked and caused the problem; it is a multiplicity of other issues, including low wages. Now, the chief advocate for a low-wage economy in the House is Sinn Féin. It wants to flood the market with cheap labour from the EU. Where are the socialist credentials of Sinn Féin when its answer to the problem is, "Get the cheapest labour that you can. Flood the market with cheap labour, exploit the cheap labour, and that will solve it"? That is Sinn Féin's answer.”
“it spins a lie, a falsehood. I certainly will not accept the motion's invitation to endorse that lie. <BR /> <BR />There have been haulage shortages and HGV shortages across Europe for at least 15 years. Anyone who has read the transport intelligence report will know that the United Kingdom is in no worse a position than parallel countries in the EU that have not exited. Figures have already been given. In 2020, there was a shortage of 124,000 HGV drivers in Poland, at least 45,000 in Germany, 43,000 in France and a total of 400,000 across Europe. Yet, the motion, in pursuit of the obsession of its authors to blame everything on Brexit, tries to spin the notion that the shortages are a direct consequence of Brexit. They were there long before Brexit. They are in countries that have not exited.”
“I do not in any way gainsay the fact that there are obviously considerable shortages affecting various sectors in our economy, but I take issue with the deliberate and disingenuously opportunistic nature of the motion. When it says:”
“What does the Member say to the fact, which sometimes has a habit of getting in the way of the political line the Member wants to pursue, that the number of haulage drivers that Poland is short of is twice the figure of the EU? Poland is still in the EU, at least for now.”
“Will the First Minister agree that it is untenable, given the nature of the protocol as a Union-dismantling instrument, imposing the partitioning of the United Kingdom and imposing checks because the rest of the UK is regarded as a third country, for any unionist Minister to continue to implement the protocol, and that, if that is the price of Stormont, is that not a price that no unionist could pay?”
“Given that the First Minister's party returned to Government only on the basis that, as promised in NDNA, Her Majesty's Government would legislate to restore Northern Ireland's full position within the internal market of the United Kingdom, which has not happened, will he give us an update on his party's leader's promise that, if it does not happen in October, his party leader will resign him as First Minister, along with his colleagues?”
“Does the deputy First Minister take unionists for fools? They would be fools if they went back to a North/South body while east-west continues to be trashed. Does she not appreciate that the answer lies in the EU giving up its ill-gotten sovereignty over Northern Ireland? Unless and until that is done, mere tinkering will not work. That is the requirement for restoring stability and normality.”
“I welcome the fact that the Minister now anticipates that she may have a meeting, but it was a most embarrassing experience to have to explain to the principal of one of the premier schools in Ballymena that the Minister was refusing to meet him about an issue that had caused immense upset outside the school. The very least that you have to do is reinstate the bus lay-by. Without that, Larne Road will constantly be choked by traffic. It is a question not of the Department acknowledging that it got it wrong — clearly, it did — but of righting the wrong that it did.”
“How could anyone have thought that it was sensible or wise to build obstructions to travel on the Larne Road, outside a school that depends on that artery to deliver its pupils? How anyone could have thought that is beyond me. How the Minister can think that it is right to refuse to meet a public representative about the issue is also beyond me. I would like to hear an explanation from the Minister about why the school principal, Translink and public representatives were not consulted. Why did she refuse to meet public representatives, including councillors? That has to be explained and addressed. That scheme has to be reversed; end of.”
“There was no consultation with Translink to ask, "Do you need buses to come to this school? Do you need lay-bys for the buses?". There was no exploration with the principal about how many kids cannot cycle or walk to school. There was no consultation with local businesses, whose premises are now cluttered with parked cars. There was no consultation with local residents, whose streets are now cluttered with parents parking up in the mornings and afternoons. <BR /> <BR />When I brought an official from the active travel unit to the site, all I got was the most brazen zealotry. When I asked to meet a senior official, I was refused. When I asked the Minister to meet me, she refused. Now, really. The active travel unit in the Department needs a dose of proportionality and reality.”
