Three years to the day that the Northern Ireland assembly collapsed over a public spending scandal triggered by a botched renewable energy scheme, the British and Irish governments outlined a programme to resuscitate the region’s democracy and rebuild its public sphere. To sweeten the deal there are substantial sums available to public services that have been stretched to breaking point. Sinn Féin and the Democratic Unionist party (DUP) could not have refused this offer, as it would have triggered fresh elections. Neither party wanted another poll for fear of losing yet more support from voters tired of their desire to dominate their communities at the expense of almost anything else.
If negotiations in the days to come were to collapse it would pose troubling questions about how much the main NI parties want self-government. With the Stormont assembly not operating, no new legislation has been passed. Civil servants have been reluctant to act. This has not stopped laws being imposed from Westminster. Last summer MPs used amendments to force Northern Ireland to allow same-sex marriage and liberalise restrictive abortion laws. Both were much-needed changes. But it would have been better for local politicians to have made and won the arguments on the ground and reformed the law themselves.
Yet the ears of too many of Northern Ireland’s leaders have been so sensitively attuned to the bugle notes of sectarian strife that they cannot hear the clamour of contemporary life. It has taken outsiders – in this case the Northern Ireland secretary, Julian Smith, and the Irish tanaiste, Simon Coveney – to deliver a plan that reflects the priorities of the people living in the region. They have understood that only good and responsive government can defuse the fury that lies behind the first Royal College-backed nursing strike in a century. Or diminish the despair engendered when Northern Ireland tops all the UK tables no one wants to: worst for suicides; child poverty; and economic inactivity. If this continues, it is hard to see how the current political structure – cast from the 1998 Good Friday agreement to guarantee participation for the unionist majority and nationalist minority – could last.
To their credit, London and Dublin have identified problems, come up with workable solutions and coughed up the money. The two capitals have attempted to meet tricky demands, such as those surrounding the Irish language. It helps that the DUP has after December’s election lost the influence it had – or thought it had – over the Conservative party. In doing what the Stormont assembly is supposed to do, the two capitals offer a way to move forward. This requires local politics to change too. After decades of paramilitary violence, the people of Northern Ireland welcomed devolution. However, and with good reason, they appear to be turning against the idea that power sharing is about power being shared out just along narrow community lines. They are aghast at the lack of accountability and transparency in politics.
People’s eyes were opened by the “cash-for-ash” scandal that brought down the last assembly. NI ministers acted as if they could spend Treasury cash – to the tune of £490m – with no consequences. Such chicanery was enabled by NI parties willing to go into coalition as long as they looked after their own. This has to end. Parties need a shared vision of where the region is going and the compromises required. In the last three years businesses, trade unions and charities have been essential in motivating opinion on public policy issues. That genie cannot be put back into the bottle. What needs encouraging is the development of a society which is more tolerant and a politics that is genuinely pluralist. The assembly is supposed to have a role in managing the Irish border after Brexit. To do this and much more will need Northern Ireland’s democracy to shape up in a short space of time. One can only hope it can do so.
