Sammy Wilson
East Belfast · Democratic Unionist Party · Northern Ireland
“I only use it to show the divisions that there are in the SDLP. <BR /> <BR />What kind of individual have we got who is laying down and who made this report? First of all, there is an irony. The day I met Mr Bain was about three months after he had written letters and made threats and things like that.”
“If the Commissioner for Standards heard some of the things that Mr Allister has said in the Chamber when he is not on the side of Sinn Féin and is not in cahoots with them, if he heard some of the things that he has said about Sinn Féin, he would be apoplectic. He would have a heart attack.”
“If we accept that we allow the commissioner upstairs to dictate his view of what a debating Chamber should be, we do harm to all of us who like to see a bit of fire and passion in debate. Of course, he did not have to make the complaint because the Ena Sharples of the Assembly was happy to go running.”
“Quite frankly, I do not care what the outcome of the debate is, but the reason for the petition of concern was very clear. This whole episode is not about people being concerned about the standards in the Assembly, and it is not about whether people have abided by the code of conduct.”
“<BR /> <BR />One of the bits in the interview that I really enjoyed was when, at one stage, he demanded from me an answer that I could not give him. I had not read the Hansard reports, and I had not done any work for it because I was not all that concerned.”
“Thank you, Mr Speaker. I start off with an apology: sorry we got it wrong as far as Mr Bain was concerned. <BR /> <BR />I will start by saying that I welcome the debate. I have been waiting for the debate. Indeed, I have probably prolonged my time in the Assembly to take part in the debate, because there is an important issue at stake.”
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“That is the kind of fantasy world that some of the people who are taking the stance that they are taking on the Budget are living in. They hope that those things will not materialise, but the reality is that, although there are limits to how much money we can spend, the Budget is predicated on the basis that we will have additional funding, either through loans, money from Westminster or savings that we have made. If we cannot obtain that, people are at some stage going to have to face that reality. As I pointed out, despite how they might try to hide it — they hope that this is not highlighted too often — even Sinn Féin Ministers, when faced with the reality of being told, "That is how much you have in your budget", will still make choices. I do not like some of the choices that they make.”
“I know that the Finance Minister has brought forward a Budget that is predicated on the assumption that we will eventually see sense and abide by and implement the Stormont House Agreement. If not, towards the end of this financial year, unless the Treasury turns a blind eye to our overspending, which is very unlikely, we will find that there will be emergency reductions in Departments' budgets that will be much more difficult to implement when squeezed into the last couple of months of the year. <BR /> <BR />Therefore —”
“I could go through an awful lot of areas of expenditure for vulnerable people that he has reduced in the education budget , but I suppose that the real test of whether Sinn Féin is sincere in its rhetoric would be to see whether its Education Minister is prepared to live up to it. For example, those who have learning difficulties and need statements and support are finding that they have less funding from the Department of Education because the Minister, whether he likes it or not, has had to live within his budget. However, globally, Sinn Féin and the SDLP think that we do not need to live within our budget and that we can simply keep on spending money that we do not have and, indeed, turn our back on money that we could have. That is the important thing. <BR /> <BR />This Budget could be made easier.”
“It loves to use this headline language and say, "We are against austerity", yet, when it comes to implementing reductions in the education budget, it does not really care too much about the vulnerable. Ms Cochrane is not in the Chamber at the moment. I think that she made an excellent point about the cutting of the early years budget, although she did not point the finger at the Minister responsible. Who is cutting the early years programme, which is the very foundation of the whole education process for many vulnerable youngsters? Who has cut that programme to the tune of £2 million? None other than the Sinn Féin Education Minister. On the one hand, that party comes off with the rhetoric of anti-austerity, but, on the other hand, it knows full well that, when it comes to the reality, this place has to live within its budget.”
“<BR /> <BR />Now, we have the deputy First Minister talking about the need to have a sustainable Budget. He does not even recognise the contradiction in his own objective; on one hand, a sustainable Budget while, on the other hand, doing everything he can to make sure that the Budget is not sustainable and indeed that we pay back money weekly to Westminster, turn our back on the ability to borrow money that could have helped us in the long term to reduce the cost of government in Northern Ireland and refuse the opportunity to have capital expenditure that would of course have benefited his own Education Minister. <BR /> <BR />By the way, when talking about his own Education Minister, we see once again the hypocrisy of Sinn Féin.”
