03/02/2013 Sunday Politics Northern Ireland

$:/STARTFEED. And on Sunday politics in Northern Ireland, the

planning Minister defends his controversial Sprucefield ruling

Apology for the loss of subtitles for 2425 seconds

against the DUP's Simon Hamilton. Good morning. Welcome it to Sunday

Politics in Northern Ireland. Hundreds of jobs gone as Alex

Attwood insists there will be no John Lewis store at Sprucefield.

Will the matter be taken out of his hands? Also as MLAs try to clamp

down on the abuse on social networks sites, will they find the

internet uncontrollable. With me to talk about that is Joanne Stuart

and the Belfast Telegraph's Liam Clarke. As the economic decline

continues, Northern Ireland has waved goodbye to 150 new jobs and a

�150 million investment. John Lewis has withdrawn spans to build a

store in sprays they have after the Environment Minister insisted it

was Belfast or nowhere for the scheme. This has angered his

colleagues, how has the news gone down with the citizens of Lisburn?

Are they relieved or cheated? a disgrace. I think in the economic

climate, especially in the building industry, and it needed a boost.

is because of Belfast do not want us to have it. I think it would be

terrible if they go to Dublin and do not stay at here. I think John

Lewis has shown remarkable endurance and patience about this.

It has been nine years. To come to Lisburn? If they are thinking about

taking the trade out of the city centre, they should have stayed

anyway. In it is out of my price range, but I have a neighbour who

would go to hell and back for John Lewis. The occurrence state of the

economy, is it worth while are putting up a new store? Will they

get much business? There are probably shops that are struggling

as it is. Does Lisburn need an expensive store? They have been

talking about it for ages, it is like asking a girl out, if she does

not make her mind up. Alex Attwood joins me and the D B MLA Simon

Hamilton. How is red-carding a development on this scale good news

for Northern Ireland PLC? Basque people in Lisburn, Newtownards,

Craigavon, were it something of this character were to happen at

Sprucefield, 20 stores, twice the size of Forest side, the evidence

is overwhelmingly that it would have serious detrimental impact,

measured up to 30% on all the town centres and city centres of Greater

Belfast and beyond. That means consequences in terms of thousands

of job losses potentially and business closures. That is why,

when we have a Belfast first policy, but we have built up and the City,

invested in Titanic, there may even be a City University coming, why

would we turn on our head the established proper policy for

retail development? In this case, John Lewis has made it clear it

wants to come up to Lisburn or Dublin. The Belfast first policy is

a red herring. You have turned this into Belfast only! You are thumbing

your nose at this Investment! policy I am adopting is the a

policy adopted by the Executive. It says that in order to drive the

economy of Northern Ireland, you need to have a vibrant and bright

Belfast. That is why all that investment across Heritage, tourism,

Bart's, the Titanic has come here. A vital and vibrant Belfast as part

of a strong town and city centre retail policy, in the greater

Belfast area and beyond, that is the best model. The notion of that

he's send the message from Peter Robinson by the proposal going

ahead, that these towns and cities have to sink and swim on their own,

it is not credible. This is an Executive policy, we might not like

it, we have to stick to it and get on with it! Sprucefield was

designated within the regional development strategy as the only

regional out of town shopping centre Humbert in Northern Ireland

and Alex Attwood talked about a recession, we cannot afford to lose

this investment at any time. These are not just any jobs, these are

some of the best jobs in retail in Britain. John Lewis employees rank

the company as one of the best he in the UK. Employees become

shareholders in the company. What if it means displacement of jobs

and other town and city centres are losing out? This will lead to

disinvestment. This is not a case of Lisburn losing out and Belfast

benefiting. This is a case of the - - Northern Ireland losing out. John

Lewis will re-examine and move forward on plans to go to Dublin

and that is not good for Northern Ireland. It is taking much needed

investment away from Northern Ireland and taking it to Dublin.

That is not good for Belfast, Lisburn are anywhere in Northern

Ireland. That is not the evidence. The evidence that I gave to the

planning inquiry is that the impact upon it Belfast would be 15%, the

impact upon a Lisburn would be 25% of retail, in Craigavon a 35% and

so on for Newtownards, Newry and other parts of the North. This will

have an impact. The issue is not John Lewis, it is a scale of

development at Sprucefield of the 20 shops twice the size of Forest

side. That would have a big impact. If John Lewis it go to Dublin.

might go there as well. It might be Dublin and somewhere in the north.

