Alex Attwood
West Belfast · Social Democratic and Labour Party · Northern Ireland
“I certainly do not take away from the contribution being made by the judiciary in Northern Ireland to framing a society that upholds the right principles and applies human rights standards across the board without fear or favour. <BR /> <BR />There are two issues with bail. One is police bail, which nobody has commented on so far.”
“Whatever it is, it is a flip-flop. It is trying to cover your tracks. It is having said to people that everything was all right when things were not all right. People saw through it.”
“I thank the Minister for giving way. When I was housing Minister in 2010-11, I conducted a fundamental review of the Housing Executive. It was based upon a number of principles, including protecting the institution of the Housing Executive, its legacy and name.”
“What world have you been living in for the last two or three months? <BR /> <BR />That is why Mr Agnew is right to say that there will be anger. There will be anger at the DUP on the day that a public inquiry is established into RHI, belatedly endorsed by Sinn Féin because it had no place else to turn.”
“He accepted a point from me and then said, "Well, actually, since that time the then deputy First Minister has been looking at the matter." Is it not curious that 18 months ago, despite NAMA, despite Red Sky, despite ransom strips — and, for all we know, people might have even known about RHI then — Sinn Féin, despite all that evidence, s…”
“Sorry, apologies. <BR /> <BR />I agree completely with Mr Agnew who said, in his opening remarks, that there was a need for an independent open process to investigate ministerial conduct, not least given recent events, and that there will be public anger if the motion is not passed.”
The complete record
Every one of 1,562 lines we hold for Alex Attwood, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 15 of 32.
“That is in a context in which OFMDFM-published data states that relative and absolute child poverty in Northern Ireland will be above 30% on both standards by 2020. That is happening in an environment in which, in July, the High Court in Northern Ireland granted a judicial review to the Committee on the Administration of Justice. Why? Because FM and DFM had not produced an anti-poverty strategy. That case was defended. It had to be defended on the instruction of FM and DFM, otherwise there is only one person running that Department. It must have been signed off in order to give instructions to barristers and solicitors to fight the case. The courts found in favour of the CAJ that there had not been an anti-poverty strategy.”
“That latter category is us. The people of Northern Ireland, in assessment after assessment, receive a larger share of their income from benefits and a smaller share from earnings. That is what we are washing our hands of in this Bill. <BR /> <BR />As I said, I am not sure what in the Bill is being signed off on in principle. I ask the Minister whether work-related requirements for parents and the changes in respect of the assessment of child poverty are or are not being signed off in the LCM. Whilst those two matters are definitively welfare-related, are we, through this Bill, moving onto the ground of work-related requirements for parents and the Child Poverty Act? This Bill goes after the Child Poverty Act 2010. That Act had four measures of income-based child poverty.”
“Is that what we are signing up to today? With the 2015 Bill, is that the principle that the Assembly is being asked to concede to London? If people in the Chamber have not read clauses 7 and 8 and clauses 9 and 10 of the Bill that is referred to in the Chamber, I urge them to read them before they put their hand up to support the LCM. Unless I am completely in error — no one seems to want to correct any error — this is what the LCM means: unilateral change to the benefit cap; reductions in the benefit cap that have immense implications, especially in our region; and the freezing of working-age benefits from two to four years. <BR /> <BR />The Child Poverty Action Group goes further:”
“— said the Child Poverty Action Group, and who are we to second-guess it? —”
“Remember, that is a freeze on working-age benefits from two years to four years, until April 2020. Noting the sums of money for welfare and tax credit mitigation, at the same time there is a freeze extended from two to four years, virtually for the lifetime of this Parliament and for most of the lifetime of the next mandate of the Assembly. It will be frozen solid. That ends the link with prices and earnings and,”
“I ask the Minister to confirm whether, with the LCM, that is the principle that we are subscribing to. It continues:”
“You must draw the conclusion that, on the basis that the benefit cap in London has been reduced to £23,000 and elsewhere, including here, to £20,000, there is risk, and that risk is magnified because the drafting of the clause, which, it seems to me, the LCM now wants us to sign up to, is such that Iain Duncan Smith does not even have to discuss this with our Minister. He can ignore the economic circumstances in Northern Ireland if he so chooses, and we know that he will so choose. <BR /> <BR />It gets worse. This is what the Child Poverty Action Group said about clauses 9 and 10, which, it seems to me, the legislative consent motion obliges us to accept:”
“It makes the challenge to Eileen Evason and whoever works with her even more challenging. While they will have a huge responsibility for the allocation of moneys based on whatever criteria, at the same time, DWP — not in Belfast but over in London — will be at its work. The lesson of the past six months is that, when needs must, the British Government will renege on what they say will be the situation in order to find more money to give it to those whom they want to give it to.”
