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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“On 7 December 1922, exactly 100 years ago, the elected unionist representatives to the predecessor of this House, the Northern Ireland Parliament, unanimously declined to leave the Union of the United Kingdom and join the Irish Free State. One hundred years later, it remains the unanimous view of every unionist elected representative that the protocol is unacceptable because of the manner and extent to which it dissipates and disrespects that very same Union. That fundamental has not changed and will not change for those of us who are, by conviction, unionists. <BR /> <BR />What is the Union? As David Trimble quite rightly said, it is the Acts of Union. What do they do?”
“That is the challenge to you, Secretary of State, and you are failing miserably in that challenge. <BR /> <BR />I will finish with this: "No surrender" is not just an historic slogan; it is a present-day necessity in opposing the Union-dismantling protocol.”
“I will be there to try to stiffen the resolve to make sure that unionism does not roll over and votes for strength not weakness. However, let us be very clear, Secretary of State: your first priority should not be trying to bludgeon unionists into submission on the protocol. Your first priority, Secretary of State, should be to defend the sovereignty and recover the sovereignty that was ill gotten by the EU over the very place for which you are the Secretary of State. If you are the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, you, as a Conservative and unionist, should be making sure that the Union rules in Northern Ireland, not the EU.”
“It is a delusion to think, "If only we could have those talks". <BR /> <BR />Of course, it is equally a delusion to think, "If only we could have Stormont, there would be no cost-of-living crisis, no fuel hikes, no problems in our health service": utter delusion. The utter delusion is rooted in the fact that the Assembly and the Executive, if there were one, have no money of themselves. All of those issues depend entirely on the generosity of the Treasury. Without the Assembly, money is coming for the energy crisis just as money came for COVID. Where from? The Treasury. It is another delusion that feeds the ego of some in the House who think, "If only we could get Stormont back". Those talks will not deliver. <BR /> <BR />Let me say this to the Secretary of State: you can call an election. Bring it on, Secretary of State.”
“I am sure that we will have an opportunity to hear from you later. <BR /> <BR />I say this gently to Mr Doug Beattie, who seems to put faith in certain talks: those talks cannot deliver a solution, because they are circumscribed by the mandate that the EU has given them. That mandate is only to tinker; it is only to make the protocol work better — whatever that means. There is no mandate that allows the sovereignty issue to be addressed in those talks. Sovereignty is the fundamental issue with the protocol: the fact that we are subject to foreign laws and that the other part of our nation is decreed to be a foreign country and, therefore, we must check its goods. Those issues are incapable of being addressed in those talks because the parameters of the talks do not extend to them.”
“They are, but, sadly, most in the House do not care. They do not care that our farming industry faces a crisis because, come 31 December, 51% of our veterinary medicines will not be available. They do not care about the rise in steel prices. They do not care about the 30% increase in travel costs. They care only about the precious protocol because they see it as delivering their all-island economy, which they see as a stepping stone.”
“Of course, it is coming loudest and clearest from those who — for not one, not two, but three years — brought government in the Province to a halt until, through using their leverage, they got what they needed, but how dare unionists think that they should dare to defend the Union? The protocol is dismantling the Union. That is why, of course, its greatest cheerleaders are Sinn Féin and its little helpers in the House.”
“How dare unionists stand up for themselves? How dare unionists say that they cannot operate a system that requires them to operate a protocol that decrees that GB is a foreign country? How dare unionists not accept the partitioning of the United Kingdom? How dare unionists say that they will not accept, colony-like, foreign laws over which they have no control or input? How dare unionists think of using the only leverage that they have to force change on those issues? That is the arrogant, belligerent message that is coming across in the House: who do you unionists think you are that you should dare to stand up for what you believe in?”
“That is the very reason why it is they who are putting the institutions in total jeopardy.”
“All of that is the product of the protocol. That is what those who continue to howl at the moon about Brexit and continue to insist on the protocol seek to put upon Northern Ireland.”
“What an ultimate irony and what a fundamental reason why no one — never mind a self-respecting unionist — who is a self-respecting democratic can come to terms with a protocol that says, "You are not good enough to make the laws that govern your country. Your laws will be made in a foreign place. They will be handed down to you. They will be changed as a foreign place sees fit. You will have no say whatever in how you manufacture your goods, the standards that you manufacture them to or how you sell them or trade them".”
