Claire Hanna
South Belfast · Social Democratic and Labour Party · Northern Ireland
“I thank the Minister for his answers so far and for the announcement of the inquiry. In common with other Opposition parties, we have been calling for a long number of weeks for an inquiry under the 2005 Act. I am glad of the acknowledgement of that.”
“My question was about a contingency or plan B, as the challenge was entirely foreseeable. Has the Minister given any thought to publishing an anonymised list? Such a list could contain some geographical detail, the date, the output and the payment, so that we can get a sense of the levels of applicants that are credible and not credible.”
“— it is so important we let the people who have put all those qualities into the public discourse know they have been validated and that the redress they are entitled to is delivered to them.”
“I thank all those who have spoken. Like others, I attended the launch of the report on Friday and have spent some time since reading it. I think that, for everybody there, it was a very difficult few hours — even for those of us who did not live through those experiences.”
“<BR /> <BR />Colin McGrath, when moving the motion, referred to the appalling shooting last night of a public servant and member of the PSNI as an illustration of what we have failed to eliminate and what we are definitely not returning to, but, as we said, that opportunity has been squandered.”
“<BR /> <BR />Colin McGrath made the point that, despite the disappointment and the stop and start of progress, if we found ourselves 20 years back, we would still push to try and deliver the Good Friday Agreement, because the fact is the that core analysis of John Hume's three strands still stands.”
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Every one of 479 lines we hold for Claire Hanna, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 6 of 10.
“I thank the Member for giving way. You will see from Hansard and from our website that, 20 minutes after we were given the figures, I asked for clarity on the difference between the figures.”
“Will the Minister clarify what that shared future measures money for the Executive Office will be spent on? <BR /> <BR />Can I get clarity on one other item? On page 6, you refer to a £126·2 million resource DEL and £17·7 million capital DEL, and, on page 8, it refers to a £140·1 million resource DEL and £29·1 million capital DEL. Will you outline the reason for the discrepancy in those figures?”
“We appreciate the Minister's energy, but we support the view that there has not been sufficient time to scrutinise the statement. The first big report of the mandate was the paramilitary report. The First Ministers completely bypassed the Assembly on that occasion. At least you have taken questions, but one hour for Members to scrutinise is not sufficient. <BR /> <BR />I am looking at a couple of the figures here. Despite having significantly reduced powers in this mandate, £19·2 million has been allocated to the Executive Office for the social investment fund and Delivering Social Change, and a further £7·4 million has been allocated for shared future measures, as well as money that has gone to other Departments for the same purpose.”
“First of all, in the previous debate I did not say that; I proposed taking £800,000 from the extensive administration budget in OFMDFM, which had gone up year on year. We have made proposals, and tomorrow we will again. You choose to ignore them. My colleague in health set out some. We have set out things for childcare, and you ignore them as well. We also made a suggestion about zero-based budgeting. It should not be a case of "This is what we will do, because it is what we have always done"; we should start from day one. Will you respond to that specifically, rather than cherry-pick the things that you will and will not listen to?”
“Did you just walk in halfway through the sentence? The Member will recall that, prior to the part where I talked about more effectively slicing the pie, I talked about growing the pie and seeking some information on the revenue raising that would be part of that.”
“It is interesting that the deputy First Minister noted that he would wait to see the outcome of the election before setting a hard course. That is a good idea; it is a pity nobody else is allowed to do that. In the disastrous event of a Brexit, which powers that are currently with the European Union does he see being devolved to Northern Ireland? Has he done an audit of those powers? Which would usefully come to the Assembly?”
“The Member has brought this up before. Nobody is suggesting that there is not social need out there or that there are not problems that need to be solved. The Member needs to accept that people are critical because it is an invite-only scheme — only preferred suppliers and organisations have the opportunity to tender for the work. Nobody wants to take the money away from the early years schemes that you refer to, but do you not agree that any organisation with ideas and solutions should equally be allowed to apply for the money and deliver the solution?”
“If we are out of the European Union, it will take a lot of money from London and a lot of policy and imagination from this Executive. As the young people say, "Good luck with that".”
“They are not; rather, they are waiting for skilled employees and 21st-century infrastructure. The Budget that we are tinkering with does not go any way to addressing that. <BR /> <BR />In wrapping up, I will say that one thing that has not been addressed, and I do not expect it to be in this Budget, is the need for some direction on what the Executive are planning to do if we leave the European Union. Anything that we say today will become absolutely irrelevant in two weeks' time if there is a no vote, and we need to know what we will do to address that.”