“As it is an integrated college, the catchment area is huge. The principal told me that there are 100 kids from Antrim and 70 kids from 20 miles away, in the glens of Antrim, and that is why the school is serviced every day by seven or eight buses. It was essential to have lay-bys for the buses to prevent the traffic from clogging the Larne Road. What happened? The active travel unit of the Department came along with a madcap scheme to take away the bus lay-bys, widen the footpath to make it wider than the road and force the children to cycle and walk from Cushendall, 20 miles away. There is no regard for reality. <BR /> <BR />Most significantly — and here we really touch on the zealotry of some in the active travel unit — there was no consultation, even with the principal.”
“We have seen the installation of a 6-metre-wide pavement — wider than the carriageway — and the removal of lay-bys for buses that deliver children to the school, all in circumstances that give no regard to the needs of the school.”
“There will be no dissent in this debate, and certainly none from me, as to the health benefits of activity, walking and cycling. I have no objection to the advancement of riverside walkways and parks and all of that, but I make the point that there has to be proportionality with cost. We just had a debate about the huge needs of our water infrastructure, which, as the debate illustrated, are horrendous. There also has to be proportionality in the application of such schemes. I am going to raise an issue that I raised in the House last week: the madness of a scheme outside Slemish College in Ballymena by the active travel unit in the Department for Infrastructure. The Minister has written to me to explain that the scheme is under the aegis of encouraging children to walk and cycle.”
“— you are a Government who have failed fundamentally.”
“My goodness, look at what we do with largesse from the Treasury. I got an answer from the Finance Minister a few weeks ago. At the time of his answer, there was £750 million in Barnett consequentials, in this case for health. How much of that did we spend on health? Five hundred million pounds. We would far rather prioritise all sorts of vanity projects than put it into hard infrastructure. Here we have it again: what is the Department for Infrastructure's priority? Is its capital project priority the Narrow Water bridge, or is it the sewage works in my constituency and many others? Are political vanity projects overriding real need? That is what seems to be happening. I say this to the House: you cannot point the finger other than at yourselves, because you are the Government, and —”
“Yes. Take the small village of Armoy because so often it is the rural villages that are at the front edge of neglect. For years, there has been an approval for a scheme for social housing. It cannot be built, yet there is a crying need for such housing in that and many other villages. There is no joined-up, authentic approach to these matters. <BR /> <BR />I referred to Ballymena. We have the Spencetown terminal pumping station. It is already operating above its designed capacity. In consequence, effectively, there can be no new approvals. Indeed, it is in contravention of its own Water Order consent. It is at risk of being prosecuted by the Environment Agency. <BR /> <BR />All that this Executive have to offer the people of Ballymena and North Antrim are excuses. They say, "It's someone else's fault. It's Tory austerity".”
“But, really, you cannot look beyond those who govern to find the problem here, particularly as they have had nearly 15 years to address the issue. It is in a worse plight than it was when devolution returned in 2007 — much worse. <BR /> <BR />Apply it in my constituency. Rural villages across North Antrim are starved of development opportunities. Armoy, Dervock — all of them. I have met the Minister about those issues. Because of no investment, social housing and private housing cannot be built. Nothing is on offer in the current cycle; it will probably be the next decade before anything is done. Take the major town in my constituency, Ballymena. Development in large parts of it ground to a halt because the Spencetown treatment works cannot cope.”
“An outsider listening to this debate, having listened to the litany of complaints, neglect and obvious failure, would surely by now be saying to themselves, "What bunch of incompetents is in charge of that place for its waste water treatment to have got to this dire state?". The answer is this: the bunch of incompetents that have been populating the Executive of Northern Ireland. Who has been governing for the last 14 years but the very parties in this House that make these issues? <BR /> <BR />The parties of Government in this House need to own the mess that they have made. Yes, part of it has been because of inter-party rivalry and wanting to expose Ministers by holding back funding. We saw it in Danny Kennedy's time; maybe we are still seeing it in this particular Department.”
“At the beginning of the Minister's remarks, he referred to the fact that there have been further amendments. I would like some clarity. Do the relaxations in respect of the 1-metre rule and the wearing of masks apply to places of worship? I have been asking that in Assembly questions and have not been able to get an answer. What is the current position regarding places of worship?”
