Northern Ireland (Regional Rates and Energy) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-03-21
Topic: Mixed Topics
Richard James Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party, Right): My hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim (Paul Girvan) was the penultimate Back-Bench speaker in this debate, and I am the last. I am always pleased to contribute to debates about Northern Ireland—and, indeed, a few others as well First, I would like to thank the Secretary of State for bringing the Bill forward. As we outlined yesterday, this is not the preferred scenario for Northern Ireland. We very much want to see the Bill coming forward, but it is no doubt due to Sinn Féin’s obstinate attitude, the obstacles it has put up and its austerity agenda, which we are all going to suffer from. Today will hopefully be the first stage in people not suffering, because the people back home will have an opportunity to see what we can do The preferred scenario is that we allow those who were elected to do a job to sit down and do that job. My colleagues are desperately aware of that and are itching to do it, yet we are past the stage where we can apply a plaster to cover the wound. The wound is infected and seeping and needs urgent attention, and today’s debate is the prep for the surgery. The Secretary of State has set that out. I would like to thank all hon. Members who have contributed so far to bringing the Bill forward. We have discussed who and what caused the wound—a militant Sinn Féin agenda—and now we are beginning the process of cauterising it and stopping the bleeding I want to put on record my thanks to my colleague, the MLA and former Finance Minister Simon Hamilton, for all the hard work he has done. He is a really hard-working MLA, as all MLAs are. They do incredible work across all constituencies in Northern Ireland, night and day The people from the Province have waited long enough for decisions, and today we are waiting for the right decision to be made. For example, I know that the council that covers the majority of my constituency, Ards and North Down Borough Council, has been working really hard to keep the rates down in its area, as has Newry, Mourne and Down District Council. Ards and North Down Borough Council has initiated a scheme whereby the grey bin for any waste is collected every other week, a blue bin for recyclables is collected on the alternate week and a brown bin for food waste is collected every other week, along with a kerbside collection of glass Such initiatives enable savings to be made at the council level. Some of the savings were put into an educational pot that is used to promote environmental issues in schools, by taking children to see how recycling works and holding other such events. The pot is used to go around community groups and host events in communities, and a large amount of it goes to offsetting the rate, meaning that despite the council building a state-of-the-art leisure centre and many other outputs in Ards, when it met on Tuesday 13 February and struck a district rate for 2018-19, the domestic rate was 22.3273p in the pound—a rise of 2.96%. It is a thrifty council, using all its Ulster Scotsism to look after the pennies and the pounds and ensure that it can still deliver a good rate. For the average household in Ards and North Down, that equates to an increase a £1.35 per month, and they get all the things I have mentioned and a lot more for that money. The council has attempted to stay as close to the inflation rate as it possibly could, while still providing an acceptable level of service provision When we look at the decision that the Secretary of State is making today, we understand the reasons why she has put it forward and why it must be done. I know that the Secretary of State will say that we pushed and pushed her to take the decision, and we are very pleased that she has done so For the record, may I commend the Secretary of State for her answers during Northern Ireland questions today? She was pithy and confident, and she showed all the things we look for in a Secretary of State. There again, the Under-Secretary obviously did extremely well, too, in assisting the Secretary of State. He always does well Some will question why, when others are attempting to keep increases as near to the inflation level as possible, the Secretary of State has set the rate at the level she has. We need more finance, and this will enable such money to be collected, allowing business to continue and the wheels to carry on turning. This is all part of the additional money that has been granted by this House.