Debate contribution: Fiscal Devolution

Debate contribution by Mr Matthew O'Toole on 29 April 2025.

MLA

Mr Matthew O'Toole

Party at the time

Social Democratic and Labour Party

Date

29 April 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Fiscal Devolution

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4921836

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Thank you very much. I welcome the fact that Members have participated in a colourful debate, and I will reflect on some of what was said. It is important to say, first of all, that many Members commented on the motion's brevity, which is a quality not often associated with me or, it has to be said, Mr Frew, who participated in the debate. Mr Frew noted that there was not much detail in what is a short motion. As I said, he and I are not often noted for concision, but that was a deliberate choice on the part of the Opposition. There have been lots of motions with lots of words and lots of subclauses, and that have been amended until the cows come home, and nothing has happened. As the Opposition, we wanted to put down a clear, declarative motion on an important principle: fiscal devolution. It comes back to a lot of what we have talked about as an Opposition: the connection between holding power and taking responsibility. Mr Honeyford said an important thing. He is in a different party, but I often acknowledge when people from different parties say things that I agree with. Mr Honeyford, his colleague Mr Tennyson and others acknowledged that, in this place, there is a breakdown between people holding power and their taking responsibility and the connected issue of accountability. That has been demonstrated vividly today by the failure of the Finance Minister to even do us the courtesy of showing up to the Chamber to address the issue, despite, as I and others mentioned, his party's repeated commitment to fiscal devolution and its repeated statements reflecting on the shortcomings in our current funding model, which is acknowledged in our motion. He did not turn up today. Part of the deeper problem in our politics is about the connection between holding power and taking responsibility and then being accountable to the public for how you use that power. That is right at the heart of devolution and right at the heart of power, whether you are a unionist or a nationalist. We believe in fiscal devolution not just because we believe in more power here and, ultimately, Irish unity. The argument for fiscal devolution does not have to be one that is unionist or nationalist. I agree with Jemma Dolan that we need to move towards taking more decisions on this island and, ultimately, constitutional change, but you do not need to be a nationalist at all to believe that. You can be opposed to Irish unity and still believe that, inside the UK, we would be better governed if more decisions were taken locally. I hear the TUV in the corner signalling its discontent, but I want to come back to some of what was said by unionist Members. Lots of unionist Members, particularly Mr Gaston from the TUV, talked about how bad — how terrible — Stormont is at delivery, and a considerable part of my day job is to point out when Stormont Ministers are not delivering for people. Mr Gaston and virtually every unionist Member who stood up said a version of, "Look at how poorly Ministers perform here. How can we trust them and, indeed, the Civil Service with more responsibility?". Many of those same people also said today and have certainly said on other occasions, "Isn't the Labour Government awful? Isn't what they are doing awful?", whether that relates to inheritance tax, rises in National Insurance contributions or a range of other fiscal decisions over which we have limited power. Those parties also want to talk about the limitations in our funding model. They do not see a contradiction there, it seems. They are willing to point out the contradiction between those of us who aspire to constitutional change but not to acknowledge the contradiction in their own position, which is that there is a UK Government who do awful things to us, and it is really frustrating that they are imposing increased National Insurance contributions, increasing inheritance tax for farmers and doing all those things, but we should never talk about taking more power for ourselves. There is a contradiction there, and I am sure that some unionist Members, in their heart of hearts, will acknowledge that contradiction. It does not mean —.

I am happy to give way.

The idea of being permanently in government is a novel one for the SDLP at the minute

, but I acknowledge that there are flaws in our political system, particularly with the incentivisation for his party and the other big party to collapse this place repeatedly. That comes back to the core point that we are making: power means responsibility and accountability; when you seek power, you take responsibility for staying in power, making decisions, making people's lives better and being accountable. As others, including Eóin Tennyson, have said, there is an inextricable link — to use a phrase from the 90s — between taking fiscal powers and taking more responsibility. Regardless of whether you are a unionist or a nationalist or do not subscribe to any constitutional position, if we end up in a constant doom loop in which we say, "Well, we can't take more powers, because, effectively, we're useless here, our politics is dysfunctional and we don't trust one another. We don't even trust the Civil Service to deliver. By the way, we don't trust the UK Government either, whether they're Labour or Tory. They're either delivering austerity or we can't trust them on various other things", we will not be able to offer our people anything. I therefore say this, particularly to unionist Members: think through the logic of a lot of what you have said here today.

