Northern Ireland Budget (No. 2) Bill

Jim Shannon Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 9th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sammy Wilson]

I am sure that the hon. Lady will have an opportunity to make her point later, when she makes her own speech.

This is the second occasion on which the Northern Ireland Budget has come to this House. On the first, in an act of political cowardice the then Finance Minister in the Northern Ireland Assembly, Máirtín Ó Muilleoir of Sinn Féin, refused to bring a budget to the Assembly. Sinn Féin has always liked to hold its hand out for British pounds, but it does not like to make the hard decisions that must be made when it comes to spending money in a responsible way. No budget was brought to the Northern Ireland Assembly in November 2016 when it should have been, and, shortly after that, Sinn Féin collapsed the Assembly.

That was very convenient, because Sinn Féin did not have to make the hard decisions. They wanted the post and the responsibility—they wanted all the kudos that was involved in being head of the Department of Finance— but they did not want to make the hard decisions. It was convenient that the Assembly collapsed—or that Sinn Féin collapsed the Assembly—because that meant that Sinn Féin did not have to put their hand up for a budget.

I have been in that position. When one has to allocate money across Departments, there will always be people who are disappointed, and there will always be criticism. One will be told that one should have prioritised this and should not have given money to that, or that, magically, one should have produced for everyone money that just was not there, which, of course, is not always possible.

The budget came to the House of Commons on the first occasion because of Sinn Féin’s failure to produce a budget; on this occasion, it has come here because Sinn Féin made it impossible for anyone else to produce a budget. Having collapsed the Assembly, Sinn Féin then refused to return to it, appoint Ministers, and enable the Assembly to make decisions about how money was spent and allocated and to present a budget for the people of Northern Ireland. Sinn Féin preferred to engage in a game of blackmail: they would not allow the Assembly to be set up unless all the parties in the Assembly agreed to their agenda, before they were even in the Assembly. Sinn Féin knew that that agenda would have been impossible to deliver had it come to votes in the Assembly—even some of the nationalists would not have voted for it—so what did they do? They sat outside and said, “We have a veto. Under the rules that currently govern Northern Ireland, if we are not included in the Executive that Executive cannot sit, and that Executive will not sit until we get our way and are given promises that the policies we want will be implemented.”

Oddly enough, it seems that Sinn Féin are holding up all political progress in Northern Ireland so that the 4,000 Irish speakers in Northern Ireland can see Irish road signs and can be spoken to in Irish when they telephone about their rates bills, although they can all speak English. We are being held to political ransom. We have Irish broadcasting and Irish schools, and £197 million is spent on all kinds of Irish-medium education. We spend money on Irish festivals, and we allow Irish street names if enough people in the area want them. Despite all that, one of the reasons we are discussing this budget here tonight is that because 4,000 people in Northern Ireland claim to be Irish speakers, Sinn Féin say that unless an Irish language Act makes Irish an official language—which would mean hundreds of millions of pounds of expenditure—they will not allow any progress.

The hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands) said that he did not want to become involved in an argument about who was right and who was wrong, and who was responsible. However, if he looked at even the surface of what is happening in Northern Ireland, he would be able to point the finger of blame—and, by the way, the blame does not lie with the Government at Westminster, although I know that the favourite activity of the Scottish National party is to blame them for everything. The blame for this should not be laid at the door of the Government at Westminster; it should be laid at the door of those who know that they have a veto, who have used that veto irresponsibly, and who are quite happy for this budget to be pushed through the House of Commons today without the level of scrutiny and accountability that would have been possible in a Northern Ireland Assembly.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Sinn Féin often ask about the Irish language and the funding for it, but very few members of Sinn Féin can speak Irish. Is my right hon. Friend as amazed about that as many of the rest of us are?

[Sammy Wilson]

It does not surprise me at all. Sinn Féin have introduced this hurdle because they do not want the Assembly to be up and running anyway. I shall say more about that in a moment. Sinn Féin prefer the political vacuum, for a reason. The Secretary of State must bear that in mind, as must the hon. Member for Rochdale (Tony Lloyd), who said that he hoped that this was not part of some creeping direct rule. There was a contradiction in his argument, because he then said that we were moving towards a crisis, and that there must be pressure for action. He was right.

