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A new report by the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee has recommended a change in the law to allow the Stormont Speaker and the First and Deputy First Ministers to be elected by a two-thirds supermajority of MLAs.

It adds that in recognition of their equal status, the positions should be rebranded as ‘Joint First Ministers’ with the position open to any two MLAs of any two parties rather than just the largest parties as is the case today.

The recommendations have been made in the NIAC’s report on its inquiry into ‘The effectiveness of the institutions of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement’.

Committee Chair Sir Robert Buckland said: “When Stormont collapses critical public services are cast adrift. Health, education, policing; all are feeling the strain while important decisions go unmade, and the people of Northern Ireland suffer.

John Hume's glasses and signature on a signed copy of the Good Friday Agreement.

“More stringent safeguards are needed to protect against the cycle of restoration and collapse that has dogged Stormont.

“The short-term measures we’ve proposed will shore up the stability of Stormont increasing the incentives to keep the institutions moving and enabling the Assembly to run without an Executive in place.

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“In the longer run, we feel that a full independent review into the effectiveness of the institutions of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement should be conducted with input from all stakeholders. This should include the North-South and East-West elements, but a fully functioning Stormont is the foundation on which the rest stands.”

The committee points out that each of the proposed changes would require consultation with the Irish Government as co-guarantors to the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement as well as the parties of North.

They would require tweaking the 1998 Northern Ireland Act that came from the Agreement. The Act enshrines power-sharing government and devolution in the North.

Currently, votes from a majority of MLAs within both the Nationalist and Unionist traditions are needed to secure the posts of Speaker, and First and Deputy First Ministers.

The committee states that ‘with the growth of the proportion of NI society identifying as neither Unionist nor Nationalist since the Agreement, supermajority voting would effectively equate to cross-community consent, the Committee heard during its inquiry’.

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