Gerry Carroll
West Belfast · People Before Profit Alliance · Northern Ireland
“Yesterday morning, as others did, I stood alongside our resident doctors as they commenced a 24-hour period of industrial action. We often praise our healthcare workers in the House and more generally, saying things such as that they are invaluable and that we wish them well.”
“If we have learnt anything from the political events of the past week, it is that powerful people — powerful men, in particular — and institutions should always be held to maximum account when it comes to abuse, neglect and victims, and that victims and survivors should be believed and supported on every occasion.”
“Agency spend has, again, gone through the roof and is sky-high; locum spend has gone up and continues to go up — it has gone up by in the region of £0·5 billion over the past few years; and, almost every single year out of the past five to 10 years, hundreds of millions of pounds of public money have been pumped into the for-profit privat…”
“With bills increasing month-on-month and year-on-year, that is true, and those workers need a proper settlement that meets their needs and the ever-increasing cost of living. One striking doctor put it to me starkly yesterday. They said that they left Scotland and took a more senior position in the health sector in Belfast.”
“I commend Stephen and his colleagues in the Bill Office and the Executive Office officials, who worked closely with me to try to support, amend or help along my amendments — whatever way you want to look at it. I also want to commend the Member for Fermanagh and South Tyrone who spoke out during the last few stages.”
“I commend people for speaking out on the issue, especially Sharon Burke. I think that she might be in the Gallery. She has been emailing Members on that issue.”
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“As I said, the crisis did not appear from nowhere. Almost since the NHS was founded, decades ago, dental care has been coming under sustained attack. Just a year after its creation in 1948, the Labour Government introduced dental prescription fees, while charges for dentures followed in 1951. That slow privatisation has never stopped. Today, under a different Labour Government at Westminster, with a Stormont Executive doing their bidding at home, dentistry is closer than ever to breaking point. I do not think that the alarm bells have gone off in the Department, however. <BR /> <BR />NHS dentists are losing money. They are being forced to subsidise NHS work with private income, and that simply should not be the case. Market solutions created the crisis, and they will never be able to solve it.”
“It is no coincidence that the communities that suffer most are in constituencies such as West Belfast, as was mentioned, and other deprived areas with high levels of poverty and inequality, where private dental fees are unaffordable for working-class families. The link between poverty and poor oral health is well established. Children in deprived areas suffer disproportionately from tooth decay. Untreated dental disease leads to children missing school, missed work appointments and missed hospital admissions, and, quite often, lifelong health consequences and complications. When NHS dentistry crumbles, it is never the wealthy who are left behind.”
“It is a crisis that the Minister and successive Governments have allowed to fester year-on-year without getting a grip on the crisis. Fewer than a million people — just half of the population — are registered with a health service dentist in the North, which is frightening, and almost 400,000 people have been lost since 2023. I do not understand how a patient just gets lost and there is no follow-up action from the Department or a health trust. The mind boggles. <BR /> <BR />The number of health service dental treatments delivered is 40% lower than before the pandemic. Health service dentistry has utterly collapsed, and I would say by design.”
“I declare an interest: I have a sibling who is a practising dentist. I support the motion — I thank the Members who tabled it — and the amendment from the Alliance Party, although we have to wonder whether another strategy is needed rather than the Minister and the Executive just doing what needs to be done. <BR /> <BR />As the Member opposite said, thousands of our constituents in West Belfast are living in unbearable agony. They are pulling out their own teeth and living with untreated infections because they cannot get access to a dentist that they can afford. How many oral cancer diagnoses have been missed? How many death sentences have effectively been declared because people have been unable to get access to a dentist? This is fundamentally a class issue and a poverty issue.”
“Minister, you may or may not be aware that my TD comrades in Dáil Éireann are trying to introduce legislation to stop trade with Israel. Will you introduce procurement legislation or policy to isolate Israel, which would include but not be limited to not giving public money to organisations that are invested in the apartheid state?”
“I thank the Member for giving way. I said that there was a role when a crime was being committed. That is not being disputed. It was a general comment. <BR /> <BR />Does the Member have any concerns about an increased roll-out of drones in police surveillance? It would affect young people and people from nationalist and, presumably, migrant backgrounds, who are already being stopped and searched quite heavily. Does he have any concern about the overuse of police powers in those communities, as suggested in the amendment?”
