“More waffle”: Stormont’s Programme for Government
16 September 2024
Michelle O'Neill and Emma Little-Pengelly
launch the Stormont Executive's PfG.
The Stormont Executive unveiled its draft Programme for Government (PfG) last Monday (9th). It had been long delayed and was delayed further by the UK general election. The production of a draft programme was a legal obligation on the Executive and there was little expectation of anything beyond a box ticking exercise.
Such expectations were well founded with the PfG amounting to no more than a description of the poor state of public services and a vague wish list of what the Executive would like to do. There were no substantial proposals that had funding commitments and timeframes set. There were no measurements or targets by which implementation should be measured. What we had was a statement of the Executive's "missions" of "People, Planet and Prosperity" which are "underpinned by a cross-cutting commitment to Peace". Many of the initiatives outlined in the document have already been announced. It mentions a £150m enhanced investment zone for Northern Ireland, which is essentially a policy that provides grants and tax breaks for a region. This was promised in the Safeguarding the Union deal that led to the restoration of Stormont in February. The same goes for the £235m transformation fund “to make our public services better, more easily accessed, and more efficient”. This was also announced earlier this year. In terms of funding the Programme for Government, the Executive says demands on finances outstrip the funding available, so "we have had to prioritise where we invest our money". If the PfG points to anything it is towards more cuts and privatisation. However, as is typical with Stormont, this is not stated explicitly. The headline on the front page of the following day’s edition of Irish News describing the PfG as “more waffle” was spot on.
The illusion of the PfG soon crashed into financial reality with a succession of announcements on further cuts. The first of these came just the following day when Stormont finance minister Caoimhe Archibald made a statement to the Assembly warning of the 'grave consequences' that arose from budget pressures totalling £767m. While this would be partly offset by an expected £500m in Barnett consequentials from the UK government, there was "little hope" of more money beyond that. Archibald said that “urgent action” had to be taken by ministers and that collectively the Executive “must ensure a balanced budget is delivered.” She declared that: “Difficult times require courageous leadership.” This is the type of rhetoric that could easily have come from the Labour chancellor Rachel Reeves or any of her Conservative predecessors. That fact that it is echoed in Storment shows the degree to which the Executive fits within the framework set by a British government. It is also worth noting that of the £767m total budget pressure, 90% is in health, education and justice. More than half is needed for public sector pay. The implication is for substantial cuts in these areas and last year's parity pay settlement for public sector workers being a one-off offer.
On the Friday (13th) of last week the UK government snuck out another couple of bad news stories. The first of these was a pause in City Deals, the bespoke packages of funding and decision-making powers negotiated between central government and local authorities. Four of these had been proposed for the north and would have accounted for an additional £1bn in public expenditure. On top of this the UK government announced its decision not to fund the redevelopment of Casement Park in time for the Euro 2028 finals. This would have accounted for around £400m in spending. While this does not mean a complete abandonment of the project it represents a significant scaling back of plans for a high-grade sports stadium that would have been capable of hosting international tournaments. It undermines the Executive’s economic development strategy which has the hosting of prestigious sports events in Northern Ireland as one of its core elements. It is a particularly bitter blow to Sinn Fein which has elevated the redevelopment of the Casement Park site to a totem issue for Irish nationalism. A new stadium was to be symbolic of the delivery of something substantial to their community in terms of culture and also in terms of bringing investment into the district (West Belfast) where Sinn Fein has its strongest support. This has now been put in serious doubt.
The default position of the Stormont Executive is to put the blame for any problems on a lack of funding from the British government. However, this is only partially true. It doesn’t account for the worse state of public services in Northern Ireland compared to other regions of the UK. For example, half of Northern Ireland patients wait more than a year for treatment compared to just 4% in England despite the fact per capita health spending has been around 7% higher than England. Such a glaring disparity exposes the failure of Stormont as an administration. This failure was highlighted in a recent paper by independent think tank Pivotal that found “little evidence” of plans to tackle long-term problems facing the region. An examination of the progress the Executive has made in the seven months since its restoration found that while some action has been taken on issues like public sector pay settlements and a childcare strategy, a joint vision of how systemic issues will be addressed had not been demonstrated.
It's not that the Executive lacks the tools to make a difference. It has control over local taxation powers, most importantly the regional rate, a mildly progressive property tax, that could be used to raise revenue and offset any reduction in funding from the British Treasury. The continuation of a cap on the top rate of the regional rate shields the wealthiest individuals in the north from paying a level of taxation similar to their counterparts in the south and GB. The continuation of industrial derating, a 70% reduction of the normal rate on premises classified as for industrial, benefits some of the biggest companies operating in the north. As a result of concessions to wealthy individuals and businesses Stormont is operating one of the most regressive taxation systems in Europe. Andrew McCormick, a former permanent secretary at the Department of Health, has described this situation as the middle class “laughing all the way to the golf course” while the health system collapses.
Such iniquities going unchallenged expose the conservative nature of the local parties. But more fundamentally they expose the reality of the devolved institutions. Despite the labels of Assembly and Executive these institutions do not represent government in any meaningful sense of the word. They are no more than the public face of a huge bureaucratic apparatus whose primary purpose is the distribution of sectarian patronage. This is what lies behind the waste, incompetence, lack of accountability and at times outright corruption. It is also the unspoken, yet widely understood, foundation of the political settlement in the north. It can’t be reformed or evolve into something approaching normal. It hasn’t done so over 25 years it never will.
This is not a problem for political parties such as the DUP and Sinn Fein. They are comfortable with the system despite the poor outcomes in terms of public services and policy. Those who stand most exposed are the trade unions and NGO’s who have promoted Stormont as a vehicle for reform and a shield against austerity. Such claims have been exposed as completely false. The unveiling of a vapid PfG followed by rapid fire announcements of further spending cuts are just the latest evidence for this.