Simon Hamilton
Strangford · Democratic Unionist Party · Northern Ireland
“I have emphasised to the Member and the House before, that, whilst I accept that those are not good enough — that is why we have been developing the plan — there are alternative technologies in place that can present opportunities for those who just cannot get acceptable speeds.”
“I thank the Member for his intervention. There are some initiatives that I believe will help and act as a driver to improve broadband access. One such intervention is the broadband universal service obligation (USO), which is being taken forward by Her Majesty's Government.”
“I thank the Member for his question. However, he is conflating two issues. I wrote to his party leader, and indeed to all Assembly party leaders, before making the announcement that I did last week about wanting to publish the details of the businesses in receipt of the non-domestic RHI scheme. It was my intention to do that tomorrow.”
“<BR /> <BR />The Chancellor, in his autumn statement, made some more funding available for telecommunications, and my Department is studying that and seeking to avail itself of that to the fullest possible extent.”
“In addition, my Department is managing a contract for the delivery of the superfast rollout programme, which, by 31 December, will provide access to superfast broadband with speeds of at least 24 megabits per second to a further 38,000 premises, both business and residential, across Northern Ireland, including in the Newry and Armagh cons…”
“I signalled the intention to do this a few weeks ago. The Member and the House will know that inspections of all installations would have taken place over the 20-year lifetime of the RHI scheme.”
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“This is not something that we would ordinarily want to be doing, but we are in circumstances of having significantly less public expenditure in Northern Ireland. We all know that, for a host of reasons — real-term cuts in our Budget, the penalties for welfare reform, issues with public sector pensions and so on and so forth — we are already under immense pressure next year. We are looking at a Budget that will be short by several hundred million pounds of what we think is needed. You cannot sustain that, and it looks like that is the way that it will be for a number of years. So, we need to take serious action to live within our means. <BR /> <BR />One of the ways that you would sensibly do that is by accepting that, if you have less money, you therefore spend less on providing fewer services, which should need fewer people.”
“I thank the Member for his initial very complimentary comments about the statement. No plans are in place at the minute in respect of voluntary redundancy schemes or restructuring our broad public sector. The Executive unanimously agreed last Wednesday and ratified on Thursday the decision that the head of the Civil Service and officials go away and look at the range of options that there are for restructuring the public sector. I imagine that that will include — it will include — a voluntary redundancy scheme. <BR /> <BR />The size and scale of all of that will come out in the wash when the head of the Civil Service and his team do their work on our behalf. It is absolutely the right thing to do.”
“It is also why I said in this statement that, even if there are any reduced requirements, it is very unlikely that we will be able to allocate any more in January monitoring because we will be using them to pay our overcommitment. <BR /> <BR />I am hopeful and optimistic that we will be able to live within our means. I have to say, though, had we not been able to access this facility, I would not have been so confident; in fact, I would have been pretty confident that we would have breached our Budget. What we worked on over the past couple of days ensures that we will live within our means.”
“As I mentioned in the statement, there is the more technical side of the monitoring round process to go through, and we will do that. In fact, I will present a paper to the Executive next week to deal with any reduced requirements. I do not expect there to be any. We will do any technical adjustments and transfers between budget lines in the normal fashion next week. However, unless there is a huge surprise between now and then, we will exit the October monitoring round with an overcommitment of £25 million. That is incredibly challenging in the circumstances that we find ourselves in, and is, in part, why we sought a larger facility than we received. That is why I impressed upon all Ministers the need to identify any reduced requirements within their Departments very early.”
“If they are so principled and so against the way in which the allocations to their Departments are being funded, it is their right not to take that money. Should they not wish to take up the benefits of the loan facility, I will recommend to the Executive, in January, that the allocations to their Departments are reversed. If they are so principled and do not want to avail themselves of the benefit of the loan facility, they, of course, would not want to take the money that comes from it. I will give them the opportunity not to take the money that the rest of us in the Executive have agreed to allocate and how it should be funded.”
“He is, it seems, happy to take that money, but he is not happy with the mechanism to provide that money. That is an unacceptable position for the Minister and others in the Executive to take. That is why I will write to Ministers whose Department has received an allocation in the October monitoring round but who voted against the mechanism by which that money is funded.”
