Northern Ireland

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement made by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland in another place. Obviously, there are a lot of good sentiments and good words in the Statement. I would be keen to see a world-class Northern Ireland and much of the Statement referred positively to the Province that is my native land. However, deadlines may not be a good idea in Northern Ireland—not that the Unionist community could not keep to deadlines. The problem is that the criminality of Sinn Fein/IRA may not positively be over. The noble Lord, Lord Glentoran, referred to £200,000-worth of drink being stolen in the south of Ireland. Is the Minister aware that Thomas Maxwell, who is currently in gaol in the Irish Republic on charges of stealing that £200,000-worth of vodka, was the Sinn Fein official who took the two clergymen and General de Chastelain around the arms dumps in the autumn of last year—only six months ago? He is now charged with stealing £200,000-worth of drink, so it is hard to see how Sinn Fein/IRA is divorcing itself heavily from criminality. In answer to a Question on 10 May last year, at col. WA 62, the Minister indicated that £1.43 billion had been lost to HMG by fuel laundering in Northern Ireland over the past four years. If we take the period from 2000 to the end of 2005, the figure is £2.1 billion. That does not take into consideration the drugs, the VAT swindles that relate to drink and the cigarettes. It is all there to see. A friend of mine recently spent a number of hours in South Armagh. He counted exactly 50 unmarked fuel-laundering tankers in the South Armagh area.