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Northern Ireland (St Andrews Agreement) Bill

The noble Lord has a memory lapse. It is interesting that he cites the noble Lord, Lord Maginnis of Drumglass, someone whom I know very well and someone whom I live about half a mile from. The noble Lord, Lord Maginnis, introduced the discrimination; it was his brainchild. I find it difficult to understand how the noble Lord, Lord Trimble, can say what he says here tonight. I want to refute it clearly, and to make it clear where the Democratic Unionist Party stands in relation to that issue. Policing is very important. If anybody for a single second—for a single solitary moment—believes that in the lifetime of anyone who is presently engaged in politics in Northern Ireland Sinn Fein would be entrusted with the policing of Northern Ireland, I respectfully say to them that they are under a delusion. As far as the Democratic Unionist Party is concerned, Sinn Fein will not be in such a position, because Sinn Fein would not have the confidence of the unionist community—and at the moment the Democratic Unionists speak for the unionist community in Northern Ireland. I cannot make it any clearer than that, and nor can my party—and it is on the record in another place. It has been clearly said that that will not happen. I must make that point.