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Northern Ireland (St Andrews Agreement) Bill

My Lords, I do not know whether I gave a good answer or not, then. Obviously, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Glentoran. We can have a detailed debate in Committee; we are not limited in that. I fully accept and confirm once again that, if all this collapses—if there comes a point when it is not worth continuing—that will be recognised and the plug will be pulled. The Secretary of State made that abundantly clear and if anyone wants confirmation of that, I invite them to read what he said in yesterday's Hansard from the other place at cols. 420-21. I do not need to repeat that. The point is that, if the plug gets pulled on the devolution process, our commitment remains that the parliamentary process for dealing with direct rule in respect of Northern Ireland must change. We fully accept that. It is quite unacceptable as it is. In the period up to March, we have no plans for further change but, if the plug is pulled, we will change the parliamentary process in line with the commitments that we have already given. Of course it would be better for Sinn Fein—I say for Sinn Fein—sooner rather than later to make its position abundantly clear. It is in its interest. It is not for me to lecture to it. It is not helpful to put a date on that. We have set out dates in the Bill: two days’ time; 30 January for the dissolution to start the election process; 7 March for the election; 14 March for the appointment of Ministers; and 26 March for the return of devolution and the pledge of office. I fully accept many of the points made by and certainly would not seek to argue with the noble Lord, Lord Trimble, given his immense experience of being First Minister in Northern Ireland. The process will be watched, it is true. I do not want to get involved in differences between the parties. Many aspects of the Bill have been requested by political parties; that is why the Bill is here in this form. I shall not spell out which parties, but they have all had a finger in the pie. That was made abundantly clear to me by the Secretary of State and was made clear in the other place yesterday. On the point made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mayhew, we have got to this stage and it is worth trying. This is the final lap. We have made it absolutely clear that if the dates are not met—the first is two days away and to get that far needs just the indication of a nomination—we will have to ask ourselves whether it is worth continuing. I interrupted the noble Lord, Lord Laird. I must repeatedly make it clear—because, to be honest, words that are said get out there into the media and positions are then changed—that this issue of on-the-runs is not returning. I cannot be clearer than that. We were absolutely clear about that when the legislation was withdrawn. I accept that the Bill was put forward; I am not arguing about that. The position has been made abundantly clear. I cannot get into what other people have said in other countries, because I do not know. I have not discussed this with them. I want to make this absolutely clear so that there is no doubt and no need for amendments on this in Committee; the on-the-runs Bill is not coming back to this Parliament.