“<BR /> <BR />In conclusion, it is worth saying that young people are already subject to stop-and-search on a huge level by the police. They are subject to spit hoods as well, and I do not think that we should be adding to that carte blanche. Obviously, if someone has committed serious injury or a serious crime, that speaks for itself, but, in a general sense, adopting that approach is quite mistaken. Of course, those vehicles are not risk-free, as I have outlined, but the elephant in the room in the debate, when we talk about risk to life and risk to people, is cars. How many people every single year do cars knock down and kill? Most of us in the Building use one, so I think that we need to focus on that as well —”
“Generally, I warn against a policing-led response to this. The response from young people to that will be that that is needed like a hole in the head. We need to have a youth-led response that actually talks to young people and engages with them. As a youth worker in a pervious job, I know that people respond to that better than when a stick used against them. It is much easier to take the approach of blaming young people and parents, but it is more appropriate and more difficult in this political climate to find the funding to invest in young people more generally, including in youth centres, which are being cut back, and in summer schemes, which are not being protected, to give young people a bit of hope and to listen to them about their needs, their wishes and what they are interested in.”
“We will have to try to understand why young people engage in the practice and encourage them to do it safely and not in a way that puts themselves and others at risk. <BR /> <BR />I missed the start of the debate, but there was a clear demand for managed sites — it has been referenced already — so that people can use the vehicles in a safe and controlled way. I appreciate that the AERA Minister is standing in, but we need to hear from the Justice Minister or even the AERA Minister about any work that is being progressed around safe sites.”
“<BR /> <BR />This may be the more difficult part to grapple with: why are so many people — according to the statistics, it is primarily young people but not just them — attracted by those vehicles? I am generally not interested in cars or fast vehicles — I started to drive only two years ago — but I imagine that, for young people, it is the thrill of travelling fast. They often live alienated lives over which they have no control or say, and a vehicle going at 50 mph or whatever the Member said, dangerous as that is, can feel liberating or like a good thing to people, obviously with huge risks to them. In some cases, people can literally feel heard: some of those machines can be quite loud. People have also raised that with me in the constituency.”
“<BR /> <BR />Like the Member for North Belfast, I met the Belfast Hills Partnership some months ago — I think that it was in the summer — on the issue. While we do not necessarily agree on the solutions to the crisis, there is unanimity on the fact that people using scramblers and such vehicles to go on to green spaces and cut or chop them up and obviously destroy habitats is an issue. We should appeal to people to not engage in that: stop doing that; it is disruptive behaviour. However, we should also be cognisant of the fact that industrial dumping and pollution ruins green spaces and ecosystems as well because of the harmful items placed in waters primarily by industrial farming.”
“If you speak to people about e-scooters and scramblers, you will get a pretty strong response, as has been said, from constituents and people across the North. I echo the tributes paid to Valerie Armstrong by my colleague from West Belfast. It is hard to believe that it is 10 years since she was killed in Colin Glen Forest Park, where I previously worked. That shows that those vehicles can be dangerous. They were fatal for Valerie, so I want to remember her, as others have done, and pay tribute to her family. <BR /> <BR />In a general sense, I appeal to people — not just young people — not to engage in the ripping up of parks and public green spaces, particularly when using scramblers and any other vehicles. I would hazard a guess and say that it is not only young people who are doing that.”
“A job of work will be required to challenge the narrative put out by business organisations about the Bill. I hope that that limited but important Bill is not watered down as a result of pressure from them, and I welcome assurances to that effect. <BR /> <BR />Minister, will you make it clear whether provision for the demands made by Unite the union — I declare that I am a Unite member — on the extreme weather conditions policy will be included in your Bill? If not, would you be open to supporting amendments to that effect?”
