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Northern Ireland (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill

My Lords, I realise the seriousness attached to the issue in the amendment and I hope that I have made it clear that the Secretary of State, along with the whole Northern Ireland team, shares those concerns. The current Order in Council process is not adequate in the long term, but while I do not want to revisit old battles, one has to admit that it has served Northern Ireland since, I think, 1972. I cannot believe that that was not looked at during the long years of Conservative Government to try to find a better system for more scrutiny in both Houses. Obviously, a solution was not found. We do not have one either at the moment though I suspect that every Member could find a way of doing it. We take the concern seriously, but we may not be believed until we have put our solution on the table. At the moment the Government are not prepared to put a solution on the table. I am not saying that these issues are not thought about. We genuinely do not want plan B or plan C to interfere with plan A; we want the Assembly back. It is the duty of Northern Ireland politicians to get elected and to serve their people. Direct rule and inadequate scrutiny of Orders in Council have to be second best in any democratic process. If restoration of the Assembly is not possible, we would want to engage with Members of both Houses to find a way of making the system work better. We have had discussions in the past 12 months on that but we have not come up with a Northern Ireland-proof solution, specifically for it—though I accept that the amendment is—that does not spill over into the management of the business of secondary legislation across the Houses. The Secretary of State has asked and charged the Minister of State, David Hanson, to take this matter forward with the parties in due course if that situation arrives. However, we do not want to plan for failure. For some, the present situation is very comfortable—direct rule, part-time commuting Ministers; it’s great for them. They love it because they do not have to grow up and take decisions themselves. They coalesce only in attacking the Government; it’s the one thing that unifies them. They don’t have to stand up and say what they would do, how they would fix the budget. They have no responsibility whatever. We want them to grow up and take adult decisions on behalf of those they seek to represent. But some people are comfortable with the status quo. I genuinely think that the amendment, though it may offer the seeds of a possible solution, could get in the way and help the prize slip from our grasp. We have some distance between now and24 November. I realise that there will be a Recess, but I think that the situation will hot up considerably towards the end of the September/October period. I do not want to say anything now that will cause problems in that period. I want to put a couple of points to noble Lords. One of my colleagues in the other place, devaluing the argument somewhat, said to me, ““I don’t understand what the Conservatives are complaining about. They are a party of government; they have been in government and aspire to be a Government, and the Lib Dems haven’t been there for 100 years or near enough, yet they come up with these solutions because they think it’s easy””. Well, it isn’t easy. If it was, we would have found a solution by now. In fact, we would have found a solution under the direct rule of the Conservative Administration.