Debate contribution: Justice Bill: Consideration Stage
Debate contribution by Mr Peter Martin on .
- MLA
- Mr Peter Martin
- Party at the time
- Democratic Unionist Party
- Date
- 16 June 2026
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Executive Committee Business
- Heading
- Justice Bill: Consideration Stage
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5624744
Read the official Assembly record
Text
I thank the Member for her intervention. I am aware of some of the MACRs around Europe. I looked up Switzerland, which is one of the most liberal and progressive countries in Europe. It has the same MACR as ours: 10. The Member raised prevention, early intervention and ACEs. I can certainly provide her with my report, which is now a good eight years old. I made a raft of policy suggestions around those things before Northern Ireland was even talking about trauma-informed care and ACEs, when they were still within the ambit of the Scottish Government, who started talking about that in 2007. I am more than happy to provide her with the report and the policy recommendations that I made a long time ago. I will stop there; I have spoken for more than long enough. I am content with the current position: a MACR of 10. I have outlined my arguments for that. I accept that there are Members who disagree. I am happy to continue the conversation offline and to do so respectfully. As I considered the issue — I considered it long and hard — I could not get past the fact that the victims of some crimes will, in some of the circumstances that we have debated, have no access to justice. Those crimes are being committed, albeit in low numbers. A Member said — I wrote it down — that we needed a victim-centred approach: I completely concur. That is why I have made my arguments and why I will not support the amendments.
Have I really? That long?
266 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.
- Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.07 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
- None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
- Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.77).
- No identity-based framing was identified (1.00).
- The overall probability was at or below the not-flagging threshold.
This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.
Jev’s structured answers
| Question | Probability | Met? |
|---|---|---|
| Identity framing | 0.04 | No |
| Sectarian or communal antagonism | 0.02 | No |
| Cultural grievance politics | 0.02 | No |
| Dog-whistle messaging | 0.05 | No |
| Controversy escalation | 0.07 | No |
| Legitimate policy scrutiny | 0.77 | Yes |
| Overall judgement | 0.07 | At or below not-flagging threshold |
| Option | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-based framing (chosen) | 1.00 |
| Reports or questions it | 0.00 |
| Criticises or condemns it | 0.00 |
| Adopts it | 0.00 |
| Subject | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-related subject | 0.74 |
| Legacy of the Troubles, victims and paramilitarism | 0.18 |
| Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues | 0.04 |
| Disability (including neurodivergence and mental health), disabled people and disability or sickness benefits | 0.03 |
| Sexism, misogyny, ageism and other equality groups | 0.01 |
Assessed 21 October 2026 at 15:56 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.
Disagree with this assessment?
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