“I suppose that it is their job to defend their Executive, but, deep down, they know that people consider the Executive to be completely failing them on multiple fronts, especially on the cost-of-living crisis. They have failed to protect people. They have failed to act for people. We know that the British Government have failed people, but Sinn Féin and the other Executive parties have done their bidding by implementing their ridiculous Budgets, which have resulted in people's services being cut in real terms in real time. <BR /> <BR />People may ask what can the Executive do. They could implement rent controls, but all Executive parties have voted against those consistently. They could stop giving hundreds of millions of pounds to private landlords. They could scrap industrial derating for big companies. If people in the South —.”
“Energy companies are increasing their prices, forcing people to look at their meter and turn down their thermostat a bit, because they cannot afford to pay their energy bills. What is the result of that? People are cold and are having health problems, yet energy companies are making a huge fortune on the back of everybody but especially on the back of poor and vulnerable people. There needs to be a windfall tax on energy companies, but I have heard nothing about that from the Executive parties. If they agree to do that, brilliant, but I have not heard the Executive articulate at all that they will do that, so I do not know whether they are for it or not. <BR /> <BR />I agree with some of what the Sinn Féin Members said. There was, however, also a lot of defensiveness from them.”
“Given the increase in the cost of food, the number of parents skipping meals will rocket. The Executive are not talking about that. They are still ruling out capping the price of food. Although the deputy leader of the Alliance Party referred to it in passing, the motion makes no mention of the profit bonanza that private companies are experiencing whilst people are being ripped off. Take Tesco, for example. It has taken a hit because of the war on Iran and has adjusted its forecast, but it is still projected to make £3 billion in profit in the coming year. If you ask me and most people, that is completely insulting and disgusting. <BR /> <BR />The top 20 energy companies up until August 2024 made £557 billion in profit. That was almost two years ago, so the figure will obviously have increased now.”
“More people will be forced to go to the dentist, if they can even get access to a dentist, given the crisis in dental care as well. To get treatment, they will be forced to fork out hundreds, if not thousands, of extra pounds to a dentist. More and more people will be eating sugary foods and processed foods, and they will be unable to access to a dentist. They will have rotten teeth or get oral cancer. That is just one small example of how the cost-of-living crisis will have a direct impact on the health of people in my constituency and across the North. <BR /> <BR />Parents already skip meals. At least 41% of them have reported cutting back on or skipping meals in order to feed their children. Of course, any parent would do that. That will go in only one direction.”
“Again, there has been no action from the Executive on that. <BR /> <BR />The cost of food has increased exponentially. People can do without many things in life, such as computers or phones, but they cannot do without the essentials. They cannot do without food. People are paying through the nose when they go to supermarkets. DAERA's food strategy framework action plan from last year found that nine out of 10 consumers were worried about the price of food. The result of that is pretty clear. People will buy less healthy foods and will instead buy more processed foods. In any supermarket, the more processed foods are cheaper. I am not judging people, but the reality is that that is what people will be forced to do in order to feed their family. <BR /> <BR />What will be the result of people buying more processed foods?”
“Everywhere we look, it is clear that most people are struggling to make ends meet. While there is no doubt that Trump's war on Iran has played a major part in driving up prices — let us not forget that the war has also led to destruction and to the killing of thousands of Iranians — most of the deep cost-of-living problems predate the war. The war has just exacerbated them. Take the fact that people have been forced to be on a waiting list for years to get a hip replacement or some other medical procedure. That is a cost-of-living problem that has direct financial and health impacts on people. We heard yesterday that 6,000 people had died in the past 10 years while waiting in emergency departments. That is because they are in the wrong place, are not getting treatment or are not being seen to by our healthcare system.”
“<BR /> <BR />In conclusion, I ask the Minister, through the Speaker, this question: was there a vote at the Executive on this? There has been some back and forth between Sinn Féin and the SDLP, but I presume that this went through by consensus at the Executive, and I presume that the Executive parties supported it. I also remind Members that MLAs still get free parking at this Building while we are telling other people to pay for parking outside their place of work. The leader of the Opposition talked about transparency. Indeed, I am all for that. I remind him that his party had the chance to vote against accelerated passage of the Bill but refused to do so.”
