SDLP Leader Claire Hanna MP will today challenge the Prime Minister to support urgent reform of Stormont, highlighting that the abuses of office wouldn’t be tolerated elsewhere, and warned that a failure to act now risks a total collapse following the next election.
Speaking ahead of Prime Minister’s Questions, Claire Hanna MP said:
“People look at our politics and see institutions that too often seem incapable of doing the things they were established to do.
“Yesterday, we saw a Petition of Concern, a safeguard intended to protect minority rights, used to block legislation to improve children’s education. Disagreements over legislation should be settled through effective scrutiny, not by weaponising safeguards.
“Stormont is running out of road, the governments are running out of time, and the people we represent are running out of patience with the continued failure of the Executive to deliver on any of its priorities.
“The SDLP makes no apology for our ambition to build a new Ireland, but we are resolute in our commitment to building a better Northern Ireland in the here and now.
“People are entitled to ask how we can build that better future when progress can be blocked at every turn. How can we expect people to believe in these institutions when so much political effort is devoted to tearing things down, rather than improving people’s lives.
“That is why the SDLP published Politics for the Common Good. It is a practical blueprint for moving beyond the politics of vetoes and deadlock and towards building something new.
“If our politics cannot be reformed to meet those expectations, then we should not be surprised that more and more people start looking elsewhere for a different future.
“The conversation about a New Ireland is growing because too many people have lost confidence in the ability of the status quo to deliver. The answer to that challenge is not more vetoes, more collapse and more dysfunction. The solution is urgent reform of our institutions to facilitate a politics genuinely focused on the common good.”