There are decisions that need to be made, and we need a process for that. It is clear, however, that one of the parties required to set up the Northern Ireland Executive is determined not to be in that Executive. Its members prefer to sit on the Terrace of the House of Commons, lobbying Ministers and Members, rather than coming in here, and rather than doing their job in Northern Ireland as well. We see them all the time, sitting about this place collecting millions of pounds for not doing their jobs, and at the same time complaining about the outcome of the process. They have pointed the finger at the DUP, and one of the arguments they have made is that my party and those who asked the Government to implement this budget are supporting Tory austerity. However, I can say that we have probably done more to alleviate the impact of austerity in Northern Ireland than Sinn Féin or all the other parties put together, because, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Nigel Dodds) has pointed out, the confidence and supply arrangement that we reached with the Government was what resulted in the additional resources the Secretary of State has referred to becoming available to the Northern Ireland budget.

I know that the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North would have liked to have had the same benefit. I thought the SNP was opposed to outsourcing, but it appears that it wants to outsource the negotiations on its budget to the DUP, saying to us, “You go and do a deal with the Government and then we will reap the benefits of it.” I think the Government may well be prepared to make the benefits of that kind of confidence and supply arrangement available to the Scottish National party if it is prepared to back the Government in the same way as we have done.

In fact, we had the situation last week when the SNP was so determined to annoy Members of this House that it called votes when we were in the Smoking Room cheering on England to get them through to the quarter-finals—they are now in the semi-finals. What were SNP Members doing? They were doing their best to disrupt our night of enjoyment. They can hardly expect a confidence and supply arrangement from anybody in this House when they behave in that way.

I accept that this is a difficult budget. In cash terms, it is a flat budget. The amount available to Government Departments in Northern Ireland is no different from that in the previous year, and that does present challenges. It presents further challenges when the allocations are based on decisions that the Assembly made nearly two and a half years ago. It set certain priorities, wanting to see over the next five years an extra £1 billion put into the health service, and of course that meant that, since the cake had to be sliced up, other Departments would find that their budgets faced cash reductions.

While this has presented challenges, those challenges have been reduced somewhat due to the additional money obtained for the reform of the health service, the additional money for frontline services in health and education, and the additional money for broadband, infrastructure projects, mental health and areas of severe deprivation. Indeed, some school budgets, or parts of school budgets, have been protected because breakfast clubs, after-school clubs and so on have been able to have money allocated to them from that severe deprivation funding.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I echo the sentiments of my hon. Friend the Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) in relation to the passing of William Dunlop. We all understand the family’s heartache and wish to convey our thoughts and prayers to them at this time. I have a brother who raced bikes—indeed, he raced with the Dunlop family over a great period of time. He had a very serious accident, but he lives today, whereas William Dunlop and the other Dunlops do not live. We think of the family at this time, and it is important that we do so.

I thank the Government, and particularly the Secretary of State, for introducing this legislation. I echo the frustration expressed by others about the process. I can well remember the story told in my office about the husband of one of the girls, who used to get his hands on what was then referred to as the Index book and circle presents he wanted from Santa. His dad was a pastor and in no way able to fulfil those requests. Ultimately, there was always something that he did not get, and that was the one thing that he really wanted. My parliamentary aide has implemented with her children a three-present rule: the children can ask for only three presents to avoid disappointment. There is a logic to it—it is not an Ulster Scotsism.

I feel like I am circling the Index book of needs for Northern Ireland while knowing that without a working Assembly, there is no way that the man in red—or, indeed, in this case the man with the red briefcase—can get it right, but there are asks that I believe we truly need out of this budget. Even at this stage, I am urging that the red briefcase be used to help the Secretary of State to meet our greatest needs.

The shadow Secretary of State mentioned my name in relation to the north-south interconnector. He shares our frustration that while we have a north-south interconnector, we are not even sure whether we will actually be able to use it. Decisions are made, but there is no process in place to ensure that it actually happens. It is an important project, with great benefits for both the north and the south, but particularly for us in Northern Ireland. I wait to hear from the Minister whether the interconnector will go ahead.

