Debate contribution: Regional Balance Bill: Second Stage
Debate contribution by Mr Pádraig Delargy on .
- MLA
- Mr Pádraig Delargy
- Party at the time
- Sinn Féin
- Date
- 8 September 2026
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Private Members' Business
- Heading
- Regional Balance Bill: Second Stage
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5674304
Read the official Assembly record
Text
I thank the Member for her intervention. As she said, we are on a trajectory and moving in the right direction. There is more change to come, but, as we have all agreed, huge change in Invest was needed. That change has started to happen. I recently met the new regional manager of Invest in Derry, whose vision I am absolutely committed to. I can see such clear potential and a clear pathway for us, and I know that other parties have done the same thing. I am really pleased to see that. It puts us on a positive trajectory. We need that commitment from Invest, and we have seen it from the top of Invest, but our regional office needs more power, including the enabling powers so that it can make decisions to bring investment, not just rubber-stamp what happens at Bedford Street.
We need to see that power in Derry and in all the other Invest offices.
I have two concerns about the Bill. It has two limitations that I hope that we can work at Committee Stage to enhance. The first is about the Executive's commitment and sign-off. Of course, cross-party agreement is pivotal to the issue, as has been said. We want to see regional balance as a key tenet of policy in every element of every Department, but the reality is that, although a lot of parties in here want that, other parties in here do not. My fear is that certain parties that do not support regional balance will not sign up to it, and we will be left in a position where the progress that we have made with Sinn Féin Ministers in the Economy, Finance and Infrastructure Departments could be undermined by other parties. I see that Mr Brett wants to get to his feet. I am talking about your party, so go ahead.
Thanks for the DUP party political broadcast. It was a bit worse than the Sinn Féin one. In essence, what we are looking at is 100 years of partition in our country that has been overseen by unionist Governments and unionist Economy Ministers. No one can deny that. No one can deny the fact that Derry and other regions in the North have been chronically and critically underfunded by successive unionist Governments and successive unionist Economy Ministers. That record speaks for itself, and the evidence base is the fact that Derry and other regions in the North have lower-performing economies than Belfast and other regions. That is not accidental; it is the result of deliberate policy that has been created under unionist Ministers. That tide has begun to turn.
441 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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