Examination of Witnesses (Questions 200
- 219)
WEDNESDAY 27 JANUARY 1999
MRS JANET
TREWSDALE and DR
PAUL GORECKI
200. Can I turn to a slightly different
subject now. I am conscious that, I think, all of us, even despite
things that might be happening in the Chamber at the moment, would
like to see the peace process continue and be successful, but
it does occur to me that there might be an affect, or a price
for peace, as well, in terms of employment, and I just wondered
what you thought the effect of peace might be, in terms of the
differences in employment between the communities in Northern
Ireland? And I say that in the sense that it occurs to me that
if the peace process is successful then there are clearly some
areas, the security-related industries being the obvious one,
where there will be a scaling-down of employment, and I just wondered
what you thought the consequences of peace might be, in terms
of employment differences and employment opportunities between
the communities?
(Dr Gorecki) I guess you can think of the effects
in three ways. First of all, you get those sorts of industries
which are liable to benefit from peace and political stability,
so that would be tourism, where some work we did suggested maybe
a 10,000 to 14,000 increase in jobs over a five-year period; there
undoubtedly would be an increase in inward investment, and, by
doing comparisons with Scotland and the Republic of Ireland, maybe
an extra 1,400 jobs a year would come in. And you would also have
a different sort of investment coming in, a higher quality investment,
in the sense, you could argue, with political violence, it is
very unlikely that firms are going to come to Northern Ireland
and invest substantially in R&D facilities, invest in extensive
training, in developing sub-supplier networks, simply because
if the violence gets out of hand then they would have to leave,
and those sorts of costs cannot be recovered, that investment
is just down the drain. So that you are more liable to get firms
that come in that do put roots down in the local economy, and,
as a result, generate a lot more employment, a much higher multiplier
effect than just the number of people that they employ in their
factory. Now, in terms of what the breakdown would be by religion,
I am not in a position to make any sort of judgement about that
because we are not quite sure what industries there would be or
any sort of inward investment, but, clearly, there would be substantial
gains for all, in terms of getting access to jobs; sorry, I am
not quite sure one can break that down. But, certainly, when you
come to look at the jobs which are liable to be lost, clearly,
those are going to be predominantly in the security forces, where,
if you look at the RUC, it is overwhelmingly Protestant, as is
evidenced in some of the testimony in briefs you have already
had. And there, clearly, if you look at the size of the RUC in,
say, 1994/5 and you look at police forces in Great Britain, with
sorts of population between 1 million and 2 million, then you
can get substantial reductions. If you take Hampshire, for example,
the force would go down to something like 3,000; if you take Merseyside,
it may go down to about 5,000 or 6,000, I cannot give you the
exact number. So, depending on which particular force you choose,
you are going to get substantial reductions, no matter what; and,
clearly, most of that is going to occur amongst Protestants, and
if you want to increase the Catholic proportion, then you may
have even more than that. So clearly there is going to be a major
issue there, which the Patten Commission is going to deal with,
and presumably will report in the next few months; so, clearly,
there will be major job losses there which will be concentrated
in one community. In terms of the wider economic implications,
that will depend on the sorts of packages that those people receive
and the degree to which they retain spending power in the economy,
and hence manage to keep service sector people employed. It will
also depend on the degree to which that, say, £400/£500/£600
million of public expenditure remains within Northern Ireland;
clearly, if it remains within Northern Ireland, that means that
substantially larger employment will be created than otherwise
would be. So it is not clear quite what the effect will be, it
depends on the public expenditure implications as well. And I
guess the third aspect, which I have already alluded to earlier,
is that, potentially, if you have peace and political stability,
you have an environment, hopefully, in which you can have a more
integrated labour market, in which it will be less segmented,
so you may be able to, for example, build factories on neutral
sites, to benefit those from disadvantaged areas, so you can get
clusters of factories getting together, so people have more choice
in terms of jobs, so if there is a decline in this employer they
are not going to get a job there, rather than being concentrated
in one area where there is only one employer, and the employers
will have a greater variety of labour from which they can draw
upon. But what the breakdown will be I do not know, except insofar
as, hopefully, all these developments will lead to more employment
and lower unemployment, and, do not forget, Northern Ireland's
unemployment rate has already declined substantially, so it is
no longer the worst in the UK, Merseyside and the North East now
have higher unemployment rates, where, say, twenty years ago,
Northern Ireland's unemployment rate was close to twice the national
average. So I think, hopefully, the employment distribution may
not be that important, what may be important is that unemployment
would be driven down very low and most people who wanted a job
would be able to have a job.
