AND THERES MORE Jonathan Craig (DUP) I agree that it is good that this subject has been brought to the House. Like many others around the Chamber, I am disgusted, outraged and sickened by the length of time that this application process has taken, and, as yet, it is not complete. As we learned earlier, this has all been going on since 2004. What I find remarkable in all of this is that we are talking about not only one of the best known names in the retail business in the whole of the United Kingdom, that is, John Lewis, but one of the few national chains in the United Kingdom that buys into the whole social principle with regard to its workforce. That is why I find it remarkable that the SDLP, of all parties, has attacked it. The company is wholly owned by those who work in it. I think that is something that the Minister needs to go away and have a good, long, hard think about. It is not one of those capitalist companies that drains the resources out of the system and passes them on to billionaires who we all rarely get to see or know about. It is a company that shares its profit among its workforce and is wholly owned by its workforce. I thought that that party over there would have been wholly behind that and would have totally supported it coming in to Northern Ireland and, for that matter, Ireland as a whole. Others have already asked what the issue was. Why could it not go to Belfast or, for that matter, to the centre of Lisburn? All those questions were asked at the time. In 2006 and 2007, I and some of my colleagues, such as the Minister of Health, were privileged to have sat in negotiations with John Lewis, which were carried out with the local authority at the time. As mayor at that time, I took part in those negotiations, and what I found fascinating about the company was not only its social principles and how well it looked after its workforce but the whole concept of what it was bringing, not specifically to Sprucefield or Lisburn but to Northern Ireland as a whole. At that time, it was said that it would bring 1,200 jobs. Some 800 of those jobs were to be directly associated with the shop, and 400 were to be part of an all-Ireland distribution network. If those 400 jobs do not come to Sprucefield, they will certainly go somewhere else. We can be absolutely certain of that. The other thing that I found extremely alarming when the Minister made his statement was that the company, which has a social conscience, had clearly agreed that a quarter of its workforce at Sprucefield would be targeted for areas of high unemployment. In fact, part of the agreement was that it would target unemployment in areas such as West Belfast, which the Minister allegedly represents. I say allegedly because 25% of that workforce would have been 300 jobs, targeted for areas like West Belfast. I would not pat myself on the back if I were the Minister, allegedly representing West Belfast and taking 300 jobs away from my own area. I would hang my head in shame, quite frankly. What was the impact on all of us going to be? A major shopping chain coming not just to Sprucefield but to Northern Ireland plc, bringing with it not only the prestige that it wanted but an all-Ireland draw. That is why it could not go in the middle of Belfast. The company clearly works out its plans so that there is a minimum population of 2,500,000 to draw from.
Posted on: Thu, 30 Oct 2014 12:30:09 +0000