Debate contribution: Budget Bill: Second Stage

Debate contribution by Mr Pat Sheehan on 19 February 2024.

MLA

Mr Pat Sheehan

Party at the time

Sinn Féin

Date

19 February 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Executive Committee Business

Heading

Budget Bill: Second Stage

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4223500

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I speak as a Sinn Féin MLA, although I am Deputy Chair of the Committee for Education. The Chair of the Committee covered most of the remarks that I would have made if I had spoken as Deputy Chair. Sinn Féin wants an education system that delivers for all and leaves no one behind. We believe that education should be underpinned by equality. Our education system should equip all children and young people for life and allow them to pursue their dreams and goals without barriers. As Sinn Féin's education spokesperson, I want to comment on the ongoing funding crisis in education, which has taken place against a background of years of Tory austerity and chronic underinvestment. Sinn Féin continues to prioritise important issues in the education system, including tackling underachievement, special educational provision and improving early years. I thank the Finance Minister for the £688 million pay award for public-sector workers. Our hard-working teachers and non-teaching support staff, like all public-sector workers, deserve fair pay and conditions, and I am hopeful that those can be delivered in the time ahead. The independent review of education recently published its final report, 'Investing in a Better Future'. The report notes that education in the North is highly underfunded, largely as a result of historical and systemic spending cuts. The crisis directly affects learners and the workforce. Many of the report's recommendations can be delivered only with additional funding. Recurrent funding for the Department of Education has reduced in real terms by £145 million — that is 6% — over the last 11 years, while the pupil population has increased by 7%. During that time, per pupil funding reduced in real terms by around 11%. The funding provided for our children and young people is lower than that received by those in other regions. The British Secretary of State created this difficult Budget, resulting in Departments making the decision to live within it. The Department of Education has made cuts to programmes that disproportionately affect the most disadvantaged children and young people. We had cuts last year to programmes like holiday hunger, Happy Healthy Minds, digital devices and so on: the list is lengthy. Not only is there not enough funding for education but, when cuts are made, they disproportionately affect the children who are already most disadvantaged. Further cuts to the education budget could have had a detrimental impact on a wide range of areas, including the day-to-day running of schools, special educational needs support, school transport, youth services and school builds. The Irish-medium sector also needs to be properly funded. At the moment, there are severe difficulties in regard to accommodation quality, and resources that are generally available to English-language schools are not available in the Irish language. The supply of teachers is creating difficulties in the Irish-medium sector as is the lack of expertise from specialists, such as educational psychologists who have fluency in the Irish language. The funding gap in education needs immediate attention, but there is also the need for additional long-term investment in education.

Absolutely. I could not agree more. Much of the written material that goes into mainstream schooling is not translated into Irish. An extra burden is placed on teachers in the Irish-medium sector to translate papers that are given to the Irish-medium sector in English. The Fiscal Council's assessment of the financial package supports the position that the Executive are underfunded on the basis of need. The financial package does not address our historical underfunding in a sustainable or long-term way. The British Government need to engage meaningfully and urgently with the Executive and the Minister of Finance to address that underfunding, including the chronic underinvestment in our education system.

617 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not qualifying

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 09:37 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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