Debate contribution: Election of Speaker and Deputy Speakers

Debate contribution by Mr Matthew O'Toole on 27 October 2022.

MLA

Mr Matthew O'Toole

Party at the time

Social Democratic and Labour Party

Date

27 October 2022

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Assembly Business

Heading

Election of Speaker and Deputy Speakers

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4178179

Read the official Assembly record

Text

First of all, in nominating Patsy McGlone, I welcome the passage of the culture and language Bill at Westminster. Patsy would be a fine Speaker, and, as the most fluent Gaeilgeoir in the Chamber, he would be the perfect person in this era. In July, we met to pay tribute to David Trimble, one of the key builders of the institutions. At the time, I said that many of us had lost the ability or the willingness to build things and that some of us simply wanted to tear things down. Three months on, and, sadly, that has not changed. While the Assembly has sat mothballed and silent, people's homes have got colder, their trust in politics has fallen even further, and their lives have got harder. My party is not responsible for that mess, but I am ashamed by it. I am ashamed of this place because, unlike others in the Chamber, I am capable of shame.

In May, we asked people to vote for us and our parties on the basis that we would come here to represent their interests and to try to make their lives better. Since then, the cost-of-living crisis has deepened and been intensified by the actions of the Conservative Government in pursuing kamikaze economic policies that are designed to make rich people richer but, in fact, make everyone poorer. Headline inflation is at a 40-year high. The cost of budget food items has risen by 17%. Energy costs have multiplied, as we all know. Gas and electricity bill payers here await reductions to their bills. People on pre-payment meters do not know when they will get support. For home heating oil users, which is most people in Northern Ireland, all that they have is the vague promise of a paltry £100. All that is compounded by the fact that we have the lowest disposable income in these islands and our healthcare crisis and the crises in various public services deepen by the day. To say, as the party opposite has done, that devolved government can do little in these circumstances is as nihilistic as it is untrue. There may not be limitless resources to make everything better, but, without Ministers, things will unquestionably get worse. Budgets will not rise. Nurses and doctors will not be recruited. Plans will not be made. Investment will be stalled. The previous collapse in 2017 is sometimes cited as justification for this collapse. Let me be clear: that was wrong, too. It damaged our economy and harmed public services. Two wrongs do not make a right. It is true to say that the Chamber does not have much influence on EU-UK relations and the protocol. If we were sitting in an Assembly and there was a functioning Executive, we might, at least, be able to try to find a common voice on what we want from our post-Brexit arrangements. People here are not just losing faith in politics and democracy; they are losing interest. What we are doing today is a farce, but it is also a tragedy. It is completely removed from the needs of real people who are suffering. To the Members opposite, I say this: your constituents are suffering, too. Another election would be a farce. It should not happen. An election to what? It would serve simply to polarise people and waste millions of pounds at a time when people are in need and public services are collapsing. It would stretch the elastic of public confidence and public patience beyond breaking point. Unionism used to say that it wanted nationalists to make Northern Ireland work. If only we were allowed. If only they would do the same. The DUP seems set on turning this place into an ungoverned and ungovernable mess. That is a tragedy for everyone who lives here, but it is a huge strategic error for unionism because the result would not be safe direct rule from London, which would be untenable and unacceptable, not least from this wholly discredited Tory Government; the result would be an inevitable increase in the number of people, including fairly moderates ones, who would ask whether the real way to make Northern Ireland work is to seek a new North in a new Ireland inside Europe. I want the Assembly to sit. I want to serve the people of South Belfast and all of Northern Ireland. The SDLP wants to be a constructive Opposition to those who have been given the right to serve in government and ministerial office. However, if we are all forced simply to live amid the ruins of one party's destructive and self-destructive urges, our attention and that of others will turn inevitably to building something new and better for all the people of this place.

794 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 09:32 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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