“At least he is being honest, I suppose, but I would throw that back and challenge him by saying that trusts have spent £60 million on private ambulance services over the past five years, and the Department, through the trusts, is spending hundreds of millions of pounds every year on private healthcare as well. Money can be found when it is needed, and it should be found in this case. <BR /> <BR />The Minister usually refers to England in debates, usually to say that things are bad in England so we should be less angry about things being bad here. However, I will let the Minister know — I am sure that he knows this already — that, in England, there is a £10 million travel fund for people with cancer, but there is no suggestion of anything like that being put in place here.”
“We hear a lot of talk about people working together, non-silo mentalities and all those kind of buzzwords. Hundreds of millions of pounds were spent on Grand Central station, which opened one or two years ago. To my knowledge, there were no extra bus transport services put in place for people to get to those hospitals and healthcare sites. I am happy to be corrected on that, but I do not believe so. Therefore, although there is all this talk about using public transport, the investment is not being put in place at all. <BR /> <BR />The Minister talked about finance and said that it has been a financial issue.”
“The Minister talked about the Bill not being about reversing the original decision that was made in 2022. That is exactly what the Bill is doing. It is reversing the original decision. <BR /> <BR />Young Lives vs Cancer corresponded with me and, I am sure, others, ahead of the debate. It said that, on average, families in which there are young people with cancer are paying £700 every month. If the Minister has the power to reduce that cost, he should go ahead and do that speedily. However, he is doing the opposite: he is lumping an extra payment on to those families. Even for that sole reason, Members should vote against the Bill today. Waiting for free parking at hospitals to come through from the Assembly will be like 'Waiting for Godot'. It will never come, especially if we pass the Bill today.”
“To use words that the Minister used in response to me in the question for urgent oral answer, "in an ideal world", it would be wonderful to see people use public transport, and they should, if they can. I remind the House that, just a few moments ago, the House backed a piece of legislation that will charge people to apply for their SmartPasses. It is a contradiction and a sign of one hand not knowing what the other is doing. It is also the case that there is insufficient, to put it mildly, public transport provision in many areas of the North, never mind the fact that people who have cancer are being told that they have to get a bus or train. Do we expect people with cancer and other serious ailments, diseases and illnesses to sit on a bus or train? To be frank, that is disgusting.”
“If you look up "hames" in the dictionary, you will see a picture of this Bill and an account of how it has been handled by this Minister, the previous Minister and the Executive as a whole. From the start of the process, those who could have availed themselves of free parking have been messed about, taken for granted and made mugs of by the Assembly. They were promised free parking at hospitals, but one of the first things to be done by the Assembly when it was reconvened was the reversal of that decision. It seems like patients and health workers are only good when it comes to photo ops for Executive parties in the Building. <BR /> <BR />In previous debates, the Department talked about public transport for healthcare appointments and people using public transport for healthcare appointments.”
“That needs to be factored into the Department for Infrastructure's policy considerations, because I do not believe that it has been to date.”
“I am concerned that, when departmental officials last appeared before the Committee, it appeared that no work had been done to determine whether, if the number of people who were applying for a SmartPass were to drop, the SmartPass fee would go up. For talk's sake, let us say that 100,000 people applied for it last year at a cost of £12: if 50,000 people apply for it the year after that, will the cost go up to £24 or more? That has not been worked out by the Department. <BR /> <BR />The Department for Infrastructure officials who presented to the Finance Committee talked about people living longer. For the most part, that is the case, but people in my constituency of West Belfast and elsewhere are dying 10 and 12 years younger than people in the wealthier parts of Belfast and across the North.”
“It is worth noting that the Law Centre has stated that a payment to register for the SmartPass would create a barrier, particularly for people on low incomes, to accessing it. That is bad policy. It is also worth mentioning that the majority of responses to the DFI consultation on paying a fee for a SmartPass opposed any fee being levied. There is a question as to how the Department for Infrastructure and the Department of Finance can stand over that proposal. <BR /> <BR />My concern is that fewer people will apply for the SmartPass, which may be the intended consequence of the clause. A figure of £12 is being bandied about by the Department as the cost of a SmartPass.”