“Let me pick up the Member's first point on hypocritical Ministers. I think that there are hypocritical Ministers in the Executive, not least some of her party colleagues. Last week, they sat in the Executive and voted against the allocations to their Departments. After crying and crying and crying for weeks for money to meet the very real pressures that their Departments were under, they voted against the way in which the allocations were funded. Not only did they display a degree of hypocrisy in not voting for how the allocations should be funded but they offered no viable alternative. In fact, they offered no alternative at all. <BR /> <BR />They wanted the money. The Minister of Justice wanted £29 million for his Department. He has received that because of the work, efforts and courage of others.”
“Once a draft Budget is agreed and published, which I hope can be done in the next number of weeks — in fact, we have to do it within the next couple of weeks, although I would rather that it had been done several weeks ago, which I pressed for — it will go out to public consultation, and there will, obviously, be a role for the House in that. I am looking at the Chair of the Finance Committee. I hope that the Committee will play the role that it has played in the past of coordinating the response of Committees, particularly on their Department's allocations. In that sense, there will be a role for the House to have an input between the draft and final stages and as a receptacle for the views that will, I am sure, be expressed by many who will be affected negatively or positively by the draft Budget.”
“We do not anticipate any or many positive Barnett consequentials for the Executive in resource expenditure. It would be nice if there were, and it would help us to a large degree, but I do not anticipate many, and we certainly could not plan on the basis of what decisions might be in the Government's autumn statement. If there were to be any Barnett consequentials, I would expect them, in line with recent Budget and autumn statements, to be more on the capital side. We may get an increase in capital, but that does not help us with the current problems that we face. <BR /> <BR />In answer to the Member's question on the role of the House in next year's Budget, I do not see that being radically different from its role in the past.”
“<BR /> <BR />At the risk of repeating myself, I hope that in agreeing a draft Budget, if we know that inescapable pressures like that will come up, we deal with those in the baselines of Departments right at the start of the Budget period rather than trying to do that in monitoring rounds and taking money away from other public services.”
“A lot of non-inescapable pressures are not being met, and Departments will have to suck it up and deal with that themselves from within their budget. Whilst I would like that to have been the case with many of the pressures that were deemed inescapable, with other pressures that Departments were facing and the fact that there would not be a lot of spare cash lying around this year due to reduced requirements, we had to do something to meet many of the inescapable pressures that were legal or contractual in nature. I can understand that people might feel that we should have had better budgetary management at the start of the year to deal with this. In some cases, there was some budgetary management, but it was not sufficient to cover the totality of the legal or contractual pressure that that Department faced.”
“The Member mentions TB, as I did. My understanding is that the bill for TB compensation this year was in excess of £13 million. That is a lot of money going out the door. Whilst it is necessary to offer some compensation to those whose herds are affected, it is a powerful amount of money to pay in the circumstances, particularly our difficult financial circumstances. It is not the case that we did not expect anything like this to appear: the baseline set for the Department was, I understand, around £5·2 million, so anything over and above that — unfortunately, this was a bad year in the sense that the total bill is around £13 million — meant that the Department was in the terrible position of having to find that money. In more benign financial circumstances, Departments may be able to find that money from within their own budget.”
“We can still make £125 million of allocations, and, whilst we have to deal with a £100 million facility next year, that gives us the time to agree a balanced Budget and a credible plan for handling it in the next financial year.”
“<BR /> <BR />The only alternative was to make further cuts above and beyond the 4·4% that Departments were planning for. That might have meant cuts in-year, with half the financial year gone, of 8% to Departments, which would have been incredibly difficult for them to administer. That would not have eliminated the risk of overspend; it might have exacerbated the likelihood of overspend, so we would have been back to the first consequence. That is when the First Minister and I concluded that something a little different, more imaginative and a bit innovative was required, which is why we sought the permission of the Chancellor to access the loan facility, which ensured that we do not have to administer cuts above and beyond the 4·4% that Departments were planning for.”
“One was that Departments would significantly overspend. Members will recall that the head of the Civil Service, in a fairly unprecedented act, wrote to the permanent secretary in Treasury about two weeks ago and pointed out that he believed that we were heading for a breach of our Budget in excess of £200 million. As I pointed out in the statement, the conclusion that the First Minister and I came to was that the consequences of that would have been grave. At the very least, that £200 million would be taken off the Budget next year, but there may have been a penalty on top of that, and issues like corporation tax and Desertcreat would have been taken off the table and not discussed at all. I did not think that that was a viable option and nor did the First Minister.”
