Adam Jogee

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady, who is a near neighbour and a former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, both for her interest in and commitment to Northern Irish affairs and for her full and appropriate tribute to Michael. I thank her for making it. For nations across the globe, St Patrick’s day is a day of celebration, acknowledgment and togetherness, and a day—it rather feels like a month nowadays—when the world can be described in two ways: those who are Irish and Northern Irish, and those who wished they were. The noble Lord, Lord Brennan, a man born to an Irish father and a Welsh mother, told me last night that as St David’s day is 1 March, he was not prepared to concede a month to celebrate St Patrick’s day unless it started around 8 March. I told him that as long as St George’s day is safe in April, I was happy to let the debate go on. St Patrick’s day’s global popularity is perhaps most obvious in the city of Chicago, which famously dyes its river green every year to mark this important milestone. While I appreciate the sentiment, I am sure that we have all had enough of the rivers and lakes in our country—whether the Thames outside this place or Lough Neagh—turning the most unusual of colours. Much of this is closer to home. I am proud of my own family roots in Northern Ireland. My late grandmother’s father was of good, solid County Down stock. I note the passing of his last remaining child, my great-aunt Margaret Wilson, who died at the grand old age of 105 last week. The blend of Irish and English is clearly a recipe for a good, long life. My own roots parked to one side, one of the best decisions I ever made—other than being born to a good Staffordshire woman in my mother, over which I had little influence—was to marry my brilliant, wonderful wife. I had little influence in that, either—she had to say yes. My wife is a woman of and from Northern Ireland but who calls the ancient and loyal borough of Newcastle-under-Lyme home.