“I will be brief. I will speak to amendment Nos 2 and 3, which relate to clause 17. I raise my concern and opposition to that aspect of the Bill, as I have consistently done throughout the Committee Stage. As has been discussed, the proposal gives the Department the power to set a fee for issuing or replacing SmartPasses. My concern, as I have stated already, is that charging a fee for a service that should be free is a wrong policy. It is about revenue raising, as we were told at the Finance Committee a few months ago. I am also concerned that it is likely to be passed as the Bill commands the support of the House in the weeks ahead towards the Final Stage. I am concerned that there will be nothing to stop the Department, save for a proposal through the House, from increasing the cost of the SmartPass fee.”
“In recent days, some concerns have been raised with me about amendment No 12 regarding widening the scope of the deaf community. Have there been any discussions on the Committee about increased funding and increased support from the Minister or the Executive to those organisations so that they can supply services, classes and the like to meet some of that demand if the definition has been broadened out?”
“I thank the Member for giving way. If I have picked him up correctly, I think that he is talking about amendment No 22.”
“The figures are completely shocking. The underfunding of our NHS and the waits in ED are leading to mass deaths. There has been a desensitisation to that in some quarters. In 2016, 60 people died in EDs; since then, 6,000 people have died. That is shocking. Who will be held accountable for that? Whose head will roll because of that shocking figure? <BR /> <BR />Minister, you talk about solutions. In the past five years, £60 million has been spent on private ambulances. Do you not think that that is an extortionate spend by our health trusts? If you do, will you commit to putting that money back into the NHS — into the NIAS — and ensuring that we have capacity to look after and treat sick people?”
“— you have failed to act on this really important issue.”
“A 53% increase in private rents is disgusting but not surprising. It is something that I, and many others, warned about years ago. The truth is, Minister, that you have allowed landlords to run riot and rip people off. When are you going to introduce rent reduction and rent caps? It should not fall on my shoulders to bring forward a private Member's Bill on the issue, but I am doing so because —”
“The Minister will be aware that there have been wildfires in the Black Mountain area in my constituency over the past few years. How will his strategy and action plan take that area and other mountainous locations into consideration?”
“<BR /> <BR />I extend my solidarity to the University and College Union and to the students who will be fighting the decision and pushing back against it. This situation may have been predictable, but it certainly was not inevitable. With the coming together of the will of students, workers and people in the House, we can defeat the decision.”
“I am concerned. Like the Member for South Belfast, I have been contacted in recent days by people who are appalled at the decision. I have also been contacted by staff who are scared to speak out. That says a lot about the culture that is in place not just at Ulster but at many places across the North. They are scared of speaking out and of what the ramifications will be if they raise their heads above the parapet. <BR /> <BR />Our assessment is that the blame for the debacle lies with Ulster University's management as well as with the Executive, who have taken a head-in-the-sand approach to properly funding higher education. They have failed to invest in higher education and have forced students to pay more for education year-on-year when it should be free.”
“<BR /> <BR />It says a lot about the type of society in which we live that Ulster University, or any other institution, can, with Stormont's acquiescence, overspend on a building until it ends up costing £350 million but, at the same time, issue hundreds of P45s to the people who will work in that building: those who make education possible for people across our constituencies. What is the point of having shiny new buildings if hundreds of staff are to be laid off and those left, who will be forced to do the jobs of two, three or four people, are overworked and stressed to the max?”
“It is what happens when universities and other institutions become more wedded to marketisation than to educating. Universities are being treated as factory lines rather than being about lifting up communities and educating people about history and the world around them more generally. The management of Ulster University seems to be more concerned about shiny new buildings, international flights, celebrities and balancing budgets than about students and workers on campus.”
“I declare that I am a past pupil of Ulster University — there may be some of its students in the Gallery today — and a former sabbatical officer of its students' union. <BR /> <BR />We have to say unequivocally that Ulster University management's proposal to sack 450 workers is a mistaken, ill-thought-out and regressive move. I hope that others will support my call for Ulster University's management body to reverse that disgraceful decision, which will cause untold harm to students and communities across the North. As has been said, they are already facing a cost-of-living crisis, with the price of fuel going through the roof and food prices skyrocketing. What are those 450 workers expected to do? Where are they expected to go for work? <BR /> <BR />Unfortunately, the decision is predictable.”