The DUP, as all Members know, made a deal on confidence and supply, securing £1.4 billion for all people in Northern Ireland from all religious persuasions and all political parties. I say to the new Northern Ireland spokesperson for the SNP, the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands)—we wish him well in his new position—that if he needs any training in how to secure a good deal, we might be available to help him. We can give him some good advice.

We all understand that the 1998 Belfast agreement does not allow for the full budget to be allocated. However, we are at the stage where 95% of the budget can be spent. My first ask is that instead of allocating £20 million of the supply and confidence additional funding, can we please have all the outstanding money allocated? The money is there to be allocated, so let make it happen. Will the Secretary of State please release the money, as it will enable us to do several things that are essential to keep our schools open and our NHS running. Will she allow the release of funds to enable the Education Authority to swallow the budget restriction that has been imposed on schools? That restriction is leading to more pressure on small schools. Even larger schools are being forced to lose teachers. I have wonderful schools in my rural communities, as we all have, but they may be forced to close their doors because they cannot save £40,000 unless they lose a teacher, which effectively means that the school will close.

Can the Secretary of State release funding to subsidise urban and rural primary schools? Many primary schools in my constituency are waiting for extensions and classrooms are bulging at the seams. Grey Abbey Primary School is one that comes to mind right away, and we also have Ballywalter Primary School, for which we have been pursuing the case for some time, and Killinchy Primary School. These schools need help now, not tomorrow and not in five years’ time. Glastry College has been waiting for a new build for up to 10 years. We have been told that it is now on a five to six-year programme, but the school is over-subscribed. The numbers are increasing each year, so we need money to be released for the new build. What happens if we have a process where those expansions cannot happen? We need a Minister in place. We have a Department that effectively cannot make that decision.

The hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon) referred to education in North Down. She and I, along with my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson), share a special needs school. Longstone Special School and Killard Special Needs School have particular needs now, not at some stage down the line. The principal at Killard has written letters to all of us to say that work needs to be done in his school right now. Members must understand our frustration.

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

My hon. Friend mentioned Longstone Special School, which is in my constituency. I hope that he agrees that this issue should really cut to the heart of the discussion about resources. I had an email from a year 10 pupil at Longstone saying, “We may be special needs children, but can you help us get a library?” A library? We are talking about access to books in a school. That is one of the resource implications that is coming to the fore due to continual underinvestment for our special children who need help the most.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. He is absolutely right. Torbank Special Needs School is another that comes to mind along with Longstone and Killard—there are three schools. The school teachers, the classroom assistants and the parents all want to see better resources for their pupils and schools, and we need to encourage them. Things are being held up due to red tape, which means that things cannot be improved, which is immensely frustrating.

Why is the Department for Education’s investment budget being reduced by some 4% in the 2017-18 final budget while most other Departments have had their investment budgets increased? Why is the investment budget of the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs almost doubling from £39 million in 2017-18 to £77 million in 2018-19? We had a meeting with the Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, the hon. Member for North West Cambridgeshire (Mr Vara), the week before last, along with Lakeland Dairies from Newtownards, to look at the capital grant scheme to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson) referred. The scheme is in place, the money is there and the skills are in place, but we cannot move it forward because the Department is sitting on its hands and nothing can be done. Madam Deputy Speaker, you can understand our frustration. The Minister is a genuine person who would love to help us, but we need a process in place to make sure that things happen. Let us see if we can move things along.

The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee is holding an inquiry into fishing. Hopefully we will be concluding that shortly. The knowledge that we have gained from that inquiry has been immense. As we move towards Brexit, we are aware that we need the grant system in place to enable capital schemes in the fishing ports of Portavogie, Ardglass and Kilkeel. We need the money in place, but we do not have a Department that is able to function fully. We are out of Europe next year, and we are incredibly frustrated that we will not be in a position to respond.