“Well, he has run away, of course. I think that anyone who had put up such an illogical argument would not have wanted to stay to defend it anyway. He may well have had an easy ride in London at the weekend, when he joined people such as Russell Brand the multimillion-pound hypocrite who thinks he is a comedian when the only laughable thing about him is his grasp of economics and indeed politics. I have to say that, if you look at the logic of the people who he was with on Saturday, you can see why he comes off with the kind of stuff he came off with here today. One of the chief people there, Russell Brand, told people not to vote. The next morning, he said that he was crushed with disappointment at the outcome of the election. What would you expect?”
“I suppose that this is a rerun of the debate that we have had many times in this Assembly in various guises. Still, the air of unreality that pervaded those debates pervades this one today. It does not matter whether we go down the route of the SDLP, which will vote against the Budget, wants more money to be spent on everything and is ignoring the fact that we work within the limits of the money available to us, or indeed that of the last speech that we heard from the deputy First Minister —”
“Yes, thank you. I appreciate the Member giving way. He has now tried to make the excuse that, somehow or other, the impasse is due to a secretive process. What was secretive about the Stormont House Agreement? Not only were all the parties involved, but the outcome was published. Yet now he is trying to put this down to the fact that, somehow or other, everyone was excluded and the SDLP had no alternative but to put us into the kind of financial crisis we are now facing with the Budget.”
“Will he accept that no chequebook will be left when the Government know that they have people who will continue to write cheques ad nauseam in the irresponsible way that Sinn Féin will, even though they cannot even stick by the agreements that they made?”
“— the important thing is this: we have it, and it will keep public services running in Northern Ireland after July. Therefore, I believe that the Supply resolution that she has tabled should command the support of the House.”
“Yes, there are implications for it and it may lead to intervention from the Treasury, but —”
“Despite the opposition in Wales, the Welsh Labour Government, with all their rhetoric against austerity, have introduced a budget that reflects the cuts that have come from Westminster. It appears that only in Northern Ireland is there a group of politicians who are so immature that they cannot see that, as part of the United Kingdom, there are considerable benefits for us — £10,000 million worth of benefits each year for us. They simply ignore reality and, first, cause uncertainty for those who want the economy to work and, secondly, bring disrepute upon politics. That side of the House has been almost entirely responsible for that. <BR /> <BR />The Finance Minister, in the absence of any construction from other parties in the House, has done the best job she can.”
“Now, that is really constructive. Of course, if it spells the death knell for the Assembly, will the juggernaut stop? No. Will the cold water of austerity not affect Northern Ireland? No. It will simply be done by Westminster. That is Sinn Féin's solution: resist it in some unspecified manner and, if not successful, close the Assembly down. I take it that that is what Mr Ó Muilleoir meant when he talked about the death knell for the Assembly: "We will walk out and let those evil Ministers from Westminster do the job anyway". <BR /> <BR />It is significant that no other part of the United Kingdom has adopted that immature attitude. Despite all their rhetoric, the Scottish nationalists have still introduced budgets commensurate with the reductions that have come from Westminster.”
“"We will not carry water for British Ministers, though we will pour cold water all over economic recovery in Northern Ireland by our irresponsible behaviour." Of course, the ultimate threat that we got from Mr Ó Muilleoir at the very end of his speech was that, if the Government insist that Northern Ireland, as part of the United Kingdom, bears its part of the United Kingdom budgetary cuts, that will be the death knell of the Assembly.”
“I noticed, of course, that, although SDLP Members talked about those extra things, they did not suggest one way in which we could get the money. <BR /> <BR />If we come to the other end of the spectrum — total irresponsibility — then of course we have Sinn Féin's attitude to it. "We simply resist it all." How they resist it is unspecified. "The cuts juggernaut should be resisted. We will stand in front of it." Well, you are going to get run over.”
“<BR /> <BR />The Budget that I voted on at Westminster earlier in the year was the final Budget for this year, but, as the Conservative Government won a majority, they are now going to revise that Budget. It is the right of a Government to do that. They have decided to revise the Budget for the whole of the United Kingdom, with financial implications for here. We cannot just run away and say, "Well, it's the Government's fault". It is the parties in this House that have refused to implement the agreement that they made in December, which would have given the Finance Minister the resources to do all the things she wants to do over the next year. It is their fault that we have not got it. We cannot bury our heads in the sand and then just prattle on about what we want to spend money on.”
