Stephen Farry
North Down · Alliance Party · Northern Ireland
“Speaking for a party that has a longer pedigree in advocating a public inquiry than both the DUP and Sinn Féin, I nonetheless welcome this announcement, despite the torturous path that we have had and, indeed, the missed opportunities.”
“The first was a reform of the petition of concern to take it back to the original intent when it was designed in 1998. It was clear at that stage that Arlene Foster banged the table and said, "No, never. We are not doing that. That is a way whereby we are going to have to fold on equal marriage: it's not happening".”
“<BR /> <BR />The main points that I make concern the substance of the order. There are probably three aspects that the Minister needs to address properly before the Assembly, and they really relate to what other options he has.”
“That raises the question of why they want to go as far as 2022, especially when I am not sure — I would welcome any clarification to the contrary on it — that there has been formal Executive approval of this.”
“<BR /> <BR />There are three major substantive issues that I do not believe have been properly aired on this: VAT; European Commission infraction proceedings; and, most important, the opportunity foregone to revisit the classification of Northern Ireland Water and the ability, through a separate water charge, to allow it to borrow commerc…”
“While my party was supportive of the Good Friday Agreement back in 1998, at that time, we expressed some reservations around the very detailed nature of the proposals and how those could, in due course, destabilise Northern Ireland and prevent us from realising our full potential. We have been very much vindicated in that analysis.”
The complete record
Every one of 2,504 lines we hold for Stephen Farry, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 3 of 51.
“Those links are obviously of concern. In terms of strategies, the even wider concern that we have to have is the fact that we have a so-called action plan from the Executive on combating paramilitary activity, the credibility of which has been ripped out by the fact that we are openly having photographs taken with current paramilitary figures. There was no point in having a big campaign launch yesterday about tackling organised crime and paramilitarism if, at the same time, people are giving comfort to current paramilitaries. It is a mixed signal for those in the community. Are people really going to be empowered to come forward and talk about their fears around organised crime and paramilitary activity if they see how the leadership in this society is reacting to them?”
“Absolutely. There are ongoing issues with respect to the role played by the UDA in our society.”
“<BR /> <BR />Comments were also made about the fact that the projects on the ground are of good quality. I have no reason to doubt that but I cannot make a full judgement because I do not know how they would stack up against other projects procured through other means. We can say, in absolute terms, "Yes, things are good" —”
“I was frankly stunned to hear Edwin Poots talk about Dee Stitt's comments as "flippant". This is an ongoing problem every single day. The issue is not simply one set of remarks made in a 'Guardian' video; the issue here is that we have someone who is a current paramilitary, on a day-by-day basis, running an organisation in receipt of £1·7 million of public funds. That situation is not being addressed or faced up to in any respect. Let us be clear: the DUP has had an open agenda of trying to steer money towards Charter. It is not simply that Charter happened to win contracts in an incidental way; money has been steered to it. It is no accident that Alex Easton, for example, did a reference for Dee Stitt. It is no accident that we have two members of Charter sitting on two different steering groups. That is all done by design.”
“Let me be very clear: Paula Bradshaw was not the person who said that should be the lead organisation on the South Belfast Partnership Board. Again, the winners were picked from the top. We have not had a bottom-up process to choose the groups. <BR /> <BR />I have to say that there is a real air of tension across the community and voluntary sector. Groups are afraid to speak out about funding decisions, lest the few pennies that they still get are cut by the two parties in the lead. That is not healthy in any open, democratic and pluralistic society. We are building up a client state, and that should be of great concern to anyone who believes in democracy and the rule of law. We have to get away from that. Most people in this room know exactly what I am talking about. <BR /> <BR />Let us talk for a moment about the issue around Charter.”
