North’s political standstill producing myriad problems and failure to plug gaps

Political deadlock in Northern Ireland has led to a “governance gap” with vulnerable people “bearing the brunt of public service decay”, according to a new report.

Independent think tank Pivotal warns that an absence of strategic planning amid a budget crisis means services are stuck in a “vicious cycle, where problems are growing and our ability to tackle those problems is shrinking”.

Civil servants have been in charge of running Stormont departments for more than a year after the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) collapsed the powersharing Executive over its opposition to post-Brexit trading arrangements. But these officials have limited powers and are unable to make any significant changes during a period of unprecedented pressures on frontline services.

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In its paper, entitled Governing without Government: the Consequences, Pivotal focuses on the fallout from Northern Ireland’s “lack of decision making” and how civil servants “who have no democratic accountability, have found themselves in the impossible position of trying to maintain services with reduced budgets. The Secretary of State [Chris Heaton-Harris] has declined to step in, aside from on a couple of specific issues, saying it is for local politicians to make decisions and urging the restoration of the executive.”

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It found that vulnerable and less well-off people have been most affected by the political stalemate and highlights the axing of so-called “holiday hunger” payments to more than 96,000 children entitled to free school meals earlier this year. A mental health and counselling programme for primary schoolchildren also lost its funding.

While the health service has seen its funding allocation rise, it still faces a shortfall of £732 million (€855 million) at a time when the North’s waiting lists continue to be the worst in the NHS. The paper refers to a “lack of progress” in planned health service reform leading to rising costs.

It also notes that policing accounts for around 60 per cent of the Department of Justice’s budget, yet PSNI chief constable Simon Byrne said balancing the books might be impossible.

Urgent restoration of an Executive and fully working Assembly would be the best way to mitigate ongoing crises, according to the paper, which acknowledges that the political situation “appears to make this unlikely in the short term”.

New structures should be put in place that allow “major decisions to be made about public services amid long-term periods of institutional collapse”, the authors recommend.

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The report also urges the British and Irish governments to give greater priority to the restoration of the institutions and to support them when they are in place.

“Northern Ireland’s governance gap is the worst of all worlds. Civil servants are technically in charge of running departments, but their powers remain limited and uncertain,” said Pivotal director Ann Watt.

“Immediate challenges are not being met and neither is there a clear focus on long-term strategy. Long-neglected issues — like childcare, infrastructure and climate change — remain unaddressed. At the same time, it has been impossible to stay within budgets. This prolonged deadlock will have a long tail of consequences. Policy areas which are only going to get more difficult if proper action is not taken include health service reform, educational underachievement, energy policy, an ageing population and regionally balanced growth.

“The ongoing collapse of the institutions is a huge concern and is exacerbating all our problems. While budgets would still be tight if an Executive had been in place over the last 18 months, the lack of leadership and the inability to make major decisions is undeniably harming Northern Ireland.”