Northern Ireland Assembly, 1 July 2014

450 contributions from 68 members. The official report.

Assembly Business

Pat Ramsey (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Foyle)

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. As we have a long day ahead of us, are you minded to relax the guidance on the wearing of jackets?

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

Yes. I am very happy with the point of order that the Member raises.

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Last week, there was what was billed as an important announcement about the future of single farm payments. It was made outside the House, and the Minister has had the opportunity, yesterday and today, to come to the House and make a statement about that important matter. Is there any explanation why there is no statement on single farm payments and the future of CAP in Northern Ireland?

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

As the Member will know, I always encourage Ministers to come to the House. I do that continually. The Member will know that, under Standing Orders, I have no power to pull Ministers into the Chamber. It is an important issue, but those decisions very much rest with the Executive and with individual Ministers.

Alex Attwood (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Belfast West)

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Last week, I unavoidably missed a question at one of the Question Time sessions. My colleague Mr Ramsey tried, I think, to communicate with your office that I was called at short notice to a hospital where a close friend was undergoing emergency surgery. As a consequence, I was absent. So, apologies to the House, but there were extenuating circumstances.

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

I understand that there are some circumstances where Members just cannot be in the House. I appreciate the Member coming to the House and apologising.

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

Bronwyn McGahan has sought leave to present a public petition in accordance with Standing Order 22. The Member will have up to three minutes to speak on the subject matter.

Bronwyn McGahan (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

Go raibh maith agat. Over 8,000 people have signed this petition, and, on behalf of Sinn Féin, I want to take this opportunity to thank the businesses in Dungannon town, the Clogher valley, Blackwatertown and the Torrent area. I also want to take this opportunity to thank Eithne McCord of the South Tyrone hospital forum. I want to thank members of other political parties who also contributed to this petition, and, last but not least, I want to thank my own parish of Killeeshil, which also greatly assisted us.

In its consultation, the Southern Health and Social Care Trust is proposing to close Loane House. There are 45 non-acute beds in Loane House, and eight of those are for stroke patients. A multidisciplinary team of professionals provides care to patients with medical and rehabilitation needs during their stay in Loane House. The closure of Loane House would lead to the further blocking of acute beds in the trust's two acute hospitals, neither of which can cope with their workload as things stand.

There are equality issues, in particular when it comes to gender, as most of the workforce are women. There is an equality issue around age, in particular for those aged 65-plus, and for people with disabilities. There is also an equality issue for people who live in rural areas who will have to travel considerable distances to access services if Loane House closes. The Southern Trust states that it finds it quite challenging to provide equality of access to services. To be quite frank, I find that not good enough. NHS chief, Simon Stevens, recently stated that community hospitals should play a greater role in the care of older people. Loane House in Dungannon meets that criteria, and I ask the Minister of Health, Social Services and Public Safety to ensure that the facility remains open.

Ms McGahan moved forward and laid the petition on the Table.

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

I will forward the petition to the Minister of Health, Social Services and Public Safety and send a copy to the Chair of the Health Committee, Maeve McLaughlin.

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

As with similar motions, the motion on Committee membership will be treated as a business motion. Therefore, there will be no debate.

Resolved:

That Mrs Jo-Anne Dobson replace Mr Samuel Gardiner as a member of the Committee for Health, Social Services and Public Safety; that Mr Danny Kinahan replace Mrs Sandra Overend as a member of the Committee for Enterprise, Trade and Investment; that Mrs Sandra Overend replace Mrs Jo-Anne Dobson as a member of the Committee for Education; that Mr Tom Elliott replace Mr Robin Swann as a member of the Committee for Agriculture and Rural Development; and that Mrs Sandra Overend replace Mr Tom Elliott as a member of the Committee for the Environment, with effect from Friday 4 July 2014.

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

As required under Standing Order 79(4), I wish to inform the Assembly that Mr Lesley Cree has given notice of his resignation as a member of the Assembly Commission, with effect from 4 July 2014. Therefore, a vacancy on the Commission will exist. The motion to fill that vacancy will be treated as a business motion. There will, therefore, be no debate. Before we proceed, I advise Members that the motion requires cross-community support.

Resolved (with cross-community support):

That, in accordance with Standing Order 79(4), Mr Samuel Gardiner be appointed to fill a vacancy on the Assembly Commission, with effect from Friday 4 July 2014.

Ministerial Statements

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

Today, I am publishing 'Aspiring to Excellence', the final report of the international review panel on the structure of initial teacher education in Northern Ireland. The report constitutes the key aspect of stage 2 of the review of the teacher training infrastructure. Members will recall that, in November 2011, I announced this two-stage review. The first stage was an objective analysis of the financial stability and sustainability of the two university colleges. The focus of the second stage was designed to set out options for an educationally excellent, financially sustainable and more shared and integrated approach to the delivery and funding of teacher training.

When I assumed office in May 2011, a consultation exercise had been initiated by my predecessor into a then recommended merger between Queen’s University and Stranmillis University College. However, it was clear that there was not sufficient support in the Assembly to take forward the necessary legislation to implement it. Therefore, at that stage, while keeping on the table the option of that particular merger proceeding, I took the opportunity to take a more holistic view of our teacher training infrastructure.

It struck me that with five different providers of initial teacher education for a population of 1·8 million, our system was very fragmented and inefficient. It was also apparent that, while all the institutions were open to everyone irrespective of their background, there is, nevertheless, considerable religious separation in the training of teachers. At a time when greater efforts are being made to promote more sharing and integration in our education system as a whole, it was debatable how far this could go in practice if sharing in teacher training was itself not yet being maximised. Therefore, in November 2011, I made a statement to the Assembly to initiate the two-stage review.

For the first stage, independent consultants Grant Thornton were appointed to carry out an analysis of the financial stability and sustainability of the two university colleges. This was reported to the Assembly through a statement in May 2013. That study found that the cost of training teachers in the university colleges is significantly higher than elsewhere, and it provided sufficient evidence to signal the need to examine the case for reform. While the unit of funding was historically linked to that used in England, it was then enhanced in Northern Ireland by several premia. These payments were intended to compensate the colleges for the unavoidable additional costs incurred as a result of their small size and other diseconomies of scale. The primary objective was to ensure the sustainability of the two colleges.

Stranmillis University College and St Mary’s University College are the only teacher training establishments in the UK that receive premia additional to their core funding. This amounts to over £2 million per annum and has led to significant differences in the costs incurred in training a teacher here compared with elsewhere. In 2011-12, the cost of training a teacher in the colleges in Northern Ireland was almost 40% higher than in the comparator English institutions cited in the report. The annual cost of training a teacher in our university colleges is also significantly higher than the average cost of training a teacher at our local universities. One year of a BEd course at St Mary’s and Stranmillis costs the taxpayer 32% more than a one-year postgraduate certificate of education (PGCE) course at Queen’s University or the University of Ulster.

Furthermore, these differential costs are not the full story. The teacher training activities in the two university colleges are further supported by income from my Department for non-teacher training courses in other areas. The funding provided to the two colleges for those places amounts to almost £2 million a year. Notwithstanding their inherent value, there is clearly a substantial opportunity cost attached to them, particularly in light of the economy's need for more graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects. Even with these de facto subsidies, there are questions regarding the medium-term financial sustainability of the colleges, and without those subsidies, their future would be in even greater peril. In summary, our two university colleges are highly dependent on the number of teachers being trained, on the levels of grant per student and on funding for non-teacher education courses to remain financially viable.

On the back of that stage 1 report, I announced that I would proceed to stage 2 of the review. The terms of reference for this stage focused on the need to examine the case for the reform of teacher education provision in Northern Ireland and whether the funding being provided could be better used by the teacher training institutions if they were prepared to move towards a more shared or integrated system.

In September last year, I appointed a panel of international education experts to conduct the review. The panel consisted of a team of five international education experts: Dr Pasi Sahlberg, Professor Patricia Broadfoot, Professor John Coolahan, Professor John Furlong and Professor Gordon Kirk.

I would like to record my appreciation to the panel for the significant contribution that each of them made to understanding the complexities of our current teacher education provision and for using the information that they gathered, alongside their own knowledge and experience, to focus on how best to develop the Northern Ireland teacher education infrastructure in order to facilitate world-class teacher training.

Initially, the review panel provided an overview of current best practice in the field of initial teacher education provision internationally. Following that, teacher education providers and other stakeholders were invited to make submissions outlining their vision for the structures necessary to create a world-class system of initial teacher education that would also enhance and improve sharing and integration. Over 100 submissions were received and all were considered by the panel.

The panel then directly engaged with each of the five initial teacher education providers and other relevant stakeholders. The discussions focused on the international trends identified by the panel and the issues raised in the stakeholders' submissions.

The panel presented me with its report before the end of June deadline. In the interests of transparency, I have decided to publish it immediately. I urge MLAs, stakeholders and the wider public to read the full report and form their own judgment. For now, I will provide a summary and briefly set out the way forward.

The panel recognised the quality of many aspects of the current teacher training provision, including endorsement by the General Teaching Council for Northern Ireland (GCTNI); very positive evaluations from the Education and Training Inspectorate (ETI); alignment with the standards of university quality assurance regimes; and high rating in the National Student Survey. It also recognised a commitment from all the providers to participating in shared education and preparing students for an increasingly shared educational environment.

Nevertheless, it also pointed to significant weaknesses in the existing provision, such as its size and relatively fragmented nature and its quality when judged against international standards. It commented on the lack of an overarching Northern Ireland teacher education strategy and urged that such a strategy be developed. It noted a disjoint between initial teacher education and continuous professional development (CPD) and interpreted its terms of reference to focus on the necessary institutional design to address both aspects of teacher education. It further observed that, notwithstanding the existing partnerships between the institutions, the potential for collaboration was not yet fully developed. Finally, it reflected upon an uneven research performance between the universities and the teacher training colleges.

The panel also pointed to a number of anomalies and inequities in the current system. The first was the differential access for students in different institutions to the certificate in religious education. The second was the implications that arose from there being two different admissions procedures. It also noted the difficulties arising from the imposition of NDPB status on the teacher training colleges by the Office for National Statistics.

The panel has given the study a key international focus, analysing international trends in teacher education and identifying them as principles that should underpin a world-class system of teacher education here, and it examined local provision in light of those principles.

The panel emphasises that programmes should be academically strong, practice focused and based on relevant research. In particular, it was keen to stress the importance of the intellectual underpinning of provision, especially the need for practice-focused teacher education built on relevant educational research.

On that, the panel states:

"In our view, teacher education in Northern Ireland needs to be strengthened academically and cognitively. Provision has not yet been sufficiently infused with the intellectual power which university involvement in teacher education makes possible. That intellectual power derives from the universities' research activities. Like any other field of human endeavour, teaching requires a continuing pursuit of fresh ways of conceptualising, innovative approaches to professional action, and more sophisticated appraisals of how human learning is to be facilitated. All of those involved in teacher education in Northern Ireland must therefore make more determined efforts to bring to the education of teachers and their continuing professional development the fruits of research and other scholarly activity. Without recourse to the findings of such activity teacher education will stagnate and the quality of the education provided by the schools will slip into steady decline, with irreparable damage to the life chances of young people, the country's economic standing and its social well-being."

It also noted that the OECD has recently placed a strong focus on the importance of quality teacher education as a driver for improved educational performance and recommended that teacher training have closer links to universities or university-like institutions.

Across all societies, but in particular given the context of Northern Ireland, it maintains that teacher education should be pluralist, in that it acknowledges the competing interpretations of teacher education and its nature and purpose. The panel viewed that as including the Catholic tradition, other faith traditions, those agnostic on faith matters and specific preparation for a more integrated or shared approach.

In turn, the panel, while recognising that teacher education provision in Northern Ireland should recognise and support different philosophies of teacher education, believes that more should be done to support a shared approach to teacher education. It maintains that pluralism cannot be accepted in isolation of a complementary commitment to sharing.

For instance, it states:

"we maintain that all programmes of teacher education, irrespective of the tradition to which they adhere and within which they operate, should make provision for students of different faith and none to engage with each other across existing lines of social division, through at least the shared use of premises, where possible, through mixed classes, through shared teaching and other forms of social engagement, which bring students from different faith traditions into full participation in forms of activity that increase mutual understanding."

The panel sets out that the establishment of a world-class teacher education system can best be fostered in a certain context. It emphasises four particular elements: an agency or body providing strategic direction for teacher education; an agreed pattern of teacher education programmes; the introduction of a more rational and dependable system of workforce planning; and the effective use of resources.

It is fair to say that the issues involved impact on the work of the Department of Education and my Department. In the report, the panel makes it clear that, in the overall interest of promoting the quality of teacher education, it is hoped that both Departments can work together on the issues. In making that clear, the panel also stressed at many points in the report that comments on the wider teacher training and educational context are not intended to be formal recommendations to the Department of Education. Rather, they should be seen as an articulation of the best circumstances for a successful institutional model.

Four options have been identified for reconfiguring the infrastructure of initial teacher education in Northern Ireland. Each is evaluated by the panel with reference to four key criteria: sustaining and building on existing quality; securing the efficient use of resources; the need to respect pluralism, including different faith traditions; and practicality of implementation.

The panel has rejected the status quo as an option, commenting that it is not robust enough to deliver the change that is required. While recognising that the options proposed differed in character, the panel detailed a number of common features that should be exhibited under each, including that every teacher education course should include a programme of shared education and that all undergraduate recruits should apply through the UCAS system.

The first option, option A, is a collaborative partnership. Under that, initial teacher education would continue to be provided by all four current providers. St Mary's and Stranmillis would continue to exist as autonomous colleges but in an enhanced partnership. It would be a condition of the funding grant to Queen's University, Stranmillis and St Mary's, that they be required to work more closely together, with QUB actively exercising its role as the validating university in the collaborative delivery of a comprehensive programme of initial teacher education, induction and in-service training.

Option B provides for a two-centre model, including a Belfast institute of education. Under that model, there would be two main centres for teacher education in Northern Ireland. The first, based at the University of Ulster, would concentrate its provision in the north-west, including developing its CPD role.

For the second centre, provision in Belfast would build on the existing academic relationship between Queen's and the university colleges to create a QUB institute of education. St Mary's and Stranmillis colleges would continue to exist in their current locations, although with a somewhat changed role and constitutional status.

The institute would offer a single undergraduate BEd programme through its two colleges, with the colleges free to develop the majority of their undergraduate teaching in ways that are appropriate for their particular ethos and mission. All other teaching, including for masters degrees, and research would be conducted under the supervision of the institute.

Under option C, initial teacher education would be coordinated as a federation across Northern Ireland. That supra-institutional agency would be entrusted with ensuring that the various institutions achieve greater efficiency and increase standards. The federation would be at the hub of collaborating institutions.

Under the final option, option D, initial teacher education across Northern Ireland would become the responsibility of a single institution — the Northern Ireland institute of education.

The institute would have a single budget, a single suite of academic programmes and a single set of academic and support staff. It would have responsibility for coordinating and quality assuring the delivery of initial teacher training and in-service provision across the whole of Northern Ireland. The governance of the institute would be constituted to ensure the long-term protection of the historic mission and ethos of the existing institutions. That could include the provision of a separate religious pathway in the BEd degree, capacity for the activities of chaplains and the continued availability of a chapel for worship.

All the options are set out fully in the report and are evaluated against current international trends in teacher education.

This is a very comprehensive report, covering complex issues, and is worthy of careful consideration. I plan to use the summer months to consider it carefully and recommend that Members, the current institutions and other stakeholders do the same. As previously indicated, in the autumn, I intend to use the report and the options for discussions with the institutions and other stakeholders, with a view to finding agreement on a configuration of institutions that delivers world-class standards, achieves financial sustainability and promotes greater sharing and integration.

Robin Swann (UUP, North Antrim)

I thank the Minister for his statement. This process has been ongoing for quite a while. I, as Chair of the Committee, and members of the Committee possibly thought that the report would bring a more focused final recommendation rather than the four options that are in front of us, but it gives us something to move on from. In the Minister's summarising, he expressed all the positive sides of option D, but he failed to highlight that the panel sees option D as scoring lowest in practicability. Will the Minister still consider that as an option?

I also note that none of the four options overtly tackles the inequalities that are introduced by the Catholic certificate of education. Will the Minister ensure that whatever outcome he pursues will tackle that inequality? Can he also give an assurance that he will include the Committee for Employment and Learning and this House in any final decision?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

I thank the Chair for his comments and questions. This has been a long-standing issue before the Assembly. I suppose the question is how far you want to go back. The Chair and I were talking this morning about Lord Londonderry back in the early 1920s taking an interest in these matters. In more recent times, Members will be aware that there were efforts in the Chilver report back in the early 1980s, and, more recently, in the early 2000s, there were similar exercises. My predecessors in the Department initiated the formal consultation around the potential merger of Queen's and Stranmillis, but I think that this is the first time that, under devolution, we have the opportunity for a more holistic view as to the future of the teacher training infrastructure.