“Those who are playing with fire, as far as the future of these institutions is concerned, are those who are unbending in their support for the protocol. They are the ones who are putting in jeopardy these very institutions. Of course, they aspire to be Members of a legislative Assembly that would not be able to legislate on many issues because of the protocol. There are people in the House who preen themselves about their anti-colonial credentials, whether republicans, nationalists or crypto-nationalists. They all preen themselves about their anti-colonial credentials, and, yet, they are the new colonialists. They are the people who want to live under foreign rule and foreign laws that they cannot change or even rubber-stamp.”
“The price of this Stormont now is to implement those checks and implement that protocol.If the protocol — as it is — is wholly incompatible with our constitutional position as an integral part of the United Kingdom, it follows that no unionist can be a party to that. The failure and refusal — the stubborn refusal — of the protocol fanatics in the House to face up to that is the reason that we are in this position.”
“Then along comes a protocol that operates on the basis that, because we remain in the single market of the EU, Great Britain is to be regarded as a third or foreign country and its goods that come here must be subject to customs and checks. That is what it means to drive a coach and horses through the Belfast Agreement and upset the North-South, east-west equilibrium. Too many in the House do not want to face that reality and the political reality that, because GB is now regarded in trading terms as a foreign country, that has constitutional implications that no unionist can come to terms with. That means that the very basis of our Union has been corrupted by the protocol and, in consequence, no unionist can accept implementing that very protocol.”
“There is a straightforward reason why, after three months, the net product of the Assembly is nugatory and today is just another stunt sitting. That straightforward reason is the protocol, something that most in the House do not want to face up to. The very same people who yesterday and in recent days were effusive in respect of Lord David Trimble consciously and deliberately ignore the very telling finding of Lord Trimble about the protocol. He said that the protocol has ripped the heart out of the Belfast Agreement. Why is that? The Belfast Agreement was proclaimed to be the establishment of an equilibrium between east-west and North/South.”
“On a point of order, Mr Acting Speaker. Arising from your announcement of the resignation of Mr Roy Beggs — I salute his service to the House — has any other Member who was not returned as a Member of the House resigned from offices that they continued to hold, for example, on the Commission? If they continue to hold those offices, are they continuing to be paid?”
“The only advantage to the debate today is that, although there will be an echo chamber debate about all the issues, it gives one the opportunity, which I wish to take, to place on record the fact that Wednesday is the centenary of the formation of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, which served this country with such gallantry and selflessness and which paid such a high price to the terrorists who are represented in the House. Furthermore, later this week, of course, we will have the momentous occasion of the platinum jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. What a remarkable achievement: 70 years to rule over us. Long may she rule over us, indeed.”
“That is such an affront that no democrat — unionist, nationalist or other — should be prepared to live under it. I am clear to the House, therefore, that I trust that the attempt to break the resolve of unionism will fail and continue to fail. Unionism needs to hold its nerve. It is doing the right thing and, in doing so, has no option but to continue to repudiate and make clear that you cannot have the protocol and Stormont at the same time. The protocol is about dismantling the Union: that is why Sinn Féin is its cheerleader. The protocol is about dismantling Brexit: that is why Alliance is a cheerleader. Now, however, Members need to come to realise that the protocol is also about dismantling the Assembly. On your head be it, because that is the course that you have chosen to take.”
“<BR /> <BR />Then, you top that off by saying to Members of this elected Assembly, "You should have no power over many of the laws that govern your constituents. You should have no power to make or to change laws that govern trade, economy and all the things that the protocol controls".”
“That is what today is about: trying to coerce and cajole unionists into giving up the key essential leverage that they have against the iniquitous protocol. I trust that that will not work today and that it will not work until that protocol is gone. No unionist who is awake at all to the protocol — sadly, that may not include all unionists — can ever come to terms with the fact that, under that protocol, Great Britain, the other part of this nation, is decreed to be a foreign country, which means that its goods must, therefore, be checked as if they were coming from Bolivia rather than Britain. That is such an affront to my citizenship and to the unionist position that it can never be accepted.”
