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Northern Ireland (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill

: Unfortunately, my Lords. I, too, welcome the noble Lord, Lord Trimble, to our Northern Ireland debates; I am sure that he will find them refreshing. I congratulate him on an excellent and measured maiden speech, and we on these Benches look forward very much to hearing from him on future occasions. Although the Bill covers a lot of ground, as we have heard from noble Lords, I reiterate that we welcome it and we broadly support its principles. The introduction of anonymous registration, as we have heard from my noble friend Lord Smith of Clifton, gives us some concern. Again, I hope that it will not be necessary to introduce it for too many people. This measure, and others, will be brought into force by the laying of an order. As the Minister said at the outset, we look forward so much to the day when the Assembly will deal with all these matters. It might have been better to include Northern Ireland in the Electoral Administration Bill, which has just passed through your Lordships’ House, instead of having to do all this by order, once again bringing Northern Ireland in as a sort of afterthought. Can the Minister tell us the reasoning behind that? Northern Ireland has benefited from individual registration with personal identifiers, which has proved much more robust than the previous system of household registration. However, how to encourage more people into voting will be a problem for us all to address. The 10 years proposed between canvasses is far too long, especially as the annual canvass has proved so successful, a point made by my noble friend Lord Smith of Clifton. We are very disappointed on Part 3, which is on donation controls. It is understandable that concerns exist, and will probably do so for some time, around the publication of donors in Northern Ireland, but the Bill still does not achieve full transparency, which is regrettable. The various parties in Northern Ireland will be exempt, as we have heard, from full donation controls until October 2007, and then there is the interim period between 2007 and 2010 when measures will allow the parties to submit their donation returns in confidence. I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure the House that full disclosure will be achieved by 2010, as asked for by my noble friend. On Clause 12, the new insertion of special provision in connection with Northern Ireland, I simply say that if we cannot encourage the same legislation in the Republic of Ireland, how do the Government believe that putting a ban on receiving foreign donations in Northern Ireland will work? Unless and until we can agree comparable legislation across borders, that provision is likely to be meaningless. Openness and transparency is so important a principle to embed into this sort of legislation, and I hope that the Minister will address concerns of noble Lords on this matter, if not this evening then perhaps during further stages on the Bill. Part 4, which is on devolution of policing and justice matters to the Assembly, is certainly something that these Benches support. During the passage of the Bill in the other place, the Government gave reassurances about how and when such functions would be devolved. It would be very helpful if the Minister were able to repeat them here in such a manner, for completeness. Such transfer of these matters can clearly take place only when the Assembly is running properly and confidence is being restored on a genuine basis. Perhaps the Minister can give us some idea about how the person nominated to be head of the department will be chosen. The Explanatory Notes from paragraph 75 onwards relating to the issue are not terribly clear to me. There appear to be three possible options for choosing the person to head the department, and it is rather confusing and complex, notwithstanding the Minister’s explanation. As my noble friend intimated, perhaps amendments need to be tabled at a later stage to tease out the detail. The noble Lord, Lord Glentoran, made strong representation on the devolution of policing, and I am sure that further examination of that part of the Bill will be a major part of our deliberations in Committee. Part 5 contains further miscellaneous provisions, in a miscellaneous provisions Bill—an extension of the amnesty period for arms decommissioning to 2010, an enormous increase in the limit of loans applicable to the consolidated fund of Northern Ireland, and suddenly the emergence of a single wholesale electricity market provision for the whole island of Ireland. It is quite a collection of disparate policy objectives. We support the energy proposal, which is extremely important. Energy is becoming a very hot political potato, and we wish that part of the Bill every success. We welcome the clause on sustainable development, but it seems an odd place to put the provision in the Bill. It is an afterthought, when it ought to be embedded in the whole culture of legislation. The noble Lord, Lord Laird, made the commendable suggestion of the inclusion of fair trade in this part of the Bill. Then we are back to dealing with crime and the extension of SOCAP, the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act. Those provisions are welcome and will, I hope, begin to eradicate those levels of crime in Northern Ireland that give us all cause for concern. We support those measures. Clause 28 brings Northern Ireland into line with the rest of the country as regards the part of SOCAP that deals with health and safety matters. It is right that it is the office and not the person of the Chief Constable which holds the responsibility for health and safety matters within the PSNI. I well remember the hours of deep discussion of how police officers should deal with health and safety matters when a Bill first included them a number of years ago. Some very silly arguments were put forward at that time about who would be responsible for dealing with breaches of the Act. I am glad that sense prevailed. I am sure that it will continue to do so in Northern Ireland should any of these matters be brought forward.