agendaNI issue 102

...informing Northern Ireland’s decision-makers

Delivering skills for a future economy Belfast Metropolitan College’s Louise Warde Hunter Agriculture Minister Edwin Poots discusses post-Brexit agriculture and environmental ambitions

Chief Nursing Officer Charlotte McArdle on surge planning and post-covid transformation

Northern Ireland Assembly Speaker Alex Maskey outlines procedural changes and short mandates

Issue issue102 8 Aug/Sep Jan 202111

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Delivering on an ambitious vision for a prosperous future bespoke tourism strategy; and • create a compelling tourism and economic proposition by developing and investing in our unique heritage and assets.

Chief Executive of Mid and East Antrim Borough Council, Anne Donaghy, says: “Over the next four years we will continue investing in a wide range of strategic initiatives to ensure we maintain our long-earned reputation, locally and internationally, as a proud, vibrant and ambitious place which collaborates, encourages, and supports economic and tourism growth and prosperity.”

A local council with a national mindset

Mid and East Antrim Borough Council has strong ambitions for economic and tourism growth in the area in the coming years, and has just launched its second Corporate Plan, described as a “blueprint for creating a better future for all”.

Elected members set the vision for a plan for 2019-2023 which outlines the Council’s key initiatives and areas for investment, all aimed at realising its vision to be “a strong, vibrant, safe and inclusive community where people work together to improve the quality of life for all”.

Among the five strategic themes within the plan is sustainable jobs and tourism, under which the Council has set five key objectives for 2019-2023:

Mid and East Antrim Borough Council has fostered strong working relationships with key stakeholders and partners across the UK since the body’s inception, and the correlation between local government and Westminster has never been more important. With Brexit, Belfast Region City Deal, global investments and Heathrow Hub expansion plans all in the pipeline, these relationships ensure Mid and East Antrim is a key player in decisions affecting Northern Ireland as a whole.

• enable entrepreneurs to deliver economic growth through partnership and other supports;

The Belfast Region City Deal will see £1 billion invested in the region over the next 15 years, with around £80 million of investment earmarked to deliver significant economic benefits to the Mid and East Antrim borough through major projects at the former St Patrick's Barracks site in Ballymena, The Gobbins and Carrickfergus. This deal will also support digital development and tourismled regeneration, underpinned by infrastructure developments and investment in skills to connect people to jobs and services.

• attract more visitors to stay longer and spend more through the delivery of a

Mid and East Antrim Borough Council and its partners have identified the digital

• grow, support and sustain new and existing businesses through Council and other initiatives; • position Mid and East Antrim as a dynamic and outward-looking region that welcomes and supports inward investment;

innovation sector as crucial to plans to deliver significant future economic growth in the borough. The City Deal funded project will house a range of business incubation spaces, laboratory and maker space, digitally enabled Grade A office accommodation and a series of co-working and collaborative spaces hosting a number of innovation and enterprise programmes with a Northern Ireland-wide reach.

As the engine room of Northern Ireland advanced manufacturing it was a natural step that the borough compete for the biggest UK infrastructure contract, bidding for one of four Heathrow Logistics Hubs as part of the airport’s expansion.

The Council is proud the bid it initially led up, before the Graham Group took up the reins remains in the final stages of the competition, with Mid and East Antrim having been selected as one of the last 18 sites out of an original 127, and just one of two remaining bids in Northern Ireland.

This ambition is only possible when the public and private sector work side by side to support a joined up vision, and, if successful, this bid would result in an investment of up to £5 billion locally and the creation of 5,000 jobs.

Heathrow will be the first major infrastructure project in the UK to pioneer the large-scale use of hubs.

A catalyst for change A dedicated innovation centre which is home to pioneering global companies has been hailed as the first step towards the creation of a Northern Ireland innovation district. The Innovation Centre at Ecos was recently launched by the Council, in partnership with Catalyst. The facility offers 20,000 square feet of digitally-enabled Grade A office space and has already attracted 94 knowledgeeconomy jobs of the 125 posts initially targeted by 2022.

Mid and East Antrim Borough Council invested £1.7 million in the project in order to redevelop the existing building into an innovation hub supporting local businesses with high-growth potential. It is also an ideal venue for conferences and social enterprises, such as Usel, which has just taken over the catering facilities on site. Tenants include PlotBox, which has digitally transformed the mapping of cemeteries in America,

Europe and the Middle East, and Clarke Facades, a firm which designs, fabricates and installs major construction projects across the UK and Ireland.

Council Chief Executive Anne Donaghy continues: “Council made a multi-millionpound investment to make the Ecos building into an Innovation Hub in order to create 125 knowledge-economy jobs.

We have been overwhelmed by the level of knowledge-economy companies that have based themselves here in the heart of Mid and East Antrim.”

The Council is currently working with its partners on the delivery of a £26 million i4C innovation centre at the former St Patrick’s Barracks site, which is adjacent to the existing Innovation Centre at Ecos, and funded through City Deal. The innovation district will be SMARTenabled and integrate several new buildings planned for the former barracks site, including social housing, a leisure centre and civic centre buildings, as well as a Northern Regional College campus, delivering an economic boost for Ballymena of £150 million.

Building bridges Mid and East Antrim Borough Council has also been rekindling relations with its counterparts in Scotland, particularly Dumfries and Galloway Council.

The councils are part of the North Channel Partnership Group, a partnership launched in 2019. They are exploring opportunities for greater joined up working on a number of key issues, including improved infrastructure and connectivity. Statistics show how similar both councils are, with many shared challenges and opportunities. They are working together to firmly establish a virtual bridge across the North Channel, which both areas are confident will boost economic activity through business and tourism in the years ahead.

Welcoming the world Few areas of Northern Ireland can boast a world-class coastline, castles and country parks that offer a feast for the senses, like Mid and East Antrim.

The Council has prioritised maximising the potential of the attractions on its doorstep to fully deliver on the borough’s tourism offering.

The award-winning #MEAdventures campaign, which highlights the spectacular natural and built environment, continues to inspire local residents, and grow and attract audiences from across Northern Ireland, while our dedicated Shaped by Sea and Stone tourism campaign showcases our assets to the world.

With over £51 million spent by visitors to the borough last year, the figures speak for themselves.

Holidaying in Mid and East Antrim is firmly on the rise, according to recent figures released by the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency.

The area has seen a 17 per cent increase in tourism revenue in the area and an 11 per cent increase in jobs in the tourism sector from 2015 to 2017.

The encouraging upward trend in both visitor nights, spend and contribution to the Mid and East Antrim economy highlights how the Council’s plan to be customer-focused and responsive to demand is working, with the worldrenowned Causeway Coastal Route the jewel in the area’s tourism crown.

T: 0300 124 5000 E: enquiries@midandeastantrim.gov.uk W: www.midandeastantrim.gov.uk

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Contents

10

04

Matters arising

06

Issues

14

Infrastructure Minister Nichola Mallon on investment priorities

14

Cover story: Belfast Met’s Louise Warde Hunter on delivering skills for a future economy

20

20

10

43

Roundtable discussion: Delivering a cleaner energy future 28

NIRO and excessive subsidies

34

Covid-19: The economic hangover

40

A ‘slower’ hard Brexit

Hosted by

Health and care services report 44

Chief Nursing Officer Charlotte McArdle discusses future planning

50

Critical care capacity

56

Department of Health CDIO Dan West on digital transformation at a time of crisis

62

34

56

65

89

82

112

Nursing and midwifery workforce gaps

Environment, waste and water report 66

Environment Minister Edwin Poots outlines environmental priorities

70

Climate Change Committee (CCC) carbon emission recommendations

74

A Clean Air Strategy for Northern Ireland

82

IPCC’s Jim Skea discusses the impacts of global warming of 1.5 C

86

John FitzGerald on climate change challenges on the island of Ireland

o

Enterprise and economic development report 90

Covid-19: Regional impact

96

Skills and the regional balance

102

The Northern Ireland Protocol

104 Public affairs

122

124

104

People: Declan Lawn

108

Speaker Alex Maskey on Assembly business in a pandemic

112

Director of Parliamentary Services in the Assembly Gareth McGrath

114

The All Party Group on fair banking and finance

122

Political Platform: Matthew O’Toole MLA

124

Interim Mental Health Champion Siobhán O’Neill

Northern Ireland Procurement Conference 2021 Thursday 4th March 2021 • Online Conference

A new era for procurement Procurement is an important element of the Northern Ireland economy. Northern Ireland central and local government spends approximately £3 billion per year on procurement, of which £2.7 billion is spent by government departments and their arm’s length bodies. Many of Northern Ireland’s private sector organisations also spend significant amounts in the local economy. agendaNi magazine’s annual procurement conference will examine what effective public procurement means for organisations in Northern Ireland. The conference will have a genuine, in-depth understanding of the key issues via a high-level panel of local and visiting speakers.

Speakers include: Sharon Smyth

Peter Wilson

Director of Supplies and

Assistant Director

Services, Construction and

Business Services

Procurement Delivery

Organisation

Riccardo Drentin

Pamela McCreedy

Partner

Chief Operating Officer

McKinsey & Company

NI Audit Office

Paul Quinn

Livia McHauser

CEO, Office of

Engagement Manager

Government

McKinsey & Company

Discussion topics for 2021 include: 4

What will Covid-19 mean for procurement;

4

The impact of Brexit for Northern Ireland organisations in terms of procurement;

4

Local government procurement;

4

Digital procurement;

4

Procurement as a strategic and

Procurement Ireland

innovative function; Colin Jess

Julie Welsh

Director

Chief Executive

Social Enterprise NI

Scotland Excel

4

Procurement across the health sector during Covid-19;

4

Engaging the utility supply chain;

4

Creating social value in procurement;

4

Best practice in procurement: case

Sponsorship opportunities available – an excellent platform to showcase services and expertise to a key audience

studies from outside Northern Ireland.

To register...

By phone (028) 9261 9933

Online www.agendaNi.com/events

Full programme available online

agendaNi Issue 102 Jan 2021

Editorial

New year, new challenges…

Owen McQuade, Managing Editor owen.mcquade@agendani.com

Happy New Year to all readers.

David Whelan, Deputy Editor david.whelan@agendani.com

So far, 2021 may not be the new horizon which we had looked towards

Fiona McCarthy fiona.mccarthy@agendani.com

last year, but there is cause for hope.

The social and economic pain, not least the loss of lives, was devastating and as we sit amidst fresh lockdown measures further pain is inevitable.

However, the emergence of a vaccine and the subsequent roll out to the most vulnerable groups offers a sense that we may soon return to normality. Emphasis must be placed on distributing the vaccine to as

Ciarán Galway ciaran.galway@agendani.com Odrán Waldron odran.waldron@agendani.com Circulation and Marketing Lynda Millar lynda.millar@agendani.com

many people as quickly as possible. Normality, however, must not be the pre-pandemic status quo.

Events

In September 2020, 327,189 patients were awaiting their first outpatient

Olivia Carragher olivia.carragher@agendani.com

appointment in Northern Ireland. The staggering figure represents a 7 per cent increase for the same period the year before. While much of that increase can be attributed to Covid-19, the reality is that Northern

Advertising Stephen McCoy stephen.mccoy@agendani.com

Ireland entered a global pandemic with a health service at breaking point.

Design

The health service is representative of how political indecision, division

Gareth Duffy, Head of Design gareth.duffy@agendani.com

and stalemate has culminated in Northern Ireland being a laggard in many areas when compared to its British and Irish counterparts.

Paul Rooney, Graphic Design paul.rooney@agendani.com

These challenges will not be lessened by the cumulative economic

Subscriptions

damage set to be inflicted by Brexit, which will make Great Britain,

Sharon Morrison Email: subscriptions@agendani.com Online: www.agendani.com

Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland poorer in the long run.

But, the pandemic offers a chance to reflect on past failings and build

agendaNi

back better, with smarter and more collaborative approaches.

bmf Business Services 19a Maghaberry Road Maghaberry, Co Antrim, BT67 0JE Tel: +44 (0) 28 9261 9933 Twitter: @agendani Web: www.agendani.com

Our health and care services report focuses on the future potential of transformation. Our waste, water and environment report looks at the potential of a green recovery and our enterprise and economic development report assesses regional ambitions for economic growth.

Printed by: GPS Colour Graphics

Moreover, our packed public affairs analysis delves into the workings of the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive, featuring, among others, an interview with Speaker Alex Maskey on the legislative challenges within the remaining short mandate.

David Whelan

www.agendaNi.com

FSC® is an acronym for the Forest Stewardship Council®, which is an independent, non-governmental, notfor-profit organization that was established to promote the responsible management of the world’s forests. The FSC® system provides an assurance that products such as wood and paper have been harvested in a socially and environmentally responsible manner.

The FSC’s Chain of Custody certification provides a way in which the material can be tracked from the certified initial source through the manufacturing process to the end user.

matters arising

Pyper to support PfG delivery Jenny Pyper, who was most recently Chief Executive of the Utility Regulator before her retirement in Autumn 2020, has been asked to “lead and further reform the Civil Service” and to “support the development of a PfG”, after she took up the role on 1 December 2020.

The Northern Ireland Executive failed in its New Decade, New Approach agreement commitment to publish a new Programme for Government by April 2020 and the request to Pyper to support the PfG’s development, despite only being in post to the end of June, is the clearest indication of any future timeframe to date.

The new interim Head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service is set to oversee a new Programme for Government (PfG), despite only being guaranteed an eightmonth tenure.

Pyper’s appointment comes only after the First and deputy First Minister failed to agree on a permanent candidate for the post, having whittled down an initial list of candidates to three. It is not believed that Pyper had been an applicant for the position when advertised and was put forward by the

Strategic Investment Board, commissioned to assist with engaging an interim Head.

In December 2019, then Head of the Civil Service David Sterling announced his intention to retire, giving notice for August 2020. However, come the 1 September that post sat vacant. Sterling was himself appointed on an interim basis originally in 2017, although no length was placed on the intended term.

Pyper has been a civil servant for almost 30 years and previously worked under Arlene Foster MLA as head of energy division within the then Department for Enterprise, Trade and Investment (DETI), where Foster was Minister.

Pyper will also chair the newlyestablished Covid-19 Taskforce, which will deal with issues including vaccination rollout, mass testing and compliance.

Bodies to take EU funding hit of EU funding was a profound policy challenge and offering an example to MLAs said: “I think Invest NI is in the position now where they will have to stop writing new business going forward because they don't have budget cover."

In its annual reports and accounts for 2019-20, Invest NI’s performance report listed a number of risks including: The Department for the Economy and its arm’s length bodies, including Invest NI, could recognise a significant shortfall in funding as a result of Brexit.

In December 2020, Economy Minister Diane Dodds MLA, a supporter of the leave campaign, told the Northern Ireland Assembly’s scrutiny committee for her Department that she estimated that European funding was worth around £100 million to the Department and its various arms-length bodies.

4

agenda matters

The British Government has pledged to create the UK Shared Prosperity Fund to replace the loss of EU support programmes but the Minister said that initial indications “suggest that the UK shared prosperity funding will be significantly less than current EU funding” at levels of around £11 million compared to the £100 million previously provided by the EU. Mike Brennan, the Department’s Permanent Secretary, said that the loss

“uncertainty over budget allocation affecting Invest NI's ability to honour commitments to clients and deliver corporate objectives”.

Describing the potential impact, Invest NI said the absence of a multi-year budget allocation has impacted negatively on their ability to plan going forward. Included in this budget is European Regional Development Funds (ERDF), which it acknowledges will be impacted by Brexit in future years.

matters arising

Teacher training reinforces divide from one side of a segregated school sector, place them in the same sector for teaching practice and that, after graduation, the students return to the same sector for employment,” the report states.

It also suggests that students training at some institutions are socially separated and may never encounter students from other institutions.

A “radical review and redesign” of initial teacher education is needed if Northern Ireland is to address problems of educational division and duplication, research by the Ulster University's Unesco centre of education has found.

Educational division and duplication may be being reinforced by the training of teachers along sectarian lines in Northern Ireland’s four institutions, which provide Bachelor of Education (BEd) or Postgraduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) degrees, according to the report into community division and student separation in initial teacher education.

Acknowledging that all four institutions are open to applications from students from all sections of the community, the report says that “the training of teachers along sectarian lines became a feature of the education system" following partition and has not substantially changed.

“The problems of community division are complex, and they are woven across many dimensions of life in Northern Ireland. The separation of education is not only indicative of this tangled mess but significantly also makes a considerable contribution to its reproduction. In order to untangle a

“It is widely acknowledged that St Mary’s does, in effect, prepare teachers for working in the Catholic Maintained sector (CCMS) whilst Stranmillis prepares students for the employment in Controlled sector schools. In effect, each college has tended to draw its students

knotted thread, a loose end needs to be found. A radical review and redesign of ITE may provide the starting point from which the wicked problem of educational division and duplication can start to be unravelled,” it concludes.

Justice case backlog sees ICC appointed ‘nightingale’ It had been hoped that the ICC would provide flexible accommodation for Coroners Court hearings, tribunal business, pre-hearing consultation space and jury assembly, which it is believed will free up capacity in Laganside Court. However, the plans have been hit by further post-Christmas restrictions meaning that from the week commencing 4 January 2021, only jury assembly was taking place.

“In subsequent weeks, we intend to introduce Appeals Service hearings and Coroners Inquests,” stated the Minister, The Department of Justice is attempting to address its case backlog of court and tribunal cases by utilising the International Conference Centre (ICC) as a ‘Nightingale’ venue.

On 4 January, Justice Minister Naomi Long announced that the ICC will be used to support the Northern Ireland Courts and Tribunals Service (NICTS) operations following Executive approval in December 2020.

who clarified that the NICTS will not be undertaking any additional activity at the ICC that wouldn’t otherwise occur in one of its own venues.

The contract with the ICC will initially run until the 31 March 2021.

agenda matters

5

Credit: Gerry Lynch

issues agenda

Covid-19: The third wave The absence of all-island cooperation is limiting the ability to successfully control the Covid-19 pandemic in Ireland. Meanwhile, a cyclical policy of suppressing SARS-CoV-2 through public health restrictions continues to stifle society and the economy. agendaNi assesses recent Covid-19 developments.

A failure to achieve consensus on the harmonisation of the Covid-19 response across the island has served to undermine the effectiveness of public health measures in both jurisdictions.

Locally, the Northern Ireland Executive has behaved with dysfunction. A reluctance on behalf of some Executive parties to diverge from the British response to the crisis has collided with a rejection of that same response by others. The ensuing horse trading on public health restrictions against the interests of lobby groups created a significant delay in recognising the ongoing crisis in the health system.

For instance, in mid-November 2020, the DUP utilised a cross-community veto to thwart a proposed two-week extension to public health restrictions. Indeed, one 6

agenda issues

month previously, the party had criticised the Executive’s latest restrictions and acceded to the democratic will of its government partners with apparent reluctance.

Meanwhile, the introduction of successive restrictions, some euphemistically referred to as a ‘circuit breaker’, and lockdowns has served to diminish public trust and confidence. This is exacerbated by poor communication from and an obvious lack of coherence within the Executive.

Consequently, while each winter in Northern Ireland heralds an annual crisis in the health and social care system, winter 2020/2021 is a different animal.

From December 2020, hospitals across Northern Ireland have consistently

exceeded capacity while the challenges posed by an exponential increase in Covid-19 transmission have been inadvertently compounded by infection control measures and staff sickness.

Zero Covid alternative Speaking with agendaNi in July 2020, President of the Epidemiology and Public Health section of the Royal Society of Medicine Gabriel Scally outlined: “We will either get to zero cases on the island and relax many restrictions or, if we don’t have effective border controls and a good testing regime, we will have to wait for a vaccine.”

During that same month, the Northern Ireland Assembly Committee for Health considered the A Better Way to Go:

issues agenda

Towards Zero Covid report from the Independent Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Independent SAGE). The Committee agreed to forward a copy of the report to the Health Minister, asking him to adopt a ‘zero Covid’ objective, and to seek his views on each of the recommendations.

The zero Covid approach, as adopted by Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan and Vietnam, seeks to effectively eliminate the SARS-CoV-2 virus within a defined geographic entity. The absence of community transmission for a period of time enables the safe reopening of the economy. While there would still be a potential for imported cases, these could be controlled.

Rolling lockdowns While zero Covid has remained politically unobtainable in Ireland, Gabriel Scally’s analysis has prove to be true. In the absence of zero Covid, recurrent waves of transmission and rolling lockdowns have filled the vacuum. Both north and south, the administrations on the island have sought to utilise increasingly ineffective lockdowns as their primary tool to mitigate the pandemic, hitherto controlling it just within the capacity restraints of the two healthcare systems.

In other words, current policy seeks the suppression of Covid-19 to an ‘acceptable level’, enabling the economy to reopen between surges in transmission while awaiting vaccination rollout. One public health measure which has facilitated this strategy has been the ‘lockdown’ concept.

Such a strategy has proved costly in the UK and Ireland. Speaking as early as May 2020, the Executive Director of WHO Health Emergencies Programme, Michael Ryan, warned against easing public health restrictions too soon and reopening the economy too quickly, suggesting that it could lead to a “vicious cycle” of economic and health catastrophe.

“This is what we all fear; a vicious cycle of public health disaster followed by economic disaster followed by public health disaster followed by economic disaster. If you reopen in the presence of a high-degree of virus transmission, then

Latest Covid figures in Ireland* Northern Ireland

Republic

Total Confirmed Cases

81,251

113,322

Total Deaths

1,384

Latest Daily Cases

1,378

5,325

Latest Daily Deaths

18

17

Confirmed Cases in ICU

45

76 (recorded at 11:00 and 19:30)

Confirmed Cases in Hospital

577

817 (recorded at 08:00)

67,135 (in last 7 Days)

116,016 (in last 7 Days)

663.6

522.7

Tests Completed Seven day rate (per 100,000)

2,282 (includes probable and possible)

*As of 5 January 2021

that transmission may accelerate,” he said.

Similarly, at the outset of the pandemic, Ryan advised that: “We have got to be able to show that we can go after the virus because lockdowns alone will not work.” This was supported by WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus who stated: “So-called lockdowns can help to take the heat out of a country’s epidemic, but they cannot end it alone. Countries must now ensure they can detect, test, isolate and care for every case, and trace every contact.”

Again, speaking with The Spectator’s Andrew Neil in October 2020, David Nabarro reiterated: “We in the World Health Organisation do not advocate lockdowns as a primary means of control of this virus. The only time we believe a lockdown is justified is to buy you time to re-organise, regroup, rebalance your resources, protect your health workers who are exhausted, but by and large, we’d rather not do it.

“We really do appeal to all world leaders: stop using lockdown as your primary control method. Develop better systems for doing it. Work together, and learn from each other.”

During the same month, The Lancet published a letter titled the “scientific consensus on the Covid-19 pandemic”. In the letter, signed by 80 public health experts and doctors (and subsequently

signed by over 4,000 more), the rationale for lockdowns is acknowledged as being about slowing the spread of the virus and ensuring that health systems are not overwhelmed. It identifies Japan, Vietnam and New Zealand as having demonstrated that “robust public health responses can control transmission, allowing life to return to near-normal”.

While conceding that lockdowns have been disruptive, both socially and economically, the letter asserts that “these effects have often been worse in countries that were not able to use the time during and after lockdown to establish effective pandemic control systems”.

“In the absence of adequate provisions to manage the pandemic and its societal impacts, these countries have faced continuing restrictions. This has understandably led to widespread demoralisation and diminishing trust,” the letter emphasises, concluding: “The evidence is very clear: controlling community spread of Covid-19 is the best way to protect our societies and economies until safe and effective vaccines and therapeutics arrive.”

All-island cooperation If zero Covid is to be pursued as a realistic alternative to cycles of lockdown, it must be achieved by all-island consensus.

agenda issues

4 7

issues agenda

“33,863 vaccinations in a short space of time is a significant achievement for Northern Ireland. We are continuing to lead the way in delivering vaccines to our most vulnerable and our frontline workers.”

Health Minister Robin Swann MLA

For instance, as exposed by the Christmas travel ban in the Republic, any effort to enforce a rigid quarantine upon arrival strategy akin to that in New Zealand (where borders are closed to most visitors and all arrivals are tested and quarantined for 14 days) must be pursued on an all-island basis to prevent circumvention using ports in an alternative jurisdiction.

In December 2020, when the Republic introduced a 48-hour travel ban (subsequently extended) to and from Great Britain, the Executive stopped short of a similar embargo, instead advising against non-essential travel.

Consequently, in response to the Irish Government’s decision and the subsequent predictable surge of people circumventing the ban via northern ports, the Executive’s Health Minister, Robin Swann MLA suggested: “It left us as the funnel or as the avenue of getting back in.”

The lack of meaningful collaboration is conspicuous. Indeed, Swann had previously intervened in July 2020 and again in September, through a series of four letters to the Republic’s Health Minister Stephen Donnelly TD, relating to the data of passengers travelling north via Dublin Airport. However, Swann received no written response from his southern counterpart.

Already, in October 2020, Taoiseach Micheál Martin TD has rejected the zero Covid approach as being unrealistic.

8

agenda issues

“Given our geographic location and proximity to Britain and mainland Europe, and with two jurisdictions on our island, the advice of NPHET is, and our view as a Government is that this is simply not a realistic option,” he said.

Lingering crisis The Covid crisis will linger long into 2021.

In the meantime, an already weakened health system is paralysed by rising transmission rates, forcing hospitals to operate beyond capacity, decimating health and social care staffing and undermining non-Covid care.

From 26 December 2020, a six-week lockdown was imposed, with a review scheduled for 23 January 2021. A curfew was also implemented between 20:00 and 06:00 until 2 January with all retail, hospitality and leisure closed between those hours.

Welcoming the consensus within the Executive, the Health Minister said: “The evidence before us was clear that decisive intervention was required to prevent the growing tide of Covid-19 cases overwhelming out health service, with catastrophic consequences.”

Vaccination roll-out Some hope emerged when the first Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 vaccination was administered to nurse Joanna Sloan on 8 December 2020. The initial phase of

the vaccination programme focused on care home residents and staff, alongside HSC staff in direct contact with vulnerable patients. Second doses of the vaccine began on 29 December, by which point 8,940 care home residents, 10,484 care home staff and 14,259 HSC had received the vaccine.

The Health Minister said: “33,863 vaccinations in a short space of time is a significant achievement for Northern Ireland. We are continuing to lead the way in delivering vaccines to our most vulnerable and our frontline workers.”

Welcoming the approval of the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine the following day, Swann stated: “The vaccine programme will transform the situation but that will take time. Between now and then, we need another big push to get through these next few months. We can all play our part in supporting the health service and in protecting each other from Covid19.”

The initial phase of the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccination programme began on 4 January 2021, beginning with those aged 80 years and over and determined by clinical vulnerability factors.

Latest restrictions Now, the latest Covid-19 statistics indicate that Northern Ireland has a seven day incidence rate of 663.6 per 100,000 (as of 4 January 2021) compared to the Republic’s 14 Day Incidence Rate of 245.6 per 100,000 (as of 28 December 2020).

