Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
SOS must take part of the blame for mess at Stormont
THE Secretary of State was scathing as he set out his emergency Stormont Budget in the absence of a power-sharing Executive.
Stormont ministers had “failed to protect the public finances” despite Northern Ireland’s block grant providing “21% more funding per head” than equivalent spending in Great Britain, Chris Heaton-harris said.
He told MPS that if caretaker ministers had shown the “necessary diligence” during the last six months, budgetary measures he was introducing “would not be needed”.
Mr Heaton-harris added: “Northern Ireland ministers have long failed to demonstrate prudent fiscal management.”
He may have a point. Stormont’s main parties have for years ducked many of the difficult decisions and revenue-raising measures which they fear may prove unpopular with voters.
In the past six months, 14 ministerial directions – formal decisions to overrule departmental advice on value for money – were issued by caretaker ministers, amounting to more than £435million of Government spending.
But the Secretary of State must also shoulder some of the blame for the current mess Stormont finds itself in.
His bluff of a snap election on which he embarrassingly backtracked only served to deepen the crisis by unnecessarily forcing caretaker ministers from office.
While the Northern Ireland Office is now setting a Budget, the absence of caretaker ministers pushes responsibility onto unelected senior civil servants to make wholly political decisions on how to rein in spending.
Dr Andrew Mccormick, a former senior civil servant, told BBC’S The View that Stormont officials have been placed in an “impossible” position.
He said: “We have a situation where decisions that are inherently political, decisions about how public money is used, the responsibility being transferred to permanent secretaries, who will do their best, they’re not afraid of taking hard decisions.
“But that’s not their role in a constitution. This is an affront to democracy. It has no democratic legitimacy.”
The Northern Ireland Secretary’s Budget statement also fails to acknowledge how the Stormont impasse is a direct consequence of the UK Government’s mismanagement of the Brexit process.
Dr Mccormick, who was Stormont’s lead on Brexit, added that London “said different things to different people” about the Irish Sea trading arrangements under the Northern Ireland Protocol.
He went on: “The fact that it said different things to different people about what the Protocol meant all the way through 2020, that is quoted in everything that DUP representatives say about why they’re not going into Government.
“But it links to the issue of the Conservative Government having its cake and eating it.
“For them to lecture our ministers for not being in Government misses out that responsibility that they share.”
The projected overspend of £660million this financial year – equivalent to almost 5% of the Budget – looks set to be dealt with through a mix of savings and an advance on next year’s block grant.
But it will require difficult decisions in some Stormont departments this year and stores up further spending pressures for next year.
In his Budget statement, Mr Heaton-harris warned of spending cuts in education and raising Translink fares.
He said his message for the “parties” was that “if they disagree with my Budget, they should restore the Executive” – failing to acknowledge that only one party is blocking devolved government.
The Northern Ireland Secretary even raised the spectre of introducing domestic water charges, a prospect roundly opposed by the main Stormont parties.
But after the election climbdown some weeks ago, Mr Heaton-harris’ unsubtle threat to coax a restoration of power-sharing may be simply dismissed by MLAS as another bluff.
Ministers had “failed to protect the public finances”