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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“The motion is dressed up as being about concern for ratepayers and rural communities, when, in reality, it is a direct attack on climate legislation that working-class people need the most.”
“I appreciate the Member's giving way. I think that she still sits on the Executive Office Committee. Is she also concerned that the deputy First Minister is blocking progress on a Climate Commissioner in the Executive?”
“Minister, given that an independent report found clear evidence of sexism and misogyny in the PSNI and that the report and its findings were accepted by the Chief Constable, how appropriate is it for that organisation to deal with violence against women and girls?”
“I thank the Member for giving way. Does he agree that if it is said that a Bill is poorly drafted, it may not be the Member's fault and may be a case of the Minister or somebody else questioning the role and effectiveness of the drafters?”
“I appreciate the Minister's giving way. Minister, I will take you back slightly. You said that poverty is a "household problem". Do you agree with me and many others that it is a societal problem that requires political solutions rather than being just a household issue as such?”
“I thank the Member for giving way. Leaving aside the very valid moral argument for the payment, does she agree that, if we do not invest in the likes of free school meals, we could see the financial costs at the end of the system? Other Members mentioned the justice system and people being forced to drop out of education. Does she agree, therefore, that there is a financial impact at the end of the child's school life, if you will?”
“People who are on universal credit should not be financially penalised for receiving a small but important payment. If we are saying that a small but important sum of money could lead to people being penalised, kicked off benefits or whatever the situation may be, that really shines a light on how broken our welfare system is across the board. However, that is a wider debate that I will not be allowed to get into. The Principal Deputy Speaker may not have heard me, but she will not let me go there.”
“If the will is there, the money will be found. The will is there in some parts of the House but not in others. I have a long list of ideas, if anybody wants to listen, about where that money could be found locally. <BR /> <BR />When I first became involved in political campaigning — a long time ago now — it was around the issue of making poverty history globally and locally. Unfortunately, more than 20 years on, we are further away from that. It is disgraceful that we have one in three children in my constituency living in poverty. We need to address that issue. The holiday hunger payment scheme will not address poverty, but it will be a step in the right direction. I urge Members to support the Bill on that basis. <BR /> <BR />My final point is about benefits and welfare support. Members have made valid points about that.”
“What that money is spent on is not the business of anybody in the House. Are we really to develop a scheme — I do not want to give anybody ideas — that forces parents to bring receipts to the EA or whomever the payments will be issued by, with CCTV being monitored to see who is buying chocolate rather than other items? That is absurd stuff. I agree with her sentiment, although she did not frame it in the way in which I did. <BR /> <BR />Unsurprisingly, there has been a lot of focus on affordability. The original holiday payment scheme showed that the normal economically stringent and fiscally conservative rules could be broken when there was a health crisis and when the will was there to break them. They should be broken when it comes to meeting people's needs. They should not be in place to satisfy the British Government or the Treasury.”
“I will add that to your comment. <BR /> <BR />The Assembly is rightly criticised for not legislating. I support the legislation. I would like it to do more, but Members should vote for it. We need to stop punishing working-class children and reinstate the holiday hunger payment in time for the summer holidays. I know that the Member will make the point about the Bill's limited scope, but I say this to him directly: we should be more ambitious and look at the universal provision of free school meals all year round. <BR /> <BR />I share the concern raised by the Member for Lagan Valley. I will strongly paraphrase her comments, so she may want to intervene. Basically, whose business is it if a parent or family spends money from the scheme on an extra treat or an extra trip at holiday times?”
“Thank you for that. I have two young kids. One is at nursery. I had made notes on what to say later, but it makes sense to come to them now. Education and learning does not happen just in schools or just in term time. My son was sent tasks or homework — call it what you want — to do at home at Easter time. Many kids in our constituency have to do that on hungry bellies. That work involves thinking and using your brain; it is a form of education and development, but there are no payments to support families and children to do that. I will extend that to ask this: what if there are no school books or homeworks being used in the summer time, for example? Are children still learning and still developing if they are reading non-curriculum books, watching television programmes or even just playing and mucking about?”
