Debate contribution: Coronavirus Act 2020 (Registration of Deaths and Still-Births) (Extension) (No.3) Order (Northern Ireland) 2024
Debate contribution by Miss Nicola Brogan on .
- MLA
- Miss Nicola Brogan
- Party at the time
- Sinn Féin
- Date
- 14 October 2024
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Executive Committee Business
- Heading
- Coronavirus Act 2020 (Registration of Deaths and Still-Births) (Extension) (No.3) Order (Northern Ireland) 2024
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 4589588
Read the official Assembly record
Text
I thank the Minister for bringing the motion to the Assembly, and I am happy to speak in support of it. As has been outlined, the legislation was introduced during the pandemic to allow the registration of deaths and stillbirths to take place via telephone and for documents such as death certificates to be sent electronically. That was necessary to allow registrations to continue during the pandemic while minimising face-to-face contact. The height of the COVID pandemic was a difficult time for all of us, but especially for those who lost loved ones. We, as a society, pulled together, adapted and made changes to help to save lives and ease the burden on our incredible healthcare workers. During that time, we learned new and more efficient ways of doing things. For example, we discovered the value in practices such as remote working. We also learned that there was a different way to handle the often traumatic issue of registering deaths and stillbirths. The changes to how deaths and stillbirths were registered made the process more efficient and eased the burden on health workers and infrastructure while maintaining the appropriate checks and balances to ensure that deaths were still properly investigated. Crucially, those changes also eased the burden on grieving loved ones. The public have widely availed themselves of the option to register deaths via telephone since its introduction. It has reduced the administrative burden on those who deliver the service. To revert to the old system at this stage would only cause stress and confusion, so I am happy to support the motion to ensure that those provisions do not lapse.
271 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: 0.02 (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 (0.72).
- 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 | 0.02 | No |
| Sectarian or communal antagonism | 0.01 | No |
| Cultural grievance politics | 0.01 | No |
| Dog-whistle messaging | 0.01 | No |
| Controversy escalation | 0.02 | No |
| Legitimate policy scrutiny | 0.72 | Yes |
| Overall judgement | 0.02 | 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 | 0.99 |
| Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues | 0.01 |
| Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials | 0.00 |
| Parades, bonfires and commemorations | 0.00 |
| Irish language, Ulster-Scots and language policy | 0.00 |
Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:13 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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