The annually managed expenditure budget, which is mostly for welfare, shows a 16% increase over the past two years. What is the underlying reason for that increase? No one has mentioned—at least not directly—the local roads budgets for our Departments and our section officers. They have had no increase in their moneys for the past few years. Indeed, those moneys have been decreased over the past couple of years. I am pleased to see that Ballyblack Road East has been resurfaced in the past four weeks. That is good news, but Ballygalget Road in Portaferry has not been done. The Dalton Road estates has not been done either. The reasons for our frustrations are clear. The system does not seem to respond to our needs as the elected representatives of our constituents. We need a Department that can work with us. No white lines have been put down in parts of my constituency for more than two years. We have got to the position where a person knows that they have to be on the left hand side of the road, but there is no white line to tell them where the middle of the road is. People will say that they know that they have to be on the left hand side of the road and that they will not stray, but we understand their frustration when we see such decay and when things that should be done are not being done.

I agree with David Sterling’s briefing regarding the needs for the 2018-19 budget that was published in December 2017. Some £410 million from the confidence and supply agreement could be spent, with £80 million for immediate health and education pressures and £30 million for programmes to address mental health and severe deprivation. Just today, and over the weekend, the press back home informed us—some of us probably knew this already—that Northern Ireland has among the highest levels of suicide. The constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Nigel Dodds) has some of the highest levels of suicide in the whole of Northern Ireland, and indeed in the whole of the UK. We want to address the issue of mental health and severe deprivation, but we need to do that with a functioning Assembly and a functioning Department. We had a meeting earlier this year with a number of Northern Ireland charities. We want to address this issue, and we are keen to see the Northern Assembly addressing it, but we have a frustration with the system, which does not seem to have the same capacity or interest.

Let me go back to the budget. Some £100 million is being spent on ongoing work to transform the health service in line with the broad-based consensus fostered by the Bengoa report. As Members have mentioned, there is a £20 million shortfall for pharmacies. Again, we need a Department that can address these things. I brought up the situation involving insulin pumps at the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee last week. The Secretary of State will remember me telling her that children under 10 with type 1 diabetes are frustrated because they cannot get their insulin pumps. They are frustrated because there is no process. Their parents tell me that they are worried about the health of their children. What are we doing about the health of our children when it comes to making decisions?

This House will have to take such decisions very shortly, otherwise we will have to find a method whereby the Northern Ireland Assembly and Departments can make them. We need action on the insulin pumps for children under 10 with type 1 diabetes. Northern Ireland, followed by Scotland, has the highest level of type 1 diabetes in the whole United Kingdom—it is higher than that on the mainland.

I have asked—other Members have agreed to this—for the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee to hold an inquiry on the important issue of cancer drugs. We should have a cancer drugs fund in Northern Ireland. These decisions need to be made by the Northern Ireland Assembly. The permanent secretary of the Northern Ireland Department of Health understands the issues, but his hands are tied. We need a process to get the cancer drugs in place.

We also need a system for the operations waiting list. If this situation goes on much longer, people will die because they have waited too long for their operation. I hate to say that, but it is a fact of life. Many of my constituents are frustrated. Just last week, a constituent told me that they had waited 54 weeks for an assessment, and that is before they are even put forward for an operation, which might take another two years or so. That is not the way we need to live. Of course, people suggest to them—I feel frustrated with this system—“If you want to go private, we can bring you to the top of the list just next week.” Well, some people cannot do that; they do not have the finances. These people have paid their tax and national insurance for perhaps 50 or 60 years —all their working life—and expect the NHS to respond to them.

The issue of broadband has been mentioned. There are small and medium-sized businesses in my constituency that are run from people’s homes. We want to encourage people to start small businesses. I thank the Government for their policy, and the Northern Ireland Assembly and the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment in Northern Ireland for the way in which they have promoted the idea of people in businesses working from home, but we have now reached a stalemate. We have the money for broadband that we secured through the confidence and supply arrangement, but we need a method of getting that money out. David Sterling also mentioned £4 million to prepare the ground for transformation, and £100 million to be transferred from existing capital funding to address public services and police resources.

