12
Examination of witness
Jim Allister.
Q108 The Chair: We are holding the ninth public evidence session of our inquiry on Article 2 of the protocol/Windsor Framework, the so-called non-diminution of rights provision. We will be holding a further such session during the day. We are joined now by Jim McCallister, the leader of Traditional Unionist Voice, the TUV. You are very welcome and we very much look forward to your evidence. Today’s meeting is being broadcast and a verbatim transcript will be taken for subsequent publication. It will be sent to you to check for accuracy. Please introduce yourself for the record and, if you have a short introduction, please feel free to make it.
Jim Allister: Thank you very much. For accuracy, the name is Allister, not McCallister.
The Chair: That is my fault, I do apologise. I even underlined it. My apologies, Mr Allister.
Jim Allister: I am Jim Allister, Member of Parliament for North Antrim and leader, as you said, of Traditional Unionist Voice. I am pleased to be with you this morning to talk about an issue that is very important to me and my constituents.
Article 2 is an intrinsic and inseparable part of the protocol, or as we now profess to call it, the Windsor Framework. Being such an intrinsic part, it is inseparable from the overall undemocratic aspect of the Windsor Framework. Like subsequent articles up to Article 10, it denudes Northern Ireland of the right to have a say in many legislative issues. There has probably been most focus on the fact that, particularly under Article 5, there are 300 areas of law where we are subject to laws that we do not make and cannot change.
The same arises by virtue of the same route of dynamic alignment in respect of Article 2. It is a constitutional insult and a constitutional absurdity that any rules, regulations or laws that govern any people should be not those they make themselves but those made through dynamic alignment, which means the laws of others being enforced upon them. So there is a fundamental democratic objection which informs the approach to Article 2 as much as it does the rest of the protocol impositions.
Article 2 is also something of an insult. You would think when reading it that, without the Belfast agreement and without the EU, we had no rights in Northern Ireland. But, of course, we have the fair employment Act from 1976. We have the equal pay Act from 1970. We have had legislation on incitement to hatred since 1981. We have had the Disability Discrimination Act from 1995, the race relations order from 1977, the sex discrimination order from 1976, the equality Act sexual orientation regulations from 2006, and so it goes on. You would think from reading Article 2 that we were devoid of all those.
We will no doubt come in the questions to the full import of Article 2. For me, it is of overwhelming political and constitutional significance in that, through dynamic alignment, it involves the removal of local and national sovereignty on these issues. To that extent, it has the capacity to add to the Irish Sea trade border and the Irish Sea rights border. You can end up with a situation where people in this part of the United Kingdom have different rights—rights they cannot change—than would prevail elsewhere in the United Kingdom. I suppose it all boils down to the fact that it is an unacceptable imposition of EU colonial rule.
The Chair: Given your view, which you are not the only person to express to us today—
Jim Allister: I am glad to hear it.
Q109 The Chair: Given that view, why do you think that the UK and the EU negotiated and included Article 2 in the face of the sorts of objections from senior figures, including a senior lawyer like yourself and other lawyers? What is the real political significance of that? Is it all negative, or were they trying to achieve something positive in terms of guarantees of rights for the people of Northern Ireland?
Jim Allister: I think it all came about because of the desperation of Boris Johnson to get a deal—any deal. He was prepared to sacrifice sovereignty in my part of the United Kingdom to get that deal. The EU—detecting and exploiting his desperation, and as part of its overarching strategy to ultimately thwart Brexit by keeping hold of a part of the United Kingdom—saw this as another opportunity within the protocol to build upon the suppression of sovereignty and the colonial rule that it had introduced through Articles 3 to 10.
To build on that, on the issue of rights, I think Article 2 was built into that as part of the EU’s continuing, in perpetuity control. One of the significant things about Article 2 is that it does not even have a democratic veneer. The others in the first 10 articles are supposed to be subject to a facade of democratic consent in that there is a vote every four years. There is no such vote on Article 2. It is a permanent feature—a permanent fixture of EU dynamic alignment for Northern Ireland, a part of the United Kingdom. Whatever else happens on rights in the rest of the United Kingdom, we are tethered, with no pretence of democratic oversight, in respect of Article 2.
