Also it can be argued that despite Direct rule democracy was present in the form of representation by NI MP’s in Westminster. For example in the early days of direct rule NI had 12 MP’s representing their interest in the House of Commons.
However on the other hand, critics will point out that the House of Commons is made up of over 600 MP’s from throughout the United Kingdom which reduces the NI MP’s real influence to almost an insignificant level of representation.
Yet on several occasions these small numbers of NI Mp’s have infact extended some considerable influence. For instance during John Majors government ministry (1991-1997) due to a reduced majority, the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) held a form of balance of power on certain key votes, in this particular case the issue was European Integration. However it must be remembered that this power was only ever really exercised on big constitutional issues where the government’s majority was reduced considerably.
Since the signing of the GFA in 1997, and the re-implementation of devolution, which subsequently followed, local politicians were once again empowered to make decisions concerning local government issues. Despite this it was common, during the 1st assembly for members to get bogged down in the politics of Sectarianism, which restricted local government proceedings.
Despite such problems it is undeniable that the self-government and re-establishment of the NI parliament (The Assembly) provided by the GFA has come a long way in ensuring NI government is more balanced and inclusive due to its Consociationalist principles which is a political system formed by the cooperation of different social groups on the basis of shared power.
The assembly itself is directly involved in government and ministers are nominated to government through an electoral system called the ‘d’hondt’ system whereby seats are won singly and indeed successfully on the basis of the highest average. This method requires that the number of seats awarded to each party in the assembly, be divided initially by one and thereafter by the number of Executive committee seats won by the party by one. This rather tedious system provides smaller parties with the opportunity of winning seats by means of 2nd and 3rd preference votes. In essence it is a form of proportional representation provides a power-sharing situation. It is undeniable that such a system is both democratic and indeed fair.
Yet another example of a more democratically refined system of government in place since devolution is the committee system. The GFA hoped the committee system would promote power sharing in several ways. Firstly membership of the committees is decided using the d’hondt system to ensure committee representation was commensurate (proportionate) with seats in the assembly and secondly the committees would work in partnership with each of their target departments e.g. Health, Education etc. Indeed the committees act as a balance of power, scrutinising their subject departments thus ensuring their target departments do not become the mini fiefdoms of their ministerial heads. Due to the consociationalist nature of the NI assembly/executive there is no formal opposition. Therefore committee’s scrutinise and challenge executive decisions and hold the executive to account, over legislation and anomalies.
Another way the democratic system has been introduced into the devolved system of government is through the passage of legislation. No longer can the secretary of state by-pass MLA’s and introduce legislation without the consultation of the political parties of NI, as was the case under direct rule. Nowadays there is a lengthy, detailed process which scrutinises legislation from its conception right through to its accepting or scrapping as the case may be during the final voting stage. In order to pass legislation, it must be debated and scrutinised by committees and assembly members before either being passed or rejected. In this way theoretically all NI MP’s have the ability to accept or reject legislation. As a result we can conclude that such a process provides direct representation.
Finally the NI executive which is effectively the cabinet of NI has the ability to govern on key issues and furthermore acts as a forum for discussion on issues which involve two or more ministers in order to recommend a common position where necessary. This is a further example of increased representation.
In conclusion it can be argued that the GFA achieved its primary goals, which included the protection of rights and interests among all sides of NI’s communities and moreover paved the way for a return of devolution and representative government. Indeed in this sense the GFA empowered local politicians to make local decisions, instead of a secretary of state and their junior ministers, who as we have seen were usually British politicians and therefore detached from the issues of governing NI and its people. Despite these undeniable successes the 1st assembly was plagued with the politics of sectarianism and regularly became bogged down and eventually suspended on several occasions. Nevertheless despite these problems, the NI assembly and executive debated, passed and initiated a range of legislation directly concerned with NI. Indeed personally I believe these devolved institutions of government created on the whole a much more democratic system that that which existed under direct rule.
