Northern Ireland Assembly, 6 October 2014

447 contributions from 61 members. The official report.

Assembly Business

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Members will have been saddened to learn of the passing of George Savage, a former Assembly Member for Upper Bann. I had the pleasure of knowing George from working together during the first mandate from 1998 and subsequently on his return to the House in 2007. He was quiet and unassuming and did not seek the spotlight but worked behind the scenes diligently on behalf of those he represented. He was a fundamentally pleasant and decent man, and you could always do business with him, even on difficult issues. I think that that has been reflected in the warm tributes that have been paid to him since his passing from across the political spectrum in the House.

I want to take this opportunity to extend my personal condolences to his family circle and to all his party colleagues on their sad loss. As we have done on such occasions in the past, I will call a representative from each of the parties to speak for up to three minutes to pay tribute to our late friend and colleague. I will allow around 30 minutes for tributes and, if there is enough time remaining after all the parties have spoken, I may be able to call other Members who rise in their places to say a few words. The House will now pay its respects.

Mike Nesbitt (UUP, Strangford)

Two Saturdays ago, I was honoured to attend Craigavon Civic Centre for the installation dinner for the current mayor, Colin McCusker. I was struck by the number of people, from all parties, who remarked on how sad it was that illness had prevented George Savage from attending that evening's celebration. Those were timely remarks. George's funeral took place on Friday in Donaghcloney, and I know that the family was comforted by the very large number of people, representing all sectors of our society, who attended that day. It will be a tough week for Joy and the family, and I hope that they will take some comfort from the fact that we are paying tribute to George in the Chamber today.

George Savage was an Ulster Unionist stalwart, a man who loyally and faithfully represented the party in the upper Bann area for decades. He was a long-standing member of Craigavon Borough Council and was twice elected mayor, serving as first citizen in the mid-1980s and again in 2005-06.

He also served two terms as an MLA here at Stormont. He was elected first in 1998 and again in 2007. The first time, of course, was the original mandate of this Assembly, when he joined a brave and courageous team at Stormont, trying to make it work.

He also found time to put on the uniform and serve in the Ulster Defence Regiment during some of the darkest days of our Troubles. Those are the facts. Behind facts, of course, lies the person. George Savage was, indeed, an Ulster Unionist to his backbone and a proud Orangeman. A farmer by profession, he became a knowledgeable member of the Agriculture Committee. George was also a tireless worker for his constituents and was held in high esteem by political friend and foe alike. He was described by the SDLP's Dolores Kelly as a decent, hard-working and well-respected man, and by John Dallat as a gentleman who gave his full commitment to making the Assembly work. Many Assembly staff with no connection to party politics have gone out of their way, in recent days, to make clear their sadness at the news of his passing.

I cannot help but pause, at this point, to reflect that George was one of the original 28 Ulster Unionist MLAs elected in 1998 to Parliament Buildings to try to give meaning to the Belfast Agreement. It is a sad and sobering thought that he is the sixth member of that team to pass away. This year, alone, we have bade farewell to David McClarty, Sir John Gorman and Sam Foster, following the early losses of Tom Benson and junior Minister James Leslie. Now, sadly, it is the turn of George Savage. Our thoughts are with his family and many friends. He will be greatly missed in Upper Bann and much further afield.

Stephen Moutray (DUP, Upper Bann)

I count it a great privilege to be afforded the opportunity to take part in this tribute to my friend and colleague, not only in the House but for some 13 years on Craigavon Borough Council. George was a quiet, unassuming, affable and mildly spoken person who was not given to rash words even in the heat of debate. He treated everyone the same, no matter what their station in life. His commitment to constituents was second to none. For nearly 40 years, he was an elected representative who was always approachable and contactable, even in his farmyard, as was often the case. His love of farming and country life was known far and wide.

Such was George that his friendship spanned beyond these shores. He was influential in the linkage between Craigavon Borough Council and Ballina in County Mayo. George made many lasting friends as a result, and he attended festivals in Mayo on a yearly basis. George was a giant in agriculture. He farmed extensively near Donaghcloney. He served as Deputy Chair of the Agriculture Committee and on the Northern Ireland Drainage Council, and chaired the SOAR rural partnership.

Some year ago, I was in the south of England and, in a second-hand shop, I picked up a book that referred to the Savages being resident in Donaghcloney for some 300 years. I gave the book to George on my return and he was delighted because he was, justly, proud of his ancestry. He was also proud of his family: of Joy; of his sons Kyle, George and Nigel; and of their families.

Last Tuesday, George would have been 50 years married to Joy. His son Nigel spoke eloquently on Friday about the saving faith that his father had. I trust that, in the days that lie ahead, that will help sustain the family. They have the knowledge that it is, truly, absent from the body but present with the Lord. I extend sincere condolences on behalf of the DUP to Joy, Kyle, George, Nigel, their families and the Ulster Unionist Party on the passing of a real gentleman. Thank you.

John O'Dowd (Sinn Féin, Upper Bann)

Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle. I first got to know George Savage in 1997, when I joined Craigavon Borough Council. In Craigavon and, indeed, across the North, 1997 was a very difficult year, with tragedies on all sides of the community and intense conflict on our streets, which was reflected in our Craigavon Borough Council debating chamber. In that atmosphere, it would have been perceived to be difficult to engage or make friends with a unionist, but, in George's case, it was not. George and I come from opposite poles; George was a former UDR soldier, an Orangeman and a proud Ulster Unionist. He knew that I was an Irish republican, but in no way did that come between us being able to engage with each other on a personal or a constituency level to assist our constituents across the board. I learnt a lot from George Savage in terms of not only his determination to represent his constituents but how to work as a team player across the council chamber to achieve what was best for the people of Craigavon. Despite all the pressures that we were under in Craigavon over many years, we did that quite often.

When I heard that he was ill and that he had passed away, it came as quite a shock because he was always out and about. I often met him in this Building, even after he had retired as an MLA. He was still up here lobbying and representing his constituents and the rural community and ensuring that their voice was heard. A tribute to him especially is that the new generation of Sinn Féin councillors on Craigavon council — I think of our current deputy mayor, Catherine Seeley, and our group leader, Gemma McKenna — speak very highly of George as well. Those are new young councillors going into Craigavon council. As the deputy mayor said the other night, she was often late for a council meeting because George was outside the chamber telling her stories. He made an impact across the generations.

My deepest sympathy to his family and to Joy. Without doubt the greatest loss is to his family, but the rural community and Craigavon have also lost a great champion. I wish them well.

Dolores Kelly (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Upper Bann)

On behalf of the SDLP's Assembly and parliamentary group and our local councillors in Craigavon, we place on record our sincere sympathy to Joy and to George's sons, daughters-in-law and grandchildren. I had the privilege of serving for many years on Craigavon Borough Council with George when he played a role as mayor and another as deputy mayor, and I served on numerous committees with him. George was, foremost, as others have said, a family man. He had a long and enduring good relationship not only with his wife and family but with his mother; he often talked about his mother, who lived to a great age.

I was deeply vexed when I heard the nature of George's illness only a few weeks ago, and I was deeply saddened at his sudden passing. George was a decent, hard-working family man. He is one who, in 1998, remained true and resolute in his support of his then party leader, David Trimble, as he made a great compromise to make a better future for everyone in our society. He never wavered in his support nor in his conviction that what he was doing was the right thing.

George, as others have said, was not afraid of building cross-border links; he had a great relationship, as Mr Moutray said, with the communities in Ballina. I know that they, too, will miss him greatly, especially the energy and commitment that he brought. It is only a few months ago that I facilitated a meeting between George and our Environment Minister. George was an employer in the local area, and he had ambitious plans for future development. I hope that those will not be lost; I am sure that his sons will try to realise their father's ambitions.

I saw a great tribute at the funeral; people from right across the community turned out in their hundreds to pay tribute to George. His loss will be felt, as others have said, right across the community, but it will be felt most around the family hearth. My sincere condolences to the Ulster Unionist Party, which has lost a true friend, and to his family and the wider community.

Trevor Lunn (Alliance, Lagan Valley)

I am conscious of the fact that everybody who has spoken so far probably knew George Savage better than I did. I knew him as a colleague here in the last mandate just for four years, and I got to know him fairly well. I am impressed that there have been such fulsome tributes from what you might call political opponents. It says a lot about George, the man and the politician, that even, dare I say, John O'Dowd from Sinn Féin can pay such a tribute to an Ulster Unionist. That is very good to see.

George was a gentleman. The word "gentleman" has been used so often, but it does not do any harm to repeat it: he was polite and he was calm. He was the Mayor of Craigavon twice, which was quite an achievement. He was the sort of solid citizen that nobody ever said a bad word about, and why should they have, because he was good man. He was a good family man, a good neighbour and a good politician. He was quiet in his way, fair enough, but a lot of us are quiet in our ways and are just as effective. He will be sadly missed.

I know about his history now: he was a member of the UDR, an Orangeman and a farmer. It was one of his Masonic colleagues who told me, about a month ago, that he was not well at all, but it still came as a big shock that he passed away so quickly.

He was a solid citizen and a solid Ulster Unionist, with a good history in politics and a good history in life. So, on behalf of the Alliance Party, I send our condolences to Joy, his wife, and his three sons, Kyle, George and Nigel, and to the Ulster Unionist community. He will be sadly missed.

David McNarry (UKIP, Strangford)

Like most, I knew George Savage for a long, long time. Throughout that time, it was a pleasure to talk to him, have dealings with him and listen to him. He was an outstanding character — "character" being the operative word — about whom you could say, "He did what it says on the tin." That was specifically George's way of doing business.

I have heard my former colleagues in the Ulster Unionist Party use the word, "stalwart", which in this case is very apt. I offer my sincere condolences to them for the loss that they must feel. There must be a tremor going through George's former constituency and among the people who knew him: he loved them as much as they loved him.

For someone like me, who held him in the highest esteem, these occasions are extremely sad, as they are for us all. It seems that over such a short period, we have been paying tributes, and properly so, in this House to others who have left us. That has become commonplace, but nevertheless I am very pleased that the Assembly allows and dedicates moments like this for Members to make fitting tributes to people, particularly people like George, who will be missed.

He is, as you said Principal Deputy Speaker, our late friend and colleague, and I am sure that his wife, Joy, and his family will receive the message loud and clear of how we held him in such high regard in the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Jim Allister (Traditional Unionist Voice, North Antrim)

I first got to know George Savage not through politics but in another walk of life. Some years ago, the Savage family went through a very traumatic experience when one of George's sons was brutally assaulted. I, in my role as counsel, had the privilege of representing the Savage family in the subsequent litigation. I met George, Joy and the son in question frequently over that period, and I found George to be everything that has been said of him: a true gentleman, a man with deep concern for his family and a man with whom it was a pleasure to work.

As an MEP, I had some interchange with him in pursuit of agricultural issues, and there too he was most diligent in all that he did.

So, it was with sadness that one learned of his passing. To his wife and family, I convey my condolences and those of my party. To his party, to which he undoubtedly was a very faithful servant, I, too, express condolences on the loss of someone whom it was good to know.

Basil McCrea (NI21, Lagan Valley)

George was a friend of mine. I look back on our interactions with much fondness. There was always a sense of humour with George when you were speaking to him. You sometimes had to wait a little while to discover exactly what he was going to tell you, but there was always the great finger that was raised, which indicated that he was about to say something. I was talking to Joy about it. She said that people sometimes asked how he got that finger. Apparently, a tractor managed to run over it, and, George being George, he just put a bandage on it and carried on. That was the mark of the man. He was very self-effacing, did what had to be done and got on with things.

People here have tended to talk about him being a gentleman and somehow non-controversial. I remember with fondness that he did get his own way through having a particular way of doing things. Even when we had the Belfast Agreement coming up, he told me how he had influence with people who might not have been in the mainstream. He said that he thought that one of the big contributions that he had made was that he was able to talk to people whom others would not talk to.

On such occasions, I am mindful of the family. Those of you who know the family well will know that Joy is facing not just one but two challenges. It is my great hope that things improve with Kyle, who is not particularly well. Joy is one of those amazing women. You talk about great men, but behind every great man there is arguably an even greater woman, and Joy is certainly that.