“Of course, that is not specified. <BR /> <BR />At least there was some construction in his amendment. SDLP Members have taken a totally different view. They have simply buried their heads. Listen to them. They have prattled on today about the need for annual Budgets, the need for more money on childcare and the need for more money on health, as Mr McKinney told us, as if there was not a problem and we did not have a shortfall — a shortfall caused by their party and the fact that it joined Sinn Féin in the blocking mechanism of the Stormont House Agreement and welfare reform. They cannot pretend that they have not caused a problem. They certainly cannot then go and blame the Government at Westminster, as Alex Attwood tried to do, and say, "Well, we were promised the final Budget".”
“Of course, it does not. First of all, although I suspect his amendment will not be carried by the Assembly, we would immediately be in the situation, not where we have a black hole, but where we would be throwing ourselves over the cliff, because there would not be any spending power available for Departments after the end of July. The second issue, of course, is that the reductions are unspecified. He will argue, of course, that he has covered them in his amendment, but all that does is give general terms. It actually works, in effect, on a 15% annual reduction in the budgets of all other Departments apart from the Department of Health. I would have thought that, if he wanted the Assembly to make that decision, we would have had at least some indications as to what that means for schools, housing, roads and all of the other budgets.”
“If Mr Allister wants to let Sinn Féin and the SDLP off the hook on the decision they have taken, then the way to go is to vote for his amendment. I will give way.”
“It ignores the fact that the Finance Minister is trying to get the Assembly and the parties that have buried their heads in the sand to address the whole issue of the Stormont House Agreement. It ignores that issue. The one way of either getting the parties here to focus on the problem or to get the Government at Westminster to focus on the problem is to have a Supply resolution that clearly leaves the problem unresolved and forces people to pay attention to it.”
“Eventually, Departments, if they keep spending at the rate this Supply resolution would authorise, will be overspent, and there will be consequences. I suspect that the Treasury will not permit it. The Treasury will certainly not want that to happen in Northern Ireland, because it would have implications for Scotland, Wales and other parts of GB as a whole. Nevertheless, we have to move forward and have certainty that Departments will be able to spend. <BR /> <BR />There have been three reactions. One was from Mr Allister, who said, "Let us not have the black hole in the Budget; let us cut £600 million from these Supply resolutions". I have two issues with that.”
“None of us wants to be in the situation we are in today of the Finance Minister bringing forward this proposal. It is not an ideal situation, but it is the only solution available if Departments are to have the authority to keep on spending after July to deliver all the services people expect in Northern Ireland, to pay public-sector wages and to pay grants to groups that depend on government. This Supply resolution has to be passed today, and Stephen Farry is right: those who wish to vote against it ought to consider the consequences, which will be that every one of their constituents will be affected when, after July, the ability to spend money is no longer there. <BR /> <BR />As was pointed out, the Finance Minister is asking us to authorise the expenditure of more money than we know will be available.”
“I welcome the positive response from the Minister. Finding ways of attracting private investment will be very important, especially at a time when public budgets are under pressure. One of the groups that would benefit if such impact bonds were introduced would be Sport Changes Life, which has had a dramatic impact on problems at interface areas. However, there is a requirement for gap funding for that group until such time as impact bonds are in place. Can the Minister give us an assurance that, given the good work and the response from the PSNI, he will seek in the monitoring round to ensure that sufficient funds are made available to keep those projects going in the interim?”
“I thank the Member for giving way. I do not even know what she was going to say. Would she agree with me that, regardless of how the SDLP tries to wriggle out of the embarrassment that it clearly finds itself in, having put public services in jeopardy, the final Budget referred to in the Stormont House Agreement was for 2014-15? Of course, we are now into a new financial year. Had it acted, we would have had the final Budget through and Departments would have had surety about the money that they would have available for this year.”
“I thank the Member for giving way. He indicated that he believes that the amendment from Mr Allister addresses the problem, but, first, the amendment does not state where the £600 million comes off, so we are voting in the dark on that one. Secondly, the pressure on those whom the Member has quite rightly condemned for not implementing the Stormont House Agreement would be lifted if we were to remove the £600 million from the Budget.”
“I thank the Member for giving way. He talks about vagueness and there being no plan etc. What is the SDLP's plan for the issue before us: how we ensure that there are sufficient resources to keep on the business of government in the Health Department and in all other Departments for the rest of the year?”
“I thank the Minister for his reply. Another part of the driving licence policy that does not apply to Northern Ireland is the inclusion of the Union flag on driving licences. The Transport Minister in England has made it quite clear that, if the Minister here asks for arrangements to be put in place, people who wish to have the flag on their licence can have it included. In light of the decision by the Minister in England, what action has he taken to ensure that those who wish to have that choice can have it?”
