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5.40 pm
Mr. David Wilshire (Spelthorne): Supporting the Bill gives me no pleasure whatever. I wish I did not have to, but I do so for one clear and simple reason--the conditions that originally made the emergency powers necessary have still not gone away. There is still no permanent return to normality. In Northern Ireland, there is still no universal renouncement of violence for political ends; there is still no decommissioning of weapons and explosives; and there is still no end to beatings, torture and exile.
Not only do those conditions continue, but there is now at least one extra reason for keeping up our guard and voting for the Bill. That reason is the lynch-mob killings in the nationalist community, by members of that community. Even if the five people recently murdered were guilty of a crime, there is no crime known to mankind that could ever justify summary execution as we have seen it on the streets of Northern Ireland in the past five weeks.
I applaud the Government--I again record my pleasure at hearing qualified continuing support from the Opposition--because they are striking a note of optimism. The Government show optimism by seeking only a two-year, not a five-year, extension. They show optimism by excluding some of the current provisions, and by promising to keep all other powers under review.
The Government show optimism, which the hon. Member for Redcar (Ms Mowlam) has not noticed or is not prepared to give them credit for. The thrust of her speech, if I understand it correctly, was that the Bill shows no response to changes in circumstances in Northern Ireland, or too little. I refer the hon. Lady, and anybody tempted to agree with her, to the ever-growing list of responses to the changing security position. I refer her to the comment by my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State that the Bill itself is a response.
There are changes in the Bill which will alter the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1991. I do not believe that those changes are too few--perhaps they are too many. However, I am prepared to give the Government the benefit of the doubt. Even this afternoon, my right hon. Friend's speech showed a response. The idea that there has been no response, or too little, can be dismissed out of hand.
Although not many people attend these debates, those who do so will be well aware that I am much less optimistic than my colleagues on the Front Bench. Nevertheless, I salute unreservedly the progress that they have made. I applaud the determination to keep the peace process on track shown by both the Prime Minister and my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State. I rejoice with the people of the Province at the huge improvements in their way of life. I wish, as I am sure the House wishes, only that the improvements had been even greater in the past year.
Sadly, I have little doubt that there will be those in the Province, in the Republic and in the United States who will portray the Bill as proof that the House wishes to repress the nationalist community. They will claim that it is proof that we wish to deny democracy to the Province, and they will see the Bill as proof that we wish to undermine the rule of law. That is total and utter nonsense.
The true purpose of the Bill is the exact opposite of what is claimed by Sinn Fein-IRA. It is the inevitable response to the continuing terrorism of Sinn Fein-IRA. Sinn Fein-IRA, not the Government, is now the real repressor of the nationalist community. Sinn Fein-IRA is bludgeoning into cowed silence the community that it claims to represent, but it can get only 10 per cent. support in a secret ballot when the guns are not to be seen. Sinn Fein-IRA, not the Government, is the real denier of democracy in the Province. Sinn Fein threatens to resume the use of the bullet and the bomb if it does not get its way.
Mr. Roy Beggs (East Antrim):
Does the hon. Member accept that suspicions are very strong in Northern Ireland that Sinn Fein has not done enough to curtail the current spate of drug-related murders, attributed to the IRA?
Mr. Wilshire:
The hon. Gentleman is being rather generous in saying that Sinn Fein-IRA has not done enough. Perhaps somebody could tell me what Sinn Fein-IRA has done to try to stop those foul murders. If somebody knows something, I look forward to being told. However, I expect that the hon. Gentleman agrees with me that it has done absolutely nothing, and that is despicable.
Sinn Fein-IRA, not the Government, is busily trying to undermine the rule of law in the Province. It has taken unto itself the role of investigator, of prosecutor, of judge and--worst of all--of executioner. While each continuing manifestation of terrorism is enough to justify support for the Bill, the five recent murders make the case utterly overwhelming.
Over the past five weeks, five nationalists have been murdered by members of their own community. The House must ask why that has happened. In my judgment, the answer is that a small number of evil psychopaths believe that their wish for a united Ireland entitles them
to play God--or perhaps Satan. Their approach is stark. There is no need in their world for formal investigation; no need to test anything that they consider to be evidence; no need to allow anybody whom they consider guilty to defend himself; and no need to provide for any appeal. In their world, in their ideology and in their twisted minds, all that is necessary is to blow men's faces away with a shotgun, and not even to say sorry.