“I suppose that I would rather not have been in a position where we had to do what we did and ask for access to the national reserve and a loan of £100 million. In an ideal scenario, that would not have happened. Whilst I acknowledge that the forgone savings of £87 million and £114 million for next year on welfare reform are not the totality of our Budget pressures, it would sure make things a lot easier if we were not squandering that money and were not having that self-inflicted wound imposed on us. <BR /> <BR />Over the last couple of weeks, it has become increasingly clear to some of us, if not everyone, in the House and to a lot of people outside that our pressures were getting worse and worse in-year, as had been predicted. I thought that we faced two likely outcomes, and the First Minister agreed.”
“That is why the in-year position that has been dealt with by this agreement was a test for the Executive, and I hope that we have shown that we have passed that test. We also have to pass the test in agreeing a balanced Budget for next year and getting things back on an even keel. If we can do that, I am hopeful that we will get a positive decision on corporation tax in the coming weeks.”
“We have put forward a very robust case for it — I think that it is a case that has won the argument, in fact — and we are waiting for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to make an announcement by the autumn statement, which, I think, is scheduled for 3 December at the latest. That gives us sufficient time to plan for its implementation before the end of this Parliament. <BR /> <BR />I do not think that the Government are getting cold feet. I think that they were right and were acknowledging the reality, I suppose, that, if the Executive could not deal with the pressures that we were facing in-year, the pressures that we would have to face in taking £200 million or £300 million out of our Budget to pay for corporation tax would be a bridge too far.”
“<BR /> <BR />I take the Member's point about some Departments always coming back year-on-year with quite large bids. One way that, I hope, we can address that is that, in drafting a Budget in the next number of weeks and agreeing a final Budget, we will have a much more strategic approach to our Budget. Given that next year's Budget will require reductions across the board, we should not fall into our old trap of reducing budgets by an equal percentage but address pressures and seize opportunities where they exist. <BR /> <BR />I am still hopeful that our negotiations and discussions on corporation tax will bear fruit.”
“Of course, I would be in a better position as Finance Minister and the whole Executive would be in a better position if we were not losing over £80 million this year — to the tune of £87 million — on top of the £13 million that was lost last year because of the penalties for non-compliance with welfare reform. <BR /> <BR />The Member and, I hope, the House will appreciate that many of the inescapable pressures are legal and contractual in nature. One of the best examples, although it is not the biggest, is that of his party colleague the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, who had a pressure of around £7 million for TB compensation that we cannot legally avoid. Whatever the total is for that in a year, it has to be paid.”
“I thank the Chairman of the Committee for his welcoming of the statement and the agreement it represents. He is right to acknowledge the allocations, and one of the positive points is that we have been able to make allocations of £125 million. I will come on to the point about inescapable pressures in a moment or two, but we have been able to alleviate the worst pressures that face the Department of Health — not all of them. The £60 million will go on top of the £20 million that was allocated and set aside for the Department of Health in the June monitoring round for a total of £80 million.”
“A serious job of work lies ahead in the coming weeks in order to agree a Budget for next year to deal with the range of pressures that our public finances face. We must now, as one, dedicate ourselves to the huge task of agreeing a draft Budget by the end of October. I am up for that challenge and call on everyone in the Executive to similarly commit themselves. On that note, I commend this statement to the Assembly.”
“<BR /> <BR />To put the matter beyond any doubt, I intend to write to those Ministers who opposed October monitoring at the Executive but were the beneficiaries of allocations last Thursday to confirm that they wish to utilise the loan to ease pressures in their Departments. If they choose not to avail themselves of the benefit that the facility will bring for public services delivered by their Departments, then I will recommend to the Executive in the January monitoring round that those allocations are reversed. Clearly, if they do not wish to take up the allocations made possible by the loan facility, then that pressure on next year’s Budget will be lifted. <BR /> <BR />We have put out the fire in this financial year. Had we not, I would have feared for the future of public services in Northern Ireland.”
“Nor will I be lectured by Ministers who are so hypocritical that they will welcome additional allocations to their own budgets whilst being absolutely unprepared to vote for the way in which those allocations are funded. That is not fiscally responsible. It is, instead, brazen political opportunism. Will those Ministers who are seemingly so opposed to this deal refuse extra money for their Departments, or will they, as I suspect, be only too happy to benefit from the hard work and courage of others? They can also attempt to explain, if they can, why they voted against £60 million for health, £29 million for justice or £1·3 million for victims' services when each of those areas and others were crying out for help.”