“They are a cut-and-paste of information that is coming over from London, taking by rote what the Treasury is setting down and not really putting any of the creativity and imagination that devolution, and devolution's specific tailoring to circumstances, was supposed to address. <BR /> <BR />The issue of corporation tax has been raised, and I will not have time to go into it, but we need some clarity on what rebooting the negotiations will mean and on the various positions of the two Government parties. We believe that the devolution of corporation tax will be justified if it brings demonstrable, value-added, productive and decent jobs, but, so far, we have had a lot of rhetoric and no strategy. It is a myth that investors are waiting for the tax rate to drop.”
“We have correctly restructured down to nine Departments. That is a good thing, but it means that each scrutiny Department has more areas to scrutinise, and that has not been factored in effectively. In many cases, the information has not gone before the relevant Committee. <BR /> <BR />We, as the Opposition, will give good ideas a fair wind. We think that part of that might involve hard decisions and some form of zero-base budgeting. We cannot keep saying, "There is no money for this" or "There is no money for that" and, if anybody makes a suggestion, presenting it as just stealing money off something else. A reformed budgeting process should start as day one. At the moment, we feel that the Budgets are essentially just tinkering with the direct rule Budgets that have not served this place very well for the past 40 years.”
“Instead, we have these quarterly reviews and supplements. That has not served Northern Ireland very well nor provided enough strategic focus. Yes, of course, the one-year Budget that we are looking at now is unique in supplementing the additional year of the mandate, but the process is still flawed. We have argued for some time that we need a Budget oversight committee. Regrettably, that was rejected in the last mandate.”
“I will not go over all that again, but it is fair to say that this does not fill in any of the blanks that many of us felt were in it. The Government parties will start, I am sure, with the single transferable criticism that we are too vague and are not setting out alternatives; but when these Estimates provide detailed operational plans like "housing" and nothing else, you are not in very good shape to criticise the rest of us for not having a lot of detail. <BR /> <BR />Like it or not, and most people seem to like it except the parties across, we are in a new phase in the Assembly. Over the coming months of the mandate, we will have to recalibrate the processes. The budgeting scheme is something which desperately needs work. This is the only government institution in these islands that does not have an annual budgetary process.”
“We think that this half-year version of it is treading water in the absence of a programme. We are democrats and we accept the outcome of the election, but I think that we are past the time when it is just about having a big mandate: it is about what you do with it. We do not believe that this programme or Budget do anything very substantial with it. The Estimates that we are being ask to consent to come with very little explanation. We are not coming from a position where all these amounts are unjustified, but, in many cases, we do not know for certain what they are being used for. We are in a position to only scrutinise the bulges and contractions in the figures. <BR /> <BR />This debate comes a week after the discussion on the Programme for Government.”
“Our party is certainly not opposed to borrowing for strategic reasons for viable capital projects — indeed, the reform and reinvestment initiative was an innovation by the SDLP to encourage this sort of sensible economic planning — but, shamefully, this Executive has borrowed something like two thirds of their borrowing capacity for, I believe, revenue purposes and, we believe, for killing jobs, not creating them, in the scheme that the previous Member seems to be very proud of. <BR /> <BR />The sad life story of this Budget that we are tinkering with in this mid-year process began with disagreements over welfare and the Fresh Start talks that, I think, gave the character of how the Executive would work; that there would not be partnership or accommodation of differences. It was cobbled together to get over an election.”
“<BR /> <BR />I congratulate the previous speaker for his very detailed maiden speech. He correctly raises the issue of the excesses, primarily the £68 million arising from the incorrect rate of interest being applied on pension scheme liability. I agree, just for transparency, that a little bit more clarity will be required on how that happened and how it will be addressed. The Member also touched on the issue of borrowing.”
“It is your job to be smarter and more effective with the money and to, as you say, grow the pie and certainly slice it more effectively than has been done in the previous two mandates. <BR /> <BR />Today, we are addressing the Supply resolutions for the Budget we approved earlier this year and for the Main Estimates for the year ahead. As others have said, it is largely a matter of process. We accept the procedural requirements for keeping salaries paid and services running and we will not oppose those procedures today. However, we reiterate our concerns about the flawed priorities that the Budget has rubber-stamped and the contorted budgeting process which is a symbol of the systematic process failure of this Executive, particularly in bypassing the Assembly.”
“I want to formally wish the Minister well. I admire his defence of these Estimates. I know that you probably did not even have time to open your pencil case before the Department had to issue them, but, as somebody who has shared a constituency with you for the last five years, I do hope that we will see the energy and ambition that people correctly associate with you put into future documents from the Department of Finance. We do not see it in this one. <BR /> <BR />I note that, in your remarks, you pre-emptively and quite comprehensively pin all the blame on the Conservatives and austerity. We are no fans of them, but the fact of the matter is that you, your party and your partners are now in the driving seat.”