“There is a lot of talk about this being a bottom-up approach —”
“Yes, that is very much the case. At the heart of this is the suspicion, which has not been addressed — so we assume, therefore, that it is by silence confirmed — that the point of SIF was that money was not being channelled to the so-called right community organisations. So a plan — whether we call it innovative from the standpoint of OFMDFM or cunning from the standpoint of others — was designed to ensure that the money went into the so-called right hands, at the expense of others in the community. <BR /> <BR />Some people have spoken about issues of public concern and said that there is no public concern. Frankly, there is; there is actually huge public concern. In particular, there is concern right across the community and voluntary sector. What we have seen here is a top-down approach to picking winners.”
“That came after a meeting in which I was invited by the then First Minister to run a pilot involving Fastrack to Information Technology Northern Ireland (FIT NI), with Charter as a subcontractor, with the potential to channel £7 million directly to that organisation outside normal procurement. That was some pilot. I said no to that. I advised that Charter could apply for public funds like any other organisation. <BR /> <BR />My experience of working with Charter was disappointing. Out of the 18 organisations on the collaboration and innovation fund, Charter gave us the most difficulty in terms of management. It is not actually a paradigm of good management, if that is what it is being asked to do in SIF. Everyone else was able —”
“There has also been a lot of mud thrown at various elected representatives who have been sitting on SIF partnerships and other forums with some of the groups that we have been discussing. That is elected representatives doing their job by representing their constituents and engaging in public scrutiny. <BR /> <BR />Yes, Charter NI, if you want to talk about that, has been funded through other Departments. However, the key point is that it was funded through open, competitive, merit-based processes. Yes, when I was Minister for Employment and Learning, I funded Charter through the collaboration and innovation fund. Let me give some background to that.”
“First, it is claimed that parties are only raising concerns over SIF now, following the particular scandal around Charter and Dee Stitt. In fact, a number of parties have been raising concerns about SIF consistently since 2011. It has certainly been raised by me in a number of Budget debates, looking at the inefficiency of SIF and whether we could spend the money in support of communities in a more efficient and effective way.”
“At the outset, I want to say that this is a valid and legitimate debate. It is shining a spotlight on what is in effect a DUP and Sinn Féin scandal. I want to thank those who have spoken in favour of the motion and who have joined in highlighting the very serious and substantial concerns voiced about SIF for their very positive and constructive comments. There is a consensus, certainly in this corner of the House, that this is a major and legitimate public concern. <BR /> <BR />I want to highlight the failure of the DUP and Sinn Féin to address the heart of the arguments that have been voiced by a number of Members today. We have seen quite a lot of deflection in this regard, so let me run through some of the issues.”
“In the light of the deep concerns expressed by many businesses across the UK and the agriculture sector, particularly in Northern Ireland, the warnings from the financial markets and the looming Budget deficit, will the First Minister explain her remark to her party conference that this is the greatest opportunity for Northern Ireland for decades?”
“The costs are significant. There is between £30 million and £40 million per year in running costs, and potentially several hundred million pounds of capital. It is important that Members are aware of that in terms of the full aspirations for expansion of the university in the north-west.”
“<BR /> <BR />We have to be realistic before we can talk about expanding our higher education sector. I appreciate that medical school funding may be an issue for the Department of Health in isolation of some of the wider issues, but we have to recognise that we currently have a £55 million deficit in higher education. Before we can talk about expansion, we need to fix the hole first and make sure that the foundations are solid. When we published the Big Conversation paper in March this year, we talked about not just addressing the funding shortfall but looking to expand the number of places available in Northern Ireland in line with the needs identified in the skills barometer. Obviously, Magee can capture some of that, but more and more capital investment will be required to make this a reality.”
“I fully understand and appreciate the relevance to the city, the hurt that has been felt over 50 years because of decisions that were taken — quite in error, in my opinion — and the potential now for the transformation of the city for that investment. That is all taken as read. <BR /> <BR />We also have to appreciate that the expansion of Magee was not a formal commitment in the previous Programme for Government. People think it was: it was not. During the last mandate, we managed to expand Magee by several hundred places — about 650, to be accurate — and we have commenced the construction of the new £10 million teaching block, but this remains a long way short of the 10,000 additional places that people are looking for in the One Plan and, more recently, the strategy group under the city council in partnership with the university.”