“In fact, not only have savage cuts been avoided, we have been able to make £125 million in allocations to address many of the most acute pressures in the Departments of Health, Justice, Enterprise and elsewhere. <BR /> <BR />Those parties who voted against my recommendations last week and who have criticised its contents since need to answer this question: what would they have done instead? Would they breach our Budget and risk the wrath of Treasury, or make cuts of around 8% in-year to departmental budgets and accept the serious consequences that that would have had for public services? <BR /> <BR />I will not be criticised by those who offer no viable alternative to what is before us today.”
“In the inevitable discussions with Treasury that would have followed a breach, I am certain that we would not have escaped without the Treasury's spotlight being shone on our so-called super-parity measures. Each of those possible negative consequences have been avoided as a result of this agreement. <BR /> <BR />The only alternative to overspend would have been to seek to live within our means by making further, deeper cuts to departmental budgets. Over the past weeks, we have heard loudly and clearly from the likes of the Chief Constable, the Health Minister and other Executive colleagues, about the severe impact that cuts above the 4·4% planned for in June would have had on public services in Northern Ireland. Those additional cuts have now been avoided and a crisis in public services has been averted.”
“The consequences of breaching the block grant would have been multiple and grave. Not only would Her Majesty's Treasury have removed the total of our overspend, which would have been in the range of £200 million to £300 million, from next year’s Budget, there was the prospect of an additional penalty being heaped on top. <BR /> <BR />Issues that are important to this Assembly, such as the ongoing discussions on the devolution of corporation tax powers, would have ceased, and the flexibilities that we are seeking for the continued funding of the proposed community safety college at Desertcreat would not have materialised. It was also possible that HM Treasury would not even have tolerated our heading towards an overspend and could have stepped in before year-end and begun to manage our access to cash on a day-to-day basis.”
“It is not the all-encompassing agreement on the totality of our budget challenges that I would like to present to this House. Some have suggested that what was before the Executive last Thursday should have been rejected simply because it did not address every single issue. Such criticism is short-sighted. <BR /> <BR />It was never likely that our deliberations last week would end with agreement on dealing with this year’s pressures and next year’s Budget and solve the welfare reform issue. However, it would have been a complete and utter disaster if we had let another week pass without dealing with the most immediate and pressing problem that is this year’s financial position. Every single day that passed was making living within our 2014-15 Budget less and less likely.”
“<BR /> <BR />We have needlessly squandered £87 million of funding that could have delivered significant benefits in areas like health care but for the political intransigence of some who have put their political aspirations in another jurisdiction above the best interests of the people of Northern Ireland. Opposition to passing welfare reform may well be their democratic right. However, it has, in my view, dubious merit whenever refusal to pass welfare reform legislation because you are trying to protect people already in receipt of welfare is putting people on the dole queue and condemning them and their families to a life on welfare. <BR /> <BR />I freely admit that this path through our present problems is far from perfect.”
“<BR /> <BR />I am pleased to be able to advise the Assembly on what I believe is a workable solution for the challenges facing the Executive’s immediate resource expenditure difficulties. However, it is unfortunate that the full implementation of the 4·4% baseline reduction — brought to the Executive in June — has been delayed to this point. That unwarranted delay has only created a more difficult environment for Departments to plan and deliver public services. We also need to be clear that the use of the £100 million facility is only a short-term fix that provides some chance for the Executive to live within adjusted HM Treasury control totals for this year.”
“There cannot therefore be any attempt to renege or reinterpret the conditions. I have attached a copy of the Chancellor’s letter to the First Minister to the statement. <BR /> <BR />The detail of the consequential impact on 2014-15 departmental resource expenditure is set out in the annexes that accompany this statement. As a result, we exit the October monitoring round overcommitted by £25 million on resource DEL. That is a significant level of overcommitment, and I have encouraged all Ministers to make best endeavours to identify reduced requirements in the remaining months of this financial year. That means that it is unlikely that any further bids for funding will be entertained by the Executive in the January monitoring round.”
“<BR /> <BR />The Chancellor also makes clear that repayment of this facility will happen in 2015-16. Whilst I accept that that adds to our challenges next year, the Executive have tasked the head of the Civil Service with beginning work on the development of options for reducing headcount in the public sector and further pay restraint. Along with possible political agreement on shrinking the size of Stormont, the savings that such difficult but necessary steps will realise will greatly assist us not only next year but, critically, on a recurrent basis. It is perhaps worth pointing out that, contrary to what one daily newspaper in Northern Ireland stated erroneously, interest is not payable on the loan. <BR /> <BR />It is important to stress that the Executive have now agreed to the terms and conditions set out in the Chancellor’s letter.”