If they go to Dublin first, they will establish the distribution

centre there and that will take a huge percentage of jobs there that

we cannot get back. If it goes to Dublin, then four the period of

time it that it is there, which is not likely to happen now, they have

said they are not going to Belfast. If people take the John Lewis trade

to Dublin, them way the -- when they are there, they will purchase

other goods and services. That is why we will lose out. This is a

Belfast decision taken by a Belfast Minister in the interests of your

home city. Would you and you be different if you had MLAs in Lagan

Valley? My responsibility... Your party is pretty it's the --

interested in another development. The DUP has questions to answer.

They have been on the back foot about their political contact --

conduct and they want to turn the story around. My job is not to make

plans based upon the next month to the next year. My job is to give

advice and the advice has to be what is in the national interest.

Let us hear what the DUP plans to do about this. The First Minister

has made it clear he is not happy. He says it is bad news for Northern

Ireland. He says ministers should encourage investment. He is not

holding back on what he says. What does he do? He goes back to the

Executive and tries to call in at the decision, over remit? This has

been taken out of his hands. He he is the Minister! Changes to the

Northern Ireland Act have been amended to allow for the First

Minister and the Deputy First Minister to act jointly to bring

controversial decisions into the Executive. We are going to have all

sorts of issues brought back that have been made by your ministers as

well. That is the point of having shared government. We cannot have

one Minister moving ahead on one decision. This is an issue of such

significance to the economy, it is not just about the investment and

jobs, it is about the impression it gives potential investors, if you

want to come here and make that investment, you are told by

government Minister that you are not welcome. Members of the

Executive may gang up on you! deal with this impression that I

said this to developers? I know that the system that I inherited

from the DUP and I know the character of it today were we are

turning around all the significant applications, were we had in six

months alone 250 renewable applications sent out. The

character of planning today compared to 18 months ago has sent

out a strong message to investors that we will get the decisions made.

The Michelle O'Neill made a decision and I backed her up at the

Executive and in writing around the proposed move to Ballykelly. It was

taken because of ministerial authority. The win he turned down

an investment and all those jobs, that sends a message to investors

and it is not a good message. not a pro economy message. Let us

get a business response. Let us bring in it Joe and Stuart and Liam

Clarke from the Belfast Telegraph. What is your position on this. Do

you come down on one side as to whether or not at the development

should or should not happen? shows the difficulties we have with

the planning system. The fact it has taken and nine E years and we

have had a different interpretation of planning policy. The economic

investment is really important to Northern Ireland. We have had a

difficult few months were we have been getting the wrong message

going out across the world and we want to get these high-quality

businesses coming into Northern Ireland. You also have people who

say we need to deal with the issue of out of town shopping centres.

They say it will have a detrimental effect on other places. If you look

at this decision, 30 years down the line, it is the right decision, but

in the next six months, it looks like the wrong decision. We need to

look at how we maximise the investment. Sprucefield is existing

there. We will not have another harbour creating further problems.

We will look at how we invigorate the city centres. People are

looking for different things. We cannot remove the people's choice.

We have to give them different reasons to go into the city centre.

This is about looking at how we look at culture and how that can

help to reinvigorate. I have worked with theatre companies about how

would you reinvigorate empty retail units. That is on one scale, it is

not on the scale of 1,500 jobs and millions of pounds worth of

investment. We have to look at it creatively about how we are

reinvigorating its city centres. Stopping one development will not

be to do this. It seems to send a bad image for Northern Ireland if

we lose it John Lewis. The danger for Alex Attwood, who has speeded

up planning procedures, he has a danger of going it down in history

as a man who lost this very significant landmark Investment. It

will open up interesting issues in the Executive. The DUP seem to have

done their homework. Or ruling and Minister, that impinges on a system

which is dear to Sinn Fein. They may have the right to call it in,

but there is a question if the Sinn Fein would support it. It could

open up a can of worms? Be it opens up a precedent. If Sinn Fein agreed

to it and it seems to me that the Executive can take the decision and

the question will be what lino will see Sinn Fein it take. It is quite

a political decision. It has quite a way to run. Let me ask you, if

this decision is called in and comes back to the Executive and if

the First Minister and Deputy First Minister say they are not happy,

would you feel the need to resign? I find buys up under pressure all

the time, it will not turn me away from what it Joanna the just said.