Mr Grogan
201. To what extent do you think all this
has got something to do with differences between Catholic and
Protestant schools, in the representation of Catholics, and what
differences in performance, and so on, might affect employment
opportunities, and is there anything the Government could do?
Is it related to schooling at all?
(Mrs Trewsdale) You are talking about the segregation
of the schooling system, are you, or are you talking about the
11-plus?
202. I am inviting you to comment, on the
11-plus, or the difference in performance between different schools,
and so on: is it a factor, do you think?
(Mrs Trewsdale) I think the underachievement in
education, regardless of religion, is a very important aspect,
and one obviously that we have looked at in great detail. Paul,
do you want to follow up on that one.
(Dr Gorecki) We could send you some supplementary
evidence. But, I think, in the work that was done for us on educational
underachievement, the first paper is a sort of scene-setting paper,
and I think the result of that was that the educational outcomes,
in terms of grades at 16 and 18, were very similar between the
Catholic system and the Protestant system, and, insofar as there
was an imbalance in grammar school provision in the Catholic system,
the Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights addressed that,
I think, about four or five years ago, and that is now being rectified.
Furthermore, the funding formula now is completely transparent,
and so two schools in exactly the same situation are now treated
equally because of the introduction of formula funding under the
Education Reform (Northern Ireland) Order of 1989. And, of course,
the National Curriculum is now taught everywhere, so, in that
sense, in terms of output at 16 and 18, there may be differences
in the subjects which are taught, the subjects people take, there
may be different preferences there, I do not know, in the sense,
traditionally, science has been taught less in the Catholic schools
than in the Protestant system; but, apart from that, I think the
output at age 16 and 18 is very similar. But, if I am wrong on
that, we could certainly send you a supplementary note on it.
203. Thank you. So, moving on from schools,
you seem to be saying it is probably not much to do with the performance
of different schools; does higher education come into it, the
provision of places in higher education? I note that you said,
in answer to one of the earlier questions, that there has been
a change in recent years, in terms of the sorts of people who
go into higher education in Northern Ireland, is that right? I
seemed to hear you say that—no?
(Mrs Trewsdale) No, what we said, I think, was
that Northern Ireland has the highest proportion of its school-leavers
going on to university education, it is 40 per cent, which is,
I think, highest of any region in the United Kingdom; and, again,
that we have a higher proportion of students who are from disadvantaged
backgrounds within that 40 per cent who go on to university. The
two universities in Northern Ireland have always been intergrated,
there has never been any segregation at all in terms of religion
at either of the universities; there has been, traditionally,
many moons ago, obviously, that certain professions would have
tended to go with certain religions, but, thankfully, that has
now changed, and indeed is changing. I think that the two universities—you
are talking specifically about higher education, so I am talking
at university level—that they are indeed already promoting
equality of opportunity, as far as the students are concerned.
I think, if you go to the Dearing Report and the Annex on Northern
Ireland, you will find that one of the problems in Northern Ireland
higher education is that we are some 4,000 places short, in terms
of the number of students, and, traditionally, apart from obviously
some going to Oxbridge, which has always happened, and other universities,
we exported most of those extras into Scotland. Dundee has been
referred to many times as the third Northern Ireland university,
and, of course, with our students, as I have already said, coming
from already disadvantaged backgrounds, that the £1,000 fee
for the students, and indeed the running down of the grants in
favour of the loans, and the idea that non-Scottish students attending
Scottish universities have to pay £4,000, not £3,000,
as they would if they were going in Northern Ireland or in England
or Wales, is actually causing a problem. Now, if I could just
sort of wear my other——
204. Is that impressionistic, or is there
statistical evidence?
(Mrs Trewsdale) No, I was going to say, if I could
just now put on my other hat, which is as a university lecturer,
at the Queen's University of Belfast, and I could say to you that,
as far as the students that we have from disadvantaged homes are
concerned, the argument is, well, the £1,000 will be paid
and you have the loans rather than the grants; problem solved.
But that is not how it is perceived by the families; it is perceived
that debt is involved, and there is a tradition one comes across
in Northern Ireland, and, I would say, from both communities but
in particular in the faculty that I actually work in, the majority,
the vast majority, of the students actually do come from a Roman
Catholic background, there is this fear of debt, and the idea
that one does not take out students' loans even. Middle-class
families understand things about low interest rates and payments
back and disadvantaged families do not; loans equals debt equals
do not touch. So they work, and they work, for jobs, paying money,
and, as a result of that, of course, their studies do tend to
suffer, it is a vicious circle.
