Debate contribution: Executive Reform

Debate contribution by Mr Phillip Brett on 4 March 2024.

MLA

Mr Phillip Brett

Party at the time

Democratic Unionist Party

Date

4 March 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Executive Reform

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4254145

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I congratulate the leader of the Opposition on his appointment, and I welcome him to his place here today. We will not be party to a stunt that uses and abuses people's emotions about a sensitive issue.

"There has to be power-sharing ... they are the fundamentals to which we hold dear".

Those are not my words but those of the leader of the SDLP, Colum Eastwood. In the words of the leader of the SDLP, we must have a power-sharing Executive. Those comments stand in stark contrast to the motion. What has changed? Is this a U-turn policy from the SDLP? Is this the leader of the Opposition auditioning for a higher role in his party? Or is it a fact that the SDLP have been placed in opposition by the people of Northern Ireland? Of course, there is no mention in the motion, or in the contributions made by SDLP Members so far, of the collapse of the institutions that his party presided over following the Belfast Agreement. There have been no comments whatsoever, but simply criticism of the Executive — an Executive that, for the past number of years, the SDLP —.

Of course.

I agree with the Member that the politics of domination have been very damaging for relations in Northern Ireland. I agree with her that Northern Ireland only moves forward when all communities move forward together. The lesson of the past three years should be that the concerns of a major section of our society cannot be simply ignored and papered over. The only way in which we all move forward —.

I will happily give way.

The point that I was making to the Member is that the mandate that we were given was not simply just transferred to the DUP; we did not make up our mandate. We were given a mandate by the people of Northern Ireland to take the action that we took. I must remind the Member that it was not my party that brought about the settings and rules by which we operate currently. Her party and others in the Chamber campaigned for the Belfast Agreement, and these are its outworkings. We have managed to improve that through the St Andrews Agreement and other agreements. However, the way in which we operate is a result of the conditions set out before us. I want to make some progress before I give way to anyone else. We have had two years with the leader of the Opposition in post and not a single policy settlement has been put forward here. He proposes to create a new Committee, to which he will, selflessly, appoint the Chairman. He has been so ready for Opposition in the past two years that his contribution has been to congratulate the Alliance Party's policy. When the provision for Opposition was introduced in the House, we were told that it was a new age for democracy. We were told that people would be held to account. Instead, we have an attempt to use the motion to create another office that they will fill. No meaningful proposals have been put forward here. The lesson of the past three years must be that Northern Ireland will move forward when all communities move forward together. I encourage the leader of the Opposition, when he next brings a motion, to perhaps make it relevant to the people of Northern Ireland. Then, perhaps, at the next election, he will no longer be in the Opposition.

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

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 09:40 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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