Official Report: Tuesday 10 February 2026

Mr McAleer: I take this opportunity to speak about the incredible work of the Spirit of Paul McGirr charity and its most recent mission to Lusaka, Zambia, when four young students from the Dean Maguirc College in Carrickmore went out for 12 days, along with Clíodhna and Anthony, and gave their energy and hearts to help others.

Paul McGirr was a young Tyrone footballer who, tragically, died in 1997. In death, through the dedication of his family and the work of the Spirit of Paul McGirr, Paul's legacy has lived on in the most meaningful way. The charity is Tyrone-based and was founded in 2007 in Paul's memory. It works in close partnership with deprived communities in Lusaka in Zambia to design, fund and construct safe spaces that enable people to realise their potential. Over the years, that has included the construction and maintenance of schools for children with special educational needs, a preschool for orphaned children, primary and secondary schools and essential maternity and health facilities.

My daughter, Ríoghnach, was part of the most recent group, which returned home on Sunday after spending 12 days in Zambia with the charity. Through a partnership between Anamore and the Dean Maguirc students, the focus of their mission was a roof-repair project at a rural maternity and health centre. The existing roof was leaking rainwater into the treatment rooms, threatening the structure and the continuity of care for women and newborn babies. Repairing the roof was critical to ensuring that the centre remained safe, weather resistant and fit for purpose.

In preparation for their mission, the girls had a successful fundraising campaign here through activities such as a 12-hour handball marathon, a coffee morning and a sponsored cold-water plunge into the freezing waters of Lough Macrory on New Year's Day morning.

At its heart, the mission reflects the simple but powerful belief that safe, sustainable buildings can help to protect families and support livelihoods. Every project undertaken by the Spirit of Paul McGirr charity reflects that belief, building bridges between communities and empowering young people, families and volunteers to be part of lasting change.

Mr K Buchanan: I welcome the opportunity to address an issue that is central to public confidence, community safety and the long-term stability of policing in Northern Ireland: the urgent need to restore and strengthen police recruitment and our collective responsibility in that. I am a member of the Policing Board. At many Policing Board meetings, concerns are raised about the decline in officer numbers and the pressure that that places on the PSNI. Those concerns reflect what communities across Northern Ireland already know: our police service is being stretched beyond what is sustainable. We want to build a society in which people feel safe in their homes, confident in their communities and supported by a visible, responsive and representative police service.

Every section of society and every political representative in the Chamber has a responsibility to encourage and support recruitment into the PSNI. We cannot call for better policing while failing to promote policing as a respected, viable and valued career. We cannot demand improved response times, greater neighbourhood visibility or enhanced community engagement if we are not prepared to champion the very people who deliver those services.

The deadline for recruitment passed last Wednesday. In past recruitment campaigns, including those in my constituency of Mid Ulster, the number of applications has remained lower than average. That should concern every one of us. If we want a police service that is representative, resilient and rooted in the communities that it serves, those communities must feel encouraged and supported to step forward. Let me be absolutely clear: encouragement cannot be left solely to local officers or neighbourhood policing teams, because they already carry enough on their shoulders. The responsibility belongs to us all: community leaders, public representatives and politicians.

I have done my part. I have used social media, community forums and my public engagements to say openly and without hesitation that I support the PSNI and encourage young people in Mid Ulster and further afield to consider a career in policing, but I must ask this: where is the leadership from other political representatives across Northern Ireland? Where are their social media posts, their statements and their public encouragement? Where is their willingness to stand up and say clearly and confidently that policing is a noble profession of which the community should be part? Their voices are silent.

Leaving the burden of promoting recruitment to local officers certainly is not leadership. If we want to see change, we must all be prepared to stand up, speak out and actively promote policing as a valued and vital profession. If we want a safe, stable and confident Northern Ireland, we must invest in the people who protect it. That means predictable, long-term recruitment and ensuring that policing remains an attractive career. It means each of us using our voice and our platform to encourage that, and not all of us in the Chamber are doing that.

Mr McMurray: In the first instance, I pay the utmost respect and give thanks to the Ambulance Service. Its staff are highly trained men and women who answer the call to a ream of incidents across the country, often coming across the most challenging and distressing of incidents. The figures that I will highlight do not reflect on their commitment or their work but rather on the wider systemic issues facing our health service. Too often, those staff spend their time dealing with the challenges of handovers at hospitals, rather than responding to calls in the community.

The Northern Ireland Ambulance Service has set a target of responding to category 1 calls within an average of eight minutes and responding to 90% of calls within 15 minutes. Those targets are regularly missed across South Down. In the Mournes district electoral area (DEA), there was no calendar month in which an average response time was recorded that was within the 15-minute target, and, in Slieve Croob, there was only one month in which the average response time was within 15 minutes. The Mournes and Slieve Croob are rural in nature, but, even in Downpatrick DEA, where the county town lies, there were only two months in which response times were within the 15-minute target. For one of those months, the time was 14 minutes and 59 seconds. Crotlieve had seven months in which the average response time was over the 15-minute target.

Those were just the average response times to category 1 calls. The maximum response times are extremely worrying. A response time of four hours and 38 minutes was recorded in Slieve Croob.

In the Mournes, there were four months in which response times of over one hour were recorded. One of those was two hours and 34 minutes, and another was three hours and 15 minutes.

A category 1 call is defined as dealing with a life-threatening condition, such as cardiac arrest, severe bleeding, unconsciousness, convulsions and fitting. When those are taken into consideration, the waiting times are extremely concerning, not just for the casualty but for those who are generally attending to them. As is so often the case when there is an issue in the statutory sector, the voluntary and community sector steps in. In that regard, I must mention agencies such as Slieve Croob Community First Responders, Mourne Mountain Rescue Team and the RNLI, which very often attends to a casualty if the Ambulance Service cannot.

We need to increase the workforce capacity in the Northern Ireland Ambulance Service, finalise the ambulance handover protocol for Northern Ireland, improve measures to ensure better flow of patients through A&E departments and out of our hospitals, and improve capacity in our communities and care system.

Mr Beattie: I want to make a statement on Victor Hamilton, and I do so with the permission of his family.

Victor Hamilton was originally from Carrickfergus. In 2022, he was murdered in Ballymena. Four people were involved in his murder, three of whom were foreign nationals. The chief suspect in that murder escaped justice by going back to Portugal. A second man was given six years for manslaughter — three behind bars and three on licence. After being behind bars for three years, he should have been deported. He was not, and he is now back out in the community. The other foreign national was given two years for withholding information. Due to time served, however, after one year's sentence, which should have been behind bars, he was released. He also should have been deported, but, again, he was allowed back into society. We have failed the victim's family in that regard.

A bit of good news, however, is that the individual who escaped to Portugal has been arrested and faces extradition. How does the family know that? They read it in a newspaper. There has been no victims' care whatsoever. Nobody went to them and said, "This is what is happening". Nobody went to them and said, "This is what is happening to the individual who got six years behind bars", or "This is what is happening to the individual who got two years and should have been deported but was not". Nobody has been to the family whatsoever.

I have long called for changes to the victim information scheme. I will continue to do so because it is letting people down. The family read about the perpetrators in a newspaper. The way in which we treat victims of crime and their families is absolutely scandalous. That is not a one-off. Victor Hamilton is another male who is largely forgotten and not spoken about in the Chamber or anywhere else. He joins the likes of Jim McFadden, whose family were let down by the system, and Michael and Marjorie Cawdery, whose family were also let down. We really need to deal with how we look after victims of crime in Northern Ireland. Right now, we are not doing that.

What is this statement about? Is it about foreign nationals not receiving the full weight of our criminal justice system? Is it about victims' care? It is about both because you cannot have one without the other. First, the criminal justice system is there for a reason. It should act for a reason. Deportation is the responsibility of the Home Office — we know that — but our criminal justice system must trigger it. Secondly, victims deserve to be treated with care. They should not have to read in the newspaper about the arrest of somebody who may have murdered their loved one. That is what is happening. The system is failing. We are failing. We need to deal with that.

Mr McNulty: It is an honour for me to speak in celebration of a hugely significant milestone: the 30th anniversary of Aware, an organisation that has played a crucial role in improving mental health awareness and understanding, and providing support, education and hope across the North.

Thirty years ago, the landscape around mental health looked very different. Conversations about depression, anxiety and bipolar disorder were avoided. People who were suffering faced stigma, isolation and a lack of support. In 1996, at a time when services were underdeveloped and public understanding was limited, a small group gathered in a living room in Derry with a shared determination to help and support people living with mental illness. From that conversation grew an organisation built on a simple but powerful purpose: no one should have to face mental ill health alone. From humble beginnings, Aware was established as a charity grounded in lived experience, peer support and hope. Over the past three decades, Aware has grown to host 24 weekly volunteer-led support groups, alongside education and early intervention programmes that now reach thousands of people every year.

It is impossible to mark this anniversary without paying tribute to the volunteers who are at the heart of Aware. Individuals give their time in the evenings and at weekends and listen without judgement. They create safe spaces for people at some of the most difficult moments in their lives. Many bring their lived experience. The fuel for their fire is often the personal challenges that they have overcome that enable them to be compassionate, empathetic and supportive and to be bringers of light for others. I also acknowledge the staff, trustees, supporters and partners who have ensured that Aware has continued to grow and respond to changing needs, particularly in recent years when demand for mental health support has increased significantly. Their work has helped to ensure that mental health remains not just a health issue but a societal priority.

While progress has been made, challenges remain in ensuring timely access to services and in continuing to break down the stigma. Organisations such as Aware are essential partners in that journey, strengthening communities through prevention, education and support and providing a lifeline and a lighted path in a safe and welcoming non-clinical environment. Today, I place on record my sincere thanks and those of my party, and, I am sure, of every Member in the House, to everyone who has contributed to Aware's journey: its volunteers, its staff and all those who have had the courage to seek —

Mr Speaker: Time is up.

Mr McNulty: — help and, in doing so, have helped others to do the same.

Mr Robinson: How many times have we heard the phrase, "The magic of the cup" about football over the years? That certainly was true at Coleraine Showgrounds on Friday evening when Limavady United defeated the current premiership champions, Linfield Football Club, 1-0 to progress to the quarter-finals of the Irish Cup.

I have watched Limavady play on several occasions in the Playr-Fit Championship this season. Going into the game, I had a quiet confidence that they would give Linfield a serious contest, and that they did. I watched Limavady do similar last year when they knocked out the league champions, Larne, in the fifth round, winning again by a single goal. Linfield have won the Irish Cup a record 44 times, whereas Limavady never have, which makes this one all the more stunning. I offer congratulations from the House to the Limavady team, manager and backroom team and to the Limavady board, who have invested really well in recent seasons. It sets the team up against their neighbours Coleraine, which is only 13 miles away, in what will be a mouth-watering game that will draw a large crowd from both towns.

I am what they call a cross-breed. I have a Limavady-born father and a Coleraine-born mum. I was schooled in Limavady but lived in Coleraine for decades. I have a Coleraine-born wife, but I have an office in Limavady. My late grandfather took me to my first Coleraine match as a boy. I have a great affinity with both towns. I could go on and on. Given my ties to both towns and the fact that I watch both teams and want to see them do well, I find myself saying this: may the best team on the night win.

Ms Nicholl: Today is Safer Internet Day. The risk that children and young people face online is something that I think about every day. The latest research from CyberSafeKids in the Republic of Ireland shows how children are navigating digital platforms with limited safeguards, limited parental oversight and limited privacy protections. Those findings sit within a wider societal reality. The one thing that I keep thinking is that, every day, there is more news about the Epstein files and more discussion of the abuse and the salaciousness around it. It is really awful, dark content. It is such a reminder that, when power goes unchecked and children are not protected, the darkest side of humanity really flourishes.

History has taught us time and time again that abuse is enabled by silence, by environments where those with influence go unchecked and by deference. I worry that, while it is good that we are having these conversations and things are coming out more into the open about child abuse that has been happening, what is happening online is being monetised, and that is increasing. There are certain things that we can do; my party leader is doing what she can on deepfakes, and I plan to bring forward an amendment to the Justice Bill to ban nudification apps. However, there is so much more that we have to do as a society, and that means empowering families and having difficult conversations about the reality of power and the reality of child abuse that exists. We need to strengthen digital literacy and promote existing tools to keep children safe.

There are two things that I want to highlight today, which I previously was not aware of. The first is a really important tool that every parent, teacher, youth worker and politician needs to know about. Childline and the Internet Watch Foundation have created the Report Remove tool, which allows any child or young person to request the secure removal of an online image of themselves that they are worried about or did not consent to. That is a really practical and accessible safeguard that every parent, teacher and youth worker should be aware of.

Secondly, I am conscious that, while we talk about historical clerical abuse and look at what is happening now, many people who were perhaps abused as children are living in silence now. I want to say to them that there is a victims-led charity called the National Association for People Abused in Childhood. So much of the issue is about the silence that people live with, and them then coming forward to talk about what they experienced but not being treated in the way that they should be. There is a charity there to help those people.

Safer Internet Day is more than just a reminder about screens and apps; it is a reminder of our collective duty to challenge the systems that are in place —

Mr Speaker: Time is up.

Ms Nicholl: — for children who are at risk.

Mr Brooks: Today, I want to recognise and welcome the establishment of the Controlled Schools Unit within the Education Authority (EA). At its heart, that is about equality for our controlled schools, and we should be honest about that. Controlled schools educate almost half of all pupils in Northern Ireland and comprise the largest sector in our system; yet, for years, they have been the least-coherently supported. I do not make that claim lightly, but it is the clear finding of the independent review of education and reflects the lived experience of many of our controlled-school leaders.

The review could not have been clearer. The current system is failing our controlled schools and the Education Authority, which is spread across every sector, has been unable to give them the focused and consistent support that they need. That is a criticism not of EA staff but of the structure that asks one body to be everything to everyone but succeeds for some sectors better than others. The new unit is a direct response to that inequality. It is a modest but practical proposal for a dedicated unit within the EA to provide tailored support, clear accountability and strategic focus for our controlled schools. There will be no more being an afterthought, and no more being treated as the default sector that can simply be asked to make do.

I struggle to understand the opposition to the policy. Critics on the Sinn Féin and Alliance Benches hide behind the review's aspiration for a single managing authority, but they know that that is making the perfect the certain enemy of the good. They know that the chances of that in the short to medium term are slim to none, yet they are happy that the controlled system will live with inequality in the meantime. Let us be frank: were any other sector in that position — were Catholic maintained, Irish-medium or integrated schools shown by independent evidence to be systematically under-supported — the Assembly would not hesitate to act. No one would tell them to wait nor would anyone suggest that equality could be deferred for the sake of administrative neatness. Yet, when it comes to controlled schools, some suddenly argue that targeted support is unnecessary, inconvenient or even unfair. That position is not neutral, nor is it technical; it is a choice to tolerate inequality in the largest sector in our education system in a way that would not be tolerated if it were elsewhere.

The Controlled Schools Unit does not take support away from anyone, nor does it undermine collaboration. It simply recognises the reality that equity sometimes requires different structures, not identical ones. The Minister's approach is staged and sensible. It offers immediate improvement through the unit, while preparing the ground for a future managing authority. It puts children and school leaders first, rather than asking them to wait years for perfection.

Opposing the proposal is not about protecting the system; it is about defending a status quo that has already been judged to be failing our controlled schools. If we are serious about fairness, consistency and equal respect across our education system, we cannot ask controlled schools to accept a level of support that no other sector would be asked to accept.

Mr Mathison: In answer to my question yesterday, the Health Minister confirmed that he would not legislate in this mandate to provide a statutory basis for the support provided to our young people with SEN and disabilities when they leave school. His answer was direct and honest but came as hugely disappointing news to parents across Northern Ireland desperately hoping for change in this mandate. Campaigners such as Alma White, who has spearheaded the Caleb's Cause campaign since the institutions returned and has done so much to raise awareness of the cliff edge facing our young people with additional needs when they leave school, will be understandably devastated by the news yesterday. I know that their campaign will continue and that Alma and parents like her will keep fighting for legislation to ensure that our young people continue to receive services and support that meet their needs when they leave school, but I urge the Health Minister to look again at what can be done in this mandate.

We all know the challenges in the Minister's Department. They are well understood and should not be minimised. However, work needs to be done to address the issue now. We should not forget that it is a Programme for Government commitment. It states:

— crucially —

The work done so far to deliver that has not been enough. It has tinkered, and it has largely been warm words, not tangible action. I have asked many questions to the First Minister and deputy First Minister to establish what they are doing to ensure that there is focus and commitment in all the relevant Departments to deliver on that promise to improve protections for young people with SEN when they leave school. So far, I can identify no clear ambition on their part to take hold of the issue and ensure that the coordination needed across Departments happens. We need to see leadership from them on the issue.

Our young people need a plan. Time was against us on so many issues due to the irresponsible collapse of our institutions that lost us two years of the mandate, two years when the big issues in Northern Ireland were left with no interventions. In the time that we have left, all steps necessary must be taken. Can there not even be a commitment for the legislation to at least be drafted, ready to land on the desk of the next Health Minister? To simply kick it into the next mandate with no work delivered now would be to profoundly let parents down and let down young people who have campaigned so hard for change. We must not let that happen.

Mr Gaston: Now that the nationalist and republican alliance sanction to exclude me from the Chamber has been served, I take the opportunity to put on record a number of things about breathegate. First, I want the House to know that, when the First Minister of no alternative appeared before the Executive Office Committee last Wednesday, I again covered a number of the same questions that the Chairperson and her mates in Sinn Féin and the SDLP took great exception to and silenced me on these Benches for. To be crystal clear, it was never out of scope to ask questions at the Executive Office Committee on behalf of victims about the sexual abuse that they suffered at the hands of IRA men. For as long as Sinn Féin jointly heads that Department, it will never be out of scope of the Committee whose flagship is ending violence against women and girls. Scrutiny does not suddenly become misconduct simply because it makes a few in the Chamber feel uncomfortable.

Secondly, I turn to the public reaction to last Monday's vote. On 12 June last year, I wrote to the Committee on Standards and Privileges stating:

Looking at the response online and in print, any objective observer must recognise that those words have proved to be prophetic. The supporting emails, the many messages, the phone calls and well over 1,000 new followers on Facebook in the past seven days show me whom the public support on the issue.

More concerning is that the truth of what lies behind the continuing refusal to release the contemporaneous note has not yet fully emerged. A step towards that truth would be the publication of the note taken during the private meeting between the First Minister and the Committee Chair — a meeting of which the Executive Office Committee has no independent record; a meeting of which the only minute was produced by the First Minister's office; and a meeting the note of which remains withheld from the public to this day. I welcome the fact that the Ulster Unionist Party has now called for the note to be published. I ask this simple question: will the Alliance Party and the SDLP follow? If Members have confidence in the standards process and in the vote that was taken last week —

Mr Speaker: The Member's time is up.

Mr Gaston: — transparency should not frighten them.

Mr Frew: I rise with regrets to lament the loss of McKillens department store on Church Street, Ballymena, straight after the loss of Wyse Byse, another family-run business in the heart of the town. These are serious times. I feel shock but also gratitude to the McKillen family for serving the people not only of the town of Ballymena but of the wider County Antrim hinterland for so long. I am grateful to the staff, some of whom have worked in McKillens all their working life. It will be such a blow to that family-run business that those loyal staff members will now lose their jobs in the heart of a town that they love so much.

The Assembly and, more so, the Executive need to take a good look at the cost of doing business, especially in the retail world. I warned, back in 2020-21, about the damage that lockdown philosophy would do to businesses and employment. Alas, that has now come true. Lockdown philosophy caused inflation. It caused prices and the cost of stock to go up; it meant that people shopped more online because they could not get out to the shops; and people were paid 80% of their wages for doing nothing and staying at home. There is a price to pay for that, and, unfortunately, the Ballymena folk, the McKillens store and Wyse Byse, along with all the staff who will now have to look for other employment, have had to pay it.

Mr O'Toole: I beg to move

Mr Speaker: The Business Committee has agreed to allocate up to one hour and 30 minutes to the debate. The proposer of the motion will have 10 minutes in which to propose and 10 minutes in which to make a winding-up speech. All other Members who are called to speak will have five minutes.

Please open the debate on the motion.

Mr O'Toole: Thank you, Mr Speaker.

We are just over two years on from the restoration of the institutions, and it is fair to say that the public have not been overwhelmed by the performance of our restored Executive. It is also true that part of that lack of trust comes from a sense that people who take office here, particularly those in ministerial office, feel that they are immune to or insulated from accountability. However, in those two years, there has been a step change: an improvement in accountability through the establishment of an official Opposition. We have consistently used our time constructively but robustly to put Ministers on notice that accountability starts here. I see that the Minister for Communities is already laughing, which is an indication of how seriously he — a man found twice in breach of the ministerial code — takes the matter that is before the Assembly today.

As part of the opposition role, we have consistently put Ministers on notice that we will hold them to account, but we will also try to effect a broader improvement in our political culture and in trust in politics in Northern Ireland. Revelations in recent weeks, far beyond Northern Ireland, have illustrated that there is broad crisis in trust in politics here and around the democratic world. Nearly everywhere, trust in politics and politicians is at a dangerous low. Some, perhaps much, of that derives from misinformation and outright disinformation stirred up online on social media by malign and ill-intentioned actors at home and abroad with the connivance of social media platforms that have no interest in defending healthy democracy and democratic structures. Some of the crisis is legitimately borne of deep and widespread frustration with growing inequality, with wages simply not delivering a decent life for so many in our society and with a political system that has not or will not respond to that frustration.

There is also a real sense that too many politicians give the impression that they believe themselves to be above accountability. We in Northern Ireland often act as if our specific history and specific institutions mean that we are insulated from broader changes in democratic attitudes, as if our divided society and communal voting patterns rendered objective accountability and standards processes trivial and secondary. That has certainly been the DUP's response in recent years. Elections are, of course, the ultimate form of accountability, but we are also — at least ,we should be — accountable between elections. That is particularly the case for Ministers, who have legal powers to spend public money and instruct public servants. That is why the contentious attitude of Minister Gordon Lyons to two separate findings of standards breaches — breaches of the ministerial code — is so disappointing and extraordinary. It comes after the contemptuous response of his party colleague Paul Givan to a vote of no confidence that was brought to the Chamber under the relevant section of the Northern Ireland Act 1998 following his indefensible use of official departmental resources in his visit to the occupied territories.

It is no exaggeration to say that those matters have been among a handful of top issues on which my constituents have corresponded with me in my time in politics. Those two separate breaches and the public outrage not just at the initial actions but at the failure of those Ministers even to express any self-awareness, let alone contrition, have, as I said, been among the most intense and overwhelming things that my constituents have communicated with me about — outraged.

In June last year, at a time when migrants and vulnerable groups feared for their lives, Minister Lyons posted a notorious Facebook message in which he confirmed — this is important: I acknowledge that he confirmed it, as he will, no doubt, say in response, as he has before, that it had been revealed elsewhere — that migrants had been moved to Larne Leisure Centre, which, at that point, was a site of growing protest. I repeat: that was at a time when migrant communities just up the road in Ballymena had been experiencing something approaching a pogrom. The standards commissioner felt that Minister Lyons, who was not only the MLA for East Antrim but the serving housing Minister, had likely:

A plain reading of the post suggests that the Minister's priority was not to strongly urge protesters to stay away from Larne Leisure Centre but to distance himself and his party from knowledge of the location of the vulnerable people who had been rehoused. There was not one word of empathy or concern for the well-being of those families, who had reason to fear for their safety and perhaps even their lives.

It is no surprise, then, that the standards commissioner found that the Minister had breached two different rules under the ministerial code. We know what Minister Lyon's response has been. Broadly speaking, it is fair to say that he has shown contempt towards the findings and has been dismissive of accountability, which is not entirely unlike his attitude in 2024, when he was found to have breached the code in relation to non-attendance at North/South Ministerial Council (NSMC) meetings. Of course, on that occasion, as with the vote of no confidence in Minister Givan before Christmas, his party colleagues were able to nullify any accountability because the current rules give the DUP and, indeed, Sinn Féin an effective veto over votes of no confidence and censure motions of any kind. That is unlike the situation faced by Mr Gaston, who has been treated somewhat differently. I assume that he will be outraged by the difference between his treatment under the rules and that of Ministers, because no sanction can be effected for a serving DUP Minister.

It is worth saying that, in a healthy political culture, repeated breaches of the ministerial code would engage a sense of honour or shame. Sadly, not only has the Minister not resigned but he has not seen fit to apologise or offer even one word of reflection or learning. I genuinely think that lots of people would have viewed the Minister's reaction and his position differently had he, at least, acknowledged that things could have been done differently or that his words could have been used more appropriately. It is that failure to even acknowledge why others might have had difficulty with his post that has infuriated so many. This is the same Minister who yesterday called other people "petty" for refusing to indulge the criminal, authoritarian President Donald Trump. It is no wonder that people from all political backgrounds frequently say to me, "You could not redden their necks".

Today we are doing more than simply tabling a vote of no confidence under the Northern Ireland Act, because we know that the DUP would be able to nullify that; we are giving the Assembly an opportunity to register its condemnation of Minister Lyons's breach, vote no confidence in him as a result of that and take positive action. I can almost predict how Minister Lyons will respond, though I will keep my fingers crossed. I want the Assembly to take positive action, because it is clear that our standards system is not fit for purpose and needs to be improved. I assume that Mr Gaston, who, just a few moments ago, was lambasting the standards system, agrees with that point.

The outgoing standards commissioner outlined a range of ways by which the standards system could be improved, but the motion is part of a broader effort to reform our politics, because one thing is clear to every Member in the Chamber: the public have had enough of the way that we do business. We cannot go on like this, with the Executive collapsing at the drop of a hat; Ministers who feel immune to any kind of accountability; public services that are getting worse, not better; and an approach to government that simply treats the public with contempt when they ask for clear targets and delivery in a Programme for Government. We cannot go on like this.