The panel was deliberately asked to provide a range of options. That is important because it gives us flexibility for how we take forward discussions with the stakeholders in the autumn. There is no preferred option that the panel has endorsed. While, personally speaking, I have my own views, and I am on record in that regard, I, too, remain open-minded about the option that will find favour and will be one that we can deliver here in Northern Ireland.

The panel has provided the commentary alongside each of the options that I have outlined today in a brief manner, in the spirit of a statement to the Assembly. While option D is the most radical in its reforms, hence the comment that it is perhaps the least practical to deliver, it is also worth noting that it scores most heavily in improved efficiency and in the delivery of a world-class system of teacher education. So, it is important that we have a rounded view of each of the options. Again, Members and others can consider those in full detail.

Finally, the Chair made comment in relation to access to the certificate of religious education. The panel identified that as being an inequity in the current system. There are two different ways that the issue can be addressed. Outwith my responsibilities as Minister, there is an issue about our equality law in Northern Ireland and whether schools should have the ability to take decisions based on whether someone does or does not have that certificate. That is a matter for OFMDFM and the Department of Education to take forward.

Plan B, as we could perhaps term it, is to ensure a more readily available equality of access for all students to the certificate, which enhances their employment prospects across the board, rather than the situation today, in which those who can access the certificate more readily have a wider range of schools to apply to than those who do not.

The Chairperson also mentioned engagement with the Committee. Ultimately, we will have to consider how decisions are taken, depending on how the discussions go with the stakeholders in the autumn. I am certainly committed to keeping the Committee fully informed of progress. My officials are appearing before the Committee tomorrow to discuss the report, and I know that attempts are being made to organise a session with the panel in the early autumn for further discussion and scrutiny of the report and its options.

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

This is a very important detailed statement to the House. Apart from the Chair, to whom I gave some latitude, there is an extensive list of Members who want to ask a question. Members should not make further statements on the statement; it should be a question on the statement.

Tom Buchanan (DUP, West Tyrone)

I will certainly stick to the question. I thank the Minister for his statement to the House. Will he advise whether any costings have been done for the four options? Will St Mary's adhere to the panel's recommendation that all undergraduate recruits should apply through the UCAS system?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

I thank the Member for his questions. The options have not been costed as such, but, in terms of finance, we know that the status quo is not sustainable. We made a statement on that already, and Members will be aware of the Grant Thornton report, which sets out the compelling arguments on that situation. It is worth putting it on record that the panel members found the analysis in the Grant Thornton report to be very persuasive.

(Mr Principal Deputy Speaker [Mr Mitchel McLaughlin] in the Chair)

The UCAS issue was addressed by the panel as being an inequity in the system because it means that students can hold offers from Stranmillis and St Mary's at the same time, and St Mary's is maybe in a better position to control entry than Stranmillis. Even though teacher education is sometimes oversubscribed, we have a strange situation in which Stranmillis has had to fill places through clearing at times, because people have had the double admissions option due to the approach that St Mary's has taken. We have encouraged St Mary's to use UCAS and will certainly continue to do that outwith the wider discussions that we want to have over the general way forward.

Fra McCann (Sinn Féin, Belfast West)

Go raibh maith agat, a LeasCheann Comhairle. I thank the Minister for his statement to the House. Does he agree that the review cannot consider the future of St Mary's in isolation from its place in the community of west Belfast and further afield? He is also fully aware that our party supports the right of St Mary's to have the financial autonomy and government support that it requires to promote its mission of academic excellence, teacher education, Irish-medium education and access to higher education for disadvantaged groups. I call on the Minister this morning to engage positively with St Mary's and to support the college in developing measures that will ensure its long-term sustainability. It is time to put an end to the years of uncertainty for the college, years in which management has been forced to be preoccupied with the issues. It is clear that St Mary's resolved to remain autonomous. I ask the Minister, in all good faith, to sit down with —

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Order. We are waiting for a question.

Fra McCann (Sinn Féin, Belfast West)

Does the Minister not believe that it is time to sit down and work with St Mary's on its long-term future and that the purpose of the report is to close St Mary's either through the front door or the back door?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

There is no set agenda for the outcome of the report. Suffice it to say that the status quo is not an option. I am more than happy to sit down with St Mary's to discuss not only the future of the college but the wider system of teacher education in Northern Ireland. The report is designed to facilitate that. I obviously recognise and, indeed, the panel recognised the important place that St Mary's holds in the community, particularly in west Belfast. The panel has gone to great lengths to stress the importance of pluralism in teacher education, and the point about pluralism and diversity is recognised in all the options set out. It is worth stressing that pluralism and diversity can be accommodated through a range of institutional formulas.

Obviously, the public sector contributes very heavily to St Mary's, but we have to bear it in mind that we have to deploy taxpayers' money with a degree of responsibility and efficiency. We do not have an efficient approach to teacher education in Northern Ireland; our costs are out of step with those in teacher education in other parts of these islands and elsewhere. The panel is keen to stress that, if we find efficiencies in the current provision, they should, in the first instance, be reinvested in the improved provision of teacher education. There are ways in which that could be accommodated. We have a duty to look seriously at the way in which public money is used and to consider doing things differently. St Mary's needs to be part of that discussion. We cannot carry on with the way we are doing things at present.

Pat Ramsey (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Foyle)

I thank the Minister for bringing the report today. He will acknowledge that it has been fairly contentious, and the Committee did not find favour as we went through the process leading up to this.

I refer the Minister to paragraph 8.21 on page 48 of the report, where the colleges will be required, under the new funding arrangements, to increase shared education and engage in greater collaboration. Will the Minister give an assurance to the House that, irrespective of what option goes forward, he will protect and respect the ethos and integrity of each of the institutions and that they will not be financially penalised?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

I thank the Member for his questions. Obviously, this issue is highly contentious. In some ways, education and the particular issue of teacher education go deep to the heart of identity issues in Northern Ireland. No one is under any illusions that it is anything to the contrary. In terms of the issues around the ethos and identity of the colleges, the options provide different means by which those can be respected as we move forward. There is the issue of whether that is accommodated through different institutions, through the institutions coming together in collaboration or through a single institution. The historical missions and each ethos need to be consolidated and protected in the new designs.

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

I thank the Minister for his statement. How do the options set out in the report compare with international best practice?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

To an extent, that question builds on the one asked by Mr Ramsey. It is worth stressing that the trend is strongly towards the consolidation of teacher training in a university setting. There are numerous examples of that across these islands and the wider world. While there may be exceptions in that regard, where small teacher training facilities continue, they are very much in the minority.

Closer to home, we see examples of successful change. A major reform programme is under way in the Republic of Ireland to consolidate their teacher training institutions, including bringing a number of them together under Dublin City University. In that regard, it is worth stressing that what is primarily a secondary institution is finding a means of accommodating institutions coming into it that have had a very clear denominational background. That should give people reassurance that it can be done.

We also have to look at situations elsewhere in these islands, where you have a number of single institutions that address a number of religious and denominational issues. For example, you have Liverpool Hope University and the University of Roehampton. Roehampton is an interesting example: it was formed by four different religious-based colleges coming together in the mid-1970s. You also have the example of Homerton College becoming a part of the University of Cambridge in the past few decades. Again, that is a college with a long history going back to the mid-18th century. Perhaps the most interesting example is Glasgow, where you had St Andrews, which was a Catholic training institution, forming a partnership with the University of Glasgow and subsequently becoming a part of the university, with a new institute of education. Again, in that merger, the means were found to respect that historical religious ethos and mission.

David Hilditch (DUP, East Antrim)

I thank the Minister for his statement this morning. Last October, when officials appeared before the Committee, and again in November, there was a high degree of criticism of the process. There was mention of political interference and the independent review panel having been steered. How do you respond to that? Do today's report and recommendations vindicate that criticism?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

I am not sure whether that comment is valid. This was an independent review panel, and it is its work that has been produced today. The five people involved are of huge standing as international experts in the field of education. They have been very robust in the methodology that they have adopted in engaging with the stakeholders and have sought to find options that accommodate the mission and ethos of the institutions. I have no difficulty in commending and recognising the quality of the work, and I believe that it provides us with a solid foundation on which we can proceed to have further engagement with the stakeholders with a view to finding an agreed way forward.

Bronwyn McGahan (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

Go raibh maith agat. I thank the Minister for his statement. What does the report have to say about teacher education for the Irish-medium sector? Does the Minister agree that St Mary's is a specialist and high-performing provider of teacher training through immersion in the Irish language?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

I certainly recognise that, in a general sense, St Mary's is a quality provider of teacher education. The panel members recognised that in the report. They also recognised that we could do a lot better in teacher education across the piece. That is not meant to be a comment on any individual institution, but it is a reflection of the fact that we have an overly fragmented system and that, through a more collaborative approach through a range of options, we all stand to gain a better outcome.

The Member is right that St Mary's has developed a specialism in Irish language. In all the options, there is a commitment to respecting diversity in the education system and to ensuring that teachers are prepared for the range of sectors that may exist in Northern Ireland in the future, including the Irish-medium sector. Where that type of specialism needs to be catered for through all the options, that space can be carved out to ensure that people are prepared for that sector.

Alastair Ross (DUP, East Antrim)

Will the Minister remind the House of his personal preference of the four options that are laid out; tell us when he anticipates that he will bring his final decision to the Executive; and tell us when he believes the landscape of teacher training in Northern Ireland will be changed?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

I thank the Member for his questions. I am on record as a supporter of integrated education. I would favour having a single, integrated system of teacher education in Northern Ireland, but, in saying that, I recognise that mine is only one of many voices and that we need to have an agreed way forward on teacher education. I have to respect the views of others, and we have to ensure that what we put in place will be sustainable for the future and will cater to all needs in our society. I believe that the process I intend to embark on in the autumn will address that.

The initial plan will be to have meetings individually with the different providers and some other stakeholders, before moving quickly to round-table discussions. After we have had that initial round of discussions, we will map out further what other work needs to be done to find common ground. I appreciate that this will not be an easy task, in that there are a lot of strongly held views on the future, but I hope that, as a result of the report today, particularly when people properly scrutinise it and fully understand the importance of the comments and observations that have been made by the panel members, people will appreciate that we need to change from the current status quo.

It is not simply about coming up with a different financial arrangement. It is not simply about moving in the direction of sharing and integration, important as they are. There are important educational implications that arise from the particular institutional focus that we have. Ultimately, the real prize here is ensuring that we prepare teachers for the modern world of education.

Phil Flanagan (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle. Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire as an méid atá ráite aige go dtí seo. The Minister's agenda is abundantly clear, as, indeed, is that of his panel, which has done likewise in other places. As the Chair said, it demonstrates how bureaucratic the system of governance here is when, three years after getting the job, no decision has been made and we are no clearer about what the Minister is actually going to do. St Mary's has indicated that it is resolved to remain autonomous, and we support that, but it is willing to embrace —

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

We need a question.

Phil Flanagan (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

— shared education if its position is respected. Can I ask the Minister whether he believes that there is something wrong with a teacher training college that has a deeply held Catholic ethos?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

Let me say a couple of things in response to what the Member has said. First of all, this is the first time under devolution that we have had a holistic view across the range of teacher education providers in Northern Ireland. A consultation was initiated by my predecessors in the Department around the Queen's/Stranmillis merger. If there had been sufficient consensus in the House for the necessary legislation to go through, we would have proceeded with that. The opportunity for action in this area was there, but it was not going to find support, so we have taken the opportunity for a much wider look at the issue.

What we have done is taken a structured approach to providing the evidence and the strong case for change in the system. The Grant Thornton report has looked at the financial issues and has clearly spelt it out that the status quo is not financially sustainable, including a context of continued subsidy, never mind a situation where subsidy is gradually removed from the institutions.

The report that we are publishing today sets out the evidence, particularly in light of international trends, for how we can reconfigure our situation. I am clear in accepting that we have to have a system that respects religious pluralism. For the foreseeable future we will have a Catholic sector in Northern Ireland that, of course, has to operate in the context of a stronger framework of shared education. It is important that we prepare teachers for all the different sectors and that we can accommodate the needs of diversity in Northern Ireland through a range of institutional formats. All the options set out are worthy of consideration in that regard.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Before I call the next Member to speak, I want to make it clear that I do not expect to have to remind Members that it is not statements on the statement: it is questions. I hope that is sufficiently clear. The Speaker himself made it clear before he left the Chair, so it is questions, if you do not mind, on the statement today.

Seán Rogers (Social Democratic and Labour Party, South Down)

Thanks to the Minister for his statement. I am sure, Minister, you will applaud the work of our teacher training colleges in providing good teachers to educate our children. Many parents still choose a faith-based education. What steps are you taking to ensure that there is more equitable access to a certificate in religious education?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

Building on the answer that I provided to Mr Flanagan, I accept that we will see pluralism in our education system for the foreseeable future, and it is important that we prepare teachers in that regard. Let me also say that, in so far as we may have a Catholic sector, that does not mean that children in those schools are taught exclusively by teachers who come from the Catholic faith or a Catholic background. We should have a situation here where any professional teacher, irrespective of their background, should be capable of teaching in any educational setting in a professional manner, irrespective of the particular ethos of that type of school.

In relation to the certificate in religious education, there is a view across a number of parties in the House that we need to address that issue. One option is through amendments to equality legislation, which is beyond my responsibilities. The other option is through ensuring more ready access to that certificate. At present, students from Stranmillis normally access the certificate through distance learning via the University of Glasgow. In other institutions, that is more readily available or, indeed, is hardwired into the curriculum. That creates a certain inequality in opportunities for employment on the far side, and we need to address that — there is no question about that.

Sammy Douglas (DUP, Belfast East)

I thank the Minister for his statement. Does he agree that the two university colleges — Stranmillis and St Mary's — work on joint projects at the moment? Will he assure the House that he will work with the two colleges to ensure that

"sustaining existing quality and building upon it"

will ensure their sustainability into the future?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

Again, I thank the Member for the questions. I obviously recognise the existing collaboration. In so far as the options recommend deeper collaboration, that is not at the expense of recognising the good practice that pertains. That includes the joint special needs literacy project that Stranmillis and St Mary's are engaged in, some shared continuing professional development (CPD) programmes and the Classrooms Re-imagined: Education in Diversity and Inclusion for Teachers (CREDIT) programme that is funded by the International Fund for Ireland. Those are all good projects that we can build on and deepen.

The process that we are engaged in is all about finding a sustainable solution for teacher education in Northern Ireland as a whole, and the views of Stranmillis and St Mary's are critical in that regard. We are committed to working with them to provide and find a sustainable solution for the system as a whole.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

I call Mr Mervyn Storey, the Chairperson of the Education Committee. We will extend some latitude to you.

Mervyn Storey (DUP, North Antrim)

That is a very dangerous thing to do, Mr Principal Deputy Speaker.

Speaking initially as the chair of the Education Committee, I welcome the statement. It includes issues that are of particular interest to the Education Committee, including a highlighting of the disjoint between initial teacher training, continuing professional development for teachers and the issue that has been raised in the House of the differential in access to the certificate in religious education. In the spirit of seeking to promote working together, will the Minister join the Education Minister and work towards an agreed policy that will see the removal of the certificate on the basis of the Fair Employment and Treatment Order? As a member of the Executive, will he ensure that he joins his Education Minister colleague in that?

I want to conclude by asking some questions as a Member. Will the Minister tell the House that the access arrangements for the certificate are fundamentally flawed? Currently, if someone seeks a certificate, they need a letter of recommendation from a local parish priest, which creates considerable difficulties for many young people. Does he believe that Stranmillis is fundamentally hampered? It no longer has representatives from the Transferor Representatives' Council because of actions taken by Sir Reg Empey?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

I thank the Chair of the Education Committee for the questions. The report is very far-reaching, and, while the panel has a very specific terms of reference on options for institutional design, it made wider commentary that is applicable across the piece for education and, in particular, teacher education. I am more than happy to have discussions with my colleague the Minister of Education in that regard.

The Member focused particularly on issues about the certificate in religious education. Again, it is worth stressing that there are two ways in which we can address this, one of which is through amending equality legislation. I am more than happy to give my personal support to working with the Minister of Education and OFMDFM to address that issue.

I concur that the situation that applies today regarding the relative ease of access or otherwise is a major inequity in the system that impacts on equality of access for graduates to employment. I also concur that we have to address that.

