Multi-billion pound scale of Treasury pandemic money for Northern Ireland becomes clearer
Today the Northern Ireland Audit Office will publish a report into the cost to Stormont of dealing with the crisis and that report estimates the total cost to date at more than £2 billion.
However, that figure does not include multiple smaller projects each worth less than £1 million and the report focuses solely on Stormont’s actions – even if the money has been provided by London – rather than policies implemented by Westminster such as the furlough scheme which has kept a wage coming to almost a quarter of a million people in Northern Ireland.
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Hide AdThe cost of the furlough scheme is met by the Treasury. No official figures are available for its cost in Northern Ireland but a crude calculation means that the 250,000 people on furlough here could have cost in the region of £2.4 billion over a six-month period, although it is likely to be slightly lower than that figure because some of those furloughed have already returned to work.
Treasury figures from July put total government UK spending on the pandemic at £190 billion at that point. In rough terms that would proportionately equate to about £5.7 billion in Northern Ireland. Those figures have increased over the last month and continue to do so.
To put the expenditure into context, Stormont’s annual resource budget for day to day spending on salaries and services is about £12.1 billion (which does not include other items such as pensions or social security funded directly from the Treasury) – or about £6 billion for the six-month period since the start of the pandemic.
The Audit Office stressed that it had not yet undertaken any assessment of the value for money, or effectiveness, of the measures which had been taken.
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Hide AdMost of the additional Stormont expenditure has been in health and economic survival.
Dodds gave three orders to top official
Economy Minister Diane Dodds has issued three ministerial directions to her top officials over pandemic spending they could not defend their value for money.
Senior civil servants must seek a ministerial direction if they cannot stand over a proposal.
The Audit Office said that there had been three ministerial directions, all relating to Business Support Grant Schemes.
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Hide AdMrs Dodds’ department said it was “content that it took the necessary, swift action to support tens of thousands of businesses” and the whole executive backed her stance.
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Alistair Bushe