The Northern Ireland secretary has said that it is not his “job” to set a budget and that it is the responsibility of the Northern Ireland Executive. This comes after no resolution was reached in negotiations between executive parties and Sir Chris Bryant. He is understood to have presented a set of conditions, including revenue raising, to be attached to any potential deal on a Stormont budget. Sir Chris said: “They really have to take me seriously when I say there is no more money.” Seven months into this financial year the Northern Ireland Executive has still not agreed a budget.
Speaking after a series of one-to-one meetings, the First Minister Michelle O’Neill said there was still “no white smoke”. Democratic Unionist Party leader (DUP) Gavin Robinson said he felt there was a level of optimism that was “not matched by the reality inside” the room during talks. Speaking on BBC Newsline, Sir Chris said it is the “legal responsibility and duty” of the executive to set a budget. He described talks ending without agreement as “a bit frustrating” but added that he’s still “hopeful”.
He said: “I just wanted to get a move on” and added: “Whatever the total envelope is you have to live within it”. Sir Chris also said he would only set a budget for Northern Ireland if the executive parties asked him to. “They should be able to put together their budget but they have to decide what their priorities are.” After talks with the secretary of state, the first minister said that while there may be things dividing the executive, her party would persist in trying to get a budget deal done that allows public sector pay awards to be made for this year. O’Neill also said she was getting “impatient” with the government and that she would take no lectures from it about managing finances.
The DUP leader said: “As it stands today, the secretary of state is not moving, the practical, honest reality of that is that without additional resource, there will not be a balanced budget”. Robinson added that “there will be no legal ability to do what it is we think the executive needs to do, and what we want it to do” without a budget. Stormont ministers argue the UK’s devolution funding formula no longer delivers enough for them to balance their books. The government had offered them an additional £525m this year, but they said it still left significant gaps in managing their spending pressures, particularly delivery of pay awards for public sector workers.
It is not clear what the shape of a final budget agreement could look like, with some parties insisting there is still scope to “reprofile” some of the financial package. Bryant’s conditions are believed to include the executive committing to £200m in additional revenue raising in 2027/28 and 2028/29. He has also asked that they should improve “discipline” around promises and delivery of pay parity to public sector workers in Northern Ireland. Ulster Unionist leader Jon Burrows said he did not want to sound “defeatist” and would continue to engage with the government.
But he said there was a real prospect that it would be resolved in time to avert the potential of strike action by health care workers waiting on pay uplifts for this year. Speaking before talks with the secretary of state, Alliance’s Agriculture Minister Andrew Muir said it is now “make your mind up time” for the executive. “This needs to be resolved not in weeks or months, but days. We need to come to a final conclusion and give certainty to people who deserve proper pay but also in terms of investment in public services we need to get this done,” he added.
Speaking on BBC NI’s The View programme, Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) leader Claire Hanna said a budget is “an agreement to take responsibility and an agreement to prioritise”. Her party, which is the official opposition in the legislative assembly, is “very clear about the severe constraints,” she said, but added: “the fact is by not having a budget in month eight of this financial year, everybody who’s trying to operate in that budget is running at 95%”. Talks between the government and the executive parties have been taking place for several months now, but earlier this week O’Dowd warned that a “crunch point” is approaching. On Tuesday, the executive met again, with O’Dowd saying afterwards that he planned to present a series of options to his ministerial colleagues in the days ahead about a way forward.
He did not divulge what those may be, but the government has already said no to a request from the executive to allow a larger chunk of the money in the three-year offer to be spent this year, referred to as “front-loading”. Without an agreed budget, departments face operating on emergency spending restricted to 95% of the prior year, with warnings that funds could run out by January. The secretary of state has also warned that a cost-of-living £100 payment cannot be made to households in Northern Ireland until an executive budget is agreed. That came after the government announced its first budget under Andy Burnham last week, with Northern Ireland getting an additional £270m for public services as a result, of which £131m can be used this year.
Sir Chris has said that he is exploring contingency measures to allow him to pass a budget bill at Westminster, in the event that a deal cannot be reached to do so at Stormont. No cost of living payment for NI until Stormont budget agreed, says Bryant ‘Shortchanged’ or ‘fighting chance’: Views differ as NI secretary meets parties on budget Health workers run out of patience with Stormont budget delay Divided executive ‘speaking as one’ on budget, says finance minister