We ask the Assembly to collectively endorse not just an improvement in the standards processes — we have specific proposals on that, including changing the threshold for a veto when it comes to censure — but a broader programme of reform that makes it harder to collapse the institutions, ensures that we do not have a vacuum in governance in this place and that neither the DUP nor Sinn Féin can take advantage of that and, more broadly, improves the culture. It is about saying to the British and Irish Governments, "We know that we cannot go on like this, and we want to work with you to improve and change it". We think that that is doable and essential.

A final word — we hear laughs across the Chamber from Mr Burrows, who has talked a lot in recent weeks about improving accountability. If the Ulster Unionist Party is serious about improving accountability, there is no reason at all that it cannot vote for the motion.

Mr Burrows: Will the Member give way?

Mr O'Toole: I will not, because I do not have time. I will respond to the Member later in the debate. I will be happy to give way later on.

The Member has talked a lot in broadcast outlets across Northern Ireland about the need to improve accountability: I agree with him. That starts now. Let us vote for the motion.

Mr Gildernew: I thank the proposer of the motion. We support it. I am sure that we all remember the disgraceful hate-filled violence that erupted in towns and villages across the North last year. Shamefully, in Ballymena, a number of homes were attacked, and families were forced to flee the area, eventually finding shelter and safety in Larne Leisure Centre. The next day, Minister Lyons posted on Facebook, complaining that neither he nor any of his East Antrim DUP colleagues had been consulted about the decision to bring those families to the leisure centre the night before. The Commissioner for Standards ruled that Minister Lyons breached the code in two separate ways with his poorly judged Facebook post: first, by failing to demonstrate leadership in a sensitive and volatile situation, and, secondly, by failing to operate in a way that was conducive to promoting good community relations and equality of treatment.

At no point in his post did the Minister show any compassion or empathy for the victims of that hateful violence, nor did he use his platform to encourage the protesters to stay at home. The commissioner's report states that Minister Lyons's message:

As a Minister, his words carry significant weight. At a time when there was a need for clear political leadership, the Minister failed to show it.

In addition to failing to show empathy, the Minister appeared to criticise the decision by the Housing Executive to use the leisure centre in an attempt to distance himself from the decision and, seemingly, to deflect any anger from protesters away from him and his party. The commissioner's report states:

The Minister put his party political interests ahead of the public interest and of what was expected of him as a Minister.

Mr Frew: Will the Member give way?

Mr Gildernew: I will not.

To add insult to injury, the Minister has failed to show any regret or remorse for his actions; instead, he has attempted to deflect and evade responsibility by seeking to undermine the integrity of the office of the Commissioner for Standards and by painting himself as a victim of a political pile on. In the aftermath of the Minister's post relating to Larne Leisure Centre's being used as a temporary refuge for those fleeing their homes last year, the Communities Committee passed a vote of no confidence in Minister Lyons. That position has been fully vindicated.

As I have said, we support the motion. We fully support institutional reform as we try to make our unusual political structures work better.

Mr Sheehan: Will the Member give way?

Mr Gildernew: Yes. Go ahead.

Mr Sheehan: Does the Member agree that the economic consequences of Brexit and the underfunding of our public services are the major difficulties facing the Assembly and Executive? Does he also agree that, although institutional reform is necessary, constitutional reform and the ending of partition are absolutely essential if we want to effectively address the fundamental financial, political and constitutional issues that these institutions face?

Mr Speaker: I am not sure what that intervention had to do with the debate, but it is done now.

Mr Gildernew: I fully agree with my party colleague: that is the fundamental reform that is needed.

To be clear, the commissioner's findings are only the latest in a long line of poor decisions and failures by the Communities Minister. To date, he has failed to develop an anti-poverty strategy; failed to deliver important social inclusion strategies, including gender and LGBTQ strategies; and failed to introduce an Irish language strategy. As with those who were forced from their homes in Ballymena and sought refuge in Larne leisure centre, it seems that, in the eyes of the Minister, those often marginalised people are invisible. However, make no mistake: the public saw what Minister Lyons was doing with his social media post, and they see what he continues to do by ignoring the needs of so many often vulnerable sections of our community in the North.

Mrs Cameron: I rise to oppose the motion and to place on record my support for the Minister for Communities, Gordon Lyons.

Let me begin with something on which there should be agreement across the House: the scenes at Larne Leisure Centre on the night in question were unacceptable. Racism, intimidation and violence against anyone have no place in our society, and the Minister has been clear and consistent in condemning that behaviour from the outset. However, the motion is not about addressing racism: it is about political opportunism. At a time when people across Northern Ireland struggle to access healthcare, waiting lists continue to grow and public services are under real strain, the official Opposition have chosen to use valuable Assembly time on a motion that they know will go nowhere. They know that it will not remove a Minister or improve a single public service. Therefore, this question must be asked: why bring it forward at all? The answer, we know, is that they do so because it is easier to attack than to deliver.

The finding against the Minister relates not to corruption, misuse of office or dishonesty but to an alleged failure to demonstrate a sufficient level of empathy in a social media post. That alone should concern Members across the Chamber. Serious questions remain about the commissioner's report, in particular the failure to properly consider whether the Minister was acting in his ministerial capacity at all. It was a constituency matter. Had that been correctly assessed, the complaint would never have been deemed admissible. The report also makes claims that the post may have heightened tensions, yet it provides no evidence to support that assertion; no investigation and no factual assessment, just conjecture. If elected representatives can be sanctioned on the basis of subjective interpretation rather than evidence, we risk creating a chilling effect on legitimate political speech and constituency representation.

What makes the motion even more difficult to take seriously is the absolute hypocrisy around it. Some of those who have been loudest in lecturing the House about empathy have attended the funerals of convicted terrorists —

Some Members: Hear, hear.

Mrs Cameron: — or defended decades of violence by saying that there was no alternative. The hypocrisy in the Chamber is stark, but the public can see the double standards that are at play.

A Member: Will the Member take an intervention?

Mrs Cameron: I will not, thank you.

The latter part of the motion is equally troubling. It calls for so-called institutional reform involving the Irish Government. Let me be clear: reform of these institutions is the responsibility of this Northern Ireland Assembly, not external actors. The appropriate forum for such a discussion already exists through the Assembly and Executive Review Committee. Constantly running down these institutions does not "restore public confidence"; it undermines it.

The motion is disproportionate, politically motivated and, ultimately, damaging to the credibility of the House. For those reasons, I oppose it.

Ms Mulholland: I had a speech ready about the lack of ability for us to hold Ministers to account, but I received a text asking me to humanise the crux of the issue as it was for those who were involved in the events in Ballymena.

I have heard the terms "political opportunism", "political point-scoring" and "politically motivated" being mentioned in the Chamber already. I can honestly, hand on heart, say that there is not one bit of me that is politically motivated when I talk about this, because, on the night of the Ballymena riots, I talked on the phone to people who were terrified. I received videos of children in attics and a text message that said, "If they set fire to this house, Sian, the people in the attic will die". That is the reality of what we faced on the Monday and Tuesday night. That is not politically motivated for me. I think — I hope — that most people in the Chamber know that there is nothing in what we did and in what we tried to do at that time that was politically motivated.

At the heart of this were five women, four men and six children aged between one and 14. Those children, once we were able to get them out of their house, were vomiting on the floor of the police station at 2.00 am. A meeting was then set up to try to take them to wherever they would be safe. Ballymena leisure centre was ruled out as it was too close, so Mid and East Antrim Borough Council went to its nearest council provision, and that is where they were sent. At 4.00 am, that is where they were given shelter, with police offering the children yoghurts from their own lunchboxes to try to settle them. That was the reality and the human element of the situation.

When I support the motion, for me, it is not about a Minister or a Department. It is about the politics of empathy and the politics of compassion. Regardless of the intent, I do not think that the intent of the Minister — I have talked to him about it — was to create any more tension. I hope that it was not. I really do. However, the lasting impact of what happened will be from how it was read and perceived by people. I use the words of a young Filipino man, whom I met on the Friday with the UK's ambassador to the Philippines:

Again, that is not political opportunism or me point-scoring: those are the words of someone who was deeply impacted by the events on the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday in Ballymena and Larne. They are still feeling the impacts. They are still frightened to walk down the street because of the colour of their skin or because of their perceived nature. That still goes on. That is still reverberating through the town. Those people are genuinely frightened that it will happen all over again and that all it will take is a match to relight it. That is where the fear was on the Wednesday when that post went out. The Minister said, "I was not consulted". I asked at the time whether, had the Minister been consulted, there would have been a different response. That question was not answered.

When accountability fails again and again, it exposes the current shape of our institutions. Yes, they were set up at a time when we were greatly divided. The overriding priority, post Good Friday Agreement, was managing division, but I hope that we have moved on as a society and as a Chamber. However, all too often in this place, compassion is misread for weakness or niceness or not being strong enough. People are told to get a thicker skin. Do you know what? There are plenty of us who do not want to have to have a thicker skin to be in politics. People out there want the politics of empathy. They want to see their representatives in this Chamber representing their best interests. They want to see that people care, but so often in this place empathy is sacrificed for sound bites and playing to the crowd. That has to stop because it does not serve anybody.

Ultimately, the debate is about whether our standards framework has practical authority or symbolic value alone. For me, a system that identifies failures but cannot respond to them is not fair or consistent, and it does not provide and protect integrity. All it does is expose its own vulnerability. Supporting the motion is not about political point-scoring and it is not about punishment: it is about reaffirming the fact that we need a politics of empathy that is clear, compassionate and unequivocal in coming out straight away and standing with those who are most impacted.

Mr Burrows: This motion is wasteful self-indulgence on the part of the Opposition and reeks of double standards by those who support it. It also makes a case for some cultural reforms, but not the sorts that are being envisaged, nor for the same motive, as Mr O'Toole pointed out.

Of course, it is wasteful when we have so many things to deal with in Northern Ireland. The standards commissioner costs £600 a day. That is why I would not complain about being told to "shut up" on the radio. Frankly, I would rather that £600 a day be spent on fixing potholes than on litigating words that have been said. It is wasteful because of the pressing issues that we have in Northern Ireland. The issues that my colleague has in Health and those that exist in Justice, Infrastructure and across the board are huge, and we are spending more time debating motions like this one. If we are not dealing with non-binding motions, it seems that we are dealing with litigating and arbitrating over words or posts. People in the real world will be wondering what on earth we are doing.

I will come to the conduct of Mr Lyons in a moment, but the motion reeks of double standards. Matthew O'Toole stood up and talked about accountability. In 2024, one of the senior members of the SDLP wilfully and knowingly took part in an illegal parade through the middle of Londonderry. The SDLP took no disciplinary action. That was a breach of criminal law that was sent to court. He has now accepted effectively a caution. No action was taken. I see that Mr O'Toole does not want to look me in the eye, and I am not surprised.

As we talk about standards and breaking the law, we turn to the Alliance Party. In 2018, an Alliance councillor was caught drink-driving. The party rewarded Mr Patrick Brown with promotion to the position of MLA.

Mr Tennyson: He was suspended.

Mr Burrows: Yes, but since. He was a councillor then, and he was an MLA later.

Mr Burrows: I come to Sinn Féin. We have seen Mr Sheehan's conduct. Sinn Féin is the party that took part in Bobby Storey's funeral and still says that it was OK to murder people in the past but wants to litigate a post. One of my colleagues said that the post was clumsy. Could it have been drafted better? Did it leave some people wondering, 'What is the meaning of that?". That is for learning after the incident. No one is seriously suggesting that the Minister wilfully tried to whip up tension; it was about looking at something that happened in the heat of the moment in a difficult situation and asking, "Can we collectively learn from how we communicate during a very difficult situation?". That was the reasonable and proportionate thing to do.

When I read the Assembly Commissioner for Standards' reports, I am deeply concerned. I used to give expert evidence on reports, one of which proved that Sinn Féin had politically directed the former Chief Constable, who lost his job as a result. However, there are significant things about this report. First, conduct and misconduct reports are supposed to look at wilful and dishonest behaviour, not innocent errors — if you call it an error.

Mr Sheehan: Will the Member give way?

Mr Burrows: No, I will not give way.

The issue is that the report polices omissions, which is difficult. Yes, we should be empathetic, but should every post be interpreted on the basis that you should follow factual information with empathy? If I posted tonight, "A road in my constituency is closed because of a fatal road traffic collision", could I be policed for not also saying, "and I have empathy with the family affected"? We are going down a dangerous road. There is confirmation bias throughout the Commissioner's report. She makes the classic error of saying, "X was said, and my interpretation of X is the following" without giving objective supporting evidence. For example, when the Minister said that he was not consulted about the decision, she says that that is a criticism of not being consulted and that the party would not have gone along with the decision that was made. There is no evidence for that.

Mr O'Toole: Will the Member give way?

Mr Burrows: No, I will not give way.

We have a situation in which the standards commissioner, who has been subject to at least two pieces of legal advice since, litigated a Facebook post that was sent at the request of the police. We come back to the issue of whether the post could have been drafted better and been more precise and whether there is any learning. I am sure that there is learning. However, here is the reality: those who tabled the motion have done a lot worse.

I note that the Alliance Party now supports reform of this place with a role for the Irish Government. That was a strand one issue even during the 1998 negotiations. The Alliance Party is now going down the line of saying that it is a strand two issue, which reveals where its politics have drifted to.

There are many things for us to do in this place, and driving up standards is one of them, but this is wasteful, self-indulgent and unnecessary.

Mr Speaker: The Member's time is up.

Mr Frew: I oppose the motion, because it is absolutely nothing but political posturing. This has been a hypocritical debate. Like Sian Mulholland, I was on the ground in that period, along with other elected representatives from most parties. We saw the damage that was being done. We witnessed the violence and the pain, the hurt and the suffering of the victims as they fled their homes, with many of them concerned for their safety and lives. I know what it was like in that pressurised period. Most of the elected representatives who were on the ground got little sleep. Gordon Lyons would also have known that. The PSNI contacted his constituency office and told one of his staff members that it was really concerned about intelligence about a riot, a protest and violence at Larne Leisure Centre. I would have expected Gordon Lyons to sit up and take notice of that and to try to do all that he could to prevent damage to life, limb and the built form. That is exactly what Gordon Lyons did that day when, two hours later, he put out a factual post to say that the people who had been sheltering there the night before were no longer there, so there would be no need to have a protest at the focal point — the leisure centre — which was being occupied by people from Larne and other areas who were utilising the facilities that Larne has to offer. What is wrong with that?

Gordon Lyons was acting as MLA for East Antrim and even stated that in his post. The first issue that we need to deal with is why the commissioner decided to investigate him under the ministerial code. There are two fundamental questions. When is a Minister acting in his professional capacity as a Minister with regard to his ministerial office and duties? And when is he acting as an MLA in his constituency office, helping his constituents, working for the people of East Antrim, working to provide facilities to keep people safe, working with the local police commander —?

Mr Buckley: Will the Member give way?

Mr Frew: Yes, I will.

Mr Buckley: Does the Member accept that it is also a gross hypocrisy that the same commissioner ruled that the Sinn Féin ministerial team that attended Bobby Storey's funeral did so in its capacity as MLAs, not as Ministers?

Mr Speaker: The Member has an extra minute.

Mr Frew: The Member makes a valid point. That means that the commissioner has been inconsistent on those issues. That is why we need reform of the standards process. We also need to ensure that Ministers are afforded the same protection as MLAs and are adjudicated on by a panel of their peers, as every MLA can be. Not having that is a loss. It is a slight that we need to rectify. We have a commissioner — one person, no matter who they are — who produces a deeply flawed report, and the only other place it can be aired is the Chamber, which is a political arena. That is wrong and unfair and is not natural justice.

We hear from people who line up hypocritically to take a dig at Gordon Lyons for doing what the police asked him to do: to try to calm people down and to put out factual information about there being nobody sheltering in that facility. Here we have a commissioner who believed Michelle O'Neill when she said that she did not see the sex offender in the Great Hall but did not believe Gordon Lyons. Gerry Carroll was investigated as an MLA. As an MLA, he stated, "Victory to the Palestinian resistance", with two clenched fists. When did he do that? On the day of the Hamas attacks. The commissioner believed Gerry Carroll when he said, "Oh, I just woke up; I was rubbing my eyes". In 2021,the SDLP called for the sacking of nurses and healthcare workers in a complete breach of their human rights, yet nothing was done. The SDLP's former leader breached the law when he walked down a street illegally and has accepted a caution for that. Of course, the only Minister in this place who has been found guilty in a court of law for religious discrimination against a Protestant — or anyone, for that matter — is Conor Murphy of Sinn Féin. Listen to the hypocrisy, and people will know who in this place is wasting time —

Mr Speaker: The Member's time is up.

Mr Frew: — when we should be fixing potholes, our health service and everything that goes with it.

Mr Tennyson: What we witnessed last June was a festival of wanton racist violence, with members of our ethnic minority communities subjected to a race-based pogrom on our streets. I take great exception to Members, including the leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, who come to the Chamber and say, effectively, that it is a trivial matter and that there are more important things that we should be getting on with. Tell that to the families who were hiding in their attic, fearful of being killed. Tell that to the pregnant mother who had to be removed from her home in the middle of the night. Tell that to the children in my constituency who were going into school and telling their teachers that their mummy and daddy were fearful that they would be killed when they went to bed that night.

I am sick, sore and tired of Members traipsing into the Chamber and engaging in culture wars and scapegoating minorities for their failures. That includes the Communities Minister, who, in the run-up to that festival of violence, when asked a question by me about the housing crisis, blamed migrants, because he was so fearful of taking responsibility for the housing targets that he had missed and so fearful of taking responsibility for the rent controls and regulation that he had not introduced.

Our ethnic minority communities — all our minority communities — deserve better. When community tensions were at such a febrile level and at such fever pitch and when families were displaced from their homes, the Minister's response, as housing Minister, was not to put his arm round those families and to work to get them appropriate accommodation or to call on protesters not to attend protests that, we all knew, would inevitably turn violent — far from it, his response was to distance himself and his party from the decision to place those people in that accommodation. His response was to amplify the location of that temporary accommodation even though he knew the risks, and his response since has been nothing more than arrogance and contempt, blaming the standards commissioner, blaming the police and blaming the politicians who dared to call him to order or to question his motives. It is disgraceful and shameful.

If the public are to have any trust and confidence in these institutions, we must show that there is integrity in this Building. I have to say that I do not see much integrity around me in the Chamber. We see dizzying levels of hypocrisy and whataboutery and no culture of accountability, no humility and no preparedness to admit that you got it wrong. The people whom we represent deserve so much better than what goes on in this toytown Parliament. It is disgraceful.

There are solutions, and that is why we will support the motion. I believe in moving towards a culture of accountability and showing the public that, when there are breaches of the rules, there are consequences and Ministers will be held to account, rather than the circus of sectarian vetoes and mechanisms of the Assembly being used to protect party political interests and shield people from accountability.

It was said that the Minister's comment was made in the heat of the moment: the test of leadership is how you respond in the heat of the moment and when you are under pressure. The Minister has utterly failed that test. The standards process that we have at the moment is a race to the bottom. It is a lowest common denominator approach whereby Ministers are held only to the standards that their leader can muster. History tells us that the bar is pretty low for the DUP in that respect, so we will support the motion. I ask the Minister again to take the opportunity, even if he is not going to resign and even if he is going to treat with utter contempt Members of the Assembly who are holding him to account, to at least apologise to the families who were so heavily affected by his failure to stand up and show leadership. It is the least that those people deserve, Minister.

Mr Bradley: Before I say anything more, I welcome the North Antrim representative back to his proper place.

Let me be absolutely clear: the motion is not just flawed; it is selective, and that selectivity matters. When it comes to standards in the House, some parties appear to be judged on what they did and others on how someone might feel about what they said. During COVID, Sinn Féin breaches were ignored and latitude was granted. Ministers attended large funerals, appeared at mass gatherings and participated in events that plainly breached public health regulations. Those are objective facts, yet, when those cases were examined, the commissioner focused on capacity and context. Party political settings were treated as non-ministerial, and Ministers were given latitude for uncertainty involving guidance and judgement calls. No one was found in breach because the public "might" have lost confidence, a photograph or video clip "could" have sent the wrong signal, or someone felt that the tone was inadequate.

Evidence mattered, but was glossed over.

In Mr Lyons's case, evidence disappears, and perception takes over. Now, suddenly, the test has changed. Here, a DUP Minister issues a statement condemning violence and acknowledging lawful protest, and does so following contact from the PSNI. Instead of asking what rules were broken or what evidence proves harm, we are told that someone "could" reasonably conclude that tensions "may" have been heightened or there "may" have been a risk. That is not a standards regime; that is a woke vibes test.

There are different rules for different parties. Let us be honest about what the public see. Sinn Féin Ministers break COVID rules, explanations are accepted, mitigation is applied and there are no invented standards. A DUP Minister issues a lawful statement, hindsight is applied, empathy is graded and a breach is found. That is not consistency: it is imbalance. It gives the unavoidable impression that, when Sinn Féin Ministers act improperly, the bar is high, but, when a unionist Minister speaks imperfectly, the bar is suddenly very low. I ask the House this: when Sinn Féin Ministers attended events that breached COVID regulations, were they assessed on emotional tone? Were they disciplined for not expressing sufficient remorse or empathy? Were they judged on compassion rather than compliance? No, they were judged on rules and evidence. Now, we have a new elastic standard that applies only when convenient and a chilling effect. Let me be clear on one point: neither Minister Lyons nor any DUP Minister will take lectures on empathy from Sinn Féin, Alliance or the SDLP.

If the motion passes, the lesson to Ministers from all parties is simple: do not reassure the public, relay police requests or speak clearly in volatile situations. Silence becomes the safest option. Let us be honest: that silence benefits those who thrive in chaos and grievance politics. It is not good governance. The House cannot defend a standards system in which Sinn Féin Ministers receive latitude for actions while DUP Ministers are punished for interpretations, evidence is demanded in some cases but speculation will suffice in others and the rules appear to be tightened or loosened depending on who is in the dock, so to speak. It is not about defending one Minister; it is about defending fairness, consistency and credibility, because, if the standards system loses those, it loses the confidence of the public and rightly so.

At a time when people across Northern Ireland are waiting years for hospital treatment, struggling to see a GP and driving on roads that are falling apart, the Opposition have chosen to use their limited time in the Chamber on yet another political stunt. The SDLP knows that the motion will reform nothing, so the only plausible explanation is that it is about headlines and press releases, not about helping people. Once again, a DUP Minister is criticised not for breaking a rule or causing harm but for how a post might have been interpreted, even though the commissioner found no evidence linking it to violence. The double standard will be obvious to the public. Sinn Féin, Alliance and the SDLP are using the motion to distract from their failures in health, infrastructure, justice and economic confidence. While they shout from the sidelines, DUP Ministers are getting on with business and the job of delivering for the people whom we represent. The people of Northern Ireland do not want theatre; they want leadership, stability and delivery. That is what DUP Ministers are focused on.

This is a nonsense debate on a nonsense report, designed to attack a Minister because he aided the PSNI by making a public statement on social media —

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up, Maurice.

Mr Bradley: — as a constituency MLA.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up. Thank you.

Mr Kingston: The scope of the SDLP motion is astonishing and, indeed, absurd. It is no surprise that the leader of the SDLP Opposition wants to criticise the DUP Minister for Communities, seeing as he put out a public press release when he referred the Minister to the Commissioner for Standards, whereas making any such complaint is meant to be a confidential process akin to a workplace complaint. Perhaps something will come from that.

The motion travels from a complaint about a Minister to calling for an entire renegotiation of our political arrangements, co-facilitated by the British and Irish Governments. That is quite a leap of logic —

Mr Frew: Will the Member give way?

Mr Kingston: I will give way shortly. Let me finish the sentence.

That is quite a leap of logic, and it would be a fundamental violation of previous agreements. We have heard further political deviations from Sinn Féin during the debate, making it clear that it is an entirely political matter. Somehow, I cannot see the Secretary of State or his Irish equivalent rushing to the SDLP cry that our institutions are in crisis.

Mr Frew: I thank the Member for giving way. He rightly states that the motion has consequences and actions, one of which is that the Assembly should write to the UK Secretary of State and the Irish Republic Government. Should it be reflected in that letter that the House was divided when it voted on the motion?

Mr Kingston: I agree that, if there is to be action from the outcome, it should reflect the reality of the divided wishes of the Assembly and that it is not unanimous in the outcome.

The complaints raised with the Commissioner for Standards against Gordon Lyons last summer were treated by the commissioner as potential breaches of the ministerial code of conduct. We see no reason why they should have been dealt with under the ministerial code. The relevance of that is that the Committee for Standards and Privileges, of which my colleague Paul Frew and I are members, has no role in considering the commissioner's reports on breaches of the ministerial code. The report is just published without comment from the Committee. If it had been treated as a complaint of a breach of the MLA code of conduct, we would have deliberated on the report at the Committee. However, given that the Committee has no further role in the matter, I wish to make it clear that we disagree with the former commissioner's findings in her report.

At a time of widespread disorder, raised tension and violence on the streets, Gordon Lyons responded to a PSNI request to clarify that evacuated families were no longer in Larne Leisure Centre by making that factual point in his social media post. It is disgraceful that some people engaged in an arson attack on the leisure centre. They should be brought to justice for their thuggish behaviour, and I hope that that will happen. Clearly, information on the leisure centre's having been used as an evacuation centre was already circulating, otherwise the police would not have made their request to elected representatives. Therefore, there is no justification for linking Gordon's factual post to the attack that occurred. That is entirely conjecture and would not stand up in a court of law. Indeed, in his post, Gordon stated:

To be clear, we consider the scale of complaints against Gordon to amount to a politically motivated pile-on, and we reject the conclusion of the former commissioner that his conduct in the matter was a breach of any code of conduct. Needless to say, we will vote against the motion.