Trevor Lunn (Alliance, Lagan Valley)

I thank the Minister for his answers so far. Will he comment further on the importance of links to universities to maximise potential linkages to educational research?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

I thank the Member for the question. In some ways, this is probably the key implication that I take away from the report. I appreciate that a lot of Members are focusing on the future of the institutions individually. This morning, equality issues have been a major theme as well. However, the real prize that we have to focus on is the infusion of teacher education into a rich research environment, and that is what is provided through the university setting or through closer links to universities. That is perhaps the background to the trend internationally towards teacher education in the context of a university. It is why there has been a consolidation or reconfiguration of teacher education in different jurisdictions, including our neighbours in the Republic of Ireland, in recent years. There is a real prize to be found, and it means that the robustness of the qualifications that teachers receive will stand on a par with those achieving other academic qualifications. It is important that we ensure that we provide the best opportunities for our graduates, not only for their potential pathway into education but into other fields and endeavours.

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

In the best — or is it the worst? — Alliance tradition, the Minister is sitting on the fence when it comes to telling us which option he prefers. I suspect that most of us can work it out. What is the essence of the difference, if any, between the impact of options A and C on the autonomy of each of the colleges? Under any of the options, is the UCAS requirement enforceable and, if so, under which?

Stephen Farry (Alliance, North Down)

I thank the Member for the question. Let me make it clear that my approach is one of seeking to build consensus. I have put my very clear views on the matter on the record on numerous occasions, including earlier today in a response to Mr Ross. If we are to find something that is sustainable, it is important that it has broad-based support, and that is why it is important that we have options that can be the basis for further discussions with all the stakeholders.

The difference between options A and C is that option A is a collaboration and option C is a federation. In a federation, you will see a move of some constitutional issues towards the central authority. There is a distinction in terms of governance between the two options, and, again, I encourage the Member to read the report in full. Indeed, those options can be further elaborated on in the discussions that we may have with the stakeholders in the autumn.

The UCAS issue is important. I have already commented on the differential opportunities that arise from that and the particular impact on Stranmillis in terms of planning ahead and student entry. It is in the bizarre situation of being simultaneously oversubscribed and having to fill places through clearing because of people holding an offer for St Mary's at the same time through the non-UCAS strand. I certainly will use my best endeavours to ensure a common admissions policy across the institutions, and, indeed, the panel members were keen to stress that point as well.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

The Assembly is well aware of the growing concern among the public last winter about the quality of care provided by our emergency departments and the robustness of governance procedures across the health and social care system in Northern Ireland. I made clear in my statements to the Assembly earlier this year my disappointment about the events that had contributed to the public’s unease and announced a series of actions that I had taken or would take to respond to the concerns. Today, I want to inform the Assembly of the progress on these actions and the next steps to further improve the quality and governance of health and social care in Northern Ireland.

On 10 February, I announced that I had commissioned the Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority (RQIA) to conduct a review of unscheduled care services in the Belfast Trust with a view to the wider regional context.

That followed the RQIA's inspection of the emergency department and acute medical unit of the Royal Victoria Hospital (RVH) following the major incident declared by the Belfast Trust on 8 January. The RQIA has completed its review and submitted its report to me. I have accepted its findings and recommendations, and the authority will publish its report today. I thank the RQIA and the expert team, led by David Stewart, for their thorough examination of the issues and their proposals for transforming the delivery of unscheduled care.

On the major incident at the RVH, the RQIA has identified planning and systems failings by the Belfast Trust in the period leading up to the incident on 8 January. Management of the flow of patients, in the Royal Victoria Hospital and across the trust as a whole, could have been handled better. I am very disappointed by the trust’s apparent inability to identify and plan for those anticipated pressures. I am contacting the chairs and acting chief executives of the Belfast Trust and the Health and Social Care Board to ask them to account for those systems failures. I require their assurance that they have learnt lessons from the RQIA's findings and are taking steps to prevent the failures from happening in the future.

While none of the other trusts was in the same position as Belfast, the RQIA has made a number of recommendations for concerted action across the region to improve the delivery of unscheduled care. I believe that, if we are to secure improvements in the delivery of unscheduled care, a regional approach is essential. I am therefore announcing my decision to establish, from today, a regional task group to take forward the RQIA's recommendations, under the leadership of my Department’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr Michael McBride, and its Chief Nursing Officer, Charlotte McArdle, who will co-chair the task group. The task group will take immediate action to oversee and coordinate the implementation of the RQIA's recommendations. I want to see results, and I have set the clear aims for the task group of eliminating all avoidable 12-hour waiting time breaches from this winter onwards and, over the next 18 months, of making significant progress towards achieving the four-hour waiting time standard.

Members will recall that I commissioned the Health and Social Care Board to examine serious adverse incident (SAI) reporting arising from our emergency departments in the five-year period from 2009 to 2013. The findings are being shared with the Committee for Health, Social Services and Public Safety and will be placed on the Department’s website.

In summary, the findings are that, in the five years covered, 83 serious adverse incidents were reported. Of those, 48 involved the death of a patient, while 13 identified some element of delay in aspects of a patient's care. Delays arose for a range of reasons, including issues around the triage process, a missed diagnosis, the accurate and timely communication of information, and the speed with which medications or treatments were delivered. It is impossible to say definitively to what extent any delay contributed to any death.

I am very well aware that we often talk about systems and processes designed to prevent things from going wrong or to learn from mistakes that have been made, such as the SAI process. However, we must never lose sight of the fact that at the very heart of all of this is the patient — a son, daughter, father or mother — and families deeply affected and hurt by what happened to their loved one. I am determined that all our processes and systems will be as open and transparent as they can be, while respecting the need for patient confidentiality, and that they fully meet the expectations of patients and their families in being informed and receiving clear and unambiguous answers to their questions. Those are some of the governance aspects that I have asked Sir Liam Donaldson to consider in the work that I am commissioning from him.

There has been some confusion in public discussion and commentary about the role and purpose of the SAI system. It is intended as a means by which incidents and unexpected events are investigated so that learning can be identified, shared and implemented. If things have gone wrong, it is important that lessons are learned, thereby preventing a recurrence. The reporting and learning from SAIs can have a positive impact on the quality and safety of healthcare. An open and learning culture encourages the reporting of SAIs as a valuable means of highlighting and resolving potential problems with services. All our services — emergency services are no exception — are becoming increasingly complex, and there will always be incidents from which we can learn.

Elimination of lengthy delays is critical to ensuring high-quality care and to improving patient experience. I believe that this can be done. The HSC achieved a 44% reduction in the number of 12-hour waiting time breaches during last year. That is a considerable achievement, and I pay tribute to all staff in the HSC who worked hard to deliver this improvement, but there is still much more to do.

I have therefore directed the task group to address, in particular, the design and implementation of more effective patient pathways for our frail elderly people and patients with respiratory conditions. To achieve this, the whole system will have to work together, including our GPs, Ambulance Service, community care teams and staff in acute hospitals.

I believe that the integral involvement of the HSC's professional staff in the work of the task group is essential to its ultimate success. This is not a managerial-focused initiative. It will be strategic in its intent but practical and operational in its delivery. It will also be vital that learning and perspectives emerging from the Royal College of Nursing and the College of Emergency Medicine summits, held earlier this year, are acted on, as appropriate, by the task group.

The task I have set is challenging. However, I am convinced that it can be achieved. The winter period will, no doubt, bring its own challenges. When pressures emerge, as they no doubt will, we must put our wholehearted support and encouragement behind front line staff, who have been tasked to deliver transformation in unscheduled care. It can be achieved by harnessing the talents of our staff, whether they are doctors, nurses and social workers or managers and policymakers. I believe that they will have your support, and I commend this statement to the House.

Maeve McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

Go raibh maith agat. I thank the Minister for his statement. It is clear that RQIA has identified planning and systems failures by the Belfast Trust. In the Minister's statement is his quite stark comment:

"I am very disappointed by the Trust’s apparent inability to identify and plan for these anticipated pressures."

Will the Minister give the House an insight, first, as to what the systems failings were and what recommendations will be progressed? Will he also go as far as to comment on the response of the ombudsman this morning to high levels of dissatisfaction with the complaints processes in health trusts?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

I met all the trusts in early autumn and was given assurances that actions were being taken to anticipate rising demand for emergency and unscheduled care, as always happens in the winter. One of the failings in the Belfast Trust that we could identify clearly is that it had too much scheduled care coming in immediately after Christmas. It had a lot of elective surgery and so forth to take place. People had been booked in, and, therefore, beds were taken up. The trust should have anticipated that a greater number of people would come in on the unscheduled pathway and held some of those procedures back further. That was a very clear failing.

It is important that we ensure that we deal with complaints from the public in a clear, transparent and consistent way. Some trusts perform better than others in managing complaints. I have experience of that and would, therefore, like to see a greater level of consistency applied throughout trusts in how they respond to complaints. I am and have been trying, with some success, although work is still to be done, to make the health service a more open and transparent organisation.

We are coming from years and years — decades — of not having the level of openness and transparency in health that there was in a range of other services. I want to change that. If we get it wrong, I want the public to know at an early point and for us to deal with the issues that arise from that.

That is what serious adverse incident reporting is about. I do not want the press and media to jump all over serious adverse incidents because we do them, because that has the potential to actually drive people not to carry out serious adverse incidents when they should be carried out. I want us to do that, and I want us to be very clear with the people who suffered as a consequence of not receiving the care that they should have. That will be made known to them at the earliest possible point.

Jim Wells (DUP, South Down)

The Minister, in his statement, has given a commitment that all avoidable 12-hour waits at A&E departments will be eliminated. Some Members will be fascinated by the definition of "avoidable". Obviously, we all want to see a very significant decline in these waits. Will the Minister define what he means by "avoidable" so that we have clarity on his commitment?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

On occasion, there will be surges. Sometimes, those surges cannot be anticipated. That is one instance in which you would have an unavoidable delay. One of RQIA's recommendations will be for the trusts to update their escalation plans to ensure that, when things go wrong and when something outside the control of the hospital happens and large numbers of people are in attendance, they can escalate the plans much quicker to get more staff in, make more beds available and ensure that those people are treated more quickly.

So we recognise that unavoidable delays will be there, but that will not leave us with thousands of 12-hour breaches. They will happen quite infrequently, and therefore "avoidable" is not a term that we are putting in to leave the door open for thousands of 12-hour breaches to continue occurring.

Fearghal McKinney (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Belfast South)

We were saddened to learn this morning of the scale of the SAIs. We should remember that at the heart of each one is an individual and a family. Given the scale of them, does the Minister accept that there must be a question mark over whether we are actually learning from the SAI process? In that context, does the Minister agree that it is appropriate or necessary to have an external eye looking over the SAI processes, underpinned by legislation, to ensure that the growing dissatisfaction and concern in the public mind is addressed?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

The Member is absolutely right that we are dealing with human beings and individuals. The SAI process takes place over a long period — five years — but that does not lessen the impact for any individual who did not receive as good a quality of care in that period of time as they might otherwise have received.

We are going to have that external eye, and the Member should be aware that we have commissioned someone of real standing to carry out that piece of work: Sir Liam Donaldson. He will be looking at all of this, including the SAIs and all the issues around the quality of care. Quality is something that we want to prioritise, and we have the 'Quality 2020' document, which sets out very clearly what we believe we should be achieving on quality. That is not merely an aspiration: it is something that we intend to deliver on.

Roy Beggs (UUP, East Antrim)

In the Minister's statement and, indeed, in some of his answers, he placed much focus on 12-hour breaches, which are coming down. However, the 2013-14 A&E waiting time statistics show that there has been a further reduction in the number of patients treated within four hours and a worryingly increasing bulge in the number of those waiting between four and 12 hours — almost 150,000 in the last year. My question to the Minister is this: is he simply dealing with a symptom at the upper end of our A&E rather than dealing with the problem, and does he accept that there will be an ongoing risk of serious adverse incidents whilst there continue to be delays of more than four hours?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

I certainly think that there has been a greater concentration on dealing with 12-hour breaches. Obviously, 12 hours is a considerably longer period of time than four hours, and it was deemed that tackling that was of greatest importance. The Member knows that we have made considerable progress on this issue. For example, when I inherited the job, we were looking at something like over 10,000 12-hour breaches in that year. We are now down to 3,000. That is 3,000 too many, in my opinion, but the figure has come down by 7,000 breaches. That is a significant improvement, and I am sure that the Member will take an opportunity at some point to welcome that improvement and say that it has been a major step forward.

I recognise that there has been a decline in the number of patients treated within four hours, and that is also something that we intend to tackle. So, whilst the focus this year will be on delivering further improvement in the 12-hour breaches, we are looking at the four-hour breaches over an 18-month period. It is something that we will be looking at and addressing, but we will do it in a holistic way. We will deal with the first challenge, which is the 12-hour breaches, but seek to carry out improvement across and throughout the system. The RQIA report and the task force group will assist us in doing that. There are quite a number of focuses that will be applied in how we deal with our elderly population, respiratory conditions and so forth that will assist us in all of that.

Kieran McCarthy (Alliance, Strangford)

Like our Committee Chairperson, I note the Minister's disappointment at the Belfast Trust's inability to plan for unscheduled pressures. We all share that disappointment. The Minister wants someone to account for what he calls "systems failures". What action will the Minister take when someone from the trust or the board is found to have fallen down on the job, resulting in a bad experience for our patients? Will it be a case of heads rolling, a slap on the wrists, or simply just carrying on and hoping?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

The Member knows that the way that the system works is that I appoint a board and a chair, and the board holds the trust to account in terms of the Executive. There are monthly, public meetings that Members can attend to see how the board is performing in holding the trust to account.

I am pleased that, earlier this year, I was able to appoint a new chair to the board to hold the trust to account; that was a direct appointment by me. I will ensure that the chair knows at all times what my expectations are of the Belfast Trust and that I apply appropriate pressure on the chair to ensure that that organisation, which has over 20,000 employees, a budget of £1·2 billion, and which is by far the largest organisation in Northern Ireland and one of the largest public service organisations anywhere in the United Kingdom, actually delivers on the targets that we set for it. It is absolutely vital to do that, and it is incumbent on the trust to ensure that that is the case.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

The RQIA is tasked with carrying out a series of inspections. It has sometimes been said to me that the RQIA places a large focus on our nursing homes and so forth and that there has not been enough focus on our hospitals. So we have asked the RQIA to undertake a rolling programme of unannounced inspections, which will examine the quality of services in all acute hospitals in Northern Ireland each year from 2015-16 onwards. Those inspections will focus on a number of quality indicators about triage, admission, assessment, care, monitoring and discharge of patients. They will focus on a selection of quality indicators that will not be pre-notified to the trusts for each inspection, and no advance warning will be provided to trusts as to which sites or services within a hospital will be visited as part of an unannounced inspection. It is intended that the RQIA inspection reports will be published on a hospital-by-hospital basis as they are completed.

The proposal is to introduce these unannounced inspections from 2015-16, rather than immediately, because the RQIA already has a number of planned reviews under way, which focus on acute hospitals and which are, coincidentally, more wide-ranging than focusing on particular services. Those reviews include: a review of the experience of older people in acute hospitals, which will be completed within the next three months; a review of discharge arrangements from acute hospitals, because effective discharge arrangements are an essential part of the smooth flow of patients through hospitals, and the work of this review will inform the recommendations of the wider review of unscheduled care; and also a review of the inspection of the regional stroke strategy, the hospital aspects of which are of relevance to the unscheduled care review, and which will examine whether arrangements for fast-tracking stroke patients through the system are working effectively. Combined with the current review covering the Belfast Trust emergency department and the management of flows through the trusts, which also includes some regional elements, our advice is that the programme of unannounced inspections could begin next year.

Mickey Brady (Sinn Féin, Newry and Armagh)

Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle. I thank the Minister for his statement and I welcome the fact that he has accepted that a regional approach is essential because there are other areas outside Belfast, and other hospitals such as Daisy Hill. I accept that the RVH is a regional centre.

In your statement, Minister, you said that you directed the task group to address particularly the design and implementation of more effective patient pathways for frail elderly people and patients with respiratory conditions. That is very much to be welcomed. I ask that people with mental health problems who present at emergency departments also be considered because they often have particular problems that need to be dealt with, possibly in a different way, and a more effective pathway could be put in place for those particular people.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

With the frail elderly, I have to say that I think my focus is the appropriate one. I do not want to take away from the needs of people with mental health conditions, but I think that it is wholly inappropriate for elderly people to be on trolleys beside all the mayhem that goes on in emergency departments and have to wait for long periods of time, either to be admitted to hospital or to be treated and discharged. Therefore, it is my first priority that we deal with the elderly population, and particularly our frail elderly, with dignity and the care that would be expected for those people. This is an area in which we can deliver considerable improvement. RQIA has made recommendations to the Belfast Trust. I have discussed those with the chair of the Belfast Trust, and he accepts that those recommendations are viable and the trust will act on delivering them. It is very important that that is the case and that we have treatment pathways, particularly for our frail elderly, that will ensure that we can carry out that level of service with the dignity that should be afforded to those people.

