Debate contribution: Department of Justice: Capital Budget
Debate contribution by Mrs Naomi Long on .
- MLA
- Mrs Naomi Long
- Party at the time
- Alliance Party
- Date
- 1 December 2025
- Type
- Debate contribution (made as a minister)
- Business
- Oral Answers to Questions
- Heading
- Department of Justice: Capital Budget
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5269199
Read the official Assembly record
Text
Our five-year plan highlights the need to modernise an ageing estate. That is a critical element of making the system faster, more effective and more victim-focused. For example, we have courtrooms in which victims and witnesses cannot be separated from the accused, and that can create distress in some of those cases. We will not be able to adequately meet the needs of those engaging with the justice system if we are not able to carry out the required upgrades. It would also reduce the Department's ability to deliver future savings from the planned projects, including estates rationalisation and the use of energy-efficient systems. That capital investment will reduce the need for ever more urgent and expensive maintenance repairs as infrastructure is modernised and replaced. Those of you who watch the weather forecasts as avidly as I do during spells of bad weather will note how often the highest winds in Northern Ireland are at Magilligan Point. It is literally through hope and prayer that that building has held together during all those storms, given the battering that it takes regularly. We know already about some of the significant damage that was done in a previous storm when the wind demolished the walls of the boiler house. The funding that we have already secured from public-sector transformation is a positive step, and it will help us, but we need to do other things. We need new offices and laboratories at Forensic Science headquarters, which, in some places, is being held up internally with scaffolding. We need modular accommodation for the Prison Service, because our prison population is growing. We need to modernise the Magilligan and Hydebank prison estates. There is a new police college and modernisation of the wider police estate, IT transformation and modernisation projects for courts and the modernisation of the Royal Courts of Justice and Bishop Street courthouse, both of which are listed buildings and are heavily used.
321 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: 0.02 (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 (0.92).
- 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 | 0.02 | No |
| Sectarian or communal antagonism | 0.02 | No |
| Cultural grievance politics | 0.01 | No |
| Dog-whistle messaging | 0.02 | No |
| Controversy escalation | 0.02 | No |
| Legitimate policy scrutiny | 0.92 | Yes |
| Overall judgement | 0.02 | 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 | 0.93 |
| Legacy of the Troubles, victims and paramilitarism | 0.06 |
| Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues | 0.01 |
| Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials | 0.00 |
| Parades, bonfires and commemorations | 0.00 |
Assessed 21 October 2026 at 14:03 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.
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