Irish Church leaders have called for urgent government action to address growing poverty and political uncertainty in Northern Ireland, with the prospect of an assembly election before Christmas.
The Catholic Archbishop of Armagh, Eamon Martin, joined the leaders of Ireland Presbyterian, Anglican and Methodist at a meeting of the Church Leaders’ Group (Ireland) with the secretary of state for Northern Ireland, Chris Heaton-Harris, at Hillsborough Castle on the evening of 26 October.
They released a joint statement the next day, in which they emphasised “the importance of maintaining stability, regardless of whatever scenario evolves after this Friday’s deadline expires to re-establish the executive”.
The Stormont Assembly was recalled on Thursday in an attempt to restore the power-sharing executive before the legal deadline of 28 October, after which the secretary of state is required by law to call an election.
After assembly members failed to reach an agreement, Mr Heaton-Harris wrote on Twitter this morning that “the legal duty to act” fell on him and he would be “providing an update on this”. An election must be held within the next 12 weeks.
Power-sharing has stalled since February this year, when the Democratic Unionist Party withdrew from the executive in protest at the Northern Ireland protocol which governs trade with the province.
An election in May returned Sinn Fein as the largest party in the assembly, but a power-sharing executive cannot be formed without the participation of the Democratic Unionists, who maintain that the protocol threatens Northern Ireland’s place in the United Kingdom.
The Church leaders said that their conversation with Mr Heaton-Harris addressed this problem.
“We also took the opportunity to highlight the increasingly strained relationships on these islands, and within local communities, caused by the outworking of Brexit and the resulting Northern Ireland protocol,” their statement notes.
“Together, we urged the secretary of state to encourage his colleague, the foreign secretary, to work for a negotiated settlement with the European Union that deals with both the trade issues and enables people to be secure in their identity, allowing relationships to improve.”
Wednesday’s meeting between the Church leaders and the secretary of state had been scheduled before recent political developments and was their first encounter since Mr Heaton-Harris’s appointment last month by the then-prime minister Liz Truss. He was reappointed to the post by Rishi Sunak on Tuesday.
The Church leaders said that the meeting addressed “the fact that the people of Northern Ireland are experiencing the worst cost of living crisis for generations”.
Their statement continues: “Together, we were able to relay to [Mr Heaton-Harris] the reality of life for ordinary people from across our congregations and parishes, outlining the significant stress that is being caused by the fear of what is coming in the months ahead and the uncertainty about the support that is being offered.”
Northern Ireland’s bishops have made several interventions on the cost of living crisis in recent weeks. Archbishop Martin was one of five signatories of a statement issued on the feast of St Vincent de Paul at the end of September condemning the economic policies of Liz Truss’s government.
The Church Leaders Group said that they called for clearer government policy on Wednesday.
“While outlining some of the initiatives our churches are undertaking on the ground, as they see to make a difference, we took the opportunity to urge the secretary of state to give the clarity that is needed in relation to the support that has been promised, especially for the most vulnerable in our society, who are always affected the most when there is a cost of living crisis.”
The meeting also addressed measures introduced by Westminster in the absence of the devolved government – specifically “the introduction of the most liberal abortion regime on these islands, and the current legacy bill before parliament”. The latter will effectively end prosecutions for violent crimes committed during the Troubles.
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