Analysis: The shambolic Executive Office committee has shown Stormont at its worst

Yet MLAs on the scrutiny body have argued it’s all a media “narrative” – and criticised coverage of issues which wouldn’t be in the public domain if not for the media, and the News Letter in particular.

The committee (TEO) is supposed to hold the executive office, ie the first ministers Michelle O’Neill and Emma Little Pengelly, to account. But its ‘scrutiny’ of Ms O’Neill, the first minister, over Sinn Fein’s safeguarding scandals was woeful.

The Sinn Fein leader successfully sowed total confusion in the committee, and walked away from her attempted interrogation unscathed in October as MLAs rowed with each other in the background – while a rattled chairperson shouted “thank you first minister” over the racket.

This week we revealed that there were undeclared text messages sent from Ms O’Neill to the committee chair, Paula Bradshaw, the night before her evidence. Yet instead of this causing uproar and demands for Ms Bradshaw to stand down, the News Letter was criticised by committee members for our reportage.

Ms Bradshaw has been backed by Alliance and Sinn Fein colleagues when she has objected to Timothy Gaston (who replaced Jim Allister as TUV MLA for North Antrim) questioning witnesses who appear before the committee rather than listening to their “lived experience”.

Most MLAs on the committee didn’t seem to mind when Ms Bradshaw ordered officials to cut the live feed when he attempted to raise a letter of complaint about her handling of previous meetings, something for which she later apologised. Already fractious since the arrival of Mr Gaston earlier this year, MLAs have been at each others throats for weeks now.

In the aftermath of that farcical evidence session in October at which Ms O’Neill refused to answer questions, Sinead McLaughlin of the SDLP said confidence in the committee needs to be restored – and criticised a prior meeting between the chair and the first minister, saying that on reflection Ms Bradshaw shouldn’t have gone.

But this week the Foyle MLA u-turned – saying there is no rule or standard that prevents such a conversation “in any shape, form or fashion”. She also branded questions over the chair’s decision not to reveal text messages from Michelle O’Neill as “pathetic” and “performative” – saying there was “nothing to see” in two text messages from the first minister to Ms Bradshaw – messages in which Ms O’Neill attempted to influence how her own interrogation was conducted.

The opposition MLA demonstrated no interest in discussing undeclared communications from the head of government, telling colleagues to “just leave it”.

Sinn Fein’s MLAs have provided a masterclass in deflection – with no attempt to scrutinise the first minister. They have repeatedly protected the Alliance chair from legitimate and obvious questions raised by Mr Gaston.

There appears to be little understanding from Sinn Fein, SDLP or Alliance MLAs how their approach looks to the outside world, where people care more about effective scrutiny than the semantics and arcane Stormont rules they have cited to defend their failures.

To begin with, in the sorry saga over Michelle O’Neill’s appearance, MLAs sent questions to the first minister in advance. In what other scenario would a witness have that luxury? It gave Ms O’Neill ample time to get her arguments in line and sow confusion over what could and couldn’t be asked. But the committee was so keen to ensure she attended, they played right into her hands.

There were then various accounts given to the media about how many questions were provided in advance, from none, to two, to five. The true figure, seven, only emerging via this newspaper.

Most MLAs didn’t initially appear to see any issue with the rushed private meeting between the chair and the first minister in advance of her evidence session, during which Michelle O’Neill sought – and succeeded in getting – the meeting largely on her terms. This was demonstrated by interventions from the chair, who ruled questions out and at one point – extraordinarily – claimed the Sinn Fein politician was being ‘badgered’.

The shambles has been explained away by claims – including by the chair – that it was caused by the “unprecedented” nature of events that led up to the evidence session. But quite how that was the case why has never been properly explained. If it was rushed, it was because the committee insisted it was.

There then followed weeks of discussions about the minutes of the meeting. Alliance, Sinn Fein and SDLP MLAs had absolutely no interest in seeing the record of the meeting – which were revealed after they were leaked to the News Letter and the Nolan Show.

Nor did the MLAs have any interest in seeing the contemporaneous notes – with SF’s Emma Sheerin accusing Timothy Gaston of “questioning the integrity of the chair” for seeking them. Alliance’s Stewart Dickson, claimed releasing them would “create a very serious chill factor” for the civil servant who wrote them.

MLAs have demonstrated almost blind faith in the chair.

Yet a number of claims made by Paula Bradshaw – in Stormont and in the media – have turned out not to be the full story.

Despite initial claims that she would produce minutes of her private meeting with the first minister, it transpired that it wasn’t in her gift to do so – as she had not asked her officials to take them. Only the first minister’s officials did – an account a DUP MLA described as a “narrative”.

Then there were the text messages – that our queries revealed this week – she deliberately chose not to mention.

They show the first minister made three attempts to contact her ahead of a key evidence session – information which was not given to MLAs when a list of correspondence was provided to them. Paula Bradshaw made no mention of the messages when she was questioned about a timeline of communications provided by officials.

Her defence for not releasing the messages is that she was asked by Mr Gaston for “all the communication that went from this committee” – adding “I would have picked up on that”. In other words, because he didn’t specifically ask for communications to her phone, she didn’t declare them.

But anyone watching the proceedings in recent weeks would have a very different impression. “I have been transparent with all of this, I have not held any information back”, she said. When Mr Gaston put to her that she decided not to declare the messages, she said “that’s up to the first minister to answer”.

Ms Bradshaw asked: “Should I ignore the first minister?” – adding that she had “missed her correspondence overnight”.

Ms Bradshaw also claimed she didn’t say she hadn’t “engaged” with the first minister, she had said “I never engage”. Make of that what you will.

Some good work goes on in Stormont’s committees, in which MLAs scrutinise witnesses, probe evidence and most importantly they know what their role is. Contrast that to the TEO committee, where this week DUP MLA Harry Harvey sat through an evidence session in Irish with no headphones on to listen to a translation. He’s not fluent Irish speaker, so what was he doing? Certainly not scrutinising.

Timothy Gaston’s arrival in the TEO committee has shone a spotlight on the body – and how utterly ineffective it is.