From my perspective, the EU definitely saw Northern Ireland as the opportunity, in the words of some people, to make it the price of Brexit. But it also saw the opportunity to make it the connection that would never really let the United Kingdom take back full control, most demonstrably not here. On one side, it was a careless indifference to a fundamental aspect of sovereignty. On the other side, it was an aggressive assertion of political advantage.
The Chair: Why should this committee look at what happened as a diminution of rights? After all, all those rights you referred to in your very accurate list earlier were rights that existed before Article 2 and have continued to exist since Article 2. So, what was lost in terms of rights by Article 2?
Jim Allister: Where did all those rights come from? They came from the democratic expression, through legislation, of those who were elected by the people of Northern Ireland, either at Westminster or in Stormont. They were the creation and product of the democratic process.
With the rights we are now talking about, whether they are good or bad is not the issue. The issue is not the merit of the rights. The issue is the genesis of the rights, which is through dynamic alignment. Rights, be they good or bad, are imposed on an ongoing basis without anyone in this building or in Westminster having any right to object. They are laws made without our consent and without our input, and that is preposterous.
The Chair: But they were passed in a referendum by the British public.
Jim Allister: Sorry, but the referendum of the British public was on whether the United Kingdom should leave the EU. That was the question on my ballot paper and on everyone else’s. That is not what happened. Because of surrenders like that over Article 2 and Article 5, et cetera, Northern Ireland was left behind, subject to the EU’s customs union, within the EU’s single market—hence the Irish Sea border—and subject to EU jurisprudence on rights. None of this is what anyone voted for in the referendum. It was supposed to be about taking back control. This is the very antithesis of taking back control. This is leaving and handing control to a foreign polity—and that is the fundamental objection to it.
Lord Dodds of Duncairn: I have a quick factual point that follows on from this discussion; I will then come on to my main question. You mentioned that Article 2 is not subject to the consent vote. Are the Article 2 provisions—the dynamic alignment on the six EU directives or the areas of the directives—subject to scrutiny and any possible Stormont brake, or are they separated out from that as well?
Jim Allister: I believe they are, yes. I certainly have not picked up anything of them ever having been examined in that context.
Q110 Lord Dodds of Duncairn: That is an interesting point, as is why they should have been left out. I come on to my main question. You have described the offence as against democracy and sovereignty; what about the Belfast agreement itself, which this was designed to protect? What do you say about this being necessary to ensure that the Belfast agreement was protected and safeguarded? We have heard evidence this morning that the very existence of Article 2 and the rest of the protocol is a breach of the Belfast agreement, and I presume you would share that view. Could you elaborate on why you think that is the case?
Jim Allister: I think it is absolute nonsense to say that the Belfast agreement needed the crutch of Article 2, because, in international law, the Belfast agreement is a binding agreement. It is free-standing in its own imposition, so it did not need the crutch of Article 2 to give it effect. Legally, that is the first and important point. There is so much nonsense spread abroad about the protocol being about protecting the Belfast agreement.
Alas, the truth is that the protocol dismantled key components of the Belfast agreement. We referred to one of them, which is the democratic facade of, every four years, giving control to the Assembly to decide whether to continue with those clauses. To get to that point, they had to dismantle a fundamental tenet of the Belfast agreement, which was on cross-community support. Under Section 42 of the 1998 constitution Act, there is a provision that any matter of a controversial nature requires a cross-community vote. There is nothing more controversial than saying to a community, “You will be disenfranchised for another four years in making the laws that you might want in respect of goods and everything else—we are going to take that right away from you”. That is inherently controversial. How did they get around that? On the EU’s insistence, they got round it by exempting the four-yearly vote from the cross-community protection. That was a fundamental of the Belfast agreement that was dismantled within this.
