Debate contribution: Illegal Immigration: Impact in Northern Ireland

Debate contribution by Mr Paul Frew on 20 May 2025.

MLA

Mr Paul Frew

Party at the time

Democratic Unionist Party

Date

20 May 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Illegal Immigration: Impact in Northern Ireland

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4964265

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I am distraught about the level of the debate, which is on a very serious subject. It has been reduced to a zero-sum game. It has been about unionists being pitted against nationalists. It was horrendous to hear some of the language that was uttered in the Chamber over the past number of minutes. There is absolutely no need for that, but it is what we have come to expect. I have a few truths to say. If you are concerned about immigration or have questions around it, you are not a racist. You are not a bigot. You are not a unionist just for the sake of raising issues around immigration. That leads to the point as to why it is so important to have this debate. I cannot be responsible for how other people react to the debate, but I wish that their reactions had not been so. I wish that my ears had not heard what I have heard over the past half hour, because reducing the debate to a racist sum is disgusting. People in my constituency are so concerned about immigration.

Thank you, Principal Deputy Speaker. I thank the Member for his intervention. It is because the issue is very serious. If we were to tackle all the issues around people movement, the motion would be three pages long. Let us take one chunk at a time. I thought that the fact that our motion centres on HMOs would lead to a better debate —.

Alas, I am running out of time. I am sorry about running out of time. The thing is this: in the communities in the constituency that I represent, particularly those in Ballymena, there has been a massive concentration of people movement. There is nothing wrong with people movement. It is as old as mankind itself. People move for all sorts of reasons. That is not the issue. The issue is about controlling that movement, which is vital. We have been failed by our Government. It is not good enough to say, "It is not a devolved matter", because it really matters for the people whom we represent.

It matters to the people who have lived in an area all their life, have bought their house and have seen their environment change incredibly over the past 25 years. They have seen the difference in their workplaces, their environment, their homes and their neighbourhoods. It has a massive impact. Yet, when those people raise those issues, they are told that they are racist. They are even told that they are subhuman. They are told that they are extreme for fearing the change that is happening in their place and having no control over it. That is the worst part of it: the people there have no control. That is why politicians talk about taking back control. It is what the people want to hear. People want to be comforted and to know that something is being done to manage it, but, of course, nothing is being done to manage it.

When you come to a debate such as this and you are trying to raise concerns for the people whom you represent, you are labelled as a "pocket Powell" and a "pound-shop Powell". What populism we hear to get a hit on social media and to reduce the debate to unionists being the big baddies and nationalists being so good. The leader of the Opposition tweets about the planter and the Gael, yet he does not want us to talk about uncontrolled people movement. To the party that names itself Ourselves Alone I say, "How rich is that coming from the opposite Benches?". All we ask for is that the people whom we represent and you represent are listened to actively and not pigeonholed as extremists, racists, bigots and right-wingers. I know people of a socialist nature who have come to my office with concerns about the issue and Polish people who have come into my office concerned about the welfare and safety of their children walking through Ballymena at night. There are massive issues in Ballymena alone that no one seems to be addressing. When you ask the questions that they ask, you are deemed to be a racist and a bigot. That is not the way it should be. We need to have a decent, suitable, grown-up, mature debate on people movement and the controls and measures that are in place in our government to make sure that people move in manageable ways. That is something that we have not had. The most important thing now, which I am glad to hear, is that the Prime Minister, for whatever reason, is coming out now and taking the issue seriously. I would not have used the words that he used, but, yet, there he is, using those words. That shows you how important the issue is now. There might be other motives —

— for why it has happened, but, at least, it is now on the agenda.

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

Assessment

Qualifying Immigration, asylum, race, ethnicity and Travellers

Second assessment

Jev’s answers did not settle this record, so a second model, claude-opus-5-5, read the same text (without the MLA’s name or party) and gave its reasons on 21 October 2026. How the second assessment works

Verdict

Qualifying

Public interest or divisiveness

Mixed

Against the published rubric

The speech complains that the debate has become "unionists being pitted against nationalists", but then continues that argument by mocking the main nationalist party as "the party that names itself Ourselves Alone" and citing a tweet about "the planter and the Gael". Its central framing sets long-term residents, who "have seen their environment change" and fear "the change that is happening in their place", against newcomers. It also implies a safety threat by mentioning parents worried about children "walking through Ballymena at night", without evidence or a policy point attached. Practical substance is thin: houses in multiple occupation (HMOs) are mentioned only in passing, and most of the speech is about people being labelled racist and about government failing to deliver "control".

Public interest or divisiveness

There is a genuine element of representing constituents' concerns and asking for a calmer, "grown-up" debate, and the speech says there is "nothing wrong with people movement". But its main weight falls on grievance about being called racist, on the idea of demographic change to "their place" with no control, and on an identity-based jab at the opposite benches. Together these deepen the communal and migration argument rather than address its substance.

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:33 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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