Mr Buckley: Last June was a particularly difficult time for many people across Northern Ireland. There was never any justification for harm to any individual; I want to make that clear from these Benches. There was no justified or warranted attack on anybody who lives in Northern Ireland.

My thoughts and concerns at that time and those of the vast majority of people were with the young girl who had just been subject to a most brutal attack. Across the country, there is huge concern about the wave of uncontrolled and illegal immigration and the impact that it has had on the people in our society. [Inaudible.]

Mr Buckley: I hear gnashing of teeth from the Alliance Party, but that is a statement of fact. People such as those in the Alliance Party who have continued to bury their head in the sand on the issue have given rise to a sinister and nasty element that must be called out. Like the Member for North Antrim, I was on the ground during those days, trying to bring peace, calm and stability to my community in difficult times, as was the Minister for Communities. Some of the political opportunism that has gone on in the Chamber today is nothing short of disgraceful.

It is clear that you want to accept the commissioner's ruling when it suits your political school of thought, but you do not want to be consistent in ensuring that we, as elected representatives, can do our best to make sure that our citizens are protected, catered for and have a voice. When they do not have a voice, when you exclude them from political life to give air to genuine and legitimate concerns in our community, you give rise to more sinister elements.

Mr O'Toole: Will the Member give way?

Mr Buckley: I will not. I have heard quite a bit from the leader of the Opposition.

A lot of hypocrisy has been called out in the Chamber. On numerous occasions, it has come from the Sinn Fein Benches, whether it is to do with the personal anguish that it has caused genuine victims of the Troubles in Northern Ireland or because it has continually attended vigils to commemorate and celebrate those who took the lives of innocent people. One day recently, I spoke to Mr Alan Black, the sole survivor at Kingsmills. To this day, when he gets on a bus, he still has comments made to him, such as "It would have taken only one bullet had it been me". Those are the types of comments that continue to hurt members of our community. How does it make people feel when a Sinn Féin Member glorifies a particular individual or attends a commemoration? Where is the commissioner's report and consistency on that level of empathy? I would argue that it does not exist.

It is the same when we look at the SDLP. There has been no answer to the charge levelled against Mr Eastwood, nor have there been calls for a commissioner's investigation or, indeed, discipline. What about Claire Hanna, the current leader of the SDLP? That lady put out commentary about political violence during the Brexit negotiations. She said that we could expect civil disobedience at the very minimum. Is that not an incitement to hatred? Is that not a double standard from the leader of the Opposition? There is a consultation going on right now about reforming the Assembly. The reform that the SDLP wants, however, is a reform of exclusion. It is a reform of silencing, a reform of the very safeguards that nationalists put into the Belfast Agreement to ensure that there was no ganging-up on a political Member, only now to see them washed away because it is convenient to do so.

I am sick, sore and tired of the jumped-up theatrics of the Alliance deputy leader, who talks people engaging in culture wars, and him a chief architect of culture wars. Perhaps he should look in the mirror. When he talks about the actions and the discourse of members of my party, I need not go too far to remind him that there is a video of him circulating that does not show him —

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr Buckley: — in a positive light —

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr Buckley: — when it comes to conduct —

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Order.

Mr Buckley: — in public life.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: When I say, "Order", take your seat, right? This has gone well beyond the scope of the debate, OK? You are talking about MPs —

Mr Buckley: Yes.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: — for whom the Standards Commissioner has no responsibility, OK?

Now, I am letting it go as far as I can, but I encourage everyone to stick to the scope of the motion. If you will not, you will take your seat.

Mr Buckley: Thank you, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker.

The hypocrisy is clear. Let me be clear: if you are intent on going down the road of trying to censor and indulge in cancel culture, be sure that the Members on these Benches will put your record up in lights for all to see. I welcome it that anybody can come into the Chamber and debate, but there should be no ability to cancel a Member who rightly acted as any MLA would do —

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up.

Mr Buckley: — in the interests of his constituents.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up. Thank you, Jonathan.

Mr Gaston: From the get-go, there are several major problems with the motion. The first, surprisingly, given those who tabled it, goes to the heart of the Belfast Agreement. It does not simply call on the United Kingdom Government to act but demands that a programme of institutional reform be co-facilitated by the UK and Irish Governments. Furthermore, it proposes that the Assembly write not only to the Secretary of State but to the Tánaiste, who has no business in Northern Ireland's internal affairs. I remind the SDLP that the three-strand approach was never intended to give Dublin a role in the internal government of Northern Ireland. No thank you.

No one who respects the Belfast Agreement or the principle of consent could support this motion.

Mr O'Toole: Will the Member give way?

Mr Gaston: The very wording of the motion has ensured that no unionist in the Chamber could ever vote for it, regardless of the ministerial breach in question.

Mr Buckley: Will the Member give way?

Mr Gaston: I am happy to give way to Mr O'Toole first of all.

Mr O'Toole: Thank you, Mr Gaston, for giving way. I appreciate that. Since you are now a defender of the Good Friday Agreement, which is the most remarkable development that we have seen in some time, I presume that you are also disappointed and will agree that Minister Lyons was in breach of the ministerial code in 2024 when he refused to attend North/South Ministerial Council (NSMC) meetings.

Mr Gaston: Absolutely not, and —

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: The Member has an extra minute.

Mr Gaston: — I congratulate the Minister for the stand that he took. He still should not be going to North/South Ministerial Council meetings. Let us be very clear: you talk about the Good Friday Agreement, but you were happy to ride roughshod over the principle of consent in December when you gave away governance over 300 areas of law to the EU.

Let us look at what the motion rests upon. It attacks Minister Lyons on the basis of a report written by the former Commissioner for Standards, Melissa McCullough. That is the same commissioner who refused to investigate a complaint that I lodged regarding the Michael McMonagle scandal. I remind the House: Michael McMonagle was a convicted paedophile, who was on the payroll of the First Minister, supposedly for constituency work, when, in reality, he was operating as a Sinn Féin press officer. Was that ever properly investigated? No. Instead, it was left to a so-called report that was produced by the head of Legal Services. The Assembly passed judgement on that affair by agreeing a motion, tabled by me, that either the report was fundamentally flawed or the First Minister misled the House. Yet, Dr McCullough was not interested, and the SDLP, it seems, is quite content to look the other way when it becomes uncomfortable for the Executive.

That is the same commissioner who found no sanction for the First Minister of no alternative when she attended the Bobby Storey funeral in west Belfast during the height of the COVID lockdown regulations. It is the same commissioner who found there to be no breach when Mr Carroll tweeted, "Victory to the Palestinian Resistance" on 7 October in the aftermath of the biggest slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust. It is the same commissioner who found Dr Steve Aiken to be in breach of the MLA code of conduct when chairing a Committee but dismissed the complaint that I lodged against the Chairperson of the Committee for the Executive Office, stating that she could not investigate Committee Chairs. The SDLP, once again, was happy to look the other way.

Indeed, we saw it in the Chamber again last week. Mr O'Toole was very keen to name-drop me in his opening gambit, but where was he last Monday? Where was he to stand up for scrutiny? Where was he to stand up for the victims when Members tried to stop this MLA speaking out in Committees? My goodness, his party was happy to censure this MLA over breathegate. It appears that, in this House, accountability is demanded only of unionists. I trust, Mr O'Toole, that you have had a word with your councillor Mr de Faoite for trying to belittle unionists last week, given that you are the custodians and the guardians of standards in public life.

Let us put the SDLP's position on standards in government to the test. Does it believe that Committee Chairs should not hold private meetings with Ministers before evidence sessions? Does it believe that, when a Member seeks the handwritten note of such a meeting, the author of that note — in this case, the First Minister's principal private secretary — should then take control of the freedom of information process in the Department? I have not heard the SDLP pass any judgement or make any comment on that issue. Is that accountability, Mr O'Toole?

My goodness, we will not take any lectures from the SDLP. Last week, it was all about hurty words. Oh dear goodness, we cannot have hurty words. It was also about asking too many uncomfortable questions. We cannot ask too many uncomfortable questions that would cause unease on the Sinn Féin Benches. This week, it is about what the Minister did not say and his not showing empathy. That is what the public see.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up.

Mr Gaston: That is why the public are laughing at this place.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up.

Mr Gaston: This place needs to catch itself on.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: I call Gerry Carroll.

Mr Carroll: Thank you, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker. I thank and commend the Members for tabling the motion. Almost three months ago, in November, we debated a question for urgent oral answer that, similarly, was an attempt to hold a Minister to account. That time it was Paul Givan: different Minister, same party. Today, we are talking about the same shameless refusal of people to take responsibility.

The commissioner found that the Communities Minister was in breach of the ministerial code not once but twice, yet he still clings to office, protected by a party that values tribal loyalty over public standards. The Labour Party's defence of Keir Starmer in the past few days has been nauseating, but the DUP takes the biscuit in its defence of Gordon Lyons and Paul Givan.

There is a clear pattern here of Ministers shrinking from responsibility because their parties shield them from accountability. They close ranks, deflect criticism and wait for the news cycle to move on. They have made a cynical but, unfortunately, entirely correct calculation that there are no consequences for breaking the rules, which may be the case today. That has resulted in astounding arrogance from Paul Givan and Gordon Lyons: an arrogance that Ministers can breach the ministerial code repeatedly, but, if they just sit tight, the public will forget. People will not forget, Minister. They see through the circus, and many are asking what the Executive have actually delivered. The big parties have delivered absolutely nothing for struggling working-class communities.

In the debate, former junior Minister Cameron said that there was no evidence that the Minister for Communities's post increased tensions. I remind the Member that, after the Minister's social media post, a leisure centre housing people who were fleeing racial violence was burned to the ground. If that does not meet the threshold of increasing tension, I do not know what does.

Mr Brooks: There speaks Hamas's cheerleader.

Mr Carroll: What are you saying?

Mr Brooks: There speaks Hamas's cheerleader.

Mr Carroll: Ministers have a duty to act responsibly and to be careful of the impact of their words at all times, but especially at a time of heightened racial violence.

Mr K Buchanan: Will the Member give way?

Mr Carroll: Go ahead.

Mr K Buchanan: On reflection, and having had time to breathe, would you say that your comments about the 7 October attack were right or wrong?

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: The Member has an extra minute.

Mr Carroll: You need to get a new playbook, mate.

It is also worth remembering that, in that period in which unionist MLAs —.

Mr Frew: Will the Member give way?

Mr Carroll: I will come to you in a second, Mr Frew. It is also worth remembering that, last summer, many unionist MLAs were taking part in a strategy of whipping up anti-migrant sentiment —.

Mrs Cameron: What are you talking about?

Mr Carroll: You might not like it, but I am going to say it. In particular, there were anti-Roma comments. Sexual harassment and misogyny are always wrong and have to be condemned, but it is worth remembering that, after last summer's events, the two charges against two Romanian teenagers, which sparked the riots, were dropped. There were no apologies from any of the Members who gave a wink and a nod or stirred the pot.

Mr Frew gave a blazing defence of his Minister. Maybe he will be rewarded with a ministerial position in the next mandate. Let us remember what he said last year. He, disgracefully, tried to tie sexual assault to immigration. That needs to be called out and challenged. He talked about the problem of HMOs, not because the people in them are stuck in damp, mouldy and unsuitable housing but because there might be a tiny increase in the number of black and brown faces in Larne, Ballymena or elsewhere. Did he backtrack? Has he apologised? Absolutely not.

Some Members said that the debate is a waste of time. If holding Ministers to account is considered to be a waste of time, that shows the depth of arrogance and entitlement that DUP Ministers in particular have.

Mr Tennyson: I thank the Member for giving way. It was the leader of the Ulster Unionist Party who made that assertion. Does he agree that, given that the Ulster Unionist Party has a councillor on Derry City and Strabane District Council who has three drink-driving convictions, perhaps that Member should get his own house in order before casting aspersions on other parties?

Mr Carroll: I do not know the circumstances that the Member is talking about.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: It is quite obvious that practically everybody is straying from the scope of the motion. The standards commissioner here has no jurisdiction or remit over councillors and MPs. I accept the point that you are making, and you have put it on the record, but I want people to return to the motion. Also, when people have the Floor, they need to be heard. OK, Gerry, go ahead.

Mr Carroll: Thank you, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker.

A lot of derision and scorn has been poured on the fact that the commissioner challenged the Communities Minister for not showing empathy. It is beyond farcical that the Minister and his backers think that empathy is a bad thing and something that Ministers should not have while they are in office. It should be a bare minimum for Ministers, MLAs and anybody in elected politics. Frankly, I do not care whether it is written down in the ministerial code: Ministers should have empathy as a basic requirement of office, and, if they do not think that they should have empathy, they should not be in office. The Oxford Dictionary says that empathy is:

Last year, at the time, I said that either the Communities Minister knew what he was doing when he posted about the migrants' location at Larne Leisure Centre and distanced his party from that decision with an unsubtle wink and a nod to far right and racist agitators in the town or he was so clueless that he did not think that mentioning the location of migrants, who had been driven out of their homes in the context of racial violence, would lead to racial violence. One of those statements is true, and both of them, in my view and that of many people, are reason enough for him to be out of office.

The debate exposes the fundamental hypocrisy of our institutions. Stormont cannot deliver housing while thousands of families are homeless; it cannot deliver healthcare while waiting lists are the worst on these islands; it cannot deliver educational reform while children are still segregated at 11; and, apparently, it cannot even deliver basic ministerial accountability.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up, Gerry.

Mr Carroll: Thank you.

Mr Brooks: On a point of order, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker. Will you make a ruling on whether the Member who has just spoken was in order when he directly accused a Member of being racist towards those with "black and brown faces"?

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: I will certainly pass that on to the Speaker. A lot has been thrown here, however. I encourage us all to look at Hansard and reflect on what has been said.

Without further ado, I call the Minister for Communities to respond to the debate. You have 15 minutes.

Mr Lyons (The Minister for Communities): Thank you, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker.

The motion proposed by the leader of the Opposition is nothing more than a charade dressed up as a debate on standards in public life. Let me be clear: the report from the former standards commissioner was an attempt to denigrate my standing and it was straight from the playbook of the woke brigade. I engaged in good faith and fully cooperated with the process, yet the commissioner, Melissa McCullough, blatantly disregarded much of my evidence. As I will set out, the former commissioner produced a ragbag report that failed to clear any objective threshold in its findings. I have to say that the former commissioner sits well with the increasing number of people who want to cancel those with whom they disagree. Liberty, free speech and the exchange of views should never be cancelled, and I will never be afraid to give leadership, regardless of whether that comes at a cost.

I reject the report and believe that all objective people should do the same. Ultimately, this is not about whether you like me or agree with what I posted after the events that disgracefully unfolded at Larne Leisure Centre that night; it should be about whether my actions constituted a breach of the ministerial code. Had I revealed in real time where those migrant families had been sheltering, that would have been a failure of leadership. Had I encouraged protests, my actions might have been called into question. However, I did neither. The report is based not on evidence but on conjecture, and opinion has triumphed over fact.

What we have is the introduction of new standards, falsehoods and contradictions. In fact, the former commissioner does a number of somersaults in the report. She finds that there was coordination between my office and the PSNI and later laments the lack of coordination. She states that the post required "more thoughtful communication" but also states that it was "deliberate and considered". She states that I blended personal, political and official roles but later states that I cannot step in and out of those roles. She states that I did not prioritise public safety but later concedes that it was my intention to "calm tensions". Her report is a bucketful of biased contradictions. When the evidence did not support her predetermined position, it was inevitable that she would tie herself up in knots.

Not only is the report laced with contradictions, but it contains falsehoods. For example, while the commissioner makes many outrageous comments, I highlight and utterly reject her completely false allegation that I endorsed or encouraged protests: at no time did I do that. The former commissioner also said that I criticised public bodies: at no time did I do that. There is no evidence to support her claim. Even in the event that I had done so, that would not have been a breach of the ministerial code. With such shoddy work, it is little wonder that she got so much else wrong. The report is based on what she thinks happened rather than what actually happened. She made no effort to conduct a proper investigation or speak to a wide range of witnesses. It is, therefore, no surprise that she uses words such as "may have", "appears" and "could reasonably conclude", because she cannot be categorical. Worse, though, is the former commissioner's presumption of the positions held by the people whom I represent in how she used the line:

to justify the conclusions in her report. That is as unprofessional as it is inaccurate, and she should know better than to indulge in such innuendo.

I will address the comments that have been made about my supposed lack of empathy. Although I have explained clearly that the vulnerable families who were affected had been moved away from the leisure centre and were therefore not at risk from the awful events that later unfolded, I had then and have now a deep compassion for them and for anyone who might find themselves in such a position. What they experienced was wrong, and I have always stood against violence and intimidation. My record is not one of justifying or excusing violence, and I have consistently advocated support for the police, the courts and the rule of law. I have no truck with anyone who seeks to harm others, and it is particularly abhorrent when that is done because of the colour of someone's skin or their nationality.

I never set out to hurt or offend anyone. Anyone who knows me knows that I would never want to do that. However, the omission of empathy cannot be sufficient cause for finding a breach of the ministerial code. If that were applied consistently, it would set an alarming precedent that would threaten our public discourse. If Ministers are now required to infuse every statement with empathy — a term so subjective that it could mean anything to anyone — we are entering dangerous and anti-democratic territory. Here is the key question: who determines whether something is empathetic enough or carries the requisite emotion? Who becomes the arbiter of such behaviour? It would be unelected commissioners, who would dictate not just what we say but how we say it under the guise of enforcing standards that chime with their attitudes and personal bias. That would crush robust debate and discourage politicians from engaging directly with the public during crises. Ultimately, it would harm the communities that we serve. If the same standard were applied, we would have a future in which every tweet, post and speech was parsed for emotional content rather than factual accuracy. That is not accountability; that is political correctness and cancel culture masquerading as virtue.

I note what else the commissioner had to say for herself:

Look at the new test that she introduces: our posts and commentary should not be influenced by political considerations. My post on that day as a local MLA was shaped by neither personal nor political considerations, yet here we have the former commissioner stating that we cannot allow our personal or political convictions to shape our views and how we communicate. What an incredible statement to make.

I have a further point. The commissioner said that it was her view that stating that the migrant families had been in the leisure centre:

The PSNI, which was present on the ground and is trained in managing protests, asked that we let people know that the families were no longer there. Let us play that out. The alternative option open to me — it appears that it is the view of the commissioner and Members on the other side of the House that I should have taken it — was, on receipt of that request from the police, not to comply. That would have been the wrong thing to do. A refusal to assist the police could well be construed as a breach of the Pledge of Office. When it comes to managing protests that have the potential to turn violent and the police take the view that getting the word out is likely to be helpful, while the commissioner takes the view that getting the word out may lead to further unrest, I think that most people would place more weight on the assessment based on operational policing judgement than on the musings of a commissioner far removed from the events on the ground. Most would assume that that would be far outside her area of expertise, and they would be right. Therein lies the problem with the former commissioner: she thinks that she knows better than the people on the ground, including the police, and that she knows better than I do about what I meant and about the capacity in which I was acting.

Mrs Dillon: Will the Minister take an intervention?

Mr Lyons: No, I will not.

This goes to the heart of the problem with the report: she believed that it was her job not just to investigate and produce a report but to police the words and behaviour of Members — well, some Members. It is hard to fathom how the commissioner did not think it appropriate to investigate the conduct thoroughly of Mr Gerry Carroll, when he posted, "Victory to the Palestinian Resistance" as Israelis were being murdered, raped and kidnapped in their hundreds by Hamas.

Mr Carroll: Will the Minister give way?

Mr Lyons: I will not give way.

She took at face value his ludicrous assertions that he was not aware of what was really going on. She meekly — [Interruption.]

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Order. There have been comments back and forth, but, when Members are speaking, at least have the manners to let them be heard.

Go ahead.

Mr Lyons: She took at face value his ludicrous assertions that he was not aware of what was going on. She meekly accepted his pathetic excuse that he was simply referring to Palestinians destroying fences in an act of civil disobedience. Nobody believes that for a second. By her actions and judgements in that moment, the former commissioner demonstrated the two-tier imbalance in the standards regime governing our arrangements: for unionists, a different — higher — standard applies.

The reaction of some Members has been completely over the top. It has not been grounded in reality. It is political pantomime. Some Members have repeated falsehoods with glee. Some simply read out attack lines given to them by their party leadership. However, I doubt that there has been a more ludicrous response than that from some members of the Committee for Communities, who, led by Kellie Armstrong, resolved to write to the Secretary of State to get his opinion as to whether I may have been in breach of section 30 of the Northern Ireland Act. The Committee thinks that the report could mean that I am not committed to pursuing my political goals by purely peaceful and democratic means. Those Members claim to act in defence of democracy and accountability but disregard the facts and cuddle up together as so-called progressives.

Mr Buckley: I thank the Minister for giving way. Is he aware of any time when the Alliance Party has written to the Secretary of State about Sinn Féin's conduct in public office?

Mr Lyons: I am sure that that is something that we could find out, but, rather than taking the time to write letters, I assure him that that is probably a grand total of zero.

I remind the Committee that there was nothing progressive and democratic about the Sinn Féin movement when it was murdering and maiming people across Northern Ireland.

You can disagree with me. Say what you want about how you would have taken a different approach: that is fine. However, the idea that I am in some way not a democrat or that I believe that there is a role for violence in this society is so ludicrous that it is laughable.

We all know what way the vote will go today. Let me be unequivocal: my intent in posting was to de-escalate. It was done in an attempt to avert a repeat of what we had seen in Ballymena. It was done in the hope of a better outcome for everyone involved. It was done in good faith. The outcome of today's vote will be immaterial. It will not change the approach that I take in this job or as a public representative for East Antrim. I will be guided by what is in the best interests of those who elected me and work for them. They elected me, and they know that I am here because I have a genuine desire to make things better for the people of Northern Ireland. My job is to serve them, represent them and get things done for the people of Northern Ireland. That is what I will keep doing.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: I call Matthew O'Toole to conclude and make a winding up speech in the debate. You have 10 minutes.

Mr O'Toole: I am afraid that today's debate has been something of a festival of whataboutery and deflection from the real issues. It has been a challenge at times, for you, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker, not just to keep order but to remind people of the terms of the debate.

Let me say first of all, in relation to what the Minister said, that the motion is about more than Gordon Lyons, more than the breach found in relation to the events and the Facebook post of June last year. It is about a broader question of accountability in our politics, improving our standards process and overhauling the way we do politics, seeking to find some consensus. That needs to change and improve. I genuinely do not know how any elected representative in Northern Ireland who presumably walks around the streets of this jurisdiction, goes into shops and engages with constituents could find anything other than that public trust in our politics is strikingly and remarkably low.

Further to that, the Minister is entitled to make a response. Part of the purpose of today's debate is to get Minister Lyons to give his response on the record to the points put in the standards report. He had the opportunity to do that and did it, even if I disagree with him. He outlined an entire indictment, from his perspective, of the process that he was subject to.

Mrs Dillon: Will the Member take an intervention?

Mr O'Toole: I will in one second.

The Minister outlined his own indictment of that standards process, but I presume that he and his colleagues will vote against a motion that is about improving and overhauling how we do standards here. That is ironic. It is ironic that Members, including Mr Gaston, lambast the way we do standards in this place but then say, "No: it would be terrible to support any change."

I give way briefly to the Minister and then to Mrs Dillon.

Mr Lyons: We may want to see change in that, but we also disagree with some of the other insinuations and accusations that are made about me. There is also the fact that the Irish Government have no role in the process and should not be involved in it. Yes, we will against it for those reasons.

Mr O'Toole: Well, if the purpose is to say that the Irish Government have no role in these institutions, I am afraid that I do not agree with that. Of course we know about the previous standards breach that the Minister was subject to because he refused to engage in the NSMC.

I give way briefly to Mrs Dillon because I want to be generous in interventions where I can be.

Mrs Dillon: Thank you very much for giving way. Do you agree that it is one thing to criticise the report but an entirely different thing to personally attack the previous commissioner or any independent commissioner, for that matter, because that entirely undermines the standards process and the standards themselves. [Interruption.]

I should be allowed to speak. You did not give an intervention: would you like to be quiet now?

Mr O'Toole: It is reasonable for any Member who is subject —

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Order. I gave you, Minister, the respect to be heard: I ask that you and your colleagues give others that respect.

Go ahead, Matthew.

Mr O'Toole: It is, of course, reasonable for any Member who is subject to a standards process and the outcome of a report, including Mr Gaston, to respond to it, disagree and challenge it. That is an entirely legitimate part of the process. However, Linda Dillon is right when she says that simply questioning the motivations of the standards commissioner and dismissing them as "woke" is not an appropriate thing to do.

In his response, the Minister — I thought it was interesting — at least did something that he did not do last June. I think I quote him correctly when he said:

Mr Lyons: I said that before.

Mr O'Toole: OK. I acknowledge that the Minister says that he said that before. Today, he is saying, "Trust me and my intentions when I did that post, but the Standards Commissioner? No, that is woke nonsense. That is woke nonsense from the SDLP, the Alliance Party and Sinn Féin". The Minister nods to confirm that that is his position, which gets right to the crux of the problem: rather than engage seriously and respectfully in the debate, the DUP consistently seeks to dismiss any criticism, any challenge and any accountability. That is not acceptable, I am afraid.

I have held the Minister to the same standard that I and my party, as the official Opposition, have held every other Minister in the Assembly and Executive.

Mr Lyons: You have not.

Mr O'Toole: Yes, we have. [Interruption.]

Yes, we have. I dismiss utterly the idea that we have not. Go online, and look at the challenges that I get from supporters of all parties, including Sinn Féin and the Alliance Party, for the robust challenge that —

Mr Buckley: Will the Member give way?

Mr O'Toole: No, I will not right now; I will in a second.

— my colleagues and I give to all Ministers — all Ministers — whether they are DUP, Ulster Unionist, Alliance or Sinn Féin.

I need to make some progress in responding to comments made by others.