The Savages made a wonderful contribution to our society. George made a great contribution to the Assembly. When you get to the end of your life, all that you can really do is to look back and have others say, "He did well".

George Savage, a gentleman and a friend, will be sadly missed. I offer my condolences to his family.

Jo-Anne Dobson (UUP, Upper Bann)

It is always hard to join the House on these occasions. However, this afternoon, it is doubly difficult when we are paying tribute to a personal friend and party colleague.

My thoughts and prayers are with Joy, Kyle, Nigel, George Jnr, George's seven grandchildren and his entire family circle. They have lost a loving husband, devoted father and doting grandfather. The community of Donaghcloney and Waringstown has lost a lifelong friend, neighbouring farmer and committed politician.

As was said, above all, George Savage was a good and decent public servant, serving the constituents of Upper Bann on these very Benches and always staying true to the core values of the Ulster Unionist Party, putting his constituents and the community above all else. George stood fast and firm to our values.

My first memories of George are as a neighbouring farmer when, after my marriage, we moved to Waringstown and set up home. Back then, any time that I had the privilege to chat to George, politics was never mentioned. I believe that that sums up George. He was always asking how my son Mark was keeping, and then the topic changed to beef prices and farming. He was a man who put people above politics.

The high esteem in which George was held in the community was evident on Friday when Donaghcloney village came to a standstill. I was proud to join the community in mourning, a community quietly paying their respects and saying goodbye to one of our own.

George was a loyal Ulster Unionist, a member of the loyal orders, a former soldier of the Ulster Defence Regiment and a people's politician, here and on Craigavon Borough Council, and George was so much more than that. He was a loving husband, father and grandfather. He was a quiet man of integrity and honour. On visiting the family's home, I was told by George's son Kyle how much the hundreds of sympathy cards and tributes on social media meant to the family. I know that the tributes this afternoon will add to that. He will be sorely missed by all our numbers.

Sydney Anderson (DUP, Upper Bann)

Thank you, Mr Principal Deputy Speaker, for allowing me the opportunity to pay tribute to my good friend and colleague Councillor George Savage. George was indeed one of life's true gentlemen and someone whom I held in the highest regard. He was highly respected in all walks of life, especially within the agriculture and farming industry.

I knew George for many years, but it was not until I was elected to Craigavon Borough Council in 2001 that I really got to know him. We shared many conversations on a wide range of issues, especially on matters affecting the rural community. Being a rural dweller myself, it was always good to have someone like George to call upon when seeking advice on rural and farming issues. I know that I can say without fear of contradiction that George was truly a champion of the rural community, not only throughout Craigavon, where he served as mayor on two occasions, but here in the Assembly, where he served two terms as an MLA for Upper Bann.

George was never one to shirk responsibility and that was very evident in the service that he gave to many organisations throughout his lifetime. He was chairman of Donacloney Primary School's board of governors and a former director of Glenavon Football Club. He was involved in the Mid Ulster Football Association, did charity work with the Buddy Bear Trust and gave many years of service to the loyal and Masonic orders, to name but a few.

George also served with distinction in the Ulster Defence Regiment, in what was a very dangerous and testing time for many serving in our security forces during the Troubles. However, first and foremost, George was a family man. He was happiest at home with his family, working on the farm and enjoying the outdoor life, having often done a day's work before most of us had got out of our bed. George's wife, Joy, often said that she never knew anyone who could change from farm overalls into a business suit as quickly as George could.

At George's funeral service on Friday past, the family minister referred to some of George's trademarks. Those of us who had conversations with George will have heard him say many times, "I know a man", with that famous pointed finger. Today, I can say that I knew a man — a man I was honoured and privileged to have known; a man much respected and highly regarded; a man called George Savage.

George will be greatly missed in his community but most of all by his family. To his wife, Joy, to whom he was married for 50 years, to his sons George, Nigel and Kyle and the entire family circle, and also to his Ulster Unionist Party colleagues, I extend my sincere sympathy and condolences. George's family faces difficult days ahead without their loved one, but they can be comforted to know that George is now safe in the arms of Jesus.

Samuel Gardiner (UUP, Upper Bann)

I rise in support of all those who have paid tribute to a former colleague and friend of mine, Mr George Savage. I was privileged to be with George just prior to his death. I got another phone call from his son to say, "Look, you better come out, Sam. Dad's going". I got out, but I was a wee bit too late. Words are not sufficient to pay tribute to George or to talk about the man and his character. He was a great man, very sincere, who was dedicated to his work with his three sons on the farm and to his wife, Joy. I was privileged to serve on Craigavon Borough Council with him on the several occasions when he was mayor, and also privileged to serve in this House with George.

George's word was his bond. At the funeral, people could not get into the Methodist church. There were hundreds upon hundreds of people there to pay their tribute to the great George Savage. I offer my sympathy and condolences from my family to Joy and her three sons. He is safe in God's keeping.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Without repeating what everybody else has said, I would just like to say that George Savage was a decent, honourable gentleman and a pleasure for all of us to do business with. I called with George around three weeks ago, and we had a good time together. Dr Paisley had just passed at the time, and I was able to tell George of the high regard that Dr Paisley had held him in. Dr Paisley was Chair of the Agriculture Committee while George was Deputy Chair, and I know that Dr Paisley leant on George a lot for advice, as someone working at the coalface. I trust that it was some comfort to George, even at that time, to be told of the high regard in which he was held even by someone of Dr Paisley's standing.

My sympathies go to George Jnr, Kyle and Nigel, and in particular to Joy, who has lost a dear husband.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

I would like to advise Members that I have received a letter from the Speaker. He expresses his appreciation for the good wishes that have been sent to him from across the House and beyond but has decided that his focus needs to be on his return to health and that it is unrealistic that he will be able to return to exercise the functions of Speaker in the immediate future.

The Speaker is disappointed that he is not in a position to come to the House to announce this himself, but he has informed me in writing that he has decided to proceed with his intention to retire. He will resign as a Member with effect from 12.00 noon on Monday 13 October 2014. In accordance with section 39(2)(b) of the Northern Ireland Act 1998, he will cease to be the Speaker at that time. A copy of the Speaker's letter will be placed in the Library. Following receipt of the letter on Friday, I visited the Speaker and passed on the best wishes of Members.

When a vacancy arises in the Office of Speaker, Standing Order 6 requires the Assembly to proceed to elect a Speaker "as soon as may be". A copy of the Speaker's letter will be forwarded to the Business Committee, and it will be for it to schedule an election for a new Speaker. The Speaker's authorisation, under Standing Order 5(2), for me to exercise all his functions relating to the proceedings of the Assembly, will remain in place until his resignation takes effect next week.

I think that that covers the most immediate operational questions that might come to mind, but Members may seek further clarification from the Business Office.

While we are all sorry about the circumstances of today's announcement, I know that I speak on behalf of the Deputy Speakers and the whole House in wishing the Speaker well in future and thanking him for the dedication and service that he has given the Assembly in the role of Speaker over the last seven years.

I will therefore encourage Whips to consider arrangements for how to formally pay tribute to the Speaker so that the Business Committee can consider those tomorrow for the Order Paper of next week. Let us move on.

Peter Weir (DUP, North Down)

Further to that, I appreciate that arrangements will then be made for a more formal occasion, but I think it appropriate simply to place on record, on behalf of my party and as someone who has served with the Speaker on the Business Committee and the Assembly Commission, my thanks to him for the role that he has performed. It is also appropriate that the House acknowledges its desire to see the Speaker — the soon to be former Speaker — recover and be in the most robust health as swiftly as possible.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Let me just remind the House that I have made arrangements and advised the Whips to consider how best we can pay tribute to a man who justly deserves that. I think that the most appropriate way to do that is to return, upon reflection of today's announcement, to the matter next week. That would be the appropriate opportunity for all Members of the House, if they so desire, to pay tribute to a remarkable servant of this institution. If that is acceptable to Members, we should move on to the next business.

Committee Business

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

This is the first of three motions on Committee membership. As with similar motions, it will be treated as a business motion. Therefore, there will be no debate.

Resolved:

That Mr Edwin Poots be appointed to the Committee for Agriculture and Rural Development; that Mr Sydney Anderson replace Miss Michelle McIlveen as a member of the Committee for Agriculture and Rural Development; that Mr William Humphrey replace Mr Sammy Douglas as a member of the Committee for Enterprise, Trade and Investment; that Mr Nelson McCausland replace Mr Stephen Moutray as a member of the Committee for Education; that Mr William Irwin replace Mr Sammy Douglas as a member of the Committee for Employment and Learning; that Mr Stephen Moutray replace Mrs Brenda Hale as a member of the Committee for Regional Development; that Mr David McIlveen replace Mr George Robinson as a member of the Committee for the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister; that Mr George Robinson replace Mr David McIlveen as a member of the Committee for Health, Social Services and Public Safety; that Mr Edwin Poots, Mr Sammy Douglas and Mr Paul Frew replace Mr William Humphrey, Mr Sydney Anderson, and Mr Jim Wells as members of the Committee for Justice; that Mr Sammy Douglas replace Mr Trevor Clarke as a member of the Committee for Social Development; and that Mr David Hilditch and Mr Robin Newton replace Ms Paula Bradley and Mr Mervyn Storey as members of the Committee on Standards and Privileges with effect from Monday 6 October 2014. — [Mr Weir.]

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Order. The next item on the Order Paper is the second motion regarding Committee membership. As with similar motions, it will be treated as a business motion, and there will be no debate.

Resolved:

That Ms Rosaleen McCorley be appointed as a member of the Committee for Health, Social Services and Public Safety; that Mr Chris Hazzard replace Ms Rosaleen McCorley as a member of the Committee for Justice; that Mr Phil Flanagan replace Mr Chris Hazzard as a member of the Public Accounts Committee; that Mr Chris Hazzard replace Mr Mitchel McLaughlin as a member of the Committee for Enterprise, Trade and Investment; and that Mr Raymond McCartney replace Mr Mitchel McLaughlin as a member of the Committee for Finance and Personnel. — [Ms Ruane.]

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The next item on the Order Paper is the third motion regarding Committee membership. As with similar motions, it will be treated as a business motion and there will be no debate.

Resolved:

That Mr Roy Beggs replace Mr Leslie Cree as a member of the Committee for the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister; that Mr Leslie Cree replace Mr Michael McGimpsey as a member of the Committee for Culture, Arts and Leisure; that Mr Michael McGimpsey replace Mr Roy Beggs as a member of the Committee for Health, Social Services and Public Safety; and that Mr Roy Beggs replace Mr Michael Copeland as a member of the Public Accounts Committee. — [Mr Swann.]

Executive Committee Business

John O'Dowd (Sinn Féin, Upper Bann)

I beg to introduce the Education Bill [NIA38/11-15], which is a Bill to provide for the establishment and functions of the Education Authority; and for connected purposes.

Bill passed First Stage and ordered to be printed.

Private Members' Business

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Order. The Business Committee has agreed to allow up to one hour and 30 minutes for this debate. The proposer of the motion will have 10 minutes to propose and 10 minutes 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 to make a winding-up speech. All other speakers will have five minutes.

William Irwin (DUP, Newry and Armagh)

I beg to move

That this Assembly condemns the increasing number of illegal activities being carried out by organised criminal gangs; notes police assessments of over 140 such gangs operating in Northern Ireland; and calls for the implementation, in full, of the National Crime Agency to help deal with this problem, which is particularly prevalent in border areas.

The need for the National Crime Agency (NCA) to have full powers extended to cover Northern Ireland is recognised by many interested parties, most notably and obviously the British Government, the agencies responsible for administering justice and the courts and those involved in policing. Of course, we in the DUP strongly support that extension. As someone who represents a border constituency, I am well aware of the impact that criminal gangs have on our rural communities by creating victims of crime and the negative impact on the rural economy. We have seen audacious attempts by such gangs to carry out all sorts of crimes, including the exploding of ATMs on the forecourts of garages, the laundering and selling of illegal fuel, the stealing to order of valuable machinery and the worrying trend in the theft of cattle and the illegal slaughter and sale of those animals in the Republic and certain areas such as south Armagh. Those incidents illustrate the need to have at our disposal the expertise and assistance of the National Crime Agency. As we all know, the criminals respect neither borders nor victims in their illegal pursuits.