205. But has there been a fall in applications
then?
(Mrs Trewsdale) There has not been a fall in applications
yet to the Northern Ireland universities, but I do understand,
again, that there has certainly been a fall in the applications
from Northern Ireland to Scotland, to Scottish universities, because
of the four-year business. But I think we are still waiting for
data to be produced there.
Mr McWalter
206. Can we just develop a little bit on
the subject about the equality duty on public authorities, that
you mentioned earlier, in talking to my colleague, Mr McCabe.
It is a bit rich, is it not, if the public sector starts laying
down all these criteria about fair employment, and then, at the
same time, in the Police Service, there is a huge imbalance between
one community over another? And, try as it might, if the Police
Service or the Northern Ireland Office, or whatever, say, "Well,
there are difficulties and there are special circumstances",
is it not open to more or less any employer to say, "Well,
yes, you've got your difficulties and special circumstances and
we've got ours", and, hence, in a sense, it is going to be
equally difficult, in a different way, for us to make real inroads
into eroding the differential in employment as well? So to what
extent do you think the public sector has such a poor record in
this matter that it has not really got much opportunity to police
fair employment in other areas?
(Mrs Trewsdale) Sorry, through the Chair, when
you refer to the public sector,——
207. It is better in some areas than others,
Health and Library Boards, whatever?
(Mrs Trewsdale) For example, I think you will
find that the Northern Ireland Civil Service has improved its
percentage——
208. Yes; it is not quite there yet?
(Mrs Trewsdale) No, no, I am not suggesting it
was quite there, but it has improved a great deal since 1977 and
the founding of the Fair Employment Agency, as was. I think it
is rather unfortunate that you picked the police as an example,
insofar as, I think, of all the public sector—
209. Actually, a debated part, I should
say; it could be, rather?
(Mrs Trewsdale) It could be regarded as a very,
very special case, in that it is not just—the implication
seems to be that the RUC kept Roman Catholics out, that seems
to be the implication that is coming through. I am not suggesting
whether that is right or wrong, but what I think you will find
is that the threat of violence from the Roman Catholic side on
any Roman Catholic policeman was such that it would have been—I
am talking now during the Troubles—a very, very brave Roman
Catholic, living in a Roman Catholic area, who actually joined
the Royal Ulster Constabulary.
210. We have chicken and egg here, do we
not; the fact is that very few people brought up in a Republican
area are going to join a body which calls itself Royal and Ulster.
There was a two-way process, and certainly one of the things that
fair employment was about was changing organisations, and how
those organisations could be reconfigured so as to address some
of the perceptions of those businesses, or those enterprises,
or those councils, or whatever, so as to make it more likely that
they would be equally amenable to both communities and equally
accessible to both communities. So it is a two-way problem, and,
insofar as some public authorities did not make, for whatever
reason, those changes, and as a result had a huge imbalance between
one community and another, the public sector has, at least in
some of its elements, a very bad record, in fact, the worst record,
on these issues. So is it not of concern to you, in the Northern
Ireland Economic Council?
(Mrs Trewsdale) As far as the Royal Ulster Constabulary
is concerned, I think a former Northern Ireland Minister, in other
words, Mr Patten, is actually sorting that out, supposedly, he
has his own Commission and is dealing with that and dealing with
precisely what you have outlined there, the idea of it being reorganised.
211. Are you making an input to that, in
any way, of your concern about fair employment?
(Mrs Trewsdale) We have not actually been asked,
have we, Paul?
(Dr Gorecki) We have not made an input, no.
212. Might you do it anyway, or is this
not something that you are particularly concerned about?
(Mrs Trewsdale) Our remit is actually economic
development in Northern Ireland, in its broadest sense, it is
not specifically into the policing of Northern Ireland. We have
our paper on the idea of peace and economic development in Northern
Ireland, which, again, we can certainly send you, because we held
a very successful conference on that. But, as far as getting down
to the precise details like that, no, that is not our remit and
we do not see ourselves in that position.
213. So it was not worth dealing with, really;
too hard, or something?