“In the light of that, I will be tabling a draft Budget paper to the Executive in the coming days and hope that it will be agreed before the end of this month. <BR /> <BR />Both those conditions are entirely consistent with the position that my Department has been advocating on October monitoring and the 2015-16 Budget process. <BR /> <BR />Thirdly, the Chancellor has confirmed that the £87 million welfare reform adjustment due to foregone annually managed expenditure (AME) savings will now be deducted from the Northern Ireland DEL later this year and that the £114 million deduction planned for next year will also go ahead should there be no progress made with Northern Ireland’s welfare reform legislation. That is not actually a condition but a statement of fact from the Chancellor as to the Government’s long-standing position.”
“Again, I would have preferred if we could have already agreed next year’s Budget, but I trust that we will be able to do so in the coming weeks. I think that the Chancellor is absolutely correct to require the Executive to illustrate how we plan to move forward on the basis of a balanced Budget, taking into account all the pressures that we face and how we believe those can be addressed. <BR /> <BR />The Chancellor is not, as some might have you believe, seeking to control day-to-day spending decisions in Northern Ireland. He does not wish to dictate to the Executive how much funding health should receive or how much money education should get. He is instead, rightly, as the man responsible for all the UK’s public spending, keenly interested in Northern Ireland having spending plans that ensure that we live within our means.”
“The conditions are, first, that the Executive fully implement the 4·4% baseline reductions as indicated in June monitoring. That has now been agreed. However, as the House will be aware, I would have preferred if those reductions had been agreed during the June monitoring process when there was more time for Departments to plan prudently for reductions. Significantly, no further in-year reductions to departmental budgets are required. <BR /> <BR />Secondly, the Chancellor fully understands the critical importance of the time constraint confronting the Executive in setting the Budget for 2015-16. The Chancellor requires the Executive to have a credible 2015-16 plan in place before the end of October.”
“<BR /> <BR />We have, as a result, been able to gain temporary access to the national reserves to draw down £100 million to assist the Executive in 2014-15. That amounts to less than 1% of our resource DEL. The Chancellor's letter to the First Minister makes it clear that access to the national reserve comes with a number of conditions, although those are largely consistent with the Executive's existing plans. This is not a question of the Treasury or Her Majesty's Government stepping in to undermine devolution. Rather, at the request of the First Minister and me, they are providing short-term assistance due to particular one-off difficulties that we have faced this year. I want to put on record my gratitude to the Chancellor for dealing with the matter in such an expeditious manner.”
“<BR /> <BR />The Executive exited the June monitoring round with a zero overcommitment on resource DEL. Taking account of the allocations totalling £125 million and the £87 million reduction for non-implementation of welfare reform, the Executive were overcommitted by some £212 million. Given that departmental resource expenditure has already been reduced by 2·1% this year, seeking to address that overcommitment entirely through in-year reduction to departmental budgets would have proved very difficult to manage. Therefore, with a view to easing the impact on departmental resource DEL this year, the First Minister and I sought a solution to our in-year problems in conjunction with the Chancellor of the Exchequer.”
“<BR /> <BR />The Executive agreed resource DEL allocations totalling £125 million, including £8 million to DARD for tuberculosis compensation; £13·8 million to DETI for Invest NI and sporting events; £60 million to the Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety for pressures in the health sector; £29 million to the Department of Justice for PSNI and legal aid pressures; £4·5 million to DRD for concessionary fares; £1·3 million to OFMDFM for the Victims and Survivors Service; £0·8 million to the Northern Ireland Assembly to reinstate its June monitoring reduction; and £7·6 million to the Public Prosecution Service (PPS) for equal pay and casework challenges. Full details are set out in the annexes accompanying this statement.”
“Failure to address those departmental pressures and the cost of not implementing welfare reform through the in-year monitoring process would increase the risk that the Executive would breach its HM Treasury control total on resource expenditure. Given that addressing those pressures would inevitably require further reductions to departmental resource DEL controls, I believed it crucial that those issues should be addressed as soon as practicable to allow Departments sufficient time to manage the impact on their budgets. In view of that, following Executive discussion last Wednesday, I presented a paper to Executive colleagues on Thursday seeking Executive agreement on a way forward. I am pleased to say that the Executive endorsed those proposals.”