“They know that, other than people who obsess about the politics of football, it is about people getting together, using their best endeavours, going out and putting on a show for the benefit and enjoyment of the people who watch. <BR /> <BR />I had my first trip to Windsor Park a couple of weeks ago to watch Northern Ireland in their last match before heading off. I was very taken by the positivity and warmth of that fan base, of which Darren would have been one, and he was probably there. We send our deepest condolences to his family and to all his friends as they come to terms with this.”
“I would like to associate our party with the comments of others and add our sincere condolences to this young man's family and, as others have said, to the wider footballing family. <BR /> <BR />It was obviously a trip of a lifetime. He probably saved up for it, and the memories would have sustained him and his mates for years to come. It is devastating that an accident of this nature has happened. They will take a long time to get over it, particularly at that formative age. I hope that they look after one another in the coming weeks, during the rest of the trip and in the years to come. <BR /> <BR />I am no footballing expert but, like a lot of people, I have been so encouraged by the positivity of fans of both the teams on this island, in particular how they have related to each other and to other teams as well.”
“This is absolutely not about letting standards slip so that the facilities are not safe, but, at the moment, they are potentially inspected by more than one authority. We think that cutting out some of the duplication in the inspections will generate savings for the private provider and the public purse. <BR /> <BR />In conclusion, we think that childcare is a deeply sound financial investment, and I believe that all parties can agree on that when they look at the very obvious benefits. If we fund this now, put in place the proper strategy to address it and increase over the term of the mandate the benefits for families, we will see benefits for years to come. I commend the motion to the House.”
“It is vital, intense work. I am sure that we all complain about the long days here, but anybody with small children will tell you that a day in this Building is probably a walk in the park, although I suspect that some of the conflict resolution strategies employed would be the same in both. <BR /> <BR />We have listened to the views of and feedback from the sector, including those providing childcare on a commercial basis, and we acknowledge that there needs to be support for them. One of the areas is a reform of the regulatory regime. It imposes unfeasible standards that do not drive outcomes but drain investment from innovation and any potential savings that could be passed on to parents.”
“We recognise that capacity is a big issue for the physical infrastructure and staffing, and that we need to improve training and outcomes, which will increase the quality of provision. <BR /> <BR />Research by Save the Children has identified key factors that will influence how a child does educationally by the age of five. First, what their parents do at home is key. Poverty, and the stressful effect of family poverty, is the second element, and the third element is the quality of early years provision. The better educated the provider, the better the educational outcomes will be. To attract skilled and qualified staff, the sector must become better paid and better respected. <BR /> <BR />It is no coincidence that caring work is predominantly done by women and is lower paid across many sectors. That has to change.”
“As well as reducing the direct cost of childcare to families, it would remove a key barrier for those seeking work. For many families who get a nursery place — in my constituency, getting your first-choice nursery place is probably the exception, not the rule, and getting a full-time place is the same — there is very little paid work that a parent can do in the two and a half hours between drop-off and pickup. While I understand that the preschool year is not just about childcare, it definitely facilitates more people going into work. You can go out and do some meaningful and remunerated work in that time without having to buy into childcare. <BR /> <BR />We believe that the transformative effect and potential of the initiatives justify the investment.”
“<BR /> <BR />A number of streams can be used to fund the proposals. The current spend on preschool childcare provision is £56 million a year, and the Department of Education has said that an increase to 30 hours a week would cost an extra £42 million. England is spending an extra billion pounds on childcare, and, if the Conservatives can look after working families, it should be in the ambition of the Assembly as well. There will be direct Barnett consequentials, and we believe that they should be spent specifically in this area of provision. <BR /> <BR />To get to the point of the 30 hours' free childcare that we would like to get to, the initial step would be to increase the minimum number of free preschool hours from 12·5 to 20 hours a week.”
“All those people pay tax, and, without childcare, those two or three workers are folded back into one, and labour productivity and the tax base shrink accordingly, so there are comprehensive and compelling reasons why it cannot just be left to the market but should be invested in from public funds. We need urgent action from the Executive and a revised strategy, legislation and funding to get the best start for children. <BR /> <BR />In response to an Assembly question last June, the then Education Minister, John O'Dowd, indicated that he would introduce an early years Bill before the end of the mandate. That did not happen, but we hope that it can be picked up by the incoming Minister. The Bill can be complemented by the incoming childcare strategy and functions, which we do not believe were effectively delivered on under OFMDFM.”