The motion is not just about Gordon Lyons; it is about building a culture of accountability in our politics, improving the way that the institutions work and rebuilding trust in the public that we can deliver services for them. It is deeply disappointing when Mr Jon Burrows dismisses as "wasteful" an entire debate that is fundamentally about accountability. Lots of people who have heard lots of words from Mr Burrows in recent weeks will wonder whether he is serious. A man who came in promising to be the new sheriff in town turns out to be Deputy Dawg to the DUP. He will not utter one syllable of criticism of the DUP.

Ms Ennis: Will the Member give way?

Mr O'Toole: I will give way in a second.

Mr Burrows: Will the Member give way?

Mr O'Toole: One second.

I will consistently call out and criticise Sinn Féin Ministers. Often, I have to put up with more than glares in the Chamber; I have to put up with responses online. I and my SDLP colleagues will challenge the Justice Minister and the AERA Minister: that is what opposition is about. Mr Burrows, in his office, has not uttered one syllable of criticism of the DUP. He reinforces the opinion that lots of people have that the mission in unionist politics is simply to create three versions of the DUP.

I will give way briefly to Ms Ennis briefly and then Mr Burrows.

Ms Ennis: I thank the Member for giving way. Does the Member agree that Mr Burrows, the now leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, who spent the first weeks of his time in the Chamber talking about koi carp and pandas falling out of trees, has no credibility when he lectures others on wasting time in the Chamber?

Mr O'Toole: I will give way briefly to Mr Burrows, and then I will finish my remarks.

Mr Burrows: A lot of the opponents are rattled by some of my contributions. I have criticised every party in the Chamber, which you would know if you had listened to the interviews that, you say, you have. I have pointed out issues that I have had with the Democratic Unionist Party's judgement at times. I will go where the facts are and where the evidence is. It is entirely possible to oppose the motion but also support high standards and condemn unequivocally the disgusting rioting that took place in my constituency and elsewhere. I called for the police to be firmer and to release images more quickly —.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Excuse me: interventions are meant to be —.

Mr O'Toole: I think that —.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: No, no, Matthew.

As soon as you to take to your feet, you are meant to sit down. Interventions are meant to be short.

Mr Buckley: Will the Member give way briefly?

Mr O'Toole: I cannot. I am afraid. I have only got three minutes left.

There has been a festival of whataboutery today. The core of the motion is about standards in public life, building a culture of accountability and reforming the way that our politics works. It is disappointing to see that so many people have ignored that and fallen into the whataboutery trap, simply saying, "What about yousuns this? What about yousuns that?".

Multiple Members opposite mentioned the Bobby Storey funeral: at the time and subsequently, my colleagues on these Benches and I were robust in challenging Sinn Féin Members — [Interruption.]

Mr O'Toole: Yes, we were. The Minister of Education, I am afraid, is a man who has ignored and spurned any form of accountability.

I have held Sinn Féin robustly to account on the Bobby Storey funeral. I have held the Alliance Party robustly to account. I will do that to the DUP. The fact that your party believes itself to be immune to any criticism is, ultimately, what is damaging trust in our politics. Your party, as the leader of unionism, should, more than anybody else, care about trust in politics here, but you seem completely indifferent to generating contempt for our politics.

I will briefly mention some of the comments that were made. Pam Cameron asked, "Why bring the motion forward at all?". It is about accountability, I am afraid. She went on to criticise other parties for actions that they had taken. Accountability matters. Yes, we are all politicians, and, of course, everything that we do is political. There is nothing wrong with that; we are democratically elected people. However, we have, without fear or favour, challenged different parties.

Sian Mulholland mentioned her experience of being an elected representative in North Antrim last June, and I think that that was sincere. We should not forget the gravity of the situation. That is why the report was made in the first place. I believe that Mr Kingston is a member of the Standards and Privileges Committee: he should be mindful of some of his utterances in the Chamber during the debate. The reason why it was a matter of such concern to the public was the gravity of the situation, with people sheltering in fear for their safety. Minister, your responsibility —.

Mr Lyons: Where?

Mr O'Toole: Where? In County Antrim.

Mr Lyons: In the leisure centre? That is a lie.

Mr O'Toole: Here is the point, Minister. We were in an extraordinarily serious situation, and you, as a holder of ministerial office, were expected to reflect —.

Mr Buckley: Will the Member give way?

Mr O'Toole: I am afraid that I do not have time, Mr Buckley. I am generally generous in conceding time, as I have shown.

There has been a consistent desire to talk up the provisions of the Good Friday Agreement. We passionately believe in the Good Friday Agreement, but we also believe that it can be reformed and improved. It was funny to hear Mr Lyons talk about the Good Friday Agreement. He was previously found to be in breach of the ministerial code because he refused to participate in strand two of the agreement by attending the North/South Ministerial Council.

Our motion is not simply about Minister Lyons; he has said his piece. I hope that today's motion will pass. More generally, the public will continue to lose trust in our politics and in all of us, whoever we are — unionist, nationalist or other, socialist or green — because they do not believe that we can do politics properly and deliver accountability. We have an opportunity to pass the motion today to continue the process of pushing for reform and improvement in our politics. If Members think that the public think that it is all grand and we can go on like this, I genuinely wonder what planet they are living on.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up.

Mr O'Toole: We cannot go on like this. I commend the motion.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: OK. Time is up.

Mrs Dillon: On a point of order, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker. Will the Speaker please rule on whether it is in order for personal attacks to be made on an independent commissioner in this place? I think that it is entirely out of order, but I would like a ruling on that.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: I will pass that on to the Speaker.

The Business Committee has arranged to meet at 1.00 pm. I propose, therefore, by leave of the Assembly, to suspend the sitting until 2.00 pm.

Mr Speaker: Questions 1 and 2 have been withdrawn.

Mrs Long (The Minister of Justice): With your permission, Mr Speaker, I will address questions 3 and 10 together, as they speak to the same issue.

I want to resolve the Criminal Bar Association (CBA) dispute. We have been engaged with the CBA since before the outset of its action in 2024, and I continue to engage with it. I made commitments and delivered, including on the 16% uplift in fees, which reached bank accounts at the start of the year, and on backdating that uplift to December 2024, at an overall cost of £6·15 million, £1·8 million of which went directly to barristers. I reprioritised my delivery plan, established a working group to consider other fees and appointed Judge Burgess to lead that work because that was what the professions wanted. We agreed a road map on 8 December to address the remaining issues, but the CBA withdrew its services, notwithstanding the fact that it had signed up to that agreement.

It was in the CBA's interests that I proposed the accelerated independent review, investing additional funding and resources once again to address the CBA's remaining concerns at pace. The proposed review was conditional on a full return to service to remove the intolerable impact on victims and witnesses. That was to ensure that additional unwarranted pressure was not brought to bear on those leading the review, so that they could proceed without fear or favour and without the added injection of victim suffering. Unfortunately, the CBA rejected that proposal, suggesting instead that an additional derogation to the service withdrawal, unclarified in number and scope, might be offered on a week-to-week basis, subject to its assessment of progress. That proposal was obviously untenable. It offered no certainty to victims and witnesses and no clarity on the criteria that would be used in determining which cases could go ahead and which would be delayed.

With the CBA rejecting the review, I am moving on and have asked officials to consider other options. That work is ongoing, so I cannot say more at this stage, but please be assured that efforts and intensive progress are maintaining pace. I believe that it is time for the CBA to start acting in good faith to deliver an end to the impasse. In the interim, I am working at pace to increase tailored support for victims and witnesses who have been affected by the withdrawal and to ensure that that support is provided at the greatest possible speed. I will, of course, keep the Chamber updated.

Mr McGlone: Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire as an fhreagra sin.

As we know, the dispute has been going on for 14 months without resolution, and we know and accept the difficulties that it is causing for victims. I want to tease something out: has mediation been brought to a close? Is that option not there?

Mrs Long: Mediation has not been brought to a close; it has not started. There is no mediation in the process. It is about an evidence base, openness and transparency. The dispute is not between an employer and employees; it is a dispute about the rates that the Government will pay, out of public money, for particular services that are delivered through the legal aid system. In my view, there is no room for mediation in the dispute. Mediation was suggested, but, given that we were already quite far down the road in the work that Judge Burgess had done and on resolution of the issues — in fact, further progress has been made in the interim — I do not believe that it provides an opportunity to move it forward.

Mrs Dodds: Thank you, Minister. It appears that the dispute is escalating in its intolerance and intransigence. In the meantime, victims are suffering. I am ever so glad that the McNally family will be able to see the justice process starting for their daughter. There is huge trauma for families in not knowing whether a trial will go ahead. Will you confirm for the Mitchell family in Ballymena whether there will be a derogation for their case? When might they hope to see justice for their daughter?

Mrs Long: I concur with everything that the Member has said, and I am sure that she will agree with me that there is something fundamentally distasteful and unethical about leveraging people's trauma for personal benefit. I believe that it is wrong to do that. I do not want victims to become bargaining chips in this exchange. That is why I said that any suggestion that a derogation would be turned on and off like a tap as a means of moving this forward is not acceptable to me. I cannot have a situation where, for example, the defence counsel in some of those cases makes decisions on whether or not a case will proceed to court. The derogations were sought by the Public Prosecution Service on the basis of its professional assessment of the urgency of the situation. It took into account the feedback that it got from victims' and witnesses' services. I believe that those derogations should happen: they will mitigate the ongoing strike, not provide a resolution to it.

I am due to meet Chloe Mitchell's family, shortly, on the specific implications for her case of the withdrawal of service. Unfortunately, I cannot give them the certainty that they want. Neither, indeed, would the idea of derogations being turned on and off like a tap give that family certainty. That is why my proposals were that they return, initially, to the situation prior to 5 January, and then return to full service while negotiations continue. Only that will give victims the certainty that they need on when their cases will be scheduled. That is the point that I want to get to. I still believe that it is possible to do that, but it will require the CBA being willing to meet me halfway.

Ms Egan: Minister, will you please clarify the Solicitors' Criminal Bar Association's (SCBA) position on the accelerated review?

Mrs Long: Given that the Solicitors' Criminal Bar Association has, in contrast to the Criminal Bar Association, been very proactive in its engagement with the Burgess road map and the ongoing review, and without detriment to the service that was provided to its clients, I have been clear that any accelerated review would also have to take account of the SCBA's outstanding issues with the road map. I wrote to the SCBA, at the same time as I wrote to the CBA, to ask for a list of issues that it would like to be included in an accelerated review. The SCBA wrote back on 23 January with a number of asks. Clearly, now that the CBA has rejected the terms of that offer, we are in a different space. I am sure that, like me, SCBA members are incredibly disappointed, because, ultimately, it is its clients who are not getting a service from the criminal Bar. We will set that disappointment aside and pick up the pieces. We will continue with the road map process that is already in place, and we will continue to resolve issues for the SCBA based on the evidence that it has willingly and helpfully provided.

Ms Sheerin: Minister, following on from the Member for Upper Bann's question, there is concern across the board — the Committee had a discussion about this last week — about the impact that the situation is having on victims. None of us take that lightly.

I am also concerned about the public discussions and conversations on the matter, some of which you have engaged in, and the coverage of those in the media. There is a feeling that one cohort in society is being pitted against another, and I do not know how appropriate that is. What are you doing to ensure that victims, barristers and others who work in legal services have confidence in the justice system?

Mrs Long: There are a few things to say on that. First, when I am asked questions about the situation, which is a matter of public interest, I will answer them. I will not be curtailed by any of the legal professions, or, indeed, by Members, when answering public interest questions. In the same way, you are asking me questions here that are leading me into having a public conversation about the issue. You cannot have it both ways. I am answering the questions openly and honestly, but Members will note that, when we made the offer at the start of January 2026, I did not make any public comment. I did not speak to the House other than to say that an offer had been made. I did not go into the detail of it: I did not say anything further.

If others are going to engage in misrepresentation of what my Department and I have been doing over the past 14 months, I will, of course, refute that and provide the evidence to show otherwise. It is not about pitting one group of people against another. To be clear, it is in the interests of justice and of the Northern Ireland public that all those cases proceed to conclusion. That is also in the interests of those who are accused, many of whom are being held on remand and have not been sentenced, and of others in the community who have been grievously wounded and are not seeing justice for their loved ones in the courts. That has to be dealt with. I am not the one who is suggesting that those people should become pawns in a game about how much people get paid.

Mrs Long: The Police Pensions Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 — the regulations — set out the PSNI ill-health retirement process. Officials will continue to work with colleagues from the PSNI and the Policing Board to determine whether amendments to the ill-health retirement scheme are required. However, a statutory rule effective from 1 February 2026 amended the regulations to permit the retrospective removal of ill-health retirement exclusions from the 2015 police pension scheme. That statutory rule provides for police officers who were active members of the 2015 police pension scheme on 1 April 2024, who were previously excluded from accessing ill-health retirement for the period from 1 April 2015 to 31 March 2024, with the option to elect to retire under ill-health retirement if they satisfy the requirements for those benefits, subject to the full employee payment contributions for that period having been paid.

It may be helpful to note that the prospective element of that reform was introduced through the Police Pensions (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2024, which removed ill-health eligibility exclusions and reduced contribution rates for active members of the 2015 police pension scheme with effect from 1 April 2024. It is unlikely that further amendments will be made during the current mandate.

Mr K Buchanan: I thank the Minister for her answer. Minister, no doubt you are aware that ill-health retirement figures are continuing to climb. Does the issue that ill-health retirement is causing to the PSNI budget worry you? In your opinion, could some people be misrepresenting their ill health? Might there be a degree of fraud?

Mrs Long: I am aware of the concerns that the Chief Constable raised at the Policing Board about the steady growth over recent years in the numbers of people who are retiring under ill-health retirement. The numbers fell fairly consistently during the mid-2000s but started to rise again from around 2020, with the highest figure being recorded in the past year. That is of concern because it is a significant pressure on public funds at a time when, I am sure, the Chief Constable will want those resources to pay for officers who are active. It is also important that those who are genuinely injured and do need to retire on ill-health grounds have recourse to that option. We do not want to be in a situation in which those who gave dedicated public service and are too ill to continue are forced into a situation in which they are at financial disadvantage or, indeed, are forced to take on other work that they are not capable of doing.

Mrs Dillon: I agree with the Minister's last comments. Those who need to get injury-on-duty and ill-health retirement should absolutely be able to do so. However, there are, clearly, many people who are taking advantage of the unique circumstances and legislation around ill-health retirement and injury-on-duty retirement for PSNI officers. In no other service across these islands can people avail themselves of that. Nobody else in the public service can avail themselves of it. It is absolutely unsustainable. I have been raising the issue for a number of years now. The Policing Board has written to you on a number of occasions about it.

Mr Speaker: Have you a question as opposed to a speech, Mrs Dillon?

Mrs Dillon: It is time that we saw legislation around ill-health retirement and this issue being addressed once and for all.

Mrs Long: I accept what the Member says. I am also aware that the Policing Board has received a complaint concerning PSNI ill-health retirement. It would be inappropriate for me to discuss those matters at this juncture. It is under consideration by the Policing Board, as the appropriate authority, and I am certainly happy, on representation from the board, to act.

One must also bear in mind that this matter was brought to my attention, and concerns were raised about it, when policing numbers were at an all-time low and we had no certainty about the ability to stabilise and increase policing numbers. Therefore, it is important, as we move through these things, that we first try to ensure that we have a Police Service that is the right size, avoids undue stress on those who work in the service and allows for people to be reprofiled and, indeed, repositioned in the service where that allows them to continue in the police without seeking ill-health retirement. It is, I have to say, sad that we are having a conversation about those who may seek to abuse a system that is there, ultimately, to protect those who are there to protect us.

Mr McNulty: Notwithstanding her previous answers, can the Minister fully explain the reasons for the delay in delivering the legislative changes to the police ill-health retirement scheme, which, hopefully, will prevent abuse of the system?

Mrs Long: In fairness, we have delivered changes to the regulations, but primary legislation would be required to deal with some of the areas that the Chief Constable believes may be being exploited. He raised that with me, and, obviously, we are not the body that is responsible for determining ill-health retirement. That falls to the Chief Constable and to the board. Therefore, we are working hard with the board and the Chief Constable to determine solutions to that.

Once those solutions have been determined, we will have to consult, because these are statutory entitlements that people gained when they got their contracts. We will have to engage in a consultation to make sure that we are able to make those changes. Given how little of the mandate remains, the opportunity to bring forward primary legislation in this space is limited. However, changes are required in a number of areas around the frameworks for policing. My officials are working on that with a view to drafting a policing Bill in the next mandate, which would allow us to bring those matters together and resolve them in one piece of legislation.

Mr Chambers: I declare my membership of the Northern Ireland Policing Board. Will the Minister confirm whether the Chief Constable of the PSNI is willing to accept responsibility for completely administering the ill-health retirement scheme?

Mrs Long: I believe, from the news reports, that he did indicate that to the board last week. Again, that will need to be considered, first of all by the board and then by my Department, to ensure that there are no conflicts of interest in the administration of the scheme. One needs to bear in mind that a Chief Constable themselves may be due for ill-health retirement, so that could be an issue. Also, I would not want any perception, certainly not with rank-and-file members, that a Chief Constable would be making those decisions based potentially on the cost to the organisation. Therefore, we would have to bottom all that out in a proper consultation and make sure that the right tramlines are in place to ensure that, when this is administered, it is administered fairly; those who benefit from it are able to justify that benefit; and, crucially, if somebody goes on to make a full recovery, they are obligated to inform of a change of circumstance rather than being simply advised that they may do so.

Miss McAllister: Minister, this morning I met members of Blue Lights, which assists officers who are going through the ill-health retirement scheme. Will the Minister acknowledge that, for any legislative changes, it will be Members who are advocating for restrictions on officers who currently seek ill-health retirement who will have to vote to change the legislation and restrict it for those who are in need?

Mrs Long: That is absolutely correct. At the end of the day, I cannot legislate by myself. I will require input from the Justice Committee, the various people who are impacted by any changes, the Chief Constable and his senior management team, and the Policing Board. Ultimately, however, the final decision will be taken in the House, so those who are suggesting that there should be significant changes, be they prospective or retrospective, will ultimately have to decide on whether that scheme is appropriate or not.

Mrs Long: I have been unable to progress an increase in the minimum age of criminal responsibility (MACR) despite considerable support for that in a public consultation. That would bring Northern Ireland in line with the international standards, including directives from the UN's Committee on the Rights of the Child. At 10 years of age, our current minimum is the lowest in Europe along with England and Wales. I shared a paper with Executive colleagues that highlighted strong public support for an increase — 83·5% of respondents — and it was clear from the limited number of responses that I received that there continues to be insufficient support to enable the necessary legislative change to be progressed. That is why it was not included in the Justice Bill: I did not want to hold up its introduction through a lack of agreement on content.

I am fully supportive of removing the defence of reasonable chastisement from the law here as the effects of physical punishment of children are consistently associated with a wide variety of negative health and developmental consequences for children. As any such amendment will require Executive agreement, which, again, has not been forthcoming, I circulated a draft Executive paper in October 2024, but, despite my efforts, I was not able to secure Executive agreement to deliver change in the law in the current Justice Bill. I will continue to work with ministerial colleagues to seek their approval to repeal the defence of reasonable chastisement and move towards a position of equal protection for children in Northern Ireland.

In a draft paper to Executive colleagues in November 2025, I sought agreement on the drafting and inclusion of vagrancy repeal provisions in the Justice Bill. That too was unsuccessful, so it has been paused to allow for further consideration.

Finally, I sought the agreement of colleagues to include "transgender" in the list of protected groups under the hate crime provisions in the sentencing Bill. Regrettably, there has been a lack of consensus on that measure, so I have had to remove "transgender" from the list of protected groups identified in the Bill. I will proceed to seek Executive agreement to introduce the Bill with that omitted.

Mr Tennyson: I thank the Minister for her answer. She referred to the minimum age of criminal responsibility. If that was changed, how would children's offending behaviour be dealt with?

Mrs Long: In seeking to raise MACR, we are not saying that children's offending behaviour should be ignored or that they should get away with it. Changes would need to be accompanied by the development of new arrangements to identify the underlying causes of concerning behaviour in younger children and to provide support, guidance and help to those children and their families. Often, children who display challenging behaviour have themselves been victims or experienced multiple levels of adversity and trauma and have multiple unmet needs. Some have been groomed, some have been coerced and some have been exploited. We know, however, that the provision of targeted support to address the underlying issues at the earliest opportunity is an effective way of addressing offending behaviour, reducing the number of future victims and preventing lives being blighted by a criminal record.

Currently, if there is concern over a child's offending behaviour, they can be referred to multi-agency panels called children's diversion forums. Those or similar partnerships could be considered as a model to work with under the new age of criminal responsibility if we increase the minimum age. That would reinforce the message that young children who offend need help and support to desist.

Mr O'Toole: Minister, our party agrees with you about many of the issues that you have raised, and we want to work with you on them. However, it is clear that, before you took office — an office that, in effect, you and your party campaigned for you to have before the Executive were restored — you were on the record about the track record of your Executive partners. Why, then, did you not seek explicit guarantees in writing before you went into the Executive about what you could deliver as Justice Minister? To be clear, that would not have prevented an Executive being formed, so it is an entirely different position from that of the First Minister and deputy First Minister's parties. Why did you go in without those guarantees, and is it not a bit rich to complain about it now?

Mrs Long: I find it a bit rich that the Member whose party sat in the Executive for many years and never had any written guarantees about anything now holds others to a different standard of accountability. He says that we campaigned for me to be Justice Minister, but let us be clear: the reason that I stand here as Justice Minister — I am under no illusions about this — is that nobody else could get the required cross-community support to do the job.

Mr O'Toole: We were blocked from it.

Mrs Long: No one is blocked from doing the job.

Mr O'Toole: Nationalists are.

Mrs Long: You need to get cross-community support. Perhaps, if you engaged more constructively with your unionist colleagues, you might get it.

Mr Buckley: It is not often that I agree with the Justice Minister, but I certainly do on that. [Laughter.]

Mrs Long: I will enjoy it as long as it lasts.

Mr Buckley: It is a new dawn.

Minister, you commented earlier on young children who offend and the difficult circumstances that sometimes lead to that offending and, often, reoffending. You will know that our teachers often face the brunt of that when it comes to behaviour in classrooms that can affect them and, indeed, other children. Have you had any proactive conversations with your ministerial colleagues, particularly the Education Minister, about how teachers can share their experiences and hope for better outcomes?

Mrs Long: MACR was consulted on in the previous mandate, and we had positive responses from those who work with young people. I wrote to all Executive colleagues about the plans that we had. We responded, for example, to concerns about serious offending such as rape, serious sexual offences and murder and were willing to consider derogations in those exceptional cases, given their low number. We already have a positive working relationship with the Department of Education through the diversion forums and other panels in order to deliver the best outcomes for young people. It is important that everybody is part of the conversation.

We had said that we would review MACR after a period so that, if it was not successful, we could look at it again. If other European countries can effectively manage young people, divert them from criminal behaviour and give them a better start in life, I see no good reason, with the quality of our education system, the quality of our youth justice system and the quality of our health and social services, why we cannot do likewise.

Mrs Long: Suitable accommodation for convicted sex offenders is an important constituent of managing the risk in the community. The public protection arrangements in Northern Ireland (PPANI) bring together agencies including the police, probation services, health and social care trusts and the Housing Executive to manage the risk posed by certain sexual offenders. A designated risk manager (DRM), who is a police officer, a probation officer or a social worker, holds responsibility on behalf of their respective agency for implementing a risk management plan. Accommodation is an important component of the risk management plan, and guidance is in place to ensure that all agencies deploy a consistent approach to approving accommodation.

Risk management plans are routinely reviewed at local area public protection panels (LAPPPs) and are amended as necessary to maintain optimal risk management of the individuals concerned.

The Probation Board for Northern Ireland (PBNI) also manages the allocation of places for the most serious offenders leaving prison in approved premises or hostels across Northern Ireland. Approved premises help to manage risk and support resettlement and rehabilitation. The criteria for making a referral to approved premises includes offenders designated as category 2 and 3 under PPANI.

Ms Brownlee: I thank the Minister for her answer. I asked the question because I have been contacted by parents who are extremely concerned about the relocation of a sex offender close to a child's play park. It is extremely concerning. What safeguards are in place to ensure that convicted sex offenders are not placed close to play parks or vulnerable residents, and what can the Minister of Justice do to commit to those and to putting public safety first?

Mrs Long: Public safety must always come first in that space. That is why the Probation Board and others work closely with the Housing Executive and other accommodation providers to ensure that the approved accommodation in such circumstances is suitable and meets the requirements of, for example, any offender restrictions that that person may be under when they exit prison.

It is also important to say that any parent who has concerns about any individual and their conduct around children, regardless of whether that individual is a registered sex offender (RSO), should raise those immediately with the police. Where that person is a serious sex offender, the PSNI has the right to tell parents where it believes there to be a risk, and parents have the right to ask. That disclosure is governed by proportionality and need, but it is possible to do that. I encourage any parent who is concerned to raise the matter with the PSNI in the first instance.

Mr McReynolds: Minister, will you advise the House of the action that your Department is taking to address sexual-related offending?

Mrs Long: We are taking a number of actions. First, I propose that we strengthen and streamline notification requirements further by extending the relevant provisions of the Crime and Policing Bill, which is making its way through Westminster. I tabled a legislative consent motion on the Bill in the Assembly, and that debate is scheduled for next week. Those provisions include the requirement for a registered sex offender to notify police of a new name no less than seven days before using it, rather than within three days, which is the current requirement; a requirement for registered sex offenders to notify if they are entering premises where children may be present; a power to allow RSOs to notify virtually in certain circumstances but only where that is appropriate and fully risk-assessed; and a power to enable the police to review and, if suitable, remove of their own motion the indefinite notification requirements of a registered sex offender, again only where it has been risk-assessed and considered appropriate and only where it is a category 1 offender, which is the lowest risk category. The "own motion" review will run in tandem with an almost identical scheme that is already in place to review and discharge RSOs subject to indefinite notification requirements under schedule 3 to the Sexual Offences Act 2003, but that requires an application by the RSO. Finally, there will be a restriction on the ability of a registered sex offender to apply for a prescribed replacement identity document in a new name. That will address concerns about sex offenders changing their name in order to avoid detection. The prescribed documents are immigration documents, UK passports and driving licences.

