Standing Committee B
Thursday 12 February 1998
(Afternoon)
[Mr. Barry Jones in the Chair]
Clause 2
General functions of the Police Authority
Amendment proposed [this day]: No. 25, in page 1, line 14, leave out `civilian' and insert `professional, technical, administrative and other'.--[Mr. Mallon.]
4.30 pm
Question again proposed, That the amendment be made.
The Chairman: I remind the Committee that with this we are discussing the following amendments: No. 21, in clause 3, page 2, leave out lines 23 to 35.
No. 22, in clause 3, page 2, line 38, leave out from `to' to end of line 40 and insert `the police force'.
No. 24, in clause 4, page 3, line 19, at end add--
`(6) No regulations under this section shall be made before the expiry of the period of three years beginning with the date on which this Act comes into force'.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. Adam Ingram): When we adjourned I was dealing with points raised by the hon. Member for Fermanagh and South Tyrone (Mr. Maginnis), who is not in his place. I attempted to explain that if people operate on the basis of suspicion, they will not listen to the reasoned arguments that I, as a Minister, have advanced or to the details of what we as a ministerial team with responsibilities for Northern Ireland are trying to achieve there.
The hon. Member for Fermanagh and South Tyrone said that the Secretary of State had written to the Police Authority for Northern Ireland more or less trying to stop it communicating with Members of Parliament. Perhaps it is worth while putting part of the letter, dated 4 February, on record. The concluding paragraph states:
``Finally, I found it reassuring to have clarified for me the Authority's welcome to much in the Police Bill. I found it somewhat disconcerting that at Second Reading various MPs had been briefed that the Authority was comprehensively opposed to its provisions, especially as I had no prior indication from you that this might be the case. It is unfortunate that such erroneous impressions appear to have been given; I noted the recent Newsletter article on the same lines with interest. I do hope that this is not to become a feature of the passage of this legislation. If this were to be the case, I am sure you will see how damaging it could be, not just to my efforts to strengthen the Police Authority and enhance its strategic and leadership roles, but also to the imaging of policing itself and to the stability of Northern Ireland society at a very testing time.''
The gist of it was that the Secretary of State was clear, as I am, that we want proper discourse on the Bill, and want it to be dealt with in as open and as free a way as possible.
The Secretary of State had a meeting with the Police Authority on 20 January, and again made it clear that if its members had concerns they would be able to raise them through local Members of Parliament. There is no restriction on that. I said earlier that, as we are trying to operate openly and transparently, obvious Members of Parliament would be a conduit for complaints, but that the staff and the Police Authority for Northern Ireland have, effectively, open access when trying to get their views across.
I explained the implementation strategy that has been put in place to try to ensure the full engagement of all interested parties to handle the complexities, difficulties, uncertainties and concerns that can arise from this process of change. There is no need for unnamed sources, or for surreptitious briefing of local hon. Members, because we have a mechanism to try to ensure openness. If concerns remain despite the assurances that I am now giving and if the implementation strategy is felt inappropriate, local hon. Members will have the right to raise them with me or with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. I hope that they show great willingness to do that. The process attempts to deal with the issues openly, which is why we do not feel it necessary to progress in the way that the amendments suggest.
I again assure the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon) that we shall see how we can amend the Bill to take his serious point in amendment No. 25 into account, and that we hope to come back to it on Report. I hope that he will accept that assurance and will not press his amendment.
Mr. Ken Maginnis (Fermanagh and South Tyrone): What the Minister said just before lunch and has imparted to us in the letter, part of which he has just read out, is one of the most amazing admissions that we have heard from him. An independent body such as the Police Authority does not require that sort of communication from the Minister or the Secretary of State. Perhaps the Minister will clarify whether the letter came from the Secretary of State or from himself.
Mr. Ingram: From the Secretary of State.
Mr. Maginnis: From the Secretary of State. It is intolerable, and it smacks of an arrogance that we have not experienced for some time, that the Secretary of State should write to an independent body, the Police Authority, setting out the basis on which it may communicate with Northern Ireland Members--and, indeed, with Members of Parliament on this side of the water. The idea that the chairman of the Police Authority should, by inference, be rapped over the knuckles by the Secretary of State bears out our suspicions, to which the Minister referred, that the Bill is an attempt to subvert the whole of the Royal Ulster Constabulary by denuding the independent cushion that is the Police Authority of its power.