“There are probably plenty of examples for him to look at, too.”
“However, it must be done on the basis that people have confidence that the decisions have a degree of consistency, are not politically driven and are not driven by a Minister who clearly either does not understand the economics and the politics of school closures or is so driven by narrow party sectarian interest that he is prepared to override that and, in doing so, annoy people and undermine the good work that people try to do in an area.”
“The Minister indicated to me in a written answer that one of the attractions of many integrated schools is that, if people choose an integrated school and travel from a distance, they are more likely to get free school transport. Fifty per cent of those who attend an integrated school get free school transport. That is a massive attraction, but it is an artificial attraction. If he starts basing his decisions on the attractiveness of a school, he will find that we have the problem of increasing capacity in areas where there is already overcapacity and, indeed, of adding to the transport bill for the Department of Education. <BR /> <BR />We need area planning — I am an advocate for it — and we cannot waste resources at a time when we are in difficulty with expenditure on keeping surplus school places open.”
“If that is the case and the Minister is responding to parental choice, looking at the report, he should be granting, and I am not recommending this, far more places to controlled grammar schools and maintained grammar schools because they have the lowest number of unfilled places at 1%. If that is the route that we are going to go down, and that is the route that the Member is advocating, we are in very dangerous territory.”
“That is a proposal that was opposed by the board; it is a proposal that has been opposed by other schools; it is a proposal that does not make economic sense; it is a proposal that robs the other schools of pupils; it is a proposal that —”
“<BR /> <BR />I want to give an illustration of that in my constituency; one which you will be aware of, Mr Deputy Speaker. There is a surplus of secondary school places in Carrickfergus, where there are good schools that all perform well. Yet, only this week, despite that surplus of places, the Minister announced 150 additional places over a period for the integrated school in Carrickfergus. Within a stone's throw of that school, there are two secondary schools that are undersubscribed and which take pupils from all backgrounds and areas. Yet, their position is being undermined by the increase in capacity in the integrated school.”
“First of all, they must know that there is a degree of consistency in the decisions. Secondly, they must know that the decisions have not been made on a political basis. Thirdly, they must know that the decisions have a good, sound economic basis. <BR /> <BR />Yet, look at some of the decisions that have come from the Department of Education in recent times. Danny Kennedy illustrated one or two of them in his constituency. We have had many discussions in this Assembly about the opening of an Irish-medium school in Dungiven. How can the Minister persuade people that one of the criteria that will be used when considering the closure or opening of a school is economics — the number of pupils and the sustainability and viability of the school — when we see the kind of inconsistent and party political decisions that are driven by him?”
“I also welcome the recommendations of the report, though I suspect that, given the behaviour of the Minister in the past and his current decisions, they will be ignored by him. Mr Sheehan can call that political point-scoring, but I believe that it points to the political reality. This Minister seems to be incapable, first of all of grasping the economics of education or the political implications of some of the biased and party-driven decisions that he makes. <BR /> <BR />The whole issue of area planning is very sensitive, because people are attached to their local schools. They feel that when a school is closed it is a loss to the community. If people are to be persuaded that area planning and the decisions that result from it are for the good of their community, there are a number of things that they must be assured of.”
“Does the Member accept that, first, there are financial implications with not proceeding with welfare reform, and, secondly, the Finance Minister has to bring the final part of this year's Budget to the Assembly in June so that it is approved by the end of July for Departments to have money to spend? To suggest, therefore, that she and the Minister for Social Development could have sat back on their hands and done nothing is simply ludicrous. She could not have a Budget and know for certain what money she had in the Budget unless welfare reform had been resolved and all the consequences of that, including the additional money from the Stormont House Agreement, were in place.”
“Does the Member accept that, in what was the speech by one of the main SDLP members on the issue not so long ago, the prosperity pact was not mentioned? All that was mentioned was the party's total opposition to the Bill. Even then, no suggestions were put forward as to how the Bill could be made. They are now trying to throw a smokescreen up that, somehow or other, a prosperity pact would have got the SDLP on board. That clearly is not true.”
“I thank the Member for giving way. He is repeating the same line as Alex Attwood. The Speaker, just before the Member started to speak, made it clear that the petition of concern that has been signed was valid. It will, therefore, be put into practice here tonight. Once we vote, there is no more negotiation on the Bill. The Bill is dead, so what will he negotiate about?”