“Thank you for that, but I am none the wiser, to be honest. This is legislation. The parties to my right always decry people talking about Palestine, Venezuela or motions, but this is about legislation, and Members should vote on it.”
“I listened upstairs to the debate. If that is not how the remark was intended, I will retract, but it certainly sounded derogatory from my standpoint. <BR /> <BR />Mr Brooks also stated that the Assembly is not a factory for nice ideas. What is it? What is the Assembly meant to do? It is clearly not legislating. Apart from today, there is a lack of legislation coming through. I did not really understand the Member's contributions, but I think that they were an attempt to muddy the water and throw out dead cats to deflect from his party's seeming to oppose this measured but important Bill.”
“I will finish the point and then give way. <BR /> <BR />Welfare payments should be topped up and increased so that they are enough to live on. This payment should not be seen as a luxury; it is a necessity for people to survive on.”
“Hopefully — I say "hopefully", but I have listened to the debate intently — we all agree that working-class children should not be expected to go hungry over the school holidays. As I said, however, the contributions of some Members to my right make me question whether everybody agrees on that point. <BR /> <BR />David Brooks, the Member for East Belfast, said at the start of the debate that the payment should not be seen as a top-up welfare payment. I take that to be a derogatory framing of the payment. It is pretty insulting to the hundreds of thousands of families who rely on social security. Welfare payments absolutely —.”
“Too many families dread the holidays, thinking about how they will cover the cost of extra meals every single day.”
“As was mentioned in passing at the start of the debate, that also put unsustainable pressure on the community and voluntary sector. <BR /> <BR />To add insult to injury, the EA increased the price of school meals by 50p. That may not sound a lot, but when you are talking about a family with two or three children, that adds up to hundreds of pounds a year, which is unaffordable for so many who have seen real-term wage cuts. The Trussell Trust food banks in the North distributed over 38,000 emergency food parcels to children in 2023-24. That organisation has stated that that represents a 150% increase from five years ago, and managers of food banks have identified that the main reason for that was the removal of the holiday hunger payment scheme.”
“<BR /> <BR />As has been said, holiday hunger payments are a cash-first approach, which gives struggling families some dignity and control over their finances during the school holidays. To be honest, it was a rare positive measure introduced by the Executive at the start of the pandemic, which I and most others in the House supported. As has been mentioned, over 100,000 children benefited from those payments. Inexplicably, however, in March 2023, the Department failed to allocate enough funding to continue the scheme. In the middle of a post-COVID economic crisis — if we have ever got out of that — the price of food soared and continues to soar because of the war in Iran and other issues. That was a disastrous decision, which directly harmed children who were eligible for free school meals.”
“I thank the Member for bringing this important legislation to the House today. There is a lack of legislation, but this is obviously quite important. I met the Member about the Bill and I am happy to support it going forward. As he noted, the reintroduction of the payments is something that should have been implemented by the Education Minister, but he refused to act, hence the Member's Bill. As in many other areas, including housing, environmental protection and equality, Members' Bills are being developed because Executive Ministers are refusing to act. I will, hopefully, be bringing forward a housing Bill, because the Communities Minister has refused to act to address the ever-rising cost of rents and the housing crisis.”
“I appreciate the Member's giving way. As a former youth worker myself, I can testify to that. Does he acknowledge and agree with me that, at a recent meeting about Unison's free school meals for all campaign, at which Members in the Chamber were present, teachers and classroom assistants mentioned that, during term time, many pupils do not get any meals at home over the weekend and that, when they come into school, they get the first meal that they will have had in 48 hours or so? Does the Member agree that that is a reality in schools?”
“I appreciate the Member giving way. I also appreciate that he mentioned other areas where £20 million could be spent. I have listened carefully, but I have not heard an argument for why the holiday hunger payment should not be introduced. Will he expand on his opposition to it and the reasons why he is opposed to it, rather than just saying that the money could be spent on x, y or z?”
“Road maintenance is welcome when it happens. You will probably be aware of the situation in the Lagmore area of west Belfast, where it has taken a lifetime to get roadworks completed. A lot of disruption and frustration has been caused, and people do not know why it is taking so long. Have you or your Department engaged in any discussions with the developer about making some form of financial payment to assist with maintenance?”
