Report set to examine the viability of cutting taxes
MORE than 20 days after the general election and the faces of candidates are still plastered over many of Northern Ireland’s lampposts.
There have been reports of posters still left up in a number of constituencies, including Foyle, and North and South Belfast.
The Electoral Commission confirmed that it had received complaints from the public about the issue.
One Belfast resident told the Belfast Telegraph: “Every time I look out my bedroom window, John Finucane is staring back at me.
“It’s like Big Brother watching.”
According to election rules, parties are required to have removed their posters from lampposts within two weeks of polling day — meaning they should have been taken down by last Thursday.
The responsibility for enforcing regulation of election posters lies with the planning departments of local councils.
Speaking to the Belfast Telegraph, a representative of the DUP in Foyle said that it generally made efforts to have all of its posters down within a day or two after the election, and that it was aware that some other parties had posters up after the deadline.
The Alliance Party said: “As far as we are aware, all of our posters are down.”
Prior to the deadline last week, the party had put a call out on social media and through its members’ network for anyone who had noticed any of its posters still up to alert it. The SDLP said its candidates “make every effort” to get the posters down within the allotted two-week period.
“It is possible, however, that candidates will miss a few posters across an entire constituency, so we’d encourage members of the public to contact local teams if they spot any we’ve missed so they can be taken down as quickly as possible,” it added. AN investigation is to be carried out into the viability of cuts to tourism VAT and Air Passenger Duty (APD) tax in Northern Ireland, the DUP has confirmed.
A report in the Daily Telegraph said the DUP was poised to demand more tax cuts costing £460m to keep Theresa May in power after Brexit in two years’ time.
But the party said the review to be conducted actually formed part of its present deal to prop up Mrs May’s minority Conservative government, rather than the next phase of the arrangement.
It was reported that Arlene Foster’s party would demand £90m to cover the cost of axing APD at Northern Ireland’s airports and £70m to fund cuts to VAT — from the current 20% to 9% — on hotels, restaurants and pubs.
Hospitality Ulster has said the reduction could create up to 8,500 jobs in the tourism sector.
A DUP spokesman told the Belfast Telegraph, however: “Tourism VAT and airport passenger duty are both matters to be addressed through a report as part of the agreement between the Conservatives and ourselves to establish if both measures are feasible and what is the best way to proceed.”
The issues — along with the implementation of corporation tax cuts — are among the matters which it is understood will be dealt with by a new liaison committee set up between the DUP and Tories.
The report also said the DUP will ask Chancellor Philip Hammond for an additional £300m to cover the initial shortfall in tax receipts after the cut in corporation tax from 19% to 12.5%, which is due in the province from April 2018.
Meanwhile, former DUP MLA Trevor Clarke — who admitted last year that at one point he believed only homosexual people could contract the HIV virus until he was informed by a charity — will be back in the Assembly, if it gets up and running.
Under rules to prevent double-jobbing, Mr Clarke has been co-opted to replace Paul Girvan, who became an MP, after winning the South Antrim seat from ULster Unionist Danny Kinahan in the General Election.