“Is the Minister indicating firmly to the House that that is the direction of travel that he is minded to take: to use the power in the Bill to regionalise and maybe have a single trust or some other body in charge of it all?”
“I ask the Minister: have we in the Bill, as he promised in that correspondence, reflected the GB position, as in section 98 of the 2002 Act? If we have, can he put my mind at ease as to where we have adequately done that in the Bill?”
“When I read section 98 of the 2002 Act and compare it to the provisions in the Bill, which seem to appear in clause 56, I am not convinced that they faithfully reflect the position now pertaining in GB. I invite the Minister, in his winding-up speech, to convince me of how and where clause 56 — if that is the particular clause — reflects section 98 of the now amended 2002 Act. It is very important that the direct line descendants of an adopted person can access information about that adopted person, including their birth certificate. <BR /> <BR />There is a great thirst for family history, and people want to know about their roots. Very often, the people we are talking about are dead and gone, but their descendants want to know. There is surely no data issue once the person has passed.”
“I wrote to the Minister about that subject last year. In his reply, he stated:”
“That was about the right of the offspring of adopted persons to obtain information about the adoptee and their background.”
“That is the issue, and I believe that the oversight of the House needs to be strengthened by virtue of providing, in clause 155(2), the exception that relates to other clauses so that regulations made under clause 42 have to come by affirmative resolution. I appeal to the Minister and to the Committee, when they come to examine this matter, to take that course of action. That would be a good safeguard, I believe, going forward. <BR /> <BR />The second issue is that I want to get absolute clarity from the Minister about the subject that I raised in an intervention.”
“If we leave regulations that can dictate the qualifiers for someone to adopt to being, effectively, beyond the reach of the House, where is the assurance that something as offensive as the exclusion of such a couple from adoption could not happen here? I do not distance myself from the view of that family. I think that it is an honourable, defensible and legitimate view that a child will have the best opportunities when they have a male and a female role model. I think that that is very defensible, but that is not really the issue here. The issue is: should the state put itself in a position where that sort of thing could be put in as a criterion without it ever coming before the House?”
“<BR /> <BR />I make this point with a case in my mind that drew great publicity in Great Britain a couple of years ago, where a couple, regarded as exemplary in their treatment of and experience with children, were decreed by an adoption authority to be unsuitable because they had expressed traditional Christian views about the family and had reflected the traditional Judaeo-Christian view of a child needing a mother and a father. Because they dared to offend the populist, politically correct view, they were deemed to be unsuitable to adopt. That was a scandalous proposition from an adoption authority, which eventually found its way through to our courts.”
“Those regulations will definitively shape who can and cannot adopt, yet they are proposed to be made, pursuant to clause 155, by negative resolution. There is nothing more seminal when it comes to adoption than examining the rules that have to be met by a proposed adopter. If those can simply be made by negative resolution without ever coming to the House, we are in dereliction of our duty as legislators and scrutineers as to the presentation of those rules. I say to the Minister that I strongly think that clause 42 should be included in the list in clause 155(2) as those that would have to come by affirmative resolution to the House.”
“The clause enables the setting of the rules of suitability of those who are going to adopt children. It says:”
“Likewise with foster parents, who add to their own responsibilities the giving of all that love and care to others. I salute the efforts made by so many in that regard. <BR /> <BR />In my brief contribution, I want to reflect on two points that Ms Armstrong made very effectively. She questioned why, under clause 3, we could end up with a multiplicity of adoption authorities. Why do we want to have five different adoption authorities when what is required is a uniformity of approach across the Province, without boundary issues and all that flows from them? I do not understand why clause 3 insists on five separate adoption authorities. <BR /> <BR />The second point that I want to echo also came from that very considered speech by Ms Armstrong. She made a point about clause 42, a clause that is, I think, pivotal.”