Gordon Dunne (DUP, North Down)

I thank the Minister for initiating the report and bringing forward its findings. I think we all agree that it is important that they are actioned to stop any recurrence of what has been found within the Royal. Can the Minister advise as to what is being done to improve staffing levels within the Royal Victoria Hospital A&E?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

In terms of staffing levels within the hospital, we have advertised and recruited considerable numbers of additional nursing staff. I believe that it is around 100 nurses for the emergency department and, indeed, the acute medical unit. At present, there are 10 consultants in the RVH ED. My wife used to work in the ED in the RVH, and I think that it had one or two consultants back in the 1980s, during the Troubles. So, people can see how things have changed even since that period, and the usage of the hospital has changed in that period, because one would assume that it was an extremely busy place when dealing with all the trauma from the bombs, the bullets and so forth.

We have recently recruited four substantive emergency department consultants, although the full complement will not be in post for another number of months. The trust will also increase the out-of-hours consultant cover at the weekend in line with when the additional consultants come into post. It has also recruited three locum ED consultants, whom it hopes will commence on 14 August. The RVH emergency department has senior clinical decision-makers on site from 8.00 am until 1.00 am Monday to Friday, and a consultant on-call rota operates from 8.00 am and from 5.00 pm at weekends. The extra posts will improve weekend out-of-hour consultant cover. Middle-grade doctors work in ED throughout the night, and the Belfast Trust's ED consultant complement is greater than that in any other trust in Northern Ireland, though it does not yet meet the College of Emergency Medicine's recommendation, which is a challenge for all trusts right across the United Kingdom, not just in Northern Ireland. It certainly is not specific to the Belfast Trust.

John Dallat (Social Democratic and Labour Party, East Londonderry)

I welcome the Minister's statement. Indeed, I have enormous sympathy for him in his endeavours. I pay tribute to the staff of our hospitals for the sterling work that they do. Will the Minister agree with me that the ongoing hemorrhaging of adverse reports is sapping the energy of those people? Can he assure the House that the people who are now charged with implementing the recommendations are the people to do it, or does he feel that it is perhaps time he relied on some independent source of energy to make sure that he is not let down yet again?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

The Member makes a number of valid points, and if I am let down, the population is let down as well. So, that is not a good situation to be in. Setting up the task group and tackling this in a reasonable way will move some of the responsibility away from the Health and Social Care Board and give additional sustenance and support to the trust in delivering those things, and we should view that positively. We have capable people in our Chief Medical Officer and Chief Nursing Officer to help us address that challenge, and I think that they are appropriate people to co-chair the task group. We will give them appropriate support.

We have had a series of issues to deal with in health and social care, but unscheduled care has come up over and over and over again. To this point, we have not got on top of it in the way that we would like to have. I think that what we are announcing this morning is significant and puts us in a very challenging position. I will be held to account next January, February and March if things do not show a significant improvement, but, again, I will be holding those people to account. We have inherited a difficult problem and we have been working hard to resolve it. We have not got there as yet, but we are putting the right systems in place to tackle this so that we can deliver a better quality of care in Northern Ireland.

The one caveat is that people need to use the services wisely. I recently noticed on social media that a row had broken out because someone had called 999 and got an ambulance out to take them to hospital because they were dizzy. We have a misuse of ambulance services, but we need those ambulance services to transfer patients and to be there when people have emergencies.

We have a misuse of our emergency departments. We need our nurses, doctors and professional staff to be able to respond to real emergencies and deal with the frail elderly and the nasty knocks that people will take. However, people abuse the system. We need to get that message out as well. We need the media and the public to support us in saying that it is wrong for people to abuse the service in the way that a significant percentage of users do. We need to challenge those people. It is all well and good for us to seek to correct things, but, if the level of abuse goes up, it will undermine the correction that we carry out.

David McIlveen (DUP, North Antrim)

I thank the Minister for his statement. He will, I am sure, be aware that, until the incident at the Odyssey, the term "serious adverse incident" (SAI) was probably not in the vocabulary of a lot of people in Northern Ireland outside the healthcare family. Bearing in mind that, since the incident, the media, and perhaps even those seeking to score political points, have jumped upon the term and called it what it is not, does the Minister feel that it is now time to reassess how fit for purpose the serious adverse incident system actually is?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

I say at the outset that the purpose of the serious adverse incident reporting system is to identify and promote learning from events. The investigation of an SAI provides a mechanism to effectively share learning in a meaningful way with a focus on safety and quality, ultimately leading to improvements for service users. Where SAIs have been reported, I expect four main things: that there will be an investigation at an appropriate level by people with the right skills to carry it out; that patients and families will be told that the case is an SAI and that an investigation is ongoing; that patients and families will be involved in the process to the level that they choose and will be informed of the outcome; and that learning must be identified and shared.

Whilst the process is a non-statutory system that exists to identify learning and support improvements in the quality and safety of Health and Social Care services in Northern Ireland, it is not the only mechanism in place to identify and support learning. A wide range of work is ongoing nationally and in Health and Social Care to develop and update evidence-based best practice and improve safety and quality. As a learning process, it complements the processes of statutory accountability, which apply to all parts of HSC, in dealing with deaths that meet the relevant criteria for some form of formal investigative process. We will look at all the learning processes, in conjunction with other parts of the United Kingdom. If we feel that the processes need to be enhanced further or that improvements can be carried out, certainly we will enact those.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Minister of Finance and Personnel wishes to make a statement.

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

The North/South Ministerial Council (NSMC) met in special EU programmes sectoral format in Armagh, on 30 May 2014. I represented the Northern Ireland Executive and was accompanied by junior Minister Jennifer McCann. The Government of the Republic of Ireland were represented by Brendan Howlin TD, Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform.

The meeting began with a short discussion on areas of mutual responsibility as part of the ongoing review into sectoral priorities. Minister Howlin then provided a short outline of the informal ministerial meeting on cohesion policy that he attended in Athens at the end of April 2014.

The chief executive of the Special EU Programmes Body (SEUPB) updated the Council on progress since the previous special EU programmes sectoral meeting in December last year. At the end of March 2014, the Peace III and INTERREG IVa programmes were fully committed. Funding from the withdrawal of the peace-building and conflict resolution centre and the Narrow Water bridge projects has now been reallocated. It was noted that all expenditure targets for the Peace III and INTERREG IVa programmes have been met to date. The INTERREG IVa programme must spend approximately £85 million by the end of 2015 and the Peace III programme approximately £90 million. Those targets are challenging, but the importance of maximising full EU funding allocations was emphasised.

Ministers confirmed that they remain supportive of the concept of the Narrow Water Bridge.

Council noted that the INTERREG IV transnational and inter-regional competitive funding programmes were successful in providing an additional £9 million to Northern Ireland in the 2007-2013 funding period. SEUPB continues to work to promote the positive impacts of EU programmes through public events and confirmed that it would hold two conferences later in the year to highlight the achievements of the Peace III and INTERREG IVa programmes.

Council was updated on the progress of the development work for the 2014-2020 INTERREG V and Peace IV EU programmes. It was noted that the public consultation for the programmes would begin in early June, and, as I am sure many Members are aware, it opened on Tuesday 3 June for a period of eight weeks. I urge those who are interested in shaping the programmes to input into this consultation process. Post consultation, the operational programmes will require approval from the Northern Ireland Executive, the Government of Ireland and the Scottish Government before onward transmission and negotiation with the European Commission.

Ministers discussed the recommendations outlined in the SEUPB staffing review and noted that there is to be further consideration by officials of the recommendations.

Council approved changes to the North/South pension scheme and noted that consultation on further reform of the scheme is under way. Council agreed to hold its next special EU programmes meeting on a date to be agreed in autumn 2014.

Daithí McKay (Sinn Féin, North Antrim)

Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle. Minister, you will be aware that delays in processing applications for INTERREG in particular are a problem that has dogged European funding here for many years. Given that the South and elsewhere in Europe simply do not suffer from these problems, what actions will you take in the months ahead to ensure that the new tranche of funding will not be dogged by the same problems and to reduce the application processing times?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

I am aware of the characterisation of the processing of our INTERREG programmes as slow. I support any attempts to hasten approval processes so that from application to decision, whether that is approval or rejection, the process is as quick as it possibly can be. There are some necessary stages in the process, and, having looked at the various stages, I do not think that there are any that, in their totality, can be removed. I want to keep those very necessary legal steps in that process, but that does not mean that the time taken to do each stage could not be sped up. My officials are working with their counterparts in the Irish Republic and with the SEUPB to examine the possibility of doing just that.

It is easy for individuals in the process who, perhaps, have a particular perspective or agenda to say that Northern Ireland is the slowest and worse than everybody else. I accept that, on average, the process takes a year, which is high and could do with coming down, but, if you compare, for example, the Irish Republic/Wales INTERREG scheme with ours, you will see that it is much smaller. The average size of their projects is about €900,000 versus ours at €2·5 million, yet they are only about eight weeks quicker on average at processing. It is a much smaller scheme in its totality: our current scheme is about €260 million; theirs was much lower. Their average project size and, therefore, the complexity of any assessment, was lower, yet their processing was only marginally quicker. It is easy for someone to characterise what we are doing in Northern Ireland as being incredibly slow, but, in reality, when you compare it with others not that far away, you see that they are not much better.

Paul Girvan (DUP, South Antrim)

I thank the Minister for his statement. Will he outline some of the details of the outcome of the staffing review?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

A staffing review has been ongoing since 2012. The motivation to review staffing was that, over the years prior to that, the number of staff in the SEUPB had grown, for understandable reasons. It dealt with the early stages and critical middle stages of the Peace and INTERREG funding, and it was felt that there was a requirement to have more staff to ensure that all the assessment work, which the Chairman asked about, was done as quickly as possible and that the money that we were drawing down from Europe, or our entitlement from Europe, could be spent. Given that those projects are now coming to an end and indeed the fact that future programmes are of a smaller quantity, there was a feeling that there was a need to look at the SEUPB's staffing situation again with a view to bringing that down.

In fact, at the last Special EU Programmes Body's sectoral meeting in December, we agreed the staffing review that would see the number of staff come down to 60 last year and 57 this year. There is an expectation that additional staff savings of 10% that were mooted in that report should also be achieved. It is only right and proper that, in circumstances in which programmes are spending less money and there is not the pressure that there was back in 2012 and indeed the years before that, we should, like in all parts of the public sector, look at trying to reduce cost.

Dominic Bradley (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Newry and Armagh)

Go raibh míle maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle. Tá ráite ag an Aire ag an chruinniú den Chomh-Aireacht ar an 30ú lá Bealtaine gur dheimhnigh na hAirí go bhfuil said fós ag tabhairt tacaíochta do choincheap Dhroicead an Chaol Uisce. An féidir leis an Aire a mhíniú cad é atá i gceist leis an ráiteas tacaíochta seo don todhchaí. The Minister stated that, at the meeting of the NSMC on 30 May:

"Ministers confirmed they remain supportive of the concept of the Narrow Water Bridge."

Will the Minister explain what that expression of support will mean in practice?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

It means what it says. In fact, support for the concept of the bridge was given initially at the last NSMC plenary meeting. I am trying to recollect when exactly that was. It was a number of months ago. It was certainly towards the tail end of last year. Sorry — it was at the early stages of this year. Given what has happened with the inability to proceed with the Narrow Water bridge and its not being able to be completed, and the associated problems that that caused in getting the money that was allocated to the scheme spent in time on good projects, I am glad that we have been able to do that. In fact, that was discussed at the recent sectoral meeting. The money has been allocated to two projects. One was the upgrade of the cross-border Enterprise rail scheme. The other is the upgrade of the Boyne viaduct, which is obviously related to the Enterprise scheme as well. I am glad that we have been able to ensure that that money has been reallocated and has not been lost.

I can understand the desire of some to perhaps want Ministers to go beyond supporting the concept of the bridge and actually say that they support it and that there will be funding for it. However, in a situation in which we have only recently secured the budget for INTERREG, there is no programme in place. In fact, as I mentioned in the statement, we are consulting on what the themes should be on which we spend that money. It would be jumping the gun somewhat to say anything more than that we are supportive of the concept of the bridge. I think that the record will show that in the past, with the first attempt to build the bridge, nothing was done to stop, prevent or hinder it from happening, going through its processes. I would expect the same degree of professionalism, if indeed a future application were permitted by the next INTERREG V programme, to be carried out by all relevant Departments in Northern Ireland and indeed the South as well.

Leslie Cree (UUP, North Down)

I thank the Minister for his report and congratulate him on getting it onto one A4 sheet of paper. That ticks a box.

The Minister expressed the £175 million that there is for Peace III and INTERREG IVa as being both "fully committed" and "challenging". What safeguards are there that that money will be spent by the end of 2015?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

Unfortunately, we have wasted a second side of A4, which we should have used for something worthwhile or useful — a crossword or something perhaps.

All of that is challenging. The money has been fully committed, so projects are there for the money to be spent on. If everything goes according to plan, all of the money will be spent. Obviously, there is continual monitoring and assessment by SEUPB.

Of course, some of the projects will be led by some of our Departments here, which will ensure that there is appropriate oversight of the expenditure to ensure that it gets out the door and none of it is lost.

I suppose there is always a degree of risk. As we know in this place, from time to time, there are reasons why the money that we allocate to Departments cannot be spent. The difficulty we have with European funding is that we do not have some of the flexibilities that we have with our own funding, not that we have many flexibilities. We do not have the same flexibility, and, if we find out very late in the process — we are about 18 months away from the date by which expenditure has to be made — there may be issues.

As for managing that, I understand that, whilst the end date for actual expenditure is December, the SEUPB is keen that most things come to it midway through 2015 so that some of the problems that the Member talks about can perhaps be seen early on.

Peter Weir (DUP, North Down)

I thank the Minister for his statement. Will he outline what he believes will be the proposed themes and budget for the INTERREG V programme?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

I am pleased that the INTERREG Va programme now has an indicative budget of €282 million, which is comparable with INTERREG IV. At this minute, there is no agreement on which areas and themes the money should be spent on. The draft scheme that is out for consultation at the minute proposes four programme themes. They are research and innovation; environmental protection and resource efficiency; social inclusion and combating poverty; and sustainable transport. I am pleased that sustainable transport has been included as a result of negotiations led by my Department but obviously influenced by the Department for Regional Development. We have been able to include that as one of the proposed programme themes. Indeed, research and innovation also includes a substrand for developing renewable energy technologies.

I was very keen that, whilst not denigrating or downplaying themes like environmental protection and social inclusion, there was much greater emphasis and focus on themes that boost the economy, given the economic pressures that Northern Ireland, the Republic and, indeed, Scotland face, hence the need to push sustainable transport and research and innovation, including renewable technologies. Hopefully, both those themes and, indeed, the others will be agreed as part of the consultation and find their way on to the final INTERREG V programme.

Michaela Boyle (Sinn Féin, West Tyrone)

Go raibh maith agat, a Cheann Comhairle. I thank the Minister for his statement to the House today. Minister, through the INTERREG V and Peace IV programmes, there are many cross-border projects in health and sustainable transport, which you just mentioned. With many councils and organisations going into summer recess, will the Minister give assurances that work through the SEUPB will be ongoing to ensure full cross-border cooperation on those important projects?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

I am not sure whether the Member is aware of a particular problem perhaps in her constituency. If she is, I am happy for her to raise that with me, and we will try to deal with it.

We should not fuel the perception that work stops just because this place and councils are perhaps in summer recess; there are people who remain in the country. We are not quite like France yet, where everything seems to be abandoned in August. Work is ongoing, and I hope that there will not be any issues with the continued work on some of the very good projects that are happening across Northern Ireland. If the Member is aware of particular issues, I am happy to investigate them and to do what we can to iron out any problems.

Ian McCrea (DUP, Mid Ulster)

The statement refers to the reallocation of funding for the peace centre at the Maze. He will be aware that the reason behind that reallocation was our party's withdrawal of support, because the requirement for buy-in from the unionist community had not been met. Until that is the case, it will not be built. Will the Minister give us an idea of what that reallocation has meant and how it has been redistributed?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

Much like the Narrow Water bridge issue, which was mentioned by Mr Bradley, this presented a significant challenge in terms of the quantum of funding that could not be spent by the end of 2015. Given the time frame that was available to the SEUPB, it was decided — I think, rightly — that it was not possible to conduct an open call for new bids to come in for the reallocation of the Peace III funding that could not be spent on the peace-building and conflict resolution centre. What the SEUPB did — I think that it was right to do it — was to revisit projects that had been on a sort of waiting list. I am very pleased that projects like the Voices from the Valley project in Newtownabbey, which I am familiar with, having had a meeting with council officials from that area, and the EARLS project in Dungannon, as well as extensions for activity to local authority peace partnerships, have mopped up that funding and will now ensure that none of that money, albeit on the basis that all those projects spend all their money, is now lost back to Europe.

