Tom Elliott – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Northern Ireland Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tom Elliott on 2015-11-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, with reference to page eight of the Stormont Agreement and Implementation Plan, published on 17 November 2015, what the further financial support of around £500 million from the Government will consist of and for what purposes it can be used.

Mr Ben Wallace

The financial support of around £500m consists of:

– £160m in Additional Security Funding;

– £25m to tackle Continuing Paramilitary Activity;

– £3m to establish and fund a Monitoring and Implementation body; and

– £60m for Shared Future measures.

Additionally, welfare deductions stopped when the Assembly passed a consent motion for UK legislation to implement reforms. The UK Government will refund the deduction due for the remainder of the year, which is estimated to be around £40m.

The Executive is also to develop effective Spend to Save proposals. The Treasury will work with them to finalise proposals, help fund them (up to £125m), and let the Executive keep half the savings that can be verified by the Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR). The parties project that this will generate significant savings in the next five years, taking the total package over £500m.