Debate contribution: Display of Flags and Emblems Bill: Second Stage

Debate contribution by Mrs Deborah Erskine on 22 September 2026.

MLA

Mrs Deborah Erskine

Party at the time

Democratic Unionist Party

Date

22 September 2026

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Display of Flags and Emblems Bill: Second Stage

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5739885

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Yes, so there are people. There is no SDLP MLA in my constituency, but there are SDLP councillors. I work with all of them across the political divide. The one thing that I will say is that, in the example of Irvinestown that I pointed out, no political representatives were involved in the discussion. That points to the good community relationships that exist there between, I have to say, mainly two communities, which shows that they have tolerance for each other's celebrations and cultural expression. Clause 2(1)(e) specifies that sensitive places would include "a place of worship." Sunday Orange services happen pretty much weekly in the summer, and there will be churches across Northern Ireland that have a flag outside their property. As I said earlier, there are people in our communities who cannot stand the sight of a Union flag. Churches would fall victim to the legislation: they would be investigated for having a flag outside a place of worship, because that would be seen as a sensitive place. Somebody could report that. When you look at the different places listed, including leisure centres and council facilities, you have to wonder how the proposals would be workable.

Yes.

Absolutely. Again, for me, that demonstrates that there would be a chilling effect on cultural expression.

I want to move on, if that is OK. The Bill specifically identifies schools, medical facilities, leisure centres, libraries, shopping centres, arterial roads and public parks, and it would also allow the definition to extend further. In other words, we are talking about a very substantial part of everyday public life. The legislation would not deal with a handful of exceptional locations; it would potentially affect displays across towns, villages and rural communities throughout Northern Ireland. It would have a chilling effect. Clause 3 would require the Department to establish a procedure — potentially an online portal — by which people could notify the Department about a flag or emblem that has been displayed or is intended to be displayed. As we have talked about, it would also allow members of the public to submit their views on particular displays. We should carefully consider what that could become in practice. Would we be creating a system in which members of the public could, in effect, report their neighbours' cultural displays to the government? Could a community celebration result in a series of complaints because another person — it might take only one person — disagrees with the symbolism? Could the Department become overwhelmed with complaints? What safeguards would exist against vexatious or politically motivated complaints? The Bill does not provide sufficient answers to those questions. Clause 3(a) states:

"a person may notify the Department"

that they are going to fly a flag and state their reasons for doing so. Although I believe that the intention of the Bill sponsor is to crack down on paramilitary and terrorist flags, clause 3 would create bureaucracy for communities. I genuinely believe that it would not work in practice. We have had a bit of a discussion about some of that. The people who fly such flags will not sit down and input information into any online portal. I want to consider the issue from the perspective of the constituency that I represent.

Yes.

I thank the Member for his intervention. That points back to Mr Frew's intervention, in that we could create a system that victimises someone for being lawful. Under the system, that person could input into the portal, yet somebody else could come along under the cover of darkness and put up flags of paramilitary or terrorist organisations. It is about the practical outworkings of the legislation. We cannot have that situation. The Member is actually agreeing with those of us on these Benches about the difficulties that could be created by the portal. Fermanagh and South Tyrone is home to communities with strong traditions and identities. We have towns and villages where annual celebrations and commemorations are an important part of community life. People should be able to celebrate their culture and express their identity and not have to fear that an official's interpretation of a vague term in legislation could result in their community display being removed. That does not mean that we should not look at the limits; of course there should be limits if there is genuine intimidation, a genuine threat, criminality or a clear public safety issue, but those limits should be based on objective and consistently applied criteria. I will come to that later in my contribution. Clause 4 requires the Department to produce a code of conduct and sets out a number of organisations that must be consulted. The Assembly should not pass significant powers but leave fundamental questions about how those powers will operate to be dealt with later in a code of practice. The public should be able to understand the essential rules from the legislation itself. If the code of practice is to determine what constitutes an acceptable display, how long a flag can remain in place and how cultural celebrations will be treated, Members need to know considerably more about the framework before giving their approval. That is why I cannot give approval to the Bill today. The Bill would create a new criminal offence. Clause 5 makes it an offence to obstruct the Department or somebody acting on its behalf in the removal of a flag or emblem. A person who is convicted could receive a fine of up to level 3 on the standard scale. I understand why obstruction can be considered to be unacceptable where lawful removal is taking place, but we are creating a criminal offence in legislation, where the underlying decision to remove a display can involve subjective judgements. The underlying decision-making process here must be questioned. Before somebody can be held criminally liable for obstructing the removal, there must be absolute confidence in the process. We recently saw how confidence has been undermined in the case of the Parades Commission. Clause 6 allows the Department to request PSNI assistance if there may be a breach of the peace or an offence under the Bill. The PSNI is under enormous pressure already. The Member's Minister will know that acutely, being a Justice Minister. I fundamentally believe that the PSNI's resources should be focused on tackling crime and maintaining public safety.

1,060 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 16:36 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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