Debate contribution: Democratic Consent Resolution

Debate contribution by Mr Timothy Gaston on 10 December 2024.

MLA

Mr Timothy Gaston

Party at the time

Traditional Unionist Voice

Date

10 December 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Democratic Consent Resolution

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4716535

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Before I make my remarks, I will read an email that I received last night, which articulates sentiments that are seldom heard in the Chamber and even more seldom heard on the airwaves. It came from a number of young, articulate unionists who are concerned about how the protocol is negatively impacting on them:

"We write to you as young people who are dismayed to find that because of the Windsor Framework we are being denied the right that until recently our parents enjoyed, the right to stand for election to make all the laws to which they were subject. In asking MLAs to vote for the motion: 'That Articles 5 to 10 of the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland to the EU withdrawal agreement should continue to apply during the new continuation period (within the meaning of Schedule 6A to the Northern Ireland Act 1998).' … the UK Government is asking you to vote in a way that has the effect of renouncing our rights to be represented in the making of the laws to which we will be subject not just in relation to 300 laws but 300 areas of law for a period of between 4 to 8 years. If MLAs vote for the motion, they will be voting to approve that we suffer a unique humiliation both in comparison to the dignity until recently afforded to our parents, and in relation to young people in England, Wales and Scotland, who, along with their parents can still stand for election to make all the laws to which they are subject. MLAs will be voting to approve that while the citizens of the rest of the UK and the Republic of Ireland have the right to stand for election to make all the laws to which they are subject, is it right that we should have been denied this dignity since 2021 and that they should continue to deny it going forward. MLAs will be voting that it is appropriate for the law governing these islands to state that while the people of Great Britain and the Republic of Ireland are worthy of the right to stand for election to make all the laws to which they are subject, that we are only worthy of the right to stand for election to make some of the laws to which they are subject. MLAs will also be voting in violation of international law as set out in the Good Friday Agreement which bestowed upon the people of Northern Ireland the ‘right to pursue democratically national and political aspirations.’ That right was conferred in 1998/9 when the people of Northern Ireland had the right to ‘pursue national and political aspiration in relation to the development of all the laws to which they were subject’ and so it is only possible to uphold this right from that point. If MLAs vote for the motion, they will be voting to approve the radical diminishment of that right from 2021, in violation of international law, and further for the next four to eight years. MLAs further do not have the right to vote for the motion and thereby renounce our rights to be represented in the making of the laws to which we are subject because elected representatives only represent the rights of their constituents that are bestowed on them by trust. They have no right to actually renounce our rights for a period of 4 to 8 years. This is something that logically only we the holders of the rights can do which would require a referendum. However, no progressive society should countenance such a step because asking people to renounce their democratic rights is not something that any democracy worth the name should contemplate."

I am reading out the email; I will give way at the end of it. It continues:

"Lest anyone should seek to argue that the Stormont Brake and Applicability Motion mechanisms resolve the difficulty such that MLAs who are democrats can vote for the motion, they do not address the fundamental democratic problem for two reasons: First, there are some laws in the 300 areas to which neither the Stormont Brake nor the Stormont applicability motion apply. Second, whether the Brake and Applicability motion apply they do not change the fact that we, the people of Northern Ireland, are both disenfranchised and discriminated against when compared both to people in England, Wales and Scotland and the Republic of Ireland, because Northern Ireland becomes the one part of these islands where people do not have the right to stand for election to the legislature making the laws to which we are subject. In this context even if the Brake and Applicability motion mechanisms applied to all the relevant legislation voting to approve these regulations would still involve MLAs voting to approve that we should be uniquely discriminated against in not having the right to stand for election to make the laws to which we are subject. Democracy is a non-negotiable. Any solution to any problem that involves the mass disenfranchisement of people is completely unacceptable, especially in a context where they have been fully enfranchised in relation to central government for the last one hundred years. We would consequently call on you to vote on Tuesday against our disenfranchisement and to vote against the motion. A ‘solution’ that involves our disenfranchisement in one area of law let alone 300 is not a solution at all. We trust that as democrats you will vote against the motion or at the very least abstain. Democracy must be a non-negotiable and we would not be able to vote for any MLA at a future election who voted for our disenfranchisement, it is a vote you have no right to cast. It is extraordinary that we are told repeatedly how important it is that young people engage in politics only to be confronted with the bizarre spectacle of having the value of our vote significantly reduced

Please seize this debate to be the voice of young people and wake up our Assembly out of the strange stupor into which it has fallen in agreeing to even contemplate this extraordinarily demeaning proposition."