The work that the NCA is involved in not only relates to the crimes that I have outlined but importantly has a significant role in the area of Internet-based crime. Members will be aware that the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child has expressed its strong views on the protection of children online. The UN committee is rightly concerned, as we all should be, about the lack of NCA powers in Northern Ireland, which means that the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre is not fully operational here at this time. The entire House should be alarmed about that issue alone. Our children are at much greater risk due to the fact that the NCA is not operational here. I challenge the nationalist parties to explain to the public why they have adopted a negative stance on its implementation here given the UN report and its ramifications. The protection of our children is hugely important and completely necessary and urgent, especially with regard to the Internet and how our children are protected from those who prey on young people online.

I certainly feel that the issue is directly affecting a very broad range of people, from the rural farmer who has valuable machinery stolen to order to those involved in the detection of online crime, such as the serious and sickening issue of child pornography. The National Crime Agency is a body that Northern Ireland simply cannot do without. It operates in other regions of the UK and, at a time when our policing budgets are under severe pressure, it makes complete sense to allow the PSNI to have the necessary assistance of the NCA to carry out its investigative duties. I also believe that the ability to seize assets is vital in the fight against these gangsters, who currently think that they are untouchable.

The reluctance of Sinn Féin and the SDLP to accept the necessity of allowing the NCA to operate and the PSNI to avail itself of its expertise in the fight against crime internationally means that Northern Ireland and its citizens are at a severe disadvantage. The two nationalist parties continually bleat about equality, but, once again, the calls for equality fall short of ensuring that our communities have the very best security and that the organisations tasked with protecting communities have the very best intelligence and powers at their disposal. The nationalist parties have hollow concerns over the accountability of the NCA, yet the organisation is already subject to rigorous scrutiny from Committees in Parliament, such as the Home Affairs Committee, as well as the Office of Surveillance Commissioners and the Investigatory Powers Tribunal. The public have the right to approach these and many more bodies to question any outward operation of the NCA. Representing a border constituency, I have a desire to see criminality and its effects on innocent victims —

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

I wonder whether the Member will give way.

William Irwin (DUP, Newry and Armagh)

I will.

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

The Member talks about all sorts of bodies looking at the NCA. Will he tell the House what accountability measures exist presently in relation to the NCA? Please describe to the House the accountability to the Chief Constable and the Policing Board?

William Irwin (DUP, Newry and Armagh)

The accountability measures are mainly based in the UK. Certainly, I have no fear of any accountability measures —

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

Will the Member give way again?

William Irwin (DUP, Newry and Armagh)

I will.

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

I am asking the Member particularly about accountability measures in Northern Ireland, not in Westminster or the UK, as you put it.

William Irwin (DUP, Newry and Armagh)

There seems to be real reluctance from the Member and his party. Many people in Northern Ireland will be concerned that the Member and, indeed, his party want to let gangsters roam free and behave as they will. They are burying their heads in the sand if they believe that that is not happening. It clearly is, right across Northern Ireland. Police sources reckon that there are approximately 140 of these gangs. It is sad that we cannot get the terms to tackle those criminal gangsters.

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Will the Member give way?

William Irwin (DUP, Newry and Armagh)

I will.

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

The Member will know that the Member for North Belfast is a very well educated man and very capable in his job. Does the Member share my concern that the SDLP and Sinn Féin are providing the obstacle to the Police Ombudsman being able to hold the NCA to account — currently for non-devolved matters and, into the future, for devolved matters — and that the SDLP and Sinn Féin are preventing the Chief Constable from being given primacy for the NCA's activities in Northern Ireland? They are the ones who are stopping accountability, as opposed to this party.

William Irwin (DUP, Newry and Armagh)

I thank the Member for his intervention. I agree with him absolutely. Representing a border constituency, I have a desire to see this criminality and its effects on innocent victims significantly stamped out. We have the chance to greatly increase the PSNI's capacity for dealing with it.

I urge the House, on behalf of the victims of such crime, to reconsider the matter and move quickly towards its implementation.

Gerry Kelly (Sinn Féin, Belfast North)

I beg to move the amendment:

Leave out all after "calls for" and insert

"statutory provision to be made so that all members of the National Crime Agency on operational duty locally are subject to the same accountability mechanisms and bodies that govern the work of the PSNI and its officers.".

Beidh mé ag labhairt in aghaidh an rúin seo. I will speak against the motion and for the amendment.

Let us make very clear some of the myths and, at minimum, exaggerations being pointed out here. The NCA already operates in the North on non-devolved matters. That means things like immigration, customs-related crime, fuel laundering and smuggling, which are some of the things that Mr Irwin mentioned. In a way, the core issues are simple, and he pointed them out. The first one is accountability, which was crucial to Patten, crucial to us and crucial to the new beginning to policing. I will return to assets recovery a bit later.

Why do we not want them to be unaccountable? Because our history has demonstrated what unaccountability does. Back in those times, you had a force within a force; you had shoot to kill; you had state agents involved in crime, right up to and including murder; you had confessions beaten out of people going through interrogation centres; and you had a police force — not a service — that acted as front line troops and was involved in collusion and corruption. If you want to know why we are so strong on the issue, the history and the evidence shows why. Let me say this: more recently —

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Gerry Kelly (Sinn Féin, Belfast North)

No. You will have your chance to come back.

More recently, some ex-RUC people who left and got away from the accountability measures brought in by Patten came back in through the retire/rehire revolving door. We have seen that that was much abused in terms of where they were, which created a huge difficulty. At least some of them left specifically because there were accountability mechanisms there, so that they would come back as temporary workers and not be police officers, and then they went back to the old habits of non-accountability. I think that unionists are hankering back to the old situation, and, when there is an opportunity to move forward, they will not take that up.

William Humphrey (DUP, Belfast North)

Will the Member give way?

Gerry Kelly (Sinn Féin, Belfast North)

No, I will not give way.

You will also know that unionists signed up to Patten and eventually, after a long debate, to the transfer of those powers in 2010. Another myth that unionists are promoting — this debate came up close to a year ago — is that the pursuit of organised crime has ceased. Nothing could be further from the truth. The NCA cooperates with an Garda Síochána, the European law enforcement agencies, Interpol and other law enforcement agencies. This question needs to be asked: is the NCA refusing to give information or to cooperate with an Garda Síochána or any other force? The answer to that is no. Most importantly, is it refusing to give any of the information or cooperation that the PSNI needs? No, it is not. On child exploitation, which was mentioned, on drugs trafficking, on cross-border smuggling, on human trafficking — on all those accounts — the answer is no, because they are given the cooperation that is necessary to bring to book the people who are destroying our society. A perfect example of that quite recently was the finding of £100 million worth of drugs on a ship off the coast of Ireland, which the NCA was involved in and an Garda Síochána then moved on. They did not have to do that. It was an Garda Síochána who had the accountability mechanism there. [Interruption.] Maybe the hecklers will keep quiet, and I will get on with it.

I have spoken to Keith Bristow, and I know that he wants further cooperation: why would he not? I know that he wants further powers. In a certain way, people who are offered further powers always want them. Maybe that is fairly normal, except if you are in the DUP. Recently they were offered more powers similar to those that have been offered to Scotland and other places, but they seemed to refuse them. Specifically, Keith Bristow wanted the power of police officer for those in the NCA — incidentally, excluding himself. Of course, the British Home Secretary can sort that out. All she has to do is make them accountable to all the mechanisms. If they want the powers of a police officer, make them as accountable as all other police officers are in this jurisdiction in the North.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Gerry Kelly (Sinn Féin, Belfast North)

No, I will not. [Interruption.] Folks, you will have your chance to come back on all this.

What are the unionists and, indeed, the British Home Secretary afraid of? If they agree that our police officers should be accountable — they have agreed to that — what is the problem? Why not make NCA officers accountable also? It is one of the things that I cannot understand, except that you may not agree to police officers themselves being accountable and that you want to go back to the past when that was the case.

Asset recovery is raised again and again. In this instance, the Justice Minister — I am sure that he will speak about it when he gets up — has the power to deal with asset recovery. My party and, I believe, other parties put it to him well before that power ceased last October, I think, that he could have a bespoke process of asset recovery that would take the assets of those involved in serious and organised crime who are destroying our society. He has refused and continues to refuse to go down the road of having an asset recovery process that can be used here.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Gerry Kelly (Sinn Féin, Belfast North)

You are going to get up later, so by all means speak then.

Sinn Féin is up for asset recovery from those involved in serious and organised crime.

There is absolutely nothing to fear from accountability. I really do not understand what you are afraid of. The Member spoke about the ombudsman: the easy answer to that is that that will be involved if we can get the full suite of accountability mechanisms, which was agreed in Patten and should be brought in here. Our experience is that if you leave the loophole — there is a mass of empirical evidence — it will be abused, and that is what we are trying to avoid in this case.

I support the amendment. We should be united, not divided, in arguing for the necessary accountability measures.

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

Although I disagree with the motion, I welcome the opportunity to debate this important issue and put the facts on the record. First, the SDLP is not opposed in principle to the NCA; we would welcome its resources and so forth. Certainly, we are not opposed to opposing criminality, whether it is organised criminality at an international level, at a national level or whatever. We are vigorously opposed to any form of criminality and welcome resources to deal with it.

Last week in the Chamber, we debated Kincora, and there was almost unanimity on the need for an investigation of that. It was widely accepted in the Chamber that the abuse that took place in Kincora was, in fact, covered up by the intelligence services. It highlights the need for the accountability that was dodged and avoided at St Andrews in relation to the intelligence services, and now it is a timely reminder to the House that the issues that arose in the debate on Kincora last week are relevant to this debate as well. Of course, we are not dealing with the intelligence services —

William Humphrey (DUP, Belfast North)

Will the Member give way?

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

Let me get on a bit. We are not dealing with the intelligence services per se, but we are dealing with an organisation that styles itself as the FBI of the UK. In those circumstances, you need special rules and regulations to deal with the accountability of that force in relation to Northern Ireland. We know the history of a force within a force, the misuse of the RUC by the intelligence services, the misuse of agents and so forth. We want to avoid that happening again, and we will be robust in defending that position. We do not need any lectures from people on dealing with criminality — we are firm on that — but there must be accountability.

William Humphrey (DUP, Belfast North)

I am grateful to the Member for giving way. He is not frightened of debate, and I welcome that. You talk about resources being applied to dealing with the issue before the House. The last time we debated the issue in the House, the SDLP said that it had concerns — I understand that you are articulating them now — about accountability. You were going to have meetings with the Secretary of State and with the Justice Minister. I ask you this, in all sincerity: how regular have those meetings been? Are you making progress in dealing with the issues that you are concerned about?

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member has an extra minute.

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

I am pleased that the Member has raised those issues. There was a very helpful letter from the Minister of Justice in relation to the NCA. That is no secret. In that, a number of issues were raised in it. I am not going to disclose what discussions we have had with the Minister of Justice or, indeed, with the NCA or the Chief Constable, but I will characterise our engagements with all those people as very positive. However, there are still issues to be addressed in relation to accountability. Until those issues are firmly tied down, we will not be supportive of the NCA, in operational terms, in Northern Ireland. I think that that is wise counsel. I do not believe that that is being thran or obtuse or trying to frustrate the rule of law. We know the history; we are right. We are going to get this right, and it is the right approach.

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

I thank the Member for giving way. He is outlining the concerns. He says that progress is being made and that helpful meetings have been held. Does he understand, however, that, while all those meetings are taking place, international criminal gangs are operating here in Northern Ireland, some of which could be prevented from doing so if we had the full implementation of the NCA? Does he accept and understand that?

