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Northern Ireland

My Lords, flattery will get my noble friend everywhere, but I have not finished yet. It was the training and advice that I received from him that enabled me to go to Northern Ireland in April 1984. I think that it was the noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, who referred to Secretaries of State about whom placards said ““King must go”” or ““Mayhew must go””. Perhaps I beat the record: it was within 10 days of my arrival in Northern Ireland that newspapers said, ““Lyell must go, and quickly””. Indeed, one of the only times that my physical safety was thought to be at risk was when I went to the annual general meeting of the Ulster Farmers Union and had to declare that milk quotas were to be savagely imposed. How my career survived, I do not know. But it was with the enormous support of many of your Lordships and many people in Northern Ireland that I survived. In those days, the department was known as the Department of Agriculture for Northern Ireland. My understanding is that it is now the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development. With that in mind, I ask your Lordships’ House and the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, to shorten your focus. We have had a fascinating debate, thanks to my noble friend Lady Park, on very serious, deep-rooted and quite often frightening and chilling aspects of political life in part of the United Kingdom. We have a very close and special relationship with the Republic of Ireland. I want to shorten the focus and look at one aspect of Northern Ireland—indeed, for the past 33 years I have studied it. That aspect is ““what is good about Northern Ireland?””. I hope that that will be the base for political discussions and developments, which many of us will not live to see develop. But let us start from that base today. What is done today and what the Minister and his colleague, the Secretary of State, will say and do will, I hope, have a beneficial effect in 15 to 20 years time. In my career, an all-Ireland aspect was paramount. As regards agriculture and animal health, Ireland is   one island. I used to have agricultural meetings with my colleagues from the Republic with many organisations in the north and, quite often, in Dublin. We used to go to Dublin frequently for meetings on, of all things, not fishing or forestry, but horseracing. I went to the Irish St Leger from London. One of my fellow passengers on the aeroplane was the then Duchess of Norfolk who had a racehorse entered for the Irish St   Leger called Moon Madness. When I arrived in Dublin, the security officials who were looking after my safety wondered whether that was my codename. I said, ““No. That was given to many politicians in Northern Ireland as well as to me””. Alas, my tip that Moon Madness would do well was as successful as many of my other thoughts on agriculture. Moon Madness was not entirely successful. We have heard chilling tales today of death, injury and violence. But I ask your Lordships to look at one more newspaper headline, which will be known to my noble friend Lord Glentoran and to the noble Lords, Lord Laird and Lord Maginnis. Today there is a horrific headline about the deaths of two young men in County Down. They were not blown up by a bomb; they were not shot, or killed in violence. No, they died in a particularly unpleasant accident in a slurry tank, in which they both drowned. I might well have visited there. That is part of the darker side of the wonderful side of Northern Ireland that I have seen and been involved with. There have been bizarre scenes, as far as the political aspects have been concerned. In 1984, I seem to remember, although luckily I was not present, the honourable Member for North Antrim went down to Dublin. He must have spent the night there, because he bearded the Taoiseach at his front door at eight o’clock in the morning, and apparently there was a fairly lively discussion. I do not think the Taoiseach invited him in for morning coffee or prayers. I also lived through the 1985 Anglo-Irish agreement, and the great campaign of ““Ulster says no””. I was an observer for the Good Friday agreement of 1998. I have listened carefully to the thread running through many of your Lordships’ speeches, and I go along with it. I hope the Minister will reiterate that every agreement, even if not earth-shattering, is a step forward. You can never do without a good lawyer, such as my noble friend Lord Mayhew, or a good accountant, to tie up every last dot and comma. That is one of the aspects that is still giving concern to many of us this side of the water, let alone to those in Northern Ireland and the Republic. There is much more involved, as my noble friend Lord Tebbit and the noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, have pointed out. I conclude by reminding your Lordships of a small island just off the north coast of Antrim called Rathlin, which my noble friend Lord Glentoran may know. It is reputed to be there that Robert the Bruce, on the run from Edward I, who at that time ruled the roost over most of Scotland, watched the great mythical spider that fell repeatedly, but tried and tried again. Gradually, after goodness knows how many attempts, the spider won. Every one of us involved in Northern Ireland politics—and I have been lucky enough to be involved in the bright side of Northern Ireland—should remember that spider. It might take five weeks, five months, five years, or a bit longer than that, but what the Minister and his colleagues do today will bear fruit in due course. I wish him well.