“Have we not learnt anything from the past six months? The Tories said that the benefit cap would be £23,000 and £26,000, and then they came back in after the election and said that it would be £20,000 and £23,000.”
“Is there any reference there to any of the empirical evidence that you need to have in order to make an assessment about whether a benefit cap should go up or down? Yet it seems to me that that is what this LCM does. Unless I am wrong, it gives a Minister in London the ability to assess the economic circumstances over there, decide whether £20,000 becomes £19,000 or £18,000 and impose that here. That is what this LCM does. It does not just raise questions about the benefit cap policy, it gives a British Minister the ability to say unilaterally, subject to regulation, "This is the new cap and live with it".”
“in the section. <BR /> <BR />There is a quite awesome report from the Work and Pensions Committee at Westminster. I rely on it heavily. I have discussed it with officials in DSD. I know that they are considering its content at the moment, which is good because there is a lot of learning in respect of the Work and Pensions Committee's assessment of how universal credit and all of that has rolled out. The Committee is not consulted. Under law, it is not consulted about a regulation. The Secretary of State and DWP just have to take into account the national economic situation and any other matters that the Secretary of State considers relevant. Is there any reference there to child poverty? Is there any reference there to people's incomes?”
“That is code for whatever the Chancellor Exchequer is telling you. That is in the legislation. <BR /> <BR />And then:”
“Now, who but the Chancellor wrote, "the national economic situation"? Should the economic situation go down, it may well be that the benefit cap follows it down. The Bill then states:”
“The keyword there is of course "decrease". Do you think that this Chancellor, especially if he is under Budget pressure as he prepares to campaign to become Prime Minister, is not going to take another slash at the benefit cap? Does anyone think that "decrease" is the keyword there? <BR /> <BR />Anyhow, this is how the DWP Secretary of State then carries out that review:”
“We did not make an argument for no cap. We did not make an argument for a cap of £20,000. We made an argument for a £23,000 cap. Let the record correct any assertion to the contrary. <BR /> <BR />I move on from the benefit cap with this point, to quote what we are signing up to. This is clause 8 of the Bill currently before Westminster, unless I am completely wrong. As far as I am aware, the Minister has not corrected my assertions so far, so I will work on that basis and take a chance that they are right. This is what clause 8 of the Westminster Bill states about the review of the benefit cap. Maybe some people are getting weary, but he will be weary again before I am finished. This is what it says about the benefit cap review:”
“Of course, it was curious that Mr Maskey was relying on what I was meant to have said when, during the course of those negotiations, Sinn Féin did not hand over any documents on anything until yesterday: not a document on the past, we did; not a document on welfare, we did; not a document on paramilitarism, we did; not a document on criminality, we did; and not a document on finance, we did. <BR /> <BR />We handed over a lot of documents. There were some that we handed only to the British and Irish Governments. This is what our submission said, in case Mr Maskey is in difficulty:”
“Yet, Minister, we are being asked to support an LCM which, it seems to me, subject to correction, signs off on the benefit cap. That is what we are signing off on without any scrutiny, assessment, interrogation or having spoken to any of the relevant groups, never mind any of the relevant families. <BR /> <BR />I want to correct Mr Maskey, who referred to my having made some comments about the benefit cap. I want to read from paragraph 10 of our submission on welfare that was made during the course of the talks.”
