Northern Ireland Finances

Jonathan Edwards Excerpts

Monday 12th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

As I have said, the agreement on the confidence and supply money is publicly available on the internet. It recognised the priorities and the issues that needed support and additional funding. This process has not been easy—balancing a budget is never easy—but we have done it while mindful of the commitments made in the confidence and supply arrangements and the previous work that had been done.

[Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (PC)]

Will the Secretary of State confirm that not all political parties—for instance, the Social Democratic and Labour party—were consulted on the actual content of the budget? Will she outline who made the political decisions in relation to the budget?

[Karen Bradley]

As the UK Government, we have had to take those decisions. I ensured that all parties saw the statement and the allocations and were allowed input into them, not only before last Thursday, when I got the final figures, but during that period, to ensure that they were all able to contribute to the work that we were doing.