Whether it is the towns of Greater Belfast or beyond or Belfast city

centre, we have to protect in in- town retail. The consequences of

the closure of further businesses, in a situation where in Belfast we

have 25% of vacancies on Ready, the consequences in my view, there is

an argument, it is difficult, this is the time and place where we say

that we stand by our policy, stand by our retailers and we want to

bring other people, but there are times when a line has to be drawn.

How would the DUP feel if you get your way and it does not happen in

Belfast and it goes ahead as breeze filled but then it town centres and

city centres like Lisburn actually suffer and you lose a jobs?

threat to town and city centres is not coming from John Lewis, it is

coming from online retail. That is threatening our city and town

centres. The point about reinvigorating the centres is not

helped by turning away potential investors, it is about sprucing

them up and doing other things that attract people in, not just retail.

We need to leave it there. In a moment, the challenge of policing

social networking websites. First a look back at the political week

with Gareth Gordon. The murder of a Garda officer prompted Gerry Adams

to issue an apology to victims of the IRA in the Republic. By want to

apologise to the family and to the other families of other members of

the state forces. Loyalist like protesters said they would change

tactics, they will hold white line of pickets and target council

meetings. The National crime agency will not operate here following

objections from Sinn Fein and the SDLP and the Justice Minister says

it is a mistake. It is a get out of jail card for the Crumlin Road

courthouse by St MLAs. As Ballymena honours Liam Neeson, a Holywood

star revealed the secret of his success. I have got a work ethic

that I have got from Ballymena. Gareth Gordon reporting. Is the

internet the crucible of the freedom of expression or a haven

for sex offenders, he to groups and social misfits? This week there

will be two motions calling for increased control about what goes

on on the internet especially social media websites. The issue of

the flag protests has brought the issue to the fore. Your party is

proposing a one of the motions, the other is a cross-party motion. What

is the issue? What are your concerns? What of the major issues

is that sectarianism has grown new legs through social media.

Certainly anyone who uses Facebook or Twitter will see some extreme

examples of sectarianism and a lot of it seems to go ahead without any

punishment or been taken aside. It is hard to police. That is the

fundamental point. It is impossible. In his difficult. In terms of local

agencies, they do not know how to do with it. A lot of the complaints

are dealt with under the Communications Act, but what is of

interest is that in England, Keir Starmer her and the CPS have issued

guidance and I think we need, not the same guidelines, but guidelines

that would be sufficient in dealing with the problems that we have,

particularly with regard to sectarianism. Does the legislation

not already exist? It is about the effective use of it. That is the

distinction between the legislation and guidance. I think that the

Public Prosecutions Service needed to set an example and set out clear

points that police and others should abide by. I think that this

it needs to be done urgently but we also need to guard against the

situation where police will be bald did down by a lot of work with

regards to the internet. We need to distinguish between the more

serious and the less serious issues. So on people believe that the lot

macro has been heavy-handed already. We need to distinguish between what

is most serious and what is not. In terms of sectarianism, a lot of

this behaviour on the internet... Can you not just block or on follow

these people? If you took everything seriously, you would not

get out of bed in the morning. that is the case, the same should

apply to town centres are places of work, but we cannot allow this

precedent to be set on the internet. It is a public place. The this is a

global issue. This is a problem for politicians. Our MLAs will not sort

this out, this is a huge global issue. We needed to ensure the

legislation and guidance and regulations are in place to ensure

that there are examples -- examples set. Not only in terms of

sectarianism, there have been examples work young people have

taken their own lives as a result of cyber bullying. That is a good

reason why we should be doing some urgent work on this. Thank you. Let

us here are your thoughts. Do you think we needed to step up and try

to police the internet? Does it need to be more heavy hand at?

There has to be more prosecutions, more visibility of people being

taken it to account about this. What about more education? Media

literacy is a big thing. People know how to use the technology, but

do not understand the consequences. You need to know how to behave

online. There is a fundamental free speech issue at the heart of this

as well. Yes. It is being policed to affair extent. Two loyalist

sides were taken down recently. That is continuing. I remember

there was a man who was barred from social media for harassing people

who had put websites up in tribute to dead children and he got a

custodial sentence. There is legislation there. There is

something in the education thing and perhaps there should be

warnings on Facebook that you are subject to the law of defamation.

That would make people fully aware that this is not something you can

do, like talking to your friends in that their car but. In it is about

educating friends. It is internet safety day on Tuesday. He does

about the education of parents. There is a positive side. If you

live in Japan, where social media was used and helped in that