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Mr. Hogg: May I bring the hon. Gentleman back to the new clause before the Committee? I, too, have very strong Irish connections--my mother was born in County Galway--but we are not talking about that. Instead, we are asking whether it is right that a Minister of the Irish Government, with all the duties that such a Minister owes to Ireland and to the Government of Ireland, should be able to be a member of a Government of any part of this
country. The answer to that must surely be no, because of the conflicting arguments. It has nothing to do with antipathy between the countries.
Mr. Bermingham: That intervention takes us back to a very simple point: how many legislatures we belong to is a matter for us. I should have thought that in a multicultural, multipolitical Europe, being a member of more than one legislature, if we can find the time to do it--[Interruption.] I gave way to the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Mr. Hogg) and I shall answer his question step by step, if I may, because he, like me, is a logical man. If one wants to be a member of many legislatures and one's constituency will accept that, so be it. However, once one becomes a member of a Government--let us get real, in a real world--it matters not in which legislature one is a member of a Government, one acquires and retains certain responsibilities to that Government. There is no way in which a person can be a member of two Governments at the same time. That is wholly illogical. It will not, does not, and cannot happen.
4.30 pm
Mr. Hogg: In that case, why cannot that provision be included in the Bill?
Mr. Bermingham: I would have thought that common sense would tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman, when he read the Bill, that that could not happen in any event. Do we need to legislate on every word when--bearing in mind Pepper v. Hart, with which the right hon. and learned Gentleman is fully familiar--anyone reading the debates on the Bill would realise that it was never the intention of Parliament that anyone should be a Minister in two Governments? That is obvious.
I return to my primary point--what on earth have we been doing for the past couple of hours? We have been going excitedly around in circles dealing with a theoretical situation that will never arise, simply because certain Opposition Members cannot get it through their thick heads that the time has come to settle the Irish question once and for all. This is yet another step on the road to the settlement of issues that have dogged and bedevilled our societies for the past 100 years.
I have tried to be as brief as possible. I asked the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) to be brief; he took 10 minutes. I shall take six or seven minutes. Is it not time to move on to what we are really in this place to do? That is to bring peace to Ireland.
Rev. Martin Smyth:
Thank you for allowing me to speak for a second time, Mr. Lord. Earlier, I thought that the hon. Member for St. Helens, South (Mr. Bermingham) had risen only to make a point of order. When you called me to speak, Mr. Lord, I, too, could have raised a point of order.
I regret that the hon. Gentleman, for whom I have respect because we have worked in varying degrees of friendship, has revealed an underlying current that keeps coming up. If I wanted to follow his example--although I do not--I could make the same complaint because I
happen to be from Northern Ireland, which was historically the old Ulidia and I am proud to be an Ulsterman. In this place, I am regularly called an Irishman, even though I have British citizenship, which I believe includes Scotland, Wales, Ireland historically, and certainly that north-east part that we call Ulster.
In the light of the comments of the hon. Member for Stone (Mr. Cash), I must make it abundantly plain that even Europe has its regulations. Unless I have been misled, the hon. Member for Foyle (Mr. Hume) would have been happy to be a Minister in the Northern Ireland Assembly, but European legislation would not allow one to be a Minister even in a subsidiary Parliament--never mind in the main Government--and serve in the European Parliament.
My party has discouraged dual membership. If a person stands for a position in the Assembly or in Parliament, at the next election we would expect him to choose the body for which he plans to stand. We believe that such jobs are full-time, although I realise that people have different abilities and capacities for work. However, the Ulster Unionist party has maintained that principle for some time.
In relation to the comments about Whips, my hon. Friend the Member for East Londonderry (Mr. Ross) seemed to regret that I might have had to call him into line. I thought that I had done so graciously and courteously--
Rev. Martin Smyth:
We can sometimes be misunderstood. The purpose of any Whip is to try to ensure that the party's business, or the Government's business, is carried through, by fair means and sometimes foul--although I confess to my party that I have never held a little black book, never mind a red book.
Mr. Hogg:
I wanted to clarify one point in new clause 2, with regard to the party Whip. I notice that "a party Whip" is referred to in the second line of the new clause. That applies to the Whip of any party, including opposition parties, but I assume that the hon. Gentleman is restricting new clause 2 to a Whip of the Government party. Perhaps he would clarify that point.
Rev. Martin Smyth:
It would, on the face of it, be a Whip of a Government party, but one does recognise that a Whip, even of an opposition party, has particular responsibilities to ensure that his party's position carries through. The new clause could be read either way but, in light of the phrasing, I believe that it refers to a Government party.
I return to the d'Hondt aspect. I happen to be one of those who was never terribly happy that an Executive could be formed by d'Hondt. I understand that it is an excellent way to deal with Committees where one wants to have a cross-section of opinion and balanced views, but it is important that we bear in mind that an Executive has a task to do: to give leadership and to see business through. Sooner or later, we shall have difficulties at that level within Northern Ireland or any other Assembly whose Executive is formed on a d'Hondt principle, whereby, if the Minister in the Executive is arguing for a party position, and stands by it, and faces a vote of no
confidence in that Assembly or Parliament, he has to resign, and the party whose policy the Minister was seeking to follow through has the right to fill that vacant position.
Therefore, the Minister may be mistaken when he says that it would or could never happen. As the hon. Member for St. Helens, South was speaking, I reflected that we are living in another world--a changing world, for good or ill. We now have an Irish in Britain Movement, and it is possible that sometimes its members may be dissatisfied with either of the main parties in this place and may seek to advance their own position. They may even seek to get a well-known personality from Ireland to represent them and to be elected to the House.
Speaking of theory, it would not be beyond the bounds of possibility, as we are all working together within Europe, for a Government of a particular hue in the United Kingdom to share with a Government in the Republic of Ireland--or, for that matter, any other Government--a Minister who may be elected by a constituency in both countries because he is capable of work and the people want him. It is possible that such a person may be asked to take part in another Government. Having said that, I still believe that it should be in the Bill that it should not be done. If Europe can do it, which is an Assembly view--
Mr. Bermingham:
I have listened with great interest to what the hon. Gentleman has said, but would he consider this point? A company, owned and managed by English people, invests in Northern Ireland. The managing director becomes a resident and seeks to stand for the Assembly because he wants to represent the interests of his work force and so on. That is perfectly acceptable. The same happens in southern Ireland, and it is perfectly acceptable. What is wrong with that? Is that not us all becoming part of the family of Europe, and should that be criticised in any way? I hark back to the hon. Gentleman's comment about the Irish in England.
Rev. Martin Smyth:
Anyone has a right to put himself forward and to be selected. I remember during the campaign of the late Enoch Powell in South Down, a member of the SDLP, Patrick O'Hanlon, said that South Down would never let in foreigners. I saw him the next day and asked him, "What was that nonsense about, Paddy? What about that Spanish-American--De Valera?" He said, "Martin, I am glad that no one else recognised that one."
When we talk about using language and so on, we have to face reality. Sometimes there is a degree of pejorativism, but usually people are described as being part of our nation or of another nation. Those who espouse Ireland as a nation once again would never think that they were part of the English connection, and they find it difficult to recognise that British means more than English. It was an Episcopalian dean of St. Patrick's in Dublin who said, in a moment of anger,
"Burn everything English except English coal."
I happen to have a greater love for the coal miners of England than he had.
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