Flood relief package for businesses destroyed after recent heavy rain 'means nothing'

Yesterday, the permanent secretary for the Department of Finance, Neil Gibson, said the department was working swiftly to provide emergency support, but every penny would have to be used effectively.

On Wednesday, Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris visited Newry and Downpatrick, two towns badly impacted by flooding in recent weeks.

Mr Heaton-Harris announced that £15 million of funding would be reallocated from existing civil service departmental funds to help businesses.

The measures include rates relief for flooded business premises and one-off grant payments of £7,500.

The grants will be administered by the local council and the first payments will be issued next week.

The rates relief measure will include 100% relief for non-domestic rates on flooded properties for the period between November 1 and March 31 next year.

Yesterday, it emerged that Stormont is on course to have an overspend of half a billion pounds this year, despite nearly a billion already made in savings and cuts.

Mr Gibson said that the announced funding was “not the end of the story” in terms of financial support for flooding impact, but that a tailored response would need to be undertaken given Northern Ireland's current financial position.

“It was very welcomed that we were given permission to move money across from capital expenditure to resource expenditure,” he said.

“Essentially, that's a technical reason, but it's something that we can't do without Treasury permission which we've been given the permission to do, so they've allowed us £15 million in that.

“We've moved swiftly to do the things that are in our power to do, so give out one-off reliefs on the same scale and quantum that's been done elsewhere in the UK, and to provide some rate relief, which my team is working on at the moment, in terms of preparing that legislation to do as quickly as we can.

“But it's important to say to affected businesses that there is potentially going to be more needs to be done for tailored interventions to very specific businesses.

“So we don't want people to overly worry that this is the end of the story, but it's equally a very delicate time for public finances, so we need to ensure we use every penny as effectively as we can.

"So for example, looking very carefully at what type of support those businesses need. Do we want to reopen in the same way that we did? Or do we want to make any changes to how those businesses are physically constructed, so that prevents this in the future?

"So it's not that this is the end of the story, but it's that a more tailored response needs a little bit more measured consideration."

Heavy rain caused severe flooding in towns across Northern Ireland as canals overflowed and rivers burst their banks.

Hundreds of businesses were damaged by floods, with some in the worst hit areas under as much as 10 feet of water.

Mr Gibson said a long-term financial plan was needed to allow Northern Ireland to invest in preventative measures for flooding, but also across the region's public services.

"We often are almost overwhelmed by dealing with a crisis, and our track record shows we can react very well to a crisis, and crisis response has been very good over decades," he said.

"But it doesn't answer the fundamental question of what can you do and where should you invest to prevent crises happening in the future.

"And that's something we have to, as civil servants, be very clear in the advice we give to ministers - it's not just what we invest to solve today's problems, but what's the right investment for legacy spending that may provide a benefit long beyond our professional careers or their professional careers potentially, because actually, there's quite significant investment required.

"Flood defences is an obvious one that we're thinking about today, but there are obviously other preventative measures across the whole swathe of public services that we need to think about, so we do need a long-term plan.

"It sometimes feels odd talking about those in the context of a crisis because obviously, our sympathies to those businesses that have been so disrupted, and you want to do all that you can in the immediacy, but there is a more fundamental long-term problem and that's what we'll be talking about today."

Mr Gibson further stated that the finances needed for a long-term investment plan were not available at present.

"We do not have the quantum of money to deliver the type of services that people are expecting, and we don't have that money to invest that we need.

"And we then need to ask the question, how much do we need and where might we get that from."