“In that regard, I should stress that, in my final week as Minister for Employment and Learning, I received the final version of the business case — or what will hopefully be the final version of the business case. I am not entirely sure where the processing of that now lies in the Department for the Economy and the Department of Finance, never mind any formal decision-making by the Executive and decisions on funding. <BR /> <BR />The wider context is that we need to look to what is happening in higher education and the potential expansion of the sector. I can clearly state that I want to see the expansion of the university at Magee.”
“I was pleased that Mr Aiken raised the issue of cost, because it is important that we have this debate in an air of realism and that people address the issue of cost. Hopefully, the Minister will give some indication of what her officials estimate the cost of this to be. We need to look at running costs, capital costs and the location. Are we talking about locating this on the current Magee campus, or are we looking to co-locate with Altnagelvin hospital or somewhere else in the wider city of Derry? <BR /> <BR />We also need to ask whether the proposers want to take this forward on a stand-alone basis, which may potentially be easier to fund, or whether it will be taken forward as part of the wider business case for the expansion of Magee.”
“There are areas where GPs have taken on additional areas of responsibility almost by default, and there are unintended consequences. For example, free prescriptions are universally available, but that ends up with more prescribing being done, as opposed to people maybe talking with pharmacists. There is a host of other distortions in our health service passing burdens on to GPs. <BR /> <BR />Equally, we need to look at how attractive certain specialities are versus others in the health service and the number of places available. We welcome what the Minister has been saying about the need for more places, and it is in that context that we look to what we can do about expansion in the north-west.”
“The Alliance Party supports the motion but not without some reservation. We will highlight some points that the proposers need to consider and some issues that they need to clarify. <BR /> <BR />In principle, we accept the need for a medical school, and it is in that context that we can support the motion. It is worth stressing that recent talk has been about a graduate-entry school, which is of a different nature from a situation where we are talking about undergraduates, with a particular focus on GP training and primary care. That is a particular pressure point in our health service that we are all very much aware of, and the solution lies in a number of interventions, including how we might shift some of the workload off GPs to other aspects of our health service.”
“I want to ask the First Minister about the differences between the Scottish and Welsh Administrations and our Administration on some of the key issues and whether those were discussed. Notably, Scotland and Wales have adopted a position of wanting the UK to remain in the single market, whereas our First Minister is talking about the best possible market access. There is a difference there. Also, was the triggering of article 50 discussed and whether that will require LCMs in the respective jurisdictions?”
“I accept, of course, that good road design is important in road safety, as is enforcement of the traffic legislation by the police, but will the Minister recognise that the benefit-to-cost ratio for the York Street interchange is 2:33? I accept that the figure for the A6 at Randalstown is of a similar nature. Those two are the most beneficial to our economy. If the Minister is being rational in his approach to allocating funds in order to maximise the benefit to the economy, does he recognise that those two projects are top of the pile?”
“However, they seem to have fewer reservations than the Member has about having to engage pragmatically with the issue.”
“The Minister will answer for himself in a few minutes' time, but the Member is very fond of quoting the Scottish Government and seeing them as an exemplar of what can happen under devolution. Of course, one of the standout policies from Scotland is that they have zero fees for local Scottish institutions. Indeed, that is written on tablets of stone — literally — and deeply ingrained in Scottish political culture. Scottish universities such as the University of Edinburgh, which receives half its students from England, know that the TEF is very much part of their interest in ensuring that they remain competitive. By implication, if, as the Member is suggesting, Northern Ireland would somehow be bullied by Westminster into using TEF and forced into having higher-level fees, surely that same logic would also apply to Edinburgh and Cardiff.”
