Woodward hails 'new chapter' for North

Northern Ireland Secretary Shaun Woodward today hailed the historic Stormont justice deal as a “new chapter” for the country.

The agreement unveiled yesterday by First Minister and DUP leader Peter Robinson and Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness of Sinn Féin marked the end of a deadlock over devolution of policing powers that had blocked meetings of the Assembly Executive since June.

Woodward told MPs the development marked the “maturing of democracy” in the North.

In a Commons written statement he said: “This breakthrough represents a new chapter for the North, marking the beginning of an agreed process that will end in the transfer of policing of justice and powers from this House to locally elected politicians in the power-sharing assembly.”

Under the terms of the deal a new Department of Justice will be set up and a justice minister will be selected from outside Sinn Féin or the DUP, by a cross-community vote of Assembly members.

Woodward said: “As well as agreeing the steps to transfer these crucial powers, the events of this week mark the maturing of democracy in Northern Ireland.

“Negotiations that led to the Belfast and St Andrews Agreements were driven by the British and Irish Governments.

“Yesterday’s agreement was the product of negotiations between the political parties of Northern Ireland; its essential strength will rest in being an agreement made by Belfast in Belfast for all the people of Northern Ireland.”

In the House of Commons, MPs welcomed the deal but Labour former Ulster Secretary Peter Hain, who held the post in 2006 when the St Andrews Agreement which paved the way for a return to devolution was drawn up, warned that “the process will take time”.

He added: “It was never envisaged it would be one big-bang devolution of policing and justice, it will be phased through.”

SDLP leader Mark Durkan asked Mr Woodward if he was “confident that there will be no slippage or slipperiness” in the process that was outlined and that there was “a timetable envisaged if not actually expressed”.

Mr Woodward said the agreement had been “very carefully put together” and that the First and Deputy First Ministers “want devolution and want it without delay”.

He described it as a “historic” agreement as it had been made “not by the two governments but by the parties”.