If we are talking about the Belfast agreement, let us not forget that, in its section on human rights, it speaks of “the right to pursue democratically national and political aspirations”. These realities in Article 2 and the rest of the protocol deny that. If I have a political aspiration to be able to elect those who make my laws, then these proposals deny that. Something that is supposedly guaranteed in the Belfast agreement has been swept away by the protocol, which extracts 300 areas of law to do with our economy, and all the laws propped up by Article 2 to do with our rights, and puts them beyond the reach of any elector in Northern Ireland to elect anyone to determine and decide those laws. It is a massive exercise in disenfranchisement that the protocol or Windsor Framework has indulged in.
Far from protecting the Belfast agreement, they have undermined it in those two fundamental ways. I get a little tired when I hear people saying, “This is all about protecting the Belfast agreement”. This, for me, was about dismantling two fundamental protections in the Belfast agreement, and not a word I hear about it—certainly not from the Government.
Q111 Baroness Foster of Aghadrumsee: Thank you very much, Jim, for coming today and for your evidence thus far. We have spent a bit of time looking at the Dillon case, which brought forward its judgment a couple of months ago. It is very fundamental to how Article 2 is interpreted in terms of the Supreme Court handing down that judgment. I wanted to ask you for your view on the Dillon case and whether you think it narrows the grounds in relation to Article 2. What is your interpretation of Dillon as it stands?
Jim Allister: It undoubtedly narrows the scope of when Article 2 can be prayed in aid in respect of these matters, because it made reference to the Demirel test of clear, precise and unconditional obligations. Previously, we had a lot of propaganda, not least from the Equality Commission and the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, about how Article 2 could be prayed in aid on all sorts of issues. Indeed, the ambition of some was to undermine the other Supreme Court ruling on the For Women Scotland case, and they were set to do that. The Dillon judgment makes clear that there is a much narrower scope, and that it has to be Annexe 1 specific; if it is not, then Article 2 is of no relevance.
Of course, Dillon was also very clear that, through the conduit of Section 7A of the 2018 Act, there is direct effect for Article 2(1). That sets up a parallel very akin to Section 2 of the European Communities Act, way back in 1972, where you had direct compelling impact. Section 7A of the 2018 Act creates the same for Article 2(1) of the protocol. That direct dynamic imposition concerns me from a constitutional point of view. But I welcome the aspect of Dillon that certainly put the reins on the growth and impact of Article 2(1); that was to the good. If it stymies foolish challenges, such as trying to distinguish and overturn the For Women Scotland case’s application in Northern Ireland, then that will be to the good.
Q112 Baroness Ludford: Thank you very much, Mr Allister. Do you see other routes to bringing further clarity to the Dillon case’s effect on Article 2? You said that you believe that it narrows the impact of Article 2. You also mentioned the For Women Scotland judgment as an example of an area where Dillon might have put an obstacle in the way of undermining the application of that judgment in Northern Ireland. What processes or routes do you see to further clarifying exactly what limits might be put around Article 2 through the Dillon judgment? How is the clarification going to emerge?
Jim Allister: In so far as it is needed, there undoubtedly will be further JR challenges. We could again be set upon quite a protracted legal route through the High Court, the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court, because there are those who are not happy with the constraints that have been placed on Article 2, and therefore are going to try and contrive and bring challenge. It is primarily going to be through the routes of legal challenge. We are likely to see that another potential route would be for declaratory legislation on the issue. But I do not see why the Government rushed to do that, since the proper legal interpretation, I believe, of Dillon puts limitations on it.
The Chair: Has Dillon not made it clear that, if people wish to challenge for or against asserted rights in Northern Ireland, the right course for them is to do it through the courts, probably by judicial review? That is much commoner in England and Wales than in Northern Ireland; proportionately, it is exponentially more common. There are very few judicial review cases of this kind in Northern Ireland. What is the problem with Dillon effectively challenging people and saying, “You can go by judicial review to enforce your purported rights”? That is the normal way of doing things and it keeps judges in their right position vis-à-vis the separation of powers.
