I am delighted that everybody accepts, with a degree of reluctance and frustration, that the statutory instrument, while not wanted, is necessary. I thank everybody for saying, albeit with a heavy heart— I think that goes for all of us—that they will support it. I appreciate and recognise the degree of cross-party support. It is more powerful because it is cross-party.
That is not say that the frustrations are not real, or that those frustrations have not been clearly and effectively expressed this evening. We have heard a whole litany of examples, from all sides of the House, from the lengthening list of decisions not being taken because Stormont is not currently operational. We have heard examples from all sorts of people. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), who just spoke, gave the examples of a lady with a premature baby and a grandmother left waiting on a hospital trolley for too long. There were other examples. My hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield) gave a long list of missed opportunities, as did the Select Committee Chair, my hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison). The repeated refrain from all sides is that we cannot keep on, in the Chair’s phrase, kicking the can down the road. The right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson) said that the mountains in front of us are no higher than those we have scaled in the past, but he also said that bread and butter issues are far better done by locally elected politicians in Stormont.