The Member makes a political point about the UK Government. I disagree with the policies that he has outlined, but I am talking about structural issues in our system. His point is on the record. I will come on to some of the detail of fiscal power and what it means here. One of the points that was made to me was that we did not provide a list, presumably in exhaustive detail, with costings. I would have been interested to see whether the Speaker would have accepted a 10-page motion — he is indicating from the Chair that he would not have — listing every single fiscal change that we would like to see made. Let me give some examples. I will start with some of the fiscal matters that we have already said that we would like to look at but on which we have not seen progress from the Executive. We have dereliction in the Cathedral Quarter in Mr Brett's constituency. There is the shameful falling into dereliction of what is called the Tribeca Quarter. Vacant property there is being allowed to fall into dereliction, some of which is given a permanent rates break through the vacant property relief that exists in our rates system at the minute. We have been open about saying that we would curtail that relief. At the minute, in Northern Ireland, unlike across the water or down South, if your property is vacant, you essentially get a permanent tax break. We have said that we would like to reform that. There are new fiscal powers that I would like to look at. One is a vacant land tax to incentivise development. The purpose of our motion is not to say that every form of fiscal devolution is always good in every context but to say, "Let's produce concrete options. Let's look at what those concrete options are". The Fiscal Commission's multiple reports are extraordinarily detailed. It does not think that VAT is an appropriate tax to be devolved, but it does think that partially devolving income tax might be appropriate. It also talked about other taxes. I have talked about APD in the past. All the unionist parties in the Assembly are clearly not inherently opposed to devolution, because they supported the devolution of APD. One of the reasons that I talked about it was because of the blunt use that was made of it. I wish that the Finance Minister were here. I would like to hear him elaborate on his plans and his party's support for fiscal devolution, because I support fiscal devolution too.

I will give way to Mr Carroll in a second. I am depressed to see two Members from his party here but no Minister. If the Minister supports fiscal devolution and says that our current arrangements are not fit for purpose, he should have the basic courtesy to come to the Chamber and explain what his position is and what he is doing about it in the context of the fiscal framework negotiations that are apparently going on at the minute. The fact that he has not done so is ridiculous and shameful.

Corporation tax has already been devolved, but the power has not been commenced. At the minute, it would be difficult to advocate lowering the rate of corporation tax, because of the impact that doing so would have on the block grant, which would need to be adjusted, but I have limited time left, so I am going to have to close my remarks on corporation tax there. I have answered the Member's question. We fundamentally need to revisit the idea of power, responsibility and accountability in the Chamber. Having fiscal powers can be a critical part of that. Our motion is completely reasonable and concise. We have asked the Finance Minister to bring forward proposals. He and his party have said for years that they want more fiscal devolution. I agree. Frankly, I am shocked that he is not in the Chamber to give us an account. We need to tell the people, whether they are unionist or nationalist or do not give two hoots about the constitution, that the people whom they elect to here can take meaningful powers to improve their lives and take responsibility for improving their lives, rather than simply come to the Chamber huffing and puffing about things that are done elsewhere and say, "Well, we can't do anything to change it", or promise something without following through on it.

That is what the motion is about. We commend it to the House.

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. When a motion is carried and puts a specific burden on the Minister with responsibility, even if they are not named in the motion, and that Minister voted for the motion, would it be in order for Members to expect that Minister to follow up on the outcome of that vote?

1,781 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.

Disagree with this assessment?

Classifications can be challenged. A person reads every challenge, and any change is recorded publicly above with its reason.

Challenge this classification