Alan Whysall discusses the prospects for the return of the Northern Ireland political institutions this autumn. He finds limited grounds for optimism and concludes that the responsibility for salvaging the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement settlement may now fall to the next British government. This post picks up themes from the author’s two most recent papers for the Constitution Unit, called Northern Ireland’s Political Future (NIPF) and The Agreement at 25.

As the July issue of Monitor recorded, visits from US President Joe Biden and other notables to celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement had little apparent effect on Northern Ireland politics; nor did local government elections, at which Sinn Féin emerged triumphant. The principal Agreement institutions remained in abeyance, vetoed by the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), which remains concerned about the Northern Ireland Protocol and Windsor Framework. At the time of writing, tensions are growing over policing, potentially deepening the political standoff. Northern Ireland meanwhile is being governed without government by civil servants who have very limited authority, together with occasional interventions from London.

Will devolution come back?

Before the summer, many commentators believed that the DUP would reach a deal in the autumn, claiming credit for aspects of the Windsor Framework, to bring back the institutions. This remains possible – many DUP careers depend on their existence. There have been suggestions of progress behind the scenes in the last few days. But it is now harder to be confident. Stasis until the UK general election seems possible, while the political, social and economic fabric of Northern Ireland deteriorates. Why?

First, the DUP may find compromise over the Protocol difficult. Negotiations are apparently going on between the party and the government, informed by a private 18-page DUP wish list. Its public demands for action on the Protocol, and on the threats it sees in it to Northern Ireland’s constitutional position, have been vaguely expressed, but the implication is that they are substantial. It seems unlikely that London can do very much to satisfy them without reopening the Protocol or the Agreement itself: and it has warned that it cannot do significantly more. So DUP supporters may be disappointed in any feasible compromise, and according to polling, they largely endorse the hard line taken so far. Senior party figures may be obdurate too, whatever the leader, Jeffrey Donaldson, wants: the former deputy leader, Lord (Nigel) Dodds of Duncairn, spoke vehemently of the ‘many unresolved and outstanding problems’ created by the Framework, suggesting London was merely peddling spin.

A returning DUP would come back to be notionally junior to Sinn Féin in the Executive, as nominators of the deputy First Minister (DFM), since Sinn Féin won the most seats in the last Assembly election. The leadership have not made this an issue, but its base would care greatly. There are rumours that Donaldson would not return from London – where he sits as an MP – as DFM in a resumed Executive but would nominate a relatively junior figure to the role instead. That might reduce the shock of being deputy. But it may also suggest that an Executive constituted now would be more of a political battleground, rather than a united endeavour to attack Northern Ireland’s grave economic and social challenges.

A returning DUP would face the prospect of presiding over austerity. Last financial year, without a budget or Executive, the Northern Ireland administration overspent. This year, obliged to make part repayment, it faces serious real terms reductions in spending, in a budget imposed by London. The budget sets only departmental allocations, without saying what should be cut, so the civil service has gone through serious pain in making cuts itself. But its authority to change policy is limited. And much financially-supported activity reflects statutory or contractual obligations unavoidable in the short term – so the burden has fallen on activity that is less protected, where severe damage may result from minor savings.

The civil servants have now apparently declared themselves at the limits of their powers to pursue economies, putting the ball back in London’s court. They made clear that, given those limits, an overspend is unavoidable this year too; implying a shortfall carried forward, and more misery next year.

The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Chris Heaton-Harris, has said that his taking further decisions would amount to direct rule, which he is widely told to avoid; the parties say that he is punishing Northern Ireland in order to pressure the DUP.

The parties demand more money – in particular the DUP has called for increases based on Northern Ireland’s higher indices of social need. But assessing needs is complex, as the Northern Ireland Fiscal Council outlined in May; there is scope for discussion, but not necessarily a knockdown argument for substantial early largesse.

Moreover, London is keen that Northern Ireland raises more revenue itself, matching taxation and charges elsewhere in the UK. According to the Fiscal Council, bringing payments in Northern Ireland into line with water charges and council tax in England would raise on average £800 a year per household. The Secretary of State gave himself powers to require the civil service to develop proposals for such revenue raising; having received advice, he is minded to press on.

It is generally assumed that there will be a haggle about money in return for devolution, as in the past. But the financial context is different; London is keen to counter assumptions it will offer substantial prizes.

The Northern Ireland administration is in disarray, meanwhile, and will not quickly recover, having beenso long lacking in direction. The extraordinary absences of ministers, twice since 2017, have been disruptive in themselves; but there have been no agreed governmental objectives since the last Programme for Government ran out in 2016. The backlog of reform needed is massive: the health service, for example, which has graver problems even than its English counterpart, is undergoing none of the restructuring widely agreed to be necessary; there is no funding for pay increases paralleling those elsewhere. Although the parties regularly meet civil servants to develop plans for a renewed Executive, there cannot be great confidence in the present political climate that renewed devolution would work effectively, delivering good government (see NIPF, Chapter 8).

Policing is now also in turmoil, with potentially serious political implications. The Chief Constable, Simon Byrne, resigned last week at the behest of unionist parties (and others), after it was alleged that he disciplined officers for an incident at the demand of Sinn Féin, because he feared that the party might otherwise leave the Policing Board, the embodiment of the post-Agreement consensus on policing. The affair brought to the fore other tensions around the operation of the Police Service for Northern Ireland.

