Northern Ireland Bill (Allocation of Time)

I entirely endorse the hon. Gentleman’s comments; I am about to make similar comments myself. I particularly agree with him about the collaboration with the Garda, which I have noticed in the border areas. The year before last, two officers had lucky escapes in Londonderry and Dungannon. In more recent months, the attacks in Craigavon, the rocket attack in Lisnaskea and the bomb in Rosslea thankfully did not succeed. As recently as February, a 300 lb bomb was found in Castlewellan. So-called loyalist groups also pose a real danger to police officers. It is disgraceful that they have not decommissioned weapons as we approach the 11th anniversary of the Belfast agreement. A police officer was shot in the back in Carrickfergus, and of the 20 officers forced from their homes in the past 12 months, five were driven out by loyalists. The above list is far from comprehensive, and I pay tribute to the bravery of all those involved at every level of the police and security services for minimising the damage that these violent criminals wish to inflict on the law-abiding majority. As we debate the Bill, we should all remember the dedication of these public servants. Some dissident groups have moved into drug crime, and this continues the violence. Masked men who shot a man dead in Londonderry in February were thought to be dissident republicans involved in drugs. Fuel smuggling is estimated to cost the Exchequer £100 million a year. In some areas, both dissidents and republicans are, amazingly, working together to smuggle fuel. The Assembly should remember, when deciding whether to use the option provided by the Bill, that normal policing is extremely difficult in these circumstances and that—despite Patten recommendation 55, which states that police cars should be substituted in place of armoured Land Rovers—more and more patrols are forced to travel in armoured vehicles due to the rise in dissident violence. The dissident threat has also led to a huge increase in police overtime, with the result that £24.5million has had to be taken from this year’s budget to pay for last year. There are suggestions that the Policing Board is starting the new financial year £50 million in the red. The PSNI needs to save £263 million by 2011. Proposed police station closures are unpopular, the information technology budget has had to be reduced, and police overtime will be cut by 51 per cent. over three years. We are therefore discussing the Bill in the context of further looming pressures on the budget. There are more than 2,000 claimants for hearing loss, which could cost a further £100 million. I have even heard reports that that could rise to £400 million. The historical inquiries team has had to cut staff. The current established figure of 7,500 full-time officers has not been achieved, and plans for police community support officers have been put on hold for three years. On the positive side, great progress has been made in increasing Catholic recruitment, which is up to 25 per cent., and on target for 30 per cent. by March 2011. In his winding-up speech, will the Minister please confirm that police pay, pensions and conditions will continue to be set nationally after devolution? Will he confirm how inquiries into the past will be paid for in future? Who will pay for any litigation that flows from those inquiries? Could he give us an overall appraisal of the current and future financial position of the PSNI? When the Assembly comes to debate the timing of devolution, it should be aware of the extremely difficult conditions in which the police continue to operate, and the serious financial consequences of that. I am also conscious that a number of politicians in Northern Ireland take the view that Stormont should be allowed to settle down and resolve issues such as education before taking on the additional burden of policing and criminal justice. In my opinion, however, that is strictly a matter for the Assembly. The background to the Bill is that the PSNI is already the most accountable police force in the world. The Chief Constable is widely respected across all parts of the community and is self-evidently non political. He reports to a Policing Board that has representatives from all political parties, and there is further scrutiny by the police ombudsman, the district policing partnerships and the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission. Despite the ultimate responsibility resting with the Secretary of State, there is already significant involvement by representatives across all the community in Northern Ireland. It is important to stress—as the Secretary of State did—that the Bill does not deliver the devolution of criminal justice and policing. That could have been triggered at any time since the Northern Ireland Act 1998, which gave effect to the Good Friday agreement, had there been cross-community support for it. Since then, a number of models for the devolution of criminal justice and policing have been proposed. There are currently seven such models. This Bill creates an eighth model, following exhaustive negotiations in the Northern Ireland Assembly, primarily between the Democratic Unionist party and Sinn Fein. That resulted in a report to the Assembly, which was published in January. We believe that locally elected politicians should ultimately be responsible for such matters, but which model is chosen should be a matter for the parties in the Assembly to agree. At the same time, we have always insisted that powers should be transferred from this Parliament only when three criteria have been satisfied: first, that all parties represented in the Executive are committed to pursuing their objectives by exclusively peaceful and democratic means; secondly, that all parties fully support, in word and deed, the criminal justice system, including the police and the courts; and, thirdly, that such a transfer of powers commands support across the community, as expressed through Northern Ireland’s political representatives. In our view, that is not something that should be imposed according to an arbitrary deadline or timetable, so I welcome the fact that nothing in the Bill alters the existing triple lock on the transfer of powers. The mechanism for transferring policing and justice in the 1998 Act remains unchanged. Before devolution takes place, it must have the consent of the First Minister, a majority of designated Unionists and nationalists in the Assembly and of both Houses of Parliament. I give a guarantee that any future Conservative Government will fully uphold that triple lock while respecting the decision of the Assembly. In addition, we have always made it clear that any devolution of policing and justice powers must preserve the operational independence of the Chief Constable and his officers; the independence of the judiciary must also be guaranteed. Those are cardinal principles that cannot be compromised. There must be no question of allowing political interference in such matters in Northern Ireland or in any other part of the United Kingdom. We support many features of the Bill, particularly the changes to the Justice (Northern Ireland) Act 2002 in respect of appointments to judicial offices. In our view, it is right and sensible to give to the Lord Chief Justice the powers originally envisaged as being exercised by the First and Deputy First Ministers. One of our concerns when the 2002 Act was passing through Parliament was about the potential for politicisation of certain judicial appointments, but these changes go some way to allaying our fears. We are not happy, however, that the Director of Public Prosecutions for Northern Ireland is, in the words of the explanatory note,""independent of a ‘parent’ department within the Northern Ireland departmental system"." I listened carefully to the Secretary of State’s comments, and we will study the text that he referred to in detail, but we believe that devolution of criminal justice and policing would actually be strengthened if the DPP were superintended by the Attorney-General, who, according to the 2002 Act, may participate in the proceedings of the Assembly. We believe that the Attorney-General should be appointed by the Lord Chief Justice on the recommendation of the Northern Ireland Judicial Appointments Commission. I am confident that our amendments, if approved, would strengthen the devolution of justice, making the DPP answerable to a key figure who is accountable in turn to the Assembly. It would also give the DPP a shield to protect him on occasions when he has to deal with very contentious prosecutions. We have tabled a number of other amendments, including one that would set a time limit of six months on appointing a Justice Minister. That is in no way intended to undermine devolution, but we think that, given the security situation in Northern Ireland, it is not acceptable for criminal justice and policing to continue for an indefinite period without a Minister responsible to a democratic body.