“Valid concerns have been expressed about the methodology of TEF, but the point that is worth stressing, in closing, is that we can be part of the design of TEF. If we do not like the outcome — how TEF is designed — there is no requirement for our universities to use it. The Minister has the right to authorise them to use it if they wish to do so. If we feel that TEF will not be in our interest and of no use in benchmarking our institutions against others in the international market, we can walk away from it. If, on the other hand, we find that TEF will be essential to our universities being competitive with their counterparts elsewhere in the UK, including Scotland and Wales, and with the rest of the world, at the very least, we have to be part of the design process, and that involves the Assembly supporting the LCM today.”
“We see a natural discrimination — unjustified, of course — in people's reaction to female members of staff and staff from ethnic minorities, so we need to ensure that there is no bias in the system.”
“There are issues with exactly what you measure in teaching excellence. If we look at the sister research excellence framework, which is much better established and accepted, we see that there is still a degree of subjectivity in how the weightings are given and it is not entirely without controversy. When you move to TEF, you end up with issues about exactly what you measure. If you go, for example, with student satisfaction, that does not necessarily equate to quality; it may well be a reflection of the fact that some courses are not as competitive or challenging as others. You can get strange anomalies in that. Equally, if you end up asking people to rate their academic lecturers and professors, there is inbuilt bias towards white males.”
“I would need to check that, but it certainly needs to come to the Committee for decision-making. There are umpteen checks and balances in the system to ensure that any decision on fees is not something that we are handing over today; there are safeguards in place for that. <BR /> <BR />The final point I want to make is on the standards of the TEF and what it will look like. It is, as I said, an entirely subjective measurement. There is not yet agreement on exactly how it will be taken forward. I have certainly had some interesting discussions with the English Universities Minister, Jo Johnson, on that, and I am sure the current Minister has done likewise. There is still a lot of confusion about it. Jo Johnson is probably the more intelligent wing of his family compared with his better-known brother.”
“I also stress that the issue today is very much divorced from the wider issue of what tuition fees should be in Northern Ireland; that is a separate debate for another day. We all have our views on how to address the current funding shortfall to universities, but we will return to that debate at the appropriate time when we see proposals from the Minister and the Executive on that. I stress for the record that, while the TEF may be used in the context of higher-level fees in England, that is not a route we are forced to go down in Northern Ireland; it is a matter entirely within our discretion. Any decision on fee levels here is for the local Minister in the first instance. That will then be brought to the Executive and the Assembly Committee as a statutory instrument that requires affirmative support.”
“We use them to provide the skilled graduates for our local companies. It is critical to our future economic growth that we do all we can to protect the place of universities in our local economic strategy. There is a clear danger already to that narrative that has to be addressed. I plead with the Assembly today not to make things even worse by excluding ourselves from the ability to offer the teaching excellence framework. <BR /> <BR />It is important to stress as well that what is on the table is not a compulsion that local universities use the teaching excellence framework or an indication that a future Minister will insist that they do. Even if the universities wish to use the TEF, the decision has to come back to the local Minister for sign-off, so they cannot go ahead unilaterally with it.”
“We all came to what was essentially the fairly pragmatic view that it was better that we were at least part of the tent and had the options of using the TEF rather than excluding ourselves from all that. <BR /> <BR />It is also worth stressing the dangers to our institutions from a less than competitive situation. We are already at a considerable disadvantage with the funding model, which, again, is not sustainable — the Executive will have to find some form of solution to that in the very near future — and in research, where there is a tendency more and more for big research projects to be centralised in the UK as a whole. There is a danger of Northern Ireland being peripheral to that. We use our universities, quite rightly, as core bodies in our inward investment narrative.”
“I also stress that attracting international students is not done at the expense of local students; both can be accommodated. They are funded and supported through two entirely different funding streams, so an international student does not come into Northern Ireland at the expense of a local student. <BR /> <BR />It is worth recognising that Scotland and Wales are taking a similar approach to what I did when I was Minister for Employment and Learning and to what the current Minister is doing through the legislative consent motion. We are not alone in having to wrestle with this debate. I recall having many meetings with my former colleagues in Scotland and Wales on the issue.”