“That reduction did not address the £87 million reduction to our resource DEL in 2014-15 for not implementing welfare reform in line with the rest of the United Kingdom. However, it was agreed that the Executive must address that issue in the October monitoring round. <BR /> <BR />Since June, it has become apparent that a number of Departments face inescapable pressures that cannot be addressed from within their existing resource DEL allocations. Those pressures are in addition to the costs of not implementing welfare reform. My officials have scrutinised departmental pressures, and it has been determined that £125 million of those are genuinely inescapable, with many involving legal or contractual commitments.”
“I wish to present to the Assembly the Executive's conclusions on the resource expenditure element of the October monitoring round. The Executive's consideration of the wider October monitoring round, including the impact on capital budgets, is not yet complete. I will make a separate statement apprising the Assembly on the outcome of the full monitoring round at a later date. <BR /> <BR />As Members will be well aware, the Executive's resource departmental expenditure limit (DEL) budget in this financial year has been confronted with a range of significant pressures. In the June monitoring round, the Executive agreed to reduce departmental resource DEL by 2·1%, or £77·9 million, to address a number of those pressures.”
“You can ask about new budgetary processes, as you did yesterday with a terribly worded motion that called for the redrafting of the Budget for three months of the year and showed a complete lack of understanding of the budgetary process in the House. However, the fundamental point is this: even if you redraft the Budget, you need to have money to do something substantially different with it. I hear nothing from the Ulster Unionist Benches or any Benches in the House about where we would find the money to do things radically differently or better with our Budget.”
“I will try to address the point. Making adjustments would necessitate new money, but there is no new money and no more money coming from London. I presume that the Member does not want to substantially increase rates, not that that raises a huge amount anyway, and I presume that his party still holds the position of opposing water charges. Therefore, we do not have any new money to play with. Money has to then come from existing budgets, and I do not hear anything from the Member or any of his party colleagues about where we would find the money to move to health or education or, indeed, to any other budget that might be deemed a priority.”
“Despite the doom and gloom predictions, there was an increase in health spending for this year, and the Minister has done an excellent job in ensuring that the inefficiencies that were there have been extracted from the system.”
“We did not enter bankruptcy, of course, and the Minister, who is looming behind the Member's shoulder at the minute, found a further half a billion pounds of efficiencies and has committed to finding another £170 million this year.”
“Michael McGimpsey told us that there would be around 4,000 job losses in the health service in this Budget period, when, in fact, the number of nurses has gone up by nearly 6%, the number of medical and dental consultants has gone up by 15%, and the number of allied health professionals has gone up by over 12%. So that is another area in which Michael McGimpsey was wrong. He also told us that hospital waiting lists would rise, but, in reality, the number of people spending longer than 12 hours in emergency departments is down by over 73% from May 2011. Of course, he also famously told us that we would be in chapter 11 bankruptcy by 1 April 2011. He is in the House, and perhaps he could explain — I am happy for him to explain to me afterwards — why we would file for bankruptcy in an American court.”
“The Member will be well aware that the Executive agreed a four-year Budget. That included a substantial increase in the allocations for health, above and beyond what other Departments received. As I pointed out yesterday in the debate when the Member was in the Chair — I am not sure whether he was listening at that point — in spite of the warnings of doom from the then Health Minister, Michael McGimpsey, about what would happen to the health service, those warnings did not come to pass. <BR /> <BR />I will remind the Member about the things that his party colleague Michael McGimpsey said at that time about what would happen to the health service and what happened in reality, because I do not think that the Member was listening yesterday.”
“The Member has given me the question number, and I will do what I committed to do in my previous answer. I will look at it and answer it if I am able to.”
“I like to think that I know quite a lot about my brief — in fact, I know most of it — but I am not entirely familiar with the question the Member has asked about. If he wishes to have a word with me afterwards and give me the exact number of the question, I will look into it and see what we can do.”
“However, some things have developed, and Ministers will want to include them as new targets to try to work on in the final year of our mandate. <BR /> <BR />Perhaps the lack of a fundamental redrafting of the Programme for Government will not be to everybody's satisfaction, but I think that, in the circumstances we find ourselves in, in which the Budget is challenging and time is pressing, the midterm review, many targets being rolled forward and the insertion of a few additional targets is the right way to go.”