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

What I am saying to the House and what I understand very clearly is this: there is a problem with organised crime. We have to address that, and we will. We have PSNI resources here addressing it but not as fully as we want. However, as soon as there is agreement on the accountability measures that we have suggested, we will move towards that. The point I make and emphasise to the House is that, given the experience that we have had, we have got to tie these things down firmly and clearly. It is not right for people to simply say, "Well, look, there's the NCA. We've got parliamentary Committees looking at the NCA, and we've got the Home Secretary and so forth". We cannot accept that. It must be internal to Northern Ireland. The operations of the NCA must be subject to the PSNI and the Chief Constable and accountable to the Policing Board.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member's time is up.

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

That is the appropriate approach. That is what we want to see happening.

Stewart Dickson (Alliance, East Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

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

Yes.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Thank you. I call Mr Tom Elliott.

Tom Elliott (UUP, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

Thank you, Mr Principal Deputy Speaker. I am not going to give way to Mr Dickson at this stage.

I believe that the secret is in the name: National Crime Agency. It appears that the two nationalist or republican parties are opposed to it simply because it is a UK national crime agency. What could be wrong with trying to curtail, cut out and stop crime? I am not sure what the argument is about.

I heard Mr Maginness and others talk about accountability. Let us not forget that, a number of years ago, they approved the devolution of justice here with SOCA in place. The NCA will have much more accountability than SOCA had, so I do not see what the problem is with allowing an organisation to manage itself in Northern Ireland to beat international crime. This is not just about local criminals and localised crime but about international crime. This is about crime that is going on throughout the world that we can do something to stop. Criminals will see Northern Ireland as a back door to the United Kingdom and a back door to Ireland to carry out their criminal activities, and, my goodness, have we not seen plenty of it in Northern Ireland with fuel smuggling, fuel laundering, and contraband cigarettes and alcohol? Why do people not want to curtail that? Why do people not want to stop human trafficking and to use the NCA as a mechanism for doing that? I do not see why people do not want to do that. I do not see why people want to try to curtail the process.

On accountability, I understand that the NCA would not have the powers of a constable in Northern Ireland. I recognise that the two nationalist parties were willing to jump on board with Haass and approve a historical investigations unit. As I understand it, that would have been a stand-alone police force in Northern Ireland separate from anything that you have in the Police Service of Northern Ireland. Were there going to be accountability mechanisms there? I never heard any of the nationalist parties argue for that in the Haass talks, not once. So, I think that people need to get real.

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

Will the Member give way?

Tom Elliott (UUP, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

The only argument that I hear against this from the nationalist parties is that they do not want the National Crime Agency because it is part of the UK. What have you to fear? I will give way to Mr Attwood.

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

For the record, the Haass proposals said that the new arrangements would be accountable to the Police Ombudsman and the Policing Board. We opposed that, because we believed that the new arrangements proposed under Haass should have their own, separate accountability mechanisms. So, yes, we did make the argument. Maybe on those occasions you were not listening very carefully.

Tom Elliott (UUP, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

Mr Attwood is accepting that it was going to operate separately, outside the Police Service of Northern Ireland. He is then concerned that the NCA has accountability mechanisms to the Police Service of Northern Ireland. What does he want? He cannot have it every way. He seems to want his cake and eat it, but, unfortunately, no matter what argument he puts forward, this is because it is a UK national crime agency. That is the reality of it. They just do not want anything that is British in Northern Ireland. Let us get of rid it all. Let us not have it here because it is a UK-established force. I say this to those Members who do not want it: what are you afraid of? Is it maybe because it will investigate some of the criminal activities that maybe some Members in the House have a relationship with? I do not know. Maybe they will tell me. There should be nothing to stop the National Crime Agency from operating to its full potential in Northern Ireland. I think that nationalists and republicans are using excuses, and that is all that it is.

Stewart Dickson (Alliance, East Antrim)

I welcome the debate, and I want to make it very clear that we are supporting the motion and opposing the amendment.

The motion does give us an opportunity to debunk some of the myths and, indeed, fears that have been created around this particular organisation. There is absolutely no doubt that the absence of a fully functioning National Crime Agency is negatively impacting on our ability to deal with serious and organised crime. Clear, precise and statistical evidence is available and has been since the National Crime Agency came into being on 7 October 2013. What bit of "Since 2013, you have had time to sort all of this out" do you not understand?

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

What about accountability?

Stewart Dickson (Alliance, East Antrim)

I will come on to accountability.

The Justice Minister has said that there is now clear evidence of a major gap in our ability to tackle serious crime. We are not isolated or immune from these problems in Northern Ireland. There is, as others have said, people trafficking, extortion, money laundering, robbery, drug smuggling and many other serious crimes going on. There are people in this House who, by their actions, are assisting all those crimes to take place. Let us not put too fine a point on it: there are people in this place who are assisting and allowing those crimes to proceed against our citizens in Northern Ireland. Shame upon you.

There are international issues that require an international response, and the purpose of the NCA is to connect our neighbourhood policing to our national policing and our international crime-fighting agencies. The effect of the NCA not operating was explained in more detail recently by the Minister when he told us that there are examples involving child abuse, money laundering and drug importation where the responses were arguably less effective than they could have been had we been able to join up right from the very ground, from neighbourhood policing through national policing in Northern Ireland and right across the UK, reaching right across Europe and beyond its borders.

We have seen an effect on asset recovery. The police are unable to target the assets of criminals. That is less money that is being taken off criminals. We know that the proceeds of that go to communities, but the important thing is that many criminals can only be dealt with effectively by hitting them where it hurts, and that is quite often in the pocket. We are facing international criticism, as has been referred to, with the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child having expressed strong concerns about the absence of necessary powers to effectively address child exploitation.

Our police resources are under strain, and we have all heard the debate around the Budget in recent days. The effect of that and the failure to introduce the NCA has been to skew resources to the PSNI that could have been met nationally by the NCA. You are effectively making us pay for things that other people in the rest of the United Kingdom are having paid for them through the NCA. There is a serious and urgent need for a solution.

While it appears to me at least that Sinn Féin is beyond the pale in this debate, it is disappointing that the SDLP has still not been able to come up to the mark when it comes to acknowledging what has been done and what has been achieved since the agency came into force in 2013. They have fears and concerns, but I believe that they have been addressed and that now is the time to accept that they have been addressed. You cannot have everything and you will not get everything, but the time has come to accept that what is on offer is not only the best for all the citizens in Northern Ireland but substantially more than in many other regions in the rest of the United Kingdom.

Let us be absolutely clear what has been offered. The NCA cannot use constabulary powers without the approval of the Chief Constable. The director general can be called to attend the Policing Board, making him answerable on how its annual plan is to be implemented, taking account of the Northern Ireland policing plan. The Police Ombudsman's remit will cover all functions of the NCA, and the Criminal Justice Inspection's role will be extended. It is therefore nonsensical for parties to suggest that there is lack of accountability. There is more accountability here than in any other part of the United Kingdom.

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

I thank the Member for giving way. I am glad that he is outlining the degree of accountability that exists. It is just unfortunate that the mover of the amendment has absented himself from the Chamber. He outlined the exact opposite and said that there is no accountability.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member has almost a minute left.

Stewart Dickson (Alliance, East Antrim)

I wholeheartedly agree with Mr Campbell. Indeed, it is increasingly looking like a deliberate plan to oppose the NCA in all circumstances rather than to accept —

Dolores Kelly (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Upper Bann)

Will the Member give way?

Stewart Dickson (Alliance, East Antrim)

I would have except that the Speaker has only given me one minute and I need to finish this.

It is looking like a deliberate plan to oppose the NCA and its operation in Northern Ireland in all circumstances. Members now need to show maturity and recognise the significant package that is on offer. I encourage Mr Maginness and others to weigh up what is now being offered. You are not going to cross every t and dot every last i when it comes to this. What is on your shopping list is not necessarily on everybody else's shopping list. There are many in the community —

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member's time is up.

Stewart Dickson (Alliance, East Antrim)

— who will ask, after this debate, why the SDLP is acting so unreasonably and not picking up on what has been offered to defend all our citizens, which is the introduction of the NCA.

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Tomorrow is the first anniversary of the National Crime Agency. Unfortunately, the only people celebrating will be the criminals involved in human trafficking, drug dealing and some of the vilest crimes that they can inflict on our people in Northern Ireland. People should remember who benefits most from the inability of the SDLP and Sinn Féin to deal maturely and responsibly with the issue. It is no surprise that Sinn Féin cannot do so, but the SDLP is letting down the people of Northern Ireland because of its inability to step out from the shadow that Sinn Féin cast upon it. For too long, they have kowtowed to Sinn Féin on a whole range of policy matters, and here they are doing exactly the same when it comes to policing.

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

Will the Member give way?

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

I will give way to Mr Maginness.

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

As a simple matter of history, the SDLP joined the Policing Board in 2001; and, in 2007, Sinn Féin joined the Policing Board in the wake of the SDLP and on the basis of the good work that the SDLP had done to build up the PSNI. That is history, so we are not in the shadow of Sinn Féin whatsoever.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member has an extra minute.

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Ever since Sinn Féin eclipsed the SDLP in electoral terms, the SDLP has done nothing to try to differentiate itself from the largest nationalist party, and it is time that it started to do that.

Members have highlighted the fact the NCA will not have constabulary powers unless the Chief Constable grants it those powers. The new beginning to policing that Sinn Féin and the SDLP talked about included the Serious Organised Crime Agency continuing to function. The devolution of justice allowed the Serious Organised Crime Agency to continue to function, but now that SOCA has been dismissed and the NCA has come in, they want to revisit all of this and wind the clock back.

Joe Byrne (Social Democratic and Labour Party, West Tyrone)

Will the Member give way?

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

No, I will not give way again; I want to make some progress.

Either the two parties got it wrong in the first place and should admit that they got it wrong when they set up the Policing Board and those structures, or they are misleading people by the arguments that they are making here today. Members need to be very serious about this issue because we are talking about serious crime.

Sinn Féin and the SDLP often use the United Nations to advance their progressive, as they deem them, human rights policies. Yet here we have the UN highlighting a serious concern about the rights of children, and they just dismiss what it has to say. I am not usually an advocate of the United Nations, but, on this occasion, it is right. Members who usually support the UN should take some cognisance of what it has to say.

Then we have the PSNI budget and the strain that it is under. Mr Kelly, who is no longer here, interestingly, refused to engage in debate and has now run away, not for the first time, from the debate. He and Mr Maginness continually talk about the cost of policing Twaddell, for example, and yet here we have Westminster wanting to pay for policing in Northern Ireland. However, the nationalist parties are saying that they do not want Westminster to pay for that. When it comes to welfare reform, Westminster needs to open up the coffers and give them the money. They want Westminster then, but when it comes to policing, they do not want the support of a national body. They would rather that the PSNI, which does not have the resources or, let us be clear, the same expertise and specialism as the National Crime Agency in dealing with matters of human trafficking and child exploitation —

Robin Newton (DUP, Belfast East)

I thank the Member for giving way. My point specifically relates to the point that he is making about the lack of information. Does he agree that, had the unfortunate people in the Tilbury docks incident not created a row and the container had completed its journey, it is unlikely that the information would have been available within the PSNI to pick up, arrest and take before the courts those now alleged to have been involved?

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

I agree. The Member brings us back to a very important point: we are talking about human lives. This is not some technical bureaucratic matter; it is about the impact on real people through not being able to effectively tackle those who are involved in serious organised crime.

As Members rightly highlighted, the NCA currently operates in Northern Ireland but is not subject to the levels of accountability that Members would want. Again, I was not a proponent of setting up the Police Ombudsman's office, but that office would, under these proposals brought forward by the Minister, be able to hold the NCA to account on devolved and non-devolved matters.

There has got to be a point at which people realise that there is a compromise on the table. I would suggest that the compromise nearly goes too far, but we do not always get everything that we want. Members need to recognise that this is as good as it is going to get. There will not be any point in the NCA being in existence if Members want to thwart its ability to tackle crime.

We need to bring this matter to a conclusion. I ask the Minister to bring forward the legislative consent motion (LCM) that is necessary. If he cannot do it, I will work with the Alliance Party and one of its members to bring an LCM to this House. Let us have the debate and let us have the vote on this issue. I trust that Members would not abuse the petition of concern if it came to that point.