“We have seen considerable progress over the past 10 or 15 years in the diversification of our higher education offer but our figures are still well behind those of many comparator regions in the UK, and Queen's and the University of Ulster still have significant room to grow in that regard.”
“There is an overlap in how the institutions are judged against one another, and it may well be that we see prospective students from other parts of the world wishing to know the TEF outcome for a particular institution before making judgement calls and decisions to apply or not. If we do not have the ability to engage or the option of being part of TEF, we are going to be at a competitive disadvantage in terms of giving that information to prospective students. <BR /> <BR />To put this in context, we are really under pressure to diversify our higher education offering in Northern Ireland. This is not some sort of luxury that we can choose to have or not have. We are still significantly under-represented in a very large international market.”
“Indeed, the ability to charge a higher level of fees will be linked to the outworkings of the teaching excellence framework. It is important that we are clear and accept that and do not pretend that it is designed to do anything else; so, we are honest about what we are actually dealing with. <BR /> <BR />That really begs the question of why we would wish to touch this and why we want to be engaged with all of this. The simple answer is that, whether we like it or not, what happens in England has knock-on implications for all three devolved institutions. Those who are looking in from the rest of the world, and indeed our neighbours in Europe, will see what is still, in essence, a single UK market in higher education.”
“Even on the issue of fees, the highest level of fees in the world for public institutions are now being charged in England. Even in a society such as the United States, which you associate with a high level of fees, those fees tend to be at private institutions rather than those funded directly by the state. Indeed, those contrasts were highlighted in the Big Conversation document that was published in October 2015. <BR /> <BR />The legislation currently before Westminster is going to see that divergence accelerate even further. What they are looking at is a vision of a lot more smaller institutions being recognised more readily, a proliferation of degree-awarding institutions and, in practice, a lot of institutions being formed and a lot of them going under in what is going to be a fairly ruthless market for higher education.”
“<BR /> <BR />We are seeing a push-pull situation in higher education policy across the UK. Of course, higher education is devolved to Scotland, Wales and ourselves in Northern Ireland, and over the period of devolution we have seen considerable divergence in policy and practice as people adjust to the particular circumstances of the different jurisdictions. That divergence is set to accelerate, based on the legislation that is being discussed at Westminster. It is useful for people to see England itself as actually being the outlier in many respects, not Northern Ireland, Scotland or Wales. It is not just the fact that it is three against one in terms of the drift in higher education policy; England itself is actually becoming more of an outlier in terms of policy across the European Union and, indeed, the rest of the world.”
“As I said, the teaching excellence framework is probably a contestable concept in itself and, in a few minutes' time, I will explain why it is difficult to actually achieve something like this, because it is an inherently subjective concept. As the Minister has already said, it is essentially an English concept, designed to service the higher education policy as it evolves in England, but there are knock-on implications for Northern Ireland. <BR /> <BR />I should say at the outset that I signed Northern Ireland up to the first year of the teaching excellence framework, largely on an exploratory basis and on the grounds that we were better being inside the tent to see how things were shaping up. I note that my successor at the new Department has followed suit and signed Northern Ireland up to year two.”
“<BR /> <BR />Just for the record, the LCM has actually been handled in a proper manner by the Department. There may well be other issues that we need to return to, but the processes around which the Committee has had the opportunity to consider this matter are certainly very much in line with the standard procedure. <BR /> <BR />In this regard, obviously most of the discussion and debate is around the concept of the TEF, and that probably goes, in some respects, slightly beyond the actual scope of the LCM, which is on more of a technical and consequential issue rather than the principle of TEF. However, the two are fundamentally intertwined in terms of people's reaction to the LCM itself.”
“Unlike my colleagues in the Opposition, we will support the motion, although not without some degree of concern and reservation. The mover of the motion would probably also reflect that the TEF is not something that we ourselves would wish for the UK as a whole; but our challenge is how to respond to it and not what the ideal situation might be. We are not in opposition for opposition's sake; we will judge everything on its merits based on what is in the best interests of Northern Ireland. Hopefully, the Minister will pick up some of the comments made by parties during his closing remarks and give some further reassurances to allay the nervousness expressed from some Benches. I think that, in some regards, that is based on a misunderstanding of what is actually being proposed and the context in which we are operating.”
