Debate contribution: Enhancing Accountability and Trust in Government

Debate contribution by Mrs Michelle Guy on 3 February 2025.

MLA

Mrs Michelle Guy

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

3 February 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Enhancing Accountability and Trust in Government

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4773920

Read the official Assembly record

Text

The restoration of the institutions a year ago was welcome. Any sense of relief, however, was tempered by the scale of the damage inflicted by collapse on already fragile and struggling public services. Waiting lists went up; transformation programmes stalled; policy development was shelved; and challenges facing education, infrastructure, policing and our environment were allowed to escalate over time. The DUP opted to wager our public services against the thin hope that the EU and the UK Government would U-turn on a Brexit agreement that took years to negotiate. The DUP lost that bet, and we all had to suffer. We have no issue with the overarching premise of the motion. We want the Executive to deliver. We want to restore public confidence in democracy here. The motion references the Executive's "promised legislative programme". The SDLP has been in every Executive since the Good Friday Agreement bar that in the past year, so it knows well that legislation takes time. It takes preparation; it requires consultation; and, in the context of a reduced mandate, it takes real determination to get it done. I make no apologies for highlighting that the only two Departments to bring forward substantial Bills so far are Justice and Agriculture, the two Alliance Ministries. I know well that delivery is how we start to regain the trust of the public, but delivery requires stability, so we must end the cycle of crisis and collapse through institutional reform. On that aspect, our amendment adds something that the original motion lacked: substance. We have added specifics from our suite of reform proposals, which we tirelessly advocate. Our party leader wrote recently to the UK and Irish Governments about reform to try to make progress on the issue.

Thank you. I do not sit on the Executive, so I cannot confirm that for you. Our advocacy of reform is not to secure a win for the Alliance Party; it is because we need political stability to restore confidence not just in the institutions per se but in those of us who occupy and operate them. The Alliance Party's focus on reform links to a wider vision and aspiration: to make Northern Ireland the best version of itself for everyone who lives here. For us, no opportunity to do that is limited by adherence to an overarching constitutional objective. If we can make this place better by exploiting the benefits of dual market access, we are ready to make that case. If we can get a grip of our health service by committing to transformation or working across this island, we are up for it. If we can make our institutions more sustainable and make them function more effectively through reform, we are eager to get started. The reform proposals noted in our amendment are modest. They remove vetoes that prevent us from having a Government and vetoes that can be deployed in government to frustrate the functioning of our democracy. Tomorrow, the Assembly Executive and Review Committee will make a third attempt at agreeing priorities. The leader of the Opposition and I have signalled that we want institutional reform to be progressed through that Committee. The First Minister recently indicated that Sinn Féin reps will endorse that work. I hope that we can get consensus from all parties. The real measure, however, of commitment to reform will be to see an output from the work of AERC. Our public services cannot withstand another collapse. We must show the public that we are capable of coming together to do that work now, in a moment of stability, and not as the outworking of another crisis negotiation. It would be a significant moment, demonstrating actual political maturity and commitment to governing this place, if we could produce agreed reform proposals. A first step would be to agree our amendment, which proposes actual mechanisms for reform, rather than just sentiment. Alliance is up for the work of reform. I guess that we will see who else is.

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

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:52 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

Disagree with this assessment?

Classifications can be challenged. A person reads every challenge, and any change is recorded publicly above with its reason.

Challenge this classification