Member's statement: Public Accountability: Repairs to Parliament Buildings
Member's statement by Mr Timothy Gaston on .
- MLA
- Mr Timothy Gaston
- Party at the time
- Traditional Unionist Voice
- Date
- 20 May 2025
- Type
- Member's statement
- Business
- Members' Statements
- Heading
- Public Accountability: Repairs to Parliament Buildings
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 4963737
Read the official Assembly record
Text
Thank you very much, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker. There is no greater duty for public representatives than the proper stewardship of taxpayers' money, yet, last month, the House was advised that the Assembly Commission had reached a confidential settlement with contractors over the cost of repairing Stormont's roof — a multimillion-pound bill, no doubt. That is an outrageous situation: the public, whose money it is, are not permitted to know how much is involved in the settlement. The Commission, made up of Members of Sinn Féin, the DUP, Alliance, the Ulster Unionists and the SDLP, reached a secret deal with the contractor behind closed doors. That is not providing transparency. That is not delivering accountability. That is an evasion of holding people to account. I hear growing frustration from people of all political backgrounds that Stormont has become a self-serving institution, quick to complain about a lack of funds from Westminster, while refusing to be accountable for the money in its control. That is not just bad governance; it is a betrayal of public trust to withhold details of what public money is spent on. In this case, water ingress arose from drilling into the concrete slab of the roof. The public want to know who signed off on such a scheme. Was the scheme approved by the Commission, who will not tell us how much it will cost to fix? The same should apply to councils. Recently, Mid and East Antrim Borough Council settled a tribunal case using a non-disclosure agreement to hide the cost to the public. Whether it is in Stormont or local councils, the public deserve to know what their money is being spent on.
279 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.
- Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.07 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
- None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
- Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.87).
- No identity-based framing was identified (1.00).
- The overall probability was at or below the not-flagging threshold.
This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.
Jev’s structured answers
| Question | Probability | Met? |
|---|---|---|
| Identity framing | 0.04 | No |
| Sectarian or communal antagonism | 0.06 | No |
| Cultural grievance politics | 0.02 | No |
| Dog-whistle messaging | 0.07 | No |
| Controversy escalation | 0.05 | No |
| Legitimate policy scrutiny | 0.87 | Yes |
| Overall judgement | 0.07 | At or below not-flagging threshold |
| Option | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-based framing (chosen) | 1.00 |
| Reports or questions it | 0.00 |
| Criticises or condemns it | 0.00 |
| Adopts it | 0.00 |
| Subject | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-related subject | 0.90 |
| Another identity-related subject | 0.05 |
| Sectarianism, hate crime and community relations | 0.03 |
| Constitutional question, Brexit, the Windsor Framework and sovereignty | 0.02 |
| Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials | 0.00 |
Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:32 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.
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