“I have just a few observations on the Bill. It deals, obviously, with a very important issue, namely that of adoption and the care of children. There are many in our society who, without a loving adoptive mother and father, would not have made their way in this world to the extent that they have. Tribute needs to be paid to those adoptive mothers and fathers who took upon themselves all the burdens and duties of parenting children who would otherwise have had no active mother or father. I can think of people, even in public life, who write, from time to time, about how finding that right place — that right home — was the making of them. Therefore, when we deal with adoption, we deal with a very important and sensitive issue. Adoption is something for which many, as they grow up in this world, have had occasion to be thankful.”
“If the Minister is unable to do anything about this other than make representations, does it not demonstrate the tyranny of the protocol and his folly in respect of an issue that he could do something about: continuing to implement the checks that keep the iniquitous protocol alive?”
“I understand exactly what the Bill says about the rights of adopted persons to information. On the issue that the Minister now touches on, will he bring some clarity in respect of the offspring of an adopted person who wants to find out about an adopted parent or grandparent — now probably dead — but who, until this moment, has not been able to find out that information? Does the Bill do anything for that family?”
“It is not just a failure to condemn; it is a glorification of murder, and thereby a justification. You cannot glorify that which you say is not justified. It is as stark as that. <BR /> <BR />The Irish Government have lamentably failed. I quoted a few minutes ago their supposed commitment in the Stormont House Agreement. Their actions do not match those words; far from it. Rather, we have had a total duplicity in the Dublin Government's response. It is a duplicity that is as shocking as the cover-ups that they continue to provide for IRA murders through the collusion that is exemplified in just one case — Ian Sproule — but is multiplied in many cases in our Troubles.”
“As for the Alliance Party, of course, last week, it was Sinn Féin's little helper; this week, it is to be Dublin's little helper.”
“Mrs Dodds gave us the figures: of 113 applications for extradition — for murder and other crimes — eight were successful. That was because the Irish Republic was deliberate in the business of providing safe haven for murderers in this part of the United Kingdom. That is the hard truth. Therefore, it falls ill that people cannot even face up to that. That is what the motion calls on people to do — face up to that. Today, they have run away from that.”
“If there has been collusion from the Republic of Ireland, and Smithwick tells us that there was — you do not have to take my word for it, as Smithwick tells us that there was — why is it beyond some in the House to condemn that collusion? That is the question that I ask. <BR /> <BR />Of course, that collusion comes in the context of the concerted, deliberate campaign to cover up for and provide cover for the IRA.”
“Yes, there was lots of doublespeak and equivocation but no facing up to the reality that their IRA brutally murdered that young man. <BR /> <BR />When we came to the SDLP, sadly, there was no facing up to the reality of Republic of Ireland collusion. In Mr McGrath's speech and Mrs Kelly's speech, there was no acknowledgement of that collusion. Why not? Why be the protectors of collusion? You are loud enough in your demands when you think that you can point that finger at the British.”
“<BR /> <BR />It is also abundantly clear that Dundalk station and Donegal stations were rife with enablers of IRA murder, no more so than in this case, where, in their warped justification of the gunning down of that young man, the IRA produced a document straight out of a Garda file identifying him, containing his photograph and naming him. Of course, their plan that night was to kill a second young man, because they had a second photograph. Fortunately, he was not at home. <BR /> <BR />We still debate this today, however. I have listened very carefully to the contributions. We have had two Sinn Féin contributors but not one word of condemnation of the brutal murder of Ian Sproule. A motion that centres on that brutal murder, and, yet again, Sinn Féin comes to the House and cannot even find the decency to condemn it.”
“I commend those who tabled the motion. I particularly commend John Sproule for the relentless campaign that he has pursued and the Derg Valley Victims' Voice, which has been by his side. Despite all of that, however, we are no further forward in obtaining the truth about the brutal murder of Ian Sproule. <BR /> <BR />It is abundantly clear that there was rife Garda/IRA collusion throughout the Troubles. Mrs Dodds listed several of the cases: the Sproule case, of course; Breen and Buchanan, in whose murders Smithwick found clear collusion; Lord and Lady Gibson; the Hanna family; Terence McKeever; and Tracy Doak. It is all there.”