Lord Caine:

Apologies, but I must leave at 11.30 for another meeting. I have less a question than an observation. I agree with much of what Lord Hain has said about some of the issues and hurdles that were overcome in 1998, 2007, 2014 and 2015 being such that, by comparison, the protocol should be easier - I will not say relatively easy - than some of those issues. It is five years ago today that we had the referendum. Shortly after that, the Northern Ireland Executive, Arlene Foster and Martin McGuinness, sent a joint letter to the then UK Government setting out the specific concerns for Northern Ireland. A few months later the Executive fell. Throughout that crucial period of Britain negotiating, or starting to negotiate, its exit from the EU, there was no direct Northern Ireland voice. Northern Ireland tended to be represented on Cabinet subcommittees by civil servants, not by politicians. I think that was an absolute tragedy for Northern Ireland, that it was not directly involved during that period. Fast forward to today and we see elements of political stability. The DUP is going through a fairly tumultuous time. There has been talk on both sides of crashing the institutions and so on.

My plea, which slightly follows one of Lord Hain's earlier comments, is that bearing in mind the experience we had without an Executive between 2017 and 2020, we all must do whatever we can to bring whatever influence we have to bear through our direct relationships with people involved in Northern Ireland to ensure the institutions survive and we do not go through that period of instability and collapse again.