Mr Beattie: I will return to the original question. It is a natural response for people to be concerned when a convicted sex offender is rehoused in their area. How can the community disclosure scheme address those concerns?

Mrs Long: As I outlined in my response to Cheryl, it is a matter for the PSNI. There are two schemes. The first allows the PSNI, where it has concerns about the behaviours of an individual and their interaction with a particular family or children, to raise that directly with the parents. It is free to disclose that in certain circumstances. The second gives parents who have concerns about the conduct of an individual around children, be it their own children or someone else's, the right to raise those concerns and seek disclosure from the PSNI. Such disclosure has to be carefully guarded, because simply giving out all that information, as I have described previously, can lead to unintended consequences, such as people being driven underground or attacked by vigilantes or a breakdown in overall monitoring, which is what keeps people safe.

It also has to be said that the schemes are not a complete solution, because we do not know every sex offender who lives in our community. Many of them hide in plain sight, and we would never suspect them of sexual offences, yet time will tell. History shows that they can be involved in some of the most heinous crimes. Therefore, the only real protection for children is for parents to ensure that their children understand the risk not just of stranger danger but of friend danger and family danger and know about their boundaries and autonomy. Parents should uphold and defend those at all times. Even people whom the parents trust implicitly should never be entrusted with the welfare of their children without undergoing proper checks and oversight.

Mr Speaker: We move to topical questions.

Mrs Long: We have raised a number of issues not just this year but every year. Many of those span more than a single calendar year or financial year. It is important that we change the culture not just in the justice system but in our society. The work that I am doing to ensure that things such as strangulation and suffocation pornography will be banned is one way in which we can start to shift the dial on the expectations of young men about what normal sexual behaviour looks like and to protect young women from abuse. As I have mentioned in the Chamber, boys as young as 10 have asked teachers how they could safely strangle their girlfriend during sex. That is already being normalised for 10-year-old boys. Sexually active girls as young as 14 have said that they have already experienced it. That is a real concern for us. It is not a complete answer, but it is one significant piece of work that we want to see done in the mandate.

Mr McGlone: Minister, will you clarify which of the proposed measures you intend to prioritise, what budget has been allocated to that work and how progress will be measured so that survivors can see that change is happening?

Mrs Long: I can hold up as an example the work that we did with the sexual offences legal advisers (SOLAs) and the children's sexual offences legal advisers (CSOLAs). This time last year, I was able to roll that out to children as well as adults. We set aside a budget for that. It is a pilot that will be assessed. I cannot talk about next year's budget because it has not been set, but I have draft allocations that you, as a member of the Justice Committee, will discuss in detail with our director of finance in due course. You will see the prioritisation that I have given to that work.

Mrs Long: The Department has already been responding to it. We have had a series of tripartite meetings over the past year in which a number of the matters that were raised in the review have been resolved between the board, the Chief Constable and the Department. Some of that was for the board to take forward; some of it was for the Department; and some of it was for the Chief Constable.

Ultimately, the review gave a rather good rating, although it suggested some areas for improvement. Our tripartite meetings and that more regular and ongoing contact have certainly addressed one of the issues, which was about relationships and communication.

Mr Beattie: It is interesting, Minister, that you talked about the tripartite arrangements, because, in the independent review, they are described as being like "a two-legged stool" or a "parent-child relationship". Your Department said that it had a dedicated resource to look at a new partnership agreement and that it would report in 2025. Are we any closer to having that new partnership agreement, as opposed to just regular meetings in the present tripartite arrangement?

Mrs Long: The new agreement will be the three legs of the stool: we will all have to agree to it. We are doing that work. The Member may chuckle, but, as he will recognise, there have been real pressures in the policing sector. I have a small team of people in support branch to take forward all of that work, whether it be work around dealing with the data breach, work around the review or the sponsorship work that it does in policing structures more widely. We are working through the issues at the best pace we can, but we are constrained by resource. I have been honest in saying that some of the things that I would like to do will have to happen more slowly than I would like, but I have to prioritise the things that matter most. We have just talked about some of them, such as child protection and serious sexual offences.

Mr Buckley: The public are well aware of the difficult Budget position in which the Northern Ireland Executive find themselves and of the key need for Ministers to prioritise that which, as the Minister has outlined, is in the national interest, but there is a fear that "efficiency" is just a buzzword for the Minister, rather than a tangible action.

Mrs Long: I can give one example, if it would be helpful. The staff complement for our arm's-length bodies (ALBs) has dropped significantly over the past four to five years. I could contrast that with, for example, the Department of Education, where the complement of officials has risen almost exponentially in the same period. We are doing more with fewer and fewer people; that is the simple reality. If Mr Buckley would like to take the opportunity to chat to me and my officials about the number of vacancies that we carry and why that is the case, about the challenges that we have with making positions permanent and about the extra work that officials have to do to meet the demands that the public expect of us and that I expect of the Department, I would be more than happy for him to do so, because we could show him real progress. We have been successful, for example, in bidding for transformation funding, because we are able to evidence the change that we can make, when we have the resources, to make a genuine difference.

Mr Buckley: The public expect the appropriate use of public money. With efficiency in mind, will the Minister confirm or deny that the Prison Service, which is under her remit, spends up to £3,000 a day to fly external psychiatrists in from England to assess prisoners? Does the Minister think that that is an appropriate use of public money? At a time when parents of children with special educational needs wait years for an assessment, should they not have priority over prisoners in accessing such services to the tune of that amount of money?

Mrs Long: Let me say a couple of things. First, the care of prisoners' health is a matter not for the Northern Ireland Prison Service but for the South Eastern Health and Social Care Trust. It takes care of prisoners' health. Maybe the Member would prefer that, instead of ensuring that those people get the right psychological and psychiatric interventions, we simply turned them loose at the end of their sentence, unmedicated, on an unprotected public. That is the alternative to us doing the job properly.

I have already been clear that Northern Ireland Prison Service is not responsible for the healthcare of those in our care.

Mrs Long: The policy issue is for the Department for Infrastructure, not the Department of Justice. Roads legislation is not a matter for me. If the Minister for Infrastructure wishes to talk to the Chief Constable about the issue, it is entirely appropriate that she does.

As with all roads enforcement, the PSNI will enforce the law, where it is clear. They have been clear that, when it comes to e-scooters or other off-road vehicles being driven on the road or to other dangerous practices, they will engage young people to make them aware of the dangers but they will also enforce, where that is appropriate. Ultimately, however, the legislative controls lie elsewhere.

Ms Finnegan: I thank the Minister for her answer. Minister, are you concerned that there is a general lack of awareness that e-scooters are not legally permitted for road use in the North?

Mrs Long: There may well be, but it is not for me to tell the Minister for Infrastructure what she would need to do to raise awareness. That is not a role for me as Minister of Justice.

Mrs Long: As I stated earlier, I have written to Executive colleagues, because we had drafted the repeal of vagrancy laws as part of the sentencing Bill. I initially received reasonably positive responses, but, towards the end of the process, I received a negative response from the Member's colleagues. It was agreed at Executive that, in order to allow the Bill to proceed through the process, we would withdraw the vagrancy amendment. However, I have requested that the Committee continue to consider those matters, as it was not a hard no; it was simply that more information was required. The best place for that information to be debated and discussed is in Committee, and I am sure that the Chairman will be more than happy to do that effectively and efficiently and in the interest of ensuring that we do not criminalise poverty. That would be a Dickensian approach to what we are trying to achieve as a society, and I am sure that the Committee members would agree.

Ms Forsythe: I thank the Minister for her response. I agree with the Minister: nobody wants to see the criminalisation of poverty. That is absolutely not anyone's intention here. As we move away from that very old legislation, what are the Minister's plans for what it will look like in our town centres to ensure that the protection of business owners is to the fore?

Mrs Long: I set that out in more detail, if you want to read some of the stuff that I said at Committee last week, but, basically, PSNI has informed us that there will be no gaps in legislation as a result of the repeal of vagrancy laws other than simple begging. If somebody is simply asking for money, that would be the only thing that we would be removing a criminal penalty from. If somebody is causing an obstruction or a breach of the peace or if they are harassing or causing alarm or fear, there is already public order legislation and other legislation that allows the police to deal with those situations. To be clear, the only thing that we continue to criminalise if we do not repeal the old-fashioned vagrancy laws is simple begging: that is not appropriate. If someone is hungry and asks for food, that should not be a criminal offence.

Mrs Long: I shall have to revert to the Member about the detailed timeline. I have not received it as yet, but I am aware that officials have been working on it. As I said earlier, there are significant challenges in the work being done by the team who have been involved with the Gillen review. We have made significant progress and are engaging with our partners, who will be part of the delivery of a Barnahus model.

Much of what is required by a Barnahus model is already in place. We need to find ways to bring it together in a single place, where that is appropriate, and to resource that. That is a conversation not just for me but for the Health Minister, who, handily, has just arrived in a timely fashion. We will have to continue to have those conversations. We made a joint visit to the Rowan sexual assault referral centre, where we were shown a piece of land where a Barnahus-style model might be accommodated, and we will work on that together.

Ms Ferguson: Thank you for that update, Minister. The benefits of the multidisciplinary Barnahus model in preventing the retraumatisation of children and delivering a justice model that upholds the best interests of a child are really clear. That was going to be my next question: when did you most recently discuss that with our Health Minister? You have answered it inadvertently, but would you like to continue, to give us the latest update?

Mrs Long: Our officials have ongoing contact on the issue. However, we made a joint visit to the Rowan centre and had a conversation about the potential for a Barnahus. Obviously, the Rowan centre gives an example of that wrap-around care for adults, but other therapeutic interventions would be required for Barnahus.

Remember that many of the pieces are in place. There are debates, for example, on whether it would be better to keep the remote evidence centre separate from the consulting rooms where people go for counselling. We do not want children to become confused between those who are questioning them for therapeutic reasons and those who are questioning them in the course of a criminal investigation. That aside, both of us will be committed, where resources permit, to see it move forward, because we know that, when someone experiences trauma or an adverse childhood experience of such magnitude, positive early intervention can undo and mitigate much of the harm that has been caused and allow that child to go on and thrive. If I may speak for the Health Minister, that is what Mike and I would want to see.

Mr Speaker: Briefly, Minister.

Mrs Long: I plan to introduce legislation later this year to commence section 46 of the Offensive Weapons Act 2019, which will amend section 114 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 to make it an offence to possess in private any weapon listed in the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (Offensive Weapons) Order 1988. The possession of such weapons in public is already an offence. Aligned to that, my Department also plans to introduce a voluntary surrender scheme for a fixed period that will allow individuals who possess weapons that will be made illegal by the new provisions to dispose of them safely. The provision in the Westminster Crime and Policing Bill relating to the duty to report the remote sale of knives et cetera in bulk will be extended to Northern Ireland via a legislative consent memorandum. The new clause will place a duty on a seller who has made any reportable sales of related articles to notify a person to be specified in regulations made by the DOJ of those sales, and failure to do so would be an offence.

Mr Speaker: That conclude questions to the Minister. There is no time for a second question, Mr Blair, but I commend you for the sprightly way you leapt out of your seat. It is Mr Blair's birthday today, and I am sure you will all agree that he does not look a day over 40.

Ms D Armstrong: On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I want to place on record my disgust at the comments made yesterday by the Alliance Member for Lagan Valley, Mr Honeyford, during the UK-EU customs union debate. Mr Honeyford referred to me as the "little sister" of the DUP. The comment was distasteful, dismissive and deeply misogynistic. I am no one's little sister; I am my own woman, and I will not be lectured by that person in that manner. I ask you to review Mr Honeyford's comments and make a ruling.

Mr Speaker: I thank the Member for bringing that to my attention. I always encourage Members to be forthright in their views but to stick to the subject or play the ball and not the man — in this case, not the woman. I always encourage people to engage in that way.

Mr O'Toole: On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I will be brief. I will double-check Hansard, but I believe that, during Justice questions, when we discussed the exclusion of nationalists from the d'Hondt process and the fact that it does not apply to the Justice Ministry, the Minister said that, if we — meaning, I presume, designated nationalists — engaged more constructively with unionists, the Justice Ministry would not be excluded from d'Hondt. That it is not an acceptable position for anyone in the Chamber to take, particularly when a party is clear about the consequences of designation —.

Mr Speaker: That is not a point of order, Mr O'Toole. It is a political point.

Mr O'Toole: It is not acceptable, but I put my point on the record.

Mr Speaker: Members may take their ease.

Mr McGrath: I beg to move

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): The Business Committee has agreed to allow up to one hour and 30 minutes for the debate. The proposer of the motion will have 10 minutes to propose and 10 minutes to make a winding-up speech. All other Members who speak will have five minutes.

Mr McGrath, please open the debate on the motion.

Mr McGrath: Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I begin my contribution by acknowledging the stroke survivors and families and representatives of the Stroke Association who are in the Public Gallery, watching the debate. You are not statistics, and you are not case studies. You are people who know, in your bodies and lives, how suddenly everything can change, and you know the importance of having a 24/7 thrombectomy service. Today, we are here for you.

A stroke is something that will, undoubtedly, touch all of our lives, be that through experiencing one or through family or friendship circles. A stroke does not announce itself politely or time itself around service provision. It is devastating and incredibly frightening. One moment, you are yourself, and, in the next, words will not come, your arm will not move, the room tilts and fear takes over. From that moment, time becomes everything. Every minute, brain cells die. Every delay steals a part of you that may never come back. Yet, in Northern Ireland, whether you get the most effective stroke treatment available can still depend on what time of day you collapse.

In framing today's debate, there is a strong moral argument to be made for a 24/7 thrombectomy service. We already have the clinical evidence: thrombectomy is one of the most effective medical interventions to be developed. A doctor physically removes the clot that is killing the brain, restores the blood flow and, in many cases, restores a future. When it is delivered quickly, it can prevent severe disability and allow people to walk, talk, work, parent and live independently again. It can mean the difference between coming home and never truly coming back. Despite that, access in Northern Ireland is still limited to 8.00 am until 5.00 pm. That means that, in reality, over 100 people every year are denied a thrombectomy simply because their stroke happened at the wrong time of day: not because the treatment does not exist or would not work but because the service is not there when they need it. That seems wrong.

I will put a human face on the debate and talk about Paul. Paul was 41 years old. He was an English and drama teacher who was working, active and planning a future, as the rest of us do, without imagining that one ordinary day would split his life in two. When he had his stroke, his wife, Suzanne, recognised the signs immediately and called for help. The ambulance crew made a critical decision to bypass the local hospital and take him straight to the Royal Victoria Hospital (RVH), and Paul received a thrombectomy. Doctors had warned Suzanne that he had only a 10% chance of surviving the procedure, but the clot was removed on the first attempt. Paul lived, is with us today and, while he still lives with the impact of the stroke, the thrombectomy saved his life. Since then, he has achieved one of his life's ambitions and walked the Camino de Santiago to Santiago de Compostela. That is what access can do.

Paul was lucky, but luck should never be the organising principle of a health service. In 2022, the stroke action plan committed to delivering a 24/7 thrombectomy service by the end of 2024. It is 2026: that commitment was not delivered, and no replacement timeline has been put in place. Every day that passes means that people continue to lose chances that they will never get back.

The motivation behind our motion today is not blame. It is not about blaming the Minister or clinicians, because I genuinely believe that the Minister wants to do all that he can for stroke victims and survivors. Stroke teams based in our hospitals have gone above and beyond. They have expanded access, embraced innovation and improved outcomes when they have been given the tools to do so, but goodwill cannot carry a system for ever. Thrombectomy is not just life-changing; it is highly cost-effective and saves around £47,000 per patient over five years by reducing long-term disability, hospital stays and social care costs, and that is exactly the kind of reform that aligns with the Health and Social Care (HSC) reset plan.

Crucially, we do not have to guess what works. In the South, a 24/7 thrombectomy service operates in Dublin and Cork. Dublin moved straight to a round-the-clock model. It did not wait for a perfect workforce. It started, it learned and then it scaled. The culture in the South was one that said, "We are going to do this because it is the right thing to do". The South's thrombectomy rate is around 10%, which is far higher than anywhere in the UK. There is much that we can learn from that, and, given the complexity of our geography and the constraints on the health budget, I wonder whether the Health Minister will consider emulating the current process in Dublin and Cork in the Ulster region to encapsulate places such as Cavan, Donegal and Monaghan. People from those areas have to travel all the way round to access a service that could be provided in Belfast and have to try to get down to Dublin in time. I am sure that, if approaches were made to the Dublin Government to assist with some of the funding for that, that might help us provide the service with some finance. I hope that the Minister can look at that as a positive North/South health arrangement that might deliver services, be there for people when they need it and not put strain purely on our health service budget.

The motion is not asking for miracles. It asks for transparent and achievable goals; a clear, time-bound delivery plan; defined milestones; transparency about costs and savings; and serious consideration of a phased or pilot approach that learns directly from the South and, if possible, works in partnership with the South.

Even today, in 2026, stroke kills, but it does not always have to. We have a moral obligation to survivors and those who are yet to have a stroke to ensure that they do not lose their future simply because their stroke happened at the wrong time.

Mr McGuigan: We all know the FAST campaign — face, arms, speech, time — and we all understand how vital it is to recognise the signs of a stroke quickly. However, FAST is only the beginning, because, once a stroke is suspected, every minute matters. We know that 1·9 million brain cells are lost every minute that a stroke goes untreated, which means delays that are devastating for patients and their families. Rapid access to specialist care dramatically increases the chances of survival, recovery and long-term independence.

Modern AI tools help clinicians interpret scans faster, but technology alone is not enough. For those decisions to save lives and prevent disability, they must be followed immediately by the right intervention, and that is why services in the North require improvement. Despite a commitment in the 2022 stroke action plan to deliver a 24/7 thrombectomy service by the end of 2024, we are in 2026 with a service that is still available only between 8.00 am and 5.00 pm. That means that around 100 patients in the North miss out on thrombectomy every year simply because their stroke occurs outside the available hours. That is despite thrombectomy being described repeatedly by stroke experts as a game-changing treatment that saves lives, preserves brain function and significantly reduces disability.

In the North, according to 2024-25 figures, we deliver thrombectomy to just 5·2% of stroke patients even though the evidence shows that at least 10% could be eligible. Every one of those missed opportunities matters: they certainly matter to patients. Around a quarter of patients who receive thrombectomy experience reduced long-term disability, and a fifth regain functional independence. The financial argument is equally compelling: each patient who receives thrombectomy saves the health service an estimated £47,000 over five years due to reduced demand for rehabilitation, long-term care and social support. That is why stroke charities and clinicians consistently describe thrombectomy as a clear case of investing to save.

The wider context in the North makes it even more urgent. According to the Public Health Agency (PHA), there are approximately 39,000 stroke survivors living in the North, with around 2,800 new stroke patients each year and up to 1,000 people losing their lives as a result of stroke. We know that timely thrombectomy can prevent many long-term disabilities. We also know that our stroke services are too thinly spread to meet best practice standards without reform and that consolidating them into hyper-acute centres is widely recognised as being essential to expanding thrombectomy to a 24/7 service.

Despite those structural pressures, the success of the North's health service teams within current limitations should give us confidence. Analysis shows that 45% to 55% of patients treated with thrombectomy regain functional independence whether they arrived directly or were transferred from another hospital. Imagine the outcomes that we could achieve with full 24/7 availability, equitable access and reduced transfer delays.

I commend the dedication of our stroke clinicians, neuro-radiologists, rehabilitation teams and community support organisations, including the Stroke Association and NI Chest, Heart and Stroke, which continue to innovate and advocate for stroke survivors across the North. I, too, welcome the stroke survivors and campaigners to the Chamber to listen to the debate. I acknowledge their efforts to achieve progress on the issue. I also acknowledge initiatives like the PITSTOP pilot at Altnagelvin Area Hospital, which is designed to minimise transfer delays by keeping the ambulance on site until thrombectomy eligibility is confirmed. That kind of innovation shows what is possible when we design services around patients' needs.

Ms Ferguson: Will the Member take an intervention?

Mr McGuigan: Yes.

Ms Ferguson: Do you agree that the PITSTOP pilot at Altnagelvin on pre-alerts by the NI Ambulance Service and rapid multidisciplinary assessment, which optimises the number of patients who can be treated through thrombectomy and reduces the time between arrival at Altnagelvin and transfer to the Royal Victoria Hospital, should be extended indefinitely whilst phasing in the commencement of a 24/7 thrombectomy service?

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): The Member has an extra minute.

Mr McGuigan: Absolutely. I thank the Member for the intervention. At the Health Committee, we often talk about the success of pilots, but, in many cases, they stop at being pilots and do not become actual services. I absolutely commend the PITSTOP service and want to see it initiated further and integrated fully into our health service.

The Department of Health has already costed the move to 24/7 thrombectomy at just over £5 million a year, which would not only enable additional procedures to be carried out but allow equitable access, as I said. That investment is modest when set against the human impact, the financial savings and the urgent need identified by clinicians, stroke charities and stroke survivors themselves.

We hope to hear good news from the Minister when he makes his contribution.

Mr Robinson: I am content to support the motion. We thank the proposer of the motion for bringing it to the House.

We all know that thrombectomy can be a life-changing treatment for patients who suffer the most severe forms of stroke when it is delivered promptly, especially in the first six hours. It can dramatically reduce the number of deaths and long-term disabilities. It can allow people to do many of things that they once loved to do and live independently again. In a challenging financial landscape, evidence points to it providing long-term savings for our Health and Social Care system by reducing the need for lifelong support.

In stroke care, time is everything. We all know the phrase, "Time is brain". I can testify to that, having a family member who had a rapid intervention and, as a result, now lives alone at the age of 85, independently and without the need for carers. Every minute that a large-vessel stroke goes untreated, millions of brain cells are lost. Despite that, access to a thrombectomy service in Northern Ireland remains limited to office hours. We all know that stroke does not and never will respect working hours. It does not pause overnight or at weekends, yet 24/7 access to that life-saving treatment does not exist for patients who suffer a devastating stroke at 6.00 pm, at 2.00 am or on a Sunday morning.

In recent days, the Health Minister has kindly told the Health Committee, in a letter, that a considerable volume of evidence shows that the expected net savings from treating a patient with a thrombectomy and thrombolysis are £35,000 per patient over five years, in comparison with that for thrombolysis alone. That is driven by a reduced hospital stay and the requirements of long-term care. While we have to recognise that there is a significant recurrent cost to establishing such a 24/7 service, we all look forward to progress being made on the ongoing strategic outline case, which will provide further evidence of the savings to be had by introducing a 24/7 service.

It is important to say that rapid ambulance transfer to the regional thrombectomy centre at the Royal Victoria Hospital hinges on more brain tissue being saved. Therefore, a rolled-out 24/7 thrombectomy service is only one part of the overall jigsaw. A workforce plan is another part of that, given that the number of strokes is projected to increase by 60% across the UK by 2035. We have dedicated stroke teams, occupational therapists (OTs), physios and speech therapists who are at their brilliant best and could realise the potential of the treatment. I have met the stroke team at Causeway Hospital and cannot speak highly enough of the work that they do. An appropriately resourced 24/7 thrombectomy service, with rapid access, would represent exactly the high-impact, outcomes-focused reform and vision that we would want from the Health and Social Care reset plan. It is targeted and evidence-based, and it focuses relentlessly on improving patient outcomes, which is something that everyone in the House is calling for.

The Minister highlighted that the thrombectomy rate in Northern Ireland was 5·2% in 2024-25. That is higher than the regional rates in England, Scotland and Wales. We should all acknowledge that, but we need to strive for further improvements and better outcomes for patients.

Mr Donnelly: I thank the Opposition for tabling the motion. It is incredibly important, and I suspect that we will hear the same arguments from parties across the Floor. During my career as a nurse in the health service, I have been aware of the horrendous impact that stroke can cause: death, disability, suffering, inability to work, inability to communicate and requirements for long-term care. Since becoming an MLA in 2022, I have been keen to see the extension of the thrombectomy service to operate 24/7. We have heard the benefits of that relayed time and time again in the Chamber, in the Health Committee, at the all-party group on stroke or at events put on by the Stroke Association or Northern Ireland Chest Heart and Stroke.

It has been my privilege to meet stroke survivors and to hear about their experience and what the procedure and care have meant to them. I spoke to two of them again today. Clodagh Dunlop is a police officer who suffered a huge stroke in April 2015, leaving her unable to move or speak for nearly three months. Clodagh had a mechanical thrombectomy, and she is clear about the fact that it saved her life. Paul McLean, who has been mentioned, is also clear about the fact that getting a thrombectomy enabled his recovery and has highlighted the importance of the speed of intervention to being able to regain functions. I am glad to hear that Paul is now a proud parent.

Mrs Dillon: Will the Member take an intervention?

Mr Donnelly: Yes, certainly.

Mrs Dillon: Does the Member agree that the benefits are not just in health but in the fact that Clodagh has been able to return to her job. She works in public service and has been successful in her job. It is an extremely important issue, as there are economic benefits around ensuring that people get access to a 24/7 thrombectomy service.

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): The Member has an extra minute.

Mr Donnelly: Yes, I agree absolutely that there is an economic argument for that as well. I commend those people for being so active in sharing their experiences. That has helped me and other Members to understand the impact on their life.

I know that the Minister is keen to address health inequalities. It does not get more unequal than not having access to a potentially life-saving procedure because you fall ill at a certain time of the day. Strokes do not occur conveniently during office hours.