“We also need to see one-off universal payments to people who are impacted on by the crisis, so that they can navigate the storm and not go further into debt or have to dip into savings, if they have any. We need to see people's benefits raised as well in order to cope with the crisis. We need to see a rapid transition away from fossil fuels towards clean and cheap, if not free, energy supplies, so that we are not connected to that profitable but dangerous energy system. <BR /> <BR />We also need to see an end to Trump's wars. The situation is being driven by war and profiteering, and we need to make sure that, on this island, Shannon Airport and Belfast International Airport play absolutely no role in Trump's wars in the Middle East, Palestine and elsewhere.”
“The Executive parties have a case to answer when it comes to stagnant wages, poor quality homes and profit-making by energy companies that have done nothing to tackle the issues. Over 40% of people here are living in fuel poverty, while at least 27% of households went without heating or electricity over the past two years because they could not afford to pay their bills. That is only going to go in one direction, and the Executive have failed to tackle those issues. In my constituency of West Belfast, one in three children is living in poverty. That is, indeed, a cruel and disgraceful figure. <BR /> <BR />What needs to happen? First, we need to see energy price caps put in place. There should be limits on what companies can charge for fuel.”
“Whilst we have not had the same level of protests in the North — maybe yet — about the cost of fuel, people are left scratching their head and asking what the Executive have done to support them in the face of rising prices. The truthful answer is diddly-squat.”
“<BR /> <BR />The Southern Government are rightly under huge pressure as a result of their having failed to act to support people who have been impacted on by price rip-offs and the surge in the cost of fuel.”
“Right across the island, people are talking about the price that they are paying for fuel. If we ask ourselves why fuel is so expensive and why the price has shot up, the answer is simple and straightforward. First, it is because of Trump's disastrous war on Iran, which is supported by the DUP. Trump has lost that war. Secondly, it has been caused by naked profiteering by companies, which are making a fortune from the fuel that people need in order to live and travel. I will mention one company, Nicholl Oils in Derry, whose profits doubled in the year prior to the war in Iran. People are therefore making a clean mint out of the crisis.”
“Last week's fiasco proved one thing: bad decisions are not inevitable; they are choices that can be reversed when ordinary people refuse to accept them.”
“I urge those Members to be careful about that political approach. <BR /> <BR />Rumours are swirling that there may be a deal in the Executive about the local growth fund. I do not know, and I am not part of the Executive. However, the disastrous decision by Westminster to strip away the local growth fund will have a massive impact on front-line services, threatening hundreds of jobs and tens of thousands of vulnerable people in the process. The Executive can and should step in today — right now — and prevent that catastrophe.”
“My constituents and, no doubt, those of others, lose a large sum of money every month from their personal independence payments because they have been put in care homes instead of supported living places, because, lo and behold, those places do not exist. People with disabilities are being failed as well. <BR /> <BR />I missed the start of the contribution by the Member who proposed the motion, but I do not disagree with anything that I heard him say. However, his party and Sinn Féin should be careful because they constantly talk about making efficiencies and savings in services, and this is where that road leads. In recent times, every time you have talked about efficiencies and railed against the duplication of resources, people with disabilities are the ones who have been put on the chopping block.”
“Caleb's cause campaigners are absolutely right that parents should be able to access SEN provision for their children beyond the age of 19, and that fight must be won, but they have also been failed by the Executive. The senseless decision not to ring-fence the Youth Service budget could also be reversed, which would guarantee thousands of young people the safe spaces, youth workers and late-night provision that they desperately need and deserve. <BR /> <BR />We should also not lose sight of the fact that adults with disabilities and additional needs are failed on the daily by the Executive. Some of my constituents pay several thousand pounds a year for ADHD medication and other associated healthcare treatments because they cannot get a diagnosis and support from our underfunded and failing health service.”
“<BR /> <BR />I have also been contacted by parents of children with additional needs, including those with severe learning difficulties, who attend mainstream schools. They have no summer schemes to avail themselves of, and they should not be punished because they lost out in the lottery of school placements. Those families want to see wholescale reform of a broken system and full equality across the board for children with SEN. <BR /> <BR />As Alma White and others have said, if a U-turn is possible in 24 hours, what else could we achieve with genuine political will in 24 hours, weeks and months? The same logic applies across the Executive's record of failure.”