Members, that email rather eloquently expresses sentiments that colleagues would do well to reflect on tonight. Before I move on to make some points on the substance of what we have before us, I note that article 18(2) of the protocol says that the consent vote was to:

"be reached strictly in accordance with the unilateral declaration ... made by the United Kingdom".

Members, that unilateral declaration of October 2019 promised a public consultation before the vote. It is there in black and white in the words of the declaration. There has been no consultation, so why is the vote taking place tonight? I have no doubt that, if there was an issue that trampled on the rights of any community other than the unionist community, the Alliance Party would be up in arms about it, but today —

I thank the Member for her repeated intervention to make her point. I do not know whether they have a game in the Alliance Party to see who can make that point tonight the most. There you go, Mrs Long: there is a point for you. The Member for South Belfast wanted an intervention; the Floor is open to you if you want.

I will pass on your comments to Jim that you miss him dearly

and give you a point for once again promoting your European fantasy document and having it as your prop in the Chamber. Today, the Alliance Party is happy to propose a motion that should have seen a long, robust consultation with the public, but that has not taken place. Because it does not affect nationalism, the Alliance Party is happy to go along and do what it is told. When it comes to unionist rights in the Chamber, you do not see the Alliance Party speaking out, but certainly, when it comes to nationalism, it is there front and centre, leading the charge. Due process has gone out the window. We have consultations about minor changes to domestic law, but today we are voting to surrender lawmaking powers to a foreign power, giving it a blank cheque to legislate over the heads of the people of Northern Ireland on a plethora of issues that no one in the House or in the EU has even thought of yet. That is an obscenity. We meet today to debate the most important motion in the history of Northern Ireland, and, shockingly, it is also the first time in half a century that the House will make a significant decision on a simple majority basis. The UK Government sought to justify removing cross-community consent in relation to this vote by arguing that it did not apply because the decision pertains to non-devolved matters. That argument, however, is plainly absurd, because the Belfast Agreement makes provision for cross-community consent not to a subset of Stormont decisions but to all key Stormont decisions. It requires arrangements to ensure that key decisions are taken on a cross-community basis, not arrangements to ensure that key decisions of a particular kind are taken on such a basis. It covers all key decisions, and this is plainly the most far-reaching decision to be put before us. Moreover and in confirmation of that, had their initial argument been correct, it would have been completely unnecessary for them to then intervene to change the law to disapply cross-community consent to this decision. However, regrettable legislation was passed to disapply section 42 of the 1998 Act. Indeed and as if there was not enough, we must remember that the basis on which the Government sought to justify the non-application of cross-community consent was the definition of devolved matters, which kept from Stormont really controversial questions about the constitutional foundation for the relationship between the Republic of Ireland and the UK. Far from lessening the need for cross-community consent, widening the scope of decision-making into this much more controversial subject matter plainly increases the need for cross-community consent rather than lessening it. On that very basis, the suggestion that there is a justification to remove cross-community consent fails, other than for the purpose of denying unionists the protection afforded to nationalists for over 50 years: the banning of majority voting at Stormont on matters of controversy. This is the most controversial proposition to come before Stormont in its 103-year history. Put simply, the vote has been gerrymandered by the Government with the assistance of political parties, namely Sinn Féin, the SDLP and the Alliance Party, that have spent the last quarter of a century telling us how wrong, how unjust, it would be to have a vote on a simple majority basis. Today, I find myself in what, some here might argue, is an odd position. I find myself part of a minority arguing for the fundamentals of the Belfast Agreement and arguing that protections for minorities should continue to apply. However, in another sense, I find myself validated, because I and my party have always argued that the supposed guarantees of the Belfast Agreement were always a sham. The supposed —.

I thank the Member for her intervention, but I struggle to understand what the input was. There has certainly been no change in TUV policy, but you have made your point. It will be in Hansard, so congratulations. The supposed protections in the Belfast Agreement applied only for as long as they suited nationalism. Once unionism was in the minority in this place, the protections no longer applied. Why is that? It is because the protections that were sold to unionists to justify throwing the prison doors open and agreeing to share power with those who had sworn to destroy the state were a sham. That is not the position only of the anti-Belfast Agreement zealots: the Member of Parliament for South Antrim, Robin Swann, reminded the Commons on Friday of what the chief unionist architect of the Belfast Agreement, Lord Trimble, had to say about the protocol. We heard it earlier from Mr Buckley, but, for Hansard's benefit, I will read it out once again. The late Lord Trimble said:

"I feel betrayed personally by the Northern Ireland Protocol, and it is also why the unionist population is so incensed at its imposition."