Karen McKevitt (Social Democratic and Labour Party, South Down)

I thank the Minister for his statement. I will touch on the Narrow Water bridge project, as Mr Bradley did. I welcome the comments that the Ministers are behind the project, but does the Minister agree that the Narrow Water bridge project would fit well into the theme of sustainable transport and removing bottlenecks and key infrastructure networks?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

I am cautious about getting into assessing the relative merits of projects against a funding programme that has not been agreed. I do not disagree that the project that the Member talks about may well fit into the broad concept of a theme around sustainable transport. However, it would be foolish of me — indeed, it would be foolish of any of us — as we stand at the minute with the scheme out for consultation, nothing agreed and no indicative budget allocation to each of the themes in the programme, to say, "That it is a good scheme, and we should go in there. That is another good scheme that should go into something else" and start to pre-commit funding to certain projects without also knowing the merits or otherwise of other projects that might come forward. There might be a raft of sustainable transport or other projects that come forward through a call as part of INTERREG V that might be even better for meeting those achievements than, say, the Narrow Water bridge or some other project. It is a little too early to start saying, "That is a good scheme, and it fits in there. Therefore, it should get funding". We need to be incredibly cautious about taking that approach.

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

Since its inception, SEUPB has been quite a bloated bureaucracy. Whereas I welcome the indication of some reductions in staffing, are those reductions not much less than was anticipated at an earlier stage? Given that the budget for it to handle is falling so dramatically, surely they should be more substantial? Has any progress been made on bringing balance in community background to the staffing of SEUPB, where, notoriously, the Protestant community has been grossly underrepresented in the complement?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

On the first point that the Member raised, we should all welcome the fact that staffing levels in SEUPB are heading in the right direction. I agree that they are not as low as I think they should be, and I would like to see them falling further. There is agreement to get them down to 57 this year. The report that was carried out and conducted by my Department and the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform in the Irish Republic identified scope even beyond that 57 for a further 10% reduction in staffing numbers. We are also investigating the situation where this organisation has three offices across Ireland, two in this jurisdiction. That is also excessive and unnecessary moving forward, given the reduction in the organisation's budget or the budget that it manages on behalf of both Governments. That is something that I hope to report some positive news on after our next sectoral meeting.

Figures from 1 January 2013 show the community breakdown of staff as 21 from the Protestant community, 34 from the Catholic community and four non-determined. That was slightly up on the Protestant side, but it was slightly up on the Catholic side as well. When you look at the April 2014 figures, you will see that it has fallen back again on the Protestant side. I take a view on this sort of issue — it does not matter whether it is SEUPB, parts of my Department or, indeed, parts of anybody's Department, as I look at them in my role as being responsible for HR and personnel issues in the whole of the Civil Service — that I do not care what an official's religion is, as long as their work is up to scratch and up to standard and their advice is good. If there are issues, however, and individuals from a particular community background are being deterred from applying, work needs to be carried out to encourage people from that community to apply for work, as we have done across Departments, agencies, arm's-length bodies and grade levels in the Civil Service. If there are certain barriers, work needs to be undertaken to remove those barriers. I have no concern whether the staff are Catholic or Protestant, as long as their work is up to scratch.

John Dallat (Social Democratic and Labour Party, East Londonderry)

I concur with the Minster's last remarks. Recently, however, we have talked a great deal about scaling back the staff and about reduced budgets. Does anyone in the House seriously believe and does the Minister believe that we have reached a stage of integration, cohesion, peace and infrastructure at which we can seriously engage in a conversation of that type, rather than looking for increased budgets and for more work that could be done to rebuild what was destroyed in the past?

Simon Hamilton (DUP, Strangford)

As the Member was so nice to me at the start, I do not like to be nasty back to him — it is not my style, anyway — but this is not a matter of seeking to increase the budgets at the disposal of, in this case, the SEUPB. The budgets that it administers are set by Europe, and the match funding is set by this Executive and the Government of the Irish Republic. It is not a matter, therefore, of increasing its budget; the reality is that the budget that it has been administering has been going down and down and down. The budget for the programmes that it will administer in the future is much lower than it was in the past. That is a reflection of tight times across the whole of Europe. In those circumstances, it is completely unjustifiable for us to have less money to administer but to keep the same staffing in place. That is not how any business in Northern Ireland or, indeed, the Republic of Ireland would do business. If they were doing less, they would have fewer staff. It is absolutely sensible, prudent and right for myself and Brendan Howlin to look at what the right quantum of staff is to do the job that we require them to do — not a person more than that should be in place.

Whilst I have doubts over the merits of many parts of our North/South apparatus, one thing that it absolutely is not — everybody in the House should agree — is a job creation agency. It is there to do a particular job, and, if it does not require the staff who are there to do that job, they should be reduced. That is the plain and simple way in which business should be done.

Private Members' Business

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Business Committee has agreed to allow up to one hour and 30 minutes for the debate. The proposer of the motion will have 10 minutes to propose and 10 minutes in which to make a winding-up speech. One amendment has been selected and is published on the Marshalled List. The proposer will have 10 minutes to propose the amendment and five minutes in which to make a winding-up speech. All other Members who wish to speak will have five minutes.

Tom Elliott (UUP, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

I beg to move

That this Assembly notes, in the absence of a formal agreement on a new way forward for contested parades and associated protests, that it is essential that everyone involved, whether participants, spectators or protestors, demonstrates respect, restraint and tolerance for those of differing opinions.

Thank you very much, Principal Deputy Speaker. I trust that, given the current circumstances here in Northern Ireland, the motion will be debated in a calm and respectful manner and that comments will be helpful to the situation as opposed to being unhelpful. It is unfortunate that, during the multi-party talks, we could not find agreement on the issue of parades and related protests. We came reasonably close to getting an overarching agreement. However, even if we had reached that agreement, it would not have dealt with a number of the contentious parades. That is a major difficulty that we will have, even if we find the resolution that we are looking for.

While we accept that the vast majority of people are content to have respect and tolerance for a culture or event that they do not have any affinity with, do not agree with or do not support, it is clear that there is a section of people who will not tolerate an opposing culture or opinion. That is not new: intolerance has been ongoing for decades and, indeed, centuries. Many citizens have been murdered by terrorists due to the intolerance of the terrorist community, who could not accept them for what they were, whether that was because of their religion, their basic principle of wanting to serve the community as a member of the security forces, their culture or because of some twisted or vindictive reason. Even in recent decades, it has been an ongoing problem. In the mid-1980s, republicans opposed parades in the Obins Street area of Portadown. An agreement was eventually reached that the Orange Order would not use that route; instead, it would use the Garvaghy Road route. However, of course, as we are aware, just 10 years later, republicans opposed that route, and they have stopped the parade for many years.

Around the same time, we had similar problems in places such as the Ormeau Road in Belfast, Bellaghy, Pomeroy and Newtownbutler to name but a few. We have seen another upsurge in more recent times, particularly in parts of Belfast. Ardoyne and Twaddell is an example of how republicans have increased tensions in the area and put a wedge between communities and community relations in general. Of course, that is a means to an end for republicans. Anything they can do to create problems for the unionist and British culture, they will do.

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

Will the Member give way?

Tom Elliott (UUP, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

I am happy to give way.

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

I am conscious that the Member has quite a time to go. I do not dispute the rightful condemnation of violence, but is the Member going to address any offences committed by people participating in parades that have contributed to community tension?

Tom Elliott (UUP, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

Of course. The point that I was going to make, had the Member waited, was that, sometimes, those on parade and those supporting parades have questions to answer. Not every action that they carry out is appropriate or acceptable. However, small numbers on both sides of the argument are determined.

I may not support, appreciate or accept every part of society here; I may not like some events or the organisations that participate in them. I highlight one example, as I quite often do: the GAA. I do not have an affinity with GAA culture or sport at all. Some people from that organisation have given me personal abuse in the past. However, I do not link the organisation to that; I have respect and tolerance for that organisation, what it does and how it plays its games. I do not point out that a small number of people in that organisation do not give me respect. I do not lump them all in as one, just as I ask others not to lump in all those in the parading organisations who do not behave in the way that most would expect them to behave. I hope, in fairness to Mr Lyttle, that that goes some way to addressing his query.

The point about republicans is that nothing will ever be enough. If they do not get what they want, they will increase tensions and, what is more worrying, increase violence. That is what happened in recent years in the Ardoyne/Twaddell area. I have here a number of police reports going back to 2009. If you analyse them, you will establish that a small amount of the violence and tensions came from the loyal orders and the Protestant/unionist community, whereas the vast majority of the trouble, tensions and violence came from the republican/nationalist sections. I believe that that is what prompted the Parades Commission to make its decisions in recent times. Why else, if it had read those reports, would it have banned last year's return parade past Ardoyne and through Twaddell? In my opinion, it was for no other reason than the fact that the threat of violence from the nationalist/republican community was greater. In recent weeks, the same attitude has been adopted by the Parades Commission. It gives in to the greatest opportunity for violence.

I will refer to my more localised situation in Newtownbutler. For many years, parades in Newtownbutler were banned or restricted. Indeed, they are still restricted. If you ever want to watch an inoffensive parade, go to Newtownbutler in County Fermanagh, where you will see one small band leading a group of loyal orders, whether Orangemen or Royal Black Preceptory members, up the street. One of the most disgraceful decisions that the Parades Commission made was when it stopped the Orange Order parade at the bottom of the lane that goes on to the main road and did not allow people to go back to their hall. What do you do when you stop a parade? Loyal orders normally play the national anthem. They were stopped right outside a home that people would term nationalist. Out of respect, the Orange Order members moved away from that home so that they would not be playing the national anthem outside it. If they had have been allowed to go back to their hall, they would have gone inside to play the national anthem, away from any prospective trouble that it might have brought about. That was a Parades Commission nonsense, and we still witness that to this day.

Where will we develop the respect and tolerance that I referred to? Over recent years, even Members of the Assembly have inhibited the Police Service in its role. I hope that people take cognisance of this debate, but, most importantly, I hope that the Parades Commission takes cognisance of it. At this stage, I warn that nothing will ever be enough. The Parades Commission has insisted in recent years that dialogue take place. We have read many of its determinations that dialogue must take place. I can tell you that, for the last 10 months, and others will be able to relate this much better than I can, dialogue has taken place with all sections of the community in the Ardoyne/Twaddell area. At least, I understand from the community that I represent that dialogue has taken place. Some from the nationalist/republican community may be sore that they have not been involved in that dialogue, but that is not the fault of the loyal orders; that is for others to answer.

The talks have taken place. We have heard that, for the last number of years, talks were offered by the Orange Order in Portadown but rejected by the nationalist/republican community. The loyal orders have done what they can.

Sydney Anderson (DUP, Upper Bann)

Will the Member give way?

Tom Elliott (UUP, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

My time is nearly up, I am sorry.

They keep moving forward, they want to progress and they want tolerance and respect, but that is not being reciprocated.

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

I beg to move the following amendment:

At end insert:

"; and calls on all organisations and parties involved, particularly elected representatives, to demonstrate unambiguous adherence to the rule of law.".

I rise to support the motion and to propose the amendment. I welcome the opportunity to speak on the issue. I welcome the motion and agree that, in the absence of new arrangements to adjudicate on parades and protests, principles such as respect, restraint and tolerance should govern our approach to parades and protests in Northern Ireland. However, the Alliance Party believes that the motion could be strengthened by an explicit reference to the need for the principle of an unambiguous adherence to the rule of law as well. We have put that forward, and we hope that the motion as amended will receive the united support of the House today.

I do, however, hope that these words will be followed by positive actions. On a number of occasions, we have seen statements put forward by the Executive and the Assembly but the actions following that have not met the high standards of the statement. We have seen members of the proposing party, the Ulster Unionist Party, frankly, whip up tension by telling international mediators to go home when their party leader was in negotiation with that international mediator around these difficult issues.

We have seen people paint the Alliance Party as anti-British in relation to some of these issues, which is a disgrace and is false, not least considering the members of our party who have given service to Britain and British values in most important ways. Those people have talked cultural war and community tension into existence, the consequence of which is sustained dereliction and deprivation in areas that need redevelopment the most, relocation of business and reduced foreign direct investment. It is putting our Police Service in the position of being a shock absorber for failed political leadership. Although I do not agree with every PSNI approach, I would like to put on record my thanks to every PSNI officer who has served our community by upholding the law in some of the most difficult circumstances imaginable. I encourage them to maintain their restraint and professionalism in those situations that they find themselves in.

I hope that the motion that has been put forward today is a departure from some of that difficult behaviour that we have seen in recent times, and I hope that we will see more leadership. I hope that we will see more reference to the positive aspects of cultural expression in Northern Ireland. Queen's University research has shown that the number of parades in Northern Ireland has doubled since 2005. We now have around 4,600 parades, the vast majority of which pass without restriction in a peaceful, enjoyable manner for those involved. Indeed, our marching bands are at an all-time high. Some would say that loyalist culture has never been better represented.

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

Will the Member give way?

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

I am happy to give way.

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

The Member alluded to the Queen's University research. Does he agree with me that a considerable amount of the increase can be vouched for by applications that are put in by people who have their legitimate parades thwarted and who go through the motions of reapplying on hundreds of occasions to try to get the one parade, which, if it had been granted, would have meant that that increase would be nothing like what it has been perceived by the research, and also that many of the parades that he has alluded to are not loyal order parades but are ordinary annual band parades that occur on a regular basis?

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

There is obviously a mixture of parades. I do not think that anybody should object to following the proper procedure in order to have a peaceful, democratic right to exercise their parade. I will also reference the positive work that goes on in community development with many of the people involved in that cultural expression and, indeed, the fact that, in any democratic society, parading, festivals and those types of organisations should be regarded as positive and as making a positive contribution to society.

It is remiss, however, in an unfortunately still deeply divided society like Northern Ireland not to realise that there are real issues and that it will require fine human rights balances at times. We must ensure that all cultural expression is done within the rule of law and in an inclusive manner. Indeed, the OFMDFM community relations strategy, Together: Building a United Community, clearly suggests that all public space is shared space. It is not an aspiration, but a principle that is set out in the strategy. It is not, as I have heard many people falsely say, neutral or anaemic space, but is about the behaviour that takes place while you are in that space. It should be based on dignity and respect and should not be about triumphalism or intimidation.

From the point of view of the Alliance Party, the approach to parades and protests must be based on human rights, take account of responsibilities and be about improving relationships. There are, of course, rights to assemble and rights to a private life, key principles in the Good Friday Agreement about freedom from sectarian harassment and, indeed, the aspiration of our Executive to see all public space as shared space. As MLAs, we should make it absolutely clear that violence never pays. It has always been counterproductive and self-destructive and it has always divided rather that united this community.

William Humphrey (DUP, Belfast North)

Will the Member give way?

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

Who to? I will take here and then here. Go for it.

William Humphrey (DUP, Belfast North)

I thank the Member for giving way. Can you tell me, as someone who has spent his entire adult life working with young people in north Belfast, how I tell people, particularly young people, that violence does not pay, when the Parades Commission rewarded the violence of republicans in 2012 and when the House, only a few weeks ago, refused to sanction a Member who willfully broke the law? How do I tell people — how do you tell people — that violence and lawbreaking does not pay?

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

I want to make it very clear that I supported the sanction. I think that it was a missed opportunity for the Assembly to make clear what type of behaviour is unacceptable. Unfortunately, we missed those opportunities on other occasions with MLAs from other parties.

I say that violence does not pay. You tell me the state of community relations in the area where you are having to work extremely hard to repair them? Violence and the threat of violence is not productive, and because other people behave in a violent manner should not lead you to encourage anyone else to meet that violence with violent behaviour.

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

Yes.

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

The Member rightly says that violence should not pay. However, how can anyone analyse the Parades Commission's decisions on the Ardoyne and not conclude that violence most certainly has paid for those who have used and threatened it. It has shaped the determinations of the Parades Commission, which simply bowed to the biggest stick. Is that not the story of Ardoyne?

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

I am sure that the Parades Commission would robustly disagree with that analysis. I do not think it is helpful. The Parades Commission has to consider a number of things, and once a determination is made it is incumbent on all elected representatives to uphold that lawful determination.

