Speech on the Budget Bill

Speech by David Ford MLA delivered to Northern Ireland Assembly on Tue 16th Jun 2009

Speaking towards the end of the debate in the Assembly Chamber on the Budget (No. 2) Bill, David Ford MLA said, "I start by saying that I will be the last Member to speak before the Minister: I think that I am the fourth Member in a row to do that.

"Inevitably, the debate on the Budget (No. 2) Bill has been wide-ranging. To mix the metaphors of Peter Weir and Alex Attwood, we have seen many people riding their hobby horses around their favourite trees, but we seem to have lost sight of the wood. We have talked endlessly in the Chamber about the supposed priorities in the Programme for Government, the various Budget processes and prioritising business and enterprise. Although there have been some achievements in that regard, questions remain about whether our priorities are right in order to build up local businesses and whether the budgeting process is sufficiently flexible to take account of the changes that have taken place in the world economy over the last couple of years.

5.15 pm

"At the risk of sounding like a member of the Ulster Unionist Party, which, I am sure you will appreciate, Mr Speaker, I do not wish to do, I suspect that some of the populism that is inherent in the Budgets that we have seen has now reached the point whereby it is starting to catch up with Ministers. I will give one example of that particular hobby horse going around its favourite tree. Stephen Farry placed emphasis on what he described yesterday as the spring fuel payment: it was not a winter fuel payment. It required pensioners to take a leap of faith that they could afford to buy their fuel in the winter when most of us tend to use more fuel than we do in the summer, although apparently not those on the DUP Benches. It required that leap of faith and then delivered only a subsidy to the fuel companies. We could have seen real action on energy efficiency from that.

"Given the Minister's previous role as Minister of the Environment, her current role as Minister of Enterprise, Trade and Investment and her acting and, perhaps, future role as Minister of Finance and Personnel, I had hoped that she could have seen the benefits of promoting jobs by developing and then expanding an insulation campaign, rather than simply making a populist gesture that dealt with the problem for only one winter and has done nothing.

"We do not yet know what the Executive will offer to people living in fuel poverty next winter and in future winters. That is an example of placing priority, in name only, on supporting enterprise, when a large number of small building firms would have welcomed the opportunity to engage in a house insulation programme for households in most need. However, those firms have not had the opportunity that they would have been given if priority had been placed on a different area.

"Mr Speaker, you will be pleased to know that I do not intend to speak for as long as some Members have. I gather that my colleague Stephen Farry managed to make only the fourth-longest speech of the entire debate, although he did his best. Some of today's speeches reminded me of the time when my good friend Simon Hughes said in the House of Commons, "and, Mr Speaker, nineteenthly".

"I shall certainly not rehash 19 points or even half that number, but we need to look yet again at the glaringly obvious elephant in the room, which is the lack of any action on the costs of division. The argument was so well highlighted by Stephen Farry that I do not need to repeat it, although I welcome the fact that it has been referred to by other Members such as Nelson McCausland. I also welcome the fact that John O'Dowd and Peter Weir indicated a willingness on the part of their parties to look at the costs of division in general. Of course, John O'Dowd dressed it up as concerns about the costs of the Irish border in determining the economics of both parts of the island. However, the practical reality is that the costs of division in Northern Ireland are significantly greater, as I shall show later, than the costs of division across the border.

"Another matter that does not seem to have merited any discussion today involves the cost of the institutions, the size of the House and the number of Departments. I am surprised that the more articulate DUP Back-Benchers, at least one of whom is still present, did not manage to discuss it as it has been mentioned by the DUP leader elsewhere. [Interruption.]

"I will give way to Mr Hamilton if he wants me to. Hansard will note that he failed to take the opportunity to intervene on that point. No doubt Mr Hamilton will revisit it at a more opportune moment.

"The issue is not about saving the salaries of a number of permanent secretaries and a few more people in grade 5 posts, as Alex Attwood properly highlighted; rather it is about the opportunity costs of the failure to get joined-up Government in this place and the efficiencies that could be realised. It would create a much better emphasis on that supposed concentration on the economy if we had fewer Departments, with a more coherent range of responsibilities in each Department, and fewer MLAs keeping an eye on what was being done. However, perhaps Mr Hamilton and I will revisit that on another occasion.

"The debate, as is entirely appropriate for a Budget debate, has dwelt on economic and fiscal issues. At times, there seemed to be confusion between them. There is no doubt that the economic issues that are affected by the Budget will have a significant impact on the private sector in Northern Ireland and, perhaps, wider afield as we look towards our private sector engaging in markets overseas, in Great Britain and across the border.

"There are undoubtedly several significant areas in which we could be promoting that type of cross-border co-operation. Although Nelson McCausland may not like it, the vast majority of people outside this island regards Ireland as a tourist destination. People do not view Northern Ireland and the Republic as being separate. It is important that work be done in such a way as to capitalise on that tourist market throughout Europe and North America.

"Last week, genuine issues were highlighted over the way in which entry to higher education will operate across this island. It appears that some students from Northern Ireland may encounter difficulties in accessing places at universities in the Republic. However, it must also be recognised that many students from Northern Ireland wish to access university places across the water. It is not simply a matter of suddenly jumping to adopt an all-island approach while ignoring that second dimension.