“Do you accept that we do not even know what Sinn Féin wants added to the supplementary scheme? Despite the fact that it has complained that there has not been sufficient talking about this and that the scheme is not suitable for its needs, we have not heard one suggestion in the House today as to what changes it would like to see made.”
“He will probably say that it is a technicality, but he knows that there are processes that have to be gone through and that it is not practical to leave this until the end of July. Hence the reason why this is not a contrived deadline; it is a genuine deadline that has to be met because the Finance Minister would be irresponsible to leave things to the last minute.”
“The Member is right: the Vote on Account means that there is money in the bank until the end of July. However, he has also run a Department and he knows full well that there are consequences from a Budget. We know that, as a result of some of the decisions that have been made here — for example, we have had to continue paying money back to Westminster, which has impacted on the Budget — changes will have to be made in the Budget. Expecting a Department, on the last day that the money in its bank account runs out, to start making adjustments in its spending for the rest of the financial year is impractical. That is one of the reasons why the Budget process always started in June and was completed by the end of July.”
“This is not a prediction; this is something that his party, the SDLP, has brought upon the people of Northern Ireland. Why will he not, at least, accept his role in the budgetary problems that we now face, rather than simply trying to say that it is somebody else's fault?”
“I thank the Member for giving way. It is one thing for him to say that they predicted that there would be huge budgetary pressures. What he will not admit is that this was not a prediction by the SDLP and Sinn Féin. The SDLP and Sinn Féin are the perpetrators of this Budget problem. We are paying £114 million back to Westminster this year that we should not have to pay. We are losing out on hundreds of millions of pounds of loans that would have been available as a result of the Stormont agreement. We are losing out on capital money that would have been available as a result of the Stormont agreement. That is all because his party has now joined with Sinn Féin today to prevent the economic benefits that may have come from the Stormont agreement.”
“We are paying the difference between a decision that we made here in Northern Ireland and the rates agreed by the Government and Parliament in Westminster.”
“I thank the Member for giving way again. Of course, he knows that others did not hold the line. Others had to accept the consequences of welfare changes in Scotland and Wales, where the amount of money going into the economy will not rise as fast as it would have in the absence of welfare reform. Rather than waving a big stick — let us not get paranoid about it — the Government at Westminster are simply doing what you would expect any Government to do. If we volunteer in Northern Ireland to pay higher rates of welfare to our citizens and take that decision as a devolved Administration, that is not paid for by Westminster; we have to pay for it ourselves. I know that the term "fines" has been used, but we are not paying fines.”
“Indeed, I suspect that his party would be the first to complain if there was not proper consultation as laid down in the Belfast Agreement; or maybe the Belfast Agreement, as far as he is concerned, no longer matters.”
“I think I should apologise, because at least the Member has been generous in giving way, and he did not need to. I apologise for missing his words of wisdom, but unfortunately I had something else that I had to attend to. <BR /> <BR />He dismisses the processes that have to be gone through as being mere technicalities that can be swept aside if politics dictates so. Would he accept, however, that for a major piece of legislation like this, these are not technicalities? The requirements to present the Bill — a First Reading — then for a Committee Stage, public consultation on that, and then a Consideration Stage, are not technicalities, they are legal requirements. It is impossible to do this by having discussions with the Minister some time in the next couple of weeks and then, hey presto, suddenly everything can be reinstated.”
“I thank the Member for giving way. It is on the point that he made about five minutes ago, but I will come back to it. He and Sinn Féin have made much of this argument that we have to have more conversations around this issue of welfare reform. Does he accept that, if this goes through today in the form that it is in, there is no point in further conversations? The Bill is dead. The Bill cannot be introduced for another six months. The Bill will then have to go through the process again, and it will be two years before this Bill, in any revised form, can be brought to a satisfactory conclusion through this House. Meantime, all of the financial consequences that stem from this decision will have to be borne by the Assembly and the people of Northern Ireland.”
“The truth of the matter is that they did not, because they knew the limits to dealing with the aspects of welfare reform, and it was quite convenient for them to say, "It was the bad English and not us".”
“I thank the Member for giving way. We know that he has eulogised the Scottish Parliament on quite a few occasions; some of us might wish that he would go and join it. Since he is eulogising the Scottish Parliament — he is quite right that it does not have the same constitutional powers that we do — it did, for example, have the power to set up a supplementary fund to help those who were affected by welfare reform. Did it do that? It did have the opportunity to introduce separate schemes such as we have done for vulnerable groups. Did it do that?”