Gay Mitchell
Question:107 Mr. G. Mitchell asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs the Government's current priorities in regard to Northern Ireland. [21412/03]
Ceisteanna – Questions (Resumed). Priority Questions. - Northern Ireland Issues.
The Government's overriding objective is to work towards underpinning peace and political stability in Northern Ireland through the full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement. Our immediate and interlocking priorities are to achieve an early date for Assembly elections; to encourage the relevant parties to take the necessary steps to ensure the restoration and sustained operation of the devolved institutions in Northern Ireland; and to implement all aspects of the Joint Declaration that come within the remit of the two Governments.
With regard to the first priority, we remain of the view that elections to the Northern Ireland Assembly should take place at the earliest opportunity. The optimum context for such elections is one in which there is reasonable confidence on all sides that a sustainable executive can be formed after the poll. To achieve that context, we are encouraging the parties in Northern Ireland to definitively address the key outstanding issues of confidence, namely, the ending of paramilitary activity and ensuring the full, inclusive and uninterrupted operation of the institutions of the Agreement.
The recent direct engagements between the parties themselves have been encouraging. Whatever reciprocal assurances they can offer each other will obviously have a significant confidence building impact. In addition, it is important to recall that the Agreement was a collective endeavour and that all the pro-Agreement parties have a contribution to make in ensuring the sustainability of its institutional architecture.
With regard to the implementation of all aspects of the Joint Declaration that fall under the remit of the two Governments, we are continuing to work with the British Government, including through the framework of the British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference, to advance progress on important areas such as policing, security normalisation, criminal justice, equality and human rights. On 2 July both Governments published a statement of commitments under the Joint Declaration which we believe are capable of being delivered in the near term. At the next meeting of the conference, which is scheduled for November, we will assess progress in meeting those targets and review the other more long-term commitments arising from the Joint Declaration.
I thank the Minister for his reply. When does he anticipate the holding of elections in Northern Ireland? What window of opportunity exists? If elections do not take place, what is the alternative scenario? What is the timescale involved?
Was additional information given to the Government in recent months regarding the disappeared, as IRA and Sinn Féin spokespersons have stated? I have not yet read Gerry Adams's latest volume of propaganda but I look forward to reading the chapter on Mrs. McConville.
Buy it.
However, I doubt very much I will find it. This mother of nine disappeared and was shot in the back of the head. Does the Minister agree there are reasonable suspicions the disappeared are being used as pawns in this game in Northern Ireland? Will the Minister fully encourage citizens of the Republic to join the Police Service of Northern Ireland?
With regard to the first series of supplementary questions, the Government's position is that elections should have been held when they were due and they need to be held as a matter of urgency. If they do not take place, that will feed negatively into the wider political situation.
I refer to the non-operability of the executive, which has been with us for almost 12 months. According to the default mechanism under the Agreement, the two Governments deal with non-devolved matters under the aegis of the British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference.
The Taoiseach has outlined the formal position on the question of the disappeared and I do not wish to add to that. Information is provided in good faith. This concerns the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform directly and not me, but it is my understanding that we have been acting on existing information. Progress has been made on these sensitive and difficult matters for the families concerned. I would not like to characterise the Deputy's comments as reflecting the situation. It is a question of everyone trying to bring closure to these matters for the families and I pay tribute to the work of former Minister, John Wilson, who is doing all he can in his role to resolve these matters to the satisfaction of the families.
With regard to the Police Service of Northern Ireland, we decided following the Weston Park negotiations that if a sufficient threshold had been reached which meant that policing reform was being implemented on the basis of the Patten report, there could be further implementation on the basis that normal policing could best be guaranteed by the full participation of both communities with the intention that policing should be regarded as a normal career in a normalised situation, as it is here. We recommend the career to anyone who is minded to take it up, whether he or she resides North or South.
Has the Minister's attention been drawn to weekend press reports, which allege – I have no evidence to support this – that millionaire members of the IRA do not want Sinn Féin to join the policing authority because it will interfere with illegal activities from which they generate their wealth? Are the reports accurate and, if so, what steps will he take to address them?
I do not know whether the reports are accurate. The Government wants to push ahead with policing reform. We want to see the full participation of everyone involved in policing reform, including the institutions and the policing board. The sooner that happens, the better. The work done by the policing board has been one of the success stories of the Agreement. I commend its members and those who work on local police partnerships as they provide their service, time and effort to bring about a situation where everyone can have confidence in the policing service, which is a fundamental building block of the transformed society we are all trying to achieve through exclusively peaceful means in Northern Ireland. Similar legislation to the Criminal Assets Bureau legislation has been incorporated into law in Northern Ireland. I hope that will deal with criminality as effectively in that jurisdiction as the CAB has dealt with similar criminality here.