“That is how close the Supreme Court was to striking down that provision in law. The Child Poverty Action reported:”
“That was something that is in and around Mr Agnew's Bill. It continued that two — two of the judges of the Supreme Court — found that the cap:”
“Of course, it is worse than that, and it is worse than that for the following reasons. Recently, Mr Agnew successfully passed a Bill in the Chamber in respect of children's services. I want to quote from what the Supreme Court found in relation to that stuff. It was actually a former judge from here, Lord Justice Kerr, who was speaking as a member of the Supreme Court. The Child Poverty Action Group reported what the Supreme Court considered the fairness of the cap to be in relation to the rights of the child. It stated:”
“That is what the Child Poverty Action Group stated is the consequence of clauses 7 and 8 of the Bill that is before Westminster, a Bill that, it appears, the LCM says we are agreeing to in principle. <BR /> <BR />What is our message to the child poverty groups in Northern Ireland or to the 3,000 families who will now have a benefit cap of £20,000? What is our message to them when, on a whim and casually, the Assembly says, it seems to me, that we are agreeing to that, without any assessment or scrutiny by any part of these Assembly structures? <BR /> <BR />The group stated:”
“Clauses 7 and 8 refer to the benefit cap; I will get the Bill in a second and then I will be able to refer to it. This is what the Child Poverty Action Group says about those clauses, and, if I am right, this is what the legislative consent motion will do in approving those clauses in principle.”
“Let us look at what the reforms are about. There are 32 clauses in the Welfare Reform and Work Bill as drafted — 32 clauses. Subject to the caution that we do not know — subject to what the Minister might tell us later — precisely what the clauses are that have been agreed in principle but working on the basis that, as a minimum, the LCM captures the discrete welfare clauses in the Welfare Reform and Work Bill, let us look at what the LCM will mean for people in Northern Ireland in the welfare-specific clauses, of which there are a number, potentially clauses 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 and 15. <BR /> <BR />I will start with clauses 7 and 8, which we have not looked at in the Chamber. It looks like we will not have much of a chance to look at them either, so we have to rely on good authority in Britain about what is being proposed.”
“Those reforms might well include tax credit reforms. Is that Sinn Féin's position now? Is it that what London is proposing on tax credits will bring:”
“That is what the Minister's memorandum says about the LCM that you are supporting. Unless the Minister corrects me, the LCM visits on Northern Ireland, without any proper legislative scrutiny — these are probably DWP rather than DSD words, but they are the words that Sinn Féin is signed up to:”
“<BR /> <BR />My final point — I know that the Minister might not be able to answer all those questions, so they might be a little rhetorical, but I ask for answers — is to ask Sinn Féin a question, because its Members are the co-sponsors — political if not ministerial — of the LCM. This is what the memorandum says at paragraph 14:”
“How did they conclude that there are no significant equality implications when DSD says that that is the scale of the implications? It is an indictment of this place or of those who are responsible for this that they can serve up, in the heat of the moment, a statement like that, which says that DWP tells us the equality implications of its legislation, never mind the fact that we will not be given the chance to legislate for it. What a withering indictment of this place that we are reduced to DWP telling our people that there are no equality implications in its proposals.”
“If they assumed the right to do that, what was the exercise that they undertook? When was it undertaken? What does it say? Was it undertaken against the right standards; the standards of the statutory equality framework in Northern Ireland? How did they end up concluding that there were "no significant equality implications"? <BR /> <BR />We struggled over the summer — the Minister will be aware of this because, to be fair to him and his officials, they produced information in the autumn, during the early part of the talks — with how some of the welfare changes in the current Bill would impact on Northern Ireland by way of tax credits and so on. That is how we know that, when it comes to tax credits, the loss of spending power will be £800 million over the lives of the people who will lose working tax credit and child tax credit.”
“Does that mean that DWP is masquerading as DSD? The Minister knows where I am going with this. Is DWP masquerading as DSD? It has always been my concern that, at times, DSD has gone in that sort of direction. Or is that actually true? Has DWP conducted an exercise on equality implications? If it is true, let us see it, because you have produced that in writing, Minister. <BR /> <BR />Let us see what it has said in its equality screening exercise. Let us see whether it was measured against the higher equality responsibilities further to the Northern Ireland Act 1998 in respect of section 75 and other sections. If DWP has somehow or other conducted an equality screening exercise in relation to London legislation when it should have been the case that that legislation came to this Chamber, who gave them the right to do that?”