The 2022 stroke action plan highlighted thrombectomy as its third priority and committed to moving to a 24/7 thrombectomy service by the end of 2024. That has not been delivered, and no new time frame has been established. The motion asks for a time-bound plan, noting that England aims to deliver 24/7 thrombectomy by April 2026. As Colin mentioned, the Republic of Ireland is already delivering that service. The other priorities in planned prevention, including things such as picking up hypertension and atrial fibrillation (AF) in the community, both of which are major risk factors for stroke, thrombolysis, rehabilitation, hyper-acute stroke treatment and the workforce, are all vital elements of stroke services.

There is one other thing that I would like to highlight. It should be noted that a suspected stroke is a category 2 call in the Ambulance Service's triage system. That means that the target response for a suspected stroke is 18 minutes. Just 18·5% of category 2 calls were responded to within that 18-minute target between April 2025 and January 2026. I am sure many of us are very aware of what goes on in our A&Es in our hospitals. We have heard time and again that the main issue in hospitals is the lack of patient flow. That results in ambulances being stacked up outside full and overcrowded A&E departments, leading to longer response times. Unless we fix patient flow in our hospitals, people will continue to suffer and wait too long for an ambulance.

Dr Peter Keston, a neuro-radiologist from NHS Lothian in Edinburgh, has said:

Some 3,000 people in Northern Ireland suffer a stroke each year, and there are 39,000 stroke survivors living in our communities. The impacts include death, disability, suffering, inability to work or to care for others and the requirement for long-term care. Those are all real-life consequences. We have a fantastic thrombectomy service that is currently working from 8.00 am to 5.00 pm, seven days a week. Over 100 people a year in Northern Ireland miss access to a thrombectomy because of those restricted hours, resulting in avoidable harm for patients and avoidable pressure on Health and Social Care services. For every 100 patients who miss out, 42 suffer significant disability, 28 need care and some will die.

The cost of improving the service to a 24/7 service has been calculated at £5 million a year. There are benefits for patients and for the system. Thrombectomy is one of the most cost-effective interventions in the system, saving around £47,000 per patient over five years, as we have heard. It also has an economic benefit, as Linda mentioned, preventing people from having to give up work or allowing them to continue to care for others or to continue to be parents. It is a truly transformative treatment, preventing disability and the impact that that could have on someone's life and on their physical or mental health. Some 150 patients get a thrombectomy every year, but 100 more could benefit. You can have a stroke at any age, and we know that increasing age is a factor. Northern Ireland's ageing population means that we will have doubled the number of people aged over 85 by 2047. Whilst a stroke can strike at any age, there will clearly be an increased demand for services. Receiving a mechanical thrombectomy could mean the difference between —

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): Time is up.

Mr Donnelly: — walking out of a hospital or not being able to or worse.

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): OK.

Mr Chambers: I welcome the opportunity to speak on the motion. Stroke remains one of the most serious medical emergencies that we face. For many people, it is life-changing in a matter of minutes. The impact is not just clinical but personal, social and long-term. It is right that the debate also recognises the progress that has been made in stroke care in recent years. No longer is a stroke the death sentence that it was in earlier generations. Indeed, there has been a clear shift towards a more evidence-led and coordinated stroke pathway from prevention and rapid recognition through to acute treatment, rehabilitation and ongoing support. That progress reflects the work of dedicated clinicians who continue to save many lives every week across Northern Ireland.

One of the most important advances in modern stroke medicine has been the roll-out of thrombectomy, and its significance cannot be overstated. For the group of patients who are eligible, it can mean the difference between severe, life-limiting disability and a meaningful recovery. It is a highly effective intervention that directly treats the cause of some of the most serious strokes. As clinicians emphasise repeatedly, time is critical. Every minute saved preserves brain tissue, protects function and improves the chances of a patient returning home and regaining their independence.

I pay tribute to the stroke teams in Northern Ireland who have worked hard to maximise access to thrombectomy within the current service. The move to a seven-day service at the Royal Victoria Hospital delivered by my party colleague Robin Swann in the previous mandate was a significant step forward. I know that the current Minister is working assiduously to make that seven-day service a 24/7 service. The introduction of artificial intelligence in stroke imaging across stroke receiving units is also a particularly positive development. Faster and more accurate interpretation supports better decision-making and helps to ensure that specialist capacity is focused where it can have the greatest impact. Improvements in out-of-hours assessment, early-morning transfers and repatriation processes may be less visible, but they make a real difference to patient experience and system flow.

Of course, while thrombectomy is critically important for some patients, it sits within a wider stroke pathway that must function well as a whole. Prevention, public awareness, rapid diagnosis, thrombolysis, rehabilitation and community-based recovery services are all essential. Continued progress in areas such as transient ischaemic attack (TIA) services and thrombolysis rates will benefit a much larger proportion of stroke patients, and we must keep that broader picture firmly in view. Public understanding also matters. If time-critical treatment is to reach those who need it, people must recognise the signs of stroke and seek help immediately. Faster presentation to hospital, quicker scanning and coordinated clinical teams all form part of the same chain of care.

While debates such as this one, calling on a Minister to do something that he is already trying to achieve, may provide the Chamber with something to discuss, ultimately it is progress on the ground and in our stroke services that matters most. One of Minister Nesbitt's most commonly used phrases at present is "better outcomes". Little delivers better outcomes than getting the right care in the right place at the right time. I am supportive of the direction of travel that has been set, building on the real progress already achieved in stroke care. I pay tribute to the staff who deliver those services day in and day out and to the stroke survivors and associated charities who educate us all by sharing their stories.

Ms Flynn: I also welcome the opportunity to speak on this important motion because, at its heart, it is about saving lives, improving recovery outcomes and ending unacceptable inequality in access to stroke care.

In June 2022, the stroke action plan contained a commitment to the delivery of a 24/7 thrombectomy service by the end of 2024. That was not a vague aspiration but a policy commitment. We are now past that deadline, and access to that treatment still depends on the time of day that a person has a stroke. To put that reality plainly, as Colin and others have outlined, a person who has a severe stroke at 2.00 pm may recover their independence while the same person with the same stroke at 2.00 am may not. That is the human consequence of having an 8.00 am-to-5.00 pm service. We are often told that funding is the barrier, but the figures also make it clear that the estimated cost of moving to 24/7 provision is just over £5 million recurrently, a modest sum when set against the lifelong costs of disability, residential care and lost independence when someone's treatment is delayed or denied. It is not simply a question of affordability; it is a question of having to make it a priority.

As Alan Robinson pointed out, it is important to note that, despite not having a 24/7 service, thrombectomy rates here are higher than those in England, Scotland and Wales. That is a credit to the skill and commitment of our staff, but it underlines how much more could be achieved if access was based on need rather than limited hours. There is also a growing issue of fairness. England has committed to full 24/7 thrombectomy access by April 2026. Patients here are entitled to ask why their access to care should depend on where they live rather than on clinical need.

Mrs Dillon: Will the Member take an intervention?

Ms Flynn: Yes, I will.

Mrs Dillon: Does the Member agree that people in the South of Ireland in the Twenty-six Counties are able to avail themselves of a 24/7 service? While it is in only Beaumont Hospital in Dublin and Cork University Hospital and you would certainly like to see more access, maybe the Minister could enlighten us on whether conversations have been had with the Minister in the South about how that has been delivered and how successful it has been?

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): The Member has an extra minute.

Ms Flynn: I thank the Member for the intervention. The mover of the motion spoke about that in some detail. There are options there that we can look at, and we should definitely explore them. I have no doubt that the Minister will be happy to do that, and he might update us when he responds to the debate.

The reset plan speaks about high-impact, outcome-focused reform. Few interventions meet that test as clearly as thrombectomy through better survival, better outcomes and reduced long-term pressure on the Health and Social Care system. Thrombectomy is one of the rare interventions that is clinically transformative and economically rational at the same time. There is also an uncomfortable truth here about equality of access. A stroke does not respect geography or time of day, but our service does. If you live closer to Belfast or your stroke happens during daytime hours, your chances are better. That is not a health service designed around need; it is one designed around convenience.

Sinn Féin believes that health reform must be patient-centred not system-centred. The reset plan speaks about outcomes, prevention and reducing long-term demand, yet we continue to delay one of the clearest examples of that approach in action. Sinn Féin recognises the immense pressures facing the health system and the health workforce. I think that everyone in the Chamber recognises that, and the Minister has repeatedly outlined the budgetary constraints on the Department. However, transformation cannot be delayed endlessly. Therefore, the Assembly is right to call today on the Department and the Minister to move beyond commitment and, hopefully, into delivery.

The Member from the Minister's party who spoke previously, Alan, obviously outlined all the progress that we have seen from Robin Swann and others over previous years. That is all so welcome, and we have to celebrate all the improvements that have been made, because, without doubt, they have saved lives and helped many people. However, we have to, if we can, push this issue forward to get a 24/7 service.

Mrs Dodds: Thank you to the Opposition for tabling the motion because this is an important debate. It is an opportunity, Minister, for us to change lives by providing a 24/7 service. That makes sense in every way. It makes sense because of the amazing outcomes that can happen but also because the quality of life of someone who has a major disability after a stroke will be much poorer and their dependence on the health service will be much greater. Therefore, it makes an enormous amount of sense.

Like others, I welcome the folks from the Stroke Association and the Chest, Heart and Stroke Association. I was at Craigavon Area Hospital a few months ago where the Chest, Heart and Stroke Association was opening a patients' room. I had an opportunity to talk to the consultant and the multidisciplinary team that deal with stroke patients there. I asked the consultant what the number-one issue about stroke that he wanted to be resolved was, and he said, "A 24/7 thrombectomy service". He said that it was like a miracle and that patients left Craigavon Area Hospital in a terrible state but often came back with their functions restored and their outcomes much better. It is so important to recognise that different outcomes are possible with thrombectomy. It is up to us to do it. I was talking to the ever-present Pam Tilson in the Great Hall, who reminded me that we want a stroke action plan, not a stroke aspiration plan, and that we need to get ahead with it because it makes so much sense on every level. The national clinical guidelines for stroke are clear that patients who have access to a thrombectomy centre 24 hours a day, seven days a week, will benefit and have much better outcomes.

Minister, a lot has been said here about the cost of a 24/7 thrombectomy service. The figure of £5 million seems to have got into our heads, but I would like you to confirm the cost that, you think, it would be. I was at the Royal Hospital talking to Jennifer Welsh, the new chief executive of the Belfast Trust, and I asked her specifically about the introduction of a 24/7 thrombectomy service. She said that the trust was preparing a business plan for that. As far as I can see, the stroke action plan came about in 2022, yet we are only preparing a business plan in 2026 for a 24/7 service. We would really like to see that plan. It would be such good news. Given the extent of the Health budget, which is over £8 billion, if £5 million saves lives, transforms patient outcomes and, in the long run, saves the health service, it will be a good day if we can confirm that it is in the offing.

Mr Donnelly: I thank the Member for giving way. Aside from the cost, does she agree that the lack of a 24/7 thrombectomy service results in a moral injury to the staff, who enter their profession in order to save lives, not to see preventable life-changing harm happen to their patients because of the time of day at which they took a stroke?

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): The Member has an extra minute.

Mrs Dodds: Thank you.

Yes, I am struck by that point. When I talked to some of the staff on the ward in Craigavon, they made the point that it is dreadful to see patients who could benefit but cannot, because of the lack of access to that life-changing service. Many of the staff work with patients over a long period and get to know them and their family well. It is really important that they can offer the best service available.

Minister, we long for good news on this.

Ms Bradshaw: I thank the proposer of the motion. At the outset, it is worth emphasising that those who work in Health and Social Care to provide stroke treatment and care during extremely difficult and complex hours do so, as others have said, because they care so much about the well-being and prognosis of their patients. We are so grateful to them for that and all the subsequent support that they provide. I am also aware that they receive complementary and vital support through the likes of Stroke Association NI and Northern Ireland Chest, Heart and Stroke. They are here today, and we are all grateful to them for keeping the issue high on the agenda for us and providing a voice to those who have suffered a stroke and now live with the consequences.

The clinicians, healthcare workers and campaigners are doing that work with one hand tied behind their back.

It is incredibly frustrating to stand in the Chamber and call again for a 24/7 thrombectomy service for Northern Ireland. Eighteen months ago, when I was chair of the all-party group on stroke, I presented a petition to the Assembly on behalf of the Stroke Association, calling for the 24/7 service that the stroke action plan, as others have mentioned, promised by the end of 2024. Here we are again, in 2026, reinforcing the point that treatment for patients who have suffered a stroke must be a priority. Failing to deliver on that pledge will have already had devastating consequences for so many lives, and it could affect any of us at any time in the future.

We need to recognise the fundamental cost of inaction. Thrombectomy is time-critical: it is literally a matter of life and death. People are being left with serious disabilities or, sadly, dying well before their time because a 24/7 service, which could have saved their lives, has not been introduced, and they were unable to avail themselves of treatment because of the time of day that they entered the health service.

As a past health spokesperson for the Alliance Party, I met many survivors and clinicians who spoke of the huge relief that thrombectomy can bring to people who can avail themselves of it. They also spoke of the appalling consequences of delay, including brain damage, loss of independence and difficulty with rehabilitation. I want to speak up for the clinicians with whom I have engaged about a 24/7 service and office hours. Many of them come in on their days off, when they should be at home resting or spending quality time with their families, because they recognise that a patient has entered the health service and needs their help. We cannot put such a huge burden on so few healthcare professionals. I want the Health Minister to outline how he is working with the trusts to develop a robust workforce in that area.

Unfortunately, from experience in my family, I know that strokes do not keep office hours. My mother-in-law was found on the floor, having had a stroke sometime between midnight and 7.00 am on a Saturday. The ambulance arrived within 10 minutes, but the service could not save her from severe disability because of the amount of time she lay unattended. She was left paralysed, immobile and with severe and accelerated cognitive decline. It did not have to be that way.

There is a severe inequity at the heart of the system. We need to be clear that whether someone has a stroke in the wee hours of a Saturday morning or at midday on a Thursday should not make a difference to their survival prospects and potential rehabilitation; the human case should, of course, be enough. It is also worth emphasising that not providing a 24/7 thrombectomy service clearly costs the system more money through the provision of follow-up services than it would to provide it. Fundamentally, it is a test of whether the system exists for its own sake or whether it needs to be reformed to put patients first. I want to hear from the Minister on the obstacles that prevent the delivery of the key part of the 2022 action plan, when we will see 24/7 thrombectomy services and what action is being taken to keep patient dignity in the meantime.

Mr Harvey: I thank the leader of Opposition for tabling the motion on this vital matter and bringing it to the Floor. Some months ago, I had the privilege of meeting Kim, one of my constituents, who is a thrombectomy service campaigner. I heard first-hand the benefit that she received as a result of accessing thrombectomy services in the days following her stroke five years ago. Kim is now back to work and leads a full and fulfilling life. Without thrombectomy access, Kim's story might have been very different, which highlights the importance of delivering a 24/7 service in order to ensure that everyone in Northern Ireland who is eligible can avail themselves of timely medical interventions following strokes, heart attacks and other medical emergencies.

The six-hour window following a stroke is critical to a patient's rehabilitation. There should not be a lottery, whereby the quality of care depends on the time of the week that an individual suffers a stroke. Thrombectomy should be as readily available for patients who present at midnight as it is for patients who present at noon. The Department has a duty to the circa 100 people who miss out on access to a thrombectomy every year because of the service's restricted hours. That results in avoidable harm for patients and pressure on our health and social care service. I call on the Minister to move to implement 24/7 thrombectomy services without delay.

Mr McGlone: I welcome the members of Stroke Association and NI Chest Heart and Stroke who are in the Public Gallery, particularly Clodagh Dunlop, who has been a true champion of and advocate for thrombectomy services. We need those services 24/7. As is the case in so many other areas, the other part of that equation is getting access to the services.

I will speak about Michael, who took a stroke on Tuesday 27 January 2026. The first call was made to the emergency services at 11.30 pm. That was followed by at least two more calls. I made representations about the case, through the Minister's office. No first responders were available, and no ambulance was available. An ambulance eventually arrived at approximately 2.30 am. The ambulance left Michael's address in rural Tyrone at approximately 3.30 am and headed to Antrim Area Hospital, which is about 35 or 40 minutes away, so the estimated time of arrival was 4.15 am. The Ambulance Service's mean target for category 2 calls is 18 minutes. A recent analysis reported that fewer than one in five suspected stroke or heart attack calls were reached within that 18-minute target. In this case, the response time was more than three hours.

When Michael was admitted to Antrim Area Hospital, the care that was provided by the stroke team was excellent: the family told me that and wanted to pay tribute to the staff at Antrim Area Hospital. However, he was admitted approximately five hours after he had taken the stroke. We all, including those in the Gallery, know how important those hours are for at least some form of recovery and treatment of the patient. Regrettably, Michael passed away on 2 February. I have the permission of the family to raise his case here. Access to an ambulance and to thrombectomy services are crucial for stroke victims. The deployment of extra resources to the Ambulance Service and first responders is complementary to the provision of thrombectomy services in the hospital, which are provided by those excellent staff.

That, Minister, is a real-life example. In particular, it is an example of life in many of our rural areas. I conclude my remarks by saying of Michael: may God rest his gentle soul. Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam séimh.

My sincere sympathies go to the McLernon and O'Neill families, and their extended families, on the passing of a true gentleman.

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): I call the Minister of Health to respond to the debate. Minister, you have up to 15 minutes.

Mr Nesbitt (The Minister of Health): Deputy Speaker, thank you. Thank you to the Opposition for tabling the motion, and to everybody who has contributed to the discussion.

Stroke is a major health issue. Approximately 3,000 people are admitted to hospital every year after a stroke and more than 40,000 survivors of stroke live in our community. As Members have noted, my Department's 'Reshaping Stroke Care' action plan was published in June 2022. It sets out a range of commitments to improve services across the entire pathway from prevention to rehabilitation. At the time it was published, it was clear that we can and must do better, and I provide an assurance that I and my Department remain committed to so doing.

I am aware of the benefits of thrombectomy. It is a life-saving treatment for some. The evidence is clear: thrombectomy significantly reduces the impact of a large, disabling stroke. Evidence also suggests that thrombectomy is highly cost-effective. The savings as a result of thrombectomy are realised through reductions in hospital length of stay, demand for rehabilitation and longer-term care, either at home or in a residential or nursing home setting. There will also be wider savings at a societal level with, for example, improved outcomes reducing economic inactivity as a result of a stroke. As Members have noted, it is estimated that up to 10% of stroke patients could benefit from thrombectomy and our current rate is just over 5%.

While the service can be provided up to 24 hours after the presentation of stroke symptoms, it is clear that the benefit is maximised if it is provided within six hours of having a stroke. In 2020, my predecessor, Robin Swann, took the important step of extending provision to a seven-day-a-week service. As such, thrombectomy is now available at the Royal Victoria Hospital from 8.00 am to 5.00 pm, seven days a week. However, I acknowledge that there is more to be done, especially as the absence of a 24/7 service means that not everyone who could benefit from a thrombectomy in Northern Ireland can access the procedure. I agree with Mr Donnelly: that is an inequality and an inequity that needs to be addressed.

It is important to recognise that, in the absence of a 24/7 service, innovative solutions have been put in place to maximise equitable access to thrombectomy within the current hours of operation, but it does not close that gap. It includes the introduction of artificial intelligence in stroke imaging in all stroke-receiving units, which helps to identify patients who are suitable for thrombectomy and avoids futile transfer of patients from any of the other seven stroke-receiving units.

An out-of-hours thrombectomy assessment protocol has also been developed, which will ensure that patients who present out of hours have the appropriate assessments in their local stroke-receiving hospital, and that steps are taken to facilitate an early morning transfer to the Royal Victoria Hospital for treatment where appropriate. In addition, a revised repatriation protocol has been introduced to ensure repatriation from the Royal Victoria takes place as soon as possible. The time frame for repatriation has moved from 24 hours to some patients now being eligible for repatriation from six hours post-procedure. That, of course, improves patient flow and increases bed capacity at the Royal. I take this opportunity to pay tribute to the team here in Northern Ireland for their achievements in maximising access to thrombectomy.

Priority 4 in the action plan makes a specific commitment to expand the current thrombectomy service in Northern Ireland to 24/7 availability by the end of 2024, as Members have noted. I understand the frustration at that timescale not being met. The collapse of the institutions shortly after the action plan was published, combined with the unprecedented budgetary position, has, regrettably, had an impact on that delivery. However, let me be clear: the implementation of the 24/7 service remains a key focus for me and my Department.

The case for investment in services like thrombectomy to support a 24/7 service is compelling. The cost-effectiveness and the potential savings as a result of the intervention are well recognised. The expansion of the current service will require significant additional investment. A costed model has been completed, and the estimate is that it would cost just over £5 million in recurrent funding to deliver a 24/7 service. That funding could achieve a 10% thrombectomy rate and deliver up to 160 additional procedures per year. As Members will know, it is £5 million, but it is £5 million that I do not have. That does not necessarily mean that it will not happen. The investment would also address pressures in other areas, such as diagnostic radiology and aesthetics and TIA services. As such, my officials are working to refine that estimate further and quantify what additional system capacity that investment would achieve.

Consideration is also being given to phasing a 24/7 service. We are aware that it will take time to reach 10% activity once a 24/7 service commences, and a phasing of costs might be possible. I have been advised that a 24/7 service could be delivered within months of funding being made available. I am glad to say that the Belfast Trust has expressed strong interest in making that happen as soon as the funding is approved and will make every effort to support the adoption of any new service. Work is ongoing to draft a business case that reflects the costs, the phasing and the capacity in addition to thrombectomy, which will be generated by the investment. That should be completed in a number of months.

I give way to Mr Donnelly.

Mr Donnelly: Thank you for giving way, Minister. The Minister has highlighted the cost as being £5 million. Has the Minister any idea of the figure for the savings and the potential for those savings to be reinvested in other areas in the health service?

Mr Nesbitt: The societal savings from people not being economically inactive are stark. It is also about the quality of people's lives, and that should be the priority over the money.

As Members should know, we started the year with a deficit in the health service budget of some £600 million. That is unprecedented, and, as I warned, it has turned out to be unmanageable. Paula Bradshaw asked what the obstacle is. Well, the obstacle is money. I am surprised that any Member does not recognise that the funds are the obstacle. Yes, I am the Minister, but I am not master of the money: the permanent secretary is the accounting officer. He has legal obligations. He has a duty, apart from anything else, not to endorse a spend that he knows the Department cannot afford. I will return to the money in a moment.

It is important to recognise that, while thrombectomy is potentially life-saving for the 10% of patients who can benefit from it, the stroke action plan sets out a range of commitments to improve services across the pathway for the benefit of all. While capacity and funding constraints have impacted on the pace of delivery, progress in key areas has been made. In terms of prevention, that includes the development of a regional model for TIA, or mini-stroke, services. There is also an ongoing focus on improving thrombolysis treatment rates, with the aim of achieving a rate of 16%. To that end, Altnagelvin Area Hospital has been selected as one of a number of sites in the UK to participate in the thrombectomy and thrombolysis in acute stroke collaborative. That is an NHS Elect quality-improvement initiative to improve thrombectomy and thrombolysis rates.

As regards support for stroke survivors, models have been developed for stroke services and spasticity services that are integrated in the community. Analysis is also ongoing on the sustainability of our current stroke units, which includes consideration of future demand up to 2040. That will be informed by a stroke workforce review that is under way and is currently focused on the hyper-acute and acute stroke workforce.

I return to funding constraints and the £600 million gap. The health and social care system, as it stands, is financially unsustainable. People are waiting too long to access vital services, and we have been unable to take forward all of the developments that we would want to take forward, including those in relation to thrombectomy. I am clear that the way to address that is to work differently and to try to deliver services and improve health outcomes with the resources that we have available. I have taken a number of decisive steps to progress that. The reset plan focuses on a new model of care that is a neighbourhood-centred, preventative and integrated service, prioritising investment in primary and community care, where we can deliver better outcomes at lower costs. Within my Department, a system financial management programme has been established. That programme contains a series of projects that are intended to reduce costs and drive value across all aspects of our system.

A number of Members referenced cooperation with the Republic of Ireland, and I want to touch on that. I begin by repeating what I have said from the get-go: I have no ideological or political objection to cross-border cooperation on health — in fact, quite the opposite — where it makes sense.

We have begun conversations with the Department of Health in Dublin about a 24/7 thrombectomy service; in fact, on 16 September 2025, officials commenced discussions on opportunities for all sorts of cross-border collaboration. The potential for a 24/7 thrombectomy service at the Royal Victoria Hospital that would serve some residents of the Republic of Ireland was on the agenda. We are waiting for the assessment of those potential opportunities.

I say to Mr McGrath that the history of cross-border cooperations suggests that, while the Government of Ireland will invest, they tend to wait until the service is up and running and proven before they will get involved, rather than investing in the establishment of the service. I do not think that Mr McGrath mentioned the Shared Island Fund, but, so that it is not an elephant in the room, I say that I do not believe that it would be an appropriate vehicle, because the service would require recurrent resource funding, which the Shared Island Fund does not provide. It would be more of a service-level agreement between the two Health Departments.

Mr McGrath: I thank the Minister for giving way. On the topic of money, Minister, is there an opportunity to explore a graduated implementation of the service? Every time you help somebody, you save the health service £50,000, £60,000 or £70,000 that could be reinvested into the service, and that figure could grow as the years progress.

Mr Nesbitt: I absolutely agree that, in principle, we would look at a graduated or evolving roll-out of the service. I am keen on that. It makes sense in the current financial situation, because it is not all or nothing. Let us see whether we can find something in-between that is manageable, affordable and sets the direction of travel. The Member knows that, in the months remaining to me, hopefully, as Minister through to 6 May 2027, I hope to set directions of travel that the next Minister of Health will feel they want to follow over the five years of the next mandate, and that is where we really should see significant improvements.

