Long criticises ‘reckless’ Treasury for refusing to fund PSNI compensation bill

The Treasury’s refusal to fund a potential £120 million compensation payout for police officers in Northern Ireland has been described as “reckless” by Stormont’s Justice Minister.

Naomi Long said public services in the region would suffer if the money to compensate officers affected by a major data breach within the PSNI had to be sourced from the devolved executive’s existing budget.

Ms Long also said that PSNI Chief Constable Jon Boutcher has written to the Treasury to restate the case for reserve funding.

Reserve funding can be used to cover unforeseen, unavoidable and unaffordable spending pressures facing the devolved administrations in the UK.

However, the Treasury has turned down a Stormont bid for reserve funding to pay the estimated £120 million compensation bill for the 2023 data breach, saying that it is the Executive’s responsibility to find the money.

“I was very clear that I believe Treasury are wrong,” Ms Long told BBC Radio Ulster.

“I think that this meets their own criteria of being something that could not have been predicted, could not have been planned for, and is exceptional and unaffordable.

“So I think it meets the criteria for a call on reserve, and I think that it’s wrong that we’ve been denied that, because it’s clearly completely unaffordable from within the PSNI’s own budget.

“It’s not affordable from within the Department of Justice’s budget and I would argue, as did the Finance Minister (John O’Dowd), that it isn’t affordable from within the Executive’s budget either.

“There are exceptional pressures that we are facing and trying to balance my budget each year is one of the hardest jobs in the Department of Justice.”

DUP leader Gavin Robinson raised the issue with Sir Keir Starmer during Prime Minister’s Questions at Westminster on Wednesday.

Sir Keir said he was in “regular contact” with Mr Boutcher on the issue of PSNI funding.

He said the Government had allocated the Executive a “record settlement” of £19.3 billion per year on average across the next three years and had also invested £113 million in additional security funding for the PSNI.

The Prime Minister added: “Whilst it’s for the Executive to set the PSNI budget, I want to reassure him that our commitment is to keeping people safe in Northern Ireland.”

The PSNI breach happened in August 2023 when a spreadsheet released as part of a freedom of information request held hidden data with the initials, surname, rank and role of PSNI officers and staff.

Police later said the information had got into the hands of dissident republicans.

In the aftermath of the leak, some officers chose to move house and change daily routines.

The PSNI accepted liability for the data breach and negotiations about settlements continues.

The Justice Minister said the PSNI and Executive were still pressing the Treasury to change its stance.

“We haven’t obviously had a response to the letter which the Chief Constable sent, so I don’t know if there’s any movement, there’s certainly still discussion taking place,” she said.

“We continue to press this as an Executive through the Finance Minister, it’s been raised in Parliament.

“It continues to be a challenge, and I think it’s one area where all (Executive) parties are actually agreed that this is not something that it is reasonable to expect the Executive to fund, certainly not out of the Department of Justice or policing budget, and certainly not in a single year.

“It’s just not possible for us to do that.

“However, just to be clear, if and when these cases are settled, the money will have to be found, and the issue in that case then is which services we will not be able to provide as an Executive in order to do that.

“And I do think the Treasury are being reckless in placing us in that position.”

A Treasury spokesperson said: “The Chancellor (Rachel Reeves) has delivered the Northern Ireland Executive its biggest financial settlement since 1998, worth £19.3 billion a year.

“As operational policing is a matter for the Northern Ireland Executive, they are responsible for compensating the police officers affected by this data breach.”