It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend—I will call him my hon. Friend— the Member for Blaydon (Mr Anderson), and I am pleased that we have the full support of Her Majesty’s Opposition today. I have had the pleasure of knowing him since 2010, when we served together on the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee and on the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly. There are many issues that...
I could give a diplomatic answer to a lot of that. My first ever point of order asked why Sinn Féin gets paid when it does not come here, so I will not contradict myself on that issue. The hon. Lady knows my view on this and, in talking about the future of the Assembly, it is about making sure that we create the right political space in which all parties can find agreement and come together...
I have a sentence and a bit to go, but I will give way.
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I appreciate that this is about putting stuff on the record. I have a service record, and I have spoken to many councils during my time in Northern Ireland about the delivery of this issue. I will never shy away from making sure that our armed services and veterans have the best possible services. It is important that we constantly...
I congratulate the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on securing this important debate. As has been mentioned, he is a former member of the UDR, as are the right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson) and the hon. Member for Fermanagh and South Tyrone (Tom Elliott). Many people have stepped up to be leaders in Northern Ireland and have served gallantly in very...
My hon. Friend went back to Cheshire. The point is that we went back to our homes, to a safe place, while lots of people who served in the UDR and the RUC still lived in fear every moment of the day. I would like to express my condolences and sympathy to the families and friends of the young soldiers who on 9 April 1990 tragically lost their lives in that horrendous terrorist atrocity. It is...
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I give him my reassurance that the route that I have just suggested will address that and give people confidence. I am a former soldier and I played by the rules. Many people played by the rules. Occasionally, there were individuals who made mistakes, for which they must be accountable, but we were part of the establishment. We had rules of...
I understand the passion with which the hon. Gentleman talks. It is important that our response and the state’s response is balanced and proportionate.
FOI requests may be responded to by any member of staff across the Department, as they are allocated to the most appropriate person to respond depending on the subject of the request.
The Department does not have a specific budget for procurement management as the cost of this task is subsumed within existing corporate service roles and therefore not separately identified.
Under the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986 the deputy chair of the Boundary Commission for Northern Ireland must be a High Court judge appointed by the Lord Chief Justice for Northern Ireland. The Commission also has two members who are appointed by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. The appointment of members is regulated by the Office of the Commissioner for Public...
The Department does not own any land.
As of February 2017, the latest date for which data is available, the number and proportion of staff employed by the Department is as follows: a) Full- time permanent - 63 (78%); b) Part-time permanent - 5 (6%); c) Contract of less than 2 years - 1 (1%) (Apprentice on a 18-month contract); d) Agency staff - 5 (6%); e) Zero hours contract - 0.
None of the spending on external contracts was for the services of management consultants.
As of February 2017, the latest date for which data is available, there are 30 staff seconded to the department from the Northern Ireland Civil Service.
The Northern Ireland Office (NIO) does not record the total number of security passes it issues and is therefore not able to provide this information. This is as a result of other departments being provided with passes to allow access to their facilities on site outside NIO office hours including access to IT servers.
