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Mr. Adrian Bailey (West Bromwich, West): I welcome the progress that has been made over the last few days in these negotiations and the public statements that have been made and recognised on both sides of the House, but regret that we were unable to come to an agreement at the end of the day. The reality is that since the signing of the Good Friday agreement, the threshold of trust within the Unionist community required for the smooth working of the agreement and the Northern Ireland Assembly has risen. Will my right hon. Friend impress upon Sinn Fein the need for a degree of transparency in the decommissioning process, over and above the confidentiality level that was originally agreed, if we are finally to complete this process to everybody's satisfaction?
Mr. Murphy: My hon. Friend, who serves on the Select Committee on Northern Ireland Affairs, is aware of the difficulties that we face in Northern Ireland on these issues. I certainly assure him that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and I will do our best to try to ensure that we resolve the difficulties that we currently face, the main one of which, of course, is transparency.
Mr. Andrew Mackay (Bracknell): As a strong supporter of the Anglo-Irish agreement who has been very critical of the fact that it has not been fully implemented, may I put it to the Secretary of State that I was impressed with the president of Sinn Fein's speech yesterday? It seemed a major move forward. Therefore, it was all the more surprising that nobody had seemed to understand that there was a need for much greater transparency in General de Chastelain's statement. May I urge the Secretary of State to ensure that that transparency is forthcoming soon? If it is not, there is going to be a dreadful tragedy.
Mr. Murphy: The right hon. Gentleman has spent many years considering the questions around Northern Ireland. I know that he understands that these things are
never easy. As I said earlier, issues that appear to be relatively simple can sometimes be very difficult for the parties concerned, for all sorts of historical and other reasons. Nevertheless, the right hon. Gentleman is right. The Governments have a duty to try to ensure that the parties come to some agreement on these issues, and particularly on the issue of decommissioning and its transparency.
Mr. Eddie McGrady (South Down): On behalf of my party, may I express our deep sympathy to the right hon. Member for Warley (Mr. Spellar) on his recent bereavement? I reciprocate the sympathy that he has expressed to me.
In terms of the debacle yesterday that had been billed as the most historic event in Irish history, will the Secretary of State perhaps ponder the fact that, by excluding all the custodians of the development and implementation of the Good Friday agreement, he did a grave disservice to it? In negotiating only with Sinn Fein and the Ulster Unionist party, he was, in fact, putting our future democracy and development into the hands of the decision making of the army council of the IRA on the one hand and a split and divided Ulster Unionist Council on the other. That has excluded those people who had driven the process all these years, particularly my party, which people seem to forget is the largest party in Northern Ireland, as well as being the most democratic and the one without hang-ups about full implementation. Does the Secretary of State further recognise that the two parties with which his Government were negotiating are the two parties that have failed to implement their agreement, have failed to honour what they agreed to and signed up for five years ago, and have brought down the institutions in the process and put us in the mess that we are now in?
May I make two further points? Will the Secretary of State explain to the House why, in this so-called new beginning, Sinn Fein has not committed itself—it has done the very opposite—to joining and developing the new Police Service of Northern Ireland? Local Sinn Fein representatives refuse to allow the PSNI to enter certain areas of my constituency and instead say that they will administer their own justice.
Will the Secretary of State also address the issue of the continued paramilitary activity by Provisional Sinn Fein and the loyalist paramilitaries? Provisional Sinn Fein kidnapped and abducted one of my constituents 10 days ago, and a Sinn Fein member has been charged with participation in that activity. Is that the sort of peace that this so-called negotiation will deliver to the people of Northern Ireland? If it is, it is doomed to failure before it starts.
Mr. Murphy: Even though my hon. Friend gave me a bit of a hard time, may I welcome him back to the House of Commons after his difficult time over the past few weeks? I wish him well.
On the issue of process, there is no intention by either Government to exclude anybody. I have gone through this on a number of occasions and I will repeat it for my hon. Friend—it is important that if there is to be a settlement between two parties in Northern Ireland—which must be reached for the stability of any future Executive if the elections go a certain way—it is right and proper for them to try to sort out their differences. That is what the past few weeks have been all about.