I want to put on record my full support for the PSNI, which has a new policy and strategy for Northern Ireland on taking on paramilitarism. That is a good idea that I fully support, as will everyone in the House. Hon. Members will understand why we need a PSNI that is able to respond and to deliver on its project to take on and reduce paramilitarism, and to deal with those who live off the backs of others through their drugs-related and criminal activities. I understand that the Patten commission reported that there were 7,500 police officers at that time. There are now 6,715, so there is a clear shortfall. My hon. Friend the Member for North Antrim mentioned the fact that 50 experienced police officers leave every month. I understand that it takes six months to train 100 recruits; in theory, every six months we are falling behind by 400, so hon. Members will understand our frustration. We need money to train officers and to ensure that those officers are in place.

[Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson]

My hon. Friend will not be aware of this, but I and some of our senior colleagues from the DUP recently had a security briefing from the Chief Constable, who indicated that the threat from paramilitaries is not just one of organised crime, as some on the republican side now pose a very potent threat to national security and are engaged in planning acts of terrorism in Northern Ireland. That is why the PSNI needs resources. It is not only to deal with organised crime, but to counter this very real terrorist threat.

[Jim Shannon]

I absolutely support my right hon. Friend.

I will give an example of the activities of some paramilitaries. Just this week in my town of Newtownards, a group of people from outside the Strangford constituency came in and tried to assert their authority. We have to be careful with how that goes. They were having a bonfire. Two guys from another constituency came into Newtownards on Sunday morning and sat there in their very expensive Land Rovers or Jeeps. The price of the two Jeeps would probably be the price of somebody’s house. The assets branch needs to look at what those people are up to, take all the money they earned from criminal activities, and make sure they are accountable for their actions. The quicker that that happens the better.

What we are really saying is that a lot needs to be done. Will the Secretary of State release the funding that is not affected by the Good Friday agreement and save our schools, pay our nurses correctly and secure our community pharmacies, particularly in rural areas? We have kept our end of the bargain. We come to this place and do what is best for our constituents. Will someone please make the decision to do what is best for the people of Northern Ireland? End the stalemate. Allow Northern Ireland to function instead of crippling it with an inability to make decisions, or perhaps the punishment of refusing to do so.

My local businesses are suffering—[Interruption.] Madam Deputy Speaker, the coughing reminds me of your indication to come to a conclusion; I will do so shortly. I just want to say that we need something for our high streets and for the businesses that are struggling to do better.

[Karen Bradley]

May I suggest that the hon. Gentleman’s high street enters the Great Britain and Northern Ireland high street competition that the Government are running? The closing date is in August, and we would very much welcome entries from high streets in Northern Ireland.

[Jim Shannon]

The Secretary of State has given me a challenge. I will certainly take her up on it and ensure that Newtownards High Street will be at the forefront of her paperwork, hopefully before the end of July. Although high streets have done extremely well in the last month and their turnover is up, that is perhaps a wee bit seasonal. We need to do something to bring business back, including by taking legislative steps.

I want to comment on the Irish language. Sometime in life, we have to agree to differ on things, and there is something that we cannot agree on in the Irish language. We do not want the Irish language introduced to primary schools against the will of the majority of students, pupils and parents. We do not want Irish street names up in Saintfield. People in my constituency told me that that was a massive issue for them at the last election. We do not want cross-departmental money wasted on the Irish language when it is not necessary, and we do not want the Irish language in the courts, where there is certainly not a zest and an energy for that. What we do want is the right to have an Irish language; we are not against the idea of it. Some £160 million has been spent on it, so it is very clear that we are not against the idea. At the same time, we do not want an Irish language Act. There will not be an Irish language Act, and the quicker people catch on the better.

Although I thank the Secretary of State for this step, it is not enough. Take control; take us back from the brink of school closures. More money than ever should be available. Take us back from the position in which diabetic pumps are available but no one is trained to use them. Take us back to a functioning Northern Ireland that is not held to ransom by those who will not even take their seats to discuss the funding that all people in Northern Ireland need regardless of their age, sex, political views, religious views or anything else. Northern Ireland needs direction. We look to the Secretary of State for that leadership and direction—please provide it.