“<BR /> <BR />The cruellest part of this shameful episode is that it did not have to happen at all. In fewer than 24 hours, both Ministers performed a full U-turn: the nursing support was found, and the schemes were back on — problem solved, or so we were told. The question that every parent is now entitled to ask, and to which we need an answer, is this: if the resources were there all along, why were families put through that torment? I hope that the Ministers can answer that question. The answer is that the schemes were simply not a priority until the parents and the public made themselves impossible to ignore. I commend those parents for their immediate and furious opposition, which forced those Ministers to do the right thing. That pressure worked last week, and it can work again.”
“What happened last week was a masterclass in chaos by the Executive. The Education Authority announced on Thursday that summer schemes in special schools would not go ahead this year. There was no consultation with parents and no alternative was offered. Instead, there was just a cold bureaucratic announcement that upended the lives of thousands of families overnight. <BR /> <BR />Parents were left devastated. We have heard accounts of parents who were unable to sleep on Thursday night as they were consumed with worry about how they would manage the summer and the cost of private care that they simply cannot afford. I will wager that the Education Minister slept soundly that night because he thought that it was not his problem to solve. The parents were the ones who carried that anxiety and bore the weight of his abject failure.”
“Remembering the defeat and the end of empires is an important thing historically but also in a contemporary sense. As others have said, however, accuracy is key, including telling the story of the genocide against Native Americans, the transatlantic slave trade and the role of people from here who were connected to that. Minister, you may or may not be aware that the Organization of American Historians has been very critical of Trump's America250 programme. Do you have any comment to make on that, and can you detail which historians, who work on the US but are based in the North, you have been in communication with about organising America250 events here? It is important to remember the anniversary, but it must be historically accurate and cannot simply be based on Trump's wishes.”
“My family and my community have been deeply affected by alcoholism. I am well aware of its dangers but remain unconvinced that this is the best way of dealing with it. <BR /> <BR />Minister, will you confirm that, with minimum unit pricing, any money raised would not have gone into the health service or to the state but would have stayed in supermarkets' bank accounts? Will you also confirm that, if minimum unit pricing were to be introduced, it would affect drinks such as cider, vodka and other spirits but leave untouched champagne and other high-value drinks?”
“I say this: rent controls do not work for landlords, but they clearly work for private renters by reducing the money that comes out of their account every month and, obviously, putting more money in their pocket. <BR /> <BR />To the Minister and his officials, if they are listening, I say this: rent controls exist in various countries, including Denmark, Malta, Sweden, the Netherlands, Spain, Germany and France. There are rent pressure zones in the South. They are not perfect, but they exist. Many North American and Canadian cities also have them. The North cannot continue to be a laggard in that regard. It is time for rent controls and rent reductions to ease the pressure on private renters and put more money back in their pockets.”
“As you know, Mr Speaker, I am developing a Member's Bill on housing that, hopefully, after going through the hurdles, will deal with some of the problems. It will aim to freeze rents for a period of years, introduce a no-fault eviction ban to ensure that people cannot be evicted by their landlords and, over a period, introduce rent reductions. <BR /> <BR />It is the view of many people, not just me, that the Minister for Communities has absolutely failed to tackle the housing crisis, particularly in the private rented sector, hence my Member's Bill and other people's action on housing. The Minister, alongside his party colleagues and others, has tried to pour cold water over rent controls and caps. To paraphrase him, he says that they do not work and that he fears that they would be counterproductive.”
“Today, it has been reported in the news that private rents have increased by 50% in the past five years. That is obviously shocking and appalling and should be condemned, but it is not entirely surprising. The cost of private rents is something that my party and I have been banging on about for many years. Indeed, in 2022, we tried to limit the increase in rents through amendments to the Private Tenancies Bill, but all Executive parties, effectively, voted them down. The Executive parties have failed on private rents: in my view, they do not want to challenge private landlords. <BR /> <BR />We have gone way beyond the point of not wanting to annoy or aggravate people. This is a question of power and what parties here will do to challenge power and wealth: the power and wealth of private landlords.”
