Debate contribution: Northern Ireland Children's Hospice
Debate contribution by Mr Robbie Butler on .
- MLA
- Mr Robbie Butler
- Party at the time
- Ulster Unionist Party
- Date
- 21 September 2026
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Oral Answers to Questions
- Heading
- Northern Ireland Children's Hospice
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5742353
Read the official Assembly record
Text
I thank the Member for his persistence on the issue, and he is right to be persistent. I welcome that challenge, because there is a myriad of pressures across the system. We all have our local pressures, so the Member is right to press that issue. I cannot give the Member a definitive date; I can say that there will be a response and that engagement is ongoing between the hospice and my officials. I have certainly leaned into my officials, and they have completed some good work. There are budgetary constraints on all of us. Currently, we spend £2 million more each day than we have in the Health budget. Any decision that I make, I have to make it against that backdrop. We are engaging proactively with the Secretary of State and the Treasury on a Budget settlement, but we still need this year's Budget to be agreed. If the Member for North Belfast can pull any strings in his party, I would appreciate that.
167 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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