“This is patently a stunt sitting of the Assembly, initiated by Sinn Féin and its ever-willing little helpers in the Alliance Party. More than that, it is riven with the most base hypocrisy. The first person to speak in the debate, Michelle O'Neill, was the very Minister of Health who walked out of Government — not for three weeks, not for three months but for three years — caring nothing about waiting lists, caring nothing about the sick. Now, they come here to lecture us on those very subjects. <BR /> <BR />Mrs O'Neill and her party are not bringing forward a proposition to try to resolve the impasse. They are trying to bring forward a proposition to break the resolve of unionists who oppose the iniquitous protocol.”
“Since the Member is articulating those issues, maybe he will tell us what the Alliance Party's current view is on the fundamental building block that it holds to in respect of consent. Is consent not a fundamental building block of these institutions, whether one likes it or not, and, therefore, is it not wholly legitimate and within those processes to say, "Sorry, I don't consent"? There can be no compulsion to consent. Why should a community that has been told that GB is a foreign country consent to implementing such a thing?”
“The Member speaks in an irrational way. The protocol itself is causing pain. It adds excessive costs to the cost of living through transport costs. It is causing businesses that hitherto supplied trade to our supermarket shelves and elsewhere to cease to trade. The Member is very selective in her approach. <BR /> <BR />The fundamental point is this: we have a Prime Minister and parties in the House who will have to choose whether they want these institutions or the protocol. It is a choice for you all. As far as I am concerned — I trust that it is the continuing resolve of everyone else — you cannot and will not have both. Make up your mind.”
“That is abundantly clear. <BR /> <BR />I appreciate that the protocol fanatics cannot come to terms with the fact that they have embraced a system that is supposed to have consent at its heart but do not wish to live by that system. They seem to think that unionist concerns are there to be trampled on and that everyone else's concerns are there to be adhered to. Well, I am sorry: with the 65,000 unionist votes that I have, I will not allow anyone to trample unionist concerns, and I will make sure that unionist concerns are heard and listened to in the House.”
“In a moment. That is why the mendacious Prime Minister whom we have has to be brought to the point of choice. Does he want to save the protocol, or does he want to save these institutions? It is as simple as that. <BR /> <BR />If there is — I trust that there is — unrelenting unionist resolve that that choice must be made, we are in a situation where, until the protocol becomes moribund, the Assembly must be moribund.”
“Therefore, all unionists should be on the side of exercising the leverage that is available to seek to force change to that situation. That is why, since the leverage is in respect of the Assembly —.”
“There is no reason in the characteristics or personalities of Mike Nesbitt or Patsy McGlone why either of them would not make a perfectly adequate and good Speaker. However, the circumstances are such that it is not appropriate to proceed to the election of a Speaker, for one simple reason. In politics, when a community is downtrodden and ignored and its legitimate protests are trampled underfoot, that community is entitled to — nay, must — use whatever legitimate leverage it has to extricate itself from that situation. We are in a situation, as unionists in Northern Ireland, where we are being expected to live under the unbearable: a protocol that decrees and operates on the basis that Great Britain is a foreign country. That is something that no unionist can ever come to terms with.”
“That is absolutely untrue, with respect. It is not in the Bill, and the way in which the Bill is written means that it is an absolute offence, so there is no defence now of reasonable excuse. The Member should be careful not to mislead the House. Her Bill is very clear. I know that she wanted to put it in, and she failed, as I failed, in that. We have the Bill as it is, and, in the Bill as it is, it is an absolute offence.”
“I will only regret that some who tell us that they are against the Bill would not take the step that would have saved their statute book from such unnecessary and inappropriate legislation.”
“It really is quite galling to hear talk of human rights when the rights of the voiceless — the unborn — are so trampled upon and despised that you cannot even abide anyone seeking to influence others against abortion. <BR /> <BR />The Bill is unworthy and, in that sense, disreputable, because it goes way beyond what was ever necessary to protect people from and deal with illegitimate protest. The criminal law and provisions on disorderly behaviour are all there, but, no, that was never enough. There had to be a special UDI approach to abortion clinics: special places that can abide only their view of the world. Because I think that that is an abhorrent position to take and because I believe in the right to protest — whether I agree about the issue being protested against is neither here nor there — I will vote against the Bill.”