Mr. Malcolm Ross (North-East Cambridgeshire): We have heard a selective quote from the Secretary of State's letter to the Police Authority, so clearly part of that communication is in the public domain. Does the hon. Gentleman think that the Minister should publish the whole letter?
Mr. Maginnis: It would be helpful. Indeed, it would be helpful if more and more of the Secretary of State's communications were published. I shall not go into other unfortunate expeditions that she has engaged in, such as her interference in the judicial process of the United States, but again and again we find that the Northern Ireland Office is employing little more than bullying tactics to get its own way. The Minister is no doubt surprised that some of us know what is going on. I assure him that we shall have one or two more surprises for him as the Bill progresses through the House.
This issue is, as another hon. Member would say, close to the heart of the matter that we are discussing. Will the police be able to operate with professional independence or will the Secretary of State, guided by her own advisers in the police division of the Northern Ireland Office, continue to claw unto herself control of the RUC?
It did not surprise me that the Minister took the hon. Member for North-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Moss) to task for changing his mind. However, the hon. Gentleman was not one of the Ministers who was responsible for policing. The results of a period in opposition are wonderful. After 15 years in Parliament, I know that one gains a wider perspective from being in opposition than from sitting on the Front Bench and being totally dependent on an elite group for advice.
I admire the hon. Member for North-East Cambridgeshire for acknowledging the folly of what the previous Government initially proposed. That proposal has been taken up by the Government, and it will undermine the confidence of Northern Ireland.
It surprised me that the Minister perceived no difference between civilians who are employed by an independent body, such as the Police Authority, and those who are employed by the Chief Constable. His failure to appreciate that difference shows that he has little understanding of the pressures that exist throughout the policing system in Northern Ireland.
The hon. Member for Newry and Armagh would like to remove the word ``civilian'' from subsection (2). I appreciate his point, but it is a useful word, which distinguishes those who until now have played a civil service role and, as members of the police establishment, are directly involved in policing. One has to live longer in Northern Ireland than the nine months the Minister has spent at the Northern Ireland Office to appreciate the way in which terrorists justify their activities and their offences against humanity.
Mr. Seamus Mallon (Newry and Armagh): My reason for tabling the amendment is not the reason that the hon. Gentleman attributes to me.
Mr. Maginnis: I am not attributing anything.
Mr. Mallon: In a conference paper issued in September 1997, the Chief Constable described himself as ``a civilian public servant''. If that description is good enough for the Chief Constable, it is good enough for me.
Mr. Maginnis: I do not disagree. Our police force is a civilian force. But no one knows better than the hon. Gentleman and I that, unfortunately, circumstances have been such that the police have had to assume a sort of paramilitary role to counter terrorism. It was not something they chose. I am not talking about members of the RUC. In so far as civil servants are no longer to be civil servants but are to be employed by the Chief Constable, the IRA and other paramilitary organisations will find some comfort and some justification for actions that they may take against those members of our society. It would be helpful if the Minister took more seriously the points that are being raised here by those on the Opposition Front Bench and by myself on behalf of the Ulster Unionist party.
4.45 pm
We live with the reality of terrorism in Northern Ireland. People are sceptical of a police service that is not seen to be insulated from politicians and politics. To return to the matter of politicians interfacing with the Police Authority, the Police Authority has made itself available to every political party in Northern Ireland, including those to which it should not have made itself available. It has issued an invitation to Sinn Fein to come and interface. I disapprove of that; none the less it illustrates the extent to which that authority wants to maintain its independence and do the job that it was appointed to do.
One sad fact is that in her nine or 10 months in Northern Ireland the Secretary of State has had only one opportunity to spend a single hour with the Police Authority. If she had managed to spend longer she would have found, as many of us have found, that it is a body jealous of its independent role. That independent role should be protected, which it will not be if the Bill remains in its present form.
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