My Lords, I listen with interest to colleagues speaking about the importance of the statutory instrument and the difficulty of it for people here, saying that there might be people in Northern Ireland who are pressing for this. I want to bring the contrary view that this could in fact create real problems in Northern Ireland.
The Minister mentioned the number of flagpoles, which is a lot less important than the placing of them. There is one rather important building that has two flagpoles: the Parliament Buildings at Stormont. I know that rather well because, when I was Speaker there, I had to negotiate the question of flags, particularly whenever Her Majesty was coming. I was able to make the point to republicans and nationalists that, if they wanted recognition when a Head of State came from the Republic of Ireland, they had to be prepared to give recognition when the Head of State from the United Kingdom came.
What does this flag mean to people in Northern Ireland? Of all the absurd and nonsensical things I have heard in the last little while coming out of the Northern Ireland Office, this is one of the worst. The Explanatory Memorandum says:
“Consultation is not considered necessary, as the instrument is making a minor, technical change resulting from the United Kingdom’s withdrawal from the European Union”.
Only the Northern Ireland Office could regard the question of flags in Northern Ireland as a minor, technical question. It shows how utterly out of touch it is with pretty much everything going on in the Province. However, it is at one with a number of the statements from the Minister’s right honourable friend in another place.
When—I assume it is “when”—the United Kingdom leaves the European Union, Ireland will still be a member. One of the decisions that was emphasised in the Good Friday agreement and subsequently was that those of us who live in and come from Northern Ireland have a right to both an Irish and a British passport. I have an Irish and a British passport, as do my wife, my children and all my grandchildren. What does that mean? It means that for those people who have that passport, and therefore remain part of the European Union, any sense of their European identity will be wiped out by this silly piece of nonsense.
However, it gets worse. Many have been prepared to set the question of the flags to one side for the moment—people from the nationalist and republican communities, and many who support the Alliance Party, too. We are saying to them: not only can you not have the flag of the nation state you identify with but you cannot have the European flag, despite the fact that all of us have emphasised that the Good Friday agreement comes out of a process informed by the European project, encouraged by the European Union and inspired by the developments that have taken place in Europe. How many times have we heard John Hume talking about the French still being French and the Germans still German, but them being able to be Europeans together? All that gets blithely pushed to the side. By the way, we do not worry too much about dates in Northern Ireland. The Battle of the Boyne took place on 1 July, but we celebrate it on 12 July, and also have a mini 12 July on 1 July. We do not worry too much about the dates, as long as people do not stop folk celebrating the things that matter to them—and I think this does matter.
6pm
Does the Minister have any reason to believe that if this question were to come to a reformed Northern Ireland Assembly, it would get majority support and be passed? I can tell him, with a fair degree of certainty, that it would not be passed. One of the difficulties about this being passed now is that if it was passed and taken up in the Northern Ireland Assembly, I have absolutely no doubt that some colleagues—even those represented in this House—would put down a petition of concern to block it from being returned to the place where it currently is.
This is not just some minor technical question. Flags are a matter of huge symbolic importance. One may not be able to eat a flag or even keep warm with a flag, but there are people prepared to fight and die for a flag. This must be an extremely difficult debate for the Minister, because he is a Scotsman. He understands entirely the importance of symbolism north of the border, and understands very well, I have no doubt, the symbolism of flags north of the border in Ireland too.
I seriously ask him whether he will not take on board what my noble friend Lord Bruce of Bennachie has said. This is damaging. It is not just petty, it is not
just foolish, it is not just misplaced, it is not just mistimed —we do not need to do anything about it until this time next year at the earliest. We need to think seriously about whether Her Majesty’s Government might be wise not to create even more problems. There is an old saying: when you are in a hole, stop digging. I do not think there is anybody in this House who thinks that the Government are not in a hole, but please, do not dig it deeper in respect of Northern Ireland. We got through many difficulties over flags when we had the devolved Assembly—when it went into suspension there were issues about flags. It was really only one flagpole on Belfast City Hall that created the trouble. Please, can we pull this back, and pull ourselves back from a very foolish initiative by the Government?