“Just a couple of weeks ago, the House deliberately decided that the most basic of defences — reasonable excuse — would not be available for this criminalisation. Instead, the House decided that it would have to be and would be an absolute offence. No matter what your motivation or mode, just being there or engaging in silent prayer, if it could be interpreted as being capable of influencing someone, would be an absolute offence. It does not matter what the reasonable excuse was. It does not matter if you are the mother of a 14-year-old who insists on going through with the abortion. Those are the depths to which the House sunk in its blind determination to ram down everyone else's throat its world view about the taking of innocent life. <BR /> <BR />I have heard talk today about human rights.”
“It refused to accept that there should be written into the law, as there is with a vast panoply of criminal offences, the defence of reasonable excuse.”
“<BR /> <BR />We really have reached a sorry pass if we are now in a society where the liberalism of some is so illiberal that they cannot abide the very articulation of a message contrary to their own and that they believe that they should be able to self-certify public territory and to say, "Only our world view will prevail within this 150 metres: only a pro-abortion view". You are allowed to influence pro-abortion terms, but you are a criminal if you dare to try to influence against abortion. That, to me, is the oppressive and vindictive nature of the Bill. <BR /> <BR />Its vindictiveness is underscored by the fact that the House deliberately refused any amelioration in respect of clause 5 and the criminal offence of influencing.”
“Thus, when we come to a Bill that would criminalise the merest attempt to influence someone against the deliberate choice of killing in the womb, it is but a reflection of how some think so little of human life that they want not just to have absolute legality and protection for the taking of human life but to quell, suppress and extinguish any opportunity for anyone to say that it is wrong. They want to expel from the public space anyone who dares to take a stand that is compatible with a basic tenet of belief: "Thou shalt not kill". Under the Bill, an individual who dares to silently hold a placard or a piece of paper with those few words on it is to be criminalised. They do not have to say anything, shout anything or approach anyone. If their words are capable of influence, under this pernicious Bill, that is a criminal offence.”
“It should be no surprise to anyone that there would be protest against the widespread facilitation of abortion. Though abortion, by its advocates, is constantly described in the House as a medical procedure, the truth and reality of abortion is that it is, by choice, the deliberate killing of a baby in the womb. A woman's womb should be the safest possible place for the unborn. Yet, with abortion, it is the most dangerous place for the unborn, because it is there, in the womb, that, consciously, deliberately and by choice, death is visited on the unborn. It should therefore be no surprise that that provokes unease, distaste and protest. When it ceases to do so, this society will have entirely abandoned any semblance of a moral compass.”
“For a different perspective, I ask the Minister what success he has had, since he came into office, in liberating Tourism NI from its satellite subservience to Tourism Ireland? Does he agree that, until that liberation is secured, the promotion of Northern Ireland as a free-standing, delightful tourism attraction will be stultified?”
“As a member of the Audit Committee, I was surprised to discover that the Comptroller and Auditor General's salary had not been visited since 2014, despite the fact that it was notionally linked to a judicial line of salary that had increased in the meantime. Therefore, I support what the Chair has outlined. It is appropriate that the Audit Committee and, therefore, the Assembly take the matter back to the beginning of this mandate, which is the one over which we have responsibility, and that the consequences flow as outlined in the motion. That is fair and reasonable, and I therefore support that. I join others in offering my best wishes to Mr Donnelly. He has been in charge for a long time, and he performed his functions with great professionalism and diligence. He certainly will be a hard act to follow. We all wish him well.”
“Let us punish them and leave them without any tariffs. Is that really where Sinn Féin wants to take that issue? If it is, shame on them.”
“Millions upon millions of pounds that were sent over to fund the scheme are returned annually because the House and Departments are so embarrassed by what happened that they will not even play fair by those who were in the scheme genuinely. <BR /> <BR />Ms Archibald says "Let's close it". Has she no constituents who applied for the scheme genuinely, who are getting a below-par tariff and see their competitors across these islands getting a proper tariff? The message from her and Sinn Féin to them is this: shut it down. Let us compound the disaster that was RHI and compound the disgraceful failure to deal with the inappropriate behaviour during RHI by punishing the people who have the most to lose, who did not do anything wrong, who applied genuinely and accepted and believed what government were telling them.”
