Member's statement: Mental Health Disability and Learning Disability: Funding

Member's statement by Mr Robbie Butler on 2 February 2026.

MLA: Mr Robbie Butler
Party at the time: Ulster Unionist Party
Date: 2 February 2026
Type: Member's statement
Business: Members' Statements
Heading: Mental Health Disability and Learning Disability: Funding
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 5356203

Text

I appreciate your indulgence, Mr Speaker. Mental health disability and learning disability community and voluntary organisations are not facing a funding gap: they face a funding cliff edge, and it is people's mental health and workplace inclusion that will bear the cost. The transition from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund to the new local growth fund, if implemented in its current form, risks creating a profound and totally avoidable funding crisis for our communities and for the services that support them. Under the existing arrangements, funding to tackle economic inactivity in Northern Ireland has been about £25 million a year. From April 2026, it is set to fall sharply to £9·2 million, which is a reduction of around 64%, due to the shift to the local growth fund and its proposed 70:30 split. That is what people are calling it. That will drastically reduce the amount available for the very services that help people into work and protect their well-being. For example, on Friday, I visited Stepping Stones in Lisburn, which is an amazing charity that empowers people with learning disabilities and employment barriers through skills training. Sadly for organisations such as Stepping Stones, the cuts come against the backdrop of Northern Ireland's labour market, which is already under strain. Our economic inactivity rate, at 26·5%, stands as the highest in the UK, and we have the lowest employment rate for disabled people. As the chair of the all-party group on disability, I declare an interest with regard to that. Those figures are not abstract statistics. The community and voluntary sector supports around 11,000 people each year, many living with learning disabilities, other disabilities, long-term health conditions and significant mental health challenges. They also assist people to gain skills, to secure employment and to access essential intervention services, with up to 650 staff roles funded through the Shared Prosperity Fund, 403 of which are full-time posts. I urge the Chamber to unite and to lobby the United Kingdom Government to change their funding model.

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

Assessment

Not flagged

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: 0.03 (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 (0.97).
No identity-based framing was identified (1.00).
Subject area: Disability (including neurodivergence and mental health), disabled people and disability or sickness benefits.
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

Probability that each statement is true of this text (0 = no, 1 = yes). A criterion counts as met at 0.60 or above.
Question	Probability	Met?
Identity framing	0.04	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	0.97	Yes
Overall judgement	0.03	At or below not-flagging threshold

Context and attribution (stance)
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 area (top five)
Subject	Probability
Disability (including neurodivergence and mental health), disabled people and disability or sickness benefits	1.00
No identity-related subject	0.00
Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials	0.00
Parades, bonfires and commemorations	0.00
Irish language, Ulster-Scots and language policy	0.00

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 14:18 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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