Mr McGlone: I thank the Minister for giving way. Minister, the point that I made about access to services is that, important though the thrombectomy services are, the rurality of major sections of Northern Ireland is such that access to the ambulance services to transport people to the thrombectomy provision is vital to their treatment. Are you intent on addressing that deficiency?

Mr Nesbitt: I am intent on trying to address rurality where it becomes an issue. It becomes an issue across Health and Social Care delivery: absolutely. I go back to the point that you cannot have an acute hospital at the end of every street. There has to be a bit of common sense and pragmatism in how we deal with the matter. However, I certainly do not want any disadvantage to fall on somebody who chooses to live in a rural community. There should not be a particular advantage given to someone because they live in an urban area and are close to an acute hospital that provides stroke services.

Mrs Dillon: I appreciate the Minister's taking a brief intervention, particularly given the time that he has left. Following on from Mr McGlone's point about access, we do not expect to have every service in every hospital, but we expect that people can access them. We need to address the ambulance issue if we are not going to address the location of the service.

Mr Nesbitt: My plan is to look at hospitals as a network. The big issue will not be that people are not prepared to travel but that people who need to travel do not have easy access to transportation. It would be a significant minority of people — at least 10% and possibly higher — and it needs to be addressed.

I recognise how impactful thrombectomy can be. For our stroke patients, the impact on outcomes is profound, and that has been clearly demonstrated in all the documentary evidence. I also recognise the impact that the lack of a 24/7 service has on our dedicated and committed workforce. I get the sense of moral injury that Mr Donnelly referred to, and I see it when I am out and about every week. Engagement with stroke clinicians has highlighted the concerns of the workforce about the inability to deliver time-critical treatments for stroke patients. This morning, I had a good meeting about clinical priorities for the next financial year, and thrombectomy was on the list. If I turned it into a mental wish list of my own, a 24/7 thrombectomy service —

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): The Minister's time is up.

Mr Nesbitt: — does not come out badly.

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): Thank you, Minister. I call Matthew O'Toole to conclude the debate and make a winding-up speech on the motion. You have up to 10 minutes.

Mr O'Toole: Thank you, Principal — thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I was promoting you to Principal Deputy Speaker: I am sure that it will not be too long.

Thank you to everybody who spoke in today's debate, and thank you to the Minister for responding. I think that we got some positive progress from the Minister, which I appreciate. Obviously, our job, as Mr Chambers said, is to hold the Minister positively and constructively to account, but I know that he wants to make progress in the area. I welcome some of the progress that he alluded to and that he wants to make in the weeks and months ahead. We in the Opposition and, I am sure, other parties and the Stoke Association will be working to hear more about that and, hopefully, to make progress on the specifics of the work on the business case, the areas for North/South cooperation and the costing that is going on internally in the Department.

I thank everybody who participated in today's debate, but I thank, in particular, Clodagh Dunlop and Paul McLean who came to Parliament Buildings to share their stories with us; their colleagues and friends in the Stroke Association who have helped us put together the motion; and the Stroke Association's counterparts in Chest, Heart and Stoke, who have also worked hard in the area.

As Paul and Clodagh will testify and as they have testified to us in the Building today, a stroke is not a binary event, as a sprain or a fracture is. A stroke is a life-changing event. It changes the lives of individuals, their families and all who work with them and care about them. To put it bluntly, it also has a repercussive effect on the public purse, because stroke outcomes can be severe — the most severe of all is death — and thrombectomy is a key part in reducing mortality. The level of disability for those who survive is reduced dramatically — dare I say, almost miraculously — if they can get access to speedy thrombectomy. That is particularly the case for people who are in earlier or middle age. They can have the opportunity to live something like the life that they would have led, had they not had a stroke. That is a special and profound thing.
Danny talked about moral injury. People who work in the health service say that the most profound thing is the ability to heal, make better or at least minimise damage and that that, ultimately, is the vocation of people who work in the health service. Thrombectomy is a remarkable procedure that allows people to continue to work; be active, physical parents; drive their car; sometimes, to talk; and to retain certain cognitive facilities that they would not otherwise have. It is remarkable. There is, therefore, a profound moral case for us delivering the service on a 24/7 basis. Not a huge number of people will avail themselves of thrombectomy, but the effect for the people who require and avail themselves of the procedure, as Paul and Clodagh have told us today, can be transformational and remarkable.

How do we get there? How do we get to a 24/7 thrombectomy service in Northern Ireland? I am pleased that the Minister has indicated that he wants to move in that direction. We are often oppositional here, and we hold Ministers to account for one thing and another. We are holding you to account for it, Minister, but we also welcome the fact that you want to move in that direction.

It is true that, when the stroke action plan was published in 2022 and gave an indicative date of 2024 for the introduction of 24/7 services, not long after, the institutions collapsed. That is a quick reminder of why we should never collapse the institutions here. It also means that we need to be realistic about delivering the services, but I think that it is realistic to do this and to do it relatively quickly. The Minister said that cost is a significant pressure: of course it is, and, of course, he and other Ministers but particularly him are operating in an extremely cost-pressured environment. The cost of £5 million has been quoted: I will not cavil at that, because I am sure that it has been arrived at seriously. We would encourage anything that can happen to make the service more achievable. Has every staffing option been looked at? I welcome the fact that the Minister's officials are already engaging with the Irish Government. If we are able to save lives in Donegal and Monaghan and the Irish Government can reduce the overall cost for you of delivering the 24-hour thrombectomy service to the Royal, it is a good thing, regardless of whether the phasing is before or after the service is there. That is a win-win.

My last point — not to sound too much like a wonky economist — is about dynamic scoring: do not just necessarily score the upfront cost but the saving. We have 48,000 people in Northern Ireland living with stroke. First, the people at the more acute end will be living with care of one kind or another every day. Secondly, they will often be lost to the workforce or will work less than they otherwise would. They may have a family member in receipt of carer's allowance. All those things mean that we can perhaps think about dynamically scoring 24/7 thrombectomy in Northern Ireland.

I want to touch on a few comments made by Members in an extremely constructive and thoughtful debate. I thank all Members who participated. Órlaithí Flynn used the phrase — I think that I quote her correctly — that it is "clinically transformative and economically rational". That is completely true and was well put. There are many instances when we ask for an innovation in healthcare or a new experimental service where, perhaps, the cost saving is not entirely clear, even if there is a strong moral and medical case for it. This is both clinically and economically rational. It will save the public purse money because it will make people's lives better and improve outcomes.

Diane Dodds made similar points and talked about what she had seen at Craigavon Area Hospital. Philip McGuigan talked about it as an invest-to-save project, which it is. As I said, Danny Donnelly, as I said, talked about his experience, which we have heard about before, as a healthcare professional and about the moral injury resulting from a healthcare professional knowing that a person's outcome could have been better and that a worse outcome was entirely preventable. This is an instance when we can prevent that.

We often talk about Northern Ireland missing targets profoundly. This is not an area in which we are dramatically far behind other jurisdictions. We are, I believe, on a percentage basis, ever so slightly ahead of England when it comes to provision of thrombectomy, but that does not mean that we should rest there. Patsy McGlone and Linda Dillon made strong points about ambulance availability, and I will come on to that if I have time. Everybody who is eligible for a thrombectomy, whether they live in the most rural area and regardless of what time of day or night they have their stroke, should have access to thrombectomy, ideally at the Royal Victoria Hospital. Those things are achievable.

On the cross-border point, if we can get people from Dunfanaghy or Donegal town or from Ballybay, Clontibret or wherever else in Monaghan to Belfast more quickly to get their thrombectomy at the Royal, let us do that, too. That will improve outcomes for them and reduce the cost to the health service up here. That is something that we can do. It is achievable, and I welcome the fact that the Minister is engaged on it. The Minister has been clear and consistent about his priorities around reformulating services and shifting left. This could be a profound shift left for people who get thrombectomy — people like Paul McLean — and their lives can be saved. In Paul's case, his life was saved. It is all about timing.

About 18 years ago, I was with my dad down the road in the Ulster Hospital, and he got his last rites. He was not a stroke patient who was eligible for thrombectomy, but he nearly died — but for having been with some friends who spotted the signs of stroke. He had an extremely serious bleed, but he is alive. His life changed. He could not do lots of the things that he would have liked to do and that he did before, but he met his grandkids. That is extremely important.

I commend the Minister for the progress that he wants to make in the area, and I hope that we can make progress. I look forward to hearing more about it in the months ahead.

Mr Honeyford: On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. A point of order was made in the House by a Member who referenced me. Since then, I have reviewed my language, which was clumsy and was used in the heat of a debate. Any offence was absolutely unintentional. We have worked well together on the Economy Committee, and I hope that that continues. My comments were directed at the party and its serious lack of challenge to the DUP. They were not made to the individual, but I apologise for any offence that was caused.

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Blair): Thank you, Mr Honeyford. That point of order is noted, and your comments are on the record.

Members may take their ease before we move to the next item in the Order Paper.

Ms Hunter: I beg to move

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: The Business Committee has agreed to allow up to one hour for the debate. The proposer of the motion will have five minutes to propose and five minutes in which to wind. As an amendment has been selected and is published on the Marshalled List, the Business Committee has agreed that eight minutes will be added to the total time for the debate.

Cara, can you please open the debate on the motion?

Ms Hunter: I welcome the opportunity to raise the issue. I believe firmly that it is time to have a conversation about the next steps on this important issue. The evidence is growing, public concern is rising and our children are growing up in a world where they are navigating a complex online environment that was not designed with either their safety or development in mind.

Today, we will debate the issue that the Assembly:

with:

Our motion notes:

and life-ruining — sadly, sometimes, life-ending — online abuse. It recognises that:

On this island, conversations are already taking place on that in the South. I fear that, if we do not move to have those discussions now, our children will be left behind.

Let me be clear from the outset that the SDLP and I know that an instant ban is not a perfect fix. It must not be brought in prematurely, and it is not a silver bullet. I firmly believe, however, that a ban is a proportionate step — one of many — in the right direction. Children see harmful content every day. We cannot debate the issue honestly until we recognise what children see and experience. Recent research by Ofcom revealed that seven out of 10 children aged 11 to 17 have either seen or heard harmful content online. That could be pornography, graphic murders such as beheadings, suicides and more. It is not odd or occasional exposure; it is routine. It is daily: day and night. Children have access to phones around the clock. The new generation are tech-literate; often, much more so than their parents.

The motion will not be popular with under-16s. When I was 16, thinking that I knew better, I would have detested someone like me who said that they would take away my social media. I am a little older now and further removed from that. It is important to have the conversation as adults and make tough decisions to protect our children.

Mr Baker: Will the Member give way?

Ms Hunter: In the interests of time, I will not give way, but I look forward to our discussion later.

It is a day for recognising that we do not let our kids gamble and do not let them smoke or drink, so why do we give them access to social media platforms that have a plethora of harms at the touch of their fingertips? We are here today to have a tough conversation and, perhaps, an uncomfortable one. Such stances may make us unpopular and might even cost us a few votes, but it is important that we take them.

Years ago, if you made a silly mistake as a child or teenager, it was assigned to the past. Now, due to phones, social media and the rise of smartphone-enabled surveillance culture, mistakes that you make live for ever online. That is not right, and it is a lot for our children to bear.

Many will rightly see it as a parenting issue, but we know that parents are often in the dark. A new UK Government campaign launched today reveals research that around half of parents have never spoken to their children about toxic online content. Mr Baker will agree with me that many parents do not know what a virtual private network (VPN) is; they do not know what incognito mode is; and they do not understand that images and text messages can disappear and thus leave behind no trail or footprints when people are chatting on online platforms.

The platforms and social media sites are, sadly, a dream for predators, such as in the deeply sad, horrific Alexander McCartney case, which, sadly, led to two suicides and many victims scarred for life. It is unthinkable, yet it happens every day. Just yesterday, 9 February 2026, a young woman called Prin May Dickson, who endured horrific abuse on social media and on the gossip platform Tattle Life, died by suicide. She was just 16 years old. Today, I think of her family, and it is a poignant reminder of how we must act appropriately when it comes to social media platforms and our young people.

The motion also rightly highlights the addictive design features, which matter because the systems are engineered to maximise time on platform engagement and data extraction from our young people. Endless scroll, autoplay, push notification and algorithmic feeds are not neutral features; they are behaviour-shaping mechanisms. It is really important to note that, given that our young people's brains are still developing.

I acknowledge that we cannot pass one simple vote, make one simple change and declare the job done. That is why the motion explicitly acknowledges that:

That speaks in union with the Sinn Féin amendment. We need robust age assurance. We need safety-by-design requirements for our children's experiences. We need clear enforcement; we need digital literacy; and we need to support our young people to keep them safe online and offline every day.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: I call Emma Sheerin to move the amendment.

Ms Sheerin: Molaim an leasú

:

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: You have five minutes to propose the amendment and three minutes to make a winding-up speech. All other Members will have three minutes. Please open the debate on the amendment.

Ms Sheerin: Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-Leas-Cheann Comhairle.

I thank the Member who proposed the motion today. We tabled the amendment not because we are completely opposed to a social media ban for under-16s in the long term but because we want to have a conversation and a debate about it. The Member referred to that in her opening remarks. The technologies are moving incredibly fast. Things are developing faster than a lot of Governments across the world can respond to them, and we do not have the empirical evidence yet to tell us what the result of a ban would be.

All of us in the House and across the North want our children and young people to be protected. As MLAs, we engage daily with parents, schools and young people who cannot get access to transport to school, cannot get the special educational needs (SEN) provision that they need and need better services in their areas. We are here to work for them, and we want to see things improve for our young people, whether that is in the real world or online. Our fear about jumping into a ban without understanding the full repercussions is the risk that things will end up being forced underground, and we will end up with VPNs and other technologies that, I admit, I am far too old to understand becoming the norm. It will end up being even more difficult to deal with.

When it comes to the issue of online abuse, particularly of our young people and children, Sinn Féin is clear that we need to ban Elon Musk's X Grok tool, which undresses people without their consent and robs people of their dignity and of their bodily autonomy.

That is a question of basic decency that should not need any government intervention. That should be banned outright, and anybody who accesses those platforms should know that.

Those multimillionaires are making money off people's misery: we know that. They can access the information that is being shared on those platforms, and they can monitor it. They know what is going online. The same goes for Mark Zuckerberg's misinformation, with Facebook feeds full of hatred, misinformation and far-right fearmongering. Who ends up suffering? Our minority communities are being attacked. That is what we want to ban. That is what we want to see clear action on, and the British Government need to respond to that. The same goes for Instagram. Multimillionaires and billionaires are making advertising revenue off unattainable beauty standards, pushing an algorithm into young people's feeds, particularly young girls, telling them that they are not good enough and that this is what they need to do to change. We need to see action on that.

All of the societal problems that we have, including bullying and mistreatment of people, particularly of young people and other vulnerable groups in society, are amplified online. We want to see regulation of those big tech companies. We need to engage with our young people, who tell us clearly that they want to see better reporting functions and better regulation of online content. We want those problems to be dealt with, rather than jumping to remove the provision from our young people before we have assessed what the implications of that would be.

Mr Brooks: I will start by saying that I welcome the motion and thank the proposer for bringing it to the Floor. We are likely to prefer the motion over the amendment, but, regardless of that, there will be an awful lot of commonality around what we are speaking to. Everyone wants to push in the same direction.

We all wish to protect the next generation online. Social media is now a part of everyday life, yet, while it presents risks to users of all ages, those risks fall most heavily on our children. Additional workable protections should be a welcome step as we strive to make the online world a safer place. Young people today face challenges and pressures that are different from those of the generations before them. We should not be blind to the harm that social media can cause. As Professor Jonathan Haidt argues in 'The Anxious Generation', the design of our digital environment is shaping behaviour and mental health. If we are serious about tackling poor mental health, we must take every opportunity to do so.

We know that large numbers of our children encounter harmful content on self-harm, eating disorders and bullying pushed to them by recommendation systems. As the Children's Commissioner has noted, adult content still reaches children through major platforms despite their stated policies. It is clear that the first exposure to such content can occur shockingly early. Sadly, online bullying is widespread. Those are not abstract risks; they are the lived experiences of families and young people and children in our constituencies. Age-based proportionate restrictions deserve serious consideration as part of that package. Other countries are moving in that direction, and the British Government's consultation on children's social media use is an opportunity that we should take to press for protections on age assurance, addictive design features and, yes, perhaps even giving consideration to the prohibition of access to some platforms for under-16s. However, that is something that we should keep a watching review on, as we know that other jurisdictions have introduced it. We should watch that carefully.

Here at home, our Education Minister has led by opening conversations on mobile phone use in schools and by supporting practical resources, such as Smartphone Free Childhood's Parent Pact for families who wish to delay smartphones. That is exactly the sort of parent-first, pragmatic support that we need, alongside the regulation that we have talked about.

The harms, of course, do not fall evenly, and the Opposition's education spokesperson, as well as some of my colleagues, have spoken eloquently in the past of their experiences of being made a victim of AI in that regard. I am not going to speak too much about that, because they have done so in the past. When we discuss violence against women and girls in the Chamber, we understand that social media impacts on girls' well-being and —.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: David, time is up.

Mr Brooks: Oh no; three minutes.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: The three minutes goes in too quickly. I am sorry about that.

Mrs Guy: First, I thank those who tabled the motion. I know that colleagues across the Chamber genuinely care about online safety, and that matters because parents, teachers and young people want to see us working together on it.

The reality is that childhood has changed. Every generation faces new risks, but the pressures created by smartphones, constant connectivity and social media are unlike anything that we have ever seen. Those platforms are highly addictive by design and are engineered to maximise time online, because that is how profit is made through advertising and data extraction. A 2019 King's College London study found that almost a quarter of children were using their smartphones in a way consistent with behavioural addiction. A University of Cambridge cohort study, tracking almost 19,000 young people, found that nearly half believe that they are addicted to social media. It is no wonder that families feel that they have been left to navigate this alone. Companies worth billions with enormous lobbying power dominate this space, and Governments have failed to act decisively or effectively. There is now an ever-growing evidence base on the harms that young people face on social media. Therefore, Alliance supports the motion and believes that the Government should act in the best interests of children and families and not be swayed by the power wielded by huge corporations.

We also need to be honest. This debate cannot start and end with a simple age ban. It also cannot be about saying that all social media or technology is harmful; in fact, there is evidence of real positives for young people using digital spaces. Let me be clear: we are content to shut the door to social media when it is unsafe but to open it when it is safe. Restrictions alone will not fix the problem. We are not against age bans, but we need to go further and give the issue the focus and detailed solutions that it deserves. It must sit within a wider system of regulation, enforcement, digital literacy and support for parents. Alliance supports a stronger and more considered approach; for example, a tiered, risk-based system of age restrictions up to 18. That would regulate access to specific platforms and high-risk functions. Failure to comply must have consequences, with significant fines for persistent offenders and suspension of services in the UK. Time caps should be considered because prolonged, chronic exposure is most clearly linked with harm.

The Sinn Féin amendment raises legitimate concerns but removes the vital recognition of the harms caused by addictive design and harmful content. The original motion, for us, strikes a better balance, calling for proportionate restrictions alongside robust regulation. Children and young people deserve online spaces that are safe, healthy and designed around their well-being. That requires real restrictions, real accountability and real enforcement, so we are happy to support the motion.

Mr Butler: Madam Principal Deputy Speaker, I forgot about the three-minute rule, so I will read through this quickly. Pin your ears back.

At the outset, it is worth acknowledging an uncomfortable truth for us in the Chamber. Many of us, if we were to log into our own daily screen time and honestly reflect on that, would see that there is a degree of hypocrisy when we talk today about children and social media use. Maybe we are bringing a bit of our own wisdom to it.

Digital technology brings real benefits, including connection, creativity and learning, and it would be disingenuous for any of us to deny that. However, recognising value does not absolve us from responsibility, particularly when the evidence of harm is now so abundantly clear. The debate must be grounded in one guiding principle, and that is the best interests of the child. That is not a slogan but a legal, moral and human obligation rooted in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). Children have the right to protection, to healthy development, to dignity and to be heard. When those rights come into conflict with the business models of multinational tech platforms, it should not be the children who lose.

The evidence before us is no longer anecdotal, nor is it isolated. We see clear links between social media use and harm, whether that is to mental health, to emotional well-being or to development, particularly among younger users. Children are being exposed to content that is wholly inappropriate and that, in any other context, would be considered to be wholly unacceptable. They are being exposed, sadly, to pornography, self-harm material, bullying and misogynistic abuse, and the algorithms do not merely host the content but actively promote it. Crucially, children and young people themselves tell us that things are not working. Young people across Northern Ireland have called for greater protections online, for clearer boundaries and for adults to take responsibility, but that advocacy means more than listening, because we are meant to protect those young people and to speak clearly about the harms that are posed.

At the same time, we must be honest about the complexity. An outright ban used prematurely or in isolation risks unintended consequences. I need not remind many people in the Chamber about the ban on alcohol for under-18s and on smoking for under-16s. Those did not work particularly well because, while they may have been morally right, their application was not good. We also know about the proliferation of virtual private networks, which have seen a 1,800% rise in their use. Unfortunately, a lot of that stuff can be driven underground because age-based restrictions, if introduced, cannot stand alone. They must be part of a holistic response.

In Northern Ireland, we are, for once, probably in a slightly better position than some of the other regions. We have the Safer Schools NI app, which is already in around 85% of schools in Northern Ireland, but what is missing from that is parental awareness of the use of that app.

Ms Brownlee: Last night, in preparation for the debate, I tried to do a wee bit of market research with my teenage daughter. I asked her if she had ever witnessed bullying or seen dangerous or harmful content or anything that made her feel concerned or sad. Her answer was no. That was for two reasons. One was probably because she knew that it would be raised in the Assembly at some point, and, two, I was her parent and she might not have felt comfortable sharing that information with me. I have no doubt, however, that she has seen dangerous things online. She might not fully realise it yet, but what she sees online has a huge effect on her life from her inspiration for her clothes, the influence on make-up to the constant rap music that she listens to. Social media has so much control over her world, as it does over many other children. As parents, we monitor as much as possible. We have conversations and warn of the dangers, but the reality is that it is a dark and wild space that would be almost impossible to tame never mind control. When you add exposure to harmful content, addictive design features and online abuse, it becomes clear that we cannot ignore the risk of those platforms.

Research shows that young adults regret the time that they spend on their phones, describing it as "brain rot" or "doomscrolling". Robbie was right: if we are all honest, we do that ourselves. A 10-minute scroll can often turn into two hours, resulting in time lost and nothing gained and endless hours online comparing ourselves with others — our bodies, our clothes, our homes, our family life. It can have significant and serious impacts on our mental health, leaving us feeling never fully content.

We have discussed many times in the Chamber the horrific abuse received online, often from faceless trolls, with little if any recourse and no consideration of mental well-being. It is addictive, persuasive and difficult to manage. The big tech companies really need to have accountability and responsibility for the damage that they cause. As a member of the Policing Board, I know that we have often talked about the lack of collaboration between those big companies and PSNI investigations and the struggles that the police have in trying to get the evidence required to get cases over the line. That definitely needs consideration.

At the same time, screen time has real benefits supporting education interaction and access to support but only if it is balanced with good sleep, exercise and offline play. Early intervention programmes and guidance on healthy digital use are core critical components in any restriction. Of course, I welcome the Education Minister, with his parent packs and pouches but the importance of physical education as well. The evidence is clear that social media is linked to anxiety, depression and poor sleep. There are also many other difficult aspects to it.

Three minutes are definitely not enough time to talk about such an important subject. We support the motion, and we will hopefully do anything we can to address social media usage among young people.

Mr Carroll: Social media has been largely self-regulated. In practice, that means little regulation or at least none that threatens the bottom lines of those companies, which are profit and wealth. Recommender algorithms bombard children and young people with harmful material that promotes self-harm, eating disorders and suicide, as was alluded to by the Member opposite. Our young people are being shown a relentless stream of toxic content that promotes misogyny, racism and transphobia, and social media companies keep us in the dark about the parameters of their toxic algorithms and do not even disclose that detail to the Government for scrutiny. They routinely prioritise trade secrets and commercial confidentiality over children's health and well-being.

The Center for Countering Digital Hate looked at the videos that YouTube recommends to a 13-year-old Irish girl who watched one video about eating disorders. One in three future recommendations were for harmful eating disorder content. Two in three were related to eating disorders or weight loss, and one in 20 involved self-harm or suicidal content, so the algorithms are clearly a public health issue.

A study by University College London (UCL) and the University of Kent study found a fourfold increase in the level of misogynistic content that TikTok suggested over a five-day period. That is pushed on our young people, because it is presumed that extreme content will keep them online and on the apps for longer. In other words, the companies are pushing extreme content at children and young people and encouraging them into screen addiction so that they can monetise them, because they see them as consumers and customers. In the Dáil, my party colleagues have introduced a Bill to tackle toxic recommender algorithms. They have had no choice but to introduce that legislation, because social media companies are failing to protect children.

An outright ban is not the answer, because social media can often be a lifeline for young people, LGBTQ+ people and neurodivergent communities. Cutting them off from friends and access to vital support could leave many vulnerable people feeling disconnected. Two months into Australia's social media ban for under-16s, young people are already finding ways to circumvent the ban. They pivot to alternative apps that do not require an account and re-emerge on platforms with fake birthdays. That was all entirely predictable. As with other prohibitionist policies, consumption does not end; it is just forced underground. Young people already feel increasingly isolated, which is a problem that a ban does not and cannot address.

I will move on, in the interests of time.

Ms Sheerin: Will the Member give way?

Mr Carroll: Will I get an extra minute?

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: No.

Mr Carroll: Sorry.

Ms Sheerin: Maith go leor.

Mr Carroll: Maith go leor.