"Mrs O'Neill cited examples of the kind of co-operation that could take place in acute hospital services. Undoubtedly, difficulties occurred in choosing between Omagh and Enniskillen as the location for the new principal hospital in the south-west. The discussions were conducted in a partial vacuum that did not take account of hospitals in Sligo, Monaghan and Dundalk. Those hospitals have a bearing on Daisy Hill Hospital, Craigavon Area Hospital, South Tyrone Hospital, Tyrone County Hospital and Erne Hospital. If we are to maximise the economic opportunities and use available resources for the greatest benefit, all such issues must be taken into account.

"Patients from Northern Ireland travel frequently to major hospitals in Dublin for specialist services. However, much more could be done to increase the practical co-operation that benefits everyone. That is not an issue of fiscal harmonisation or forging a political link but a question of being practical and recognising that, on a small island with a population of six million, much could be done better by working together.

"I welcome the recognition from at least some on the DUP Benches that there are practical issues on which co-operation will help everyone, although there is constant muttering against that from the Ulster Unionist Benches. Mr O'Dowd's economics suggest that the wicked Brits will somehow pay for everything. However, I am not sure that we can expect that to happen in the context of the total all-Ireland harmonisation that he wishes to achieve. I declare an interest as someone who used to be called a Keynesian but is now, I believe, called a "Cableist" economist. When John O'Dowd rejected every possible source of economic information, with the exception of Karl Marx, I doubt that he was in line with the thinking of the great majority of people in either part of this island. I may be proven wrong, but the recent election results in the Republic do not show that I am.

"Issues must be examined in harmony with other UK regions, too. This week's report on potential increased tax-varying powers for Scotland has ramifications for the Assembly. It would not be particularly easy to have tax-varying powers, but they could bring benefits. The Azores ruling on the potential for such tax-varying powers makes it clear that, if the economy is prepared to take a short-term hit, an opportunity exists under European law to take up that option."

Dr Stephen Farry (Alliance Party, North Down) intervened, "Given what I am about to say, the heckling from my left may not be terribly appropriate.

"Does the Member find it strange that the Conservative and Ulster Unionist Party criticises the Alliance Party's stance on tax-varying powers at the same time as it is advocating enterprise zones in Northern Ireland? How does that party expect enterprise zones to work without our having tax-varying powers?"

David Ford continued, "The Member asks whether I find that strange. Frankly, given the contributions on the economy from that party over the past few days, I do not find it strange in the slightest. The Minister appears to agree with me, so that will save her from kicking the Ulster Unionists on that point later. However, there are - [Interruption.]

Mr Speaker: "Order. The Member has the Floor."

David Ford "The cost of division operates at an all-Ireland level on some issues. However, the Assembly is not yet confronting, on behalf of society, other, far greater costs of division. A small number of institutions of further and higher education may have problems that have a cross-border angle.

"However, Northern Ireland has many villages in which there is a potential issue about whether maintaining two primary schools would be an excessive cost to the public purse, if people were able to move forward with a degree of co-operation or to a single, integrated school.

"There are small towns in which maintaining a post-primary school is an issue related to the excessive cost of division. Issues that are not relevant in other parts of Northern Ireland do apply in areas of Belfast where health centres cater for people from only one side of a line, either visible or invisible. Those are all issues where there are very real costs of division, and there is no sign in the Programme for Government or in the Budget process that they are being tackled.

"I have just a couple of further points. I think that we -

Mr Basil McCrea (Conservative & Unionist, Lagan Valley): Oh, there is more.

David Ford: "Regrettably, it appears that Mr McCrea does not seem able to understand the simple economics that are being put to him. I was trying to make my speech as simple as possible for the benefit of him and his colleagues. I shall do my best.

"The real issue is whether the investment strategy that is highlighted by the Executive has the necessary degree of prioritisation on those issues that will enable us to develop the kind of economy that we will need in the future. It is fine to say that we are prioritising the private-sector economy. However, what parts of that are we prioritising?

"For example, I believe that Mr Weir or Mr Hamilton referred to the M2 widening as a piece of public investment. There is no doubt that that provides a certain benefit, but the practical reality for those engaged in transporting business goods is that for most of the day it has made no real difference. What it has done in other terms is to shift a traffic jam, so that Sandyknowes no longer features on the BBC traffic reports every morning; instead, Nelson Street does. I have considerable doubts about whether that is a good use of public money, as opposed to spending it on the kind of public transport developments that are needed to deal with the commuter problem in Belfast.

"We must be sure that what we do makes a real difference to enabling our businesses to function, profit and grow for the future. It has been too easy for the Executive to assume that any level of investment can be dressed up as benefiting our economy in a way that has not yet been proven in practice. In that context, I look forward to hearing from the past Environment Minister, present Enterprise Minister and future who-knows-what Minister as she answers for the Department of Finance and Personnel."

(Official Report, Volume 4, No.2, 16 June 2009, p.95 - 98)