Northern Ireland Assembly Election

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Thursday 21st March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the Secretary of State for what she has said so far. Her decision not to hold the Northern Ireland Assembly elections is understandable, but it leaves Northern Ireland in uncertainty. School budgets are in crisis and waiting lists for operations grow. There is a need to target specific moneys across all Departments in Northern Ireland, but particularly towards Health and Education, as she said. What steps will she be taking to enable financial restrictions to be eased, including on the confidence and supply moneys that my party secured from her party to enable better government and better possibilities and strategies for Northern Ireland?

[Karen Bradley]

With specific reference to the moneys secured under the confidence and supply arrangement, those moneys are being released as appropriate by the Treasury, and they are included within the Northern Ireland budget. We legislated two weeks ago to put the 2018-19 budget on a statutory footing, and we will of course do so for the 2019-20 budget later on. Clearly this is not a good situation, and none of us wants to be in this situation, but it is the least worst of the options that are available to us.