As the two jurisdictions on the island enforce their latest respective rounds of lockdown, it seems unlikely that the cycle will be broken. There is, however, some consensus on the response required in the latest phase of the crisis. First Minister Arlene Foster MLA stated: “The advice coming to us is that we will need to take action and that we’ll need to take action very quickly.” Likewise, deputy First Minister Michelle O’Neill MLA tweeted: “Urgent decisive action is required to respond.”

issues agenda

Priorities for future infrastructure investment Infrastructure Minister Nichola Mallon discusses her priorities for infrastructure investment to underpin economic recovery and growth.

Setting out her belief that the experiences of the pandemic have underpinned the important role infrastructure plays in supporting citizens, the Minister says that while she does not seek to downplay the immediate difficulties facing families, businesses and government, it is important that the long-term vision for infrastructure is not lost.

10

and name checked a range of capital projects it hoped to progress.

“In the midst of Covid-19, the climate emergency and in the face of Brexit, we are in unprecedented and incredibly challenging times,” she sate’s.

While much of the agreements ambitions have been disrupted, not least a Programme for Government planned for April 2020, Mallon says of these challenging times: “It is exactly at this type of moment that we should be ambitious, creative and courageous. I believe infrastructure is the foundation to overcoming these challenges and taking us to a better place economically, socially and environmentally.”

In January 2020, the New Decade, New Approach deal which facilitated the return of the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive pledged to “turbocharge infrastructure delivery in Northern Ireland”

Mallon states that modern and sustainable infrastructure is a “key building block of prosperity” and says that not only will it be an important part of recovery in the months ahead but it is

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essential to grow the economy, address regional imbalances, improve wellbeing and “support a thriving island where people want to live, work and invest”.

“Infrastructure is also essential in providing the physical connectivity to allow Northern Ireland to compete on the global stage. This critical role and the need for prioritised investment in infrastructure and public services, is rightly at the heart of New Decade, New Approach,” she states.

Mallon says that the agreed ambitions of New Decade, New Approach, alongside the recent funding announcement by Taoiseach Micheál Martin of €500 million, as part of his new Shared Island Unit, to build and enhance cross-border projects

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over the next five years as well as UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s recently launched independent review of transport connections across the UK, each offer opportunities that can deliver “real and positive change” for people, “especially those who have been left behind”.

As to how this will happen, Mallon says: “The Executive needs to put an end to the long history of short-sighted underinvestment in infrastructure and we need, as an Executive, to recognise the simple fact that we cannot deliver the Executive’s wider commitments without the underpinning infrastructure in place.”

Offering a sense of where she identifies the most immediate need for investment, Mallon adds: “Capital investment in our water and sewerage infrastructure is the foundation for our economy’s revival, if we want to emerge from what is likely to be the most damaging recession in recent history.

“Our water and sewerage services are crucial to the continued health and wellbeing of our people and they are essential for the post-pandemic economic recovery. There are over 100 areas in Northern Ireland where new development simply cannot connect to the wastewater network due to capacity issues in the system and Belfast is also fast approaching this point.”

In mid-November 2020, Mallon opened a consultation on ‘Living with Water in Belfast’, a draft strategic plan for drainage and wastewater management, with the consultation process open until 29 January 2021. The plan proposes a £1.4 billion investment over 12 years, which Mallon believes is “a blueprint for future integrated water management, initially for Belfast which will then be rolled out to other areas across the North”.

“Significant investment is absolutely essential to support our recovery because without it economic growth here will be virtually impossible,” the Minister states. “And as we look at what we must do to correct wrongs that have gone before, we must also look to what we have learned during this crisis as we move forward.”

The Minister points to a number of positives which have emerged during the pandemic, which she says offered “a

“The Executive needs to put an end to the long history of short-sighted under investment in infrastructure and we need as an Executive to recognise the simple fact that we cannot deliver the Executive’s wider commitments without the underpinning infrastructure in place”. glimpse of how things could and can be” including quieter and safer roads, cleaner air and more active travel.

“I don’t want us to lose this. If we simply go back to what we did before, the huge sacrifices families and businesses have made will be in vain and we will have wasted a massive opportunity. The opportunity for all of us to enjoy a better quality of life and play our part in tackling the climate crisis.”

Mallon says that in order to do this, more opportunities need to be created for active travel and for safer infrastructure for those who want to walk, wheel and cycle.

The Minister points to the positives of recent initiatives that her department has announced including the piloting of popup cycle lanes, pavement widening and the Ormeau Parklet in south Belfast.

Additionally, she highlights a £20 million allocation for blue/green infrastructure during her capital budget announcement in June, which she says will support the transformation of communities, promote active travel and shape places for a new normal.

However, Mallon admits: “The truth is, this is only a first step. There is so much more to do.

“As well as improving health outcomes, I want to ensure that we strengthen our resilience by putting, for example, a greater focus on our integrated drainage systems to protect homes and businesses from the increased risk of flooding and also ensure that we use our green spaces in a way that delivers multiple benefits for residents and the wider community.

“Greenways are, to my mind, a wonderful example of this type of positive place shaping. They can help provide a solution to localised flooding problems, while at the same time providing a positive space

where communities can improve their physical and mental health and come together in a way that tackles social isolation, which so many of our citizens are increasingly suffering from.”

The Minister outlines her ambition to deliver “more green projects that drive lasting change, enhance our economy and improve lives” in partnership with councils and local communities, as part of her drive to deliver more sustainable infrastructure.

Public transport Turning to the role of public transport, Mallon recognises the challenges associated with the pandemic that reduced 2020 usage to 40 per cent of 2019 levels. Prior to the pandemic, Northern Ireland experienced record increases in the use of its public transport network, including a 30 per cent increase in passenger numbers on the route of the new Glider service in its first year and in 2019, Northern Ireland Railways recorded its highest ever number of passenger journeys.

“These results show how investment in infrastructure can change travel behaviour, reduce the reliance on private cars and better connect our communities across the island, helping to advance tourism and economic opportunities.

“To ensure that we continue to grow public transport patronage over the longer-term, my department has released funding to purchase 21 new train carriages, is investing in new zero emission buses, as well as the multi-modal transport hub in Derry and the Belfast Transport Hub project.”

Mallon identifies rail as an area of “significant untapped opportunities”, stating that investment in rail will help address regional imbalance and improve

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sustainable and inclusive modes of transport.”

Chair of the Ministerial Advisory Panel, Kirsty McManus, presents the panel’s report to Infrastructure Minister Nichola Mallon.

economic and employment opportunities.

In response, the Minister has allocated funding for the feasibility study for the Phase 3 upgrade of the Derry to Belfast railway line, stating that she is committed to “seeing this project delivered as soon as possible”.

The Department for Infrastructure is currently working with counterparts in the Irish Government to finalise the terms of reference for a new high speed feasibility study which includes Belfast, Derry Dublin, Limerick and Cork, which Mallon says will “form a spine of connectivity and tackle regional imbalance on the island”.

Tackling regional and socio economic imbalance through infrastructure is a focus for the Minister, who describe it as an “injustice that needs corrected”.

“Too many parts of Northern Ireland are still not realising their potential and there are very significant socio-economic differentials across the North, particularly in urban areas of Belfast, the North West and across a number of our rural areas. I am keen to continue to work to ensure that we start delivering balanced regional growth and no longer leave some of our citizens behind.

“While part of that will be assisted through the development of the Belfast and North West Transport hubs, and the improvement and expansion of our rail network, my department is also progressing two Executive flagship road projects, the A5 and A6.”

Mallon points to her department’s work in progressing other key infrastructure

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projects which she says will have an economic multiplier effect, including the A1 Junctions safety programme, the Narrow Water Bridge, York Street Interchange and a range of bypass projects.

The Minister states that work also continues with partners to deliver city and growth deals across the region. The deals represent a £563 million investment of capital funding from the Executive, funding which is being matched by the UK Government. Mallon says that much of this investment will be focused on capital infrastructure projects over the next 10 to 15 years.

“This investment will help to progress many important infrastructure projects like Belfast Rapid Transit Phase 2, the Newry Southern Relief Road and the Lagan Pedestrian and Cycle Bridge. This investment is welcome and can be a real game changer in promoting balanced growth.”

However, the Minister is aware of the need to deliver a long-term strategic framework for infrastructure investment and delivery and of the constraints on public finances.

“It must be recognised that infrastructure projects have a long lead-in time and so we must continue to plan for the long-term. My officials are continuing to prepare draft transport plans for consultation which are intended to set out the framework for transport policy and investment decisions up until 2035. A key element of these is to ensure new development is planned to make use of

With long-term planning in mind, the Minister recently set up a ministerial advisory panel of independent experts and key stakeholders, tasked with presenting recommendations on how an Infrastructure Commission for Northern Ireland “might more effectively support the long-term planning and development of our infrastructure”. Mallon states that she is currently considering the group’s final report and engaging with Executive colleagues, adding: “I believe this presents an exciting opportunity to do things better and I am keen to see this work develop.”

Highlighting that the public finance constraints cannot be ignored, the Minister says that pressure on services should not limit ambitions. “We need to plan now for the long-term, investing to create opportunities for our people and tackle head-on the challenges facing our economy, society and environment.”

Concluding, the Minister says: “Having modern and sustainable water, drainage and transport networks is essential if we are to grow our economy and improve the lives of everyone. As part of the Covid-19 recovery work, and as longer term plans develop in our Programme for Government, our infrastructure has a critical role to play in addressing the key barriers to economic growth across all parts of Northern Ireland is recognised.

“Without investment in infrastructure, particularly water and sewerage services, new developments, whether they are private or social housing, hotels, schools or hospitals, will simply not be able to happen.

“Continued investment in our transport infrastructure is needed to ensure we play our part in meeting our climate change commitments for the future whilst also ensuring we provide a fast, efficient and safe transport networks to help with our Covid-19 recovery.

“As we move towards a new future, a new normal, we must be bold and work together to bring about the change needed to build a better future that delivers more for our citizens, socially and economically, delivering cleaner, greener and healthier communities.”

Translink: A responsible recovery for irregular commutes and social and leisure activities. This has the potential to place public transport at the heart of the rebuilding effort.

As we invest in the future of Northern Ireland over the coming years, it will be important to recognise the role of public transport in protecting the environment and connecting communities, writes Chris Conway, Translink Group Chief Executive.

The positive impact of bus and rail services on climate and congestion, public health, social inclusion and road safety can’t be overestimated, public transport is a safe means of travel, with a lower risk of being involved in a road traffic collision and measures in place to keep everyone safe and limit the impact of Covid-19. Numerous recent scientific studies have shown that public transport is much safer than other public spaces or gatherings, a testament to the work undertaken by the industry, alongside assistance from passengers.

help deliver a sustainable recovery that tackles climate change and improves air quality while also supporting economic growth.

Public transport underpins Northern Ireland’s ability to build back responsibly and sustainably; Translink is well placed to help the community adapt to altered circumstances and to deliver zero carbon transport for Northern Ireland.

Before the pandemic, more and more people were switching to public transport in Northern Ireland. In 2018/19, passenger journeys topped 84.5 million journeys, the highest figure in 20 years.

This equates to 5.8 million additional fare paying passenger journeys each year during three consecutive years of growth.

Translink continues to provide a comprehensive public transport offering, including school services and rural networks, as well as urban and commuter services. These services are essential to sustaining vital jobs in dependent sectors across the economy.

We must continue to maintain and expand a comprehensive network to

The public transport network in Northern Ireland is an efficient user of public resources, delivering a greater network coverage than most other regions of the UK while receiving the lowest funding (£84 per head) of any UK region, just 27 per cent of the average UK public expenditure (£311 per head) on public transport.

More people are expected to work from home on a longer-term basis going forward, but they may also choose to reduce their reliance on a second car, increasing their dependence on public transport and other sustainable modes

Translink will continue to work with businesses and stakeholders to progress sustainable transport options and will maintain our existing mechanisms to keep everyone safe, including compulsory face coverings, cashless payments where possible, a ‘no change’ policy, provision of hand sanitisers and protective screens and social distancing, as well as thorough cleaning techniques.

The global climate and air quality enjoyed a short-term benefit from reduced car and air transport during the crisis, which should be maintained wherever possible. It is now universally recognised that we must take action to improve our environment; before Covid19, the UK became the first major economy to legislate for net-zero emissions by 2050. This commitment recognises the potential for zero carbon public transport to play a crucial role in improving the environment. Translink is fully committed to this, and we are keen to see our streets made more welcoming for sustainable forms of transport, including public transport, walking and cycling. Above all, it’s vital that our urban spaces are made people-centred, with moves to reduce reliance on the private car at the forefront.

In the months ahead, Translink will work to secure the future of public transport in Northern Ireland. Safe, sustainable and efficient bus and rail travel is at the heart of our cities, towns and villages and will continue to play a vital role in keeping everyone safe, building additional support for sustainable transport solutions and a ‘green’ recovery in every part of our society and supporting the whole community in the months ahead as we seek to look beyond Covid-19 and plan a vision for an enhanced network and economy in the coming years.

More details can be found at www.translink.co.uk

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Delivering skills for a future economy Principal and Chief Executive of Belfast Metropolitan College, Louise Warde Hunter, discusses the critical role of the higher and further education institution’s role in delivering the future skills needed for Northern Ireland’s economic recovery.

Taking up the role as head of Northern Ireland’s largest and longest established further and higher education college in Northern Ireland in April 2020, Warde Hunter expresses her admiration for an organisation which had already swung into action in transitioning to deliver for its students amidst the pandemic.

In mid-March 2020 Belfast Met suspended the majority of face-to-face delivery and closed its four campuses,

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making radical changes in a short space of time, which the Chief Executive describes as a demonstration of “our unwavering commitment” to ensuring student success.

While the College was still very much open for business, Belfast Met’s delivery model was disrupted; major changes were required including a move to virtual delivery for over 12,000 students and a move to remote working arrangements

for the majority of the College’s 1,000 staff.

“The speed at which our lecturing staff moved from face-to-face learning to remote delivery methods has been remarkable, flipping a classroom-based approach to an online model seemingly overnight. That switch required the support and efforts of colleagues, including those not on the frontline interface with our students,” explains

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Warde Hunter. “Getting the right balance was critically important in ensuring we met the distinctively different needs of our students, including those learners with special needs, while also addressing pre-existing but now more pronounced societal challenges, such as digital disadvantage. In doing so we’ve had to be innovative and ensure that we stay relevant to the people who need us.”

The Chief Executive has also had to adapt her approach to how she envisaged her early days in the role.

Having originally scoped an engagement plan that involved a range of face-toface meetings across the College’s structures, Warde Hunter has had to be innovative in her approach in getting to know her team and students, while also affording them the opportunity to meet her, including online ‘Ask Me Anythings’, virtual meetings and delivering weekly vlogs.

An experienced senior civil servant, Warde Hunter was most recently Deputy Secretary as Head of Housing, Urban Regeneration and Local Government at Department for Communities and has had senior roles delivering policy in a range of areas including education, agriculture, environment and justice.

Outside of the Civil Service, Warde Hunter was Scotland and Northern Ireland Strategic Director for Children’s Services in the large UK charity Action for Children and Chief Executive of Common Purpose Ireland.

Outlining her reasoning for taking up the post, she states: “Belfast Met has a distinct identity as the further education (FE) college for the capital of Northern Ireland, responding to the opportunities afforded by growth, jobs and diversity alongside dealing with the challenges of areas with some of the highest levels of poverty, economic inactivity and deeprooted social problems.

“Coming from the Department for Communities, I am critically aware of the positive impact that a job has on families and communities. It offers confidence, a sense of purpose, a sense of pride, of personal responsibility and standing.

Belfast Met provides the wraparound to give people the skills to get a job and the confidence to believe in themselves.

“The College plays a leading role in the skills system for Northern Ireland, providing education, technical and professional skills at all levels to learners from all socio-economic backgrounds.”

remote delivery coexist; and relayed learning, where students will rotate between synchronised in-class and digital delivery of lectures.

Leadership

As well as teaching methods, Belfast Met has also been quick to adapt its student support services, which Warde Hunter highlights operates under the aim of providing “outstanding service, effecting positive change through learner enhancement, achievement and progression in an all-inclusive environment”.

The importance of leadership in a time of change was highlighted again in September 2020 when the College re-opened its buildings to welcome new

“Belfast Met is committed to excellence in every way and at the forefront of this is looking after the best interests of our students. We want students to gain not

Interestingly, Warde Hunter’s postgraduate study thesis focused on leadership in the public sector at a time of change, work that she has revisited while delivering a future pathway for Belfast Met.

“Getting the right balance was critically important in ensuring we met the distinctively different needs of our students, including those learners with special needs, while also addressing pre-existing but now more pronounced societal challenges, such as digital disadvantage.” and existing further and higher education learners, which the Principal says required an act of “reimagining the physical space coupled with continuous communications to give confidence that all steps had been taken” to ensure safe movement.

“The start of the 2020 2021 academic year was very different from any previous year. We have worked to reimagine our college with many of our familiar processes reconfigured,” she states.

Guided by PHA advice, the College was forced to revert again to campus closures during the recent period of restrictions but has established a plan for education delivery going forward which includes three models of teaching in the form of face-to-face, which is the traditional in-college delivery following social distancing rules; blended learning, whereby both the face-to-face and

only an excellent education but an excellent educational experience,” the Chief Executive says.

Belfast Met’s student support team switched to remote support in March to continue the delivery of services which range across college life from a careers and employability service through to funding advice, student wellbeing and counselling, recognising the variety of needs of the colleges diverse learners.

Economic recovery While much of the initial focus for the College and indeed for wider society was on managing the pandemic’s early impact, recognition of the need for economic recovery and growth, which also pre-dated the pandemic, has become a central focus.

It is in this area where Warde Hunter

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believes that Belfast Met has a pivotal role in ensuring the delivery of skills for a workforce of the future through their core programmes from essential skills through to higher level apprenticeships and degrees.

As well as the September intake, the College will also be offering a range of courses starting in January 2020 across a range of subjects.

“The College has a dual mandate of economic development and social inclusion. Belfast Met’s goal is to assist learners to develop the knowledge and skills needed for the workplace and/or further study and thereby support them to progress through education and training to get a job, keep a job or get a better job,” explains Warde Hunter.

The economic detriment and rising levels of unemployment and labour market inactivity predicted from the outset of the introduction of restrictions, are already manifesting, meaning that Belfast Met’s offering to skill and reskill for a changing labour market has never been more important.

Even prior to the pandemic, the College’s corporate plan, entitled Leading the City to Work, set out the ambition to address the gaps identified by the Northern Ireland Skills Barometer,

which outlines a significant shortfall in skills at NQF Level 4 and Level 5, and Warde Hunter says that the plan will be “critical to the economic recovery” of Northern Ireland following Covid-19.

“Belfast Met’s activities help to deliver on the goals and ambitions of the Programme for Government and the draft Industrial Strategy through a large range of education and training provision in priority skills sectors,” states the Chief Executive. “We are continuing to work with employers remotely to reskill and upskill their workforce, particularly through a wide range of fully-funded part time courses, helping them to deal with the challenges that lie ahead.”

Belfast Met is the lead college in the Belfast Region City Deal, which was formally announced in February 2019.

The City Deal has seen the College lead on the development of a region-wide skills and employability framework linked to the £850 million capital investment programme. The City Deal is projected to create some 20,000 new jobs by 2030 and Belfast Met leads the cross-sectoral working group in partnership with the local councils, developing an action plan which the Chief Executive explains will include the roll out of new employability

programmes for the economically inactive, youth engagement, hospitality, digital skills and upskilling for SMEs. Additionally, the College is the designated curriculum hub for the areas of digital ICT and hospitality and tourism. Explaining the purpose of the hubs, Warde Hunter says: “The aim of the hubs is to enhance existing capability within the six colleges in Northern Ireland to ensure excellence in the delivery of industry-validated curriculum, staff and sector continuous professional development, economic engagement, stakeholder engagement and future scoping.”

Belfast Met’s expertise in skills development is a valued asset as the Department for the Economy (DfE) develops a future Skills Strategy for Northern Ireland. Warde Hunter explains that as part of the College’s mandate to assist businesses to innovate and grow, thereby increasing competitiveness across the region, the College is building on the Employer Survey 2020 which it conducted on behalf of the DfE and other colleges, which provides insights into working with employers that are not engaged with further education colleges.

“The College plays a leading role in the skills system for Northern Ireland, providing education, technical and professional skills at all levels to learners from all socio-economic backgrounds.”

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“The development of a new Skills Strategy is exciting and will offer an umbrella for so much of what the further education sector does. Our proximity to employers and our place embedded in the community will really make the difference needed.”

“The great saying ‘what got us to here won’t get us to there’ comes to mind.

That doesn’t mean that we ignore the successes of the past but that there is a recognition that innovation will be required of all of us. Giving evidence to the Northern Ireland Assembly’s Economy Committee in 2020 I stressed the importance of valuing the further education sector’s contribution to the education and skills community and our wider economy.

“The development of a new Skills Strategy is exciting and will offer an umbrella for so much of what the further education sector does. Our proximity to employers and our place embedded in the community will really make the difference needed.”

Partnerships Setting out the importance of Belfast Met’s existing and extensive partnership network, which ranges from small and big employers through to community groups, schools and universities, Warde Hunter points to the delivery of a number of DfE-funded Covid-19 responsive programmes, which include online courses for high-demand areas such as childcare, building information modelling and IT. Additionally, the Department has announced a significant package of over £17 million for employers to bolster the apprenticeships system. The Chief

Executive says that, coupled with a new Skills Strategy, the provision of valuable employment for young people and the strengthening of a skills pipeline for employers will “signal the parity of esteem between a professional vocational route to employment and an academic one”.

Looking beyond Covid, Warde Hunter points to the existing delivery of a range of skills programmes to offer bespoke accredited and non-accredited training, helping to improve competitiveness of our business community. Additionally, the College supports various programmes financed by DfE and Invest NI which help businesses embrace innovation.

“The College has led on the national award-winning Assured Skills Programme for several years, securing employment for over 1,000 graduates,” explains Warde Hunter. “Belfast Met is also leading the way in working with businesses to access research funding.

Belfast Met has supported the development of the International Education Strategy for Northern Ireland working with InvestNI which has helped the further education sector to develop a pipeline of opportunities to connect us to international markets. The College has been a leading member of the UK Skills Partnership established by the Department for International Trade to developing international opportunities to

sell UK education and skills experience overseas.

“The online provision, mentoring and bespoke offerings of Belfast Met will be essential to meeting the needs of the business community, learners in employment and those returning to employment in the drive to revive the economy,” the Chief Executive adds.

Turning to her long-term vision for Belfast Met, Warde Hunter articulates clearly the drive towards three overlapping ambitions for Belfast Met to be: the college of choice, meaning that young people and learners of all ages recognise the quality of education and qualification they will receive to lead them on their chosen pathway; the employer of choice, meaning that Belfast Met is recognised as a great place of work with the ability to recruit, retain and develop talent; and the partner of choice, making Belfast Met a thought leader in the further education and skills sector, particularly on the themes of sustainability and digital.

“I think those core ambitions will guide us over the next decade and I want Belfast Met to be a major part of changing the understanding around the contribution further education can make to the recovery and growth of Northern Ireland,” she concludes.

Profile: Louise Warde Hunter Born in Belfast, Louise Warde Hunter originally began her career in London before returning to Northern Ireland in 1992 as founder and Chief Executive of Common Purpose (Ireland), a leadership development organisation. She joined the Northern Ireland Civil Service in 2004 as Director of Families and Communities in the Department of Education.

In 2009, Louise took a career break to take up the post as Strategic Director Children’s Services for the charity Action for Children, a position she held for almost three years. In 2012 she returned to the public sector as Director of the Department of Environment before being appointed as Head of Policing Policy and Strategy in the Department of Justice later that year. In 2014, Louise was appointed Deputy Secretary and Director of Policy in the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development. From 2017, Louise was Head of Housing, Urban Regeneration and Local Government at Department for Communities and Gender Champion for NICS. Louise took up the role as Principal and CEO of Belfast Met in April 2020.

Outside work, Louise is an active runner, completing her first marathon last year, having taken up the sport later in life. However, she admits to missing her loves of live music and theatre due to the restrictions.

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My vision for the renewable electricity sector Economy Minister for Northern Ireland Diane Dodds MLA sets out her ambitions for renewable energy ahead of the delivery of a new Energy Strategy.

In June 2020, I published the roadmap for rebuilding a stronger economy. In it, I highlighted that clean energy was one of four sectors which could make a real difference to economic recovery and where we should focus our efforts for

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future investment. Renewable electricity is a key part of this sector, and I want to set out my ambitions in advance of a new Energy Strategy.

renewable electricity investments.

Northern Ireland has been hugely successful at bringing forward

region from indigenous renewable

Northern Ireland continues to be a market leader, achieving almost 48 per cent of electricity consumed in the sources, largely onshore wind.

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As we seek to tackle climate change and meet the legislative requirement for net zero emissions by 2050, we need to build on this success and further decarbonise our power sector, including bringing forward significant investments in renewable electricity.

With our outstanding natural resources, we have a healthy pipeline of projects coming through the planning system and ready to be deployed in the region.

The forthcoming consultation on a new Energy Strategy, due in March 2021, will set out key policy options for the future of the power sector. However, I have said that we will not wait for the Energy Strategy to progress issues which need moved forward urgently.

I recognise that a supportive policy environment needs to be in place to deliver these investments. This starts with an ambitious and achievable renewable electricity target which can be delivered in a cost-effective way for consumers. Whilst work is ongoing to gather the evidence needed to set a new target for Northern Ireland, I firmly believe that this target should not be below 70 per cent. This outlines how ambitious I want the strategy to be, and I want stakeholders and investors to be aware of this.

I recognise that delivering a target of this level will require a range of organisations and government departments to work together. This is why the Power Working Group, which was set up as part of developing the Energy Strategy, consists of representatives from across government and industry. This will help to ensure joined-up policy and delivery in the future on key issues such as planning and grid development.

I also acknowledge the desire for a government-backed route to market for renewables investors. I have to be clear that policy decisions must be delivered in a cost effective way, and I will not simply agree to a scheme at any cost.

But I also want to make clear my commitment to putting in place the conditions to bring forward investments, and fully explore a range of potential

SSE’s Slieve Kirk Wind Park, overlooking Derry city.

“Whilst work is ongoing to gather the evidence needed to set a new target for Northern Ireland, I firmly believe that this target should not be below 70 per cent.” support schemes to give the certainty to investors. Northern Ireland consulted on potentially joining the Contracts for Difference scheme a number of years ago, and as a first step I have instructed my officials to follow up with BEIS on this previous engagement to consider how Northern Ireland could benefit from the scheme.

Finally, I see great potential for offshore wind and marine renewables. Not just in bringing forward projects that deliver renewable generation for Northern Ireland, but in local supply chain opportunities for projects that will be delivered in UK and Irish waters.

We are working closely with a range of partners across government to ensure Northern Ireland is represented in all

offshore wind and marine renewable developments. This includes engaging with The Crown Estate (TCE) to address barriers and ensure that Northern Ireland has the potential to benefit from future seabed leasing rounds.

In the interim, I want to see developers seize the chance for demonstration and testing of new technologies up to 100MW for Northern Ireland that is afforded by TCE’s Offshore Wind Innovation and Demonstration Programme.

My ambition is clear for renewable electricity, and urgent work is ongoing on the issues I have outlined. I want everyone to know that renewable electricity in Northern Ireland is open for business.