Sean Lynch (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle. I oppose the motion but support the amendment.

Let me deal with the first part of the motion:

"That this Assembly condemns the increasing number of illegal activities being carried out by organised criminal gangs".

Sinn Féin totally supports that part of the motion. We have consistently condemned criminal activity. Communities have a right to live in a safe environment, not to be impacted upon by these criminal gangs and to feel secure and safe in their homes. However, communities and citizens must be protected through the oversight and accountability of law enforcement agencies. This is the crux of the issue. The NCA, fully implemented in the North of Ireland, will, in effect, be accountable to the Home Secretary and not the Policing Board.

As recently as last week, the Minister responded to my colleague Raymond McCartney on the issue of tackling serious crime, and on making the NCA effective and, most importantly, making it accountable. The Minister said nothing to explain why he believes that all members of the NCA should be subject to the same accountability structures as all members of the PSNI.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Sean Lynch (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

No. You will have your say, Minister.

No real claim has been made to date to demonstrate that policing serious and organised crime will be ineffective if the NCA is not fully implemented.

Robin Newton (DUP, Belfast East)

Will the Member give way?

Sean Lynch (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

No. If your name is down, you will have your five minutes.

Indeed, there has been opposition to the present NCA model from former senior officers. In reading part of the motion, one would be led to believe that, unless the NCA is not fully involved in this part of Ireland, society will be left to the complete mercy of these gangs. What is the role of the PSNI in tackling organised criminal activity? This is a service that has a budget of almost £1 billion and 7,000 personnel. On the other hand, in the South of Ireland, an Garda Síochána polices four-fifths of this island with a similar budget and under 12,000 personnel. It has to deal with similar organised activity.

The parties opposite argue that, if the NCA is not established in full, there will be limited access to NCA intelligence. That is not true. The previous Chief Constable, Matt Baggott, in answering a question from Pat Sheehan at a Policing Board meeting about whether there would be any restrictions on information-sharing between any of the law enforcement agencies on these islands, answered with an emphatic no. As my colleague Gerry Kelly said in his speech, only last week, we had a good example of this type of sharing of information, where the gardaí arrested a number of criminals off the coast of Cork and captured one of the biggest hauls of cocaine ever in these islands. This was a joint task force involving the Air Corps, revenue services, naval services and the gardaí.

Mr Liam Peakin, the head of the Irish Customs Drug Watch and Law Enforcement department, said afterwards that they have the resources to tackle major drug dealers and that it was an international intelligence-led operation that involved agencies outside Ireland.

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

Will the Member give way?

Sean Lynch (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

No. That confirmed the point that Matt Baggott made to Pat Sheehan last year. During the arrests and seizure in Cork, the guards were in total control of the operation on Irish soil. There is no bigger crime than trying to land £100 million worth of cocaine in this country, North or South.

I want to close on the aspect of the motion that calls for the full implementation of the NCA to:

"help deal with this problem which is particularly prevalent in border areas."

I live close to Monaghan, Cavan and Leitrim and meet senior PSNI officers regularly. There is no evidence that major organised crime is greater in that region. One of the organised activities in the area is livestock and farm machinery theft. Only last week —

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member's time is almost up.

Sean Lynch (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

— the gardaí were successful in an operation against those who are involved in that in County Monaghan, using information from the PSNI. The law enforcement agencies on the island of Ireland are capable of tackling serious and organised criminality without the full involvement —

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member's time is up.

Sean Lynch (Sinn Féin, Fermanagh and South Tyrone)

— of the unaccountable NCA.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member's time is up. Thank you.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

It was an interesting line that the previous Member who spoke took. He seemed to support cuts to policing and railed against everything that was suggested last week about the pressures that police would be put under. He has made it very clear that Sinn Féin thinks that we can do with considerably less police and the services they provide in Northern Ireland. I am interested in hearing that argument develop over the next number of days.

The Assembly does not often bring good news to people, but good news is going out today. There is good news for fuel launderers, cigarette and alcohol smugglers, drug barons, pimps, human traffickers, gangmasters, fraudsters, those who are wrecking our environment through illegal dumping and, of course, the paramilitary organisations. They are getting that good news free and gratis from none other than Sinn Féin — we would well expect them to give them that good news — and the SDLP. They are hiding behind a fig leaf of accountability, but, behind their fig leaf, all we see is nakedness. They have no real substance to their argument, and all those whom I named will be better off as a consequence of their activities.

Sammy Wilson (DUP, East Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Yes.

Sammy Wilson (DUP, East Antrim)

I am sure that the Member is not surprised that Sinn Féin wants to protect criminals, especially since most of the criminals who have been referred to were probably their compatriots not so long ago. Does he find it surprising that the SDLP is complicit in that protection of criminals in Northern Ireland and is allowing them to walk away with ill-gotten gains and terrorise the communities in which they operate?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

I know that the public will be hugely disappointed. For a considerable period of time, the SDLP have positioned themselves as the stooges of Sinn Féin. They will never separate themselves from Sinn Féin on any of the big issues. They are like rabbits caught in the headlights.

Joe Byrne (Social Democratic and Labour Party, West Tyrone)

I thank Mr Poots for giving way. Would he accept that it is virtually impossible to run a family-owned private business in parts of Belfast in the pub trade, the fuel business or in amusement arcades? We have the abuse of an official mechanism known as the national charities registry. Fronts for paramilitaries on both sides have become legitimised and a blind eye is being turned to that. We want the NCA to be effective in that regard as well as on the other issues and to have real accountability.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member has an extra minute

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Of course I agree with the Member. That is why we want it to happen. That is why we need it to happen. The Member has stated very clearly that the current arrangements are ineffective. Meanwhile, the SDLP are wringing their hands and saying that they cannot change it because we do not have as much accountability for the NCA as we have for the PSNI. It is not that we do not have accountability. It is that we do not have as much accountability as we have —

Joe Byrne (Social Democratic and Labour Party, West Tyrone)

Will the Member give way?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

— no, I am not giving way again, Mr Byrne — with the PSNI. We really need to move ahead with this, and the SDLP needs to look at themselves and who they are is lining up with on this. They are lining up with Sinn Féin and all of the other people that I named at the start. The SDLP needs to reconsider their position. If they have genuine concerns, get them dealt with and let us move on. This business of carrying on and on and on, and delaying, delaying and delaying is brilliant news for all those criminals and gangsters out there.

Paul Frew (DUP, North Antrim)

I thank the Member for giving way. May I ask a question about the SDLP fighting for accountability? Does the Member know how accountable accountability is? At what cost will that come when we look at criminals who will be able to infiltrate Northern Ireland?

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Accountability is certainly being placed on a pedestal well above actually catching criminals. The public are fed up. I remember, when I was Minister of the Environment, going to Newry and Mourne District Council, and it was fed up with having to clean up the aftermath of fuel launderers who left materials and toxic waste dumped at the side of the road. The council had to spend £1,000 a ton to get rid of it. They are fed up with it. The public are fed up with people having fuel laundering plants dismantled, but nobody ever appearing to be arrested. Who is operating these fuel laundering plants? We need to go after these people in a serious way and ensure that all of the tools are used to tackle it.

The public are fed up with illegal dumps across Northern Ireland, and we do not have that specialist service and support from the National Crime Agency. The public are fed up with the human trafficking that is taking place; with the young girls that are being brought into prostitution and who are being used and abused; with the people who are working in the back streets as cheap labour for gangmasters. We need all the resource that we can get to support us.

George Hamilton made it abundantly clear last week that he does not have that resource. There is the opportunity for us to introduce additional resource to Northern Ireland. There is the opportunity for those people to be held to account —

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member's time is almost up.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

— in a number of different ways. Get on board, and let us get this organisation in here and get its help.

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

Whilst he did not realise it, Mr Poots has just made my argument. He went on and on — rightly — about illegal fuel dumps. He said, "Sign up to the NCA, because that will deal with it." Explain, then, why, despite the efforts of the PSNI, SOCA and other agencies on this island, virtually nobody has ever been before a criminal court in relation to such matters? If you want us to support the NCA, it has a responsibility to us — to everybody — to prove that it will go after fuel launderers.

The biggest waste dump in the history of these islands lies two miles outside Derry, on top of the River Faughan. Those responsible for it got £50 million out of that dump. It will cost £110 million to clean it up, and that is independent of any leachate that is likely to gush into the River Faughan and the River Foyle, and yet —

Robin Newton (DUP, Belfast East)

Will the Member give way?

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

Not to you. I will give way to other people. [Laughter.] He knows why. That Member knows why.

Yet the police knew nothing about it. The Serious Organised Crime Agency knew nothing about it. It was not on the radar of the organisation that David Ford chairs, namely the Organised Crime Task Force. Nobody knew about the biggest waste dump in the history of these islands. So we have asked the NCA this: convince us that those responsible for that — the organised crime on the island of Ireland — will never again be able to get away with something like that. Show us that all those private arrangements that SOCA enters into — probably not many — are approved by the High Court and that that will become the rule of thumb of the NCA. That is the way to deal with organised crime — by going after all of those involved and ensuring that there are no no-go zones when it comes to organised crime.

Let me explain. [Interruption.] You might laugh. I will give way to you if you have any questions.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Mr Attwood, I may not be able to award you an extra minute if you take interventions. The same goes for Members who speak after you. I am bound by the Business Committee's ruling on the timing of the debate. It is your choice.

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

I was not aware of that ruling. I will check the Speaker's rulings, as I have tended to do.

Let me deal with the issue of the SDLP approach. When it was right to move on policing because the accountability threshold was sufficient, we moved on policing. Why is accountability so important? It is not technical, which is how Mr Givan referred to it. Accountability is the method of ensuring that an organisation accounts for its practices. In that moment, you win community confidence. Any police officer, NCA official or anybody involved in crime enforcement will tell you that community intelligence is at the heart of good attacks on crime. By having proper accountability, you have the mechanisms to ensure that, when the community has doubts, it can have confidence and, when the community has confidence, it provides information and intelligence to the crime agencies, including the NCA.

Paragraph 13 of the Minister's paper says that the Police Service, by giving agreement to operations, becomes accountable to the board for that activity. Does that or does that not mean that all the board's accountability mechanisms — public sessions, private sessions, special committees, section 59 and section 60 requests and all the other arrangements of policing that the SDLP negotiated — will be in place in respect of the NCA? Paragraph 10 of the paper says that the NCA will be required to secure the agreement of the PSNI prior to commencing covert investigations. Does that or does that not mean that all agents involved in that activity will be subject to PSNI requirements? If the PSNI says that they are vetoed, will that mean vetoed, rather than vetoed to a degree? Paragraph 25 is the elephant in the room. Is it credible in this day and age for a Home Secretary, by order, to say that the NCA shall deal with counterterrorism, that there is no role for the Executive or the Policing Board in the North, with all our experience —

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

The Member's time is up.

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

— with the security agency and policing in the past? I ask those questions to represent our concerns.

Mike Nesbitt (UUP, Strangford)

The Home Secretary established the National Crime Agency in 2010. Its purpose is:

"to lead the UK's fight to cut serious and organised crime."

I repeat: "the UK's fight". According to the NCA, serious and:

"Organised crime is one of the greatest threats to the UK's national security."

I repeat: "the UK's national security". It is an organisation designed to have national and international reach. It is meant to have:

"the mandate and powers to work in partnership with other law enforcement organisations to bring the full weight of the law to bear in cutting serious and organised crime."

The problem is that the national reach is restricted here in Northern Ireland. The NCA does not have the same mandate and powers in Northern Ireland as in the rest of the United Kingdom. The problem is that it cannot bring the full weight of the law to bear on criminals based here. Those dedicated to child abuse or child exploitation or those who make a twisted living from cybercrime, drugs and the rest find Northern Ireland an attractive place to base themselves.

