Last month, the Northern Ireland Executive published a draft Programme for Government (PfG). In the first of a short series that will look at what the PfG means for a number of our most important sectors, Confluence Consulting MD Simon Hamilton shares some of his headline takeaways from ‘Our Plan: Doing What Matters Most’
WE’VE GOT ONE (AND THAT’S GOOD)
For any incoming government, setting out its agenda for its time in office is an important moment. In Northern Ireland, given our particular political complexities, it perhaps means a little more. The still relatively new Executive faced some criticism for taking seven months since its restoration back in February to produce a Programme for Government. But some of that criticism was lazy and unfair. The snap General Election in July and the preceding six-week campaign made publication impossible, with the summer recess not helping matters. That the draft PfG was announced to the Assembly on Monday 9 September (the first sitting day at Stormont after the summer break) suggests that this document was ready to go well before it was revealed to the public.
We shouldn’t forget that getting four different political parties with very different political outlooks to agree anything is always a challenge. “When was the last time a Northern Ireland Executive agreed a Programme for Government?” maybe isn’t a question you’ve heard at the local pub quiz. The fact that the answer is 2011 isn’t to say that we should applaud the current Executive for agreeing a draft, but it does perhaps illustrate how difficult it is to do something that to many looks like it should be simple and straightforward.
Programmes for Government are always a creature of compromise in a multi-party coalition like ours, with no one getting everything that they want. The unified way in which the Programme for Government was presented is an encouraging sign and builds on the budding relationship between the First Minister and deputy First Minister on display over recent months. Coming off the back of a period where there was no Executive for five years out of the last seven, to make the positive step forward in agreeing a draft PfG bodes well.
LESS IS MORE
Another criticism levelled at the draft Programme for Government is, to use the words of one newspaper headline, that it has a “shocking lack of targets”. I’m not sure what an acceptable number of targets for a PfG is but I’m pretty sure that the 82 commitments contained in the 2011 version was far too many. This time, the Executive have set out three overarching missions – People, Planet and Prosperity – with nine broad sets of immediate priorities that Ministers “will work to this year and throughout the duration of this mandate”. In my view, this makes sense.
The context in which this Executive operates cannot be ignored. As previously mentioned, we are, thankfully, exiting an extended period when the Executive simply wasn’t up and running and when it was, it was dealing with a pandemic. Ministers are still finding their feet, grappling with some huge challenges and building the relationships across government that are essential for success. They’re also governing at a time when public finances are under unprecedented pressure. The draft PfG reminded us that the Executive’s Budget had three times the demand for day to day expenditure than was available and the capital budget was 1.5 times oversubscribed. I served as Finance Minister during the period of ‘Tory Austerity’. We thought we had it tough. It was nowhere near as bad as it is now. And that fairly limits the Executive’s ability to manoeuvre.
I can understand the urge to be ambitious. The lure of a JFK style moonshot. But let’s be realistic. Would we rather that a new Executive with less than three years left in its term and with insufficient funding produced an unobtainable wish list only to let us all down when they inevitably fail? Or is it more sensible to select a small number of the most pressing problems and make them your collective focus? Their decision to choose the latter is both wise in the circumstances and hopefully demonstrates a growing maturity at Stormont.
ECONOMY FRONT AND CENTRE AGAIN
I was proud to serve in an Executive whose stated number one priority was to grow the economy and create jobs. That wasn’t to say that other issues weren’t important. It was more a recognition that employment was key to resolving many of our social ills and economic growth would allow us to invest in schools, hospitals and housing. When the Executive was restored in early 2020, I thought it was notable that its top priorities were health and education. It sounded like the economy had been downgraded. COVID-19 soon struck so we never got to see what, if anything, the change of tone meant in practice.
Fast forward to 2024 and it looks like the economy is front and centre again. Or first among equals at least. ‘Grow a Globally Competitive and Sustainable Economy’ is at the head of the list of nine immediate priorities and an emphasis on the economy is woven throughout the document.
But it isn’t a reversion to what went before. The kind of economic growth that this Executive seeks stresses inclusivity, sustainability, productivity and regional balance. Amid challenges on all fronts, it will be interesting to see how Ministers can help deliver on these admirable and indeed essential ambitions.