“Before I come on to my statement, I want to briefly wish William Mooney well. He has been an usher in the Building for, I think, 28 years. He certainly helped me to navigate the Building when I was lost in the first few years. I wish him well in his retirement. I am sure that others do, too.”
“It will be harder the second time. Does the Member agree that "cross-departmental working" and "non-silo mentality" are always trotted by parties across the House but their use seems to have been in short supply during this debate? Hopefully you got that second time around.”
“I thank the Member for giving way. Does he agree that, in debates in the House, "cross-departmental working" and "non-silo mentality" are always trotted out by parties but those terms do not really seem to have been used in abundance today?”
“I hope so, too. If the Bill were to reach Committee Stage — I do not want to be too presumptive — would the Member support such an amendment?”
“If the Minister had an extra £15 million in his budget — I appreciate that that is an "if" — would he support the Bill?”
“I appreciate the Member's giving way, and I agree with her about the cost of doing nothing. Doing nothing will have a cost as well. Does she also have a concern that doing nothing will have not only a financial impact but a societal health impact on her constituents, my constituents and everybody's constituents across the House?”
“I have a lot of respect for the Member for South Antrim, but I do not understand the Alliance argument that it will not vote for the Bill to proceed. I do not understand the logic. It may be about protecting its Minister — it is not the only party that is guilty of doing that. The Bill needs to be amended and strengthened, so it has to go to the next stage. I do not want to be pre-emptive, because I do not know how the vote will go, but, if it passes, it looks as if it might be the smaller parties and the independent Member who will have got it over the line. Hopefully, it will pass.”
“That is around £15 million, at least, that could be got from those companies directly. The income and revenue of the largest companies are almost £2 billion. Rather than celebrating and cheering that, the Finance Minister and all Executive parties should chase that money down, regulate it, tax it through the rates system and put it into these types of processes and procedures. There are also the record surpluses in the South of Ireland and Britain. There is a state surplus of €25 billion in the South and £30 billion in Britain, and we are saying that we cannot afford £11 million to £15 million a year. Are we serious? <BR /> <BR />I hope that the Bill passes. Obviously, it needs to be amended.”
“<BR /> <BR />The argument around financial prudence does not add up. We are in a biodiversity crisis. Lough Neagh is being strangled and killed, and we have the dumping of waste in Belfast lough, so time is of the essence. Hill farmers can play an important role in restoring nature. <BR /> <BR />I ask the Member to expand on what conversations he has had with the Finance Minister. I hope that he has been talking to him and pushing for support. I have some suggestions for the Finance Minister, if he is listening. Every year, £80 million in industrial derating goes out to large corporations, and a huge chunk of that payment goes to global corporations, such as Moy Park, Coco-Cola and Caterpillar, which have terrible human rights records and are terrible for the environment.”
“Therefore, from my perspective, I am exploring an amendment that ties nature-restorative practices to the payment scheme. I hope that the Member can come back on whether he supports that or has considered that point of view. It has been said that farmers are the best custodians of the land: we should look at that to see what we can do to support them to maintain that role and to introduce good practices. <BR /> <BR />Many hill farmers and low-level farmers live in poverty. My understanding is that 50% of the priority habitat areas are in hill farming areas. How can the Bill be used to support farmers to re-wet bogland to act as a carbon sequester? How can it be used to ensure that heather is maintained at environmentally friendly levels to stop fires spreading on hills? How can it be used to ensure that other measures are taken?”
“Mr Speaker, apologies for missing my question during Question Time. It will, I hope, never happen again. <BR /> <BR />I will speak briefly in support of the Bill. It is not a catch-all Bill, which the Member recognises, but it is certainly a step in the right direction. I met the RSPB today about the Bill. I encourage Members to also meet and talk to it about its views on the Bill and how it can be strengthened. It was a very illuminating conversation. <BR /> <BR />I heard some of the earlier conversation and debate. I have some sympathy with the argument that just giving money to farmers, regardless of what they do with it on the land that they own, may not be the best use of public money. I have some sympathy with that. It has the potential of discrediting green and nature-friendly initiatives in a general sense.”