Jim Allister: I am not disputing that that is likely to be the route followed and, indeed, the appropriate route. It does not detract from my fundamental point that Article 2(1) should not be an imposition. It should never have been there in the first place, as a direct imposition through dynamic alignment on a part of the United Kingdom. But leaving aside that argument, you are right and I agree that the proper and appropriate course or route for challenge is through judicial review. I have no doubt, with our very generous legal aid system and our—
The Chair: Is that what your former learned friends think about the legal system? You do not have to answer that question.
Jim Allister: I will not speak for them. Through our very proactive, politically inspired Equality Commission, I am sure that there will be multiple challenges.
The Chair: I would like you to say a word about the two commissions, which are named in Article 2 or in relation to Article 2. What is your view and your party’s view about the role that they play currently?
Jim Allister: I think that you judge them by their actions. In their actions, we see them as excessively proactive in terms of being interested in suppressing the democratic rights of the people of Northern Ireland. If you have a Human Rights Commission and an Equality Commission, and you have a Belfast agreement that says that you have the right to pursue democratic, national and political aspirations, and you have a protocol that says that you cannot do that in terms of having the right to elect anyone to make those laws in that sphere, it strikes me as bizarre that those two bodies, with those supposed parameters of operation, have never taken up their cudgels and said, “Right, we are going to challenge why it is that people in Northern Ireland do not, according to the Belfast agreement, have the right to democratically pursue political aspirations, such as the rather fundamental aspiration of wanting to elect those who make their laws”. By virtue of their silence and looking the other way on that issue and, instead, embracing every challenge that comes along to expand the EU’s influence in Northern Ireland, to the very point of wanting to undermine Supreme Court rulings such as in For Women Scotland, then, by their actions, you can see that they are a body discredited in terms of the breadth of approach that they take. They are very partisan.
The Chair: I have one more supplementary question related to Baroness Ludford’s question, which is about dynamic alignment. Where a treaty is made between one country and another, there will always be what we now fashionably call dynamic alignment. There are going to have to be legal adjustments, whatever that treaty is. For example, the NATO treaty has a lot of dynamic alignment in it that allows people to do things—lawful things—that might not otherwise have been lawful.
Jim Allister: But, with respect, there are very few treaties that prohibit people from electing those who make laws about a subject matter.
The Chair: The point that I was going to make is that dynamic alignment, when treaties take place, always depends on the will of the United Kingdom Parliament. No Government can make a treaty that is not approved by the United Kingdom Parliament. So is that not democratic approbation of the highest sort in favour of that process?
Jim Allister: Of the highest sort of the lowest assault on democratic rights. Yes, Section 7A was passed by the United Kingdom Parliament. That does not mean that it did anything other than disenfranchise my constituents, because it clearly did. It has created this conduit of laws in over 300 areas where my constituents have no say on what those laws are. They cannot elect anyone who can propose any amendment to any of those laws or bring forward any laws. That is disenfranchising us. That flows from the will of the UK Parliament through Section 7A, which is all the more reason why, democratically, one should be able to campaign for the reversal of that and hope that one day we will have a Government who will have the strength, courage and conviction to reassert sovereignty over their own territory.
Q113 Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick: Thank you, Jim, for your evidence thus far. Notwithstanding our positions on this particular issue, I am sure that you would accept that Northern Ireland is a divided society and hence there are different views on the Windsor Framework and Article 2. Would you agree that a consequence of all the things that have happened are a result of Brexit and that, while it was a UK vote, the people of Northern Ireland voted to remain within the European Union? Would you agree with that?