Frankly, words are not enough. There have been opportunities. We had the shared future strategy in 2005, a draft cohesion, sharing and integration strategy in 2010, Together: Building a United Community in 2013, the Haass process and now another opportunity with party talks. Elected leaders need to get their heads out of the sand, and we need to deal with these issues. If people want an alternative way to deal with parades and protests they should show leadership and create it, but, in the absence of any new arrangements, as the motion suggests, Parades Commission rulings must be respected and adhered to as the rule of law.

There can be no equivocation or cherry-picking of what the rule of law is. That equivocation and cherry-picking is heard by people across our community, who take their lead from elected representatives, and it is wholly unacceptable.

A statement was released by the leaders of the DUP, UUP, Sinn Féin, SDLP and Alliance last year. In it, they said:

"violence is not acceptable in a democratic society, nor is it inevitable".

They also called for:

"the law to be respected and upheld at all times."

They continued:

"Whatever any of the parties may believe about the wisdom of any Parades Commission determinations, it is the lawful authority dealing with these matters and its decisions must be observed."

I appeal to all elected representatives to make their actions in the coming season match those words that were set out last year.

All violence is wrong and should be condemned from whatever quarter it comes. The former Parades Commission, however, clearly rewarded violence, and it rewarded wrongdoing. It is important to remember that it also rewarded the threat of potential violence.

For republicans at Ardoyne, there is no shared space and there is no shared future. The current Parades Commission, of course, has followed sadly along those same lines of continuing to reward the threat of violence and enshrine a nationalist veto. Rewarding violence, evil and wrongdoing is wrong. It undermines democracy, and it undermines the rule of law. For some 125 years, lodges from Ligoniel have processed down the Crumlin Road. I have to say to nationalists, if they do not come down the Crumlin Road — and nationalists are happy for them to come down the Crumlin Road; they are just not happy for them to return along the Crumlin Road, even at 8.00 am or 9.00 am. Where do they process, then, for their human rights and civil rights to be recognised? Do they go down the Oldpark Road or the Cavehill Road, or do they go down the Cliftonville Road? It is strange that nationalists are prepared to tolerate morning parades but that they absolutely reject an evening parade on 12 July. Six minutes of intolerance.

I believe in civil and religious liberty. I am a proud unionist, and I am confident of my history, tradition, culture, heritage and politics. I am confident, and I accept others' traditions and their right to celebrate their culture, and I respect their right to do so. "Tolerance", "respect", "accommodation" and "dialogue" are words that we have heard much of from nationalists, and I hear constantly from nationalist and republican politicians about dialogue and the need for dialogue to resolve issues.

Around the issue of Ligoniel lodges, there has been dialogue now for over 10 years. The current process started before Christmas, when nationalists failed to turn up. There were intensive talks in March and April, and, unfortunately, they led to no resolution. I have to say that when nationalists talk about dialogue, they are being completely disingenuous. Sinn Féin, the SDLP, CARA and GARC have opposed an evening parade. Their starting point is no evening parade, and that veto is continuing to be protected.

The opposition to a traditional Orange parade was not simply a policy that was thought of on the hoof. It was hatched by Sinn Féin and the IRA, going back to a speech when Gerry Adams revealed it all in Athboy, when his mask slipped. People like Mac Cionnaith, Nelis and Rice were deliberately put in place.

How can unionism and loyalism reach accommodation with those who talk of dialogue and want local solutions when these parties campaign against parades, lobby the police against parades, lobby the Parades Commission against parades and, in the case of the SDLP and Sinn Féin, protest at those same parades, including church parades? Gerry Kelly said last year in relation to the Orange brethren at Twaddell and the Crumlin Road:

"They can stand there all they like. They won't be getting up."

Paul Carson recently said on 'Spotlight':

"We will mobilise thousands to come to Ardoyne if a parade is allowed up."

His words were echoed by Dee Fennell, another dissident spokesperson from Ardoyne in the 'Belfast Telegraph' last week. I was recently part of a joint delegation to the Parades Commission, when the chair of the commission said in relation to Ardoyne:

"There is absolute rejection from what we have heard from all nationalist parties to an evening parade."

So, accommodation, shared space, shared future, dialogue, tolerance, respect — there is not any. There is absolute rejection from all sides.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Will the Member bring his remarks to a close?

William Humphrey (DUP, Belfast North)

Last week, Gemma McKenna of Sinn Féin said:

"We maintain the view that there is no rationale for any loyal order parade in this area".

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member's time is up. I call Daithí McKay.

William Humphrey (DUP, Belfast North)

There is no tolerance for the Orange tradition in this place.

Daithí McKay (Sinn Féin, North Antrim)

Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle. We will be supporting the motion and the amendment. It is important that the motion highlights the absence of agreement, because that is the real issue here — the absence of agreement on parades, flags and the past. When I looked at the research paper and at the speech that I made the last time that we discussed parades, it seemed like Groundhog Day; we are going over the same issues again and again. The only way that we are going to resolve that is by engaging with the talks process that is being put in place, following on from the developments of the Haass proposals, engaging positively, and not having an eye on the next election down the road but thinking about how this will secure better outcomes for the future of all society.

Indeed, I wish the new Chief Constable well in his role over the summer period. The proposer of the amendment was right to say that the police, in recent years, have become the shock absorbers because there has been an absence of agreement around all these issues.

Many parades take place that are respectful and where participants do not wish to cause offence. They are dignified and pass off peacefully. There are good examples, and we look to Crumlin and Derry, where accommodation and agreements can be made if there is a willingness on all sides.

But this is not an issue that cropped up only in the past number of years; it is not something that was conjured up by Gerry Adams, Gerry Kelly or anybody else. This has been going on for hundreds of years. This is part of our history. If you go back to the 1800s or back to the early 20th century, you will see that there were always issues around parades, and they have never been resolved. This is an opportunity to resolve these issues once and for all.

We need to learn from last year's mistakes. We cannot afford to see a repeat of any Grand Old Duke of York act up to Ardoyne, whether that is at the behest of the Orange Order leadership or elsewhere, because that is not good for police officers and their safety, it is not good for business or the image of Belfast, and it is not good for young unionists who get involved at the interface and end up having to go into the criminal justice system, the process and the slippery slope that leads to unfortunate social outcomes. Those are the consequences of a lack of leadership on parades in Belfast and elsewhere.

The Parades Commission should be allowed to get on with its job without being threatened by the DUP, the Orange Order and others, and without pressure being exerted by the NIO and other parties. We need to ensure that the role of the Parades Commission is respected, because we have not come to an agreement on the way forward on parades, flags and the past. Until we reach that agreement, I cannot see how anybody can complain about the Parades Commission, given that they did not follow through on previous negotiations.

The public want these issues dealt with. I spoke to a taxi driver in Belfast the other day, and he was fearful because of some of the rumours that he had heard about what might happen over the coming days and weeks. That will obviously permeate throughout the city and the business community, and it will affect tourists as well. The economic and social consequences of this are not a price that I feel is worth paying.

We need to move this issue forward. People do not want to see the policing budget spent on camps and parades and being taken away from community policing in rural and urban communities. They want to see that money put on the front line where it belongs.

Caitriona Ruane (Sinn Féin, South Down)

Will the Member take an intervention?

Daithí McKay (Sinn Féin, North Antrim)

Yes.

Caitriona Ruane (Sinn Féin, South Down)

Does the Member agree with me that the money spent currently on Twaddell Avenue would be far better spent on welfare and protecting the most vulnerable?

Daithí McKay (Sinn Féin, North Antrim)

I absolutely agree.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member has an extra minute.

Daithí McKay (Sinn Féin, North Antrim)

Some of the areas and interfaces that are affected as a result of parades are some of our most deprived societies. The proposer of the amendment —

Nelson McCausland (DUP, Belfast North)

Will the Member give way?

Daithí McKay (Sinn Féin, North Antrim)

I will not take another intervention, sorry.

The proposer of the amendment referred to that as well. So, those who end up being involved at the behest of some politicians' words end up entering the criminal justice system and a vicious cycle of deprivation. We need to break that cycle. We need to ensure that there is agreement on parades, flags and the past — issues that dog our society every summer. People are sick and tired of it; the police are sick and tired of it; we are sick and tired of it. It is about time that unionist parties in the House showed some leadership, first and foremost for the benefit of their community.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Before I call the next Member to speak, I remind Members of two things: first, the actual language and text of the motion; and, secondly, to be mindful that words spoken here resonate in our community. The mover of the motion was wise enough to remind us of that.

Alex Attwood (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Belfast West)

The SDLP will support the amendment and the motion. However, when you cut through all of this, Mr Principal Deputy Speaker — this may touch on the point that you have just made — in the times and weeks in which we are living and in the debate that we are having, does it not come down to whether people in every party are prepared to say today that, whatever may happen over the next two weeks, their parties will advise people, wherever they may be in Northern Ireland, to accept the decision of the Parades Commission?

I make that point for a number of reasons. First, more than any other party, last autumn the SDLP was publicly and privately profoundly critical of the Secretary of State's decision to stand down the previous Parades Commission, to reduce the membership of the current commission to five, to reduce the number of days that it works and so on and so forth. That was because we saw, in doing that, the potential for bad outcomes. Despite our concerns about how the British Government, and the Secretary of State in particular, conducted themselves at that time, and whatever about the democratic right to peaceful protest, we are telling people, unambiguously, to accept the decisions of the Parades Commission. Save for the Alliance Party, we can say that with more integrity and authority than any other party in the Chamber.

Not very long ago, the party on the Benches to my right referred to the Parades Commission as "cheerleaders for sectarianism" and "obsolete". Those words have been echoed by other parties in the Chamber too often and in too many disputes over too many years. In doing so, they undermined the rule of law. Whether you like it or love it, the Parades Commission, as an institution over all these years, is the expression of the rule of law in our society. So the question is this: is every party prepared to say, during and at the end of this debate that — whatever transpires over the next days; whatever our misgivings about the Secretary of State and her conduct; whatever our views might be about the Parades Commission and the democratic right to peaceful protest — we accept the determinations?

Tom Elliott (UUP, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

Will the Member give way?

Alex Attwood (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Belfast West)

I will. We in the SDLP have found certain Parades Commission determinations over the years difficult, but we told people to accept them. That is the standard of this debate; that is the standard of these days; that is the standard that we have to live up to on 12 July.

Tom Elliott (UUP, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

I thank the Member for giving way. Will he reflect back to — I need to check the date, but I think that it was1998 — when their elected representatives in Portadown strongly opposed the decision to allow a parade down Garvaghy Road and, as far as I recall, protested very strongly, [Interruption.] maybe legally.

Secondly, will he reflect on supporting the petition of concern that stopped the Assembly bringing sanctions against Mr Gerry Kelly, who broke the law in north Belfast recently?

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member has an extra minute.

Alex Attwood (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Belfast West)

Thank you, Mr Principal Deputy Speaker. On the first point, I was with Bríd Rodgers on the Garvaghy Road when the decision was made at a political and policing level to send a parade down it. It was the first Parades Commission that then laid down the principles at the heart of disputes in this society. In the year that it was established, and in making the first decision about the Garvaghy Road, it said that, at the heart of disputes about parades, were relationships and that relationships needed to be resolved in order to resolve parading disputes. It said that to resolve relationship disputes, you needed sustained, direct and meaningful dialogue.

Sydney Anderson (DUP, Upper Bann)

Will the Member give way?

Alex Attwood (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Belfast West)

I will in a second.

That is what the Parades Commission said. So, yes, there were times when even I was on the Garvaghy Road, objecting to what the police and the political authorities had decided, but the Parades Commission then laid down principles. If our society, our communities, our protesters and our Orange lodges had lived up to the standards of sustained, direct and meaningful dialogue in every year since, we would be in a better place.

In the next number of days, the political parties will have to challenge themselves again to engage in direct, sustained and meaningful dialogue. We do not need the appearance of talks, which is what we have; we need direct, sustained and meaningful dialogue. In that space, we can create the paradigm shift that we need to resolve the multiple expressions of conflict and division that are all around us in the Chamber and in our society.

Nelson McCausland (DUP, Belfast North)

The motion refers to the need for "respect, restraint and tolerance". Is it too much to ask, then, that nationalists and republicans show sufficient respect, restraint and tolerance to enable them to get to the point at which they do not oppose and object to three small lodges and one band returning home on the Twelfth night along the main Crumlin Road to their starting point at Ligoniel? Is it too much to ask? Is there sufficient respect, restraint and tolerance on that side of the Chamber to allow them to do that?

They may vote for a motion that speaks about those things, but the reality is that there is no respect or tolerance. Five minutes — 10 minutes at the most — is all that it would take for the brethren and the band to return home. However, 10 minutes of tolerance is too much for the SDLP and too much for Sinn Féin. They could not even find it in their hearts to show 10 minutes of tolerance.

My colleague William Humphrey referred to the speech by Gerry Adams in 1995, in which he pointed back to 1992 and said:

"Three years of work went into creating that situation and fair play to those people who put the work in."

On the Ormeau Road and in Portadown, Fermanagh, Newry, Armagh, Bellaghy and Londonderry, the work was put in by Sinn Féin to create that situation. Daithí McKay took us on a journey back through the centuries. However, in the years since 1992, when the Sinn Féin machine went into operation on this, there has been a sustained attack by republicans on Orange culture and tradition, and not just on parades. Alongside and linked in some way to it, as pointed out earlier this year by the Grand Secretary of the Grand Orange Lodge, has been the burning down of Orange halls. In the 25 years before the Sinn Féin campaign, 39 Orange halls were burned down; in the 10 years after it began, 192 were burned down. Between 2010 and 2012, some 114 attacks on Orange halls were reported to the police. If burning down that number of Orange halls is not a cultural war — and I noted that Mr Lyttle said that he does not like the term "cultural war" — I do not know what it is.

As regards the parade at Ligoniel up the Crumlin Road, the first Orange lodge was formed there in 1865. They have been parading there for 150 years. That road is generally seen as a shared road. It has on it a car wash, a public library, an ambulance station, a health centre and shops. Those are, or should be, used by people from both traditions. Is it too much to ask that Orange brethren are allowed to return along that road?

What republicans want to do is sectarianise the road. They want to claim control of it. The reality, in the case of Ardoyne, is that it is people who are not in the Chamber, the dissident republicans and GARC, who are the tail wagging the nationalist and republican dog. They are scared to face them down. Two years ago, GARC brought 1,000, 2,000 or whatever number of people — a howling mob — out onto the front of the Crumlin Road. That was a shambles that was authorised and approved by the Parades Commission. At the very point where Orange brethren should have been having a peaceful, dignified parade up the road, the road was occupied by a howling mob of people going down, throwing missiles and howling abuse. Is that the sort of society that we want?

I noted that Alex Atwood spoke about the principles of the Parades Commission. The principle of the Parades Commission is to reward violence. Dee Fennell said in the 'Belfast Telegraph' the other day:

"We told the Parades Commission that in the past we have shown our willingness and ability to use radical means to stop parades taking place. We said we would do so again ... We would have mobilised people and we would have blocked the road".

We have seen what "radical means" actually means on the streets of north Belfast. Talk about dialogue. There have been 10 years of dialogue.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member's time is almost up.

Nelson McCausland (DUP, Belfast North)

What is there left for brethren there to talk about with republicans and nationalists? Are we down to discussing the colour of the laces on their shoes? That must be about the only thing that has not been talked about after 10 years of dialogue, and still there is no tolerance.

Maeve McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle. I support the motion and the amendment. The motion rightly calls for the principles of respect, restraint and tolerance to be upheld. The motion and the amendment highlight the responsibility that is placed on elected representatives. The Assembly should, and must, endorse these principles. Equality should not be simply a buzzword; it must be actioned.

My constituency in Derry has done that. Derry has very clearly sent out the message that we can negotiate, take risks and accommodate. Increasingly, in Belfast, the lack of engagement with residents' groups, the illegal protests, the cost of policing these protests set alongside —

Nelson McCausland (DUP, Belfast North)

Will the Member give way?

Maeve McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

No, I will not.

All that, set alongside the continuing work in Derry, means, as the deputy First Minister said recently, that it has become a tale of two cities.

If we are genuinely serious about inward investment, tourism, job creation and the ensuing economic growth, we also need to be serious about resolving the parades issue. We, in the House, must all ask ourselves this question: why is there not dialogue or negotiation with a view to finding agreement? Negotiation should not take away from anyone's culture. We can work collectively towards marches that are not contentious. Equally, residents who have problems or issues should be listened to.

We should effectively take on what are our responsibilities. After all, we are the elected representatives. We are the people who are supposed to give leadership, come up with the initiatives, programmes or projects, and sit down in a calm, rational and mature way. We do not have to do it in this Chamber. We were able to do it in the city of Derry, in a process very much accommodated by the DUP's own Willie Hay.

William Humphrey (DUP, Belfast North)

Will the Member give way?

Maeve McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

No, I will not.