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Delivering a cleaner energy future SONI, the Electricity System Operator for Northern Ireland, hosted a digital round table discussion with key stakeholders from across the energy sector focusing on the role of the power system in delivering a cleaner energy future.

What is the role of the electricity system in the decarbonisation of Northern Ireland’s economy?

David McGowan The electricity system is going to be central to the energy transition. The Economy Minister’s ambition for a

renewable electricity target of no less than 70 per cent is a gamechanger. As part of our role in planning the grid – we produce scenarios as pathways to decarbonising the power system. Through this research called Tomorrow’s Energy Scenarios, we anticipate that a 70 per cent renewable electricity target could reduce carbon emissions by two-thirds. That’s a significant reduction of CO2 intensity just by setting that policy in place and further

Round table discussion hosted by

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enables electricity to become that sector coupling element to help transition those more difficult challenging economic areas such as heat and transport.

However, it’s a massive technical task.

The Department for the Economy (DfE) Call for Evidence Paper set electricity use at about one fifth (17 per cent) of our energy needs in our homes and businesses today but if we look forward to 2050, it’s estimated that could rise to be as much as 50 to 60 per cent of our overall energy need. The deliverability of this is a huge technical challenge and will require collaboration across industry and with a broad range of stakeholders to ensure that we can realise the shift towards a net zero economy to support industry and consumers.

Roundtable Participants

Steven Agnew The power system has a huge role to play.

Electricity has been a success story to date with emissions reductions of around 50 per cent from 1990 levels, however, we’ve yet to turn that corner in heat and transport. Prior to Covid-19, transport emission had increased by 5 per cent and heat emissions by 3 per cent since 2001, so power is doing the heavy lifting in terms of decarbonisation. That’s set to continue and it’s recognised that to reach net zero carbon by 2050, the power sector must fully decarbonise by 2040, meeting increasing electricity demand as those other sectors look to electrification as their means to decarbonise.

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Steven is Head of RenewableNI, the representative body for the renewable electricity sector in Northern Ireland. He previously served for eight years as MLA for North Down during which time he chaired the All Party Group on Renewables and sat on the Enterprise, Trade and Investment Committee.

Tanya Hedley Tanya is Director of Networks at the Utility Regulator in Northern Ireland and is responsible for all regulation of electricity, water and gas networks in Northern Ireland. Prior to this she held the roles of Director of Compliance and Network Operations, Director of Water Regulation and Director of Electricity Regulation at the Utility Regulator. Prior to joining the Utility Regulator, Tanya worked for NIE for over 18 years in Transmission Development, Asset Management and Environmental Management. Having completed a degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering she gained Chartered Engineer status. She is also a Fellow of the Institute of Engineering and Technology and an Associated Member of the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment.

Sam McCloskey While the role of the electricity system for decarbonisation of the economy cannot be underestimated, I think it’s important that we recognise that responsibility cannot lie with power generators and operators alone. We as individuals and those large energy users need to take on some of the responsibility. To aid with this, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) recently released the Industrial Energy Transformation Fund to support energy efficiency measures and industrial decarbonisation. It’s available in Northern Ireland but hasn’t yet had strong uptake here, but it’s a great opportunity for organisations to decarbonise and to feed back in data to inform future mechanisms.

Another point I would make is around the need for a better energy mix on the system. 48 per cent of electricity from renewables on the grid is a fantastic achievement but going forward we’re going to have to need a greater mix of electricity generation.

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Sam McCloskey Sam joined CASE in November 2012 following an 18-year career in consultancy. She calls upon broad ranging experience of leading energy, sustainability, resource efficiency and R&D projects across a number of industry sectors, from local to pan-European. As a member of the NI MATRIX government science advisory panel for sustainable energy, she was intrinsically involved in the development of a Road Map for sustainable energy to 2035. She is a Fellow of the Energy Institute.

Tanya Hedley The grid exists to provide a service that customers pay for. We have to be mindful of the impact of anything we do on consumers and the affordability of those actions. Putting all the cost of decarbonising electricity solely on to electricity bills doesn’t make sense to me because you then create cost in an area where you want people to move to.

Collaboration is also important. A cultural change has begun but more work is needed to engage further with consumers to establish their needs and outline what options are available. Customers have to be at the centre of the transition but we

Steven Agnew

4.

David McGowan David is a team lead in Future Network with SONI where his responsibilities lie in energy economics. He was previously a Senior Lead Engineer with the organisation and helped develop the business case analysis for the North South Interconnector and the Celtic Interconnector. He studied Electrical and Electronics Engineering at Queen’s University Belfast before completing a PhD in the same subject.

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round table discussion

“We need to learn from the lessons of the last decade of how we can more effectively use our existing asset and minimise the build of new infrastructure. What infrastructure we do bring must be the right infrastructure for the years ahead and that’s where engagement with industry will be important. “ David McGowan, Team Lead, Future Network, SONI

also have to recognise that even those that don’t engage can’t be left behind.

Behavioural patterns and how individuals engage with energy is going to change.

As we move towards new renewable technologies generating electricity, data transparency and how that data is shared will be important to allow people to be more creative in delivering solutions that will make a difference.

What level of adaptation will be required of the grid if it is to meet the changing requirements of future generations and technologies?

David McGowan In transforming the grid we need to move from a 1,600MW renewable system today to around 3200MW in 2030. In our forecasts, the range is somewhere between 1.8-2.8GW at peak, so we will potentially have more installed capacity than we have demand to supply. That’s where things like interconnection, battery storage, alternative fuels etc, can add to the mix and there are new opportunities for industry to do that.

The grid needs to be strengthened for resilience and to facilitate the energy produced by renewable technologies to be delivered to the market and to the consumer. However, there is a short time

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horizon in which a lot of solutions will need to be delivered and that’s where collaboration will be vital. We need to learn from the lessons of the last decade of how we can more effectively use our existing asset and minimise the build of new infrastructure. What infrastructure we do bring must be the right infrastructure for the years ahead and that’s where engagement with industry will be important.

The North South Interconnector is critical.

An increase of 900MW transfer north and south is the equivalent of enough electricity to power 60,000 homes across the island and needs to be in place if we are to meet the Minister’s no less than 70 per cent target. Additionally, to reach net zero, we’d like to see that 500MW of offshore wind potential realised. At SONI we’re well positioned to work collaboratively with stakeholders to understand the potential for offshore wind. We need to understand the barriers and start developing solutions that help deliver a grid development framework, so that we can have the timely delivery of new assets.

Tanya Hedley There has been a huge cultural change in how consumers interact with the grid and further adaptation will be required as the transition continues. The original grid concept was three large power stations providing all of the electricity and a

general assumption that demand would be met at all times. Now, we are seeing self-generation and desire to sell excess generation. It’s becoming a two-way street and in the past SONI only spoke to generators but more visibility and more engagement is required of NIE and SONI in how this system works and works effectively for consumers. If this relationship doesn’t work well and there is no progressive thinking then costs are going to increase. We’re lucky in that Northern Ireland is small and we have those well-established relationships and understanding of systems. This can be an opportunity to establish ourselves as world leaders in delivering for consumers.

I’d also emphasise the need for the North South Interconnector. It makes economic sense and is an investment that we are keen to see happen because we know it will reduce costs for consumers.

Sam McCloskey The Matrix Sustainable Energy Horizon Panel Report, while an old report from 2013, carried the headline that Northern Ireland has an opportunity to be a leader in intelligent energy systems. Our constrained grid presents an opportunity for us to not be fast followers but to take the lead on innovation and do things differently. If we don’t start to move on some of these innovations to increase the energy mix or to capitalise on projects like the Girona 'micro-grid' project or some of the aspirations of the Kilroot Energy Park

then we are destined to not make the most of this intelligent energy system opportunity.

Steven Agnew

It’s worth highlighting that on grid investment, not all costs end up with the consumer. The renewables industry has invested millions in cluster substations and in some cases our members pay for a substation that others will later connect to with no option for rebate. It is a collaborative approach, costs are shared between industry and the consumer and as an industry we stand ready to invest further and to work in partnership with stakeholders to help reach that tremendous ambition of 95 per cent renewable penetration on the grid by 2030.

Tanya Hedley The substation clustering policy is a good example of where Northern Ireland has stepped outside of what others have done and delivered successfully. It was unique to Northern Ireland and I believe has been directly responsible for us

What are the enablers of enhanced infrastructure and renewable technology investment?

Sam McCloskey The two main enablers are research and development to establish technologies and then ensuring policy to support for emerging technologies from that research. By way of example of some ongoing research and development in Northern Ireland, some of the projects CASE are funding to support renewable technologies and develop support services include the use of building façade envelopes for cost effective community heat and power, floating solar technology, the creation of a layered GIS map to look at decarbonisation of heat opportunities in rural areas and tidal energy technology. Incentive to support renewable energy is currently lacking in Northern Ireland but even when we do move towards a new incentive, there is a strong lobby for an innovation Contracts for Difference (CFD), to support those technologies that can’t currently punch their weight and compete in price against

offshore wind (for example at £40MW/hr).

This will ensure that new technology will be an important part of the overall energy mix.

Tanya Hedley Wind, when first deployed, was substantially more expensive than it is now. The government support mechanism created the onshore wind industry to the point where it now functions without support. Support is needed for other emerging technologies to get them off the ground and the Government must ensure that they get this right through a competitive process.

In developing the Energy Strategy the DfE has engaged with all stakeholders and so the outcome should be something that we are all pleased with given our role in developing it. Policy will be very helpful in terms of transmission investment. We want to enable investment, especially when there is a clear business case but we’re not policy makers and so a direction from government is something we look forward to.

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There is a huge challenge in running a relatively small island grid system with limited interconnection. We are seeing levels of constraint and curtailment in Northern Ireland that are quite significant, with a cost to the industry of around £25 million in 2019, for example. That means fossil fuels coming on to the grid instead of clean renewable energy and in terms of carbon emissions, means an environmental cost as well.

achieving the level of renewable generation that we have. Consumers provided the security for that to develop and took on some of the risk. The Utility Regulator considered that risk as small leading to a proven effective decision because those clusters have subsequently filled as generators have seen the capacity and sought to utilise it.

Steven Agnew We need our planning system to facilitate the energy transition and green recovery.

We’ve reached almost 50 per cent renewable electricity generation but unfortunately some of the signals, particularly from the planning system, are ‘50 per cent and no more’. If we want to achieve the 70-80 per cent target by 2030, we need to work at all levels from the top of government through to our communities to sell the transition.

4

“Policy will be very helpful in terms of transmission investment. We want to enable investment, especially when there is a clear business case but we’re not policy makers and so a direction from government is something we look forward to.”

Tanya Hedley, Director of Networks, Utility Regulator 23

“Our constrained grid presents an opportunity for us to not be fast followers round table discussion

but to take the lead on innovation and do things differently.”

Sam McCloskey, Director, CASE On the mechanism, our recent report ‘The Power of Renewable Electricity: A route to 80 by 30’ we explored the different options of a support mechanism. What we found was that in looking at the use of CfD in Great Britain and the RESS auctions in the Republic of Ireland, both would do what’s required to incentivise the next wave of renewables. It’s clear that the CfD pathway would be the easiest because the legislation already exists to do it but in both scenarios there would be a requirement for a Northern Ireland-specific pot to ensure technologies are competitive and that consumers only pay for build out in Northern Ireland.

David McGowan Other areas of the energy market must also be considered, such as system services, which must be competitive going forward. From SONI’s perspective we look at the operability of the system and the scarcities that enable us to operate the system safely and securely so that energy is available to homes and businesses every hour. System services is a revenue stream that helps us operate that system in that manner. On infrastructure, we need strong energy policy. The net zero target exists but we need a strategy in place at local level to offer long-term certainty and short-term goals that are agile enough to unlock the cost savings. Offshore wind in the UK has dropped to £50 per MWh and we need to make sure we are not locking out technologies that may become economically viable going forward. Strong policy also helps us bring forward our business case to the regulator on

24

developing out grid infrastructure.

Tanya Hedley Things like CfDs are de-risking projects, reducing costs to the investors. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing but I am highlighting that consumers are underwriting that risk. So, those reduced costs need to be seen to be going through to the consumer. We need to be clearer on feeding through to consumers why we’re doing this and what the benefits are. The same applies for system services. System services costs are currently increasing and we know there is a requirement for that if we are going to move forward to 70-80 per cent penetration but we have to be able to show consumers that these clear and easily identified cost increases are creating value.

How can community acceptance of infrastructure and renewable technology be achieved?

Steven Agnew It needs to be a collaborative approach.

The industry, when it does build out projects, will provide community benefit schemes. Currently the industry pays approximately £2 million per year directly into communities in Northern Ireland and there are the added benefits of wider economic investment including jobs.

However, at the minute it’s being left for industry and communities to work this out for themselves and I think there are

lessons to be learned from the Scottish model, a much more collaborative approach between government, industry and communities or RESS in Ireland which has created a community pot. This facilitates communities to really buy-in, not just receiving renewable energy but also producing it. This transition does need to be a just one and the benefits of renewables must be shared but I don’t think government can continue to sit back.

Sam McCloskey I agree that better management is needed on the incentivisation side. Communities are and can feel real benefits through engaging in the transition. That’s the carrot approach. The other approach is that of the stick and we’ve seen through the UK’s recent announcement of the ban of petrol and diesel cars by 2030 how decisions can be made that simply have to be accepted. Achieving community acceptance will require a wide range of measures. However, it’s also worth commending the levels of engagement that have occurred in recent years by SONI, NIE and DfE through stakeholder consultation exercises. I don’t think any part of the community grouping will be left out by the time we have a new strategy.

Tanya Hedley Clarity of message is important. It’s not just wind farms that have had to engage with communities, SONI and NIE have been very aware of the need to engage on their infrastructure and what value it brings to communities. I don’t think the new Energy Strategy will hold any surprises given the level of engagement

that has and is occurring but, when the strategy is finalised it needs to articulate its impact in terms of greater levels of infrastructure and the impacts on consumer bills.

David McGowan

Steven Agnew Cost analysis is important because we do have a climate crisis that we have to address and because there is a much larger cost in doing nothing, environmentally and in terms of our wellbeing and way of life. If we don’t decarbonise the power system now then we’re looking at much higher costs for

What is the priority requirement of the Northern Ireland Energy Strategy in delivering a cleaner energy future?

David McGowan We need that political courage for a transformational policy. The Minister has acknowledged the ambition of not less than 70 per cent renewables on the system by 2030. That’s a visionary approach. Let’s get it in place and move forward.

Sam McCloskey There is a lot of ongoing innovation in delivering a cleaner energy future. A framework will provide that overarching strategy direction but with a delivery timescale at the end of 2021 we must continue to make progress in the meantime. We punch well above our weight in Northern Ireland in terms of renewables but we’re modest about it. I

think Northern Ireland should consider developing a 10-point plan decarbonisation plan similar to that announced by Boris Johnson in November 2020.

Tanya Hedley

round table discussion

If we are looking to deliver a cleaner energy future then the hearts and minds of people in Northern Ireland must be central to everything that we do.

Transparency is very important and it’s up to us to inform as best we can around the reasons for and impacts of the transition.

At SONI, community engagement is at the heart of what we do but we need to be setting our award-winning standards for engagement at an even higher level as we move forward and we are constantly reviewing our processes on how we engage and interact with communities because without people understanding what we need to do and without public support we have very little chance of delivering on our ambitions.

huge engineering solutions to deliver carbon capture and storage (CCS) for carbon-producing industry later, which would be a waste of consumers’ money.

Green technology is on our doorstep, so let’s utilise it to deliver the cheapest forms or electricity for the consumer and for the planet.

I believe we are getting on with things.

There are areas of ‘no regret’ which we now need to see happen and both NIE and SONI are currently actioning things that will feed in to the Strategy and we’re doing what we can to get as many building blocks in place so that we can continue progress in the Strategy’s direction. For me, the priority of the Energy Strategy is communication. The big picture needs to be presented and a clear message on what is going to be delivered and what the associated costs are for the consumer.

Steven Agnew I think the priority is deliverability. I am confident we are going to get a very ambitious Energy Strategy but what I’m not confident of is the ability to realise that ambition. Right now we have a Department for the Economy stating its desire to advance the decarbonisation agenda but we have a planning system that says no we don’t. We need those things to align and we need joined-up government, at all levels, if we are to deliver on our ambitions.

“Cost analysis is important because we do have a climate crisis that we have to address and because there is a much larger cost in doing nothing, environmentally and in terms of our wellbeing and way of life.”

Steven Agnew, Head, RenewableNI

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issues agenda

The gender pay gap: Do we even know what it is?

Senior Economist at the Nevin Economic Research Institute (NERI), Lisa Wilson, highlights a lack of consensus on how the gender pay gap should be estimated and outlines her belief that the excuse of complexity should not limit policy action.

The question that is usually to the forefront of public and policy discussions of the gender pay gap is ‘what size is it?’ or in other words, ‘how unequal are the earnings of males and females?’. Less frequently asked and reflected upon, are the more basic questions of what is the gender pay gap? And how do we measure it?

These questions form the basis of a recently published NERI study looking at the gender pay gap across the island of Ireland titled, How Unequal? The unadjusted gender pay gap in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

There is a general air in public discussion around the gender pay gap that ‘everyone knows what the gender pay 26

agenda issues

gap is’ and that the only point of contestation is whether or not it is large enough to be an issue which should be of significant policy concern. In following how this discussion plays out on social media platforms, or even on webinars dedicated to the issue, this debate translates back across the screen as being played out amongst five rival opponents. Each are staunch that their position on the issue is one of absolute fact.

The first is one which holds that the gap in pay between males and females is so large that it merits being considered as one of our most urgent social issues. The second is the opposite point of view holds that the gender pay gap is completely made up. This position was captured well

recently by an online poll by TIME magazine of over 9,000 Americans which found that close to half of male respondents see any estimates of the gender pay gap as representative of ‘fake news’ rather than a legitimate issue. The third is one which holds that the only information of interest when it comes to the gender pay gap is the extent to which any differences in pay are owing to gender-based discrimination, and so equate the gender pay gap with the concept of ‘unequal pay for equal work’.

The fourth is a position which holds that even if the gender pay gap is real, it’s not an issue worthy of policy action, because we can explain the gap through the fact that males and females engage differently in the labour market. The fifth, is a

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combination of the other viewpoints, and posits that there is no real gender pay gap, but rather there is a motherhood pay gap. From this point of view, any discussions around the gender pay gap are misplaced because they are not accurately diagnosing the issue.

The NERI took interest in these differing viewpoints precisely because whilst on face value it appears as though these opposing viewpoints are born out of conclusions on estimates of the gender pay gap, what is more accurate is that they are a corollary of the fact that there is little to no consensus on how we should estimate the gender pay gap. And so, it is more accurately the case that dependent upon which estimate of the gender pay gap one is presented it is not at all that unreasonable that one would arrive at one of the various different abovementioned conclusions on the matter.

In this regard, because there is no consensus on how we should measure the gender pay gap and often little to no clarity given by those whom are presenting the estimates on just what exactly their measure is capturing, conversations around the issue are often muddied from the outset. Thus, when it comes to debates and discussions around the gender pay gap more often than not, the debate is being played out through different songs, albeit to the same tune.

And so, at the NERI we thought it worthwhile to go back to these very basic questions and sought to bring some clarity to the debate in terms of ‘what is the gender pay gap?’ and ‘how do we measure it?’.

The gender pay gap is a concept that is broader than the concept of ‘equal pay for equal work or work of equal value’ and should not be equated such. However, just because it is not about unequal pay for equal work does not mean that there is not merit in assessing the gender pay gap. That is, as well as capturing any differences in pay owing to discrimination the gender pay gap also captures the fact that: (a) different characteristics are rewarded differently in the labour market such as for example, different levels of educational attainment; and (b) males and females have different characteristics. And in broad terms, the

“When it comes to debates and discussions around the gender pay gap more often than not, the debate is being played out through different songs, albeit to the same tune.” gender pay gap gives an overview of how males and females are rewarded differently on the labour market.

There are numerous different ways to measure the gender pay gap and various different decisions need to be made in doing so. These differences in measures and the fact that there is little disclosure of this fact in estimates of the gender pay gap may go some way to explaining why some equate the issue with fake news.

The gender pay gap is oft depicted as a discrete single, easy-to-understand concept, and so these disparities in estimates come across as unreliable and at the more extreme end made-up. Alas, that is untrue, but not being forthright about the limitations of one’s measures does create this perception.

There are two overarching ways to estimate the gender pay gap. When the gender pay gap is calculated by simply comparing the pay of all males to that of all females the estimate is known as the ‘unadjusted’ or ‘raw’ gender pay gap.

Calculated in this way, the gender pay gap does not take into account all of the different factors or characteristics of males and females that may play a role in explaining the differences, such as for example differences in education, occupation, hours worked etc.

On the contrary, when the gender pay gap is calculated after accounting for underlying differences in characteristics the estimate is known as the ‘adjusted’ gender pay gap. Those of the viewpoint that the gender pay gap is not an issue worthy of policy action, because we can explain the gap herald the adjusted gender pay gap as the measure of prestige. However, just because we can

explain some of the gap does that make the gap any less real?

When seeking to estimate the gender pay gap, the earnings period for which the earnings data covers (hourly, weekly, annual earnings) also matters, a lot. In this regard, whilst it is most common to see the gap based on the difference in hourly earnings we need to remain cognisant of the fact that when a woman applies for a mortgage or a car loan, she is not asked about her hourly income.

The income statistic that affects whether or not she gets the loan, and indeed what kind of life she is able to afford, is her annual income.

Furthermore, when looking at differences between men’s and women’s pay there is a choice as to which point of the earnings distribution we seek to compare and whether estimates of the gap in earnings are based upon differences in mean or median earnings. Depending on which measure we use we tend to get somewhat different estimates of the size of the pay gap.

Northern Ireland’s statistical body NISRA tends to prefer the median, the Republic of Ireland’s statistical body the CSO tends to prefer the mean. Because there are generally fewer women in higher-paying roles than men, the gender pay gap as measured by mean earnings arguably better captures how the structure of the labour market affects gendered differences in pay.

There is a tendency in discussions of the gender pay gap to prefer exact ambiguity.

However, policy action in the area will only have limited success while we accept the excuse of complexity.

agenda issues

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issues agenda

NIRO subsidies ‘excessive’ for small scale investors Electricity bill payers in the Great Britain will likely pay around three quarters of the estimated £5 billion cost of a 20-year renewable energy scheme, on which some investors in Northern Ireland were paid “excessive” subsidies, according to the Northern Ireland Audit Office.

Findings from an 18-month investigation on the generation of electricity from renewable energy, by the Northern Ireland Audit Office (NIAO), add weight to claims made during the RHI inquiry that some policy in Northern Ireland was designed to extract as much money from London as possible, even if that didn’t mean value for money for the wider taxpayer or consumer.

Unlike RHI, the Department closed the scheme at the time it was clear that London would no longer be paying, rather than deeming it beneficial enough to continue paying for it itself. As a

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result, Northern Ireland has in recent years gone from being the region of the UK with the most generous green subsidies to now being the only part of the UK without a subsidy scheme for renewable energy.

Northern Ireland’s successes in generating electricity from renewable sources could have been done at a significantly lower cost to the consumer, the NIAO has argued.

The NIAO report found “excessive” subsidies were paid to some owners of renewable technologies, which have

aided Northern Ireland in surpassing its 40 per cent target for all electricity consumed to be generated from renewable sources by 2020 a year early.

The NIAO report does not criticise the use of renewable sources as a means of electricity generation but has identified a “significant risk” that some investors may be achieving a higher financial return than was required “to encourage the adoption of the various supported technologies”.

The report focusses on small-scale, standalone onshore wind turbines,

issues agenda

£ 5 billion amount estimated by the NIAO to be received by generators under the NIRO scheme

3∕4 of this £5 billion could be met by suppliers in Great Britain purchasing NIROCs

£ 31 average cost of renewable electricity support schemes to the domestic consumer in Northern Ireland in 2019

£ 81 average cost of renewable electricity support schemes to the domestic consumer in Great Britain in 2019

3x nearly three times as many standalone wind turbines per km2 of land in Northern Ireland than in Great Britain

94% of all wind-generating stations are small wind turbines

anaerobic digestion plants and smallscale anaerobic digestion based generating stations. One of the main findings is that owners of standalone technologies, including wind turbines and anaerobic digestors, which contribute 17 per cent of all of Northern Ireland’s renewable power, get much higher payments than those contributing much higher levels, such as wind farms of multiple turbines.

Citing an example, the NIAO says that of the 1,200 standalone turbines in Northern Ireland, each could earn at least £95,000 a year in subsidies (a turbine of similar size in a wind farm only earns £21,000 annually). This means that technology owners could expect to pay back their £300,000 investment in four years but continue to benefit from a further 16 years of payments under the Northern Ireland Renewables Obligation (NIRO) scheme.

NIRO was established in April 2005 and mirrored other Renewable Obligation schemes in Great Britain. The scheme was open to all generators of electricity from a renewable source and closed to new applications in March 2017. The scheme provided additional financial returns through the issuing of Renewable Obligation Certificates (ROCs) for every MWh of electricity generated. Once a generator became accredited to the scheme, they were entitled to claim ROCs for 20 years.

Taxpayers’ money did not fund the NIRO, instead the cost of all ROCs was passed on by electricity suppliers to UK consumers as part of their electricity bills. Although energy is a devolved issue, Northern Ireland’s approach largely aligned with GB until 2011, when there was a divergence in the approach to meeting respective targets (Northern Ireland negotiated a lower annual supplier obligation level than Great Britain) with the NIRO offering higher levels of support for small scale wind investors (2014-2016) and anaerobic digestion based generators (2011-2017).

As a result, the cost of supporting renewable electricity to the average domestic consumer in Northern Ireland is one third of that paid by the average domestic customer in Great Britain.

However, the NIAO found that “despite lower costs passed on to Northern

Ireland consumers, we have found that, for small-scale wind and anaerobic digestion based generating stations, returns to those renewables suppliers since 2014 can be significantly higher than in Great Britain.”

The NIAO highlights a spike in standalone wind turbine based generating stations in the few years before the NIRO scheme shut for new applications, resulting in some 94 per cent of all wind generating stations in Northern Ireland being small standalone wind turbines, despite making up just 16 per cent of potential wind generating capacity.

A further finding by the NIAO was that NIRO legislation had no requirements on generating systems to have planning permission or to comply with environmental regulations prior to being accredited, which it described as “inherent weaknesses”. The review found examples “of accredited wind based generating stations in receipt of ROCs, without planning permission, or which had not complied with certain conditions set out within their planning approval”. A similar discovery was made of some accredited anaerobic digestion based generating stations, which did not have environmental waste permits of planning permission.

A “significant number” of accredited wind based and anaerobic digestion based generating stations had not been assessed for rates because the NIRO did not require evidence of registration as part of the accreditation process. The NIAO originally estimated a potential annual loss of £2.1 million of rates but says that progress in addressing this issue has seen that potential loss fall to around £100,000.

Another criticism of the NIRO legislation was that its rules around permitted use of the generated electricity “were vague and non-specific”. The review deemed an allegation that around 300 off-grid wind turbines were gaining the subsidy without a valid output, essentially wasting electricity, as “greatly overstated”. However, it did highlight a difficulty in determining what electricity uses were permitted under the NIRO rules.