“There were genuine applicants to the RHI scheme, people who took at face value what government offered them — the promise of grandfathering and letters to banks from the Minister at the time — and invested heavily, and who then found that the House, in its recoil from RHI, decided to punitively reduce the tariffs that were payable to a level below that which was sustainable — below that which exists in the Republic of Ireland and Great Britain — and leave those farmers in desperation. I am not talking about those who ripped off the scheme but the genuine farmers, some of whom we all have as constituents. They are still in desperation. That has left the Department still paying back, year-on-year.”
“I think that people would have been outraged, having heard what they heard, to know that that would be the eventual outcome. What a commentary it is on the deficiency of the disciplinary process that that is exactly what the outcome was. Permanent secretaries were cocooned, looked after by the system, allowed to retire with full pensions and available to be appointed as consultants to future Departments, untouched by their failings. <BR /> <BR />One sector did suffer and continues to suffer.”
“Members of the public watched and listened to jaw-dropping evidence in respect of this matter day after day after day, hearing such astounding admissions as a permanent secretary saying that he facilitated the non-taking of notes in order to spare major parties the blushes that might have resulted from potential FOI requests. As they listened to that evidence about repeat deficiencies that were evidenced in public administration, I am sure that people would have been outraged had someone said to them, "The end result of all this, you know, will be that not a single politician and not a single special adviser will pay any price — they, too, will escape — but one civil servant will get the lowest possible punishment, if you can even call it a punishment, namely a written warning".”
“It is not sustainable for the future of a legislative Assembly if the legislation that governs so much, touching on the manufacture of our goods and on trade, is not made in Belfast or in London but in a foreign jurisdiction over which we have no control. That is a further poison to this system, which guarantees that it is doomed, and so it should be.”
“<BR /> <BR />Now, of course, we add to that toxic mix the poison of the protocol, which has made any prospect of these institutions working on any viable basis simply beyond reach because it undermines the very ethos of what is supposed to exist here: consent to the process by which we are governed. There are boasts of the number of Bills that have been passed in the House, but, during the mandate, the House and the people of Northern Ireland became subject, courtesy of the protocol, to 300 EU laws that we cannot change and would not make. During this very year, according to the House of Lords Committee, there is the prospect of 29 changes affecting Northern Ireland's legislation about which we will never be asked and that we cannot change but to which we will become slavish rule takers.”
“Hence the manifestations throughout the mandate of deadlock, failure and squabble. It should be no surprise to anyone that we look back on another mandate of failure and deadlock: the system guarantees that. <BR /> <BR />Now we go into an election in which the most fundamental of democratic rights — the right to change their Government and the right to vote a party out of government — is denied to the people of Northern Ireland. Because of the absurdity of mandatory coalition, where any party with a handful of MLAs is entitled as of right to be in government, the electorate can never vote a party out of government or change their Government. Under this system, there is simply more of the same deadlock, squabble and failure. That is what mandatory coalition offers.”
“I join in the thanks and appreciation to the Assembly staff for their dedicated service throughout the mandate. I also wish every future happiness and success to those who are retiring. Now that Paula Bradley, Sinéad Bradley and Chris Lyttle are obtaining their early release, I trust that they will enjoy the rest of their lives. <BR /> <BR />In respect of the House, the mandate started with no Executive, and it finishes with no Executive. It started in deadlock, and it finishes in deadlock. Does that not tell us something? Surely it tells us that this system of government is unsustainable and unworkable and that mandatory coalition is a recipe for such failure because it is built on the sand of not having to be agreed about anything in order to be in government.”
“Should the Minister get the vote that he seeks today, the powers would continue to exist. Would the Minister be able to exercise those powers in the absence of an Executive?”
“I am not convinced that this is anything but a guise under COVID, when it is not COVID-required, to simply bridge the gap to when the Department hopes to bring some permanency for other reasons. I do not think that that is the right way to proceed. To that extent, the proposal is unworthy.”
“That is a retrograde step that will take away a lot of the presence, impact and, indeed, status of councils if they can simply meet remotely and not have the appearance of meeting as a council, as they should, which lends credence to what they are doing.”
“That sort of process allows that sort of behaviour, whereas, if it were in the chamber, there would be a lot more exchange, which would curb that sort of activity.”