It was a process very much facilitated through the Speaker of the House. It was greatly encouraged by, and did indeed greatly encourage, the process of negotiation and accommodation. It was a process that involved dialogue and risks, but it also involved accommodation based on the principles of respect and equality. The question before us is this: if that process can work in Derry, why can it not work in Belfast?

Sydney Anderson (DUP, Upper Bann)

I must declare an interest: I am proud to say that I am a member of the Orange Institution, the Royal Black Institution and the Apprentice Boys. As a representative of Upper Bann, I come from a constituency that has experienced more than its fair share of difficulties over parades. Despite what some would have us believe, the parading issue in Portadown has not been resolved; far from it. We have just had another example of it in the last few days, and I will return to that in a few minutes.

The motion speaks of "respect, restraint and tolerance". I agree that those things would go a long way towards resolving the problems surrounding parades. For many decades, there was little or no difficulty over parades simply because there was that mutual respect, restraint and tolerance. For many years, traditional loyal order parades passed off in a peaceful manner, and I believe that the vast majority of the nationalist community is still quite prepared to let the Orangemen have their day.

The parading issue has been hijacked by republicans determined to create a range of contentious parades, conveniently selected to cause maximum tension and disruption. Sinn Féin and the SDLP lecture us about civil rights, equality and parity of esteem, but this is nothing but hypocrisy, for it is quite clear that those parties are determined to do all in their power to deny the Protestant/unionist community its civil and religious liberties. I go further: to me, Sinn Féin and the SDLP are guilty of bigotry and sectarianism. Loyal order parades are Protestant parades. Nationalists demand the rerouting of sectarian marches, but this really means Protestant parades and often Protestant Church parades. The real sectarianism is to be found among those who oppose these loyal order parades.

All that is well illustrated by the parade planned for last Saturday in Portadown. That one-off parade and service was simply to rededicate an arch in memory of a member of the Parkmount arch committee who sadly passed away a few months ago. It was along a short stretch of road known locally as Victoria Terrace, which is not part of the Garvaghy Road; neither is it part of the impasse over the Church parade returning from Drumcree Parish Church along Garvaghy Road. False assertions about the whole issue are part of the propaganda and war waged by Breandán Mac Cionnaith, who was once trained by Sinn Féin, and today is still supported by Dolores Kelly, who is not in the Chamber, and John O'Dowd, who is in the Chamber.

Victoria Terrace contains 22 houses occupied by ethnic minorities, Protestants and those of mixed religion. I surveyed most of those homes last week and not one of the residents had any objection to the parade. In fact, they saw it as part of our culture and they said that they had enjoyed the recent junior Orange parade at the end of May. Some residents felt that they were being used by those opposed to the parade and no one had sought their views. Residents also felt that they were being placed in danger because of this particular campaign.

What we are now witnessing in Portadown is another illustration of republicans and nationalists seeking to further exclude and alienate Protestants and to take control of another area, which is adjacent to and within yards of a public park, which is undergoing a shared space programme to the tune of over £5 million of EU funding. That park has been a no-go area to the Protestant/unionist people for over 40 years, and now we have these same people trying to further extend the alienation of the Protestant/unionist people by denying them their right to walk along Victoria Terrace.

The hard-line attitude being taken by Mrs Kelly and Mr O'Dowd in supporting Breandán Mac Cionnaith sends out a very alarming signal to the Protestant/unionist people of Portadown and beyond. It is a case of "not a Protestant about the place" and marking out more territory.

I was part of a delegation led by David Simpson MP that recently met the Parades Commission about last week's parade. We presented new evidence and were left with a clear impression that it would consider the issue again. Of course, that was a forlorn hope.

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Will the Member give way?

Sydney Anderson (DUP, Upper Bann)

OK.

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Having met the Parades Commission, does the Member agree that, given the way it handled that decision by doing that U-turn, it has, some would say, lost any credibility that it ever had, if it had credibility in the first place to lose?

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member has an extra minute.

Sydney Anderson (DUP, Upper Bann)

I certainly agree with my colleague. We put forward an argument on that occasion and thought that the issues were being addressed. We thought that we had put forward a very robust argument as to why this should be overturned, but the decision that was originally taken and then overturned shows that the Parades Commission was prepared to listen to untruths, because that is what they were. As I have already said, the Parades Commission was told untruths about the people along Victoria Terrace.

There are those on Garvaghy Road who state that the parading issue in Portadown is a dead duck. Let me assure those people that it is still very much a live issue and will continue to be so until nationalists and republicans display respect, restraint and tolerance towards their Protestant and unionist fellow citizens. That way, Portadown and other areas can move forward with genuine hope.

Alex Maskey (Sinn Féin, Belfast South)

Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle. It is very regrettable that we are even here in the Chamber this afternoon discussing this matter. As both my colleagues have said, our party will support the motion and the amendment, and why would we not? When you consider what the motion suggests and says and what the amendment calls on all of us to do, why would we not subscribe to all of that? Quite clearly, we are more than happy to support the motion and the amendment.

The remarks from Tom Elliott, who proposed and spoke to the motion, really added nothing to the discussion. With all due respect to Tom, it added nothing to the debate. It gave us no new information and nothing additional to consider; it merely rehearsed a number of the arguments that we hear frequently. I do not believe that the vast majority of the public out there, if they tune into this debate this afternoon, would, first of all, be at all surprised. I think that they are likely to be disappointed and more likely to be bemused that we are having this discussion in the Chamber today despite the fact that talks are starting tomorrow. So, within 24 hours, all the parties at senior levels will have dedicated discussions/negotiations around this and other very important matters that are left over from the Haass discussions. I think that most people will be scratching their heads and wondering, since we are going into negotiations, why we are having this debate in the Chamber today at all . I would have liked Members either not to have moved the debate this afternoon at all, which I think would have been the sensible thing to do, or, in the absence of that, if we are to have a discussion, I would have liked us at least to address how we might conduct ourselves in the negotiations that are starting tomorrow.

It is very late in the day. This is already 1 July, and the Haass talks ended six months ago. Notwithstanding that, they recommence tomorrow, and we have had a period of party leaders' discussions on and off for the past couple of months. Tomorrow commences a set of negotiations, and none of us knows where they will go. Our party is very committed to making sure that they are successful and that we conclude the business laid out by the Richard Haass and Meghan O'Sullivan final paper because, quite clearly, the way to resolve these issues is through dialogue, respect and, unfortunately, regulation and enforcement, if that has to be the end result. We have many examples — Members have addressed this already in the debate — of where parades have been more successfully conducted because there has been some local dialogue. We have heard how the situation in Derry was addressed. We have heard what happened in Crumlin and other places. Even in my city, Belfast, there have been some examples of, where there have been discussions, some understanding being reached locally to minimise a lot of the problems. However, we still have a small number —

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

Will the Member give way?

Alex Maskey (Sinn Féin, Belfast South)

Yes.

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

The Member referred to a number of locations where dialogue has occurred but he did not mention Portadown. Portadown Members are here on all sides, but my understanding is that repeated attempts have been made to get dialogue in Portadown, but that those who say they represent people on the Garvaghy Road will not have that dialogue.

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

The Member has an extra minute.

Alex Maskey (Sinn Féin, Belfast South)

Thank you, a Cheann Comhairle. The fact is that, when people want dialogue, it is like everything else: if people are invited in to dialogue, they have to have an understanding that it will be meaningful and respectful. It is up to people to decide — [Interruption.]

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

Order. Allow the Member to continue. The Member has the Floor.

Alex Maskey (Sinn Féin, Belfast South)

I am doing my level best to be very patient and generous. [Interruption.]

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

Order.

Alex Maskey (Sinn Féin, Belfast South)

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I am trying not to rile up Members opposite because I know that, getting into this period of the year, it is quite difficult for them to keep settled. [Interruption.]

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

Order. The Member has the Floor.

Alex Maskey (Sinn Féin, Belfast South)

That is my direct personal experience of growing up in the city of Belfast, which I will never leave, by the way, because I love my city. I do not like aspects of it, but that is par for the course.

I am determined to send the message that, tomorrow, an opportunity will commence for all parties to enter negotiations with an absolute commitment to resolve the problems. That is what we need to do. That is what people out there want to hear. They do not want to hear a meaningless debate in the Chamber that only facilitates some people rehearsing the arguments.

Daithí McKay and other Members referred to other situations. Ardoyne is not just a current problem. Many would cite Ardoyne, 1969, as a milestone in this phase of the conflict. But Portadown, 150 years ago, was a problem. I am not even going to say where the problem emanated from, but the problem was there. Parades in that part of the world were universally banned for quite some time because of difficulties. For me, the legacy of what we have learned over the years has to be that, where people are committed to respectful dialogue and serious engagement, we can get a positive outcome for those who want to parade or those who feel offended by certain aspects of some parades. Where we have tolerance, respect and a dignified celebration of our culture, rather than people going to the toilet outside chapel gates —

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

Will the Member bring his remarks to a close?

Alex Maskey (Sinn Féin, Belfast South)

— we can get a resolution that meets everybody's needs in a respectful manner. Tomorrow, the clock starts ticking for all the parties to do that.

Colum Eastwood (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Foyle)

It is very difficult, as has already been said, to play any part in the debate and, at the same time, try to keep tensions reduced and things calm. Everybody has their own perspective on the issue. There is not just one issue but a number of issues, across the North. People have different feelings about all those issues and difficulties. I will do my best to try to heed Mr Elliott's advice. Whatever the content of his speech, his plea for calmness and tolerance is the right one.

We need to acknowledge, as the Principal Deputy Speaker said, that what happens in here is heard out there and that we are in a very difficult time. Every year, we come to this time of year, and, unfortunately, it is difficult. Whatever people say, a lot of the issues that have already been talked about have not just arrived in anybody's in tray; they have been there for a long time. Parading is a historic issue in Ireland and one that we have never really got to grips with. Luckily, parades can pass off peacefully in many areas, but there are many reasons why they do not in other areas and why people feel that parades should not go through particular areas. The bottom line in all this is that, whatever we come up with in these talks, we have a process for dealing with parades right now. I cannot honestly see a very different process coming out of any negotiation.

The process at the moment is that we have an independent commission that decides on controversial parades. That is as good as we are going to get. We go to negotiations, as we do in all negotiations, with a will to try to solve things, and I hope that everybody else does the same. However, we need some sort of independent arbiter to decide on these issues. If people cannot decide on them themselves through negotiation, respect and long, hard slog, somebody will have to make the call. Many times, I will not like the call and, many times, other people will not like it either, but we have to be prepared, as Mr Attwood said, to live with those decisions. It does not mean that we cannot protest them, but it means that we have to do so in a peaceful, dignified and respectful way. That goes for everybody, whatever the decision may be.

Members talked about the PSNI. Over the last 18 months to two years, we have put members of the PSNI in the firing line from people from different sections of our community, and that is not good enough. We have all, thankfully, signed up to the justice system, to policing and to the rule of law, and we need to do everything that we can to protect those PSNI officers whom we put in harm's way but also to protect the communities that have to suffer this, year in, year out.

Derry was mentioned. I am not going to stand here and lecture anybody, because Derry is not Ardoyne, Portadown or a whole lot of other places. However, the principle that underpins what has happened in Derry — you know it very well, Mr Speaker — is one of constant conversation, where people will get round the table when difficult issues are on the horizon and talk things through. That is not always easy; we do not always come to it

William Humphrey (DUP, Belfast North)

I am grateful to the Member for giving way. You are quite right; I do not know the situation in Londonderry but, clearly, both sides in Londonderry were willing to reach an accommodation and to show tolerance and respect. Given what other unionist representatives and I were faced with when we went to the Parades Commission, if you are confronted with a situation where it is said that there is absolute rejection of a parade from all nationalist parties — including yours — what exactly do people who want to parade do in that context?

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

The Member has an added minute.

Colum Eastwood (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Foyle)

Sometimes, we are all very good at talking about our rights, but with rights come responsibilities. Sometimes, you have to step back and say, "I do not want to exercise that right today", because you think that it will cause mayhem on the streets of Belfast, Portadown, Derry or somewhere else. We all have responsibilities to ensure that everything that we do is done in a respectful way and in a way that understands that we have to appreciate everybody else's opinion. I encourage everybody in north Belfast and Portadown to get round the table to try to resolve these issues. My party will not be found wanting when it comes to that; it never has been before.

Someone on the other side of the Chamber said that we were scared to face dissidents down. I can tell you that we are not afraid to face dissidents down; we face them down every day. I just hope that the same spirit of facing down the dissidents in our community and those who are determined to cause mayhem in the streets of Belfast or anywhere else is carried through by Members on the other side of the Chamber.

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

Parading is, above all, an expression of culture and, particularly in our historic situation, that is how it has evolved. Of course it is right that for centuries, perhaps, there have been instances of conflict in that regard. However, it is indisputably clear that, in recent times, there has been an accentuation of the difficulties over parades, not by accident but by design. That design has already been identified in this debate by the quoting of the remarks of Gerry Adams in the mid-90s, when he pointed out that what was now happening with parades, stopping and protesting about parades, was, indeed, no accident but was the design of Sinn Féin.

That is what we have seen ever since.

This year, the focus is, of course, on Ardoyne. That is because it epitomises much of the issue at the heart of this. If parading is an expression of culture, it comes down to a question of the capacity for toleration of others not of that culture to abide and permit the expression of pursuit of that culture. The very fact that Sinn Féin had a hand in orchestrating opposition to that indicates where it is coming from. That is why unionists, and I include myself, see all of that as part of that orchestrated cultural war in which Sinn Féin is engaged. You can reduce that to a number of quite compelling factors. One is that Sinn Féin is a party that demands shared government but is not prepared to share the public road. It has the audacity to say, "We demand, as of right, to share in government, but we will not tolerate, permit or allow the sharing of public space." That attitude persists. Maybe the lesson should be learned that it is a quid pro quo in some respects.

It was pointed out that what is asked for at Ardoyne is for public space to be processed for a few minutes. Those who say no demonstrate their deep belligerence and bigotry in so doing. Then, of course, they are helped on by the pernicious, perverse Parades Commission. I say "perverse" because — take the Ardoyne decision — it decides, quite rightly, that it is appropriate for the Orangemen to leave their hall, but, perversely, that they cannot return. Why is that being said by the residents of the area, who put themselves in the way of being annoyed by that parade? It is another way of their saying to the Orangemen that, "There is no home for you here. You are not coming home here. This is not your area. This is our exclusive, 'Ourselves Alone' area." That is why they argue that, "You can leave it in the morning, but you shall never return to it because it is not your home."

That is the message that Sinn Féin and the SDLP, by their belligerence, convey to those of the Protestant and unionist tradition about what should be that shared space up the Crumlin Road. We had some sanctimonious lectures from Mr Maskey about all of those things. They should look in the mirror and see why it is that they are so belligerent and bigoted in their inability to show the modicum of tolerance required for a resolution to the situation.

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

The Member must bring his remarks to a close.

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

They have been told, "No talk, no walk".

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

The Member's time is gone.

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

Maybe, if there is no walk, there should be no talk.

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

Some Members have questioned the purpose of the debate. I think that the opportunity to endorse the important principles of respect, restraint, tolerance and upholding the rule of law is an important one. I thank the Members who took that opportunity and responded in the spirit of the motion. I regret that some used the type of inflammatory language that does not help these extremely sensitive situations.

Tom Elliott rightly condemned extreme violent intolerance from some people who call themselves republicans, and I agree with that condemnation.

William Humphrey said that, for republicans in Ardoyne, there is no shared future. Whilst today's debate was about principles rather than individual areas or decisions, I regret that the challenge was not taken up by some of the Members and parties that it was aimed at to try to explain what their vision of a shared future actually is. I agree with Mr Humphrey about comments from Gerry Kelly like:

"They can stand there all they like."

That is some of the unhelpful, inflammatory language that I referred to earlier. To say that there is absolutely no rationale for loyal order parades in that area challenges some of the principles set out in Together: Building a United Community, including that all public space should be shared space. I think that there are challenges for all Members of the House to respond to some of those types of comments.

We have to get away from labelling areas as nationalist or unionist. That flies in the face of the OFMDFM Executive target of building one united community in this region, where all public space is shared space. I think that Members, especially those in the DUP and Sinn Féin, which hold the positions of First Minister and deputy First Minister, should respond to the contradiction that lies within that.

William Humphrey asked me what he should say to young people in his area about violence. I encourage him to tell them that violence has done absolutely nothing for this community, other than achieve criminal records, injury and loss, destroy community cohesion and prevent community development across our community. To engage in violence also does a great disservice to the many responsible people involved in the organisations that he said he represents and engages with. Peaceful, lawful and democratic action is key to responding to these issues, and I am willing to represent and meet anybody who has legitimate concerns within that context.