In August 2019, 54 generating stations

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issues agenda

Analysis of accredited wind generating stations in Northern Ireland at 31 March 2019 Wind-generating station generating capacity

Number of ROCs awarded per 1MWh generated (since 2010)

Number of accredited wind-generating stations in Northern Ireland

≤250 kWht

4

1,209

250kWh–5MWh

1

20

0.9

53

Total

1,282

>5MWh

Note: >250kWh and above 500MWh often consist of larger windfarms with up to 20 individual turbines. Source: OFGEM

were accredited to the scheme that were either not connected to or exporting to the grid. An OFGEM investigation originally concluded that electricity was being generated in a permitted manner in these cases, however 31 stations later had their NIROCs suspended over concerns around the independence of their Independent Technical Assurance Reports (ITARS). In June 2020, 22 schemes were reinstated on the scheme but nine continue to be under investigation.

Anaerobic digestion Looking specifically at anaerobic digestion, the NIAO highlights that high levels of financial support have resulted in Northern Ireland having approximately three and half times as many anaerobic

digestion-based generating stations per square km compared to Great Britain.

The NIAO says that a much higher level of financial support for stations in Northern Ireland than in Great Britain was decided by the then Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment (DETI) and based on an adapted financial model, which was “based on theoretical evidence submitted to DETI through a public call for evidence”.

“We noted that much of the theoretical evidence submitted came from organisations which stood to benefit financially from any increase in the level of support at that time,” says the NIAO. “We also found that the model assumed that any anaerobic digestion-based generating stations installed would be made up of a wide range of generating

outputs. In reality, the vast majority of investors commissioned anaerobic digestion stations with a generating capacity at the maximum permissible level of the band, offering the highest level of ROCs. This enabled investors to achieve the highest available financial return and as a result it is our opinion that these potential returns are greater than DETI had originally anticipated.”

In response to the NIAO report the Department for the Economy (DfE) issued a statement which declared renewable electricity as “the major success story in Northern Ireland in our efforts to address climate change” and highlighting the NIRO as the support mechanism behind the achievement.

DfE stated that the NIAO report focusses on “a subset of two technologies” which it says represents a small proportion of the renewable electricity generation supported by the scheme but added that it will consider its recommendations and findings as it develops future renewable electricity policy.

Concluding the NIAO report, Comptroller and Auditor General Kieran Donnelly, points to his findings of a “number of strategic shortcomings” in the design of the NIRO, at a time of significantly reduced public confidence in renewable energy schemes. Adding to that, Donnelly said it was “crucial” that the recommendations made are followed up and that “lessons are learned to ensure future schemes are more robust and efficient”.

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agenda issues

issues agenda

Project Eagle report delay A report into the sale of NAMA’s Project Eagle, originally due to be submitted to the Irish Government in June 2018, has been granted a further extension until March 2021.

£ 4.5 billion

the value of Northern Ireland’s property loans portfolio (Project Eagle) acquired by NAMA

£ 1.3 billion

paid by Cerberus for Project Eagle

70% 33.5%

A much-awaited report by the NAMA Commission investigating the sale of the £4.5 billion northern property portfolio named Project Eagle for £1.3 billion was expected to be submitted by the end of last year, after a series of extensions, but will now not be published before March.

In his report, Cooke highlighted the existing complications recognised by the investigation that a number of individuals “who would be obvious witnesses as persons directly involved in the sale process” remained outside the jurisdiction of the State.

The NAMA Commission of Investigation, established in June 2017, on submitting its ninth interim report, pointed to “a number of developments” since its eighth report which gave the 2020 target, including the pandemic’s impact on work collaboration and the emergence of new evidence.

However, he said that the decision to assist the investigation by the witness represented an important development because of their “central involvement” to some of the matters subject to the investigation.

The new evidence, which has yet to be heard, is to come from an individual who had previously declined to assist the investigation.

The Commission, which is headed by retired judge John Cooke, is investigating the bad bank’s sale of a portfolio of some 850 properties in Northern Ireland which had an estimated original value of £4.5 billion but was sold for £1.24 billion in 2014.

The 70 per cent estimated haircut on the sale of Project Eagle was more than double the estimated 33.5 per cent applied to the entire £77 billion NAMA portfolio.

Plans to take evidence outside of the State were unachievable due to Covid-19 restrictions and instead the Commission has now organised for a detailed statement to be submitted.

NAMA was set up in 2009 following Ireland’s banking crisis to prevent the flooding of the market with stressed assets. The aim was that assets would be managed until market recovery would allow for the assets to be maximised in the interests of the taxpayer. However, the ‘fire sale’ method, with which some assets have been sold, has led to criticism and the eventual revelations around Project Eagle.

The Project Eagle portfolio was

the estimated haircut applied to the sale of Project Eagle

the average haircut applied to the entire £77 billion NAMA portfolio

purchased by US investment firm Cerberus in circumstances that have been subject to much scrutiny in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

Then TD Mick Wallace sparked further investigation into the sale when, in 2015, he used parliamentary privilege in the Dáil to claim that a Northern Ireland politician or party stood to benefit from the sale after a £7 million lodgement into an Isle of Man bank account.

In 2015, Dáil Éireann’s Committee of Public Accounts and the Northern Ireland Finance Committee announced inquiries into Project Eagle. Around the same time the PSNI referred the matter to the National Crime Agency (NCA) due to the politically sensitive nature of the allegations and the NCA commenced Operation Pumpless.

In January 2019, the NCA submitted a file to the PPS in Northern Ireland presenting evidence in respect of eight suspects relating to potential offences of fraud, bribery and money laundering.

In August the PPS announced it will prosecute two men in relation to Project Eagle.

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Expansion planned at Belfast-based Equiniti ICS

(L:R) Stuart Gunning, Sales Director and Andrew Hughes, Pre Sales Manager.

2020 was a year of change and transformation at Equiniti ICS. Despite facing an unprecedented market landscape, not previously witnessed in its 50-year history, Equiniti ICS pushed forward, investing in new product development and winning orders in excess of £20 million.

Among the key achievements delivered last year were projects for the Office of National Statistics (ONS) and the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA); the two UK Government departments that are responsible for both the collection and publication of statistics relating to the economy and the population. Both organisations have been at the centre of collecting and reporting data pertinent to the Covid-19 pandemic. Equiniti ICS was able to react quickly and provide the technology needed, which has underpinned the significant increase in the workload of ONS; their requirements having increased by almost 400 per cent during the last six months.

Locally Equiniti ICS has provided NISRA with an updated survey management system in the form of a new portal. This portal enables users to access the survey platform across multiple device types, from any location and is available

24/7, allowing businesses to continue to supply key survey data despite the COVID-19 restrictions impacting officebased working.

Another direct impact of the pandemic has been the wide-ranging acceleration of digital transformation. Whilst this ‘change initiative’ has been active for over a decade in the public sector, departments are now embracing it more readily in the face of current circumstances. The Northern Ireland Local Government Officer’s Superannuation Committee (NILGOSC) operates and manages the pension scheme for local government and other similar bodies in Northern Ireland.

Equiniti ICS has worked in partnership with NILGOSC on its transformation programme, providing consultation services based on our expert knowledge of how to manage and leverage data effectively against a backdrop of change.

Another main issue dominating the

headlines has been Brexit, and Equiniti ICS has been at the forefront of providing solutions to the UK Government in helping support its exit from the EU. Among its recent wins has been a new case management system for the Independent Monitoring Authority (IMA); a new government department set up to monitor the UK’s implementation and application of the citizens’ rights section of the EU Withdrawal Agreement. The system has been designed to manage and monitor complaints raised by citizens via the Complaint Assessment Tool (also provided by Equiniti ICS). All complaints will be triaged, assessed and investigated through the system workflow. In the scenario that a complaint or several complaints of similar type are upheld, they will be aggregated to become an inquiry. The system inquiry process then manages the need to engage various sources, gather and store evidence and subsequently produce a recommendation report, or in certain circumstances enforce a legal action or change. This project had very challenging timescales from procurement to delivery. From being awarded the contract in July 2020, Equiniti ICS delivered the initial system within a tight timeframe, with user testing taking place in September, ready for launch on 1 January in line with the Brexit timescales.

The growth and the success the business has experienced is set against a backdrop of the current pandemic, with the company’s staff continuing to provide uninterrupted services to its clients. This has meant continued solution implementation and service provision, whilst staff work remotely. Despite transitioning from office-based to remote working, staff have embraced the challenge, utilising collaboration tools to work effectively whilst apart, underscoring the agility and adaptability of the organisation in the face of a challenging business environment.

Equiniti ICS plan to build on the success of 2020, with the business preparing for significant expansion to its Belfast centre later this year. This growth will be fuelled by the company’s approach to innovation. Through the continual research of global trends in the provision of public sector services, Equiniti ICS

seek to develop new leading-edge solutions that deliver clear value to customers. The company uses market leading Horizon Scanning systems to pick up ‘mega’ and ‘macro’ trends, which provide fresh insights into the latest technology that feeds the company’s product development.

Equiniti ICSs Outreach product is the company’s ‘citizen portal’; a flexible easy-to-use portal with an automated forms management system, which can quickly digitise any citizen facing engagement. Outreach has already gained significant customers across the UK and Ireland including Her Majesty’s Passport Office, Legal Aid Agency, NISRA and The Cabinet Office to name but a few.

Perito vNext is the pre-release name for its new cloud-based case management system, featuring robotic processing and machine learning functionality, which will fully automate departmental processes. vNext builds upon the proven capability of the Equiniti ICS Perito case management platform which provides solutions aligned to complex customer requirements and extends this capability across a 100 per cent client configurable service. vNext is designed to be highly flexible and is available on the public cloud, private cloud or on premise. In combination with a highly innovative and intuitive UX design and user interface vNext will help drive the adoption of automation and digitisation across government departments.

Horizon Scanning systems pick up “mega” and “macro” trends, which provide fresh insights into the latest technology that feeds the company’s product development.

These are examples of just two of the latest innovative products from the company’s innovation portfolio, a pipeline of new solutions that will drive digital transformation across government.

2020 will remain long in the memory. Not only as the year we endured a global pandemic, but from a business point of view it will be regarded as a defining moment for the workplace.

Organisations previously resistant to change are now benefiting from increased efficiency, easier collaboration, and have opened a host of new communication channels with customers and citizens, all as a result of enforced transformation.

Perhaps most crucially of all, on top of operational benefits will be a longer-term acceptance and openness to the benefits that change brings. Features such as RPA and machine learning will no longer be viewed as a nice to have, but for organisations to continue their journey in to an ever-evolving digital landscape, they will be essential in order

to help us proactively improve our organisations and allow us to react to unforeseen circumstances in the future.

Equiniti ICS are moving forwards into 2021 in the perfect position to partner with and help these organisations realise the benefits of such digital changes.

T: 028 9045 4166 E: EnquiriesMKT@equiniti.com W: www.equiniti-technology.com/

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Covid: The economic hangover the biggest record deficit in peace time,” he says.

Giles highlights government expectations of public sector net borrowing of around £50 billion at the turn of 2020, around 2 per cent of GDP. However, government supports coupled with tax revenue losses are now expected to see that figure grow to an unprecedented level of just under £400 billion, according to figures from the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR).

Economics editor of the Financial Times, Chris Giles, discusses the persistent economic scars set to be left by the pandemic and highlights the likelihood of increased taxes or decreased public spending to manage these.

Suggesting that the Covid-19 pandemic will leave lasting hangovers on the UK economy, Giles explains that the scale of the impact will be determined by the pace of recovery.

The extent of the economic crisis has been far larger than that of the 2008 to 2010 financial crisis, states Giles, highlighting that, at the time, a 6 per cent dip in GDP represented the biggest recession in some 70 to 80 years.

However, it has also been far faster in retraction and in recovery.

In the two months between February and the end of April, the UK economy lost 25 per cent of GDP, “an extraordinary figure”, admits Giles. The progressive reopening of the economy permitted a fairly rapid bounce back to the point where, at the end of September, the economy was roughly 10 per cent of GDP below pre-pandemic figures in February.

“10 per cent of GDP is still bigger than 34

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the whole of the financial crisis but the recovery was faster. The start of the recovery was definitely V-shaped,” he says.

Acknowledging the delayed analysis of GDP figures, Giles points to use of more reactive data such as spending on cards, which suggests that a decrease in spending driven by the further lockdowns in November was nothing like that which had originally been seen in April. This, he suggests, indicates that the inevitable Q4 economic dip in GDP will be much milder.

Giles highlights that what recovery has been swiftly achieved has been enabled by the protections offered by the UK Government, including the furlough scheme and business supports. This however, has had a dramatic impact on public finances.

“In the global financial crisis we got to a level of deficit of about 10 per cent of national income. We’re going to be around double that this year, representing

“This is an extraordinary amount and it is something that we will have to deal with if it continues,” explains Giles. “If it is a one off then we’ll have increased our national debt but we will service that debt and it will not have to be repaid. However, the big question is how much of this extra borrowing is persistent and might need to be closed through lower public spending or higher taxes.”

Unemployment Discussing what the economic impact of Covid means for unemployment and jobs.

Giles, again, highlights that Government initiatives have protected against initial unemployment rate rise projections of between 4 per cent and 13-15 per cent.

Now, forecasts are suggesting that the ending of furlough schemes will produce a more likely rise to around 7-7.5 per cent, probably peaking around the summer of 2021.

“The unusual element is that we will likely see a strong recovery, while unemployment simultaneously rises, as the economy shakes out the companies that haven’t ultimately survived,” adds Giles, who explains that an unemployment rate of 7.5 per cent is not huge in UK historical terms.

Outlining the cohort which will be most affected by the rise in unemployment, the economist suggests that rather than those who are or were employed at the start of the pandemic, it will be those hoping to enter the labour market who will be most affected. “Higher unemployment is coming from a lack of hiring, not firing,” states Giles. “Anyone coming out of school, university or college are finding it

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much harder to get into the labour market and that’s where you see the big rise in unemployment.”

Covid-19’s economic impact in the UK will last far into this decade

On a regional basis, the unemployment trend is set to be distorted. While London usually has the greatest protection from economic shocks, October’s claimant count saw the English capital rise to the top of all UK regions and inevitably, rank as the largest increase in the last year.

Internationally, the UK’s budgetary response to coronavirus has only been surpassed by Canada in the G7 but as Giles explains, this level of spending has not delivered the health or economic outcomes that may have been hoped for.

Of the G7, the UK is second only to Italy in the highest coronavirus death rates per 100,000 of the population and it is on course to record the largest economic contraction of GDP among the G7 in 2020.

Sources: OBR; ONS ©FT

The deepest economic downturn in over 300 years

“The concern is that our spending has been very effective in keeping people attached to their companies but hasn’t been very effective in either addressing the pandemic, so far, or in repairing the economy,” explains Giles The OBR forecasts a steady recovery from the 10 per cent reduction in GDP by around 7 per cent by 2022/2023, however, a shortfall of 3 per cent of national income (£60 billion) appears persistent far into this decade. The OECD estimates are closer to 5 per cent.

Giles identifies a number of potential reasons for this shortfall including a lengthy recovery for retail, particularly physical spaces, and air travel, where a permanent hangover could exist.

Additionally, he points to a skills challenge. Where people have built up skills in economic areas which no longer exist, efforts to retrain individuals generally take a long time and often lead to less economic productivity.

“Those are the long-term scars discussed by economists. 3 per cent is not a huge number, it’s a lot less than we think the scars of the financial crisis are but it does mean that there is likely to be a hangover from the crisis and that loss of output compared to where we wanted to be has a knock on effect to tax revenues,” says Giles.

Analysing day-to-day public spending

Sources: ONS ©FT

figures from the OBR, Giles highlights the austerity drive in the previous decade to get back into surplus in 2018-19. That surplus lasted only one year and the current deficit is much larger than ever before, almost treble that of 2009/2010.

The economist accepts that this deficit is likely to decrease quickly because a large proportion of it is emergency spending to deal with the pandemic, however, forecasts predict a deficit beyond the next UK election of some £30 billion of where the UK Government wanted to be, meaning a likelihood that taxes will have to rise in the future.

Giles doesn’t expect tax rises any time soon, outlining his belief that it would be the wrong time to do it given that zero

interest rates meaning an inability to offset tax increases easily, but adds: “long-term scarring will require measures to repair public finances.”

Speaking prior to January 2021, Giles adds the potential of a no deal Brexit would potentially reduce GDP by a further 2 per cent, 1.5 per cent of which would be persistent.

Concluding, he says: “It has been an extraordinarily deep recession and one that we have recovered from very quickly so far but we still have a long way to go and there are likely to be some levels of persistent problems, which will mean there is going to be some hangovers which will be with us for some time.”

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Lessons from the Troubles and the unsettled peace Author and journalist Paul Gosling details his new book, compiled from a series of interviews with political and civic leaders, focussing on Northern Ireland’s unsettled peace and promoting discussion on how to fully embed peace in society.

“It almost feels like we are taking the peace process for granted,” observed independent unionist MLA and former justice minister Claire Sugden. She was one of 35 leading public figures interviewed to consider how Northern Ireland can be transformed into a better place. One of the consistent warnings was that 23 years on from the Good Friday Agreement, we have yet to address some of the underlying tensions and inequalities that led to the Troubles.

Those interviews feature in a new book, ‘Lessons from the Troubles and the Unsettled Peace’. Simon Hamilton, a former Finance, Economy and Health Minister, and Peter Osborne, former Chair

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of both the Parades Commission and the Community Relations Council, each warned that we are not even mid-way through what is probably a 50-year peace process.

Hamilton made significant comments about how the Northern Ireland Executive worked while he was a minister, and still does. “I have thought for a while now that it is odd that a power-sharing Executive of Sinn Féin and the DUP, with all the difficulties that were there and the effort that had been put into coming together, the symbolism that was inherent within that in itself, didn’t actually prioritise peace building and trying to develop a shared society. Even trying to work out what we

meant by ‘a shared society’ or ‘a more integrated society’. It didn’t feel that was always our priority.

“Maybe what I’m trying to say is that we maybe thought that just doing it, i.e. the power sharing, was enough in itself, without realising that you had to go much, much further beyond that.”

Equally significantly, many interviewees are positive about the potential for learning from the Irish Republic, and France, and elsewhere, with regards to the use of citizens’ assemblies as a means of making consensual progress. In Ireland, these have been used to consider same sex marriage, women’s reproductive rights,

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climate change and gender equality. A pilot assembly in Northern Ireland has looked at the social care system.

There was interest from many of the contributors, former Archbishop, Lord Robin Eames; Irish language activist Linda Ervine; Co-operation Ireland Chief Executive Peter Sheridan; and others, in their use here. But they suggested that as well as big picture difficulties, assemblies might be used to resolve localised problems, such as tensions on the two sides of a peace wall, or the grip of paramilitaries over some communities.

Citizens’ assemblies could also be a means of overcoming party political stalemate over challenges such as health reform.

Progress also requires good government and effective decision-making. There have been examples of this, such as crossborder health care through children’s heart surgery in Dublin and cancer care in Derry.

There are surely many more cross-border opportunities to improve health care delivery while achieving economies of scale. Professor Jim Dornan refers to the island of Ireland as a ‘Goldilocks’ sized territory for a single structure of health care delivery.

Another example of progress has been the Glider bus service in Belfast. As Alliance Party Leader Naomi Long explained, this has, at least until the pandemic, been important in enabling people to move across the city in safety and to travel to areas they would previously have been scared from visiting. This is similar to the impact of the Peace Bridge in Derry, which also brought physically separated communities together.

More problematic, though, is the creation of shared housing estates and overcoming separation by religion at school.

Paramilitaries still seek to undermine shared housing estates by marking territory. Our society tacitly accepts this and it is surely time for us to have a serious public discussion about how to move forward, perhaps through a citizens’ assembly? Father Martin Magill suggested learning from the integrated education sector by establishing a body whose specific role is the promotion of shared housing. Another idea is to increase city centre living, which is inherently more mixed.

“It is surely time to reflect on the reality that Northern Ireland’s institutions of government do not work effectively.”

Conal McFeely, Chief Executive of Creggan Enterprises, warned that we have made too little progress in terms of the divisions and inequality in our society. A common theme across many of those interviewed was the frustration that a peace dividend has yet to be delivered in Northern Ireland, though, statistically, it has clearly provided a boost to the Republic’s economy. Another warning from many of the interviewees was that our schooling system delivers for the few, while failing for many. In doing so, it exacerbates class divisions, with many pupils leaving school without the skills or qualifications for career success. Victims campaigner Alan McBride lamented that for many children their role model is a paramilitary brigadier or commander.

It is surely time to reflect on the reality that Northern Ireland’s institutions of government do not work effectively. We have serious deficiencies in our health and education systems, weak infrastructure, inadequate skills and poor productivity. Yet the way decisions are made seems to often deflect attention from the things that are most important.

While communal divisions are constantly apparent within the Executive, they were not reflected in the responses of the 35 opinion leaders interviewed. Yet, these included senior figures from loyalist, republican, unionist, nationalist and nonaligned backgrounds, including religious as well as political leaders, and senior figures in the Dail. This suggests to me that we (I mean collectively, across society) need to find different ways to make decisions, focusing on evidence, objectives and outcomes.

Citizens’ assemblies would be one approach, another might be to bring in outside figures to help decisions to be made, just as happened during peace

negotiations. One of my concerns is that the structural recognition of communal differences solidifies them, hampering the chance of doing things differently. Lebanon adopted a similar peace approach, and still allows militias to control parts of the country, has had a collapse of government and its economy, with recently a massive and deadly explosion as a result of government incompetence.

Lebanon is a warning to us. We need to take our challenges more seriously. That involves having an honest and sensible conversation about the constitutional future of Northern Ireland. Neither unionism nor republicanism benefits from the dysfunctionality of government here. As the economist David McWilliams has observed elsewhere, Northern Ireland is like the baby of an unhappy marriage that neither parent wants to accept custody over. It is in the interests of all political parties here to make Northern Ireland work. I hope this book will help that process.

Lessons from The Troubles and the Unsettled Peace is edited by Paul Gosling and published by Holywell Trust. Copies are available at https://www.holywelltrust.com

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The cost of partition The new Hand-Book of Ireland; an illustrated guide for tourists and travellers, 1871.

A United Ireland could cost as little as one per cent of the Republic of Ireland’s annual economic output, a new policy paper by Sinn Féin has stated.

While there are many facets to longstanding conversations about the viability of Irish unity, one consistent theme is that of the cost. Those opposed to or indeed indifferent to reunification tend to look at the costs that would be incurred, with many settling on a rough £10 billion subvention required from the UK for Northern Ireland’s economy annually.

Those in favour tend to look at the potential benefits of an all-island economic approach, which would outweigh any incurred cost.

Consensus on the cost does not exist and the absence of consensus remains a stumbling block for those looking to further the discussion on the economic benefits reunification could bring across the island of Ireland.

As the economic impact of Covid-19 coupled with economic detriments Brexit emerge, the conversation on the viability of a reunification has intensified.

Recognising this, Sinn Féin’s November 2020 policy paper entitled ‘Economic Benefits of a United Ireland’, claims to challenge the “existing narrative” that the

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Irish State cannot afford Northern Ireland and that a United Ireland is not economically viable.

A standout figure in the document is the analysis of subvention required for Northern Ireland, essentially, the spending gap currently plugged by the UK Government that would be required to be taken on by the Irish Government.

In 2018–19, expenditure in Northern Ireland, calculated by that on services and of accounting adjustments was £27.888 billion, in contrast to revenue raised which was £18.5 billion, leaving a calculated subvention gap of between £9–10 billion.

However, Sinn Féin argues that this figure is an inaccurate reflection of the true cost and does not distinguish between spending on services within Northern Ireland (identifiable spending) and those British spending priorities for which costs are passed to Northern Ireland (nonidentifiable spending) such as funding the military, paying down national debt or overseas commitments. Removing nonidentifiable spending (£2.1 billion in

2018–19) would reduce the subvention figure to £6 billion.

This again, could be reduced further when considering that £3.5 billion is spent on pensions, an expenditure that should not have to be incurred by the Irish State because pension rights have already been accrued under national insurance contributions. “The ultimate subvention figure will be determined by the outcome of negotiations. This figure will range from between £2.5 billion to £6 billion,” the document states.

For context, the analysis highlights that this figure equates to just 1.3 to 3 per cent of output of the Irish economy in 2019 (€213.7 billion GNI* in 2019).

Cost alone should not be the only consideration when looking at reunification, Sinn Féin argues, pointing to the economic benefits of an all-island approach. Partition, it states, has left the Northern Ireland economy as the slowest growing economy on these islands, with 20 per cent of workers earning less than a basic living wage.

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“It is recognised that having decisions taken in Westminster has been to the economic detriment of the North… the OECD categorised the North as essentially ‘peripheral with respect to its political influence’ on Westminster for innovation-related policies,” the document states, pointing to the benefit of an united Ireland allowing for the development of a development of “bespoke localised macroeconomic strategy”.

The border The area to potentially benefit most from reunification is the border region, according to the analysis, which sets out: “Since partition the border corridor has effectively been consigned to periphery status limiting the economic potential of a significant section of our island and therefore of the whole island economy.”

Productivity in the southern part of the border region sits at 54 per cent of the island average and just 61 per cent of high-income European economies. “It is a region that should be heavily integrated and coordinated for its largest economic sectors… however, it is divided by two different currencies and two states competing for investment and economic activity,” the report says.

“Partition has trapped the border region in a vicious cycle… reunification would allow for more coordinated and strategic economic development across the island and especially within the border region, attracting more investment, improved productivity, and with it enhanced essential infrastructure.”

The EU Underpinning their analysis of the economic detriments of Brexit, Sinn Féin emphasise the EU assertion in April 2017 that in the event of reunification, Northern Ireland would automatically re-enter the European Union.

In flagging economic analysis of severelong-term reductions in output of the Irish economy in the decade or more after a hard Brexit of between 2.3 and 7 per cent, it adds that analysis of the current trading relationships between the islands of Great Britain and Ireland, in all circumstances, increased non-tariff barriers and increased administration

Republic of Ireland GNI* in 2019: €213.7 Assumed subvention:

billion

£10 billion = 5.2% of GNI*

unspecified spending: £6 billion = 3% of GNI* pension liability:

£2.5 billion = 1.3% of GNI*

burdens will apply for firms and across Britain and potentially in Ireland.

The analysis recognises the Irish protocol’s role in mitigating the threat of severe disruption on cross-border trade, important when considering that some £4.2 billion was exported by businesses in Northern Ireland to the south.

Accepting that how trade between Northern Ireland and Great Britain will be affected remains unclear, the paper seeks dispel the assumption that Britain is Northern Ireland’s most valuable trading partner, believing that this is based solely on the value of trade being higher, and that this overlooks the fact that more businesses trade north to south than north to Great Britain and the role of north south supply chains and intermediary trades prior to any sale from Northern Ireland to Great Britain.

“The assertion that trading between the North and Britain would be negatively impacted or that the North has more to lose in terms of trading with Britain in the context of Irish unity is debateable and can be rebutted in numerous ways,” it states, pointing to the threats of Brexit, including customs costs and barriers on Northern Ireland exports to Great Britain and evidence that, even in advance of tariffs, Northern Ireland’s businesses are becoming less reliant on trade with Great Britain (NISRA figures show a 9.3 per cent decrease in 2018).

