Ulster Unionist Finance Spokesperson Dr Steve Aiken OBE MLA has slammed the Executive’s handling of the latest budget monitoring round, branding it “dysfunctional and chaotic” and accusing ministers of delivering a pre-Christmas blow to health workers.

Dr Steve Aiken OBE MLA said,

“The entire run up to this monitoring round has been as dysfunctional and chaotic as the Chancellor’s recent Budget. Less than two months ago the First Minister Michelle O’Neill took pride in place at a press conference and announced that the Executive had found £100m for health worker pay, and that the Minister of Health had also found another £100m.  Both points were wrong and were highlighted as such at the time.  

“The Finance Minister has been more the ghost of ‘Christmas Present’ than Santa with this announcement today. Far from being the £100m that the Executive had hoped to deliver, the Health Minister has now just been handed a further £31m shortfall in his budget this year.  

“While I acknowledge there is less available during this monitoring round, the grinch like attitude towards our key nurses, doctors and other health staff, from the experience of delivering health pay to date it’s clear the attitude of the Northern Ireland Executive is only to pay lip service to the priorities that they themselves had laid out. To take the Christmas analogy, its ‘bah humbug’ from John O’Dowd.

“Huge questions now come to mind following this most recent monitoring round process. Why did the Executive make previous commitments that it couldn’t deliver? Why, given the A5 project was halted in June, has the many tens of millions of pounds earmarked to be spent on that this year only been reallocated now six months later? Based on their previous inaccurate remarks, do our First and deputy First Minister’s really have a grasp of detail needed?”