I am grateful for the opportunity to respond to this very interesting debate, and I thank my friend and parliamentary neighbour, the hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound), for a typically generous welcome and a generous tribute to my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose). I know my hon. Friend will appreciate that, and it is typical of the hon. Gentleman to take the time to express his appreciation of my hon. Friend’s work.
The hon. Member for Ealing North pressed me on the scope and timing of this, and what I will say is that the work on the architecture is relatively advanced. The debate has also thrown up some extremely complex issues that need to be worked through, not least in an environment where almost anything we do will be subject to quite robust challenge. He will appreciate the need to sweat things through.
The hon. Member for South Antrim (Paul Girvan) pressed me about the scope—physical, psychological and geographical. That work is relatively well advanced, and he will be aware that we have a backstop—if I am allowed to use that word—in the end of January deadline for producing regulation. That focuses minds in the system, as he will appreciate.
One of the most important questions to arise from the debate is that of legislation versus regulation. A powerful coalition has formed, comprising the Chair of
the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for Belfast South (Emma Little Pengelly) and my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield). I respect their view. A balance needs to be struck between recognising the need to engage, discuss, debate and build trust in whatever is proposed and the need to get on with things, but given the messages registered in the debate, I undertake to discuss that properly with the Secretary of State.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Belfast South on her truly interesting speech. I thank her for reminding us of the murder of Reverend Robert Bradford and all it represented in terms of affront to our democracy. I thank her also for reminding the House of the genesis of this long-standing campaign and the reality—the uncomfortable truth, as she described it—that we are talking about a period in which attitudes to disability were completely different from attitudes now. Attitudes to disability in the world of work and access to pensions were completely different then, and it is absolutely right that we respond to that change.
I wholly appreciate the hon. Lady’s point about the need for a victim-centred approach. One of the things that has struck me most during my engagement with victims —something I find unacceptable and uncomfortable—is how forgotten they feel and how disrespected for all this time. It is incumbent on us to do something about that.