Debate contribution: Election of Speaker and Deputy Speakers

Debate contribution by Mr Gerry Carroll on 13 May 2022.

MLA: Mr Gerry Carroll
Party at the time: People Before Profit Alliance
Date: 13 May 2022
Type: Debate contribution
Business: Speaker's Business
Heading: Election of Speaker and Deputy Speakers
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 4139997

Text

Mr Speaker, I wish you well. I was going to say "in your retirement", but, somehow, I think that you may not be able to retire from this place or politics. I wish you well and thank you for your service. I also thank the good people of West Belfast for returning me to the Assembly. I am proud to take up the baton as the socialist opposition in the House and to hold any incoming Executive to account. Boy, will that be needed if an Executive are formed. Our communities are struggling with soaring energy and fuel bills. Truth be told, when the Executive were sitting, they ignored the plight of workers and those who were struggling. That is why Translink workers will take strike action next week and why we are likely to see Assembly staff go out on strike in the near future. Our message is simple: if bills are rapidly rising, so should workers' wages. No more below-inflation pay offers. They are unfair and unacceptable. Today, we have to call out the actions of the DUP and its obstruction. For all its talk about the protocol, poll after poll has shown that it is not a priority nor the number-one issue that people are vexed about, whether they class themselves as unionist, nationalist or other. In many ways, it is a manufactured crisis. Where was the DUP crisis about the decades of divergence on women's rights in this place from those in Britain? The DUP tried to cause panic and fear and to whip people up on the basis of fear and division in order to save its seats. The vast majority of people did not vote for this and should not be held to ransom by the DUP's self-serving actions. The DUP has been a continual barrier to progress in this place, and there is no democratic rationale or reason for it to boycott the position of deputy First Minister. Sinn Féin should not be blocked from the position of First Minister because it is a nationalist party or because of the games being played over the protocol. However, let us be honest: real change in our society will not come from within this Building. It will happen out in the streets and on the picket lines with workers who are Catholics, Protestants, migrants and people who are classed as "other" in this part of the world. That is where I will be next week regardless of whether this place is reconvened.

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

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