“In households where both parents want to continue to work, there is a multiplier effect, with a further worker being hired for childcare provision.”
“Focused, structured learning through play in early years obviously has lifetime value — we will expand on that — but the patience, understanding and love that children receive at home are still the best guarantee that they will flourish. Allowing their parents to be stimulated and remunerated outside the home is key in that. The socialising effect of guided, structured play in early years has very obvious benefits in cognitive behaviour, reasoning and concentration, and there are obvious positives on that throughout their educational and working life. <BR /> <BR />There are, of course, economic impacts far beyond the household budget. Greater childcare provision can be a key catalyst in bolstering the economy and retaining a skilled workforce.”
“There is also an understanding that people who work, even people who work full-time, will still develop perfectly warm relationships with their children. In fact, whether and how their mum in particular works outside the home can have a strong impact on the world view of girls and boys and their understanding of their place in the world and the options and aspirations available to them. <BR /> <BR />Many people want to work part-time and flexibly, and a lot more can be done to encourage that and incentivise employers to be family-friendly. Allowing parents to have fulfilling and stimulating work is key and has benefits far beyond the financial remuneration.”
“To ensure that women are properly represented in public life and in the public and private sectors, we need to invest in childcare and ensure that women in particular do not have to make a choice between a fulfilling career and the knowledge that their children are being well looked after and developed during the working day. <BR /> <BR />As well as support and investment in this provision, families need choice and flexibility. Every family is different, and many use a mixture of public, private, voluntary and family support. Traditionally, of course, many parents stay at home to keep a home and a family, and, if that is their choice, that should absolutely be facilitated and celebrated. <BR /> <BR />Happily, there is now an acceptance that childcare is a privilege and a duty for mums and dads equally.”
“Many people are working until Wednesday or Thursday of the working week just to cover the cost of their childcare, and many people are back in the workplace just to keep their foothold in the labour market and their skills current. <BR /> <BR />The gender pay gap, which substantially decreases lifetime earnings for women, including their pension and National Insurance contributions, can in many cases be tracked back to the gaps that women in particular, who take on most of the caring duties, take to raise their children.”
“The SDLP has been campaigning on the issue for quite some time, including the publication last September of our document, 'A Better Deal for Working Parents'. As an aside, those proposals were developed alongside Executive discussions on welfare reform. I bring that up because our proposals are inextricably linked with reform of work, more work, better-paid work, better working conditions and a better calibre of work. <BR /> <BR />As a working mum of two preschool-aged children, I understand acutely the choices that parents face in finding quality and convenient childcare. Costs are by far the biggest barrier for people who want to return to work. I believe that the average is £164 a week, which is just shy of half the median income here, but £200 a week for a child is by no means unusual, and wages are not rising to match this cost.”
“Childcare and the impact on childhood development, work-based equality and economic and social well-being are exactly the sort of subjects that the Assembly needs to tackle. We hope to see detail and progress on this in the next version of the Programme for Government. <BR /> <BR />We have taken on board feedback from policy experts and private providers of childcare and, looking at the departmental changes, tried to bring forward a comprehensive and viable set of proposals. We are focusing on the preschool year as expansion of that provision is probably the path of least resistance. We believe that it facilitates more people into work and would also be a strong start to expanding more comprehensive support for families into the private sector.”
“— to meet our energy security and to reduce, necessarily, the greenhouse gas emissions for this place. Onshore wind, for example, is cleaner, safer and less expensive than this sort of tactic, but it is being overlooked. We support the motion.”
“If we were given evidence that said that it was safe, we would reconsider the position. I wish that the same effort, determination and resource that are put into increasingly complicated and contrived extraction methods like this would be put into developing the renewable base here that has so much potential —”
“The follow-up proposal detailed some of the chemicals being used. As I have outlined, a number of Departments, including DARD, had the opportunity to pull the development back in. You can take the plank out of your own eye before you start to apportion blame here. <BR /> <BR />The discussion of this matter is frequently raised alongside fracking, and I accept Mr Lyons's point that it is not the same as fracking, but there are some parallels. On the latter issue, I commend Mark H Durkan for taking appropriate deployment of the precautionary principle during his term and refusing permission for that to take place in Northern Ireland until such time as it is proven safe, which is not the case at the moment. Although we are far off any confidence that this is safe, we are not blind or absolutist in our position on many things, including this.”
