Police (Northern Ireland) Act 2000 (Renewal of Temporary Provisions) Order 2004

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 2:00 pm on 11 March 2004.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Lord Glentoran Lord Glentoran Conservative 2:00, 11 March 2004

My Lords, I thank the Lord President for bringing the order before the House today. I take as my reference that which I said in the debate on 15 November 2000, when the Bill was under scrutiny in your Lordships' House. In principle we disagree, as we did then, with the 50:50 policy. One does not need to cast the memory or the thinking process back too far to understand that under-representation of Catholics in the police force was 100 per cent a consequence of insufficient Catholic and republican applicants and nothing whatever to do with the recruitment process. There has been legislation in Northern Ireland concerning fair employment, which related to those matters, for many years. It was strictly adhered to and policed. In fact, all recruits to my company and most others had to declare at the time, in a totally confidential envelope, whether they were perceived to be Roman Catholics or perceived to be Protestants. I say that because one has to be a Protestant or Roman Catholic Jew or, in my case, a Roman Catholic or Protestant atheist. That is the way it is and was—I do not believe that it has changed very much.

We on these Benches do not argue with the fact that the republican, nationalist and Roman Catholic population is still under-represented on the police force. What is required is for the leaders of the larger part of that community to join the police force and police board and take a full and active part in the administration and policing of our Province. I know that the SDLP is a very courageous example here and I give it full credit. It is suffering in its own communities on a regular basis. But we need the full weight of the republican movement and Sinn Fein to help to correct this anomaly.

At Third Reading of the legislation on 15 November 2000, the noble Lord, Lord Molyneaux, moved a very reasonable and sensible amendment to this part of the Bill. It placed responsibility on the chief constable to bring in measures to ensure that the composition of the police service is representative of the population of Northern Ireland. There was a long debate on that amendment. It will suffice for me to restate what I said on that day:

"I support the amendment".

That was the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Molyneaux.

"The business of 50:50 recruitment and of reaching the right balance in reflecting the population is necessary, but there is a better way of doing it than the way proposed in the Bill. I hope that the Government will be able to find a way and not be stuck with something that is rather meaningless. As I have said, once we get open season for the nationalist population to join the RUC, we are home and dry".—[Official Report, 15/11/00; col. 286.]

I still believe all that I said four years ago.

I am sad that the Government have found themselves stuck with a heavy and cumbersome tool to solve a delicate confidence-building problem. In her remarks, the Lord President said that to remove the plank of 50:50 would remove the confidence of republicans in the police force. With all due respect to her and the Government, I think, hope and believe that we are well past that day. But I believe that the continual aggravation, the speeches that can be written—some of them instanced by the noble Lord, Lord Laird, just now—and the accusations that can still be made in this political process are wrong. I am getting frustrated with the Government's lack of progress in Northern Ireland. It is high time that some progress was made to rethink this cumbersome and now somewhat old-fashioned and outdated tool. On that basis, I shall support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Laird.

I have spoken with a number of people at some length outside the Chamber. A debate has been going on about the "snakes and ladders" process. Recruits find their way up the ladders, get into the pond for selection and fail to be selected, in the manner read out by the noble Lord, Lord Laird, because of the 50:50 rule. They crash to the bottom and have to pick themselves up and start all over again or go to London, or some other place, if they wish to join a police force.

The Lord President was good enough to write to me about this. I read her letter several times and I have forwarded it to my honourable friend in another place, David Lidington. We are not convinced by what she wrote or by her reasons for not looking at this process or changing it. From what she wrote to me, I understand that she is saying that people are basically satisfied with the system and that those who fall to the bottom of the ladders—go back to "Start", so to speak—have a better opportunity to get in if they climb the ladders a second time and score better points on the way up. I am not sure that that addresses the point. I can see the argument, but I do not give it a great deal of credit.

It is sad that four years on we are still stuck with this 50:50 business and that we are still arguing about it. It is even sadder—this may be criticism of myself—that I have not changed my mind nor seen reasons to do so. If the Lord President was going to remind me that at some stage in the past year or so my honourable friend in another place took a somewhat different view over 50:50, I shall put on record that I never really agreed with him and that the party has looked at the matter again and has returned to its original stance, which I think is fair. I support this amendment.