Debate contribution: Executive Budget

Debate contribution by Mr Eóin Tennyson on 14 September 2026.

MLA

Mr Eóin Tennyson

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

14 September 2026

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Executive Budget

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5685367

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. Members might be pleased to know that I do not intend to take anywhere near the 10-minute speaking allocation. I welcome the opportunity to speak on the motion, but I do so conscious that there is now a live process of negotiation ongoing between Executive parties and the UK Government. It is important that we seek to reflect the spirit of confidentiality in respect of those discussions, so I may not spell out my position on the issues in as much detail as I ordinarily would in such a debate. That has not been the approach taken by some Executive Ministers, though, who seem addicted to negotiation via loudhailer. That has the dangerous effect of undermining trust and confidence between the Executive and the UK Government and raises serious questions about just how committed some parties are to the process that is now under way. Amendment No 2 seeks to acknowledge the scale of inequity in how the funding formula operates in respect of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. As has already been referenced during the debate, if we were funded on the same basis as Wales, that would mean an additional £1 billion for the Executive. If we were funded on the same basis as Scotland, that would mean over £3 billion of additional investment for public services here. Therefore, we cannot approach the debate from a position of asking people in Northern Ireland to pay more for less. Our constituents, who work hard and pay their taxes, deserve to get a fair deal from the Treasury, as their counterparts do in other parts of these islands, and it is welcome that all parties in the Chamber have made that case and that argument.

I will, yes.

The Member is correct that the issues predate the publication of the Fiscal Council report. However, the Fiscal Council confirmed a position that the Executive were already well aware of and had been communicating. It added weight and strength to the argument with Treasury, but it was not a surprise or a new argument to those of us who had been dealing closely with those issues. It is important, as the amendment outlines, to be honest about the drastic consequences of agreeing the draft Budget as proposed earlier this year.

The Department of Justice, for example, has been a particularly frugal Department. Its spending has consistently been brought within budget, despite its share of the block grant falling from 11% to 8% over the past decade. The gap at the end of that multi-year Budget period would have been equivalent to £215 million. That accounts for the budgets of the Prison Service, Forensic Science, the Probation Board and the Youth Justice Agency. To have signed up to and legislated for the Budget proposed at the time would therefore effectively have meant defunding the Prison Service. That it is not a responsible position for any politician in the Chamber to take.

Fundamentally, the challenge with our finances is twofold. First, we have a boom and bust system, whereby a Secretary of State will ride in on a white horse and write a cheque to get us through a couple of years. Those sugar rushes to our finances may put us above the level of need for a short time and have us at the level of need in some financial years, but they will inevitably see us fall below the level of need, thus creating a cliff edge. That is not a sustainable way in which to do business, and it breeds cynicism amongst the public, amongst parties in the Chamber and in the Treasury itself. We therefore need a sustainable funding formula or, at the very least, a pathway to get us there quickly. After the previous financial package, we called for the establishment of an independent commission on Northern Ireland's funding and fiscal framework. Positive soundings were made by the previous Government about the prospect, but it was never followed up on, and, inevitably, the cliff edge that was warned about presented itself and caused the present issues. There is also the question of credibility, which cuts both ways. In effect, we have a Pavlov's dog mentality, whereby the UK Government incentivise the position in which every financial and political issue must be elevated to crisis point before negotiations are launched and solutions found. We need to change that culture in our politics. Secondly, as our amendment seeks to address, we also need to acknowledge our own responsibility in this Building and on the Executive. There are structural issues from the cost of division and segregation. There is potential for us to have more fiscal devolution so that we can raise revenue in a progressive way that does not unfairly burden families and so that we can do the transformation and reform of public services that we have been talking about in this Building for decades. Any agreement therefore needs to enable the Executive and tie them to taking serious decisions in those areas. Most fundamentally of all, however, the question of sustainable public finances cannot be divorced from the question of sustainable political institutions. Far too much time and energy has been wasted and far too many opportunities squandered as a result of the institutions having been in abeyance when the public needed them most. Public services cannot be transformed from a burning platform of crisis and collapse. Rather, sustained political leadership, which has been lacking over the past 28 years, is needed. That is why our amendment refers to the need for reform of the institutions in order to remove the vetoes and the dysfunction, to remove the culture of blame-shifting and to empower the Executive to take the difficult and necessary decisions for which the public are crying out. Alliance is committed to, and is serious about, the process that is under way with the UK Government. We are equally serious about taking the difficult but transformative decisions that would make a difference to our finances, to our public services and to people's lives.

1,011 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 16:15 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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