The NCA is designed to respond on a 24/7 basis. It has three tools in its armoury: it conducts its own operations, it provides operational and specialist support to its partners and it provides clear national leadership that ensures that the UK's law enforcement makes the best of its collective resources. Given that we all woke up this morning to the latest example of how our Budget is broken, with the cuts in the events budget, what responsible politician would not want the full resources of the NCA in play in Northern Ireland? Who, other than the organised criminals themselves, could object to the PSNI being able to call on the expertise of such a body? It is not as if the PSNI has access to the same expertise and specialist knowledge within its own ranks. Even if it did, only last week, the Chief Constable laid out starkly the seriousness of the situation facing the PSNI and its service delivery, following the latest round of budget cuts. Speaking on Thursday, George Hamilton made it clear that the cuts would make the PSNI "unrecognisable". He said that he had been pushed into a "virtually impossible" position and that there would be fewer officers, longer waiting times for non-emergency calls and possibly compulsory retirements. Quite simply, the PSNI and Northern Ireland plc need the National Crime Agency. If it is OK for the NCA to lift suspected child abusers in England, Scotland and Wales, why is it not OK for them to do it in Northern Ireland? Why do they have to ask the Chief Constable to eat into his overstretched resources to make those arrests in this part of the United Kingdom?

Opposition to the NCA has been couched in terms of concerns about oversight arrangements, but many people — not all of them unionist — have grave concerns that that opposition is rooted more in a nationalist ideological opposition to a UK-wide body operating in this part of the United Kingdom. As Mr Elliott reminded the House, when the proposals for dealing with the past were brought forward by Richard Haass, nationalists seemed happy for a new, separate police force operating here called the historical investigations unit (HIU). That would have been utterly unaccountable to the PSNI. It would have been OK for the HIU to do its own thing but not the NCA. Opponents may argue that there was more chance of the NCA and the PSNI investigating the same individuals at the same time for different reasons, but no one can tell me that there was not a chance that the HIU and the PSNI would also have investigated the same individuals at the same time, each ignorant of the other's intent and therefore each capable of derailing the other's investigation.

The bottom line is that Northern Ireland and its people do not enjoy the same protection as the rest of the United Kingdom, and that is not acceptable. Police assessments state that there are 140 gangs operating in Northern Ireland. The Ulster Unionist Party wants to see the PSNI given access to every possible resource as it works day and daily to fight crime and protect our people. There is no question whatsoever that opposition from the SDLP and Sinn Féin is severely limiting how much the NCA can do in Northern Ireland. On that basis, we reject the amendment and support the motion.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

I welcome the fact that we have the motion before the House today, as I am glad of the opportunity to share with Members the difficulties being faced by law enforcement agencies because of the ongoing situation with the non-operability in the devolved sphere of the National Crime Agency.

As has already been highlighted — Mr Givan referred to the first birthday being tomorrow — the NCA came into operation on 7 October last year, and we have still to reach agreement on its powers extending fully here with appropriate accountability mechanisms.

I have been having talks in recent weeks with most of the Executive parties on the proposal paper that I put forward. There is a significant gap in our law enforcement ability, as anyone who read the Chief Constable's recent comments in the 'Belfast Telegraph' would have seen. It concerns me, as Justice Minister, that we do not have access to the skills and expertise that are available from the NCA and are not easily available to the PSNI. These are not issues of minor crime; they are issues of serious and organised crime both in Northern Ireland and with a reach across these islands and the world.

Recent PSNI figures estimate that 140 to 160 organised crime groups are active in Northern Ireland and there are 800 active criminals. We have had descriptions from different parts of the House of the impacts of organised crime, whether it be drug dealing, fuel laundering, waste dumping or the increasing problem of cybercrime, on which there is a very limited pool of expertise to tackle it at the highest level. We all know, because we discuss it frequently in the House, the damage that human trafficking does: it destroys lives. Northern Ireland is both a transit country and a destination for many traffickers. I believe that the PSNI does an excellent job, but there is no doubt that, once criminals start operating across jurisdictions and international boundaries, as many crime groups do, it needs the support of the NCA, just as the Irish authorities — we had a list from Mr Lynch of all the Irish authorities involved — benefited from that support from the NCA recently when they seized the yacht carrying a significant amount of cocaine. The amount seems to inflate as the debate goes on. I am not sure that it has reached £100 million yet, but it was a significant and serious issue. There is a certain irony that an Garda Síochána can benefit from the full cooperation of the NCA to deal with arresting the occupants of a yacht off the waters of County Cork while some Members of the House will stop the PSNI getting the full benefit. What is even more ironic is that Gerry Kelly, who is, of course, not present in the House, managed to highlight that as one of the specific issues. If I were Gerry Kelly, I would not have scored an own goal like that.

On a resource level, there is absolutely no doubt that, at a time of increasing pressures, the PSNI must be able to tap into the resources that the NCA can provide to undertake or assist in operations. If the PSNI cannot access those resources, we will see officers being redeployed from the crimes that they should be dealing with in the purely devolved, local criminal sphere to deal with the organised issues. NCA officers are currently sitting in Belfast doing back-office work for police services in England, Wales and Scotland because they are not allowed to be operational here. That, at a time of increasing pressures, is utterly ridiculous.

Many Members will have seen the paper that the Chief Constable circulated after he received it from the director general of the National Crime Agency. The paper looked at some of the issues for which we have simply not got the resources that we need to deal with organised crime. I highlighted that at Question Time last week, but let me refer to just a few of those points. Operation Notarise, the UK-wide operation against online child abuse, could not get direct support from NCA officers in Northern Ireland. The PSNI had to carry out the duties that were performed by NCA officers elsewhere, on the basis that the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre has been absorbed into the NCA. That is where the UK-wide expertise is, yet those officers cannot be operational on the ground in Northern Ireland. We had an issue of money laundering using pre-payment cards where there was serious need for a complex financial investigation, which, again, is part of the NCA's expertise, but it could not be provided.

Mr Attwood highlighted the issue of the largest waste dump found, I think, anywhere on these islands, on the banks of the Faughan. The NCA was unable to continue the assistance that SOCA gave in the early stages with financial investigations, because it was a devolved issue and the NCA could not continue to provide that support.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Will the Minister give way?

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

I will give way.

Edwin Poots (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Mr Attwood was also responsible for an organisation called the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA), which had a key role to play in that. For him simply to place the blame on the National Crime Agency, which did not have the powers to act, is wholly spurious.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

What I want to see —

Dolores Kelly (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Upper Bann)

Will the Minister give way?

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Aw, come on. [Laughter.] I want to see all the relevant agencies joining together in the way that the NIEA was able to send people to the next meeting of the Organised Crime Task Force to discuss some of those issues. Unfortunately, that assistance could not continue. I give way.

Dolores Kelly (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Upper Bann)

Thank you, Minister. What is totally spurious, of course, was Mr Poots's allegation. As the Minister will know, it was Mr Attwood and the NIEA that highlighted that waste dump, and the NIEA brought to bear its full powers on that.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Yes, but the point that I am trying to make about joining up is that the NIEA had the duty to identify it, because that is its specific role, but the financial expertise was best available from SOCA, which was then absorbed into the NCA, and that expertise could not continue from within the NCA. We will call that a score draw between Mrs Kelly and Mr Poots.

One other issue that I highlighted last week was the NCA requiring PSNI assistance to search the homes of suspected drug dealers. Other serious incidents under way meant that the PSNI could not respond as quickly as it had hoped in circumstances that may have led to evidence being removed. If the NCA had operational officers here, that work would have been carried out by them. We have already seen the issue of the PSNI losing officers to cover work that the NCA would do otherwise, but in terms of priorities and the difficult pressures that the PSNI is under, as the current budget changes come through, it becomes increasingly difficult for the PSNI to do what is its responsibility, without also carrying out the NCA's responsibility, and to provide the services that our people expect.

I mentioned it earlier, but let us repeat it: the NCA is the UK centre of expertise in many areas around cybercrime and, in particular, child exploitation online. Those areas cause huge concerns to the people of Northern Ireland. They are areas where the NCA can give arm's-length advice and assistance. The kind of line that was coming from the Sinn Féin Benches was that they can help and they can provide the information. Sure they can, but they cannot put operational officers on the ground — the people who have the direct experience — to go in and investigate what is happening. They have to pass the information on to the PSNI, and the PSNI then has the obligation to carry things through, whereas the expertise and the information reside with NCA.

Of course, one of the key issues is around civil recovery, on which there was a noticeable reluctance on Mr Kelly's part to take any intervention, because it is really the intervention to target the assets of local criminals. That has been lost since 7 October last year. It has not been hampered or reduced and nor does it require additional resources — it has been lost. Mr Kelly spoke about the idea of setting up a separate body for Northern Ireland. Gee, look at the successes we have had on legislation in this place around contentious issues. We have just introduced the Education Bill about three years later than it should have been introduced. If education is contentious, heaven spare us from what would happen if we were required to do separate legislation for our own bespoke body. There is a body that is capable of carrying out civil recovery: the NCA. It is operational in England, Wales and Scotland, and it needs to be operational here to tackle the organised criminals who seek to secrete assets in Northern Ireland.

Sammy Wilson (DUP, East Antrim)

Will the Minister give way?

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

I will give way.

Sammy Wilson (DUP, East Antrim)

Does the Minister also accept that setting up a separate body involves additional cost? It still means that there has to be liaison with another body and that is where the gaps in effectiveness fall in dealing with crime that is seamless across international borders.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Agreed entirely. I was trying to get on and not mention everything, but I am sure that, to the people we represent, the idea of criminals living with their assets secreted in Northern Ireland in lives of luxury, in the middle of what this society is going through, is utterly unacceptable. It is not just people living the life of luxury; it is luxury derived from the misery of other people. At the moment we are doing nothing to tackle it in this jurisdiction. Those are reasons why I believe that we must get the issue of the NCA resolved urgently.

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Will the Minister give way?

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Briefly.

Paul Givan (DUP, Lagan Valley)

Is the Minister able to quantify the millions of pounds — just so that we can crystallise the issue for the public — and the extent to which criminals are benefiting and have that money in their back pocket? It would appear that it is not just the millions of pounds they have in their back pocket; it is Sinn Féin and the SDLP as well.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

In brief, the figures show that, last year, there was something like £19 million under investigation in Northern Ireland. This year, it is down to eight-point-something million pounds. I do not have the figures immediately in front of me, but those are roughly accurate.

The proposal that I put forward involved detailed work with the Home Office, the NCA, the Northern Ireland Office, the PSNI and others. In my view, it set out extensive accountability arrangements in line with local requirements and represents a sound and final proposal to enable progress. It represents a realistic, achievable framework. The question is what sort of society we want. Do we want to hamper law enforcement when there is a sensible package available for help?

We had a lot of naysaying in the debate. I will come on to some of the comments that were made by Mr Attwood in particular in a moment, but there was a lot of naysaying from Sinn Féin with absolutely nothing specific. Indeed, Gerry Kelly, in saying nothing at all specific, showed such confidence in his argument that he did not accept a single intervention from any other Member during his 10 minutes. That is an indication of a man who has real confidence in the argument that he is putting forward — real confidence that he has got it right and can deal with interventions from anybody else.

If the situation is not resolved soon, we will have to make arrangements to fill the gaps, because we will have to accept failure. I do not believe that the Assembly should accept failure in this area. I trust that all Members will agree to the motion, and I will certainly oppose the amendment as it is currently formulated, because I believe that it is flawed.

The law already has many different requirements for the NCA because it is a body in Westminster and accountable to the Home Secretary. I will take a quick intervention.

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

The Minister talked about taking steps to fill the gaps. Has he any idea of the cost implications of those measures?

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

I think that the technical term is "quite horrific".

The amendment refers to accountability. Let us unpack this and look at what we have. We have the accountability of the NCA to the Policing Board. The director general is required to attend meetings of the Policing Board on request; to consult the board on, and seek its prior consent to, his plans; and to take account of the board's policing plan. The NCA could not exercise constabulary powers or covert investigation powers without the agreement of the Chief Constable. Let me repeat that: the NCA could not exercise those powers without the agreement of the Chief Constable, and the Chief Constable is accountable to the board.