Jim Allister: So did the people of London and the people of Scotland, but I do not see any legislation that creates dynamic alignment for Scotland or London. The fallacy is that it was not a vote for Northern Ireland, a vote for Scotland or a vote for London; it was a vote for the United Kingdom and therefore the outcome should be a United Kingdom outcome. The problem is that we did not get a United Kingdom outcome. We got a GB outcome and a Northern Ireland outcome. Therein is the travesty that, having voted for the United Kingdom as a whole to leave, part of it was left behind. On the point of a divided society, I agree, sadly. But surely there is no division, or maybe there is, on whether people should have the right to be enfranchised to elect those who make their laws. Why would anyone not want to have that right?
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick: Surely enfranchisement would have continued if we all had remained within the European Union.
Jim Allister: Yes, but that then flags a rejection of the biggest democratic vote in the nation’s history. You do not have that luxury. The vote was made and the mandate of that vote was for the United Kingdom to take back control and leave the EU. It was the failure to deliver that mandate by the Boris Johnson Government and all Governments since that has created this dichotomy.
The Chair: But are you not politically asking to have your cake and eat it, because you are in favour of the United Kingdom, right?
Jim Allister: Yes.
The Chair: And you are a strong supporter of Northern Ireland being part of the United Kingdom.
Jim Allister: Yes.
The Chair: So when a vote takes place, although you are absolutely right to say that you have every right to campaign, as you put it, on behalf of your constituents, certainly on behalf of those who agree with you, nevertheless, are not you enfranchised to act within the constitution of the United Kingdom? Therefore, if there is a United Kingdom vote that takes us out of the European Union, like it or not—personally, I did not—you are stuck with it unless you can campaign for a change in the future.
Jim Allister: Yes, but the difference for you, Lord Carlile, is that there is no area of law where—well, as a Peer you do not actually have a vote in most cases—you cannot elect someone who then has a say on how those laws are made, except in Northern Ireland. That is unique to us. In 300 areas of law and in this rights area, we are not allowed to elect people to shape, pass, vote on or propose amendments to those laws. That is the fundamental democratic aspect here.
The Chair: Just to remind you that as a Peer, ironically, I was entitled to vote in European elections, but not in British elections.
Jim Allister: Yes, I am aware of that.
Q114 Baroness Ludford: The Chair played devil’s advocate earlier, so could I too? I am also a remainer. I completely respect your position on Brexit, but was it not foreseeable that Brexit carried baggage with it in terms of what would happen in Northern Ireland? Was it not foreseeable that there would be these difficulties and that Northern Ireland would not be in the same position as GB because of the weight of history, the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, the complications of the border and so on—and that, in voting for Brexit, you kind of ignored the possible consequences?
Jim Allister: So then we would punish the people for voting for Brexit.
Baroness Ludford: No, not punish them—but would you say that you could not foresee some of the complications that would come from Brexit?
Jim Allister: I could not foresee the fantasies built around the Belfast agreement. I read and heard so many times that you had to have the border in the Irish Sea because of the Belfast agreement. Where in the Belfast agreement does it say that you cannot have a customs border and the necessary things that go with that at the international frontier? It does not. The only thing the Belfast agreement says about the border is that the security posts should be removed. It says nothing about impinging on trade between Great Britain and Northern Ireland or preventing such a border as the EU might think it was necessary to have on the island of Ireland.
It would have been its choice—the United Kingdom made it very plain that we did not need a border. If the EU wanted a border, then that was a matter for it. Instead, the United Kingdom foolishly rolled over and said, “Oh well, we will simply partition our own country. We will put the border down the Irish Sea. We will impose upon the citizens and businesses of Northern Ireland the obligation for all their raw materials to pass through an international customs border and SPS border. We will have checks and customs declarations. We will have all that goes with an international border”. None of that was a product of what the Belfast agreement required, and yet it was imposed.
Baroness Ludford: Thank you for tolerating my provocative question.
Jim Allister: Lady Ludford, I remember your provocative questions from the European Parliament a quarter of a century ago.
Q115 Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick: I have a supplementary question. In view of your position and what you have already said, how do you see rights being protected for all the community in Northern Ireland?