London’s role

There is a widely shared impression of drift on the part of London. Ministers have perhaps learned enough about Northern Ireland politics to know that taking any step is difficult, but not enough to appreciate how they might make progress with the least risk. Number 10 appears not to be keen on ‘distractions’ from its main agenda – and that clearly does not feature Northern Ireland. The Prime Minister has little apparent time or attention for the place (the Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, was in Belfast talking politics this summer, but not the PM).

Ministers have, in fairness, sought to engage widely, but the universal distrust of London that has developed in recent years persists, reducing influence. The extraordinary Legacy Bill is about to become law, though opposed by all of the main parties in Northern Ireland, the UK Labour Party and the Irish government. This saps confidence further.

British–Irish relations may have grown somewhat warmer since the finalising of the Windsor Framework, after reaching their coolest point in decades. There is nothing like the partnership that characterised relations, from PM-level down, in the decades around the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement. The Taoiseach said as much recently in an unusually strongly worded intervention. The London–Dublin axis has long been the political motor, and political lifeboat, in Northern Ireland, and its absence shows. And relations will worsen again if, as is being considered, Ireland makes an application to the European Court of Human Rights over the Legacy Bill.

Beyond immediate politics, there is rather grand but vague talk from London of promoting economic revival. The Secretary of State told the Institute for Government that his principal objective, after sorting out the Protocol and reviving the Executive, was making Northern Ireland one of the most prosperous parts of the UK. His deputy, Steve Baker, spoke in a recent Commons debate of ‘private capital flooding into Northern Ireland’. The Prime Minister referred to Northern Ireland as ‘the world’s most exciting economic zone’. An investment conference takes place this week. These plans, though worthy, and usefully backed by Washington, may invite scepticism. Governments for 50 years, devolved and central, have intensively sought inward investment in Northern Ireland with some success, but nothing transformative has ever resulted. The Northern Ireland economy has strengths, but political instability may give investors pause. And no one is currently tackling issues that inhibit economic advance like skill shortages and inadequate infrastructure. Economic development will not be a short-term game changer.

What should be done?

The problems discussed in papers published by the Unit over the 18 months continue, therefore: political dialogue ever more polarised; the process of government in disorder; economic and social problems worsening; reconciliation efforts struggling. And cross-community agreement on policing, perhaps the most remarkable post-1998 transformation, is now challenged too. In short, the broader foundations of the Agreement settlement continue to crumble.

Governments in the past – under Major, Blair, Brown and Cameron – reacted with vigour to risks of political collapse in Northern Ireland, in close partnership with Dublin; with interparty talks chaired by the Prime Minister and Taoiseach sometimes lasting days or even weeks. More recent prime ministers, however, have had little personal engagement. Political advance is likely to require it, with sustained London–Dublin efforts to change the political climate.

What if the DUP cannot be moved? The earlier papers argued that, with the institutions in limbo – so that there is no Agreement-sanctioned arrangement for running Northern Ireland – the British and Irish governments have a responsibility to find temporary alternatives, delivering as nearly as possible on Agreement objectives. This might include overcoming the DUP veto.

Such changes could only be temporary, while dialogue continued on the underlying problems – the governments acting alone have little legitimacy to change the Agreement settlement permanently. Whether such an approach is possible at present depends on politics; the approach of a UK general election may make things difficult.

In reality, the present UK government may be unlikely to go so far. But, unless there is early restoration of the institutions it needs to take urgent steps to avoid serious damage to public welfare resulting from the absence of decision-making over the budget and other issues. The Secretary of State is right to be determined to avoid direct rule on any lasting basis: it is extremely controversial, the more so given the role the Agreement accords to the Irish government (see NIPF, chapter 3). But in certain areas, London intervention is essential to enable Northern Ireland to function at all, as is shown in the setting of budgets that we have seen.

Among the things London may need to do, whether or not devolution returns this autumn, is to put Stormont on a sounder financial footing – with provision, probably, for increased rates (local government taxes) or water charges. The current fiscal setup can only increase instability, threatening future Executives. Inducing the Assembly, on its return, to legislate for more revenue raising would be difficult and distracting. London may have to act, therefore – with the outraged acquiescence of the Northern Ireland parties. The legislation might bite only after the general election, giving resumed institutions a chance to modify it. A discussion of need is certainly necessary; there might be negotiation over introducing the increases gradually and cushioning those most threatened with hardship.

But the work of ensuring that the Agreement settlement survives may now fall to a new UK government. It is essential that it takes up its responsibilities energetically, empathetically and even-handedly, from the start. Its mantra needs to be making the Agreement function in all its aspects. Without a resolute approach, it risks much going wrong on its watch, not only with the political institutions, but also the stability we have come to know in the last quarter century. This would be serious work, but there are prizes for statesmanship in the field.

In addition to the two reports authored by Alan mentioned above, the Unit has more recently published a report in which Deputy Director Alan Renwick and Conor Kelly analyse how the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement is seen across Northern Ireland’s different communities and among politicians, civil servants and other experts. Perspectives on the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement: Examining Diverse Views, 1998–2023 is available free of charge via the Unit website.

About the author

Alan Whysall is a former civil servant in the Northern Ireland Office who advised British ministers throughout the negotiations that led to the 1998 Agreement. He is now an Honorary Senior Research Associate at the Unit, specialising in politics in Northern Ireland. He is the author of The Agreement at 25 and Northern Ireland’s Political Future.

Featured image credit: Prime Minister Rishi Sunak meets Secretary of State Chris Heaton-Harris (CC BY 2.0) by UK Government