“I do not know how Northern Ireland gives due consideration to anything; I presume it means the Northern Ireland Executive or Government. Will the Minister explain what consultation there will be with Northern Ireland when, today, an LCM based on agreement in principle to implement welfare aspects of the Bill before Westminster will be passed? That consultation sounds very like, "We will tell you what you are going to get" as opposed to, "What do you think about what is being proposed?" <BR /> <BR />I also ask the Minister to explain paragraph 9 of the memorandum. You will not believe this, but this is what it says:”
“What does that refer to? If you look at the legislation that is before Westminster — I will get a copy of it in a second — you will see a group of clauses headed "Welfare changes". Those welfare changes stretch not just across welfare, but across tax credit issues. We need to know, and I think we need to know today, what is the agreement in principle. What welfare aspects of the Bill currently in Westminster are we agreeing to? We need to know what that means; otherwise, we are all jumping into the unknown. I ask the Minister to be very precise in that regard because, in my later comments, I will touch upon what I am sure some of that means. <BR /> <BR />I also ask the Minister to reconcile paragraph 7 of the memorandum of understanding with the LCM. That paragraph states:”
“They have not been introduced in GB; they are in Westminster as we speak. What are the welfare aspects of the Welfare Reform and Work Bill that have been agreed in principle? It is hard in the time that we have had this morning to assess the various pieces of legislation to answer that question. That refers to the document yesterday, which also speaks about:”
“The memorandum says in the summary and policy objectives that:”
“We do not wash our hands of political responsibility for how we have addressed and tried to manage the issue of welfare reform arising from the 2012 legislation. No, we do not wash our hands of responsibility for what we did. The record proves that we were consistent in our arguments and in advocating petitions of concern at critical junctures. We were consistent: you may want to ask others why they were not consistent before and why they are not consistent today. Maybe we will get an answer in the next short while. The issue is not that we washed our hands of the crisis; we applied our hands to the issue. That is what the record demonstrates. <BR /> <BR />I ask the Minister to apply his hands and his mind to the legislative consent memorandum tabled this morning in respect of the LCM. I ask him to answer a number of questions.”
“We have a good example of when we can get these things done. There are procedures in the Assembly to bring back legislation, which demonstrates that you can do it and do it in good time.”
“Between First Stage and Final Stage of this enormously complex and difficult-to-manage legislation, which had all sorts of political consequences and connotations, there were 12 weeks, if my maths is right. Between Second Stage and Further Consideration Stage, there were 10 weeks. As far as I am aware, we have at least 10 weeks until the dissolution of the Assembly in advance of an election, so the argument that we do not have enough time is a false one. <BR /> <BR />When the DUP and Sinn Féin wanted to make enough time for the devolution of justice through the creation of the new Department — they were right to do so — we found the time and got the Bill through in good time. Indeed, we had a lot of good debates in the Chamber; I remember proposing a lot of SDLP amendments. The issue of time is a smokescreen.”
“However, let us remind ourselves of a previous time when there was immense turbulence and difficulty in and around the Chamber and in the Northern Ireland Government, when there was no devolution of justice and policing and when we were told that that was about to bring the institutions to collapse. People were grandstanding in relation to all of that, and others were trying to craft a good outcome in respect of it. How quickly was the legislation passed for the devolution of justice and the creation of the Justice Department? The First Reading of the Bill was on 14 September 2009, followed by the Second Reading on 22 September, Consideration Stage on 10 November, Further Consideration Stage on 23 November and Final Stage on 1 December.”
“Once again, where the DUP went, in my view, falsely — I think they might recognise that themselves — with being in and out of government, Sinn Féin has followed with "Let us be in on some of our law but outside in many other aspects of it". This is a calculated dereliction of political responsibility and, if it is not that, it is just downright evasion. <BR /> <BR />We are told that the reason why the LCM has to come forward today is that there is not enough time to get it through in the mandate. That is the assertion. It is an argument that we have to face up to, because we do not have much time left. The Business Office and the Bill Office will be overwhelmed with legislation and so on and so forth.”
“Had I drafted that document, for what it is worth — it is probably not worth very much — I would not have put in paragraph 3.4; it is just an advertisement of what is folly and what is false. It would have been better not said at all than said in such a crass way. <BR /> <BR />What we are witnessing with the LCM— this is really an irony — is a variation of the DUP's failed policy of being in and out of government. We now have a situation where the DUP/Sinn Féin variation on being in and out of government is being up for a bit of government and not for the rest. That is political leadership in the year 2015.”