That seems to be something that the SDLP cannot get to grips with. That is our problem with the protocol and the Windsor framework. Today, however, Sinn Féin, the SDLP and the Alliance Party are happy to play their part in betraying Lord Trimble's legacy. Today is a seminal day in particular for Alliance, which has come off the fence and decided to aid nationalism in doing what 30 years of terror failed to do in Northern Ireland: move the border to the Irish Sea. It is no wonder that many refer to Alliance as "Sinn Féin's little helpers". The leader of the self-styled Social Democratic and Labour Party told us how far people were prepared to go on the issue. She said that there would be:

"civil disobedience at a very minimum"

if there were so much as a CCTV camera where the international border is. Perhaps the SDLP will clarify what its leader meant. What is the next level up from civil disobedience? I contend that we got to where we are today only because of what Seán O'Casey would describe as "The Shadow of a Gunman". I will move on to what we are being asked to vote on today. I noted last week that the SDLP had travelled to Brussels to press for representation. Of course, such a route would also disregard the Belfast Agreement. The Belfast Agreement told unionists in its opening paragraph that our position in the UK was accepted and respected. Implicit in that was the recognition of the right to take part in national debates, such as those on whether the UK should leave the EU. No ballot paper in any part of the UK asked people whether they wanted GB to leave the EU and leave Northern Ireland behind. Sinn Féin, the SDLP and Alliance are telling their constituents that they are not up to the job and are happy to surrender control in 300 areas of law to a Parliament to which no one from Northern Ireland is elected. Seventy pages contain not the text of the law but mere titles. How can any democrat claim that that is correct? Importantly, the laws are not incidental. EU regulation 952/2013 puts us under the EU's customs code. That means that the rest of our country — the United Kingdom — is, in terms, a third country or, to use a term with which people will be familiar, a foreign country. In terms of customs, we are now known as a foreign country. How absurd.

All that is because of the border with an EU member state.

In 2020, the value of goods entering the EU single market via Northern Ireland was a mere 0·003% of EU GDP. The border posts are being built at Larne not because of a threat to the EU single market but because the EU decided that Northern Ireland would be the price that the UK paid for Brexit. One has only to look at recent court judgements where it has been decided that, to all intents and purposes, Northern Ireland is to be treated as EU territory. Indeed, let me quote Mr Justice Colton, who ruled:

"The UK is not to be treated as a unitary state for the purposes of OCR checks coming from GB into NI."

Today, we are being asked to vote to accept colony status: to become a territory that is governed by someone else's laws from a foreign jurisdiction. How democratic. How republican is that? I want to move on to consider the economic case. Before the protocol, Northern Ireland's economy was intertwined with that of the rest of the UK. Since then, we have seen a severing of links and businesses swamped with red tape. Invest NI has had to admit that it cannot point to a single job that has been created in Northern Ireland because of the protocol. Why? It is because businesses work on the basis of facts, not spin, regardless of what the SDLP tells us here tonight. It will not take them long to work out that the idea of dual market access is a nonsense and that the protocol has created massive obstacles to bringing in raw materials from GB. I remind the House that the one area of the Northern Ireland economy where there has been an increase and growth — Mrs Dodds has already pointed it out — is the services sector, which does not fall under the protocol. On Friday, my party leader brought a Bill before the Commons that spelled out a solution to the problem: mutual enforcement, whereby each sovereign power undertakes to respect and enforce the standards of the other. I credit Jim Allister with the Bill, but I cannot credit him with the idea. The proposal for mutual enforcement as a solution came from inside the EU. On Friday, Jim made public a statement from the three gentlemen involved. Let me read it into the record:

"On Friday of this week, the House of Commons will be debating a Bill which attempts to address some of the difficulties resulting from the Brexit divorce agreements between the EU and the UK, which might be of interest to readers. In 2019, we proposed a solution which would have obviated any need for these complicated and divisive legal manoeuvres. The UK and the EU could have respected each other’s positions and saved everyone a great deal of time and effort. The Financial Times characterised the proposal as a ‘win-win solution’. Regrettably, it was not followed."