Alex Attwood rightly said that a core concept that must come out of today is that, regardless of disagreements, we must accept the determination of the Parades Commission as the rule of law. He also helpfully said that, whilst rights and responsibility are important, relationships are key, and I agree with that. If Mr Attwood were in the Chamber, I would ask him — I am sure that he can respond to this on another occasion — whether he therefore agrees that to deal with parades in isolation will not get the job done and that, although we can change the architecture for parading, we must have robust good relations strategies in place that encourage equality, good relations and mutual respect across our community.

Nelson McCausland —

Alban Maginness (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Belfast North)

Will the Member give way?

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

Yes, briefly.

Alban Maginness (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Belfast North)

On the contentious parade in Ardoyne, does the Member agree that it is vital that local resolution not only be tried but be successful to resolve that continuing situation?

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

The Member has an added minute.

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

I wholeheartedly agree. Strong leadership from the Assembly and from elected representatives is obviously key, but, ultimately, local dialogue has to take place to reach a resolution to what is now an extremely entrenched issue, unfortunately.

We again had accusations of a "cultural war", which I regard as an astoundingly dangerous and unhelpful phrase. Nelson McCausland and Jim Allister both mentioned that. Burning down Orange halls, attacking Catholic churches and other sectarian crimes are heinous, counterproductive and violent sectarianism, but to talk of wars against entire cultures is astoundingly dangerous, and, to be frank, to associate the Alliance Party with that at times is an absolute disgrace. We need to get away from that type of language and get back to building the united community that we want to see.

Maeve McLaughlin said that this was an opportunity for the Assembly to endorse the principles set out by the motion, and I wholeheartedly agree with that.

Paul Givan again questioned the credibility of the Parades Commission. This is a Member who, during an OFMDFM Committee meeting, called the Parades Commission "anti-Protestant" and was suitably rebutted by a parades commissioner whose family holds Orange Order membership. So the credibility of that accusation towards the Parades Commission is wholly unfounded, and it is unhelpful in the spirit of today's debate.

In conclusion, an increasing number of people in our community are fed up with our inability to address these types of issues and move on from them. Derry/Londonderry has shown leadership on these issues, and, indeed, people want to hear about other issues, such as the increasing number of jobs and apprenticeships that are being created. People want to hear about and focus on those issues. So I hope that is the message that we send from this Chamber today.

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

I call Michael Copeland to wind on the motion. The Member has 10 minutes.

Michael Copeland (UUP, Belfast East)

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I may not even need the 10 minutes on this occasion, which, I am sure, will be very welcome. This portion of a debate is traditionally called "winding up", and I would say that there have been a good deal of useful contributions from pretty much all quarters, and I found something of merit in some of the things that were said by most people. I did note a degree of winding up, which could be expected in a debate of this nature, even when it is not the winder-up who is winding up.

The truth is, if we aspire to live in a democracy, incumbent on that is the notion that you will hear things that you do not like. Incumbent on that notion is the reality that you will see things that you do not like, and the truth is, when you take it upon yourself to restrict someone else's freedom to say things and do things, you actually challenge your rights in that society.

Parading, walking and demonstrating were the terms that I always heard used in connection with Orange, Black and Apprentice Boys' parades in the past. Marching — and I know something about marching, having once been a soldier — does not equate to a lot of what goes on at Orange, Black and Apprentice Boys' demonstrations. They are walks and parades, and they were not designed to give offence, following the routes that they traditionally followed. Then, some years ago, for whatever reason, there was talk of marching, which gave, in my view, a militaristic and aggressive resonance to the parades that was not there originally.

Tolerance, respect and restraint should not only be confined to contested parades. Those values should be present in every relationship that every citizen has with every other citizen in this country. We can talk in this place until we are blue in the face, and the truth is that on a particular night, at an interface or at a protest or demonstration, our society will be reduced to the lowest common denominator by he who throws the first stone.

There is much myth about the content, even of the music, which, on occasions, is contested. I well remember Michael Fisher of RTÉ pursuing me up Templemore Avenue, wanting to know why one of the better-known flute bands in east Belfast had just passed by playing 'The Patriot Game', which is a well-known tune in Irish nationalism and, indeed, republicanism. The truth is that the band was not playing 'The Patriot Game'; it was playing a tune called 'Tramp! Tramp! Tramp!', which grew from the American civil war, came to Ireland with the Fenian movement and became 'The Patriot Game'. It then came north of the border with the words, "No Priest, Pope or Holy Water", set to the same piece of music. The same piece of music.

The people for whom I feel most sorry are those who have been made to feel that their sense of being is in some way unfit to be seen by their neighbours. The people who feel that the colours that they wear render them a lesser human being and that their expression of who they are should be subject to regulation by a body such as the Parades Commission. I am sure that body is well intentioned, but some of the decisions that it has made down the years have, on occasion, made things worse because, once you surrender the principle of citizenship in a democracy, all else — all else — comes onto the table.

God knows, the United States is an example of many good things, but it is also an example of many bad things. Some years ago, protected by the constitution of the United States, an awful grouping of people — neo-fascist white supremacists — paraded through the Jewish district of one of the major cities, the notion being that if the constitution protected scum like them, it protected everyone. We need to create the notion that a person's liberties and rights are not restricted by law, but defended by law. That, at some stage, I am sure, will give a very major difficulty when the coin flips on to its other side.

Chris Lyttle (Alliance, Belfast East)

Will the Member give way?

Michael Copeland (UUP, Belfast East)

Chris, not today. There is an angst felt by members of loyalist flute bands. They are viewed in disparaging terms by many, yet they are extremely democratic organisations. They raise their own money. Their leadership is only as good as the first vote of no confidence. They teach young people music, and they take them off the streets, but they are castigated because of initials on a drum or because of a symbolism on a uniform. Then they see those who castigate them for those things perambulating around with children armed with AK47 rifles, and they see sporting clubs being named after people who would be adjudicated by them as being dead terrorists. The thing does not seem fair. It may well be — I may be stupid — but it does not seem fair.

It is that growing sense of resentment and feeling of being under pressure, coupled with economic decline and the removal of the great things that were once there when people were proud to go to work and make things and stamp "Made in Belfast" or "Made in Northern Ireland" on them. They now find that education prepares them for a life of being dependent on others.

Culture is a very valued thing. Aberrations of culture can be dangerous. This is the ninety-eighth anniversary, I think, of the commencement of the Somme offensive. It is coming close to 2·00 pm here. In our time, it began at 7·00 am. There are famous pictures of soldiers of Irish, Catholic, Ulster and Protestant heritage performing deeds that I can only stand in awe of. Tonight, in my constituency, there will be one of the oldest Somme anniversary parades. It will be accompanied by tension and by screens to separate the citizens of the Short Strand from the citizens of the Albertbridge Road, for their mutual safety. There will be young people there with Union flags tied round their waists — they are young. There will be alcohol consumed on the streets from blue bags. All the ingredients are there in preparation for the first stone. They do it because they do not know what it is about. They do not know the magnitude of what took place over 100 years ago in France, yet an aberration of history drives them to express themselves in ways that will cause them no good. The answer to this lies not in those who wish to parade, but with those who wish to restrict the basic freedoms that should be available in every democracy.

The amendment includes the word "law". I thought that the aspiration inculcated in the initial motion made respect for law quite clear. I served the law. Sixty three thousand people served the law with me, and many hundreds of them were killed. To this day, many thousands are affected by the injuries that they received, and many thousands more are affected by the mental trauma of what they witnessed.

My wife was 18 years of age when a bullet passed through the constable beside her on the Springfield Road before hitting her. No one can tell me about the price of defending law. I have tried to explain my thoughts to those in the Chamber as best I can. I hope that, as this place settles down and begins to discharge its obligation towards people to defend them from the real ravages of poverty, unemployment and educational underachievement, which affect all our people, regardless of race, religion, colour, creed or gender, the sacrifice on the Somme may well have been worth something.

Question, That the amendment be made, put and agreed to.

Main Question, as amended, put and agreed to.

Resolved:

That this Assembly notes, in the absence of a formal agreement on a new way forward for contested parades and associated protests, that it is essential that everyone involved, whether participants, spectators or protestors, demonstrate respect, restraint and tolerance for those of differing opinions; and calls on all organisations and parties involved, particularly elected representatives, to demonstrate unambiguous adherence to the rule of law.

The sitting was suspended at 1.55 pm.

On resuming —

Oral Answers to Questions

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

Order. Unfortunately, we have to wait for the Health Minister. That disadvantages Members who are in the House for Question Time.

Question No 3 has been withdrawn.

Cathal Boylan (Sinn Féin, Newry and Armagh)

Go raibh míle maith agat, a Cheann Comhairle. I would like to take the opportunity to apologise to you for missing a recent Question Time.

Cathal Boylan (Sinn Féin, Newry and Armagh)

1. asked the Minister of Health, Social Services and Public Safety for an update on the GP out-of-hours framework. (AQO 6476/11-15)

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

I approved the GP out-of-hours framework in January 2014. A project board chaired by the Regional Health and Social Care Board is in place to take the work forward. Implementation of the GP out-of-hours framework is necessarily dependent on alignment with a number of health and social care projects, including the 111 telephone number and the development of a directory of service and web portal. It is therefore not possible at this stage to give a definitive timetable for the business case process and the overall implementation of the framework.

Cathal Boylan (Sinn Féin, Newry and Armagh)

With the Minister being late, I thought that this was out-of-hours Question Time. Can the Minister clarify that GP out-of-hours activity has increased by 18% whilst activity through emergency departments has decreased by 2%?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

GP out-of-hours centres are busy places. In 2012-13, providers dealt with 606,000 patients. Of those, 220,000 received telephone advice; 174,000 visited an out-of-hours centre for treatment; and 31,000 received home visits. There is a considerable amount of work going on, and we understand that GPs who work in out-of-hours services feel considerable pressure in the service that they provide. It is a challenging environment for them.

George Robinson (DUP, East Londonderry)

What is the Minister's assessment of the out-of-hours service in the Limavady area? My understanding is that the out-of-hours doctors are being diverted to Altnagelvin Hospital several nights a week.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

I suspect that the Member could better tell me what the service is like in the Limavady area. Nonetheless, there have been occasions when out-of-hours centres have been unable to provide face-to-face consultations due to trusts being unable to secure full medical cover. Patients requiring face-to-face consultations were directed to other out-of-hours centres in the trust area, and it should be emphasised that telephone advice and home visits were provided as normal.

The issue is not unique to the Western Trust area. Over the past five years, there has been an 18% increase in demand for GP out-of-hours services, which is particularly high during bank holidays and at weekends. That places significant pressure on the system. The board, as commissioner of the service, is acutely aware of the ongoing challenges faced by trusts, including difficulties in recruiting and retaining GPs and other clinical staff, and is working with all providers, including Western Urgent Care, to address them. Measures include the new way of working with GPs and out-of-hours staff and the use of skill mix. The board remains focused on providing safe and effective GP out-of-hours services while working with staff, the public and stakeholders to develop and shape the future provision of out-of-hours services. I encourage the Member to continue discussions with senior trust representatives to secure the service that the people of Limavady expect.

Seán Rogers (Social Democratic and Labour Party, South Down)

Thanks to the Minister for his answers thus far. Minister, what is your assessment of the recent report citing the concerns of out-of-hours GPs in the Southern Trust area?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

We requested that report, and it is important that we did so that we could establish the level of job satisfaction and where the concerns and problems are. The report gives us the ability to address those issues. It was a tad unfortunate that some parts of the report were leaked in a way that sought to undermine the service. It is important that we work closely with the providers — the people on the front line — to ensure that it is a service that they want to be involved in, one that they are delivering to the best of their ability and one of which the general public are the beneficiaries.

Jim Wells (DUP, South Down)

2. asked the Minister of Health, Social Services and Public Safety what savings he plans to make in order to accommodate his Department's share of the cuts in the block grant, which will result from the failure to implement welfare reform. (AQO 6477/11-15)

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

As I have previously outlined to the House, my Department faces a considerable challenge in 2014-15, with some £160 million of additional resources estimated to be required in order to balance the books. The deficit remains despite my commitment to deliver some £170 million of savings. I have therefore requested further resources in the June monitoring round. If they are not forthcoming, the Executive will, effectively, be agreeing to a number of serious implications, such as a pay constraint on hard-working staff, a reduction in the range or standard of services offered, the introduction of additional charges or co-payments for services and longer waiting times for scheduled care.

Let me be clear: I have not taken and will not take actions by myself that impact on front line care for patients and clients. Equally, I will not plan or make cuts in vital health and social care services to pay for the current refusal of some Members to take the necessary decisions on welfare reform. Doing nothing on welfare reform is not an option for the Executive. The failure to agree welfare reform is unforgivable, as the financial penalties being imposed by the Treasury are surely better directed at meeting the real and pressing health and social care needs of some of the most vulnerable people in our society.

Jim Wells (DUP, South Down)

The Minister paints quite a bleak picture for the present financial year. If welfare reform is not settled and settled soon, what are the implications for the Department's future budgets of having to continue to pay penalties to Westminster because of our inability to deal with the issue?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

The pressures will increase. Every Department will feel the pinch, and the Department of Health, as the largest recipient of funding, will feel the pinch more than anyone else. The things that we have put in bids for — Members will, rightly, challenge me on them — include £13 million for safety and quality of services, and we will see whether we get that. People are always shouting about emergency departments: we have put in a bid for £22 million for unscheduled care. If some people think that that is better spent on welfare, that is a matter for them. We have also bid for £6·2 million for family health services; £10·5 million for public health; £9 million for children's services, protecting our youngest and most vulnerable; £8·5 million for supported home, largely domiciliary care for vulnerable elderly people; £20 million for specialist services; £0·5 million for the historical institutional abuse inquiry; £10 million for clinical negligence; £30 million for elective care, dealing with hip replacements, knee replacements and all of that; £21·3 million for TYC transitional funding; and £9 million for mental health and learning disability. Perhaps other Members would like to tell me which bids I should not make.

Phil Flanagan (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

Go raibh maith agat, a Cheann Comhairle. I do not want to steal Mr Beggs's thunder by asking about budgets and the previous Health Minister, but would the Minister be better served by not wasting money on following his own ideological campaigns against delivering equality for people, as opposed to blaming every mess that he has overseen in the health service since taking office three years ago on welfare reform and fines that have not even started to be implemented by the Executive?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

I really despair at the lack of knowledge demonstrated by the Member who has just spoken. [Interruption.]

William Hay (Speaker, Foyle)

Order. Allow the Minister to answer.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Members close their eyes to the fact. If you take a decision, that is fine, but stand by your decision. Come to the House and say, "We believe that we are better spending that money on welfare than on health". Stand up and say it, and do not be such a coward. People need to be very clear: money is being taken from the Northern Ireland budgets. The consequence of that money being taken from the Northern Ireland Budget is impacting on Health, Education and Justice, and the Members opposite are the people who are doing it. Let us stand up and be counted. If you are going to do it, tell the public why you are doing it and quit hiding behind the point that the money is not really being taken when we all know that it is.

Roy Beggs (UUP, East Antrim)

The Minister has indicated that he has bid for £160 million in the June monitoring round, but such a deficit to maintain existing services did not suddenly develop. Will he confirm the level of debt that existed in our health service in the last financial year, despite the £100 million in-year monitoring round allocation? Will he also confirm that that exists despite or even aside from the welfare reform issue?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Over the last three years, we have received an increase of around 2% each year, and I suppose that demand has increased by around 6% each year. We have been able to absorb £500 million of savings whilst increasing the number of nurses, doctors and allied health professionals. We have been able to reduce waiting times for most of the scheduled care and 12-hour waits in our emergency departments. Against the backdrop of the budget that we have been given, we have been able to make savings and deliver a better service.

In all those things, we had our cycle, and we have come to the end of that. Another year has been added on, and, at this time, there is a £160 million gap. We are making £170 million of savings, but there is a further £160 million of a gap that I cannot deliver on. That is why I have come to the House over the past number of months and consistently told it that that gaps exists. It remains to be seen whether we can drive another £20 million or £30 million out of it, but the reality is that the figure will not move fundamentally. I will not find £160 million of further savings without hugely negative impacts on the health service, and that is a message that needs to be got out.

If people think that they are better spending that money on welfare, that is fine; get out there and tell the public that you would rather spend the money on welfare than on health and that, consequently, people will wait longer for operations, we will not be able to deliver to the same standards of safety and we will not be able to make the changes in unscheduled care that everybody has been demanding. If you want to say that, get out there and tell the public that. I am telling the public that I want to improve the health service and I want to deliver, but, if you are going to cash-strap me in key areas, that will make it extremely difficult to carry out that delivery.