Jim Allister: It is by the sovereign Parliament of the United Kingdom. Some of these rights issues were transferred and some are accepted: for example, membership of the European Convention on Human Rights is an accepted matter. I ask for nothing more than what my fellow citizens have in the rest of the United Kingdom: that their rights are the rights as prescribed by the sovereign Parliament of the United Kingdom.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick: So you agree with the necessity of the ECHR to underpin rights?
Jim Allister: No, I do not. Left to myself, and I recited much of the legislation that we—
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick: You come back to the issue of national sovereignty.
Jim Allister: Yes. I recognise that Dillon, for example, would create a challenge to a British Government to extract the whole United Kingdom from the ECHR, so you would have to have a Government of sufficient conviction and strength to be determined to override the Windsor Framework to do that, but that is a legitimate political aspiration. We have the Human Rights Act and the European Convention on Human Rights. My constituents, as much as anyone else’s, have the rights that those provide. The objection is that we then layer those with rights that we do not make or vote for to shape all that. Meanwhile, if the rest of the United Kingdom chose to tread a different path—at the moment, there is not a great deal of difference, but if it did—then you would have a border on rights as well. Part of the essence of being a United Kingdom is that you pay the same taxes and enjoy the same rights; I think that is pretty fundamental.
The Chair: Lady Sanderson, bring us back down to earth.
Q116 Baroness Sanderson of Welton: Morning, Mr Allister—nice to meet you. What level of understanding do you think your constituents have of Article 2—I know your view on it—and where their rights are placed in that long list of domestic legislation you gave? Do they have an understanding in that way? More generally, if they do not, how do you think they feel about their personal rights? Do they feel that these are under threat since Brexit?
Jim Allister: I do not think that any ordinary constituent, if I can use that phrase, would have a working knowledge of their rights, or maybe even where they come from, until they wish to avail themselves of them. But I do not think that that cuts across the question—which I and you, as legislators, should be contemplating—as to the bona fides of rights being prescribed by others rather than by ourselves. I am not saying that my constituents in Ballymena or Ballymoney are out on the streets protesting about their rights, but I think most of them would say, “Well, if I am part of the United Kingdom, then I want the rights of the United Kingdom, not the rights of someone else”. That is the fundamental problem.
Baroness Sanderson of Welton: Yes, they would not go to such a granular level, but do you feel there is a sense of dissatisfaction or unease?
Jim Allister: I think there is great unease, particularly in the unionist community, about the whole edifice of the Windsor Framework: the fact that it puts us under a customs code that decrees GB to be a third or foreign country and the fact that it subjects us, in 300 areas of law, to single market rules which are not made by us but which, incidentally and not so incidentally, are exactly the same laws as govern the Irish Republic. I think there is an aversion to the thought that they cannot elect anyone to change any of that because it is beyond their reach. All that comes back to the fundamental democratic deficit or undermining that is implicit in the Windsor Framework.
Q117 The Chair: If I can drag you back to your very creditable career as a barrister, applying the cab rank rule to who turns up for your advice, if somebody turns up for a barrister’s advice in the Bar Library in Belfast today, is that barrister really going to have any difficulty deciding which route they should follow to enforce the purported rights under discussion?
Jim Allister: The route would be a court route.
The Chair: I am talking about the legislative background.
Jim Allister: In pursuing a right, whether it extends as argued or does not is a strict legal question which will be determined on the basis of what it says, just as in the Dillon case the court looked at what Article 2 said and interpreted it. The court was not and would not be charged with saying, “How did we get here? Is this right? Should we be here or not?” The court should be looking strictly at where we are in terms of what the legislation says.
The Chair: But in terms of Baroness Sanderson’s question, the potential claimant will still be able to establish their rights if they are found by the court to exist.
Jim Allister: Except they could not establish the right to pursue democratically national political aspirations if their aspiration was to elect the people who make their laws.
The Chair: That is a very big question.
Jim Allister: Well, it is a very fundamental question.