“Will someone reconcile for me how London legislating for the 2012 Act and the 2015 Bill — I will come back to that in a minute — accord with not diminishing:”
“We were the only part of the devolution arrangements that had devolution of welfare, in order to demonstrate that we were going to be of a significant character when it came to our legislative and policy authority. On a whim, overnight, on the basis of what two parties decide, that will be surrendered. Let me put it mildly: that is an act of the gravest political abdication of responsibility that we have seen in these places when it comes to our statutory function in many a long day. Then, as if to cover some sense of embarrassment, what do the DUP and Sinn Féin put into the proposals? I say this with a straight face, Minister:”
“We are going in the opposite direction to Scotland. As Scotland goes for devolution plus, we go for devolution minus, sending the message to London that, when the going gets hard and London faces us down, rather than face our people with the decisions that we should make in a democratic way in this Chamber — even if we do not like some of the decisions — we send the message to London that it is "Game on" for the further erosion of our democratic institutions and that which was so carefully and with craft embedded in the Good Friday Agreement.”
“<BR /> <BR />I do not understand how any party can so casually and out of the blue surrender our democratic legitimacy to a Westminster Government when people are arguing that we should have the devolution of more powers.”
“<BR /> <BR />I think that there has been form on this. When the people of Ireland endorsed the Good Friday Agreement and put in place mechanisms to secure power-sharing, in particular the d'Hondt mechanism to allocate Ministries, all of that at St Andrews was unpicked. Those who unpicked the democratic will of the people of Ireland and put in place mechanisms that served their interests have today gone further. They have unpicked the Good Friday Agreement and the Northern Ireland Act and are putting in place mechanisms, for reasons that I will explain, that serve their interests, in order to wash their hands of something that should be very much the work of Members of the Assembly.”
“We are not only handing over our responsibility for primary legislation but, according to that paragraph, handing over our responsibility for secondary legislation. I say this to the Minister: in the event of a difference of opinion on secondary legislation and the regulations, whose will prevails? <BR /> <BR />It may be that we will have some knowledge of what the primary legislation is going to be, because of the various publications that have come forward in the last few hours, but what is the situation with the regulations? Therefore, we have handed over, even if only to the end of 2016, lock, stock and barrel, our responsibilities in the 2012 Act and the 2015 Bill. That is what we have done: handed over lock, stock and barrel our particular statutory responsibilities. Is that how some in the Chamber value our democracy?”
“<BR /> <BR />What is the scale of what we are proposing? The legislative consent motion is not just for those matters in the legislative consent motion. It is not just to do with the Welfare Reform Act 2012, the Welfare Reform and Work Bill and the interactions, whatever they are, for the additional support. <BR /> <BR />It also covers any secondary legislation. Paragraph 3.2 in the proposals yesterday states:”
“<BR /> <BR />In any case, we are being asked to vote on a legislative consent motion and have only now begun to get sight of its core content. There has been no checking of its content, and the Committee for Social Development has not been consulted on its content. Save what happened at the Executive meeting yesterday, there is no Executive view on its content. <BR /> <BR />Would anybody in the Chamber permit that to happen for any other policy proposal or legislative intervention? Would Sinn Féin allow a legislative consent motion in these terms for legacy mechanisms? Would any other party do anything like that if the British Government or parties in here decided overnight that a legislative consent motion would come before the House to push on with some policy intervention, not least on legacy legislation?”
“Yes, they have done wrong, but in doing that wrong, they have partners in the crime, namely the British Government and, in particular, the Secretary of State. During the negotiations, on one opportunity, I had to say to the Secretary of State — this was in plenary format — how dare she compromise the hard-won democratic gains of policing in Northern Ireland. That is what was being proposed in some of the clauses in the legacy Bill. I say this to the Secretary of State again today: how dare she show disrespect to our democratic mandate and to these democratic institutions by being a partner in responsibility for this LCM. The LCM would not go anywhere if, on the far side of it, the Secretary of State did not have that draft Order. It says a lot about those who brought this situation into effect.”
“Sorry, it is 126 pages. What respect does the British Government have for our democracy when, as this debate began, they chose to publish a Bill of that scale? That Bill is explicitly referred to in the legislative consent motion. How dare they do that. In the course of the negotiations —”
“<BR /> <BR />I do not know what it is in full that we are voting on, because, as we know, in the last number of hours, a draft Bill and a draft Order in Council have been produced. It is utterly bizarre that, as this debate began, the NIO posted on its website a draft Order in Council running to all these pages.”