“There is plenty of money, and there are plenty of options. I urge Members and the Minister to vote against the motion.”
“I will answer the question if you will let me speak. Come on. Calm down a wee bit there. You can also speak if you want to. To address the question, I dispute the figures that the Minister has outlined, but I am happy to look at them. I say this quite clearly to the Minister: if we do not act, it will have a financial and human impact. People are dying every single year, probably in your constituency and in mine, because of dirty air. Not acting is costing lives, and it will cost more money down the line. If you want to look at where money can be taken from to tackle the climate crisis, have a look at the amount of money that your Department is spending on subsidising landlords because of huge rents every single year.”
“I thank the Minister for giving a short speech. There is plenty of money about, Minister. You are able to speak if you want to, but maybe your time would be better spent trying to tackle the housing crisis, which you are failing to do.”
“I sincerely ask the DUP this: what good is it having that seat on the Shankill if people on the Shankill and the Falls are under water, given the policies that you advocate? That is the trajectory that you want us to go on. I am happy to give way to the Minister.”
“In recent days, the DUP has been pushing hard for a unionist seat for West Belfast. It is, of course, up to the electorate to determine who gets elected there.”
“<BR /> <BR />Think about it: the DUP does not want holiday hunger payments, and it does not want more cycle lanes and cycle infrastructure. The mind certainly does boggle. Despite that, active travel funding has already been reallocated to support road repairs and to subsidise street lighting. <BR /> <BR />Finally, I will address the brass neck of the DUP, which tabled the motion. The party that presided over the renewable heat incentive scandal, burning through hundreds of millions of pounds of public money through a shambolic and fraudulent scheme, now wants to lecture us about fiscal responsibility and value for money. That would be laughable if this were not so serious. That audacity is breathtaking. Those are the last people who should be demanding a cost-benefit analysis from anyone.”
“The Garron plateau restoration project delivers £3·90 for every £1 invested, and peatland restoration, in general, reduces the risk of flood by 27%. That is what genuine cost-benefit analysis looks like. The cost of inaction eclipses the cost of action, every time. That, of course, is not mentioned in the motion. <BR /> <BR />The motion also cynically pits investment in our roads against active travel. The Walk Wheel Cycle Trust rightly points out that investment in active travel means wider, safer pavements for disabled people, parents with prams and people who cycle. It is the only form of travel that benefits our health, economy and environment at the same time. A few extra cycle lanes could be beneficial, given the scale of traffic chaos on motorways today.”
“Its recent polling found that 86% of people here want to the Executive to do more, not less, on nature restoration, and that 89% of people want them to take more, not less, action to protect nature for future generations. Obviously, that includes farmers. It is worth challenging. Farmers are not one homogenous block, and they do not buy the DUP's climate change denial, hook, line and sinker. The public are not asking us to gut climate protections; they are asking us to act. That is unequivocal. Failing to invest now means paying a far steeper price later financially — never mind the human cost — in flood damage, energy insecurity and destroyed infrastructure. <BR /> <BR />It is worth looking at examples of what works.”
“I agree with the Member for Foyle that the problem is not that we have moved too fast; the problem is that the Executive have dragged their feet for 20 years and are now looking for someone else to blame. The DUP tends to blame asylum seekers for the housing crisis, and now it blames limited climate legislation for roads not being built. The mind certainly does boggle. The framing of the cost-of-living crisis in the motion is really cynical. Climate change legislation, albeit limited, is important, and it does not make life financially harder for people. <BR /> <BR />I thank the RSPB for its helpful briefing ahead of the debate on the motion.”
“I do not know what the Communities Minister is mumbling about, but I will give way to him in a second, if he wants to intervene. <BR /> <BR />Let us be honest about what actually causes our crumbling roads and failing infrastructure. It is not climate targets but decades of chronic underinvestment, an over-reliance on private car usage and a catastrophic failure to expand our public transport network. The DUP has been central to the Budgets that have gutted our public services and worsened the cost-of-living crisis for communities. Blaming the Climate Change Act for potholes and delayed road schemes is grade-A spoofing, and people will not be fooled by it. <BR /> <BR />The North was far behind other jurisdictions on reducing emissions before that legislation was enacted.”