Q118 Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard: Thanks, Jim, for your attendance. Following the Dillon judgment, if you were by some means asked by the UK Government or the Northern Ireland Executive to provide advice—
Jim Allister: That would be very unlikely, but there you go.
Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard: If you were asked to provide advice on how they would meet their rights obligations, in particular some of those that were ruled in the Dillon case, how would you advise them to take that forward?
Jim Allister: I suppose I would take it back to the basics. If we are talking about rights—I am sorry to repeat myself—there is a right to make your own laws and, as a citizen, to elect those who make your laws, so I would advise the Government that they should rectify that deficiency. If they corrected that deficiency, we would not be in this situation, because those we elected would be making our laws, whether we like them or not. I did not like Section 7A, but it was made—whether or not with a gun to the head—by parliamentarians. That is the fundamental starting point. At the end of the day, it really is an issue of sovereignty: whether the people of a country should be able to make their own laws or whether they should slavishly follow laws made by some other entity.
Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard: In principle, I assume that means going back to scrap the protocol in its entirety, as opposed to just Article 2?
Jim Allister: Absolutely. Article 2 is an integral part of the offence of the protocol, but it is not the only offending part—of course not.
Q119 The Chair: Can we go back to the issue of sovereignty? It is a very interesting debate that you have started here. At the last general election, 239 constituencies elected Members who did not get into government; 411 at that time became members of the Government. Does that not mean that 239 constituencies, and the many thousands of constituents involved, elected somebody to make representations but no more—MPs being representatives, not delegates? Part of our constitution there, and part of your views as a UK supporter, would be to accept that you cannot always have your own way, even for your own region. Therefore, you may never achieve the aspirations to have regional control that you are talking about. It has taken Wales decades to have its first Plaid Cymru Government, and they are very tentative in the way they approach all this. Are you not oversimplifying this and being self-contradictory in your description of sovereignty, because you are assuming that Northern Ireland can have a sovereignty that does not necessarily exist at all?
Jim Allister: No, far from it. The United Kingdom Parliament has 650 Members. There are 632 of them who can bring forward any Bill they wish about the rights of their constituents. There are 18 of them who cannot do that in respect of over 300 areas of law because of the protocol. Their constituents have been disenfranchised by virtue of the fact that they cannot elect representatives who control the laws that control their lives. That is the fundamental assault.
Lord Dodds of Duncairn: I suppose this issue boils down to the age-old argument about the sovereignty of Parliament. The British constitution is not a written one, so a lot of it is convention. For instance, imagine if the British Parliament decided tomorrow, with its 400 or so Labour MPs—a massive majority, mainly from the north and in regions that are, say, anti-London—that it is going to give Manchester residents two votes and people in leafy Surrey half a vote.
The Chair: He has not thought of that. Go carefully.
Lord Dodds of Duncairn: Imagine if somebody comes up with an idea to balance the power and get away from this London-centric drag on the country. The British Parliament could pass that, and it would be the law. But like the issue of Section 7A, would it be democratic? Would it be acceptable? Would people in Surrey say, “Oh, well, that’s okay. There’s been a democratic vote, so we’re quite happy”? It is the way that the British constitution works. It is exactly the same principle—presumably you would agree, Jim—in terms of Northern Ireland: yes, the British Parliament has passed it, but it is so offensive to everyday democracy, to devolution, to the Belfast agreement and everything else. It is untenable. That is the basic principle behind all this.
Jim Allister: It fails the fundamental democratic test. It is interesting that Section 6(2) of the 1998 Act had to be amended to insert the prohibition on this Assembly doing anything that infringed Article 2 of the protocol. The legislative functions of this place have already been circumscribed in law.
The Chair: We have run out of time. Thank you very much, Mr Allister, for coming and giving evidence to us, and forgive my mistake at the beginning. It has been an interesting and provocative meeting. I suspect that, in years to come, somebody may write a PhD about this particular meeting and the discussion we have had here. We are very grateful to you and look forward to meeting you again.
