Northern Ireland (Stormont Agreement and Implementation Plan) Bill — House of Commons, 2016-02-22
Topic: International Affairs
Laurence Anthony Robertson (Conservative, Centre-right): I just want to make a fairly brief intervention in this debate. Before I do so, Mr Deputy Speaker, I wonder whether you will allow me a few seconds to refer and pay tribute to my constituency assistant who died very suddenly a few days ago. His name was Mark Calway, and he worked for me for 14 years and took a particular interest in matters Northern Ireland—and indeed in matters the Republic of Ireland—helping me quite a bit with my work on the Select Committee and as co-chairman of the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly. His death is a stunning shock, and my heart goes out to his parents, Brian and Maureen. I do hope it is in order for me to pay the greatest tribute to him possible today. All hon. Members know how much we depend on our staff, and when they are personal friends as well, such a loss, at the age of 49, is terrible. Thank you very much indeed, Mr Deputy Speaker May I pay tribute to the Secretary of State for the work she has done in getting us to this point? I know—or I think I know—how difficult things were back in September when it looked as though the institutions in Northern Ireland might collapse. I know how much work she put in—or I am guessing I know that. Her dedication was total. She was absolutely determined that the institutions would not collapse and that we would in fact find some degree of agreement and a solution that would enable us to move forward. The fact that we are here today demonstrates that she was successful in that, so I really do want to pay tribute to her—and her team—for the very hard work and extraordinarily long hours put into this Before I was Select Committee Chairman, I served as shadow Minister for about five years. During some of that time we dealt with an awful lot of legislation—statutory instruments—in Committee upstairs, taking major decisions on behalf of the Province and the people in Northern Ireland. On many of those occasions, at the beginning of my speeches I said how wrong and inappropriate it was to govern the Province in that way, yet we really did face the prospect of going back to the previous situation, and that worried and frightened me. It came about as a result of a couple of tragic murders in Northern Ireland and the linkage between them and people in the Assembly who were allegedly sympathetic to that kind of activity. I am very pleased that this Bill makes it clear that there is no place, either in this place or the Assembly in Northern Ireland, for people who hold those beliefs Many years ago we heard the famous and chilling statement that some people would proceed with the Armalite in one hand and the ballot box in the other. Those days are long gone, and anybody who tries to practise that or carry out politics in that way should be in prison, deprived of their liberty. There is no place in the Northern Ireland Assembly for that kind of people. We would not want to work on Committees in this House or anywhere else with people who by day are in the debating Chamber and at night are on the streets causing trouble and wreaking havoc. We would not accept it in this place, and it should not be accepted in Northern Ireland, so I am very pleased that the Bill paves the way for removing that kind of behaviour.