Northern Ireland (St. Andrews Agreement) (No. 2) Bill

The hon. Lady has missed the whole momentum and tenor of this debate. Her nitpicking and pettiness do her no good whatsoever. With the news that people will not be getting water charge bills through their door, that academic selection will remain in Northern Ireland—the good grammar schools in North Down will benefit from that—and that we are going to get a Government on 8 May, I do not believe that the people of North Down are sitting wondering whether it is right or wrong that their Assembly Members are getting paid. Those Members will now engage in preparatory work and will be working day and night, as we have been and as the hon. Lady has not been on this issue. We have been working long hours—well beyond midnight on many evenings—trying to resolve these issues and to make progress. I do not think that anyone in my constituency is going to question whether I earn the much-reduced salary that I and my colleagues on these Benches—as both Members of Parliament and Members of the Northern Ireland Assembly—receive. Nor do I believe that the people who were elected in North Down will be any less worthy of the salaries that are paid to them, because we are preparing for the return to government. We are still a condition-led party.