Northern Ireland Finances

Andrew Murrison Excerpts

Monday 12th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. This is the second of four ministerial statements to the House today. Notwithstanding its immense importance, and in the interests of accommodating subsequent business, I appeal to colleagues not to preface their questions with mini-speeches, but simply to ask a pithy question.

[Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)]

Nevertheless, Mr Speaker, I hope that you will allow me to add my best wishes to the Secretary of State on her birthday. I welcome the statement, particularly the bit in which she invites comments about how we might close the democratic deficit in Northern Ireland. The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee has many helpful suggestions, and we will certainly be sending them to her.

I draw my right hon. Friend’s attention to the written ministerial statement made on Thursday and the bit in which she says:

“Permanent Secretaries cannot… take the full range of decisions that would be available to Ministers”—[Official Report, 8 March 2018; Vol. 637, c. 20WS.],

which is, of course, perfectly correct. She goes on to say that Ministers will be helpful in offering guidance. May I press her on exactly what form that guidance will take? She has set out departmental expenditure limits, but there is little granularity—certainly in the public domain—about what actually constitutes those DELs.

[Karen Bradley]

I thank my hon. Friend, the Chair of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, for his good wishes, for his question and for the Committee’s work in looking at devolution in Northern Ireland. I was pleased to give evidence to the inquiry, and I know that the Committee has visited several institutions and other places in Northern Ireland to consider what might be done. I look forward to the Committee’s recommendations.

In the absence of ministerial direction from Stormont, my hon. Friend is right that there is concern about the work that civil servants can do. We have worked closely with them, ensuring that legal advice is received at all points, so that they have the support they need to take decisions based on those that were previously taken by the Executive or that the Executive had indicated would have been taken. I have written to the permanent secretaries to set out my view and to provide guidance on how any money, such as the health transformation money, should be spent in line with the Bengoa recommendations.