Health, education and roads have been identified as services facing the most acute difficulties in Northern Ireland, according to the North's Minister of Finance.
Presenting his draft budget for the financial year 2002/03 to the Northern Ireland Assembly, Mr Durkan said £6.3 million sterling (€10 million) had been allocated to the departments, a 7 per cent increase on the previous year. However, he warned spending could not continue to rise due to the Barnett formula, which dictates regional allocations from the British Treasury.
He said the Executive had decided to repeat last year's increases of 7 per cent in the domestic regional rate and 3.3 per cent in the non-domestic regional rate.
"Our plans are based firmly on the conclusion that these increases will be necessary to sustain the spending levels on our public services that I am proposing here today, and to show that we are looking to ratepayers to contribute a share to the growing costs of public services," said Mr Durkan.
"If we were to raise rate revenue and water charges roughly equivalent to the pattern in England, we would have something like £300 million of additional spending power," he added.
The DUP leader, the Rev Ian Paisley, urged Mr Durkan to raise monies for a farmers' retirement fund that could be matched by funds from the EU.
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