Evidence of this, it suggests, is that in 2018, for the first time since records began, Northern Ireland exported more goods to other countries (£11.2 billion) than to Britain (£10.6 billion).

Summarising, it states: “Reversing the negative effects of Brexit is an economic necessity. Irish unity would allow the North to enjoy full benefits of EU membership including access to the European market and to substantial

funding, and the investment opportunities offered through EU programmes and institutions, while enabling further allIreland integration.”

Energy An area where the discussion paper is less assertive is on the “potential of the green economy”. In the absence of concrete figures on potential economic benefits, it instead discusses Ireland’s underperformance in developing a green economy to date and points to “untapped avenues”.

Ireland’s Single Electricity Market (SEM) could have been pointed to as an example of where all-island integrated policy has proven to be beneficial and could serve as a template for wider green initiatives. However, the document does recognise the unique challenges facing Northern Ireland due to the absence of fiscal levers in meeting climate obligations.

“Irish unity is the route through which economic benefits of the necessary transition including green jobs and greater security of energy supply can best be realised. The benefits from economies of scale and all-island spatial planning apply equally to the green economy,” it states.

“Partition means that the benefits of a transition to a zero-carbon economy will be dampened significantly, as both parts of the island compete against each other for private renewables investment while operating two incoherent and potentially conflicting green economic agendas.”

In concluding, Sinn Féin says that the document serves to advance the economic case that the entire island of Ireland will benefit economically from unity. “It is not a question about whether we can afford Irish unity, the fact is that we cannot afford partition.”

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brexit

A ‘slower’ hard Brexit Despite Boris Johnson’s claim that the Christmas Eve agreement represented a “good deal for the whole of Europe”, the actual implications for the UK’s exit from the EU in coming years will point to a hard Brexit in all but name, writes David Whelan.

Car manufacturing in the UK, making up 13 per cent of the Great Britain’s total exports, represents a prime example of how Brexit will damage the UK economy.

The EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement, signed on Christmas Eve 2020, may have avoided the cliff edge that many had feared but the sigh of relief breathed by many may be short sighted when considering the cumulative cost of new trade arrangements.

Four-out-of-five cars made in the UK are exported, mostly to Europe. Carmakers have to some extent been granted a

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reprieve following an agreement that companies exporting goods between the UK and the EU will be given a year to produce some of the supporting paperwork proving their goods are eligible for zero-tariff access to the EU. The ‘grace period’ on some specific elements of the rules of origin declarations, which require carmakers to certify that their goods qualify as locally sourced in order to avoid tariffs, will allow companies time to obtain supporting documents from their third-party suppliers but crucially, requires companies to still

comply with the rules and meet originating requirements.

The UK’s attempts to secure more favourable terms in relation to automotive trade were rejected, as should have been expected when a single country entered trade negotiations with a neighbouring economic bloc of 26 member states.

Even prior to Great Britain officially trading outside of the single market and the customs union, Brexit uncertainty had already damaged an industry that employs more than 860,000 people with

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major carmakers quietly closing plants and shifting future projects and investments to European bases, where tariff-free trading could be guaranteed.

The cost of future bureaucracy and tariffs in British car manufacturing’s complex supply chains, with cross-channel trade in automotive parts accounting for almost €14 billion, will undoubtedly have economic implications. The UK Government has pointed to some concessions gained around batteries and electric vehicles which will ensure Britishmade electric vehicles are eligible for preferential tariff rates, but so far this sector has yet to mature at scale.

The reality is that the deal between the UK and the EU has avoided an instant hit to car manufacturing but going forward greater tariffs and bureaucracy will lead to greater levels of downsizing, relocating and unmeasurable decisions not to invest. This will have a cumulative impact on productivity and ultimately on GDP growth over the coming years.

The automotive industry is just one example whereby increased bureaucracy and potential tariffs will have a slow and cumulative impact on the UK’s GDP. The most likely damage will not be in an obvious decline in GDP but rather the absence of growth which will be required if the economy is to avoid long-time scarring from the economic impact of the pandemic.

Many agree that the deal secured was better than a no deal outcome, however, few agree that the deal meets the ideals sold by the UK Government. A major sticking point in the negotiations had been the demand for a level playing field from the EU, to ensure protection of its internal market. At face value, the UK has secured a good deal, taking back responsibility for the likes of environmental standards and labour law.

Each partner has been granted the potential to impose tariffs where it is determined the other has gained an unfair advantage for businesses, without reliance on the European Court of Justice, however, importantly, many will recognise that any imposition of tariffs by the EU will hurt the UK more than vice versa.

A further sticking point was around fishing

“The UK’s attempts to secure more favourable terms in relation to automotive trade were rejected, as should have been expected when a single country entered trade negotiations with a neighbouring bloc of 26 member states.” rights. For some, the UK’s ability to ‘take back control of its waters’ in regard to fishing was a litmus test for how successful Brexit negotiations had actually been. The five-and-a-half-year transition period whereby EU fishing fleets will have guaranteed access to UK waters is longer than many had expected but the UK will point a reduction of one quarter of EU fishing rights during the transition as a major boost. A challenge, however, will be the power wielded by the EU in annual negotiations thereafter. Any reduction of EU access will invariably bring about increased tariffs on UK fish exports and therefore, limit market access.

Market access and divergence from what was is central to many of the post-Brexit challenges. For example, mutual recognition of licences, permits and transit rights was a positive for logistics and road haulage but a reduction on British trucks’ pick up potential (down from three pick-ups inside an EU country to one) will cause major disruption to preBrexit operations for the industry.

Similarly, food and drink exports, while avoiding many of the tariffs feared if trading was reduced to WTO terms, will see the British food chain become slower, more complex and more expensive in the long-term.

One crucial area which the deal has not covered is that of financial services. Boris Johnson himself admitted that the Brexit trade deal failed to meet his ambitions on financial services. On the first trading day

of 2021, almost €6 billion of EU share shifted away from London’s financial sector to facilities in European capitals.

The EU and UK have agreed that decisions on access to each other’s markets in financial services will be based on each side declaring unilaterally that the other side’s regulatory systems are equivalent to its own. However, this does not cover all financial services and allows access rights to be withdrawn at just 30-days’ notice.

Talks are set to take place on a memorandum of understanding on future cooperation on financial services policy, with a target of March 2021, however, disruption will encourage companies to list in the EU to benefit from smoother and more active trading conditions.

These examples are not exclusive.

Almost every sector that trades with the EU will feel increased burdens and many economists agree that these burdens will ensure that the UK will be significantly poorer in the long run than if it had remained a member.

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland is set to experience a very different outcome than the rest of the UK in relation to Brexit. As expected, much of the Northern Ireland Protocol, agreed as essentially a backstop to a no deal scenario, was incorporated into the fresh deal.

The European Union (Future

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4

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Relationship) Bill was passed by 521 to 73 votes in the House of Commons but none of Northern Ireland’s MPs supported the deal. The deal keeps Northern Ireland in the EU’s single market for goods and means Northern Ireland must apply EU customs rules at its ports. It creates a border in the Irish Sea, something the Brexit-supporting DUP had held as a red line throughout the Withdrawal Agreement process which eventually felled then Prime Minister Theresa May. Implications of the deal for Northern Ireland are complex but in the main relate to disruption in trade and specifically nontariff barriers. The deal means that UK businesses exporting to the EU will not have tariffs imposed but will face certifications and checks on goods as they enter the single market for goods.

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Northern Ireland and Great Britain will have a cumulative impact on both economies and will force many exporters to reorganise their supply chains and physical routes to market.

However, trade is not the only disruption.

The ending of the transition period on 31 December 2020 also brought forward a change in citizens’ rights. Irish citizens will retain EU citizenship, meaning they retain their right to freedom of movement within the EU and continue to live, work and study in an EU country without a visa and with no time limit. British citizens, however, will not retain these rights.

Republic of Ireland

This means that goods travelling to Northern Ireland from Great Britain will face checks and disruptions that previously didn’t exist. Unionists in Northern Ireland oppose the sea border, recognising the creation of a barrier between the UK economies of Northern Ireland and Great Britain, ultimately likely to foster a greater alignment of the two economies on the island of Ireland.

For the Republic of Ireland, the disruption and cost of doing business with Great Britain will also increase. The deal ensures that no quotas or tariffs on goods will exist on goods going to or coming from the UK but checks on goods coming into Ireland will exist. Dublin Port has already been transformed to deal with a new regime for examining good and checking certificates. Ultimately, the Irish Government has recognised that some British products will stop being sold in Ireland due to transport delays.

As Northern Ireland’s largest export market, even non-tariff barriers between

However, the impact goes wider than simply food and retail. For example,

agenda brexit

emerging medicines and medical products in Great Britain that may not have EU certificates would be prevented from being sold in Ireland.

It’s estimated that the agreement avoided tariffs in the region of €1.5 billion on trade with the UK, however, Ireland’s proximity to the UK does mean that it will feel the burden of changes in the trading relationship more acutely than other member states, with fishing being a prime example.

The reality of the deal is that, while avoiding a hard exit, the UK will be more negatively affected by the new relationship in economic terms than if it had remained a member of the EU. Concerns around the impact of a hard Brexit have been avoided but only in the short-term. Instead, a slower hard Brexit looks set to emerge as multiple factors chip away at the UK’s potential GDP growth.

With the ink still drying on the current deal and some sub negotiations ongoing, some will already be looking towards the five-year review clause, set out in the agreement, as an opportunity for the UK to decrease the long-term economic impact of the Brexit deal.

Health and care services report

health and care services report

Chief Nursing Officer: Charlotte McArdle Northern Ireland’s Chief Nursing Officer Charlotte McArdle speaks to David Whelan about workforce pressures, Covid-19 surge planning and the retained ambition for major transformation.

In January 2020, resolution of a pay dispute with nurses and healthcare workers which served to catapult political parties towards a new consensus, brought with it a sense of renewed optimism.

Not only did the pay deal bring an end to service disruption but the New Decade, New Approach (NDNA) political agreement had, at its core, ambitions for significant improvement and much-needed transformation of Northern Ireland’s health system.

44

led or had the Department’s involvement including the development and delivery of a cancer strategy for Northern Ireland, a mental health strategy and the wider rollout of multidisciplinary teams across primary care as a key element of transformation.

Fast forward just a few months and the level of disruption on those ambitions was unprecedented, with Covid continuing to be the focus of attention and resources for the foreseeable future.

“One of the Minister’s first jobs was to achieve resolution over the pay dispute and once that was resolved and we looked forward, knowing that we had NDNA, there was a sense of optimism of having a new Executive. I think everyone was on the front foot and we could see the opportunity to get a lot of things moving again that we had envisaged around the workforce and transformation, which sit hand-in-hand,” explains McArdle.

Contextualising of the level of disruption brought about by Covid-19, McArdle highlights a selection of major commitments contained within NDNA which were either Department of Health

As the Department of Health’s Chief Nursing Officer, McArdle has a role of substantial breadth, primarily leading the nursing, midwifery and allied health professional’s contribution to the

development and implementation of health and social care policy in Northern Ireland. McArdle is also the professional lead, as the most senior nurse for the professions of nursing and midwifery, and policy lead for the Department on a number of areas including partnership working, coproduction and co-design and patient experience and feedback.

In more recent times, McArdle has undertaken the role as senior responsible officer for surge planning and led on the development of Northern Ireland’s first ‘Nightingale’ hospital in Belfast and more recently, an additional one in Whiteabbey.

Prior to the emergence of Covid, one of McArdle’s many priorities had been the development of a new nursing and midwifery strategy. In March 2020, the World Health Organisation-designated ‘Year of the Nurse and Midwife’, Health Minister Robin Swann MLA launched

the Nursing and Midwifery Task Group report, which had been commissioned by his predecessor Michelle O’Neill MLA and had been chaired by Richard Barnett. This series of recommendations, explains McArdle, had set out a direction of travel for the professions, in line with transformation, for the next 10-15 years and was to form the basis of the new strategic plan.

“Work on the Task Group report hasn’t stopped completely. Included in the recommendations was a need for an increase in the undergraduate programme places to continue to grow the number of nurses in training and that’s happening. Additionally, under NDNA we got around £60 million over three years for safe staffing and some of that money has already been fed into the service. So, there is some development happening but not at the speed that we would have liked.”

Quizzed on whether she envisages the strategy to now be delivered in 2021, McArdle explains that no firm targets have yet been set: “I haven’t set any firm plans for 2021 yet until we see what happens with the virus. We are still expecting another big surge in the new year and obviously, with the vaccination programme we need to wait and see how that pans out, but we’re expecting to be living and working with Covid for another while yet.”

Covid-19 Turning to the impact of Covid, McArdle points to the huge volume of work required to prepare the workforce at the start of the pandemic. In the early period, the Department asked all third year nursing and midwifery students to come into practice on paid placements and with this came not only the need to change regulations for student nurses but also to provide guidance and support packages, job descriptions and get agreement from the trusts as to how that would work. McArdle commends the work of these students

and the contribution that they made.

The Chief Nursing Officer also describes the volume of work on developing Northern Ireland’s first Nightingale hospital in just a matter of weeks as an “unbelievable achievement” given the operational detail required ranging from oxygen and ventilator supply through to staff availability and PPE guidance.

Additionally, her team worked closely with the social care sector, specifically nursing homes, ensuring that the trusts could support them with their workforce needs, and making sure that guidance and PPE was in place. McArdle was and remains responsible for visiting guidance in this respect.

Acknowledging that the many complexities of visiting restrictions in maternity and care homes is upsetting for families, she says that ongoing challenges remain a priority for her.

In the summer of 2020, McArdle’s team led on the Department’s rapid learning initiative in relation to care home sector, analysing the first surge to better prepare for further pressures. Asked to assess performance in this area, McArdle says: “In broad terms Northern Ireland did quite well. Any death is devastating for a family and we recognise that, but Northern Ireland did well in regard to the number of people we managed to keep alive. Our care homes worked really well and did a fantastic job of keeping people safe.

“There were a number of issues. Covid hit us so fast we were working to, reacting to and learning from the evidence, with things changing very quickly. Every time there was a change, the guidance and policies needed updated and distributed to the right people so that everyone knew what was expected of them.

“We took the opportunity to look at surge one in the care home sector:

health and care services report

Covid has served to disrupt many of those early ambitions brought and included in NDNA. The cancer strategy, for example, was originally planned for December 2020 and now faces a sixmonth delay while the mental health strategy, given the same timeframe, has not had a new date attributed. The new strategic plan for nursing and midwifery has also been disrupted, explains McArdle, however, some progress has been made.

“I think the policies were in place but there was so much guidance coming out on different elements of care, very quickly, that it was hard for the independent sector and the care homes to keep up.” what worked well, what didn’t and what we would need to put in place to support and help for the next surge.

That was done very quickly, and a series of recommendations made to the minister were agreed and put in place as quickly as we could. The longer-term ones are now wrapped into the surge plan for the winter period.”

Initial concerns in the care home sector at the virus’s outbreak are well documented. Some care homes struggled to source adequate PPE in the early days and in July 2020 it was revealed that over 40 per cent of Covid19 deaths in Northern Ireland had occurred in care homes (current figures on 4 December: 33.6 per cent). Asked whether safeguards were in place early enough to prevent the level of loss in the care home sector, McArdle says: “I think the policies were in place but there was so much guidance coming out on different elements of care, very quickly, that it was hard for the independent sector and the care homes to keep up. Plus, they were struggling with staffing. We’re in such a better place now in terms of understanding how the virus behaves and how we can control the spread.

“We were very much learning as we went, and things were changing very quickly and that’s a very difficult environment to be working in.

Sometimes that can appear as confused and mixed up but it’s because the information was changing so quickly.”

McArdle says that lessons were learnt: “At the start there were issues with PPE, there is no doubt about that but that was very quickly rectified with trusts providing PPE to the care homes.

There were issues about staffing, again the trusts provided a huge amount of manual hours with people moving from trusts to care homes to make sure that the residents were safe. Enhanced 4 45

cleaning regimes were put in place and support provided for testing, but these things are iterative and take time, so we have learnt a huge amount and that was the purpose of the review in the summer.”

Workforce

health and care services report

Another major challenge has been the pressure and strain being put on the healthcare workforce since the pandemic began. In late August, a Royal College of Nursing official described nurses in Northern Ireland as “underfunded, understaffed and undervalued”. Asked if this is an assessment she would agree with, McArdle says: “Frontline staff are working in very complex and challenging situations, there is no doubt about that. And we have had significant vacancies in the nursing and midwifery workforce.

“However, underinvestment in undergraduate training places has been rectified since 2016 with an increase of 87 per cent of undergraduate places across three universities (The Open University included). In fact, September 2020 saw the highest number ever start their nursing and midwifery training with over 1,300 people taking up undergraduate places.

“The increase in places is clearly having an impact. Recently published workforce statistics show that we’ve seen a reduction in the vacancy level from its highest point of 13.1 per cent in 2018 to 7 per cent currently.

teams. It can’t be completely nursedependent because we simply do not have enough staff to continue to manage Covid, given that we anticipate a rise in cases post-Christmas. We will need our nurses and healthcare staff managing a rise, plus winter pressures that we would normally face.”

Priorities

“I can see from a practitioner perspective why people would feel undervalued, but I think there is widespread recognition of the job being done. The pandemic has shone a light on the healthcare system’s reliance on nurses and midwives and the huge contribution that they make.”

Stabilising the nursing and midwifery workforce, a key recommendation of the Task Group Report, remains a key focus for McArdle who says that more work needs to be done to get to a better space than has been the case for some years and importantly, maintaining that.

Vaccine

“There has been huge investment and at a point in time we are going to have to work out how we divest,” she states.

“We won’t be able to continue having 1,300 undergraduate places every year because the system can’t cope with that number of people in training.

However, the money then needs to be diverted to other professional groups that need to increase their workforce like physios, occupational therapy and medicine.

While news of vaccines is very much welcome, there is a recognition that rollout could increase the pressure on the health service. Speaking in the week that approval of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was first announced, McArdle acknowledges that nurses have been leading the vaccination programmes every year and are probably the best placed group to lead on how to administer and provide this vaccination.

“The PHA team are working very closely with the Department to take that forward and there has been a call out through the workforce appeal for retired staff to come back and be part of those

46

“We need to get to a stable place where we can sustain the workforce and ensure we have enough nurses and midwives to provide the care that is needed, in line with the transformation programme.”

“We need to get to a stable place where we can sustain the workforce and ensure we have enough nurses and midwives to provide the care that is needed, in line with the transformation programme.”

Two areas which McArdle envisages a greater input for nursing is in the area of cancer, where she believes more can be done to provide cancer care treatments closer to home, and in the public health sphere, in relation to work to enable communities to manage their own health and helping to address health inequalities.

She adds: “I would really like to see nursing engaged in decisions and having a place at every decisionmaking table, in terms of health in all policies. Most of what we do in terms of health outcomes is actually delivered by other parts of our government system and not the Department of Health and so I would like to see a greater level of involvement.”

Looking further out, McArdle would like to see the transformation of health and social care over the next decade.

“Hopefully, post-Covid, many of the plans we have put in place in terms of hospital reconfiguration, cancer care and multi-disciplinary teams in primary care can progress and flourish.

However, I would stress that this will need a continued investment plan from the Executive.

“The challenges of the future are about changing the health system to one which is much more community and primary care focused and where home is the best and first place for care.”

Adult Safeguarding Bill •

a human rights-based framework;

•

the drafting of an Adult Safeguarding/Protection Bill;

•

the identification and publicisation of what organisations have the legal power to do;

health and care services report

•

the practice of collective and pragmatic leadership; the introduction of active learning, research and training renewal; and

•

the use of data and information to make a difference.

Speaking in September 2020, Swann thanked the review team for its work and stated that he was “committed to making lasting improvements in adult safeguarding” and that the Department would “begin immediately to deliver on the recommendations set out in this

Health Minister Robin Swann has pledged to bring forward an Adult Safeguarding Bill for Northern Ireland to

report”. Swann announced that he had asked Chief Social Worker Seán Holland to chair a new Adult Safeguarding Transformation Board to “oversee this work and to strengthen the governance around adult safeguarding to achieve a more accountable regional

help protect care home residents and

approach”.

the vulnerable people following a

“consult on a range of legislative options

number of failings within care homes.

development of an Adult Safeguarding

After also saying that he intended to before Christmas to inform the Bill”, Swann opened consultations on 17 December. The legislative options open

Robin Swann’s commitment was made in response to the publication of the first report from the independent review examining the health and care system’s response to care failings at Dunmurry Manor Care Home. The topic of abuse of adults in care has also been to the fore in Northern Ireland due to allegations of abuse in Muckamore Abbey Hospital, where the PSNI identified 1,500 crimes on one ward alone through CCTV footage.

The most notable of the findings of the review into failings at Dunmurry Manor is that “adult safeguarding in Northern Ireland has diminishing persuasive power because its practice has strayed too far from the policy intentions of 2015 and from residents’ human rights”. The

review, carried out by social care experts CPEA, was commissioned by the Department for Health after the publication of the Commissioner for Older People’s ‘Home Truths’ report on Dunmurry Manor. CPEA also noted that current safeguarding processes “did not actively contribute” to the maintenance of residents’ safety and that families’ voices were continuously ignored.

The review contains eight proposed actions to combat the responsive failure of the health and care system: •

•

for consultation according to the announcement are: defining the scope of the Bill; principles; duties to report and make enquiries; power of entry to interview an adult in private; independent advocacy; an Independent Adult Protection Board; cooperation and information sharing; offences of illtreatment and wilful neglect; and statutory guidance.

The Minister also confirmed that, in line with the review’s recommendations, the Northern Ireland Adult Safeguarding

the establishment of an Adult Safeguarding/Adult Protection Change Programme;

Partnership will be stood down as the

the assertion of adult safeguarding and protection principles;

Safeguarding Board, which will be “at

Executive moves towards the establishment of an Independent Adult arms-length from the Department”.

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health and care services report

Financial support needed for life-saving research diagnostics, treatments and cures for people with heart and circulatory diseases and the work the charity carries out locally supporting heart patients and their families.

Head of BHF NI, Fearghal McKinney, says that despite these immense challenges, the charity reacted quickly and decisively to support local people at a time when they needed it most.

“No one could have foreseen the impact the global pandemic would have on all of our lives,” he explains.

Head of BHF NI Fearghal McKinney outlines the charity’s agile approach to delivering services in the pandemic and the critical need for financial supports for medical research.

People living with heart and circulatory disease are at increased risk of more severe complications of Covid-19.

Recent research in England and Wales has also shown a rise in excess heart and circulatory disease deaths in people aged under 65 since the Covid-19 pandemic began. Figures recorded there show that there have been almost 800 excess deaths in those dying below the age of 65 from heart and circulatory diseases.

Although these figures are not available here, British Heart Foundation Northern Ireland (BHF NI) believes analysis would show a similar trend locally. The charity says that delays in people seeking care, coupled with a reduced access to routine tests and treatments during the 48

pandemic, have likely contributed to the rise in excess deaths. It now warns that figures could get worse due to increasing Covid-19 cases and the winter pressures on health and social care.

The medical research charity has been hit hard by the pandemic.

The devastating impact of Covid-19 means that the BHF’s net income, and resulting investment in new research, is likely to drop by up to 50 per cent this year. The pandemic has caused fundraising to plummet, with events cancelled and charity shops shut because of the lockdown.

Such a sharp fall could have a catastrophic impact on UK cardiovascular research, advances in

“The world changed so fast, but people living with heart and circulatory disease needed us more than ever. We moved quickly to put a number of measures in place to support people. Firstly, our Heart Helpline, staffed by cardiac nurses, was inundated with calls and emails from people confused and fearful about Covid-19 and we acted fast to increase capacity there. Our website is updated daily with up to date information on Covid-19 and what it means for those affected by heart and circulatory disease.”

Making vital services virtual It wasn’t just providing reassurance and information that became critical. BHF NI was crucial in getting essential cardiac rehabilitation available on a virtual platform.

“Taking part in cardiac rehabilitation is an essential part of a patient’s journey to recovery. Amid the current crisis, cardiac rehabilitation services have been suspended with many staff being redeployed. In the absence of face to face cardiac rehabilitation, BHF have been busy developing and enhancing digital content for healthcare professionals to signpost patients to,” added McKinney.

“We have worked with local clinicians

from across the health trusts including Dr Susan Connolly from the Western Trust.

“On our website we have launched a new cardiac rehabilitation hub. This simulates the patient journey and someone can sign up to have eight weekly emails about their progress alongside a variety of resources such as exercise videos, dietary and lifestyle advice, so that patients can continue their cardiac rehabilitation programme, albeit in a very different format.”

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The website also features videos from the Western Trust and links to the Our Hearts, Our Minds Rehab service. The charity also launched a blood pressure hub and a heart failure hub helping to support people struggling to access usual medical services.

This agile and innovative action means that heart patients are not losing out on a vital service during the pandemic.

Strategic vision for cardiovascular disease However, there remains much more to be done.

The decades since the BHF was set up in 1961 have seen a transformation in diagnosis, treatment and care. Back then, more than seven in 10 heart attacks were fatal. Today, at least seven in 10 people survive. While this is hugely positive, one consequence is that the number of people living with heart conditions is greater than ever. People are living longer with heart disease and often have more than one health condition.

BHF NI, convening power and relationships, has brought together a panel of experts, including cardiologists and health officials in a Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) Taskforce. The aim is to identify key priorities to ensure that people with, and at risk of, heart and circulatory disease across Northern Ireland receive the best possible care today and in the future in line with the transformation principles within health and social care.

“Our CVD Taskforce was set up prepandemic because we believe we need a new strategic approach to CVD for Northern Ireland and we were perfectly placed to bring the right people around the table to deliver that,” outlines McKinney.

“Services are operating within the context of no new strategic framework since 2014. There has been a lot of change in the health care system since

Dr Andriana Magariti.

then, not least the transformation agenda and this year as we consider the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. Heart and circulatory patients are vulnerable now more than ever.”

Protecting the future of medical research BHF NI have joined the Association of Medical Research Charities and 151 of its members, including Cancer Research UK and Parkinson’s UK, in calling for the UK Government to commit to a Life Sciences Charity Partnership Fund before irreparable damage is done to the sector.

“The Coronavirus crisis will unfortunately have a long-lasting and devastating impact on charities like ours, with our funding for new research falling by up to £50 million this year alone,” adds McKinney.

“It would be a tragedy if we allowed the Covid-19 pandemic to threaten years of hard-fought progress in finding treatments and cures for some of the world’s biggest killers. Next year we celebrate our 60th birthday and we owe it to future generations of patients to keep funding research to find the next breakthroughs. We are calling on the UK government to establish a vital Life Sciences-Charity Partnership Fund to support charity investment in research and help protect world-class research.”

McKinney says the work of BHF NI is needed now more than ever, so their history in progress can continue.

“We currently fund £1.8 million into lifesaving research at Queen’s University Belfast into a range of research projects including investigating the development of heart failure and repairing the heart after a heart attack.

“None of this is possible without the support of local communities through fundraising, charity partnerships and shopping with and donating to our eight shops across Northern Ireland.