I repeat that I do not for one second underestimate the work and the commitment of my hon. Friend's party to the peace process in Northern Ireland. There would not have been a Good Friday agreement had it not been for the work of the SDLP and his colleagues. In particular, we would not be in the position that we are in today with regard to the Northern Ireland Policing Board and the Police Service of Northern Ireland. My hon. Friend's party took courageous action in ensuring that Catholics not only join the board but become policemen and women, too. I think everybody acknowledges its stand on that.
I do not know what lies ahead of us, except that there is nothing wrong in people talking to try to resolve their difficulties. The negotiations, as my hon. Friend put it, between the Governments and the two parties were of an exclusive nature because the two parties have to talk. Of course, they came to the Governments to clarify certain issues but, at the end of the day, the negotiations were between themselves. The success or failure of the negotiations did not determine whether we would have elections. I have announced today that there will be elections irrespective of what now happens. At the same time, I think that it is in everybody's interest for those two parties to try to sort out those differences and move the process ahead.
Mr. Speaker: Order. I gently remind the House that, on a statement, only one question should be put to the Minister. In other words, hon. Members must be brief.
Mr. Jeffrey M. Donaldson (Lagan Valley): Is it not the case that the Irish Prime Minister, Mr. Ahern, was raising concerns about transparency on Monday, well before the events of yesterday? Will the Secretary of State explain why our Government did not have those concerns before then?
Will the Secretary of State also explain why he said in his statement that he was looking forward to and hoping for comprehensive acts of completion? Does that not imply that what happened yesterday did not represent comprehensive acts of completion? Will he also confirm to the House that the Government have given a commitment to legislate for IRA terrorists who are on the run? What is now the status of the joint declaration?
Mr. Murphy: The hon. Gentleman may have misheard what I said in the statement—I was referring to matters of public confidence. Nevertheless, he raised the issue of transparency, and I have touched on that many times this afternoon. I do not think that there is anything that I want to add to what I have said already.
On acts of completion, the statement yesterday by the leader of Sinn Fein was very significant in that it was much advanced on what happened in the spring. Commitments were made that all of us must welcome. I also welcome the re-engagement with the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning as that is so important to re-establishing public confidence. However, at the moment, I am sure that the hon.
Gentleman will agree that we now have to address the issues that are immediately in front of us and try to resolve the difficulties that are faced.
Jeremy Corbyn (Islington, North): I thank my right hon. Friend for pressing ahead with the election date and for ensuring that elections will, indeed, be held on 26 November, despite the events of yesterday.
Can my right hon. Friend throw some light on what happened between yesterday morning, when Downing street and his office were trailing the events of yesterday, and the point later in the day when the leader of the Ulster Unionist party apparently had a change of heart and a change of mind? Will he enlighten us on how that was communicated to him and why it came about?
Discussions are taking place about this historic IRA decommissioning statement, but what equivalent statements have been received from loyalist paramilitary groups? What does my right hon. Friend propose to do about the current state of the loyalist paramilitary groups who are not on ceasefire?
Mr. Murphy: My hon. Friend is right to draw the House's attention to the loyalist paramilitary groups because they have not gone away and their decommissioning is also necessary. They told us in the past that they would decommission as soon as the IRA does, but it is our view that acts of decommissioning should happen at the same time—we will continue to make that view publicly known. I do not want to get into a position of talking about who said what to whom and who is to blame because I am not sure that that would help the peace process in Northern Ireland. We have to try to move forward from the substantial, but not complete, progress that was made yesterday to enable us to find the success in what the Ulster Unionist party and Sinn Fein were trying to achieve, which was an agreement between them that they could go into government with each other if the elections fell in a specific way. As I said earlier, that is a matter for the two parties to consider. I must not underestimate for a second the fact that progress was made yesterday morning, although I was disappointed when we reached the afternoon and did not get the transparency or confidence needed to take the process forward. These things happen, so we have to keep trying.
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