NI facing significant public expenditure cuts, says Robinson

NORTHERN IRELAND faces considerable public spending reductions, the DUP has warned.

Addressing the Institute of Bankers in Belfast, First Minister Peter Robinson said the current system of government at Stormont was not fit for purpose given the challenges that lie ahead.

“We all want to make sure that we have prosperity . . . and therefore there is a requirement for us to get decisions through the system,” Mr Robinson said.

“But the system is against us in this. We have Ministers who operate within a silo in their department. We have party identification with departments and all of that means that there’s a virility test for Ministers to ensure that their department does best and they hold on to their money. It’s hard to get collective decisions through the Executive.”

The DUP leader has used a series of recent speeches to call for a leaner model of devolved government, a smaller legislature and new rules for obtaining cross-community support in the Assembly.

He said a small economy should be able to adapt and react quickly, but this was not the experience in Belfast.

“That should be one of our strengths as a small region, yet our system of government is not designed to deal with delivering expeditiously and there is no culture of collective approach to dealing with issues.”

He said he was a strong supporter of devolution and recognised that local government had delivered for Northern Ireland, but added: “I am impatient for changes that will bring better and more rapid delivery and decision-making. I hope we can convince colleagues to see such steps to improve our processes as a positive prospect and not a threat.”

The speech was criticised by the SDLP which said the DUP-Sinn Féin led Executive should have amended its three-year budget programme in light of the economic crisis.

West Belfast Assembly member Alex Attwood said: “If the budget doesn’t work, change it and fix it. Don’t slash budgets without any sense of purpose, design or priority.

“Peter Robinson now says cuts are inevitable. Yet he still refuses to revise his budget. He does so because to revisit the budget would be to admit error and this is not in Peter Robinson’s character.”