“In the early 1960s we gave a grant to Professor Frank Pantridge for his work in the Royal Victoria Hospital. In 1965 he installed his first version of a defibrillator in a Belfast ambulance.

Since then defibrillators have been used all over the world saving lives.

“In September we announced one of our researchers Professor Andriana Margariti has discovered a gene that increases the risk of blood vessel damage in people with diabetes who went on to develop heart disease. This is vital, lifesaving work that must continue.”

To contact Fearghal email mckinneyf@bhf.org.uk or visit the BHF website: www.bhf.org.uk 49

health and care services report

Critical care capacity The number of critical care beds available in Northern Ireland on any one day has changed little in the last year despite the pandemic, writes David Whelan.

While Northern Ireland’s surge planning has facilitated the potential for additional critical care beds, the permanent capacity of critical care across the health service remains at around half that of the European average.

Surge plans published by the Department of Health identified a potential increase in critical care capacity to 286 critical care beds across Northern Ireland as the impacts of Covid-19 began to be felt. However, in early December 2020, the Health and Social Care Board (HSCB) confirmed that the number of critical care beds commissioned (the number routinely available on any given day) remained largely the same as 2019, despite the onset of the pandemic.

The HSCB commissions beds across nine intensive care units in Northern

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Ireland and collates availability through daily updates. Capacity figures change depending on demand and staffing but since mid-October 2020, these have generally ranged from between 80 to 120.

Unlike the Republic of Ireland, for example, where the Department of Health has set about simultaneously increasing permanent critical care capacity and ensuring surge capacity as required, evidence suggests that little change has been made to permanent capacity in Northern Ireland.

The impact of this is two-fold. Firstly, Northern Ireland’s health system is unlikely to benefit from any increased critical care capacity post-Covid and secondly, any deployment of surge capacity will require a significant redeployment of staff, at a time when

the system is already under significant pressure.

In March 2020, the Department of Health Permanent Secretary Richard Pengelly wrote to the Chief Executives of all arm’s length bodies warning that “the availability of our most valuable resources needed to counter Covid-19 – beds, our staff and equipment – will all come under increasing pressure”.

Pengelly was outlining surge planning as the virus continued to spread across Northern Ireland but the context for the warning was a health service already at breaking point with the longest waiting lists for elective care in Europe, a staffing crisis which had just months previously provoked frontline nurses to strike, highlighting the previous absence of any political direction for over three years.

In the weeks and months that followed,

Covid-19 ICU bed occupancy: Five day rolling average 52 51

40

29

health and care services report

20

2 0

0 May 2020

July 2020

1 0 Sep 2020

Nov 2020

Source: Department of Health

resources were directed to manage Covid-19 demand, causing significant disruption to many areas of elective care and inevitably, placed further pressures on health and care services.

In October 2020, the Department of Health’s Surge Planning Framework somewhat acknowledged this when it highlighted that HSC Trusts have routinely been close to, or exceeded, their available capacity in recent winters. It added that that the reconfiguration of services during the first wave of Covid-19 will likely “reduce the existing capacity of the system to deal with large numbers of patients”.

The reality of this was apparent in midDecember 2020 when in one night between 30 to 35 ambulances queued outside full emergency departments across Northern Ireland. In one instance, 17 people were treated in the ambulances in the carpark of Antrim Area Hospital while 43 people waited to be admitted inside.

Acute service planning in Northern Ireland focused on the rapid expansion of critical care and acute bed capacity.

The Critical Care Network for Northern Ireland (CCaNNI) was tasked with rapidly developing a regional critical care surge plan and, in parallel, the Belfast City Hospital was designated as Northern Ireland’s first Nightingale hospital providing an additional 75

ICU bed occupancy

114 total ICU Beds 32 ICU Covid occupied 68 other ICU occupied 14 unoccupied beds Source: Department of Health dashboard figures 16 Dec 2020

critical care beds. The CCaNNI surge plan allowed for a total capacity of 286 critical care beds. However, the number of general adult critical care beds operational at any point in time has generally been in the range of 80-120 since mid-October, according to the HSCB. In October, now acknowledged as the beginning of Northern Ireland’s second wave of Covid-19, alarm was raised at reports that Intensive Care Unit (ICU) capacity had exceeded 90 per cent.

The reports were based on publicfacing statistics, published for the first time through the Department’s Covid19 dashboard (which included paediatric and cardiac surgical ICU beds) but significantly, offered little preCovid context for ICU capacity levels in Northern Ireland’s failing health system

and worked off figures of the number of commissioned critical care beds of any given day and not the total capacity outlined in the surge planning.

Bed availability is just one factor of informing ICU capacity. An equally important element is staffing capacity to manage ICU beds. Critical care unit capacity across Northern Ireland is defined in two ways: level two (high dependency) and level three (intensive care).

Levels of care provided to adult patients is classified by the Intensive Care Society into four levels of care.

Level two patients require more detailed observation or intervention with support of a single organ system, while level three patients require advanced respiratory support alone, or basic respiratory support together with

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health and care services report

Commissioned Bed Capacity in Critical Care Units in Northern Ireland at 11/12/2020 CRITICAL CARE UNIT

ICU commissioned beds (Level 3)

HDU commissioned beds (Level 2)

Total Commissioned Beds

Level 3 Equivalent

Altnagelvin

7

3

10

8.5

Antrim

6

2

8

7

BCH

5

4

9

7

Causeway

2

2

4

3

Craigavon

6

2

8

7

Mater

3

3

6

4.5

Royal Victoria

19

8

27

23

SWAH

2

4

6

4

Ulster

6

4

10

8

TOTAL (excluding CSICU)

56

32

88

72

CSICU

10

8

18

14

TOTAL (including CSICU)

66

40

106

86

ICU= Intensive care unit • HDU= High dependency unit • CSICU = Cardiac surgery intensive care unit support of at least two organ systems.

The nursing resource required to operate one level three bed is equivalent to that of two level two beds.

The flexibility across these levels mean that the Health and Social Care Board refer to level three-equivalent beds.

Several trusts have multiple critical care units and the way in which the surge capacity target is met can vary across those units depending on case mix and staffing. Target capacity varies depending on demand but capacity is managed to keep the occupancy level below the maximum of 85 per cent recommended by the Faculty of Intensive Care Medicine.

At the time of request in December 2020, the HSCB provided figures outlining that there were 88 commissioned general critical care beds, made up of 56 level three beds and 32 level two beds, representing a 72 level-three equivalent beds.

The HSCB were unable to provide comparative data to assess whether any changes have been made to ICU capacity in recent years, due to the fact that a daily situation report from each critical care unit to the CCaNNI only

52

began in March 2020. Prior to this, a daily bed return to the UK Bed Bureau was completed by trusts and collated differently.

However, a spokesperson for the HSCB confirmed that no change had occurred to the number of commissioned beds from the same period last year.

For context, Northern Ireland has a similar ratio of critical care beds per 100,000 people to the Republic of Ireland of around 5.5. The European average is 11.5 critical care beds per 100,000 people.

In March, the Republic of Ireland’s Department of Health brought the base adult critical care bed numbers from 257 adult beds (197 Level three and 60 Level two) to 285 (239 Level three and 46 Level two), a figure which still remained 145 beds short of the HSE’s own recommendation of 430 beds by 2031 and 294 beds short of recommended target for 2020, originally projected in 2009.

Alongside its surge planning, Health Service Executive (HSE) CEO Paul Reid has indicated an ambition to increase

its critical care capacity to 302 beds by January 2021.

However, it appears that little has been done in Northern Ireland, outside of surge planning, to increase the adult critical care capacity in the same way.

The HSCB says that alongside trusts, the CCANNI, historically, have ‘Regional Escalation Plans For Adult Critical Care’ in place, “to support the expansion of critical care capacity beyond commissioned baseline capacity, in proportional response to any increase in demand”.

“These escalation plans are in place at local and regional level and are to ensure plans are in place to manage increased demand such as the annual flu season or if there was a major incident/or accident, although additional plans have been required for the management of Covid cases.”

It adds that, as part of “normal business” these regional plans are regularly reviewed, refined and updated “to ensure that the whole critical care system in Northern Ireland is always in a state of readiness for an indeterminate period of critical care expansion”.

Analysing discharges into care homes in the first surge

As concerns around the discharging of Covid-19 patients into care homes abound, a Department of Health report has found that discharges into such homes actually decreased during the first surge of the pandemic.

The study found that “the timing of outbreaks in care homes during the first surge does appear to correlate with overall hospital admissions rates for Covid-19 (which are an indicator of wider community transmission and infection levels)” rather than pointing to any correlation between hospital discharges and infection rates in care homes. Quarter two 2020 discharges to care homes numbered 129, down from the 233 seen in Q2 of 2019.

NISRA figures in late May 2020 showed that more than half of the 705 people who had died from Covid-19 in Northern Ireland at the time had been care home residents. At the time, there had been 137 confirmed outbreaks of Covid-19 in

care homes, with three care homes reporting deaths in the double figures. In total, there have now been 545 cute respiratory outbreaks in care homes since 16 March 2020, with 46 of those outbreaks now concluded.

Speaking in November 2020, upon the publication of the report, Health Minister Robin Swann MLA said: “Care homes remain on the frontline in the battle against Covid-19. This research complements my Department’s Rapid Learning Initiative which also examined the first surge in the sector. It is vital that we keep adding to our learning as we continue to support care homes.”

The Rapid Learning Initiative found,

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among other things, that 59 per cent of care homes did not receive guidance on formulating Covid-19 individual resident risk assessment and care plans and that 44 per cent of care homes did not have access to staff resting at onset of first symptoms.

The report’s author, Niall Herity, a consultant cardiologist at the Belfast Trust, has previously provided the Department with analysis on elective care across Northern Ireland. His report found that there was a decline in the overall number of people discharged from hospitals, including to care homes, from March 2020 onwards, which reflected an overall decline in the numbers attending emergency departments. Among 465 people discharged into care homes during a two-week period studied where discharges to care homes were above the average, only five people (1.1 per cent) tested positive for Covid-19 within two weeks of their discharge.

The research found that “the timing of outbreaks in care homes during the first pandemic surge correlates much better with hospital admissions rates for Covid than with the number of people discharged to care homes”, which would align with similar analyses performed in Scotland and Wales. It is also states in the review that the research did “not support a view that ministerial or departmental communications drove consultants’ discharge decision-align during the first pandemic surge”.

Northern Ireland’s high infection and death rate amongst care home residents is also defended as having been largely in line with the worldwide experiences of the pandemic in care homes. “Given the diversity of countries, regions and healthcare systems, any variance in local policies, guidelines or communications would seem to be less plausible explanations of care home outbreaks and subsequent deaths than the virulence of the virus, its ability to spread rapidly in indoor settings and the innate clinical vulnerability of care home residents,” the review concludes.

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Are we listening: The experience of children and young people in court settings knowledge and skill together; true codesign and co-production.

One of the priorities in ‘Health and Wellbeing 2026: Delivering Together’ is to develop a leadership strategy which enables transformation by creating and building organisational culture that recognises and promotes collaboration and quality improvement. Based on the ethos of this strategy, harnessing our strengths and working collaboratively and effectively as one together, the conference brought together presentations from: •

Our young people: The pivotal input was the lived experience presented by our very own young people, whom have been through the care system with the support of a guardian. In their own words, through presentations and videos, they told us what has worked and what still needs to change.

•

Lemn Sissay MBE: A child of the state, author, poet and broadcaster, official poet of the 2012 London Olympics, Chancellor of the University of Manchester since 2015. His latest memoir is entitled ‘My Name is Why’, reflects on a childhood in care, self-expression and Britishness, exploring the institutional care system, race, family and the meaning of home.

•

Sir James Lawrence Munby: A retired English judge who was President of the Family Division of the High Court of England and Wales. Sir James has called for the family courts to become more transparent in order to increase public trust in the system. In 2019 he said the system was failing to accommodate the voices of children “well enough”, including in cases where they wished “to see the court, give evidence or meet the

Lemn Sissay MBE, award-winning and internationally acclaimed poet, talking about his own experience of being in care and the meaning of home.

In February of this year, the Northern Ireland Guardian Ad Litem Agency (NIGALA) held a Conference of which our young people aptly shaped the agenda and title, posing the question Are We Listening?

The Northern Ireland Guardian Ad Litem Agency (NIGALA) is the ‘Voice’ for children and young people who are subject of public law and adoption proceedings before the courts in Northern Ireland. We now help over 1,000 children and young people through the court process each year.

This makes it all the more important that we actively engage with them as key stakeholders to have their views and wishes heard.

The purpose of the conference was to 54

create a safe, non-judgmental space for conversations about the personal journey of children, young people and professionals working and living in the care system.

Over 300 attended the conference including guardians ad litem, solicitors, members of the judiciary, representatives from the Department of Health, from England, Scotland and the Republic of Ireland and the voluntary sector. It was introduced as a day of learning, improving and developing our

judge”. Although the courts have the interests of the child at their centre “children are invisible in the family court”.

•

Colleagues from Scotland: who shared the learning from their Care Review. The Care Review has listened to over 5,500 experiences.

Over half of the voices were children and young people with experience of the ‘care system’, and adults who lived in care.

Meeting the individual and complex needs of very vulnerable children and young people is challenging and requires us to actively promote the ‘participation’ of those we try to safeguard and protect, through listening to their ‘voices’. This was a key message from the day and best illustrated in the following words of one speaker: “Children must be listened to and meaningfully and appropriately involved in decision-making about their care, with all those involved properly listening and responding to what children want and need. There must be a compassionate, caring, decision-making culture focused on children and those they trust.”

The words children use reflect how they feel and often present a mixture of ‘emotion’ and ‘confusion’. For the family courts and professionals involved we must not simply ‘hear’ children who are able to express a view, but we must actively listen to what they have to say, weight it, evaluate it and always give reason for not giving effect to it. The simple truth is, it is they who have to live with these decisions.

A second and recurring key message from a number of our young people and

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•

The Right Honourable Lord Justice Gillen: A retired High Court Family Judge and author of ‘Review of Civil and Family Justice in Northern Ireland’ (September 2017). His main message was how the child and vulnerable witnesses need to be listened to by the Courts in an “informed manner”. He concluded that our collective understanding of how best to hear the views of children and young people in the court setting “is developing and is still, to an extent, in its infancy”.

One clear advantage of meeting the child in person is: “The judge will see the child as a real person rather than as the object of other people’s disputes or concerns.”

Our panel of young people in active participation with the audience and speakers, led by senior management from NIGALA, Sean Brown and Peter Reynolds.

“The judge will see the child as a real person rather than as the object of other people’s disputes or concerns.” speakers was the importance of ‘family’ connections and links even in the face of significant challenges and adversities lasting over lifetimes: “Where children are safe in their families and feel loved they must stay — and families must be given support together to nurture that love and overcome the difficulties which get in the way.”

There were also a number of non-verbal messages poignantly displayed in the Titanic Centre on the day. Presentation boards with graffiti style writing exhibited questions and messages from our young people and a blazer jacket with labels attached featured as one of the main center pieces. Our young people wrote messages on each label according to how each of them felt they had been (or still are) labelled. For example: “uneducated”, “unwanted”, “not likely to achieve”, “needy” and “has no ambitions”, were just a few. They creatively portrayed a very powerful message; children who have been in care sometimes feel they are walking

around with these labels attached to them for life, regardless of how successful they are.

Their message to us? “Break the stigma. We are not defined by a care background. There must be more focus on the positives and success stories… I am not a statistic; I am a child with a name.”

A comment made by a member of the audience nicely sums up what we must continue to do going forward: “Although the stories shared span across generations, the experiences remain the same. We must listen if we are to change things.”

For information and updates on our upcoming conferences and training events you can check our website at nigala.hscni.net and follow us on Twitter @NI_GALA1

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Digital transformation at a time of crisis Dan West, Chief Digital Information Officer (CDIO) at the Department of Health outlines the broader digital transformation agenda in health and care and discusses recent developments and acceleration in the context of Covid-19.

Appointed in late April 2019, Dan West had less than a year to settle into the role of CDIO for health and social care in Northern Ireland before the pandemic took hold. The appointment of a senior leader in digital was a new departure for the health and social care sector, indicating a commitment to digital transformation to deliver better outcomes and economic sustainability, West suggests.

“It’s important not to underestimate the challenge with that. Northern Ireland has about 80,000 HSC staff members doing incredible things every day. They are all incredible people, and we are all very appreciative of what they are doing, particularly at the moment.

“However, Northern Ireland also has the

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longest waiting lists in Europe for elective procedures and the highest age-adjusted per capita healthcare costs in the UK. Even with just those two macroeconomic indicators, we have got a lot of work to do in transforming health and care services,” he says.

Contextualising digital transformation, the CDIO explains the organisational architecture of health and social care in Northern Ireland. West defines ‘the centre’ of the health and social care sector as being the Department of Health, the Health and Social Care Board and the Public Health Agency and the Business Services Organisation. Similarly, he defines ‘local’ as being the six providers trusts and the primary care tier.

Since his arrival at the Department of Health, the CDIO has established Digital Health and Care for Northern Ireland (DHCNI), a joint venture between the Department of Health, the Health and Social Care Board and the Public Health Agency. The DHCNI team has six main strategic goals, including: mobilising the workforce; enabling locations and capacity; informing and supporting the public; developing data and insights; supporting vulnerable people; and enabling a recovery strategy.

1. Mobilising the workforce: This goal relates to the delivery of devices and upgrading of central infrastructure and systems to allow critical staff members to work remotely. “One example of the things we have done

there is increasing the capacity of our remote access VPN connections and rearchitecting our access solutions,” West explains.

Reflecting on the health and care response to the pandemic, the CDIO emphasises the creation of a “a series of completely novel digital services” that had not previously existed. These services include those firstly, to identify outbreaks of the virus in the community and secondly, to react through the provision of advice and guidance to individuals in order to break transmission chains.

individuals that you have been close to.

If one of those individuals gets a positive test, it identifies people who are at risk and provides advice on when to self-isolate.

“It supports and runs alongside the manual contact tracing processes. It was also the first intercountry production interoperability between two proximity apps, embracing the Google and Apple exposure notification API, globally. Likewise, it was the first app to be designed and specifically deployed to the 11 to 17-year old, post primary education sector,” West notes.

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2. Enabling locations and capacity: This strategic priority is about repurposing and enabling locations in order to augment the capacity of Health and Social Care organisations and support the provider trusts to maintain elective services. This included “allowing MOT drive-in centres to be repurposed as virological testing centres and allowing private sector provider organisations to be able to get access to data and facilities to be able to sustain our out-patient capacity during the course of Covid”.

scenario facing health and care at the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic and restoring “some semblance of normality”. This involved establishing a set of services around testing and tracing in order to break transmission chains and reduce the impact of infectivity on the population.

Similarly, Digital Self-Trace (DST) is an online contact tracing service which supports the manual contact tracing teams. “DST is an alternative to public health doctors contacting everyone who

“Northern Ireland also has the longest waiting lists in Europe for elective procedures and the highest age-adjusted per capita healthcare costs in the UK… we have got a lot of work to do in transforming health and care services.”

Dan West, Chief Digital Information Officer, Department of Health 3. Informing and supporting the public: This priority is about understanding how citizens interact with information and services and reducing the burden on frontline staff through alternative telephone and digital channels.

4. Developing data and insights: Understanding the flow of information through providing consistent access and toolsets for analysis can support organisations in planning and responding to the Covid-19 pandemic.

5. Supporting vulnerable people: The shielded population, those individuals with either chronic longterm conditions that require particular protection from the impact of the virus, or frail, elderly patients require particular attention. “Once you identified those individuals and provided advice to them, there was a need to be able to provide additional information and services. This preceded the creation of a new registry and the creation of services to interact with that registry,” the CDIO clarifies.

6. Enabling a recovery strategy: This was about transitioning from the

“One of the things we did was build the COVIDCare NI app for individuals seeking advice and guidance or looking for a symptom checker experience.

They can go through that experience on an app or a website rather than necessarily having to have a telephone conversation with a healthcare employee.

“Within the COVIDCare NI app, we also inserted an AI-based chatbot so that people could search through all of the rapidly evolving, and sometimes complex, guidance and policy relating to their own personal circumstances and questions,” West says.

West’s team then built the Northern Ireland Testing Registry as a single database of all the virological testing results. “In October 2020 alone, we processed 250,000 testing results and we matched those back to patient records,” he adds.

Designed to anonymously contact people who have been in close proximity to another individual who has tested positive for Covid-19, the StopCOVID NI proximity app was the first of its kind in the UK. “The app uses low-power Bluetooth technology on your phone to get a bit of a history of

has a positive test and having a conversation about where they have been and who their close contacts are, in order to advise those individuals to self-isolate.

“As we scale out the volume of testing taking place and we scale out the number of people who are infected by the virus, as we saw during the marked spike in October, shifting to a digital tracing format will be helpful,” the CDIO adds.

Alongside a brand new Microsoft Dynamics-based, cloud-hosted contract tracing platform which is a technology that supports the workflow of the Public Health Agency and public health doctors in delivering contact tracing services, West’s team has built another cloud-based, Azure-hosted Power BI analytics environment. “This incorporates all of the datasets about the flow of work and the flow of data in relation to these digital services and matching that with the testing datasets and other population health datasets to inform calculation of the reproduction rate and to inform the policy agenda,” he concludes.

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Helping separated parents reach agreement health and care services report

But the impact of lockdown and ongoing government-led restrictions have had a devastating impact on separating families.

Davis says: “Some parents had just separated before March 2020 or separated during Covid-19 restrictions and have been trapped in the same house for months. For many this has exacerbated their problems and it has been difficult to shield the children from the parental conflict and acrimony.

“Communication may be poor, argumentative or non-existent and research informs us that this environment has a negative impact on a child’s emotional wellbeing.”

Northern Ireland parents who experienced relationship breakdown prior to lockdown have seen less of their children, in some cases going for months without contact, according to a leading charity.

Court closures in March 2020 and the recent re-opening in September as part of the UK Government’s restrictions to flatten the curve of the pandemic, have resulted in some parents, particularly dads, not seeing their children for months, with many contact disputes still unresolved.

The anecdotal information collated by the charity Family Mediation NI (FMNI), during Covid-19, indicates a rise in the number of dads desperate to see their children. FMNI offers a practical service to those parents who wish to find agreement over family arrangements post separation.

Despite the current challenges FMNI Chief Executive Officer Joan Davis said the charity can help: “We are an independent, impartial, confidential nonjudgemental charity, publically funded to 58

assist separated parents to achieve the best outcomes for their child.”

FMNI answered 5,018 enquiries by phone and email from April 2019-March 2020 from parents looking for support to manage their separation, carried out 762 pre-mediation information and assessment appointments to individual parents and provided 1,197 joint mediation sessions for parents in all five Health Trust areas.

And with many separating families facing additional financial worries due to Covid, it’s reassuring to know that FMNI is contracted with Health and Social Care Board to provide this early intervention service free at point of access to those separated parents who choose to be empowered to manage their separation and are not in the court system.

While FMNI has continued to offer its services during lockdown, via online platforms, Davis adds: “The court service was not accessible for six months and is now working through a backlog of family cases, in the meantime the mental health of children and estranged parents is being impacted.”

With UNCRC (United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child) forming the central pillar to FMNI’s strategy, the charity has developed a child-centric approach whereby professional family mediators work with parents to encourage option generating, negotiation and compromise to achieve their own bespoke agreement. In some cases children may also meet with a specialist mediator, so their voice may be heard within the process.

Many Northern Ireland parents have successfully achieved an amicable coparenting arrangement after working with FMNI, 93 per cent of clients who engage with the charity would recommend the service, including County Down father Lee who separated from his wife last year.

Having both consulted solicitors on the breakdown of their marriage, Lee said contact with his young son became fraught until both he and his ex-wife sought out the services provided by FMNI earlier this year.

“I had barely any contact with my son for the first few weeks. It was a hostile situation on both sides,” he explains.

However, Lee seized the opportunity to go to mediation on his ex-wife’s suggestion earlier this year: “I was more than happy to go to mediation which I had wanted to do from day one,” he says. “I thought it would be a better way of sorting contact out.”

Age of children whose parents availed of child focused mediation 47% Over 7

After five sessions over Zoom the coparents were able to break the impasse with more positive communication between the two of them which led to Lee seeing his son twice a week with weekends and dates for special outings such as birthdays and Christmas too.

Communication between the two improved after the first session with the parents’ texting and calling each other regarding child contact.

Despite lockdown Lee and his ex-wife got their first joint appointment with FMNI a month after calling and were happy to use Zoom.

“Usually I prefer face-to-face contact but after 15-minutes on Zoom it felt very natural, and the mediator managed the situation very well.

“Now we’re able to work with each other,” he says.

FMNI, however, always leave the door open for parents to return should issues arise again regarding future co-parenting challenges.

The charity’s CEO pointed out mediation is often confused with counselling.

Mediation is a practical process that is future focussed and seeks to empower parents and has a robust screening and safeguarding policy. The process is voluntary and its doors are open to all who wish to engage. Parents are assessed for suitability for mediation prior to sessions beginning and the process belongs to the parents in the room, mediators are facilitators not advisors and enable adult discussion based on the agenda brought by the participants.

She points out some dads in particular, have been denied access to their children by mums, either through fear of

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Now, he’s an advocate of the charity, having recommended it to a friend also going through family separation: “My exwife and I weren’t speaking to each other but since mediation the difference is unbelievable. It’s moved our situation from being a cold and angry one to being able to talk to one another.”

Under 7

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“Agreements made by the participants have a much greater chance of success than those imposed by strangers.” infection or misinterpretation of government restrictions.

Family breakdown can be a very

“If dad was prevented from seeing his child, with or without a court issued contact order, he had no means of redress and potentially several months whereby a child had not access to one parent with all the implications of potential adverse childhood experiences,” she adds.

FMNI CEO has a positive message:

Lack of, or poor communication between co-parents is the greatest difficulty facing a family in conflict, according to FMNI.

conflict, it’s upsetting and potentially

“If separated parents can’t communicate, misunderstandings and difficulties arise, increasing conflict, which then have a knock-on effect to everything else,” says Davis. “By engaging with the mediation process, parents can learn how to manage conflict and the separation by working together for the benefit of their children.”

And the charity has had to adapt too, successfully transferring most of its mediation sessions online.

“Most of our clients have embraced Zoom, and indeed, are glad they can engage from the comfort of their own home. But others who are not tech-savvy or for some reason cannot engage over Zoom will be seen in person when assessed as safe to do so.”

stressful time for the whole family but “Agreements made by the parents have a much greater chance of working than those imposed by strangers, for example, at the end of an adversarial court process.”

She adds: “Parents don’t want to be in damaging for everyone, particularly children, and how much better for the whole family if that conflict can be managed and parents feel better equipped to move forward as separated parents with their child’s well-being at the centre of all communication.

“FMNI exists to offer separated families the opportunity to find their own agreement that is bespoke to the needs of each family and has the children at the heart of the process.”

Written by Helen Carson.

Family Mediation Northern Ireland T: 028 9024 3265 E: enquiry@familymediationni.org.uk W: www.familymediationni.org.uk

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Domiciliary review: Rapid Learning Review health and care services report

In November 2020, Health Minister Robin Swann announced the conclusion of the Rapid Learning Review of Domiciliary Care in Northern Ireland. The final report made nine recommendations and will inform surge plans for the sector.