The House must ask another question--who are the evil people who perpetrate those acts on the streets of Northern Ireland? I have no doubt that they are members of Sinn Fein-IRA. If I understood the speech by the hon. Member for Redcar, she too believes that that is the case. I think that she is right, and I am convinced that I am, too. Those who have been charged with investigating those murders say so; it does not pay to sneer at the RUC or at the security services just because they are what they are. They say that the evidence is clear. Furthermore, the leading members of all the democratic parties in the Province say so too. I am particularly impressed by the comments made by leading members of the SDLP. My experience of Northern Ireland affairs tells me that, when the SDLP speaks about the nationalist community, the House does well to listen, and the SDLP confirms what the hon. Member for Redcar said this afternoon.
The reason why I am certain that the murders are the work of Sinn Fein-IRA is that Sinn Fein spokesmen will not condemn them. Their evasiveness and twisting and turning on radio and television have been sickening. If those killings are not the work of the IRA, why do not Adams and McGuinness condemn them? The only reason I can think of is that they are clear in their minds that the killings are the work of the IRA, and they are not allowed by their godfathers to condemn them.
Before the House decides later tonight how to vote, I urge it to think through the reasons for those killings. I offer three possible reasons: first, using the twisted logic of Sinn Fein-IRA, those foul murders provide a bargaining chip ahead of Senator Mitchell's report. Secondly, Sinn Fein-IRA appears to need the profits from drug dealing; and thirdly, it is losing control of those it calls "its people". History teaches that Sinn Fein-IRA is perfectly willing to kill its own people to strengthen its hand. If Senator Mitchell confirms what I believe to be true--that Sinn Fein-IRA needs to do more to convince us that it is committed to permanent peace and democratic change--it will be very handy for it to use the bargaining chip of offering to stop the killings, the beatings and the torture. That is the sickening logic of people of this sort.
The evidence about the IRA's finances which is stacking up suggests to me that its funds are drying up. Inside the Province and in the United Kingdom generally, the police crackdown has been singularly successful. The IRA's ill-gotten gains are now much harder to come by. The international funds that used to be surreptitiously sent to the terrorists are now going to legitimate economic development projects. That being so, any criminal mind-- not just the mind of a terrorist--will turn to other ways of filling the coffers. Unfortunately, drugs are becoming as much as a problem throughout the island of Ireland as they are in the rest of the United Kingdom, and I think it inevitable that both terrorist camps will see them as a source of easy money to replace the funds that they have lost.
I see Sinn Fein-IRA's loss of control as the key reason for the dreadful murders. The other reasons certainly contribute, but it is the loss of control above all else that
begins to explain what has been going on. In recent months, I have seen for myself what the peace process has done to boost a return to what other parts of the United Kingdom consider normal policing and the normal rule of law. I have also seen the huge popularity of that return among people of both traditions in the Province.
I have been to places such as Newry, Crossmaglen and west Belfast; an English Conservative of my views would not formerly have been seen in such places. The fact that I can go there and move about freely is certainly a sign of progress. I have seen for myself that the RUC has changed--if indeed it ever was like the image portrayed by the nationalist community. It is being accepted now.
I commend to the House an example of that, which I learned in Newry. It has become possible to hold careers exhibitions for recruitment to the British Army and the RUC even in places along the border with the Republic. It has even got to the point where young people will visit the recruiting stands despite the fact that they are picketed by Sinn Fein-IRA.
Small wonder, then, that the latter is worried. Its spokesmen go on television and radio to claim that policing and the rule of law do not exist in the nationalist areas, but I and others have seen the people of such areas turning to the RUC for help and protection. It is that which Sinn Fein-IRA finds utterly unacceptable, which is why it is still prepared to kill, threaten and intimidate.
Despite the hard-won progress with the peace process, I believe that we continue to face a threat and a new set of evils. The continuing beatings and torture, and the latest murders, all produce fear. Fear in turn produces silence. In such circumstances, every democratic society has to contemplate drastic measures. My hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mr. Hunter) put his finger on it: some of the measures in the Bill may be the lesser of two evils, but any democratic society must defend itself and its people against those who do not uphold the standards to which we subscribe.
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