Unlike SOCA, all the NCA's functions, as highlighted earlier, would be subject to investigation by the Police Ombudsman. There would be, through the Police Ombudsman, accountability for all devolved, non-devolved and civil recovery issues. In addition, Criminal Justice Inspection would cover the NCA, as would Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC). So let us not pretend that there is insufficient accountability. I believe that the accountability certainly exceeds that in the rest of the UK and, arguably, in some areas, that of the PSNI.

Mr Attwood made three specific points relating to the paper that I circulated earlier. Let me just respond briefly. He referred to paragraph 13, where it is clear that the accountability of the NCA is to the Chief Constable and the board. Paragraph 10 deals with covert operations and makes it clear that they would be only by agreement with the Chief Constable and subject to the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPA) and the Police Act 2000. Mr Attwood also referred to paragraph 25. I believe that the Department of Justice is bound by annex E to the St Andrews Agreement, which clearly shows how that would be carried through. Indeed, the suggestion from the Home Secretary is that an issue of national intelligence would be carried through only for England and Wales. So there are very clear points there. However, I am grateful that Mr Attwood — unlike Sinn Féin Members — at least put forward some specific concerns and that there has been engagement with the SDLP. I trust that we will very shortly wrap up those final issues.

I also had concerns when I first heard of the Home Secretary's plans for the NCA. That is why I sought and achieved many changes in its operations, and significant discussion has been going on. However, we are now at the end of the road. It is time that Members accepted that we have a good deal. We should resolve these final issues that need to be tweaked; reject the amendment; and pass the motion and the LCM to ensure that we get the benefit of NCA to protect the people of Northern Ireland.

Raymond McCartney (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

Beidh mé ag labhairt in aghaidh an rúin agus ag tabhairt tacaíochta don leasú. I support the amendment and opposed the motion. Let me say first that Gerry Kelly was called away on an urgent matter. I notice that others who made contributions also left the Chamber, but the Minister did not draw any inference from the fact that Alex Attwood was not here.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Raymond McCartney (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

I have five minutes, and I am not giving way.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Alex Attwood apologised to me.

Raymond McCartney (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

Gerry Kelly did not apologise to you, perhaps because he did not have the chance to do so, but I noticed that you drew no inference from the fact that Alex Attwood was not here, nor did you say that he had apologised to you. I find you very defensive on this issue. At the core — [Interruption.]

Sammy Wilson (DUP, East Antrim)

You still have a rubbish argument

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Order.

Raymond McCartney (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

At the core of the debate is accountability, and it is very interesting that most of the Members who spoke today ignored it or tried to suggest that the demand for accountability was not realistic. I think that the Minister said that it was not realistic. It is realistic, and the reason is that, as we know from history and now from current practice, one of the fundamental building blocks of the positive changes made to policing in order to ensure that we did not repeat the mistakes of the past was proper and effective accountability.

I noticed that, when Tom Elliott was speaking, he made some reference to the sort of idea that because it is called "National", the opposition that is coming from Sinn Féin and indeed, as he said, the SDLP was for that result, but I think that he forgot to accept that, if the secret is in the title, it is also in the title of the Assembly that we are in. This is a legislative Assembly. We make legislation for the people whom we represent. That is what we will do. We will make legislation that is relevant to the experience of the people whom we represent. Other people can ignore that. Other people can look to other places to get their lead. We will not. We will be consistent in everything that we do. I notice that Stewart —

Sammy Wilson (DUP, East Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Raymond McCartney (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

No. I have already said that I have five minutes and I will not get any extra time. It is limited as it is. That, to us, is the core matter. Indeed, even when the Minister was speaking, I think that he accepted that the standards of accountability have made the PSNI a police service that now enjoys the support of people in the North of Ireland. He accepts that the NCA will not be subject to the same level of accountability.

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Raymond McCartney (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

No, I will not give way because —

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

On a point of order, Mr Principal Deputy Speaker. Is it in order for a Member to state what somebody else said inaccurately and then refuse to take a point of information?

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

It is, in fact, a matter for the Member speaking speaker as to whether they give way. Hansard will satisfy everyone as to what was said and who said it.

Raymond McCartney (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

Perhaps Hansard will record what was said and also what was said when I asked that question during last week's Question Time. I asked the Minister whether the NCA was subject to the same accountability mechanisms as the PSNI and he told me that it was not. Maybe, sometimes, when people speak, the metamorphosis comes out and you hear it in a different way. That is what I heard this afternoon and it is what I heard last week. That is what I am saying. If the Minister wants to contradict that, he can. Are those who are operating in the field, in operations and carrying out investigations, subject to the exact same accountability mechanisms as all PSNI officers? Is it or is it not the case? Silence, as Father Ted once said — [Interruption.]

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Will the Member give way?

Raymond McCartney (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

If you want, I will give way, yes. [Interruption.]

David Ford (Alliance, South Antrim)

Sorry, Mr Principal Deputy Speaker, I was so shocked that any member of Sinn Féin was actually giving way in this debate that I thought it was yet another rhetorical question. I am grateful to the Member for finally getting round to the point of accepting that there is an issue for debate. Of course, somebody who is a member of the National Crime Agency does not have identical accountability mechanisms to those which apply to members of the PSNI, but I have listed all the ways in which they are as close as they can be given that it is a UK-wide body. I listed the accountability mechanisms to the Policing Board, the ombudsman, CJINI, HMIC and everybody you could think of.

Raymond McCartney (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

I suppose that now when the Minister has been asked to reflect on the point of order, he will reflect on whether he actually agrees with what I said despite the fact that he said that I misquoted him. It is very simple. People can call it a fig leaf. They can call it whatever they want. We will not sign up to any body that does not have the same accountability mechanisms as the PSNI. We will not allow the failings of the past to be repeated and revisited here. That is our job. That is our task. That is what we are elected to do. We make no apology for that, nor will we allow inferences or snide remarks to deflect us from what we do. We are here to represent the people who put us here. There will be proper accountability for all policing structures in the North while Sinn Féin has the powers to do anything about it. Go raibh míle maith agat, a Phríomh-LeasCheann Comhairle.

Mitchel McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, South Antrim)

Question Time will commence shortly. We will conclude the debate after Question Time. Members may take their ease while we change the top table.

The debate stood suspended.

(Mr Deputy Speaker [Mr Beggs] in the Chair)

Oral Answers to Questions

David Hilditch (DUP, East Antrim)

1. asked the First Minister and deputy First Minister how East Antrim is benefitting from the social investment fund (SIF). (AQO 6737/11-15)

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

A LeasCheann Comhairle, with your permission, I will ask junior Minister Jennifer McCann to answer the question.

Jennifer McCann (Sinn Féin, Belfast West)

East Antrim is part of the northern zone. A number of projects were prioritised in the northern zone area plan. Indeed, contractors are on site at one of those capital projects, the Causeway rural and urban network capital project, which is the development of a charity hub in Coleraine. In addition, a key revenue project, employment fuel poverty, has just received a letter of offer. That project, worth £1·8 million, will help insulate homes and reduce heating costs in deprived areas in the 10 current council areas across the zone, including in East Antrim. Details of all projects prioritised in the funding allocation for each of the nine investment fund zones are available on the OFMDFM website.

David Hilditch (DUP, East Antrim)

I thank the junior Minister for her answer. The East Antrim area probably did not benefit terribly well from the capital projects. Will there be opportunities in the future to avail of the social investment fund, particularly given the financial difficulties we face, now and in the future?

Jennifer McCann (Sinn Féin, Belfast West)

As I said, to date, there are 23 projects, with a total commitment of £34·4 million, across all the social investment zones. As of 1 October, a further 12 projects, valued at £18·8 million, are at final-stage approval. Of that, £12·3 million is for capital projects, and it is expected that those projects will soon be issued a letter of offer as well. There is certainly a further strand of SIF money coming soon.

Oliver McMullan (Sinn Féin, East Antrim)

Go raibh maith agat, a LeasCheann Comhairle. What opportunities exist to ensure that the social investment fund adds value and complements other Executive initiatives?

Jennifer McCann (Sinn Féin, Belfast West)

We all acknowledge that working in silos does not work, and, yet, for too long, that is really how business has been done. The social investment fund cannot operate in isolation and must integrate and add value to other key policies and initiatives. For example, SIF projects will need to align with the Executive's child poverty strategy to help alleviate poverty among our communities. We are all too aware of the expected projected rise in child poverty levels, and family poverty levels more generally, due to austerity cuts, which are unacceptable. We want this money to make an impact and address evidenced, objective need where there is a clear deficit. There are also clear links to neighbourhood renewal, education, regeneration and employment programmes, and investment and other initiatives in rural and urban areas. SIF provides a real opportunity to bind those projects together and enhance outcomes, while addressing the gaps that exist.

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

2. asked the First Minister and deputy First Minister, in relation to the independent assessment of the Victims and Survivors Service's individual needs review, carried out by the Commissioner for Victims and Survivors in 2013, what degree of importance was found to be placed on the need for entirely truthful admissions from people who were involved in illegal activities when the service considered individual needs reviews. (AQO 6738/11-15)

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

The individual needs review process was established to assess the needs of individual victims and survivors as defined under the Victims and Survivors Order 2006. The process was informed by the key areas of need identified by the Commission for Victims and Survivors in its comprehensive needs assessment.

The purpose of the review was not to extract admissions of any kind from the individuals who presented at the Victims and Survivors Service. Therefore, in delivering the process, the service operated a clear policy of confidentiality for any information provided during the review and ensured that every client completed a declaration to confirm their understanding of the process.

Last year, the Commission for Victims and Survivors commissioned an independent assessment of the Victims and Survivors Service. As part of that, the service has been asked to produce proposals for a new assessment process, and discussions are ongoing. Any process must take account of the sensitivities involved and the need to ensure that victims and survivors are not subject to unnecessary questioning, while still ensuring that the relevant information is secured to make an informed decision, in line with governance requirements.

Gregory Campbell (DUP, East Londonderry)

I appreciate the need for entirely innocent victims not to be subjected to unnecessary questioning. However, given that there are those who are not so innocent, such as the deputy First Minister himself in the distant past, how does he feel about owning up to the atrocities that he engaged in as part of a truth recovery process to try to help bring others forward into 2014 with an understanding that people with blood on their hands are prepared to own up and accept the part that they played in the past?

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

The definition of a victim is very clear and has been set down in legislation since 2006.

Mike Nesbitt (UUP, Strangford)

The deputy First Minister will know that two schemes under the individual needs review that are most favoured by the bereaved — respite breaks and education and training — have both been suspended due to lack of funds. What assurances can he give the House that those funds will be secured under October monitoring, which, I believe, is £3 million, to get to the point where those schemes are back in play?

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

The Member is absolutely correct. The schemes are of huge importance to victims and survivors. In our previous Question Time, I made it clear that we intended to deal with that during our agreement in relation to October monitoring. Hopefully, that will be dealt with shortly.

Ian Milne (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

Go raibh maith agat, a LeasCheann Comhairle. In the independent assessment, what is the time frame for the implementation of the recommendations?

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

In total, there are something like 70 recommendations — 55 from individual reports, and a further 15 from the commissioner's covering advice. Of those, ownership for 52 lies with the Victims and Survivors Service, and ownership for seven lies with OFMDFM. The Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety has responsibility for two, and the remaining nine have joint ownership. Some 47 of the 70 recommendations have been fully implemented, and 17 have been partially implemented. All the recommendations are due to be implemented by March 2015. Progress against the implementation of the recommendations is monitored monthly via the monthly victims and survivors update meeting. We will continue to ensure that whatever action is taken in respect of the recommendations and, in particular, any others relating to direct victims services not only happens but that they are the right actions that have the desired impact.

Dolores Kelly (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Upper Bann)

In relation to the support given to victims groups such as WAVE, there were issues around the number of pages in application forms that individuals had to complete. Has any flexibility or consideration been given to the concerns raised by those organisations?

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

That has been the subject of controversy for some time. There can be no doubt that the Victims and Survivors Service has taken on board the criticisms that have been made of the difficulties presented, and we await the outcome of its deliberations on how it intends to proceed with that.