Domiciliary care is the range of services that can support individuals within the home. These services can include support with personal care, eating and drinking and household management.

These homecare services are delivered through both the statutory and independent sectors and there are around 33,000 registered social care workers providing services in Northern Ireland, 45 per cent of whom work in domiciliary care. In total, around 270,000 people receive homecare from 18,000 domiciliary care staff (16,206 registered domiciliary care workers, 531 registered domiciliary care managers, 2,073 registered support workers and 120, domiciliary care providers) each week across Northern Ireland.

The Department of Health’s current definition notes: “It [domicillary care] is the range of services put in place to support an individual in their own home.

Services may involve routine household tasks within or outside the home, personal care of the client and other associated domestic services necessary to maintain an individual in an acceptable level of health, hygiene, dignity, safety and ease in their home.”

Domiciliary care as a concept has expanded to incorporate “increasingly complex tasks”. These include the administration of medicine; supporting people with advanced dementia; stoma and catheter care; supporting people with dysphagia; and end of life care.

Described as an “essential frontline service” and a “core community service”, domiciliary care has been

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maintained throughout the Covid-19 pandemic with difficulty. It facilitates timely discharges from secondary care, enabling greater efficiency in the health and care system.

The Domiciliary Care Rapid Learning Review published in October 2020 was primarily focused on the response to Covid-19 while simultaneously highlighting pre-existing systemic challenges. The final report is intended to inform surge plans for the domiciliary care sector and any progress on measurable recommendations is to be monitored by the Adult Social Care surge working group.

Speaking about the Review, Minister for Health Robin Swann MLA said: “My Department has undertaken a Rapid Learning Review looking at the experience of domiciliary care during the pandemic. The Review engaged with a wide range of stakeholders including service users, carers, providers and commissioners.”

The Review comprises four themes.

1. Service user and carer experience.

2. Workforce.

3. Service provision and business continuity.

4. Infection prevention and control.

In the foreword to the final report, Chief Social Work Officer Seán Holland concedes: “We didn’t get everything right and there are many lessons to be learned,” adding: “I am very conscious that the value of the service provided in domiciliary care is not always reflected

in the pay, terms and conditions of the workforce. The lessons from this review on these issues will be included in the Reform of Adult Social Care process which continues alongside the pandemic response.”

Overall, the Review collated “any learning about domiciliary care issues” throughout the Covid-19 pandemic to then inform the ongoing response and future planning. While acknowledging that several areas of the current domiciliary care sector require reform, the Review is primarily concentrated on Covid-related lessons. Broader learning in relation to longer-term challenges has been passed onto the Department’s Reform of Adult Social Care (RASC) team.

In total, the Review made nine overall recommendations containing dozens of action.

1. Improve recognition and profile of the domiciliary care workforce: • Domiciliary care staff member attendance at ministerial briefings.

• A letter from Seán Holland specifically directed at domiciliary care staff.

• Domiciliary care providers “to consider sending” letters of gratitude to domiciliary care staff.

• Promotion of positive media stories relating to domiciliary care.

2. Improve recognition and support for family carers: • An open letter of appreciation to

family carers from the Health Minister.

• HSC trusts proactivity in offering carers’ grants and flexibility in their use to relieve stress for informal carers.

• HSC trusts proactivity in offering direct payments to family carers both for service user care and as a response to a specific carer need.

• Identification of new carers and referral into carer support services as required.

• Conveying new guidance to providers in advance and highlighting revised guidance.

• Clear and consistent interpretation of IPC advice in domiciliary care settings.

• Delivering clear and concise guidance with actionable points.

• Regionally consistent, Covid-specific and current IPC training.

• Implementation of clear communication pathways for IPC guidance.

• Review of the optimal deployment of PPE supply points.

• Encouragement of strategies to encourage the optimal use of PPE.

• Providing regionally consistent guidance.

• Producing specific supported living guidance.

8. Data: • Agreeing a core data set for domiciliary care during the pandemic across HSC trusts and regional agencies.

• Monitoring of IPC training uptake by providers.

9. Systemic issues and future planning for domiciliary care:

• Promotion of the inclusion of service users and family carers in pandemic planning.

• Ensuring prompt access to testing and test results for domiciliary care staff.

• Home and the provision of adequate care in a home setting.

3. Workforce support:

5. Meeting need of service users and family carers:

• Pay, terms and conditions improvements for the domiciliary workforce.

• Proactive engagement with “all those whose domiciliary care packages have been stood down since the start of the pandemic”.

• The future model of social care provision, including the roles of statutory, private and voluntary sectors.

• Informing all service users and carers who had services stood down or reduced how they can contact their relevant HSC trust.

• Supports needs of carers.

• Use of the Covid Staff Wellbeing Framework by providers to support staff.

• Increased awareness of access to psychological support for staff.

• Promotion of the NISCC online resource for staff wellbeing.

• Delivery of information on bereavement to domiciliary care staff.

• Opportunities for social interaction on virtual platforms.

• Provision of additional uniforms free of charge.

• Recognition of a predominantly female workforce.

• Recognition of potential for financial difficulties among the domiciliary care workforce.

• “Explore the provision” of mobile devices during the pandemic.

• Conduct a workforce survey in three months’ time.

• Development of a proposal for improvement of the lowest pay for social care staff in the independent sector.

• Development of proposals for standardised enhancement of training, development and career pathways.

4. Infection prevention and control (IPC):

• Proactive engagement with people on HSC trust caseloads who may not have previously received a domiciliary care service but may now have additional need as a result of the pandemic.

• Proactive engagement with GPs, media outlets and community groups to publicise access pathways for support.

• Production of tailored Covid-related guidance for domiciliary care service users and family carers.

6. Financial support for providers: • Establishing mechanisms for continued review of additional Covidrelated costs.

• Collation of financial support available for providers in one document accompanied by regionally consistent pathways for claiming supports.

7. Communication with providers: • Making all guidance, policy and procedure information for domiciliary care electronically available on one platform.

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• The prioritisation of carers’ assessments and reassessments to be included in HSC trusts plans to mitigate against fatigues and adverse impact on wellbeing.

• Review and consolidation of relevant IPC and PPE guidance to ensure regional consistency.

• Including cost and benefit analysis of informal care in future service planning.

• Resourcing adequate data systems.

• Collection, analysis and application of data in domiciliary care.

• Meeting complex care needs.

• Support inclusion of service users and carers in planning and policy decisions.

• Obtaining evidence on demographics demands for forecasting and future planning.

• Reviewing and update the definition of domiciliary care.

Following the Review, Minister Swann announced a £5 million funding package for domiciliary care.

Speaking in November 2020, the Health Minister stated: “I am determined to drive forward reform across adult social care, including homecare. This will be ever more important as the elderly population continues to grow and as enhancements in technology and new models of care mean more and more people can be supported in their own homes.”

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Nursing and midwifery workforce gaps Deficiencies in workforce planning for nurses and midwives in Northern Ireland, with vacancies common and growth not meeting demand, expose a sector ill-equipped to meet the exceptional demands of the Covid-19 pandemic or the demands of an increasing and aging population, according to the Northern Ireland Audit Office.

More than one in 10 registered nursing posts in Northern Ireland were found to have been vacant in late 2019 according to the Northern Ireland Audit Office (NIAO) report, with annual spend on temporary nursing staff reaching £115 million by 2018-19, an almost 688 per cent rise on the £14.6 million spent in 2006-07. In that same time period, agency spending has risen almost 523 per cent, from £8.6 million to £52 million, an increase that “has provided particularly poor value for money” according to the report.

The reliance on temporary and agency staff has occurred “against a background of inadequate workforce planning, rising demand for care, high vacancy levels, the need to provide safe staffing levels, and over sickness and maternity absence”. The £115 million spent on temporary and agency

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nurses and midwives accounts for 13.2 per cent of total staffing costs, which stood at £870 million in 2018-19, a 28 per cent rise from the £680 million spent in 2011-12.

By March 2019, the HSC’s nursing and midwifery workforce group was made up of 22,493 staff or 19,737 whole time equivalent (WTE), with over 16,000 nurses, 1,300 midwives and almost 5,100 nursing and midwifery support staff. The report states that the variance between staff in post numbers and WTE figures are accounted for by the fact that “significant numbers of staff” work “part time to varying degrees”, with 37 per cent of HSC nurses and 63 per cent of midwives registered as part time as of March 2019.

It is in midwifery that the largest challenges appear to be rising for workforce planning in this area. While

the number of WTE HSC nurses has increased by 11.7 per cent between 2012 and 2019, and WTE nursing and midwifery support staff increased by 15 per cent in the same period, midwifery WTE fell by 1.1 per cent. Coupled with a workforce comprised of 63 per cent of those in post working some variance of part-time hours, the midwifery stream appears to be the worst affected of the three streams within the sector.

Despite the overall growth in the sector in terms of employment, the report finds the increases to have been “insufficient” in dealing with the increased demand the healthcare system has been put under by a “growing population which is living longer and developing more long-term conditions”. The 8.8 per cent rise in HSC registered nurses from 2012 to

2019 should have been a rise of over 23 per cent, “assuming similar delivery structures”, in order to meet the increased level of demand.

On top of the 2,100 nursing vacancies the report states that a further 1,600 “nurses are required to ensure safe staffing levels” and notes that a “recurrent funding gap of almost £40 million” has made the recruitment required to fill these gaps harder. The temporary and agency staff who are brought in to fill the workforce gaps caused by these vacancies and the lack of funding are said to “incur higher costs than permanent staff, and are less likely to deliver satisfactory patient outcomes”.

The report also states that “some key previous workforce planning decisions have also contributed to the current staffing pressures”, one such example cited is a Departmental Nursing and Midwifery Workforce Review from 2009 to 2013 that recommended that no changes be made to the number of preregistration nursing training places being commissioned; this review did not consider the impact of the rising demand for care. In the aftermath of this review, funding for these preregistration nursing was reduced.

Having allocated an annual average of £30.1 million for the places between 2009-09 and 2010-11, these figures fell to an annual average of £28.8 million between 2011-12 and 2016-17, which resulted in 732 fewer nursing training places being commissioned during that period when compared to 2009-10 levels.

These cuts occurred at a time when demand continued to rise, with the Department telling the NIAO that the “decision was taken in the face of wider financial and affordability pressures”, but the report finds that the significant and prolonged reduction in training places has had longer-term consequences, including contributing to the rising vacancy levels and increased

nursing and midwifery workforce group at December 2019 – including 2,114 registered nursing vacancies

£115 million The amount spent on temporary nursing and midwifery staff in 2018-19 – including £52 million spent on agency staff

13.2% The proportion of overall nursing and

health and care services report

The failure to meet increasing demand is perhaps best illustrated by the more than tripling of total vacancies between 2013 and 2019. Total vacancies rose from 770 to 2,700 in that period, with 2,100 of the December 2019 vacancies made up of registered nursing vacancies, which also goes some way to accounting for the overreliance on temporary and agency staff in the healthcare sector. Between 2014 and 2019, the registered nursing vacancy rate rose from 3.2 per cent to 11.5 per cent, just 1 per cent off one in every eight registered nursing posts being left vacant.

2,754 The number of staffing vacancies in the HSC

midwifery staff costs spent on temporary staff in 2018-19

£1,700 The highest amount paid by three HSC Trusts in 2018-19 for single shifts worked by agency nurses on bank holidays

732 The reduction in nursing training places between 2011-12 and 2016-17 compared to previous levels

11.5% The proportion of HSC registered nursing posts vacant at December 2019

1,210 The all-time high number of nursing training places commissioned in 2020-21.

reliance on more expensive temporary staff”. Funding for post-registration training, which allows for specialisation, was also reduced, falling from almost £9.5 million in 2008-09 and 2009-10 to an annual average of £8 million between 2010-11 and 2018-19.

The Department has recognised these failings in its HSC Workforce Strategy, which is planned out to 2026, and is now following steps to fill the staffing holes according to the NIAO. An updated workforce plan published in 2016 had attempted to tackle the issue of demand outstripping supply but delays in its implementation meant that the number of training places commissioned in 2015-16 and 2016-17 was 129 fewer than recommended. The Department and trusts launched an international recruitment campaign in 2016, with the goal of 622 additional HSC nurses by March 2020.

By March 2020, 504 overseas staff had been secured, 458 of which are still in post, but “stringent requirements for achieving UK nursing registration, and

visa criteria meant that substantial delays are common before nurses can commence HSC employment”. In the wake of Covid-19, the Department has begun using web-based interviews in an effort to reach the 622 goal quicker.

The report states: “To date, it is unclear whether the actions taken will effectively align staffing supply with the rising demand. The Department will need to continually monitor the situation to consider what further longer terms action may be necessary.”

In May 2020, Minister for Health Robin Swann announced that funding had been secured for an extra 300 nursing and midwifery undergraduate places, bringing the overall number to a record 1,325. “This was a problem before Covid and will remain so after Covid, however the pandemic has only exacerbated it,” the Minister said. “It is clear that there are no quick fixes, and sustainable multi-year funding is required.”

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Northern Ireland Planning Conference 2021 Sponsored by

Thursday 11th February 2021 • Online conference agendaNi’s Northern Ireland Planning Conference is now firmly established as the major annual event for all those with an interest or role in planning and development in Northern Ireland. The 2021 conference comes at a time of great change. A key priority of the restored Executive is ‘Investing for our Future’ and effective planning will be a key component to ensure Northern Ireland’s economic and social potential can be realised, particularly as we approach the recovery phase of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Speaker panel

2021 discussion topics 4 Update on planning policy 4 Local Development Plans to shape the

next decade 4 Covid-19 as an opportunity to rethink town

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Angus Kerr

Professor Brian Evans

Chief Planner and Director

City Urbanist

of Regional Planning

Glasgow City Council

Department for Infrastructure

Dr Louise O’Kane

4 Planning for major projects in

Planner and Engagement

infrastructure and housing 4 Shaping places with transformative digital

planning

Paul Duffy

Officer

Head of Planning

Community Places

Mid and East Antrim Borough Council

4 Community engagement in planning

Helen Quigley

projects

CEO

4 Putting climate at the heart of planning and

development

Petra Biberbach

Inner City Trust Group

Chief Executive Planning Aid Scotland

4 Planning Engagement Partnership to

Stef Webb

strengthen public participation

Gary McGhee

Place Director

4 The future of town centres post Covid-19

Partner and Head of

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4 A collaborative approach to placemaking

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4 Best practice case studies

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How to register By telephone +44 (0)28 9261 9933

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Environment waste and water report

Environment, waste and water report

Environmental priorities: Minister Edwin Poots MLA Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs Minister Edwin Poots MLA offers a synopsis of the key environmental initiatives underway in his Department, including the delivery of an Environment Strategy for Northern Ireland.

In June, Agriculture and Environment Minister Edwin Poots announced plans to deliver a co-designed Green Growth Strategy in response to Covid-19.

Announcing a target of Spring 2021 for a draft Strategy and delivery framework launch for consultation, Poots says: “The Green Growth Strategy is a key priority area for the Northern Ireland Executive. The strategy and delivery framework will focus on economic development and renewal, yet will also recognise the importance of our environment and advocate a pathway to a sustainable future as part of our recovery from the Covid-19.”

Describing a need to address a holistic approach to recovery in the context of unprecedented transformation of the global economy linked to Covid-19 and public concerns around climate change,

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the Minister explains: “We have been presented with the opportunity to renew our thinking and to stimulate and support new approaches, including alternative sustainable business models. We must seize the opportunity presented by the Covid-19 crisis to ensure the recovery plans have a greener, more sustainable focus, building on the many gains made and lessons learned in recent months.”

Setting out that officials in his Department are currently developing a plan to engage with key partners in the coming months, to ensure meaningful stakeholder engagement and that “the principles of co-design and delivery are both implemented and central to this strategy”, the DUP Minister adds that the outcome will be a framework of programmes to help deliver “a resilient recovery through greener, low carbon

and circular economy for Northern Ireland”.

Environmental Justice In January 2020, the New Decade, New Approach (NDNA) agreement set out that “the Executive will establish an Independent Environmental Protection Agency to oversee this work and ensure targets are met” but shortly after the deal, Poots, the new Environment Minister gave an indication that setting one up was not a priority for his Department.

Poots confirms that his preference, for now, lies in the extension of the remit of the Office of Environmental protection, the UK’s new post-Brexit independent agency, to Northern Ireland.

“Environmental justice is vital for each

and every citizen of Northern Ireland and as minister I recognise that access to it is an essential principle which must be maintained as we leave the EU and its associated oversight structures,” he states.

Poots confirms an Environment Strategy for Northern Ireland, as part of the Green Growth framework, will be a key part of the Department’s commitment to the continued protection and improvement of the environment.

“As Northern Ireland’s first environmental strategy, it will establish an over-arching framework for our environment for decades to come and provide an enormous opportunity for all of us,” he outlines.

The Department are currently reviewing responses to the public discussion document on the strategy, which closed in February 2020, and Poots says that his officials will continue to engage with stakeholders and other departments in the coming months with the aim to publish a draft Environmental Strategy for consultation in spring 2021.

Environmental Protection proposed in the UK Government’s Environment Bill is the best option that we have at the current time.” department are working towards a plastic packaging tax, meaning that from April 2022, a tax will be levied on all plastic with less that 30 per cent recycled content.

Poots believes that the tax will stimulate greater demand for recycled plastics and help build a circular economy for plastics.

A green recovery In early 2020, the Minister wrote to the UK’s Committee on Climate Change (CCC) seeking advice on Northern Ireland’s equitable contribution to the UK’s net zero emissions target and asking, “how we can improve our evidence base on both greenhouse gas emissions and the associated economic and financial impacts”.

Outlining an ambition to “keep plastic in the economy but out of the environment”, Poots urges caution “not to demonise all plastic” in the necessity of addressing the throwaway culture around plastic.

Speaking just days before the CCC advised that Northern Ireland’s carbon emissions be cut by at least 82 per cent by 2050, the Minister outlined a future pathway: “I will bring my conclusions to the Executive to agree a way forward on climate change. It will of course require the support of the Executive to introduce any new cross-cutting approaches on climate change. I’ve noted the Committee on Climate Change advice to the Prime Minister and it provides the analysis of how UK climate policy can become a core element of the Government’s approach to rebuilding the economy after the Covid-19 crisis.

Poots says that he continues to work with ministerial colleagues across the UK to introduce an extended producer responsibility scheme that will place responsibility on producers for the full net cost of managing their products once they reach the end of their life.

Additionally, he says, officials in his

“I am committed to building a green recovery from Covid-19. I will consider how the committee’s recommendations, which highlights their clear economic, social and environmental benefits from immediate expansion measures such as tree planting, peatland restoration, green

Poots is keen to stress that while a focus remain on future delivery, much work is already ongoing in the Department to address known environmental challenges. To this end he points to the NDNA’s commitment to “prepare a plan to eliminate plastic pollution”.

Environment, waste and water report

“I am therefore keen to see an independent environmental oversight in Northern Ireland and, while the decision on whether it operates in Northern Ireland rests with the Assembly, I believe the Office of the Environmental Protection proposed in the UK Government’s Environment Bill is the best option that we have at the current time.”

“I believe the Office of the

spaces and other green low carbon climate resilient infrastructure.”

Air quality Turning to air quality, Poots highlights the recent launch of a discussion document in advance of developing the first Clean Air Strategy for Northern Ireland, which will remain open until the 15 February 2021.

“This is a tremendous step forward in the development of the first Clean Air Strategy for Northern Ireland and I welcome all opinions and encourage the exchange of ideas on air quality issues and mitigation measures.”

Referencing progress to date in this area, including the launch in May 2020 of the NI Air Quality app, he adds: “I recognise the importance of clean air to each and every one of us and I’m glad to see how new technology is being used to promote this.”

Concluding, Poots highlights his recognition of farming’s environmental impact in Northern Ireland, stating: “Farming is a fundamental part of the fabric of Northern Irish life and as such, is an essential and important contributor to our economy. Any activity which takes place over such a large geographical scale is bound to have impacts on the environment, both positive and negative.

“I recognise that by reducing emissions from our farms it is necessary to ensure that future sustainability of Northern Ireland’s agri-food sector goes hand in hand. I want to work with farmers and indeed other stakeholders to design a series of emission reduction measures, which will achieve positive outcomes both for our farms and our precious environment.”

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Environment, waste and water report

What is at the end of the tunnel?

Water provides are not exciting and largely unseen and forgotten; it’s only now, when these services are failing that our politicians have come to recognise just how vital they are to our economy and our environment.

“Historical lack of investment means that many of Northern Ireland’s sewerage and wastewater systems are now failing, essentially they are ‘full’ and are struggling to process the current volumes of sewage, wastewater and trade effluent so that it can be treated and put back safely into the local environment. An increase in the volumes feeding into these sewer systems, will likely overwhelm them causing untreated sewage, trade effluent and wastewater to spill into premises, streets, rivers and onto our shorelines.

Over the last couple of years NI Water has been vocal in highlighting the economic and environmental crisis facing Northern Ireland as a direct result of the historical lack of investment in our sewer and wastewater networks.

Right now, it’s clear to councils, businesses, private and social housing, hospitality, tourism and environmentalists alike, that the necessary infrastructure isn’t in place for their future plans, nor can it be without a stepped change in investment over the next decade and more; a situation recognised and strongly supported by the Utility Regulator in its Draft Determination on NI Water’s 2021-2027 business plans.

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Northern Ireland’s sewerage and wastewater systems are now failing NI Water’s Chief Executive, Sara Venning, explains: “We are committed to transparency with our customers and stakeholders, we have had to be vocal and will continue to be as the situation becomes more and more critical. The water and sewage services that NI

“This is the situation right now in major parts of all our cities and in over 100 towns across Northern Ireland, many of which are central to economic growth plans. NI Water is already unable to respond positively to many plans in these areas for much needed new development such as social and private housing, office buildings, factories, hotels etc. The negative impact of our failing sewer and wastewater infrastructure on Northern Ireland’s economy and its environment is all too obvious.

There is a simple solution to this growing crisis “However, there is a simple solution to this growing crisis, enable NI Water to invest sufficiently in its infrastructure.

We’ve often said that NI Water’s current funding model is broken. Could it work?

Yes. Has it worked? Not in the last decade. Is it likely to? Well let me explain. NI Water can only invest what the Executive decides to allocate to NI Water from its Northern Ireland Capital Expenditure budget. There is no

“The Social and Environmental Guidance for Water & Sewerage Services (2021-27), which sets the Executive’s priorities and level of investment for NI Water over the next six years, states that a constrained budget environment is expected to persist and the actual budget set for NI Water needs to be affordable within the Northern Ireland budget expenditure process.

“So is NI Water’s funding model likely to work going forward? We’ll have to wait and see what the Executive decides to allocate to NI Water.

“We’re often asked for our views on funding models, this is a matter for Government policy, NI Water is ‘model agnostic’, but Northern Ireland needs and deserves a model that is funded.”

Treat this as an absolute investment priority It’s not just Venning that has strong views about this economic and environmental crisis. Commenting recently on the importance of NI Water’s infrastructure, the Construction Employers Federation stated: “Treat this as an absolute investment priority because the whole economy depends on it, the future growth of the economy depends on it, not just the construction sector, but if we’re to see a vibrant, modern Northern Ireland and if we’re to deliver the councils’ various plans then we need this wastewater treatment network upgraded.”

The Northern Ireland Food and Drink Association said: “To put it really simply, without NI Water there is no Northern Ireland food and drink and we are 100,000 jobs in the Northern Ireland community. The underfunding in NI Water infrastructure will inhibit the

Environment, waste and water report

additional capability for increased investment outside of this mechanism; all of NI Water’s capital investment must fall within the Executive’s allocation. If the Executive decides to allocate a sufficient budget to NI Water, job done, the model works. However, NI Water is just one of many relying on an allocation from the same Northern Ireland Capital budget; so NI Water has to compete against ring-fenced, flagship and other Executive capital investment priorities and our experience for many years has been one of inadequate capital allocations. No other water utility in the UK is required to operate in this way and it is the people of Northern Ireland that are being disadvantaged.

“No other water utility in the UK is required to operate in this way and it is the people of Northern Ireland that are being disadvantaged.” growth of Northern Ireland food and drink going forward.”

The Utility Regulator says it’s needed

CBI Northern Ireland added: “When it comes to the business community, foreign direct investment and indigenous companies, they look at a number of things when they are deciding where they are going to put their money and where they are going to invest.

Infrastructure is hugely important and all utilities are key components, they are hugely influential in a company deciding to put money into a particular area. If Northern Ireland hasn’t invested in water, and it hasn’t, we have to think about how we get that sustainable funding model for the future, this is a problem that needs addressed. We talk about building back better after Covid, if we’re genuine about that then this does have to be at the top of the Executive’s agenda.”

Venning concludes: “It’s important that people know and understand the consequences of under-investment in what are probably Northern Ireland’s most vital and fundamental infrastructure systems. The Utility Regulator has now scrutinised our PC21 plans for the 2021-2027 period and in its Draft Determination is recommending circa £2 billion in of capital investment over this period. In its recent briefing to the Committee for Infrastructure the Utility Regulator stated: ‘This money is desperately needed… It’s important that NI Water is funded to deliver this essential service for consumers… The ability to deliver is conditional in having confidence in the budget.’

Perhaps Esmond Birnie, Senior Economist at Ulster University sums it all up: “We have been in a situation for some number of years now in which the level of investment going into the water service sector in Northern Ireland has been both volatile and in most years inadequate. If in the future we really want to say that Northern Ireland is open for business much will depend on whether we are prepared to follow through on devoting enough of our public capital into investing in the water service here.”

“So where are we with investment?

Well, businesses, councils, economists, environmentalists all know it’s needed, the Utility Regulator says it’s desperately needed, but the Executive has the final decision. Northern Ireland needs it and deserves it, we hope it is light that’s at the end of the tunnel.”

E: PressOffice@niwater.com

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Environment, waste and water report

Carbon emission reduction: 82 per cent target advised An 82 per cent target for carbon emissions in Northern Ireland has been advised by the UK Climate Change Committee (CCC).

The Northern Ireland Executive’s commitment to introduce an Environment Strategy has enabled the UK Government’s advisory body to set a target for Northern Ireland for the first time.

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and reductions by 2030. However, a response was delayed until after the CCC had completed its work on the UK’s Sixth Carbon Budget.

“An 82 per cent reduction in all greenhouse gases in Northern Ireland represents equivalent effort and a fair contribution to the UK net zero target,” wrote John Gummer, Chair of the CCC to Environment Minister Edwin Poots in early December 2020.

The UK Government set its 2050 net zero target in law in 2019, however achieving net-zero emissions for the whole of the UK by 2050 does not necessitate all parts of the UK getting to zero emissions, as some areas deemed net sources of greenhouse gases will be offset by other parts of the UK which are net sinks.

