Justice and Security (Northern Ireland) Bill

I approach the debate as someone who is interested—too interested, some would say—in Northern Ireland. Even so, I am an outside observer. We are talking about ““normalisation””—a horrible word—and how far we have gone down the road to achieve it. Yesterday, some of us were in Northern Ireland for the Northern Ireland Grand Committee, including you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, in your capacity as Chairman. I should like to put on record our thanks for the welcome that we received from the great people of Belfast. I was taken by the fact that there was a Christmas market outside City hall. Germans were trying to sell us sausages, and Italians were trying to sell us sweets and wine. There was a mixture of accents—as for me, English was their second language—and it took me back 15 or 20 years, when the only non-Northern Irish voices that we heard in the streets were those of Cockney or Yorkshire squaddies saying, ““Show us your driver’s licence or your passport. Open your car boot. Show us what is in your bag or wallet.”” There is a huge difference, because where there were once security posts there are now market stalls—that is the reality of so-called normalisation. We have come a long way, but we must consider how far we have travelled on that long road, and whether the proposals in the Bill are necessary. Anyone who visits Northern Ireland will not experience any difficulty travelling around, or in undertaking daily activities such as shopping, eating and drinking. The situation is vastly different, and it is a clear sign that things have changed. We talk about normalisation but, in truth, ““normality”” in Northern Ireland has probably never meant what it means in the rest of Great Britain. We are looking for a new normality that accepts that we live in a globalised world with global challenges. It says that we can never return to a world in which the use of force and the fear of intimidation are the basis on which our community is built. The hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Patrick Cormack) chairs the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee in an exemplary way. He is non-partisan, and has tried to provide challenges, both to the Government and to Northern Ireland politicians. I want to look at the things that we discovered in our work on security, and discuss two areas that show the progress that has been made as well as the challenge that we face. First, the Select Committee is conducting an inquiry on tourism. In early October, we went to Northern Ireland, and we have been taking evidence ever since. We saw the quality of the tourism industry that has developed in Northern Ireland, and the fantastic opportunities that are available. People from all over the world visit Northern Ireland and, by spending their money there, provide genuine hope for the future. There is a strong interest in encouraging more people to come, to stay longer and spend more money, so that we can build Northern Ireland into a place that we can all enjoy and of which everyone in the British Isles can be proud and can boast about to the rest of the world. The other side of normalisation, as the hon. Member for South Staffordshire said, became clear in our work on organised crime. Clearly, such crime takes place in mainland Britain—there is much more than anyone wants—but in Northern Ireland there is a history of paramilitary involvement, and the worry is that people who learned their trade fighting security forces will use those lessons to intimidate ordinary people. People trying to go about their ordinary day-to-day lives face threats and extortion. People who are trying to build houses and public service institutions are told, ““You either do as you are told, or when you come to work tomorrow morning, the building won’t be there. It will be damaged or destroyed.”” We took evidence from a gentleman who had to hand over a six-figure sum every year just to keep his buildings intact and his equipment safe. That is not the sort of world that anyone could call normal. Smuggling of all sorts of products, from oil to soap powder, takes place. The mind-boggling variety and scale of counterfeiting shows the ingenuity of some of the people on that island and undermines the concept of normalisation. At a time when the sad events in Ipswich are to the fore, exploitation in the form of people trafficking, particularly for sex, is increasing in Northern Ireland. These are some of the issues confronting the police and the legal system there. Behind it all is the worry that terror, and the history and impact of terror, are still there. That must be borne in mind as we consider how to take forward the so-called normalisation process. Last week the Committee had a session with the police in Northern Ireland. They gave us a run-down of what had happened in this year’s marching season, which should gladden all of us in Parliament. For the first time in almost four decades, there was no need to use troops on the streets to police the marching season. That did not happen by accident. The police force, the security forces, political parties from all sides, the Parades Commission and, above all, people on the ground got together and worked out a way of bringing the almost 3,000 marches to a relatively peaceful conclusion. On the back of that report, we also saw evidence of what happened just 12 months previously at Whiterock, where blast bombs were used, people were clearly shooting at police, and devices were found and dismantled before they could cause further harm. There is evidence of increased activity by dissident republicans, which should worry us all. We want to move from a terror-led past to a respect-driven future, but the path is not easy. The Bill reflects the great progress that has been made on that journey. The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee met Ministers and the Attorney-General. We expressed our cross-party concern that we had not participated in the pre-legislative scrutiny of the Bill, and we were worried about whether matters should be moving as fast as they are. We recognise that intimidation and, perhaps more important, the fear of intimidation still exist and might prevent people from coming forward. They want to do so but they are frightened that, if they do, they will not receive justice and violence will be visited on them. There are also worries that if people volunteer to sit on juries, they will not be able to do so as we in Great Britain do, and that they would not be picked for jury service in the same free and independent manner as those of us who have done jury service in this country expect to be the norm. For that reason, most of us have said that we will support the Bill, at least in the short term. We are happy that things are moving forward and that we have come a long way, although we are convinced that there is still a long way to go. The hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) may not agree, although I agree with him, that through the Bill we are putting in place an abnormal situation. We should all work as hard as possible to remove that abnormality. I know that that is the Government’s intention, but anxiety has been expressed across the House today about whether, once the measure is enshrined, it will ever be removed. Non-jury trials should be seen as the exception, rather than the norm. Hon. Members have taken a strong position on the extended powers of the Human Rights Commission. I think that it has done a good job in Northern Ireland. We all know that there was a need for it. In the time that I have been involved in Northern Ireland, there has seemed to be a ““business”” around human rights, and it is good to have one concentrated human rights body doing the work that needs to be done. I welcome the fact that it will be able to get into places of detention and have access to evidence.