Budget without additional cash would have ‘massive impacts’ on public services

A budget agreed with the current funding settlement for Northern Ireland would lead to “significant cuts and massive impacts” in public services, deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly has said.

Finance Minister John O’Dowd said there needed to be an “injection of investment” from the UK Government before budget challenges facing Stormont departments can be met.

Despite the delay in powersharing ministers agreeing to a budget, First Minster Michelle O’Neill said she had not given up on the prospect of securing a multi-year settlement.

Mr O’Dowd published draft proposals for a multi-year budget in January, but they have not yet been agreed by the powersharing Executive.

In February, the UK Government announced it would make £400 million available from reserves to the Executive to deal with overspend pressures in health and education.

The money has to be repaid over the next three years and the Treasury said it would be conducting an “open-book exercise” looking at the Executive budget.

SDLP opposition leader Matthew O’Toole has said the powersharing Executive was now in “breach of the law” by not agreeing a budget by the start of the financial year.

Speaking following a meeting of Executive ministers on Thursday, Ms Little-Pengelly said they all wanted a multi-year budget agreed “as quickly as we can”.

She added: “But the reality is that there is a very, very significant shortfall, and that shortfall is not between just simply what ministers would like to do and what we have.

“This is about core statutory services.

“We heard today right across all of the departments, the pressures and what this proposed budget would mean for them.

“The moment that budget would be agreed, unless we secure additional resource from Treasury would simply lead to significant cuts and massive impacts in terms of our public services and on the people that we are here to serve as well.

“We don’t believe that is right, we don’t believe that is fair.”

The deputy First Minister said ministers were making a “reasoned argument to the Treasury” for more funding.

She added: “This is not about going to the Treasury or the UK Government or the Prime Minister with a begging bowl, this is about going there and asking for collaboration that we will do everything that we can to root out that inefficiency and waste, to make sure that we are transforming to do things differently.

“But in the meantime, we also need that help and support in terms of ensuring that we can continue to deliver core public services.”

Asked when the budget would be agreed, Mr O’Dowd said: “To achieve the ambition of the budget is going to take an injection of investment from the British Government.”

He said he had met with Northern Ireland Secretary Hilary Benn on Monday on the issue and would speak with him again on Thursday.

He added: “That engagement with the British Government will continue and I will continue to engage with my Executive colleagues in regards to that matter.

“But the challenges they face cannot be met currently with what the executive has available to it.”

Ms O’Neill added: “I’m not giving up on getting a multi-year budget, because I think that’s what we all really, really want to see, because that itself provides some sort of certainty in terms of planning purposes.

“It’s a work in progress, is how I would describe the budget.

“The reality is that every minister spoke this morning about how they can’t live within the allocation that’s there right now and that’s not something that they say lightly, that’s something that they have all indicated will lead to real-life implications.”

The First Minister added: “We didn’t get elected just to move the numbers around.

“We got elected to make a difference to people’s lives.

“There is an ongoing conversation across the Executive but directly, directly with Westminster, around the fact that it is woefully inadequate in terms of what people are entitled to.

“It’s not special treatment, because I really resent whatever that is sometimes articulated to us, the case we’re making is for fairness, and the case we’re making is for what is appropriate for the level of need that we have here among our public.”