DON'T MESS WITH HAY

Assembly Speaker, William Hay, was in good form today. He managed to deflect several rogue questions that members tried to fire at the First Minister during OFMDFM questions. One was Alex Attwood's attempt to bring up the issue of why the First Minister had not decided to speak to the House about the decision to re-advertise the post of Victims Commissioner.

The second was a supplementary after a question was posed about Freedom of Information. The offending Assembly member asked Dr Paisley about the letter he sent (signed by his son) to a lottery fund which claimed that a private developer's plans for the Giant's Causeway had UNESCO approval, something UNESCO denies. According to the Belfast Telegraph this evening, this issue may now come under investigation by the Commons.

Some of the Speaker's interventions can be heard on today's 'Maxwell on Monday' from Belfast Tonight on Citybeat.

The fact that the Speaker stopped both questions being put to the First Minister (though the first I refer to was brought up again by Alliance leader, David Ford) does show the tremendous power that he has. According to the Speaker's Office it is impossible to contradict the Speaker on the floor of the Chamber and he is only accountable to the Assembly as a whole - he is not subject to any over-arching body or ombudsman.* The speaker can only be removed if the Assembly choose a new one. His judgements and procedural decisions are based on the Standing Orders, precedent and in the last instance Erskine May. (a man from the 19th century obsessed with Parliamentary procedure - his Parliamentary Practice book is considered a part of the British constitution - you know the one that isn't written down!)

Now some people who know a thing or two about being beyond questioning are the Burmese Junta. The situation in the country came up in the Chamber today because of a motion by the SDLP. I accept that the Assembly should back campaigns that help the Burmese people - but I wonder how much value there is in a devolved region of the UK giving a significant amount of debating time to a foreign policy issue. We don't have our own foreign office, nor are we ever likely to have one, but imagine if we did?

They could nominate Gregory Campbell Ambassador to Vatican City?

Some of the rest of today's Assembly action can be heard on 'Maxwell on Monday'

*According to Speaker's Office