Northern Ireland's First and Deputy First Ministers will be travelling to Brussels next Wednesday to secure a comprehensive European structural funding programme aimed at facilitating Northern Ireland's transition from an Objective 1 region over the next six years, it has been announced.
At a European summit in Berlin in March last year, member-states agreed to support regions such as Northern Ireland, which had qualified for the Objective 1 status of a most deprived region up to 1999 but no longer met the relevant criteria, with a special transitional funding arrangement.
After negotiations conducted since then, Mr Trimble and Mr Mallon hope to secure the so-called PEACE II package, an additional funding programme which together with the transitional Objective 1 package should ensure continuous substantial financial EU support for Northern Ireland over the next few years.
The package is expected to be worth around u £940 million sterling made up of u£590 million from the transitional Objective 1 programme, u £280 million from the PEACE II package and around u £65 million from other EU initiatives.
The Assembly's Finance and Personnel Committee yesterday questioned senior officials from the EU and the Department of Finance and Personnel, as well as the Finance Minister, Mr Mark Durkan, about details of the package, stressing the need for inclusion of a social dimension in all economic funding programmes. Mr Durkan also emphasised the importance of retaining North-South co-operation, which had been a main priority in the PEACE I programme, in the PEACE II package.
Meanwhile, the DUP Regional Development Minister, Mr Peter Robinson, has assured members of the Assembly's Regional Development Committee that his department's work would not be affected by the DUP's planned policy of rotating ministerial appointments among DUP MLAs.
Mr Robinson outlined to the committee his vision of his department's main tasks and priorities over the next 25 years. One of the department's main undertakings will be a review of two of its largest agencies, the road service and the water service. It will also aim to draw up proposals for a long-term transportation policy.
There has been speculation that the British government was considering an investment package for roads and transport in Northern Ireland. While the size of the package is not yet clear, Mr Robinson said he had been told it could be in the region of u £2 billion.