(Mrs Trewsdale) No, that is a little unkind, I
think. It is not that it is too hard, the fact is that we have
a work schedule to organise and the priorities to organise, and
we have tended to look at broader issues, for example, back, if
you like, again, to the long-term unemployment issue, which we
happen to think is a broad and important issue. We have looked
at the new TSN and its impact in Northern Ireland. We do not necessarily
go down into the minutia; it is resources. It is not a case of
thinking they are too troublesome, not at all.
(Dr Gorecki) What we looked at was the economic
implications of peace and political stability and what the implications
of that would be on the size of the Royal Ulster Constabulary,
and what the knock-on effects would be, possibly, on the economy,
through the effects on public expenditure; that was the focus
of the work. And in our work we noted the points you have made,
that of the under-representation of Catholics and also the under-representation
of women, if you compare Northern Ireland with other parts of
the United Kingdom, and those are the things that stand out quite
strikingly. But, as for commenting on the way in which the RUC
can increase its representation of Catholics, whether it should
fly the Union Flag over police stations, whether it should be
called the Northern Ireland Police Service, or whether police
stations will be like fortresses, or more friendly towards the
local community, I think the Council thought that those sorts
of things were really outside of its remit, which is to provide
economic advice to the Secretary of State on the development of
the Northern Ireland economy.
214. Would you agree with me that, in a
sense, if you do not tackle those issues then if somebody comes
to you, and say they have got 70 per cent of their workforce is
Catholic and 30 per cent is Protestant, and you know there are
some kinds of ways in which they are deliberately configuring
things to make it less attractive for Protestants to get jobs
there, equally qualified Protestants will not get jobs there,
because there is a network operating to stop them, you are in
a very weak position if you then say, "Well, if you reorganise
things a bit and you were a bit less offensive about how you portrayed
yourself and you did not have Gaelic on your letterhead as well
as English", all various ways you can send out signals, you
are on very weak grounds, because, in a sense, there is such an
outstanding example of that within the public sector itself? If
one of the things you might be doing is promoting equality of
opportunity, some of these examples can act as quite a strong
prophylactic against achieving the kind of developments that you
have been looking for, and it might have been helpful if the more
flagrant examples, one or two of them, you might have tackled?
(Mrs Trewsdale) We, the Economic Council tackled?
215. Yes.
(Mrs Trewsdale) The legislation has been there
since 1977 and was revised, and the idea of the flags and emblems
that you are obviously referring to, that is what it is known
as in the legislation, has been there some time; there are legal
procedures there that people can go through, and there have been
some classic legal cases, Shorts, for example, and various others.
216. Who have done well.
(Mrs Trewsdale) Yes. I do not really sort of follow
your argument as to why the Economic Council and the way it is
constituted should be responsible and the conscience-keeper of
the public authorities who are transgressing. The law is there;
if people feel that there are problems, then there is redress
through the law at the moment. Now the RUC, of course, as I say,
I think the Chris Patten idea will, hopefully, sort that out.
217. I am clearly not going to get any further
with this line of questioning.
(Mrs Trewsdale) I am sorry, because we really
do not have any direct input or opinions, in that sense.
218. I would just like to place on the record,
for our Clerk, that I do think that the issue of firms, concerns,
councils, or whoever, sending out signals to indicate a marginal
preference, or an established preference, for one community or
the other, is, it seems to me, something which, from the NIEC's
own arguments about equality of opportunity and giving everybody
a chance to participate equally in the workforce, is of economic
consequence as well as of social consequence. Can I move on to——
(Mrs Trewsdale) No-one would disagree with that;
one is not saying it is a good idea for them to do that, but what
I am saying is, we are not there to police it, the law is there
and exists already.
219. If I may ask, about your response to
new TSN (Targeting Social Need), you say, in your Occasional Paper
11, that, and I quote from the first page: "A strong theme
of TSN has been on the spatial aspect. Extra resources are targeted
towards those located in areas designated as disadvantaged."
Then you say: "However, there are grounds for arguing that
it might be better—at least in labour market terms—to
provide good access for people in TSN areas to locations where
there are numerous work sites closely linked, rather than to encourage
firms to go to TSN areas." And then you talk about "clustering
many firms in a single location". Now this seems to me, potentially,
an argument for saying that perhaps a company that is thinking
of relocating to a disadvantaged area might decide not to do so,
and that, secondly, it is an argument for, as it were, clustering
firms. Does this recommendation come from research?
(Mrs Trewsdale) First and foremost, I think what
we are arguing, about the idea that you can have, if you designate
a geographical area as being disadvantaged, using a geographical
boundary, you do not necessarily target the——
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