Coulter has historic first Debate Honour
Rev Dr Robert Coulter, the Ulster Unionist Party Assembly member for North Antrim and UUP Stormont Commissioner, had the honour of proposing and speaking on the first motion of the new legislative parliament when MLAs supported his call to rejoin the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association.
Dr Coulter said: “It was a tremendous personal honour for me when I was told I would be proposing the first motion for debate in the new Assembly. In the past, I have also had the privilege of representing the Assembly at CPA conferences in Australia and Wales.
“The success of this motion is an important milestone for the Assembly. In rejoining the CPA, the Assembly is re-entering the largest association of free and democratic parliaments across the world.
“This is an important statement for the Assembly to make. It says Northern Ireland is back on a sound democratic track and, once again, is a distinct part of that great democratic worldwide community.”
Dr Coulter said the CPA was founded in 1911 and was originally known as the Empire Parliamentary Association. It became the CPA in 1949.
Active CPA branches existed in 169 national, state, provincial and territorial parliaments across the Commonwealth, with a total membership of around 16,000 parliamentarians, he added, making the CPA “one of the greatest democratic forums on earth”.
The North Antrim MLA recently attended the annual conference of the British islands and Mediterranean region in Belfast, which was hosted by the CPA’s United Kingdom branch.
He said CPA membership would bring “real and tangible benefits” to Assembly members. “It will put them in the mainstream of a worldwide association and embed the Assembly where it rightly belongs – alongside other democratic legislatures.
“The time has come for our Assembly to take its place once again among our parliamentary friends and among the great community of nations and free people that make up this truly international body, spanning all continents and income levels and bound by a common heritage of democracy, liberty, justice and freedom under the law,” said Assemblyman Dr Coulter.