Lord Empey – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Empey on 2015-11-20.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how much was deducted from the Northern Ireland Executive’s budget in 2014–15 and 2015–16 due to its failure to implement welfare reforms.

Lord O’Neill of Gatley

As a result of the delays in implementing welfare reform in the Northern Ireland Assembly, the Northern Ireland Executive’s budget was reduced by £87m in 2014-15 and £114m in 2015-16 to reflect the additional costs to the Exchequer of the existing welfare system.

As a part of the ‘Fresh Start’ agreement to facilitate the implementation of the Stormont House Agreement, the government committed to returning a proportion of the deduction for 2015-16 when the Assembly gave legislative consent for the Northern Ireland (Welfare Reform) Act 2015. This will be added to the Executive’s allocations in 2016-17 and 2017-18.