Secretary of State for Northern Ireland

The **secretary of state for Northern Ireland** (; ), also called the **Northern Ireland secretary** or **SoSNI**, is a secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom. They are in charge of the Northern Ireland Office. The Secretary is a member of the Cabinet of the United Kingdom. They are 17th in the ministerial ranking.

The works with the other Northern Ireland Office ministers. The shadow minister is the Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

## History

Historically, the main ministers for Irish (and Northern Ireland) affairs in the UK Government were:
- the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (c.1171–1922);
- the Chief Secretary for Ireland (1560–1922); and
- the Home Secretary (1922–1972).

Scotland and Wales have had the  Secretary of State for Scotland (1885) and Secretary of State for Wales (1964) for a long time but Northern Ireland did not have a Secretary. This was caused by the Government of Northern Ireland and Parliament of Northern Ireland. The office of Secretary of State for Northern Ireland was created after the Northern Ireland government (at Stormont) was suspended. The government was later ended after civil problems.  The British government was worried that the Parliament of Northern Ireland was losing control of the situation. On 30 March 1972, the country was put under the direct rule of the  british Parliamen. The Secretary of State replced three jobs from the previous government. These were:
- the Governor of Northern Ireland - The main representative of the British monarch
- the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland - now the First Minister of Northern Ireland and deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland
- the Minister of Home Affairs - Now the Minister of Justice

Direct rule was expected to last for only a short time. Sharing the pwer was preferred as the solution. It has been renewed by a vote in Parliament each year. The Sunningdale Agreement in 1973 created the Northern Ireland Executive from 1 January 1974. It was ended by the Ulster Workers' Council strike on 28 May 1974.  The Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention (1975–1976) and Northern Ireland Assembly (1982–1986) could not restore the government.  Following the Belfast Agreement (also known as the Good Friday Agreement) on 10 April 1998 removed many of the duties of the Secretary of State and the Northern Ireland Office.

Many of the powers of the Secretary have been given to the Northern Ireland Assembly and Northern Ireland Executive. The secretary of state in now limited to representing Northern Ireland in the UK cabinet and controling the operation of the administration. They are also in charge of several other areas. These include security, human rights, some public inquiries and elections.

The secretary of state officially lives in Hillsborough Castle. It was the official home of the governor of Northern Ireland. The castle is still a royal residence of the monarch in Northern Ireland.

## List of secretaries of state for Northern Ireland

|colspan=|Portrait|Name|colspan=2|Term of office|Length of term|Party|colspan=|Prime Minister|||||
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
||**William Whitelaw** <small>MP for Penrith and The Border</small>|24 March 1972|2 December 1973||Conservative|rowspan=2|Edward Heath||||||
||**Francis Pym** <small>MP for Cambridgeshire</small>|2 December 1973|4 March 1974||Conservative||||||||
||**Merlyn Rees** <small>MP for Leeds South</small>|5 March 1974|10 September 1976||Labour|Harold Wilson|||||||
||**Roy Mason** <small>MP for Barnsley</small>|10 September 1976|4 May 1979||Labour|James Callaghan|||||||
||**Humphrey Atkins** <small>MP for Spelthorne</small>|5 May 1979|14 September 1981||Conservative|rowspan=5|Margaret Thatcher||||||
||**Jim Prior** <small>MP for Lowestoft (until 1983) MP for Waveney (from 1983)</small>|14 September 1981|11 September 1984||Conservative||||||||
||**Douglas Hurd** <small>MP for Witney</small>|11 September 1984|3 September 1985||Conservative||||||||
||**Tom King** <small>MP for Bridgwater</small>|3 September 1985|24 July 1989||Conservative||||||||
|rowspan=2||rowspan=2|**Peter Brooke** <small>MP for Cities of London and Westminster South</small>|rowspan=2|24 July 1989|rowspan=2|10 April 1992|rowspan=2||rowspan=2|Conservative||
|rowspan=2|John Major||||||||||||
||**Sir Patrick Mayhew** <small>MP for Tunbridge Wells</small>|10 April 1992|2 May 1997||Conservative||||||||
||**Mo Mowlam** <small>MP for Redcar</small>|3 May 1997|11 October 1999||Labour|rowspan=5|Tony Blair||||||
||**Peter Mandelson** <small>MP for Hartlepool</small>|11 October 1999|24 January 2001||Labour||||||||
||**John Reid** <small>MP for Hamilton North and Bellshill</small>|25 January 2001|24 October 2002||Labour||||||||
||**Paul Murphy** <small>MP for Torfaen</small>|24 October 2002|6 May 2005||Labour||||||||
||**Peter Hain** <small>MP for Neath</small> <small>_(also Welsh Secretary)_</small>|6 May 2005|28 June 2007||Labour||||||||
||**Shaun Woodward** <small>MP for St Helens South</small>|28 June 2007|11 May 2010||Labour|Gordon Brown|||||||
||**Owen Paterson** <small>MP for North Shropshire</small>|12 May 2010|4 September 2012||Conservative|rowspan=2|David Cameron <small>(Coalition)</small>||||||
|rowspan="2"||rowspan=2|**Theresa Villiers** <small>MP for Chipping Barnet</small>|rowspan=2|4 September 2012|rowspan=2|14 July 2016|rowspan=2||rowspan=2|Conservative||
|David Cameron <small>(II)</small>|||||||||||||
||**James Brokenshire** <small>MP for Old Bexley and Sidcup</small>|14 July 2016|8 January 2018||Conservative|rowspan=2|Theresa May||||||
||**Karen Bradley** <small>MP for Staffordshire Moorlands</small>|8 January 2018|24 July 2019||Conservative||||||||
||**Julian Smith** <small> MP for Skipton and Ripon</small>|24 July 2019|13 February 2020||Conservative|rowspan=3|Boris Johnson||||||
||**Brandon Lewis** <small> MP for Great Yarmouth</small>|13 February 2020|7 July 2022||Conservative||||||||
||**Shailesh Vara** <small> MP for North West Cambridgeshire</small>|7 July 2022|6 September 2022||Conservative||||||||
|rowspan=2||rowspan=2|**Chris Heaton-Harris** <small> MP for Daventry</small>|rowspan=2|6 September 2022|rowspan=2|5 July 2024|rowspan=2||rowspan=2|Conservative|Liz Truss|
|Rishi Sunak|||||||||||||
||**Hilary Benn** <small>MP for Leeds South</small>|5 July 2024|Incumbent|*|Labour|Keir Starmer|||||||

Incumbent's length of term last updated: .

## Infobox (official post)

- **post**: Secretary
- **body**: State
for Northern Ireland
- **insignia**: Royal Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom (HM Government).svg
- **insigniacaption**: Royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom, Royal Arms of Government of the United Kingdom, His Majesty's Government
- **image**: Hilary Benn Official Cabinet Portrait, July 2024 (crop 1).jpg
- **incumbent**: Hilary Benn
- **incumbentsince**: 5 July 2024
- **style**: Northern Ireland Secretary
(informal)
The Right Honourable
(within the UK and the Commonwealth)
- **status**: Secretary of State (United Kingdom), Secretary of state
Minister of the Crown
- **residence**: Hillsborough Castle
- **appointer**: The Monarchy of the United Kingdom, Monarch
- **appointer qualified**: on advice of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Prime Minister
- **termlength**: At His Majesty's pleasure
- **first**: William Whitelaw
- **formation**: 24 March 1972
- **precursor**: Lord Lieutenant of Ireland
Governor of Northern Ireland
- **deputy**: Minister of State for Northern Ireland