That was because, as I have said, the EU and the Republic of Ireland sought to use Brexit as an opportunity for a land grab. Given that this debate could have happened as late as 17 December, it is striking to me that there was obviously a desire to get it over with before the EU general product safety regulation comes into force on Friday and possibly before the new NISRA trade data comes out tomorrow. I will conclude by appealing to unionists in the House. I will begin by referring to the High Court action that was brought by Jamie Bryson yesterday. I note that, yesterday, the Secretary of State sent in a team of nine lawyers and that they threatened to seek costs. The judge in the case rightly dismissed that out of hand. It was all part of a desperate attempt to scare off any challenge. Let me quote what Justice McAlinden said yesterday about the so-called constitutional legislation that was referred to in 'Safeguarding the Union':

"This is just an example of the Government throwing breadcrumbs, trying to presentationally keep everyone happy, but in reality without any legal effect."

He added:

"Why did the Government pass legislation saying the Windsor Framework was without prejudice to the Acts of Union when plainly the same Windsor Framework does have effects on the Acts of Union placing Northern Ireland in a different place than the rest of the UK which many people in our community do feel diminishes the Union? In reality that legislation does not undo the holding in Allister, but restates it."

Whatever you think of my party leader and me, it is indisputable that we have been proven to be correct about the impact and reality of the sea border and the Windsor framework. No one can claim that the Acts of Union have not been trashed: just yesterday, a judgement reiterated the fact that they have been. No one in the Chamber would repeat today or at any other time the outlandish claims made by Sir Jeffrey Donaldson that resulted in the restoration of the institutions. We all know what the result of the vote will be, because of the nationalist and republican Alliance. For the benefit of Hansard, I confirm that that is "Alliance" with a capital A. The question is this: what will you do about it? The assurances that unionists were given, whether they were in the Belfast Agreement or the Windsor framework, were clearly not worth the paper on which they were written.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. It appears that we have touched a raw nerve with nationalist and republican Alliance. There is a bone of contention there. Yes, Alliance might not be designated as such, but that is the perception in unionist circles; I certainly believe that. I restate my comment about Alliance being Sinn Féin's little helpers. On that basis, you will troop through the Lobby with its Members later, I am sure. I will return to what I was saying.

I will give way, because you look cross.

Offence is a choice. We talk about courtesy. I let the Member in, and I thought that I was being courteous.

She obviously disagrees with that as she is chuntering from a sedentary position. Listen, I am sure that we will have many a dispute in the months and years to come, whether you like it or not. Going back to what I was saying, the House operates on a sham basis. We have seen that tonight. Minority protections clearly only apply to non-unionists. Why, therefore, do unionists continue to prop up this sham? I will pick up on a couple of points that were made earlier. The deputy First Minister, in her capacity as an MLA, mentioned sending a strong message to Westminster. We could have sent a strong message to Westminster by returning to the House only to vote against the motion before us tonight. The position of unionism has been weakened by a return to the House to operate the very mechanisms that are ushering us out of the UK. I ask the Member and her party to reflect on that position. I want to go forward with a strong and united voice in opposition to the protocol, but we need to grow a backbone and use the leverage that is at our disposal. Our rights have been trampled: unionism is in the minority and is being disregarded by the other side of the House, so we need to question the very existence of the institutions that we are sitting in tonight.

I will give way.

I thank the Member for his intervention. The 'Safeguarding the Union' document, which was sold to unionism in Northern Ireland to bring back the institutions, was what was being tested in the courts. It turns out that the safeguards in 'Safeguarding the Union' are not worth the paper that they are written on. When we talk about rights, I am talking about the Belfast Agreement. I am talking about the Government taking action to remove cross-community consent to ensure that the vote tonight was gerrymandered to get what they wanted. That is exactly what has happened. When unionism has been in the minority in the House, our rights have been diminished. Our rights have been trampled on, and if the vote was going to go the other way, the republican Alliance Party — Sinn Féin's little helpers — would be the first to stand up and call that out. However, because the vote will go against unionism, the Alliance Party en bloc are saying nothing about it.

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Can you confirm that this is indeed a political Chamber? Members seem to be getting very offended by everything that is being said, maybe if they do not like the Member. My goodness, I had to apologise to get speaking tonight. I am glad that I was given that opportunity, apart from being interrupted by the interventions from the Alliance Party. Remind the Alliance Party that this is a political Chamber.

4,007 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Qualifying Constitutional question, Brexit, the Windsor Framework and sovereignty

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:46 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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