“I thank the Minister for giving way. What he is saying is very helpful, but I invite him to go a step further in the reassurance he is giving and say that that decision to link TEF to any increase in tuition fees would not simply be at the discretion of an individual Northern Ireland Minister at some stage in the future but an issue for the entire Executive and, indeed, the Assembly through an affirmative resolution.”
“This really is a kick in the teeth for local government; the hard-working and free-thinking councillors from all political parties; the community planning process, which is a bottom-up process; and the review of public administration itself. Will the Minister comment specifically on the implications that this has for the ongoing development work that councils have been taking forward, which was predicated on the transfer of regeneration powers? I particularly have in mind the Queen's Parade development in my home town of Bangor, which was very much based on the transfer happening. Other work will now have to be done to accommodate the change of course by the Department.”
“I welcome the Minister's recognition of the very severe consequences of a hard Brexit, both for the Republic of Ireland and also for farmers and agri-food in Northern Ireland. Given the very high levels of integration in the agri-food economy across the island that have developed over the last 40 years, does the Minister believe that whatever outcome emerges from Brexit, that we have to ensure that the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland remain part of the same market system for agri-food, otherwise we are going to see massive diseconomies of scale, inefficiencies and a loss of prosperity in both parts of the island?”
“I give credit to the Minister for setting out what is a very ambitious agenda. He talks about nailing colours to the mast on the issue of rates capping. If he checks through the Assembly and Executive voting record on this, he may discover that Sinn Féin is actually doing a U-turn. On the specific issue of business empowerment zones, given the current ongoing deadlock around the transfer of regeneration powers to councils, is there not a danger that the Executive are taking a very mixed, contradictory and incoherent approach to how we can best regenerate our towns, villages and cities across Northern Ireland?”
“I thank the deputy First Minister for his statement. Will he comment on the reports in this week's 'Sunday Independent', and the subtext at the last meeting of the all-island forum on civic dialogue, that there is a frustration in the Irish Government that, while there is a lot of cooperation on scoping out the practical issues, there has, to date, been no clear ask from the Northern Ireland Government on what special status would look like going forward and that, if we do not have a clear ask in the very near future, we are in danger of missing the opportunity to sort out Northern Ireland's interests?”
“Can I, therefore, ask the Minister to answer Naomi Long's question: what value added is provided by Charter, a smaller organisation, for its management fee as opposed to the management of GEMS, which is a larger and more experienced organisation?”
“When I was Minister for Employment and Learning, we funded GEMS through three strands of money to deliver community-based employment programmes without any difficulties. By contrast, when we funded Charter, we had management difficulties.”
“The deputy First Minister and I agree on the need for special status for Northern Ireland, but does he also recognise that if this is to get traction with the whole community, including with unionists, it has to be sold in very pragmatic terms around the interests of Northern Ireland and, therefore, be decoupled from wider constitutional aspirations and the issue of a border poll?”
“— in Bangor, and a supplementary was taken on marching bands. Could I ask the Deputy Speaker to reflect on the consistency of the approach that was adopted today and maybe come back to the House to provide further guidance to all Members so that we can better frame our questions in light of the guidance from the Chair?”
“On a point of order, Mr Speaker. This is a different point of order about Standing Order 20(8). While, obviously, respecting the option for the Speaker to act with his discretion in such matters, could I seek clarity for the House on the relevance of supplementary questions? Question 5 to the Minister for Communities referred specifically to Ulster GAA and Casement Park. A supplementary question about Windsor Park was permitted from Mr Stalford but one was not permitted from my colleague Mr Lyttle about The Oval. Furthermore, question 6 was specifically about the Ulster Fleadh —”
“Recommendation D2 in the report has been abandoned.”