“As I have just outlined, at the time, the information available did not say that it was exploring the sub-geometry or whatever it is. And I think after the fact, when the follow-up proposal —”
“I have outlined the role that Mid and East Antrim Borough Council could have played in it; I understand that DETI granted the licence; DRD has influence over Northern Ireland Water, which has a demonstrable interest in protecting our water supply; and, indeed, the outgoing Agriculture Minister has responsibility for the Forest Service and could have potentially rejected permission to take the —”
“If the reforms to planning were to do anything, and even though they were not as comprehensive as we had initially designed them to be, they were designed to bring in community consultation and give the people closest to the impact of a decision a say through their local councillors. <BR /> <BR />A previous Member to speak has, I believe, continued with the campaign to try to pin the blame on the former DOE Minister and Department and, potentially, throw some anti-politics sentiment about why a decision might have been made. I do not think that that is the case. Once the details of what was being proposed emerged, I think that it is fair to say that there have been a number of missed opportunities to bring the development in.”
“After local government reform, the DOE had no jurisdiction over the permitted development notification, which had become, at that point, a matter for Mid and East Antrim Borough Council. In September 2015, the then Environment Minister, Mark H Durkan, wrote to the council clarifying this. He advised that the means of removing the PD rights was for the council to carry out a further environmental impact assessment (EIA) screening exercise and consultation based on the new information available. Unfortunately, we think that there was a missed opportunity that it did not take place.”
“The work was initially described as minor and non-contentious exploration — I think that we can clearly say that it is not. InfraStrata was lately granted a licence to reinject petroleum and other fluids, and I thank the Member for outlining what some of those were, into the site, and therefore it no longer could fall into the category of permitted development.”
“<BR /> <BR />As a background to how we got to this point, we know that the DOE got an application from InfraStrata in August 2013 detailing its intentions at Woodburn to probe the subsurface geology and identify areas for potential oil and gas deposit. I understand that officials in the Environment Agency made a determination, based on the information available at that time, concluding that the development did not need an environmental statement and that, according to the information submitted, the proposed borehole was essentially a legally permitted development (PD) and that planning permission was not required. <BR /> <BR />Since that decision, further information has emerged about the detail and the potential risks of what was proposed.”
“I thank the Member for his intervention. Yes, I am aware of that, and I believe that InfraStrata has acknowledged some of those breaches, even if others have not accepted that they have had breaches. I believe that this has been compounded by the fact that there have not been baseline studies and surveys to allow us to effectively quantify any environmental damage. I understand that there are concerns as the company doing this exploratory work is not financially secure and would not necessarily be in a position to fund any clean-up, if such clean-up was possible, in the event of a substantial breach.”
“Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. This is my first opportunity to congratulate you on your role which we know you will bring integrity and balance to. <BR /> <BR />The SDLP supports the motion. First and foremost, it is clear that there are substantial concerns about the proposals for exploratory drilling in Woodburn and that not enough is known about this kind of drilling and the potential impacts and effects on local communities. We certainly do not have enough information to declare it safe. We had been told that the well site would be fully watertight — a zero discharge zone — and lined with layers of cement and steel to prevent liquids escaping into the surrounding soil and the ground water.”
“Is there a role for local councils in the solution to the drug problem?”
“Can you outline, without recourse to the phrase "enemy of the peace process", the difference between what you did in the South and what we have done here in choosing to use opposition to hold a failing Government to account?”
“The alternative to Fresh Start would have been to negotiate solutions to a lot of the issues that were ignored by Fresh Start. The Member critiques the lack of detail in our responses, yet the outcomes-based approach with no detail is fine for you. You critique us hitching our wagon to the Ulster Unionist Party, which, you claim, is anti-building roads. Have you any differences with the party you have hitched your own wagon to? <BR /> <BR />You criticise the process that we outlined to the electorate, which was that we would seek to negotiate a Programme for Government and, if it was not acceptable, we would go into opposition. You did that in the Republic; we did the same here.”
“— for people. Issues of identity are also parked in the "too hard" pile. We look forward to seeing the detail.”
“We have heard a lot, but we have 100 pages of rhetoric here. When we start to get some of the detail, we will give it a fair wind. The proposals that are good we will support, but there is nothing in here on how we prepare for corporation tax powers, nothing on how we enhance North/South cooperation, nothing on how we get more out of devolution and nothing on how we address the mess over selection —”
“On childcare, a section of society that is crying out for support, OFMDFM failed to implement a childcare strategy and handed back funds that any parents who are paying out possibly more than they are earning will absolutely wince at. If you want to talk about alternatives, we have produced very comprehensive proposals and you are more than welcome to use them. <BR /> <BR />We are with the Government on wanting a strong economy, a more equal society, longer lives, more fragrant flowers and tastier dinners. We are with you on all of those things. Previous contributors from Executive parties have asked us what our alternative is. What is your alternative? You have not produced any detail yet.”