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6.53 pm
Mr. Peter Robinson (Belfast, East): The process of gentrifying members of Sinn Fein and elevating its leaders began many years ago. It started in secret meetings, but its first public manifestation came in 1993 in the joint declaration, which is sometimes referred to as the Downing Street declaration. The then Prime Minister recognised that it would not be palatable simply to bring those who were recognised as active IRA terrorists into the democratic fold as if nothing had happened--that there had to be a cleansing process and that Sinn Fein-IRA had to do something to make people believe that a change had taken place.
The two Prime Ministers set down in paragraph 10 of the joint declaration the criteria that they would apply to bringing Sinn Fein-IRA into the political process. They first required that there had to be a "permanent end" to acts of paramilitary violence. Sinn Fein-IRA balked at the word "permanent". Months of clarification were required, because they were not prepared to sign up to anything that might be deemed to be a permanent end to violence. Automatically, Unionists gauged that their refusal to say that they had permanently ended violence was an indicator that they would turn the violence on again if things did not go their way and they wanted to apply more pressure.
There have been many stages in the process but, to this very moment, the giving up of arms so that they could not be used in the future would have been the one clear indicator that Sinn Fein-IRA were putting violence behind them. Although that would not be a totally safe method of calculation, it would be a clear statement of intent that they were reforming their ways. That has not happened and I do not believe that it will.
During the referendum campaign, when many of us said that the Belfast agreement was silent on those issues and that there was no requirement to decommission before the Sinn Fein-IRA representatives entered government and the prisoners were released, the Prime Minister came out with a lot of promises. As the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) said, the right hon. Gentleman made hand-written pledges that those who used or threatened violence would be excluded from the government of Northern Ireland and that prisoners would be kept inside unless violence was given up for good. In the House, he defined that as meaning decommissioning.
At the Dispatch Box, the Prime Minister was asked by the Leader of the Opposition:
On a recent visit to No. 10 Downing street, I remember being left open mouthed as I saw two members of the IRA Army Council roaming freely around the corridors in their shirt sleeves. The previous Government knew that those people were responsible for giving the instructions to launch a rocket at No. 10 Downing street, but this Government consistently go along with whatever Sinn Fein-IRA demand because they know that they have the capacity to carry out more violence on the mainland against the citizens of the United Kingdom.
The Bill is unacceptable, and it would remain so even if the best of the amendments were accepted. That might make it less unacceptable, but it still would not be acceptable because it is predicated on the acceptanceinto government of Sinn Fein-IRA without any decommissioning whatever taking place. It merely--and in my view quite inadequately--purports to provide a failsafe against failure to engage in decommissioning ex post facto. So far from the Bill being a failsafe, it is a risk--as even the Secretary of State said from the Dispatch Box. That statement is a long way from the words spoken by the Prime Minister on the steps of Castle buildings, when he talked of the certainty that these measures would contain.
The Bill suggests that the so-called failsafe is triggered--an unfortunate term--by a failure to keep commitments. The commitments that are expected to be kept are set out in clause 1. What commitments have the IRA or--on the other side of the coin--Sinn Fein made? They are not set down in the joint statement or in the Bill. Who made them? When were they given? The IRA certainly has not made any. In the last IRA statement about decommissioning that is on record, the issue was "firmly ruled out"; it was "a red herring"; and talk of a "gesture" handover of weapons was "fanciful." The statement went on:
I suspect that the commitments referred to are not in the Belfast agreement, because that simply commits people to use any influence that they may have. No sanction is applied if they do not use that influence or if decommissioning does not take place. The provisional movement says that it will keep to the Belfast agreement, because that agreement does not require it to do anything more than to use whatever influence it may have.
The commitment referred to cannot be a commitment contained in the report of General de Chastelain, because there is no such commitment in that report. It cannot be
any commitment contained in the declaration of Sinn Fein-IRA during the recent talks process. In that declaration, they referred to decommissioning and said that
Dr. Norman A. Godman (Greenock and Inverclyde):
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his characteristic courtesy in giving way to me. I assure him that I have no wish to disrupt his speech, but I want to ask him a question. Is it his intention to take up a seat on the Executive or to refuse to take up such a position?
Mr. Robinson:
It is clear that we are trying to ensure that the Executive will have excluded from it those who are still wedded to violence. In those circumstances, we would be delighted to take up a seat in what would be a more democratic process. I am sure that those are the circumstances that the hon. Gentleman envisages, and I hope that he will vote for that this evening.
The Sinn Fein declaration went on to say that, against the background of the full implementation of the agreement,
It should be remembered that all the personnel involved in the IRA army council were in Castle buildings and were capable of taking decisions on behalf of the IRA. They could have clearly indicated that they were prepared to decommission.
Mr. Jeremy Corbyn (Islington, North):
I have followed the hon. Gentleman's speech closely. Would I be right in thinking that he has a problem with the very idea of sharing any power, authority or responsibility with any representative of the nationalist community? Would that be a fair summation of his views?
Mr. Robinson:
No, but I would not expect to hear a fair summation of my views from the person who has just spoken. It has been abundantly clear from the moment that I stood to my feet that it is a requirement that those in government and exercising Executive power should be those who are exclusively committed to peaceful and democratic means. There is no commitment to peaceful and democratic means if one has an armed terrorist organisation at one's beck and call with tonnes of Semtex, thousands of rifles and handguns, and even surface-to-air missiles.
"Will you agree with me that prisoners should not be released early until the organisations they belong to have substantially decommissioned their weapons?"
The Prime Minister replied:
"The answer to your question is, yes, of course it is the case that both in respect of taking seats in the government of Northern Ireland and the early release of prisoners--the only organisations that qualify for that are organisations that have given up violence and given it up for good."
13 Jul 1999 : Column 216
The right hon. Gentleman came to Northern Ireland and pleaded with the people that they should believe him and take his promises and pledges that violence would have to be given up, that decommissioning would take place and that no one would be released from prison or enter government unless that had occurred.
We all know that our position has been vindicated. Although we find ourselves on the verge of government, Sinn Fein-IRA still have not decommissioned one bullet or one ounce of Semtex and they are being allowed into government under the Government's proposal without doing anything in relation to decommissioning. The Bill is therefore being introduced by a Government who once again find themselves toadying to the terrorists.
"The weapons belong to the revolution, not to any individuals."
It added:
"Nothing would be surrendered until all objectives are achieved."
There is no commitment from the IRA that has to be kept.
"the full implementation of the Agreement would demonstrably facilitate the decommissioning process".
After the agreement has been fully implemented and they have gained all the concessions, decommissioning might be facilitated.
"we believe that all of us, as participants acting in good faith, could succeed in persuading those with arms to decommission".
So the Sinn Fein statement contains no commitment to do anything other than say that decommissioning would be facilitated if it were given all the concessions contained in the Belfast agreement. In those circumstances it "could" succeed--not "will" succeed. Sinn Fein will not ensure that it does succeed, even though it has the capacity to do so.
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