Debate contribution: Fiscal Devolution

Debate contribution by Ms Diane Forsythe on 29 April 2025.

MLA

Ms Diane Forsythe

Party at the time

Democratic Unionist Party

Date

29 April 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Fiscal Devolution

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4921710

Read the official Assembly record

Text

The DUP does not support the devolution of additional fiscal powers to Northern Ireland at this time. We do not believe that the capacity exists in Departments or in the Northern Ireland Civil Service to manage further complex and fundamental elements of the tax system, such as income tax or VAT. We fully support the first sentence of today's motion:

"funding arrangements for public services in Northern Ireland are not fit for purpose."

That is absolutely the case, and the fact that the new needs-based factor has not been baselined or backdated, as if it had applied from the start of the previous spending review period in 2022, has left the Executive without the guts of half a billion pounds annually. Without agreement from the Treasury to rectify that situation as part of a new, fair, responsible and long-term fiscal framework, it will continue in perpetuity. That action could be taken relatively quickly and would have real benefits for our public services. In contrast, protracted negotiations would be required for the aims of fiscal devolution to simply get a fair hearing from the Treasury. I wonder why the Opposition are overlooking that. We look forward to seeing the report of the assessment that Professor Holtham has been commissioned to undertake on that. The financial reality is that we have just received a challenging Budget for 2025-26. We are waiting on the announcements from the June monitoring round and the comprehensive spending review. The Executive have made it clear that there is a strong desire to move to delivering multi-year Budgets here in the coming years. We are governed by a Labour Government who have proven to be completely unpredictable and have targeted pensioners, family farms and small businesses in their first months in office, and we have no idea about what else could hit us. The Opposition need to get real about recognising the financial and economic environment in which we are living. In the next few months, they should focus on that rather than pushing for fiscal devolution options by September 2025. Of course, we should be ambitious in how we approach the funding of public services. However, those efforts have to be credible and responsible. We have to be realistic about what is achievable in a context in which the fiscal deficit between Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom has been widening. The Budget process is already incredibly fraught with contention between political parties. The devolution of tax-varying powers would inevitably add a new dimension of volatility to the Executive's Budget. As unionists, we are clear that any change or upheaval of that nature could be exploited by those whose overriding intentions are focused not on transforming public services but on unsettling the political and economic foundations of the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland's place within it. Ironically, in a separate motion that will be debated today, the Opposition call for an infrastructure commission to be established, given the weaknesses in and concerns over how major capital projects have progressed in Northern Ireland. Do they really expect that the situation with fiscal devolution would be any different? Are the right skills and structures really in place to countenance taking concrete steps on that front? Given that the latest figure for Northern Ireland Civil Service major capital projects overspend sits at £3 billion, we need to get our house in order; this is not the time to add to our problems. The DUP is committed to delivering a fair funding model for Northern Ireland. Our party leader, Gavin Robinson MP, has long led on that issue in Westminster, and we are pleased to see progress. Whilst others celebrated, however, we were clear that last year's financial package fell well short of what is required to put our finances on a stable footing. We agree that the funding arrangements for public services in Northern Ireland are not fit for purpose, but we do not support additional fiscal powers being devolved to Northern Ireland at this time.

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

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:27 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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