Michaela Boyle (Sinn Féin, West Tyrone)

3. asked the First Minister and deputy First Minister what action they are taking to improve the gender balance in public appointments. (AQO 6739/11-15)

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

We are committed to achieving greater diversity in public appointments consistent with the overall principle of selection on merit as a means of ensuring effective public bodies. We recognise that some sections of our society are under-represented on the boards of public bodies, and we are working to encourage greater participation from those groups. Our officials have put in place several measures to raise awareness of public appointment opportunities amongst women and members of other under-represented groups. That is an important step in encouraging them to apply.

Secondly, officials have improved the processes for public appointments aimed at making them more accessible and encouraging greater participation. Some of the steps taken include the establishment of an interdepartmental public appointments forum to share best practice across Departments, including increasing diversity. Independent advice will be provided to the forum by a senior academic with considerable experience in equality and diversity issues, producing the twice-yearly 'All Aboard' publication, which gives details of public appointment opportunities arising over the next six months, and circulating upcoming appointment opportunities to an extensive mailing list of several hundred individuals and organisations, including private and voluntary sector women's groups interested in receiving information on public appointments.

Departments will interview larger numbers of applicants for appointments. Appointment plans will include diversity guidance, which has been developed by the public appointments forum. Rather than making generic appointments, posts are filled to address specific skills in order to build effective teams, and Departments are developing alternatives to established criteria such as better use of presentations.

Michaela Boyle (Sinn Féin, West Tyrone)

I thank the deputy First Minister for his detailed response, and I commend his Department for what it is doing to address female representation on public bodies. What are the current statistics for female representation on public bodies?

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

The recently published public appointments annual report for 2012-13 shows that of a total of 1,050 applicants for public appointments in 2012-13, 317, which is 30%, were women. Of the total number of people appointed in 2012-13, 291, which is 40%, were women. That is a very welcome increase on the 29% in 2011-12. At 31 August 2014, women held 37% of the total number of appointments held. While some progress has been made towards greater diversity, it is clear that further work in raising awareness and encouraging more women to apply for public appointments is needed to ensure an improved gender balance on public bodies.

Pat Ramsey (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Foyle)

Further to Michaela's question, does the deputy First Minister believe that there should be a change in legislation to ensure that groups other than women are included? I attended an all-party group on visual impairment this morning. People who are visually impaired account for only 1% of public appointments across Northern Ireland, and there is discrimination against disabled people generally. Would the deputy First Minister like to comment on that?

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

The Member, as do all other Members, knows that in order to get answers we have to have the agreement of the First Minister and the deputy First Minister. I appreciate the Member's point, which is a good one. It challenges us all on the levels of representation that there are for diverse groups in society. I will undertake to have a conversation with the First Minister to see whether more can be done, although I already indicated in my answer that we are not just talking about increased representation for women. We are looking at how other people in society can feel distant from decision-making and at how we, as a Department, can ensure that we are putting in place processes that can create far greater representation across the spectrum.

Colum Eastwood (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Foyle)

4. asked the First Minister and deputy First Minister whether their Programme for Government 2011-15 commitment of promoting 1,670 jobs in Londonderry in 2013-14 was achieved. (AQO 6740/11-15)

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

The Programme for Government 2011-15 includes a commitment to develop the One Plan for the regeneration of Derry, incorporating the key sites at Fort George and Ebrington. Job creation is one of the key priorities of the One Plan, and that is reflected in the milestones and outputs identified for each year of the Programme for Government period. For 2013-14, the programme set a target of 1,670 jobs promoted through the public, community and private sectors, and we are pleased to report that the total number of jobs promoted for 2013-14 that have been identified to date is 1,683. That figure is an estimate based on inputs from all Departments, from Derry City Council and from Ilex's analysis of the impact of the City of Culture.

The jobs to be created have been achieved through small business start-ups and expansions, support from Invest NI and as a result of the City of Culture year. It includes two major inward investments by Fujitsu and Convergys, which together account for over 500 new jobs. I commend all businesses that have created jobs in the city during a very difficult economic period. At the same time, I recognise that much more work still needs to be done.

Colum Eastwood (Social Democratic and Labour Party, Foyle)

I thank the deputy First Minister for his answer. We all know that there is a difference between jobs promoted and jobs created and people getting paid to work in those jobs. How many actual, real jobs have been created in the financial year?

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

The important thing to remember is that jobs promoted is, effectively, a guarantee of jobs, given the commitments made by different companies, but over a period. These are not jobs that are put in place immediately, but they are not promises; they are firm commitments that are having a very important impact on the employment situation in a city that badly needs jobs created.

One of the key issues for the One Plan is to create jobs in the city. That is also possibly the biggest challenge, given the current economic climate. Interdepartmental groups set interim one-year targets to align with the One Plan catalyst programmes, and each Department reports back through OFMDFM to the strategy board.

As I said, the jobs target for 2013-14 was 1,670. That target was set in 2010 and was based on a number of assumptions about future development. Among the major inward investments negotiated in 2013-14 was investment by Fujitsu. As the Member will know, the First Minister and I met Fujitsu in Japan, and 192 jobs were then created. Of course, we met Convergys when we were in the United States. It is creating 333 jobs. As well as that, I know that a lot of work is taking place under the auspices of Invest NI. Whilst Invest NI cannot direct companies on where to locate, I think that there is a recognition that, given the difficulties that exist in the north-west, not only in the Derry area but in Limavady and Coleraine, that area needs to be tackled. That is one of the reasons why the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development made a decision to relocate to the north-west.

Obviously, we are continually looking at opportunities to bring jobs to the city. Just last week, the First Minister and I met a potential investor. It looks very promising, and, if it comes to pass, as I expect it will —

Roy Beggs (UUP, East Antrim)

The Minister's time is up.

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

— there will be further job announcements in the time ahead.

Sammy Wilson (DUP, East Antrim)

How many of the 1,600 jobs which currently deliver welfare benefits to other parts of the United Kingdom are located in Londonderry? Does the deputy First Minister have any concern that 1,600 public sector jobs could be lost to Northern Ireland? Or, is he more concerned about Sinn Féin's pursuit of power in the Irish Republic than about jobs for people —

Roy Beggs (UUP, East Antrim)

The Member has asked his question.

Sammy Wilson (DUP, East Antrim)

— in Northern Ireland?

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

I hear the nonsense propagated regularly that Sinn Féin's position on the welfare cuts, which are very ruthless and of which more are promised as a result of last week's Conservative party conference, is all to do with the development of Sinn Féin in the South. That is like saying that we do not care about our neighbours or increased levels of child poverty or low-paid workers whose tax credits are being threatened. Of course, we could get into the politics of "whataboutery". People talk about it costing £40,000 a night to police Twaddell Avenue. That is £280,000 a week. Over 12 months, it is a figure of some £12 million, which could, quite easily, employ 200 new nurses or 200 new teachers.

Maeve McLaughlin (Sinn Féin, Foyle)

Go raibh maith agat, a LeasCheann Comhairle. I thank the deputy First Minister for his response, and I welcome the additional focus and the focus on Derry and the north-west. What progress is being made in relation to the Ebrington and Fort George sites?

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

A development framework for the Ebrington site was completed in March 2014. It, ultimately, supported an additional 1,800 jobs in the city and an additional gross value added of £42 million. The framework will, shortly, be submitted for outline planning permission. Current developments on the site include a two-storey underground car park and enabling platform, which have just been completed. Many Members who pass that way on their way to Stormont will have seen that. Commercial opportunity is approved for a further two buildings, and a proposal is being developed for a maritime museum and renovation work to develop a digital and creative industries hub.

The North West Regional Science Park, which I had the privilege of officially opening just a couple of weeks ago, is the first development at Fort George. It was completed recently. On opening, the facility will be 80% occupied, which exceeds its target. The focus there will be on research, development and innovation. I think the fact that the science park is of a regional nature will be a major attractor to that site. It was very encouraging to hear the people associated with the project saying that they envisage a substantial extension to the science park in the time ahead.

So, I think that that, coupled with the many and very exciting expressions of interest that there are in Ebrington, clearly shows that the potential of Fort George and Ebrington to deliver many, many more jobs is very real indeed.

Roy Beggs (UUP, East Antrim)

I remind Members to make sure that their mobile phones are not causing interference to the sound system.

Kieran McCarthy (Alliance, Strangford)

5. asked the First Minister and deputy First Minister for their assessment of the impact that budgetary reductions to the Victims and Survivors Service will have on victims and survivors across the community. (AQO 6741/11-15)

Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin, Mid Ulster)

A LeasCheann Comhairle, with your permission, I will ask junior Minister McCann to answer this question.

Jennifer McCann (Sinn Féin, Belfast West)

We fully acknowledge that the needs of victims and survivors have to given high priority, and we will continue to work to ensure that they are. We are committed to ensuring that the victims and survivors' budget is protected, and, to that end, we have a bid for £1·3 million in additional funding in October monitoring. We have raised the issue directly with the Minister of Finance and are confident that the budget will be protected at the same baseline — £11·3 million — as in the previous financial year. However, we are also aware that there has been an increase in the number of victims and survivors coming forward to the service.

To protect front line services, and in line with the levels of efficiency savings being sought from our Department and its arm's-length bodies, the Victims and Survivors Service is seeking a 4·4% reduction in administration and in funding to groups. The Victims and Survivors Service has been working with groups to help them find the efficiencies needed, and the service itself has been able to make efficiencies in its running costs to mitigate the impact on its front line services. We remain optimistic that a bid for additional funding for the Victims and Survivors Service will be successful in October monitoring. Funding for victims' services has increased over recent years, with £50 million being allocated for victims during this budgetary round.

Kieran McCarthy (Alliance, Strangford)

I thank the junior Minister for her response. Can she, on behalf of the deputy First Minister, explain why he and the First Minister decided to reduce disproportionately funding to the Victims and Survivors Service by somewhere between 15% and 20% while the Department saw a reduction in its budget of 1·4%?

Jennifer McCann (Sinn Féin, Belfast West)

As I said in my answer, there have been efficiency savings of 4·4% right across all arm's-length bodies. Unfortunately, the bid that was made in June monitoring was not met, and that is why we are very optimistic that it will be met in October monitoring. Therefore, the funding cuts that you are talking about had to be implemented in the previous period. We are committed to ensuring that funding is protected for the services that are being delivered to those victims and survivors who need them.

Christopher Hazzard (Sinn Féin, South Down)

Go raibh maith agat, a LeasCheann Comhairle. When does the Minister envisage a new Victims' Commissioner being appointed?

Jennifer McCann (Sinn Féin, Belfast West)

As the Member will be aware, the Commissioner for Victims and Survivors, Kathryn Stone, left her post on 12 June 2014. Our officials are currently working through the processes to appoint a new commissioner. The appointment will be regulated by the Commissioner for Public Appointments and will follow the code of practice for ministerial appointments. The process will be taken forward by HR Connect, and advertisements recently appeared in newspapers. The closing date for applications was 12 September 2014, and interviews will take place in the week commencing 13 October. The Victims and Survivors Forum was consulted on the skills and qualities needed for the role, and that was taken into consideration when finalising the necessary skill sets for the incoming commissioner. I know that the Member will be aware that, as this is a live recruitment process, it is not possible to comment any further.

Roy Beggs (UUP, East Antrim)

I remind Members that supplementary questions should link to the original question, which was about budgetary reductions.

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

The junior Minister has underlined the need for reductions in costs, and so on. Is maintaining and sustaining a service, particularly one that serves as a respite for victims and survivors, not so important that it should remain unaffected by any sorts of cuts? You are sending out the wrong message to victims and survivors if you continue a policy of reduction in cost.

Jennifer McCann (Sinn Féin, Belfast West)

The real source of the financial difficulties that we are in today is the result of the Tory Government reducing the block grant from 2011 in real terms by £1·5 billion. We are facing into year four of those cuts, and we will see that being the case with all sorts of funding. I agree with you about victims and survivors funding being crucial. I have met a number of organisations and, indeed, individual victims along with junior Minister Bell in recent days, and we have to look at where those services are being cut, but we also have to remember that this is a result of the Tory cuts to the block grant and is the type of thing that we are seeing being played out and cascading down to impact on vulnerable people and vulnerable groups in our society out there.