The NI Fiscal Council has laid bare the scale of Northern Ireland's budgetary challenges. 

Dr Steve Aiken OBE MLA said:

“Sir Robert Chote's report on Northern Ireland's sustainability is sober reading. Coming on top of the disputed HM Treasury's open book exercise, the NI Fiscal Council highlights, even before our current budgetary difficulties, that our finances need to be structurally fixed. While the 'maths' of the Treasury is disputed and Sir Robert points out that the figures on Health spending are particularly suspect, it is clear that there needs to be a new way in how we do business. While it's highly unlikely we can squeeze £3.5Bn out of our current budget in efficiencies, we also know that even achieving the degree of % efficiencies that our Health Department made last year will not fill the £1.5Bn or so of pressures that are being reported by departments.

“In the absence of any budget, or any likelihood of one, departments are supposed, by the provisions of the Northern Ireland Act, to limit spending to the vote on account for this year to 45% by the summer. However, Ministers seem to have been given the green light to spend more. As has been said many times before by the Fiscal Council, there is seemingly no penalty for not passing a budget - there is no 'summer' crisis, no emergency executive meeting, no palpable sense of urgency; instead the Secretary of State talks vaguely of political discussions around the level of need.

“On that, at least, the Fiscal Council agrees. That we have already dropped a percentage point, of around £120M, is acknowledged, but raising it to the levels of Scotland or Wales will require a lot of negotiation; that will require an in-depth look at the data on our public services and coming up with a coherent ask. Regrettably, there is little evidence that either the NI Executive, or other political parties than the UUP, are taking a serious look at fixing the structure, rather than applying yet another sticking plaster.”