We need to focus on the multinational companies and hold them to account for allowing toxic content to thrive on their platforms. They have run the show for too long. We should not blame children and young people for a system created by adults —

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up.

Mr Carroll: — who are focused on profit and wealth. I support the motion and the amendment.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: I call Danny Baker to wind on the amendment. Danny, I advise you that you have three minutes.

Mr Baker: Go raibh maith agat, a Phríomh-Leas-Cheann Comhairle.

The focus today needs to be on the big social media companies. When we have this conversation, everyone says that they want the best for our young people, but the conversation quickly delves into social media and smartphones. What is the definition of social media? If you have that conversation with young people, they will tell you that it means Snapchat, WhatsApp and playing Playstation, Roblox and Fortnite. Those all involve interactions in the wider world and all have dangers.

Our young people want protection, but they also want the right to participate. They want to be connected to their peers. Imposing outright bans and restrictions, in isolation, will cause unforeseen consequences. All our young people know about VPNs and how to access them through a quick, 30-second download. For anyone who does not know what a VPN is, it allows you to dip into a server anywhere in the world, which exposes your smartphone to the unforeseen consequences of downloading different data. Certain countries may not have such good regulation, which could expose someone to the darker side of the web, opening corridors to graphic pornography and exposure to all that is wrong with the internet.

Do you know who does not know about VPNs? Parents. It is very easy to test that. Last week, in preparation for the debate, I went down to our youth club, and we did workshops with our 11- to 16-year olds. Every one of them identified that they need protection, but they felt that that should come from the companies. Young people should not be talked down to; they should be talked with, supported and guided through this. Young people know about VPNs, but I did a quick questionnaire on WhatsApp with my parents and their friends, and very few of them knew what a VPN was. When I asked them about social media, everything came full circle. Everyone was nostalgic and wanted to go back to the days when there were no phones, saying, "Was it not way better back then?".

That is the problem: if you do not do it right, you end up putting our young people in greater danger. It is so important that we have the conversation, but we have to be realistic: if we do not understand social media, there is a wider implication. I thought that I had a good handle on our young people and social media in general, but — this is why WhatsApp is important — we do not even know the meaning of emojis. That was evident from the Netflix show 'Adolescence', which showed the meaning of a kidney bean emoji in the context of toxic masculinity, violence against women and girls and all of that. I guarantee that none of us would have known what that meant, but our young people did. Let us not push them down that path. We need education, and we need to work together. At this point, let us keep the focus on those who are responsible: the big firms —.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up.

Mr Baker: Elon Musk and the other billionaires are responsible, not our young people.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Thank you. I call Sinéad McLaughlin to make a winding-up speech on the motion. Sinéad, you have five minutes.

Ms McLaughlin: Thank you, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker. I thank all the Members who contributed to the debate. I honestly believe that, although we might use different words or place a different emphasis on things, we are all on the same page. A lot of the evidence on this issue is still evolving, but, at its heart, the motion is about simple responsibility: our responsibility, as legislators, to begin the conversation. This is not the end of the conversation; it will go on every day in our constituencies, schools and homes, as well as with those big tech companies and billionaires who create the platforms that damage our families and our people. Our responsibility is to protect children and keep them from harm.

Social media is part of everyday life for our young people. It shapes how they communicate, learn and see themselves. It is not all bad, however: there is some good in there. It influences how they measure success, judge their own worth and understand relationships. The fact that something is normal does not, however, mean that it is harmless. As a grandmother now, I thank my lucky stars that I did not have to contend with social media platforms as a mother. My children had Bebo on a computer that sat in the middle of my kitchen. We would look over at them, and they spoke only to their friends. That is going back a little bit, and I am deeply concerned about the type of world that our children and grandchildren are growing up in.

Technology has moved faster than our protections, and young people are too often left alone in digital spaces that were never designed for their mental well-being. For many parents and grandparents, that creates constant anxiety that we are playing catch-up while the damage is already being done. We would not put a child in a car without a seatbelt, but a report released today by CyberSafeKids in the Republic of Ireland states that 51% of children have no parental restrictions on their access to online content. That is a scary figure. Just 39% of eight- to 12-year-olds say that their parents can check, monitor and control what they do and see online. So, we do have a problem.

There is a growing and credible body of evidence that links excessive social media use to anxiety, depression, poor sleep, poor body image and attention problems in children and young people. Those risks are not abstract; they are real harms that parents see at home, that teachers see in classrooms and that mental health professionals see every day. We are dealing not with neutral platforms but with systems that are deliberately designed to be addictive. Many Members talked about that addiction in their contributions this afternoon. With algorithms that monetise attention, and business models that profit when young people stay online longer, those platforms do not just host content; they shape behaviour, expectations and the way in which young people see themselves and others. It is worth noting that many of the people who design and profit from such platforms do not allow their own children to use them. That should give us pause.

Across families, schools and communities, people are sounding the alarm. Teachers report increased distraction and anxiety; parents are struggling to set boundaries in an online world that never switches off; and mental health professionals warn that the pressures facing young people today are fundamentally different from those that were faced by previous generations. For far too long, we have hoped that the tech industry would regulate itself, but it has not done so. Other countries have recognised that doing nothing is no longer an option. Governments across the world are beginning to step in, because the cost of inaction is simply too high.

There are multiple levels to this complex subject. I accept and agree with all the contributions and with the angles from which Members made them. The problem will not be solved through legislation alone, or, indeed, banning, because it is a multi-level problem. However, we must listen to the evidence and make interventions at all levels. We in the SDLP do not think that there is one solution, and one solution only; we accept that we need to work on multiple levels.

The British Government's consultation reflects the growing recognition that stronger protections are needed and that the status quo cannot continue. The debate has rightly —

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Time is up, Sinéad.

Ms McLaughlin: — recognised that no single intervention is sufficient on its own. Restrictions alone are not enough.

I urge Members to support our motion.

Madam Principal Deputy Speaker: Members should take their ease.

Mr Speaker: In conjunction with the Business Committee, I have given leave to Pam Cameron to raise the matter of access to GP services in South Antrim. I call Pam Cameron. You have up to 15 minutes.

Mrs Cameron: Thank you, Mr Speaker. This Adjournment topic focuses specifically on GP access in South Antrim, but every Member will recognise that this issue affects the whole of Northern Ireland. No constituency is untouched by the pressures facing general practice, and no family is unaffected by the growing difficulty in securing timely GP care.

The recent report from the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has laid bare the scale of public concern. More than 15,000 people responded to its call for evidence, and over half rated their experience of accessing GP services as poor. Many described spending long periods on hold, repeatedly calling or being advised to try again the next day. Some patients turned to private provision or emergency departments, not out of choice but because they felt that they had nowhere else to go. The Committee also heard that the Department does not hold complete full-time-equivalent GP workforce data, which is a basic requirement for any modern health system that seeks to plan sustainably.

At the same time, we know that the number of GP practices has fallen over the past decade while demand has risen. As of March 2025, Northern Ireland had just over 305 GP practices, supporting just over two million people. That represents a 13% reduction in practice numbers, despite a significant increase in population. Average list sizes have risen by more than 23%. That imbalance between capacity and demand is the foundation of the many difficulties that we see today. The pressures are even more evident in rapidly developing areas. According to the 2021 census data, in 10 years, the population of Ballyclare has grown by around 8·5%, and the population of Antrim has grown by around 9%. Those growth patterns reflect extensive new housing and expanding commuter communities, but GP capacity has not increased in tandem. Surgery teams are now attempting to support thousands more residents without the corresponding infrastructure, staffing or investment.

Behind those figures are, of course, real people. One constituent stated that, after hospital clinicians advised that they urgently needed medication, their GP practice did not have the staffing capacity to issue the prescription, which meant that they had to return to hospital simply to obtain that medication. Others described being unable to access their practice because they could not sit on hold at 8.30 am, including teachers, who cannot leave classrooms; carers, who cannot abandon those whom they support; and shift workers, who cannot walk away from their duties. One parent told me that they spent an entire morning phoning repeatedly for their unwell child, with no queue system and no callback function. After losing a day's pay, they ended up in their local GP out-of-hours service. Others described delays in follow-up after photo-based assessment, with at least one person's condition worsening significantly overnight.

We know that extended waits for specialist consultants are also pushing patients back into general practice for interim reviews, pain management, sick lines and monitoring that should be taking place in secondary care. Long delays in key areas, including pain services and hip and knee replacements, are forcing people to return repeatedly to their GPs, while they are living in significant discomfort and pain with reduced mobility and a loss of independence. Those prolonged waits are also driving economic inactivity, as people remain unable to work at times, while they wait for their procedures and treatments.

It is important to recognise that not all the feedback was negative. Some patients shared very positive experiences of being seen promptly and being treated with genuine compassion by their GP practice. Those examples remind us that, despite immense pressure, many GP teams continue to provide excellent care every single day.

I also want to be clear about the perception around these issues. The concerns that people have shared with me about access are, of course, real. They are valid and deeply felt. But it is equally true that, when people succeed in getting through and are seen, they describe the care that they receive as professional, compassionate and of a very high standard. My point is not to minimise anyone's frustration — far from it — but simply to say that, if the wider conversation continually paints general practice as being beyond repair, we risk discouraging some people from seeking the help that they genuinely need in the first place. We must address the problems of access whilst recognising the dedication of the staff who continue to deliver high-quality care under immense pressure. Goodwill alone cannot sustain a system under this level of strain. Much of the GP workload is unseen: reviewing blood tests and imaging, chronic disease management, follow-up hospital letters, safeguarding responsibilities, palliative care support, supervising trainees, visiting care homes, supporting social care teams, dealing with prescription shortages and liaising with pharmacists, district nurses and allied health professionals. That is the clinical engine room of the NHS, and it is running beyond capacity.

I also want to touch on community pharmacy, because it is clearly a vital part of the primary care system. Pharmacies remained accessible throughout COVID and the successive winter pressures. With the appropriate support, they can relieve pressure from GPs by expanding Pharmacy First, supporting repeat prescription management and continuing their important vaccination and prevention work. However, pharmacy itself must be stabilised if it is to take on more, particularly in the light of the medicine supply pressures and financial challenges.

One of the gravest ongoing risks is the rise in GP contract hand-backs. When a practice reaches the point where it cannot continue, patients are dispersed into neighbouring practices whose lists are already overstretched. That is deeply destabilising and can create a domino effect across an entire locality. Although South Antrim has not yet seen the same level of contract collapse as other areas, the pressures are similar and the risk is real. We cannot, of course, ignore the age profile of our GP workforce. While GPs are of a similar generation and are approaching retirement around the same time, others are burning out under the weight of the current workload, and the pipeline coming behind them is perhaps not large enough to replace those who will leave the service. Without urgent stabilisation, contract hand-backs could escalate sharply as practices lose the experienced clinicians who have held the system together for years.

We must remember that GPs and their staff are human, just like the rest of us. They have lives, families, good health, ill health, mental health issues and the same pressures that we all face on a day-to-day basis. They are doing their best under immense pressure. I have also heard of completely unacceptable instances of verbal abuse being directed at GPs and their practice staff. Such abuse may be born out of frustration, but it is wrong and harmful nonetheless. No workforce can withstand that level of strain without consequences for morale, retention and well-being.

The challenge is made more concerning by the fact that future recruitment is also at risk. During my discussions with GPs and the BMA, I was told that they had held a round table with medical students at Queen's University. Those students were asked whether they would consider a career in general practice, and a large percentage said that they would not. That should alarm us all.

I am glad to see the Minister of Health with us this afternoon. I very much appreciate his time; he is a busy man. Minister, do you believe that we have sufficient numbers of new GPs to come forward to replace those who are due to retire or leave the service? If not, what plans are in place to address that gap?

The emerging neighbourhood model aims to provide more care within the community and to reduce unnecessary hospital reliance. That, of course, is the right direction of travel, but it is achievable only if GP practices are supported to deliver more neighbourhood-level work, including in care and residential homes. Trusts may need to redirect parts of their budgets into community-based services. If so, that must be done clearly, fairly and consistently. If resourced properly, the shift-left model would help to reduce avoidable attendances at emergency departments by ensuring that more people are treated safely earlier and within the community. Multidisciplinary teams (MDTs) have also shown real value where they exist, bringing physiotherapists, mental health practitioners, pharmacists and social prescribing link workers directly into practices. However, MDT roll-out has been unequal. Some areas benefit from full coverage, while others have little or no MDT provision. That inequality must be resolved.

Funding sits at the heart of all of it. Health receives more than half of the entire Executive Budget, yet general practice receives the lowest share of any UK nation at around 5·4% or roughly £450 million. GP representatives asked for an additional 1% — around £80 million — of the Health budget to stabilise the service; instead, practices received an uplift equivalent to roughly 50p per patient. Understandably, that was deeply frustrating for GPs, particularly when negotiations stalled and the contract was ultimately imposed. I am encouraged that GP representatives and the Department have since returned to discussions, and, while we are not privy to those conversations, I hope that they lead to a fair and timely resolution that restores stability to general practice.

The single greatest source of frustration for many patients remains at the 8.30 am bottleneck. People want a system that does not require them to sit on hold, lose wages or rearrange caring responsibilities just to secure a GP appointment. Modern telephony, queuing systems, callbacks, digital pathways with non-digital alternatives and staggered appointment releases are all essential steps forward. Practices stand ready to play their part, of course, but they need the tools, the workforce and the investment to deliver change.

The debate is not about blame: it is about acknowledging the pressures, recognising the experiences of the public and supporting the work needed to build a fair, sustainable and patient-centred primary care system. General practice is the foundation of our health service. If it is strengthened and stabilised, every other part of the system benefits. If it continues to be stretched beyond safe limits, every part of the system suffers.

I place on record my thanks to all the constituents who got in touch with me with their feedback and experiences of GP access in South Antrim and to the GPs and BMA representatives who met me ahead of the debate to share their insights and concerns. Their contributions have been invaluable to the debate.

Mr Blair: I thank Pam Cameron MLA, my South Antrim colleague, for introducing this important issue to the Assembly this afternoon. Like her, I am grateful that the Minister is here to hear us and to respond.

First, I record my sincere thanks to the doctors, nurses and wider staff who provide GP services across South Antrim with such care and compassion. Their dedication often goes unrecognised, yet they work under immense pressure, with rising demand and limited resources. They deserve our stated respect and support.

Our population in South Antrim is growing, with new housing, an ageing population and more people living with long-term conditions. Our health service must keep pace, or our constituents will pay the price through increased frustration and pressure. It is for the Health Minister and his Department, of course, to ensure that access to GP services in South Antrim and across Northern Ireland is improved and sustained, and the Minister and the Department need our support in delivering that. As MLAs, however, we hear directly from those affected when the access is not there or falls short. Like my South Antrim colleagues, both in the Assembly and at local council level, I am routinely contacted by constituents who have struggled to get a GP appointment or who are stuck on waiting lists for what they describe as "an eternity". People phone the GP at 8 am, and they redial repeatedly only to be told that all the appointments have gone. All MLAs are familiar with that story. Other people wait weeks to be seen about issues that cause real distress. Too often, people are left in pain or anxiety and are unsure about where to turn.

GP practices are the front door to our health service and are central to prevention and early intervention. They deliver initial cancer testing, antenatal and postnatal care, vaccinations, chronic disease management and mental health support, among many other services. When people cannot access those services promptly and consistently, we miss chances to diagnose earlier, intervene sooner and prevent conditions from worsening. Access to such care is not a luxury; it is fundamental to safe and effective healthcare. We need GP services that are accessible and sustainable, regardless of where in South Antrim someone lives. That means timely appointments, well-staffed practices and clear, consistent systems for contacting surgeries and the management of those systems.

Avoiding unnecessary hospital admissions is key to relieving pressure on the wider health service. When people cannot get a GP appointment, many of them end up in overstretched emergency departments or out-of-hours services, often with conditions that could have been managed in primary care if the capacity had existed and been available initially. That is not good for patients, staff or the public purse.

There are wider structural issues that we cannot ignore. For example, across Northern Ireland, fewer people are entering or remaining in the medical profession, including general practice. Pay, workload and burnout all contribute to that, and we as elected representatives should and do take that seriously. We know that the NHS is vital to our society, and the Alliance Party remains committed to prioritising it.

I look forward to the Minister's update on the efforts to improve access to GPs in South Antrim. My colleague who secured the Adjournment debate has made it clear that it was brought here in the spirit of a constructive conversation. I hope that continues, and I hope that we can assist the Minister in his part of that constructive conversation.

Mr Speaker: Before I call the Minister, can I clarify whether Mr McNulty wants to speak? No.

Mr McNulty: I prefer not to speak.

Mr Speaker: You are sitting in on the debate. Good man.

Minister, you have up to 15 minutes.

Mr Nesbitt (The Minister of Health): I thank Mrs Cameron and welcome the opportunity to outline my thoughts on primary care. Mrs Cameron mentioned the Public Accounts Committee's 'Report on Access to General Practice in Northern Ireland', and I welcomed the report. We have considered the findings and the recommendations in full, and we will now work in partnership with general practice, the representative bodies and patients and service users to address those recommendations. That said, a number of the recommendations in the Committee's report are being addressed in work that is already in train and is set out in my reset plan, which was published in July last year.

I am aware of the enormous demands on general medical services (GMS) and the impact it has had on patients and general practitioners. In that context, I fully recognise the dedication and tremendous efforts of all GPs and practice staff in working to meet the needs of their patients. In South Antrim, there are 11 practices and 59 GPs, both partners and salaries, and they have a combined patient list of 85,000-plus patients. It is no small commitment. I assure you that my Department is committed to addressing the issues across Northern Ireland and to ensuring that patients will be able to access high-quality, sustainable GP services now and in the future. To help achieve that, my officials continue to take forward a wide range of work in the short and longer term with stakeholders across the system.

Regrettably, there have been 16 contract hand-backs since financial year 2023-24. There were 11 in that year and five in financial year 2024-25. However, no contracts have been handed back since last February. Mrs Cameron said that there was not the same level of hand-back in South Antrim as there had been elsewhere, but, in fact, there have been no hand-backs in South Antrim. Despite the pressures on general practice and the number of practices that have handed back contracts, we have been able to ensure that only one of those contract hand-backs resulted in practice closure.

Mr McNulty: Will the Member give way?

Mr Nesbitt: I give way to the Member, but I have no confidence that this will have anything to do with South Antrim.

Mr McNulty: I thank the Minister. You are very gracious for giving way. You mentioned the pressures on GP practices. At an all-party group last week, when discussing arthritis, it was said that long waiting lists are factories for disability — frighteningly so. GP practices have a major part to play in relieving waiting lists. What is the Minister's assessment of some GP practices not allowing scheduled appointments until March at the earliest?

Mr Nesbitt: I am not aware of GP practices denying people access until March. I will make this more general point to the Member: we are now at a position at which, after a hiatus, negotiations on the 2026-27 contract can begin between the Department and the BMA General Practitioners Committee. That is absolutely critical. Every year's contract is important, but this year has to be a consequential year for health and social care delivery, because we have to shift left into the neighbourhood model. While that will include community pharmacies, as Mrs Cameron mentioned, ophthalmologists and dentists, GPs are its heart. We need them all, but, above all, we need GPs. I will not say anything that will be critical of something that you have stated and which is news to me, but I will take it away and ask officials to examine it.

On short-term measures, the general practice improvement and crisis response team supports practices at risk. That has been important in providing stability, but more sustainable options are required in the longer term. I note that none of the 11 practices is receiving support from the crisis response team, never mind handing back contracts. We are also working with the GP federations to explore how they can play a role in the longer-term sustainability of general medical services. Over the past number of years, my Department has made available significant funding to help GPs meet the growing demand for primary care services and enable practices to improve their telephony systems and accessibility and increase staffing levels to ensure that telephony demand is managed effectively. A best practice guide, 'Making all Contacts Count', has also been developed and shared with all practices, supporting the management of patient demand and optimising workflow, with the aim of improving experience for patients and practices.

My priority is always to ensure that patients, including those in South Antrim, can continue to access safe, high-quality, sustainable GP services when they need to. My desire has always been to work constructively with GPs to help achieve that outcome. I have stated many times that I regret that it was not possible to reach agreement on the GMS contract for the financial year 2025-26. My Department has remained engaged with GP representatives over the past year with a view to finding a way forward to re-establish normal relations and re-enter negotiations for 2026-27. I am pleased to say that we have made good progress on that recently, and I am optimistic that we will be able to re-engage in substantive contractual discussions in the coming weeks.

The 2025-26 GMS contract included an additional investment of £9·5 million in general practice. I also made a ministerial direction in line with the recommendations of the pay review bodies, which the Executive have agreed. That has enabled my Department to implement the pay award for independent general medical practitioners in full in 2025-26. That was at a value of £11·7 million of additional investment. That payment is due to be made to GPs and their teams in the February pay run.

To help primary care to deliver and grow, it is critical that we train, develop, support and retain the GP workforce. My Department has funded initiatives to recruit and retain GPs. Training places are at an all-time high of 121, which is an increase of no less than 86% since 2015-16, and my officials are progressing work to project the number of GP training places required over the next five years. I hope that that answers, in some part at least, Members' questions about how we will supply our workforce, going forward. We are working with key stakeholders to increase the exposure of undergraduates to general practice. We are encouraging more GP trainees and ensuring that there are sufficient GP training practices to meet demand and support GPs in training. We have introduced other schemes to support the GP workforce, including the Attract, Recruit, Retain scheme, which is designed to support the recruitment of GPs in hard-to-recruit areas. Since that scheme was established, in January 2023, 110 GP practices have applied for and received approval in principle for funding under the scheme, and 70 practices have applied for and received final approval for payment in respect of a recruited GP.

Members will be aware that, last year, my Department announced investment of £61 million over the next four years to support the wider roll-out of the primary care MDT model, which will provide access to a wider range of services for primary care and help to stabilise GP services. The multidisciplinary team model remains the key to stabilising and strengthening vital primary care services and ensuring that they can continue to provide high-quality care to our people, now and into the future. The MDT programme has significantly expanded the capacity of primary care since its introduction, with an additional 335,000 consultations provided in financial year 2024-25 alone. It is estimated that a full roll-out of the programme could provide around one million additional appointments in general practice settings. On 24 July last year, I published a plan for the completion of the primary care multidisciplinary team model across all areas of Northern Ireland.

As we are mindful of the serious staffing and funding pressures facing Health, full roll-out of the programme will be taken forward in a two-phase approach over the next seven to eight years. The first phase is supported by £61 million from transformation funding. That will enable completion of the model in the seven existing MDT areas and expansion into five new GP federation areas, with a population of around 670,000, over the next four years up to the end of financial year 2028-29. The new areas to benefit from transformation funding during phase 1 will be north Belfast, the south-west — Fermanagh and west Tyrone — east Antrim, Craigavon, Dungannon and Armagh. Detailed local plans that determine the sequencing and timescale of investment in practices during phase 1 have been agreed, and funding for 2025-26 has been allocated accordingly. The south Antrim area, which is part of the Antrim and Ballymena GP Federation, will commence roll-out during phase 2, along with the east Belfast, south Belfast, Lisburn and Mid Ulster GP federations. Phase 2 will run for four years, from financial year 2029-2030, and that will see the MDT model completed in the remaining five GP federation areas. Lessons are being learned as further roll-out progresses, and, while phase 2 may seem some way off, I can assure you that, if it becomes possible to do more faster when it comes to that roll-out, that is exactly what will happen.

In the interim, a number of practices in the south Antrim area recently received significant investment in their premises in advance of the MDT roll-out across the south-east Antrim locality. That will enable them to accommodate the additional staff associated with the roll-out. However, all practices in the South Antrim constituency already have access to a practice-based pharmacist.

Looking to the future, we remain committed to working with GPs and their representative bodies to support primary care services with the aim of securing the long-term future of general practice over the coming years. However, it is important to bear in mind that any increase in the level of spend on primary care must be investment with a purpose, that purpose being to improve the sustainability of and access to services and to ensure that patients can expect the same high standards from their GP, no matter where they live. The focus of investment in general practice in the future should be on meeting the evidenced demand for services and transforming the way GP services are delivered. In my reset plan, I made a commitment to developing a neighbourhood model to deliver greater levels of care to our citizens in their local communities and as close to their front doors as possible. That model will see GPs and their federations, along with Community Pharmacy, voluntary and community organisations, trusts and independent providers working closely together to provide coordinated care to patients in their localities. It is an important enabler of my commitment to shift left. I hope that GP practices will play a decisive role in the ongoing development of the model and in its implementation.

We are now working at pace to take that work forward in line with that commitment. To inform the early developmental work, I visited examples of how neighbourhoods can work within that model in England. We saw that GPs were at the heart of those models. There is very good reason for that. It is because GPs know their patients and their communities that they are so well placed to play that central role in the establishment of a model that will improve access to care and shift the focus from reactive treatment to proactive engagement.

Over the past number of months, my officials and I have been engaging with GP colleagues as part of the design phase of that new neighbourhood model. I assure you that that will continue. What is clear is that building a neighbourhood model will require providers to work in new ways to deliver their services. The proposed model will be built around 17 integrated neighbourhood teams that act as provider alliances. They will operate with the trust and area integrated partnership boards at GP federation level, serving an average population of 115,000. Those integrated teams will know the populations that they serve and will work together as a team of teams. In doing so, they will lead and drive delivery on improving access and priorities for moving more care closer to home. They will work with smaller neighbourhoods within the footprint — the natural communities to which people feel that they belong.

There are new ways of working, new ways of thinking, new partnerships and new approaches to service design. The potential is enormous. By building care around communities, we can improve outcomes, reduce pressure on hospitals and create a more sustainable system. I hope that Members will note the actions and initiatives that my Department is taking forward and will be reassured that I am committed to ensuring safe and equitable access to general medical services for all the people of South Antrim and Northern Ireland. As Mrs Cameron said, GPs are the lifeblood of our health and social care system. When it works well for them, it works well for everybody. That is my ultimate determination.