The Minister had written to the CCC in February 2020 to ask the CCC for advice on Northern Ireland’s fair contribution to the UK net zero target

The CCC recognises the unique challenges faced by Northern Ireland in emission reductions, given its large agricultural sector. “Northern Ireland is

a significant net exporter of agri-food products produced in Northern Ireland but consumed in the rest of the UK. It is therefore fair that, as well as taking the right actions to reduce emissions from agriculture, some of these emissions are offset by ‘sinks’ that are located elsewhere in the UK.” Adding: “Our analysis suggests that Northern Ireland achieving net zero greenhouse gas emissions is not necessary for the UK to meet its climate targets.”

However, the CCC says that “deep emissions” reductions in Northern Ireland will still be crucial if the UK is to reach its 2050 targets.

Emissions pathways for Northern Ireland without greenhouse gas removals 30 COVID-19 uncertainty

25

Environment, waste and water report

MtCO2e

20

15

10

5

0 2010

2015

2020

2025

2030

2035

2040

2045

2050

Outturn

Baseline

Headwinds

Widespread Engagement

Widespread Innovation

Tailwinds

Balanced Net Zero Pathway Source: NAEI (2020) Greenhouse Gas Inventories for England, Scotland, Wales & Northern Ireland: 1990-2019; CCC analysis.

Possible targets in Northern Ireland climate change legislation All greenhouse gases

CO2 only

All GHGs excluding agricultural methane emissions

All GHGs excluding agricultural, land use and waste methane emissions

2030

48% reduction

56% reduction

53% reduction

52% reduction

Sixth Carbon Budget period (2033-2037)

60% reduction

70% reduction

67% reduction

67% reduction

2040

69% reduction

83% reduction

78% reduction

79% reduction

2050

82% reduction

Net zero

93% reduction

96% reduction

Source: Climate Change Commission.

Interestingly, the CCC says that there is “no purely technical” reason why net zero is not possible in Northern Ireland but that getting to this point would likely result in one, or both, of a substantial reduction in output from Northern Ireland’s livestock farming sector or a “much greater than equitable” share of all UK greenhouse gas removal technologies being located in Northern Ireland.

greenhouse gases by at least 82 per

The public discussion document

cent by 2050 into any climate legislation

launched in Northern Ireland by

separate, longer target for biogenic

appropriate contribution to the wider

In recommending a target to reduce all

methane.

UK’s effort.

for Northern Ireland, the CCC says that supplementary targets may also be required.

Environment Minister Edwin Poots asked for views on two policy options.

The first being legislation that would

These would include a carbon dioxide only target, expected to be net zero by 2050 and supplementary targets for all greenhouse gases, as well as a

bind Northern Ireland to net zero by 2050 and the second legislating for Northern Ireland to make an

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Environment, waste and water report

Using science to produce clean heat, create jobs and warm homes the heat can be used directly, or if hot enough, for power generation. Direct use of geothermal energy primarily includes space heating and cooling, district heating, swimming pools and spas, agriculture (mainly greenhouse heating or crop and timber drying), fish farming, and use with heat pumps (for both heating and cooling) in industries such as data centres.

Metres of drill core through the Sherwood Sandstone. One of the main geothermal reservoir rocks in Northern Ireland.

The UK is legally-bound to achieve net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050. Northern Ireland generates 47.7 per cent of its electricity from renewable sources but the heat and transport sectors of the energy system still rely heavily on fossil fuels and are more challenging than the power sector to decarbonise.

Geothermal energy has the potential to form part of the solution through its direct use as a low carbon energy source and the role it can play in optimising the electrification of heating and cooling. The Geological Survey of Northern Ireland (GSNI) is actively researching the geothermal potential of Northern Ireland.

The temperature of the Earth increases with depth, this is described as the geothermal gradient. This gradient is not uniform across the globe and in the UK is around 26°C/km (Busby, 2014).

Assuming an average annual air temperature of 12°C, this means that subsurface temperatures at 1,000m, 3,000m and 5,000m are around 39°C, 89°C and 139°C, respectively.

Geothermal energy Geothermal energy is heat derived from the ground from depths of a few metres to multiple kilometres beneath the Earth’s surface.

Low-grade heat stored in the shallow subsurface (<200m) is derived from solar radiation absorbed by the ground and distributed via natural groundwater systems or industrial structures such as flooded mines. This energy is widely described as ground-source energy or shallow geothermal energy. Higher temperature heat resources at depths of >500m are termed deep geothermal energy. In Northern Ireland this resource is most easily accessible in buried hot sedimentary aquifers.

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Applications Geothermal energy is a growing part of energy supply in many countries including France, Germany the Netherlands, Denmark and in some UK cities. Shallow Ground Source Heat Pump (GSHP) systems can be used for heating and cooling of individual buildings or, with larger multiple loop systems, for small-scale heat networks.

GSHP systems are particularly useful in decarbonising heat in residential or commercial premises, especially for those not connected to the gas network.

In contrast, hot sedimentary aquifer geothermal systems have larger capacities and greater efficiencies and

Northern Ireland’s geothermal resources During the oil crises of the 1970s, governments looked to geothermal to ensure security of supply. The presence of geothermal resources in Northern Ireland was proven in 1979 by an exploratory borehole when water with a temperature of 66°C was recorded at 1902m depth in the Sherwood Sandstone. These results led to the siting of the Larne No 2 geothermal borehole in which an equilibrated temperature of 91°C was calculated at 2880m depth.

Why use geothermal?

In 2020 the challenges include climate change, clean and inclusive growth following the Covid-19 virus, energy decarbonisation and job creation as part of a green new deal and helping 22 per cent of families living in fuel poverty and energy inefficient homes in Northern Ireland (NIHE, 2018).

In Northern Ireland, by 2022, approximately 560,000 of all homes (approx. 70 per cent) will have access to the gas network which in future could distribute green hydrogen, but lowcarbon and sustainable solutions are also required for the remaining 30 per cent of homes.

Geothermal technologies are low carbon, do not depend on the weather, are unobtrusive, scalable, have long lifespans, can be retrofitted to homes and require minimal remediation costs.

Wells to extract groundwater have existed on this island for centuries and there are thousands of modern borewells across Northern Ireland servicing farms and businesses with sustainable fresh water today. Shallow geothermal heat from groundwater, using heat pumps replaces fossil fuels for heating and cooling and reduces the carbon footprint.

In Paris there are 53 geothermal plants in the Paris Basin providing hot water to almost 200,000 homes; one geothermal doublet (one well taking out hot water and another returning the cooler water) provides 70°C water from 1,800 m depth and runs a 12.2 MWth geothermal plant, saving €1.9 million and almost 17,000 tons of CO2 per year compared to gas.

The geothermal doublet has a 35-year lifespan, which can be extended for an extra 35 years by re-casing the wells (Hofmeister and Baastrup Holm, 2014).

Northern Ireland’s geology is comparable to the Paris area and would suit similar geothermal installations; the 400–650 m thick Sherwood Sandstone is present at depths down to 2km and beneath this lie older sandstones also with good porosity and hotter temperatures. The inferred geothermal resource for waters hotter than 40°C in the Sherwood Sandstone alone is 35 EJ (exajoules) equivalent to 9.72 million GWh of energy (Busby, 2014).

Geothermal holds potential for green jobs and in Germany where there is a growing geothermal industry in addition to carbon savings, the utilisation of geothermal energy has created >22,000 jobs and provided an economic stimulus of €13.3 billion since 2000 (BMWi data).

In 2019, across 25 European countries there were 5.5 GWth of installed capacity for geothermal district heating and cooling systems and two million ground source heat pumps (EGEC, 2019).

What are the barriers to geothermal?

Despite the potential, the uptake of geothermal resource within the UK remains low relative to other nations.

Technical barriers (i.e. geology, engineering, flow rate and temperature) are not limiting uptake. Non-technical barriers include lack of risk insurance schemes and longer payback times

Closed-loop Mine water GSHP array energy

Geothermal heat and power Hot sedimentary aquifer (direct use heat)

Hot dry rock (power)

Water level

10 20

200

Shallow aquifer

10-14˚C

100

10-17˚C 25˚C

800 1000 2000 5000 Depth (m)

Environment, waste and water report

Geothermal energy use fits with six of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals and aligns with the Northern Ireland Programme for Government Outcome 2: We live and work sustainably – protecting the environment.

Ground source heating and cooling Open-loop GSHP

> 60˚C Deep aquifer

> 130˚C

Granite intrusion

Different shallow geothermal (left) and deep geothermal (right) energy technologies. © UKRI. Abesser et al., 2020.

Unlocking the potential of geothermal energy in the UK. British Geological Survey Open Report, OR/20/049.

Microscope image of a fragment of sandstone from the Ballymacilroy borehole. Blue resin highlights the open space between sand grains. This open space allows hot water to flow through the rock.

owing to the relative value of hot water versus petroleum; however, this is changing with the need to decarbonise our energy mix.

It has been recognised (GTR-H 2006, CSA 2008) that potential commercial investment in the development of deep geothermal energy in Northern Ireland requires greater certainty on regulation, including clarification on the legal ownership of resources, licensing, planning and permitting regimes, and policy support mechanisms.

The Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland is currently developing a new Energy Strategy for Northern Ireland which will set the strategic direction for energy decarbonisation to 2050. The strategy will address a range of measures to decarbonise the energy sector through a ‘whole-systems’ approach. How we may make use of our geothermal resources to decarbonise our heat sector will be considered as part of this process.

Geothermal Conference GSNI and the Queen’s University Belfast Centre for Sustainability, Equality and Climate Action (SECA) hosted an online conference on Friday 11 December to consider the potential for geothermal resources in Northern Ireland.

‘Building Back Better: A future for geothermal energy in Northern Ireland’ featured case studies from Europe and the UK and generate heat policy ideas that can feed in to the Energy Strategy for Northern Ireland and a cross-border, collaborative geoscience research project.

Dr Rob Raine Energy Geologist, GSNI Dundonald House, Belfast, BT4 3SB E: Rob.Raine@economy-ni.gov.uk

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A Clean Air Strategy for Northern Ireland respiratory diseases, including asthma.”

Environment, waste and water report

The WHO estimates the cost of air pollution to economies in the WHO Europe region, with the figure for the United Kingdom being £61 billion. In May 2018, Public Health England published a report on the estimation of costs to the NHS and social care in England due to the health impacts of air pollution. The Department of Health (DoH) produced estimated burden costs for Northern Ireland using these figures and found that costs associated with diseases related to air pollution were around £1.5 million. When taking into account information on diseases where the evidence for an association with air pollution is currently less robust, then the costs could rise to nearly £5.4 million.

DAERA Minister Edwin Poots MLA and Head of British Heart Foundation Northern Ireland, Fearghal McKinney launch a discussion document on Northern Ireland’s first ever Clean Air Strategy.

agendaNi outlines the key components of a discussion document set to enable the development of the first Clean Air Strategy for Northern Ireland.

A decade ago, Public Health England estimated that 553 deaths in over-25s in Northern Ireland were attributable to exposure to anthropogenic air pollution.

For the UK as a whole, it’s estimated that annual UK deaths due to exposure to air pollution are between 28,000 and 36,000 people.

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Northern Ireland attributed to particulate matter air pollution could exceed 4,500 people.

Projections of future costs by DoH indicate that in the period 2017-2025, the total cost to the HSC of air pollution in Northern Ireland is likely to be in the region of £55 million to £190 million, with the largest share of this expenditure occurring in secondary care.

However, the costs in all the other sectors combined is likely to exceed this spend. For the period 2017-2035, the combined cost is likely to be in the region of £182 million to £635 million.

When all diseases are included, air pollution is expected to cause 84,000 new cases of disease in Northern Ireland between 2017 and 2035.

Transport

Greater climate awareness and increasing recognition that existing air quality policy and frameworks are not delivering the expected improvements in air quality in Northern Ireland are central to the development of the first Clean Air Strategy for Northern Ireland.

In Northern Ireland, the biggest sources of particulate matter (PM), fine particles that, once in the air, are harmful to human health, are domestic wood and coal burning, industrial combustion and road transport. Increasingly, evidence is emerging to show that ammonia emissions (which are predominantly from agricultural activities) are a significant source of PM, as ammonia reacts with other air pollutants to form PM.

According to the British Heart Foundation, air pollution is associated with around 800 deaths in Northern Ireland annually and the charity estimates that over the next decade heart and circulatory disease deaths in

World Health Organisation (WHO) guidelines on air pollution state that: ‘By reducing air pollution levels, countries can reduce the burden of disease from stroke, heart disease, lung cancer, and both chronic and acute

The Strategy consultation document sets out a range of considerations for future legislation and management but core to air quality management in transport is the reduction in vehicle pollutants through increasing levels of

Nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter are the most common pollutants released from vehicles. From 2006 to 2016, the number of vehicles in Northern Ireland increased by 18 per cent, a higher rate than in England, Scotland and Wales and popularity of diesel vehicles is one of the reasons for the problems we now see with levels of nitrogen dioxide.

use of public transport, EV usage and active travel.

Main Sources of Air Pollution

legislation or controls should be introduced that prohibit the sale of unseasoned wood logs for home burning;

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information on smoke control should form part of councils’ annual local air quality management reporting.

Agriculture Agriculture accounts for 1.4 per cent of Northern Ireland’s GVA and 2.6 per cent of total civil employment. However,

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The document analysis the potential benefits and challenges associated with extending smoke control areas, which can be declared by local authorities but which only cover a small area of Northern Ireland.

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The consultation document states: “In an effort to reduce air pollution from household heating in Northern Ireland, serious consideration needs to be given to promoting behaviour change in individuals who are choosing to light an open fire, when this is not, of necessity, their primary heating source.”

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Research by NISRA through its Continuous Household Survey 2016/17 found that: “Some households burn solid fuels to heat their home, with this being the primary method of heating for 4 per cent of households, and a secondary method for 68 per cent of households.”

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Household emissions, usually through burning of materials, are more prominent in winter. Emissions from household heating present a significant problem for local air quality. 2011 census data showed that 2.6 per cent of households in Northern Ireland were classed as using solid fuels (wood and coal), the materials recognised as emitters of the highest levels of pollutants.

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it is also a major producer of air pollutants through ammonia. At high concentration, ammonia can negatively affect the health of plants and ecosystems.

Ammonia is not classed as a local air quality pollutant. This means that there are no limits or targets for ammonia in ambient air in the EU ambient air quality directives nor are there limits in ambient air for ammonia in the UK Air Quality Strategy and district councils do not measure levels of ammonia in urban centres.

Ammonia is, however, controlled under the Pollution Prevention and Control Regulations, which specify the amount of ammonia which may be emitted from industrial premises and agricultural installations exceeding certain thresholds.

For the UK, the EU targets are to reduce ammonia levels by 8 per cent by 2020 and then by 16 per cent by 2030, compared to 2005 levels. The devolved administrations will be expected to make their contribution to the UK’s target, and have fed into the UK’s National Air Pollution Control Programme, published in July 2019, which sets out the actions being undertaken to reduce the UK’s total emissions of pollutants.

In 2017, Northern Ireland’s ammonia

emissions were 13 per cent greater than 1990 levels. DAERA have outlined plans to develop an Action Plan for Ammonia and the Department has set up an Ammonia Project Board, specifically tasked with examining the issues and evidence surrounding the ammonia problem in Northern Ireland.

Within the Strategy’s consultation, the critical question asked is: “Do you think that the process in place to address ammonia emissions in Northern Ireland is appropriate?”

Industry The industrial sector accounts for a significant proportion of air pollution emissions in Northern Ireland and the sources include various types of activities ranging from large power stations to petrol station forecourts. Air pollution emissions from industry are, however, subject to strict regulation.

The discussion document asks: “Are there any industrial sectors or air pollutants that require new or further investigation?”

The discussion document forms part of a two-stage approach to developing the first Clean Air Strategy for Northern Ireland. The final Clean Air Strategy is set to undergo a further public consultation later in 2021.

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Integrating the Northern Ireland waste journey Despite much progress, a “step change” is needed if Northern Ireland is to deliver Environment, waste and water report

on climate change commitments, writes Jackie Keaney, Commercial Director, Indaver (Ireland and UK).

Northern Ireland has committed to climate change, net zero carbon and waste management targets under the UK 2050 net zero carbon target, Paris Climate Change Accord, and the UK Circular Economy targets.

The latter commits Northern Ireland to a maximum 10 per cent landfill cap and achieving a 65 per cent recycling level by 2035. These are ambitious targets. In 2019/20 Northern Ireland surpassed both England and Scotland to achieve a recycling rate of 51 per cent while landfilling 24 per cent of our residual waste. This is a great result, which was only possible after many years of hard work and a great response from the public. It does however shine a light on the challenge ahead. A step change is still needed to deliver these significantly higher targets and deal with what remains, the non-recyclable rubbish.

Although significant strides have been made, we continue to either landfill huge quantities of our residual waste or counterintuitively export it at significant cost for other European countries to exploit this resource through renewable energy production. Figures from the Environment Agency show we are currently landfilling and exporting over 400,000 tonnes of household waste annually.

The UK Government’s Committee for Climate Change advise that continuing to landfill large volumes of waste is no longer viable, it is detrimental to our environment and directly contributes to global warming. To meet these climate change and waste management targets, more waste education programmes,

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recycling and energy recovery (Energy from Waste (EfW)) infrastructure must be delivered.

The Northern Ireland Waste Management Plans produced by the arc21 councils over the last decade suggests this will be achieved through the development of an Integrated Waste Management System.

Other countries have shown integrated waste management systems can and do work. This is achieved by having clear policy objectives, alongside householder education, funding and recycling incentives. For example, in 2018 Germany landfilled only 2 per cent of its waste and did so by increasing its recycling levels to 67 per cent and by extracting full value from the remaining 31 per cent via EfW facilities. It is now time for Northern Ireland to play catch up with Great Britain and the rest of Europe in integrating its waste management system, delivering higher recycling and maximising resource use efficiency.

Northern Ireland achieving a 51 per cent recycling rate has been possible partially because of £40 million funding by DAERA for a range of support measures since 2010. This has supported councils to increase recycling capacity and provide householder waste education programmes. Unfortunately, as with many regions, recycling rates are starting to plateau and many experts believe the next 15 per cent will be even more difficult given the remaining waste make-up and the fact that all the “easy” items are now captured. Nonetheless, to further drive recycling efforts, in 2019 DAERA earmarked a further £23 million

in capital funding to provide additional recycling infrastructure.

Further investment, policy interventions and financial support, potentially in the form of well managed subsidies, will also be required to deliver the necessary behavioural change required to achieve 65 per cent recycling by 2035.

Unlike the situation with recycling, Northern Ireland’s EfW infrastructure is seriously under-developed and a significant gap remains for the treatment of residual waste. It is not possible to recycle 100 per cent of waste due to contamination, multi-material composite packaging and some poor-quality materials. These are rejected by recycling sorting facilities because they cannot be recycled in a technically, economically or environmentally feasible way. The circular economy recognises the need for alternative treatment solutions for such non-recyclable waste and by cooperating with partners across the whole value chain, EfW facilities prevent this waste from going to landfill, ensuring the maximum value is extracted.

Logically residual waste should be treated near to where it is generated.

The benefits of proximity and selfsufficiency as set out in DAERA’s Delivering Resource Efficiency Strategy will ensure Northern Ireland will benefit from the investment and job creation in an indigenous integrated waste treatment system. This is particularly pertinent as the focus moves from the pandemic to a ‘green’ economic recovery.

Environment, waste and water report

What is an Integrated Waste Management System?

We are all familiar with the concept of an integrated transport system where all modes of transport, planes, trains, automobiles, cycling and walking networks, work together in an efficient and joined up way. This delivers efficiencies, aims to meets the demand of passengers and maximises the limited space to avoid congestion.

As with transport the waste management system must adapt to a more integrated and sustainable model as society transitions to a low carbon and circular economy model.

An Integrated waste management system is a strategic and sustainable approach to managing the waste we produce. It covers all aspects of the waste hierarchy in an integrated manner, such as waste prevention, source segregation, composting/anaerobic generation/recycling (often collectively referred to as ‘recycling’), energy recovery and disposal with an emphasis on maximizing resource use efficiency.

An integrated waste management system starts with the householder and preventing waste where possible. Proper segregation of unpreventable waste by the householder using a three-bin system will achieve higher recycling rates and ensure only non-recyclable material will end up in the residual ‘black bin’. A suitable mix of infrastructure which recycles waste, recovers energy and other materials from non-recyclable waste and limits landfill disposal provides a sustainable solution which ensures that environmental targets are met.

Such an integrated waste management system is necessary until society becomes a truly circular economy when we have designed out waste and when we are keeping products and materials in use and regenerating natural systems.

arc21, the umbrella waste and resource management body representing six Northern Ireland councils, are developing a residual waste management facility which includes a mechanical biological treatment facility and an EfW facility. This facility, which follows best practice across Europe and the UK, is a significant and necessary investment required to implement a fully functioning integrated waste management system.

W: www.becon.co.uk E: info@becon.co.uk

arc21 residual waste project The need for residual waste infrastructure is set out in the arc21 Waste Management Plan endorsed by its six constituent councils and these proposals pre-empted the Circular Economy objectives by a decade. The Becon project which is being proposed by Indaver is designed to provide a sustainable and cost-effective solution for its residual, largely unrecyclable waste. The project will: •

divert up to 300,000 tonnes of municipal waste from landfill or export every year through both increased recycling and energy recovery;

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accelerate the development of the Circular Economy in Northern Ireland;

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contribute to greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets;

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export 18MW of electricity, enough to power up to 30,000 homes;

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enhance Northern Ireland’s resilience and security of supply while increasing the diversity of energy production;

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enable other decarbonisation projects such as district heating and hydrogen fuel production for transport/ industry use;

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deliver £240 million private sector inward investment, supporting 455 construction jobs (at peak) and 300 direct and indirect jobs when operational;

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generate millions in rates income and revenue share for arc21 councils and leave a significant infrastructure project in public ownership.

EfW can enable a wider circular economy The vision is for a well-functioning circular economy in 2035 is where quality recycling is steadily increasing and landfilling is minimised. At the same time EfW has an essential function, enabling the wider circular economy and as an important renewable energy provider. Increasingly the sector is also contributing to other decarbonisation technologies such as hydrogen production, district heating and supporting other renewable sources.

Through closer co-operation, joined up thinking and targeted investment at all levels across the sector we can aspire to deliver an integrated waste management system which just like transport underpins a modern, efficient and increasingly ‘green’ economy.

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Environment, waste and water report

How to ‘build back better’ Professor of Green Political Economy at Queen’s University Belfast, John Barry, discusses the pandemic, pluralism and tackling the planetary crisis.

Like buses, crises (including the opportunities that can also accompany them) seem to come in threes. First, we have Brexit and now the real possibility of a no-deal Brexit since the landslide election of Boris Johnson’s Conservative party. Second, the Covid19 pandemic and the uneven manner in which governments, populations, businesses, trades unions etc. have responded, have devastated lives, communities and economies. Finally, looming above both of these is the planetary crisis – climate breakdown and the erosion of the life supporting systems of the earth. But not only do we face all three, they are also interrelated in complex and unpredictable ways such that addressing one of them could have impacts on the others. This is the trilemma of the turbulent times we live in. Additionally, this list does not

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include another connected crisis: the rise of right wing populism, xenophobia and ‘post-truth’ politics and ‘fake news’.

Lest you get too depressed too early in reading this, there is some good news.

The good news is that we have seen some progress on green issues. The climate crisis in particular has crept up the political agenda. This can be observed in the rise of social mobilisations such as Extinction Rebellion and the Youth Strike for Climate movements that unexpectedly emerged in the last year. We can also point to the ‘green wave’ which saw support for Green Parties across Europe increase in the 2019 European elections.

Other positives are that Northern Ireland has also achieved almost 50 per cent of its electricity being generated

from renewable energy sources, there is a Climate Change Bill going through the Assembly and the New Decade, New Approach deal has stressed the importance of a ‘just transition’ as we decarbonise our economy and move away from carbon energy.

I want to draw attention to the rise and importance of non-state actors and action, issues and forms of cooperation (existing and potential) organised around responding to the planetary crisis at local and global scales. Too often, the media, academia, think tanks and public discussion focus on the state, corporations/business, large organisations such as churches, trades unions to the neglect of civil society, localised political actors and agency.

These local, non-electoral, non-policy, often more confrontational, oppositional, decentralised and grassroots forms of ‘small p politics’

are now discernible around our planetary calamity.

The ‘simulative green politics’ I am speaking of here is the ‘big P political’ rhetorical and public acceptance that there is a planetary emergency, as evidenced for example in the number of elected chambers from national, to regional and local levels across these islands that have declared ‘climate and ecological emergencies’, but then … nothing.

The response by states to the pandemic, now that is what a real emergency looks like.

Relatedly, think how the unprecedented existential crisis our species faces is presented as a ‘normal’ policy challenge that can and must only be framed and presented within such parameters. However, the planetary emergency is a ‘state of exception’ not something that can be or ought to be shoehorned into the normal policy process and its incremental reformist logic. As if the planet and its nonhuman living and geo-chemical processes cares for ‘Overton windows’ in policy making. This is what it means to ‘listen to the science’ as Thunberg and the Extinction Rebellion movement suggest. To continue in this provocative and radical vein, but remember ‘radical’ simply means getting to the root cause of a problem, and this has been solely lacking in nation-states addressing the global ecological crisis.

Our existing liberal democratic nationstate systems and associated capitalist socio-economic orders, the soft and hard ‘operating systems’ of the state, especially the ‘core state imperative’ of endless GDP economic growth, have now passed the threshold beyond which they are dysfunctional, sub-

optimal and dangerous. Addressing our planetary crisis calls for more radical, structural transformation, not ‘greening’ business as usual.

to the dominance of neoclassical

We have now reached a stage where serious debate is given to Elon Musk’s dreams of colonising Mars, but where someone proposing that we need to transition beyond neoliberal capitalism and liberal democracy are viewed as utopian or misguided, dangerous or ‘politically immature’. More worryingly we have reached a stage where our young people, perhaps most clearly evident in those involved in the Youth Strike for Climate movement, can now more readily imagine the end of the world rather than the end of capitalism.

The climate anxiety and apocalypticism experienced and felt by these young people, who do not have a vote though they do thankfully have a voice outside electoral politics, should bring shame on our generation.

conceptualisation of economics), opens

We live in turbulent times. The UK is not simply exiting the EU, but we as a species are leaving the climatic stability of the ‘1,000 years of grace’ of the geological era known as the Holocene, for the dynamically unstable ‘Anthropocene’. At the same time, turbulence is needed to reimagine economics. Dissent, disagreement and discord should be encouraged. There are at least three reasons for this.

Firstly, any ‘just transition’ to a postcarbon, post-capitalist society will produce ‘winners and losers’, thus necessitating conflict transformation processes within any sustainability transformative process. As such, disagreement needs to be included in any process not marginalised or supressed, as part of effective and democratically legitimacy problem solving.

usual. Normal was the problem.

Secondly, within our thinking about economics and the policy prescriptions that follow from that thinking, more than ever we need pluralism and challenges

Political Economy in the School of

Environment, waste and water report

At the state and ‘big P politics’ level we witness a form of ‘wishful thinking and simulative green politics’, as governments blithely press ahead with ecocidal GDP economic growth, for example, which has long passed its sell-by date as an adequate, never mind ecologically appropriate, goal.

This ‘wishful thinking’ is the dominance of techno-optimistic modes of framing solutions to the climate crisis within mainstream public debate and especially policy thinking within the state, with science fiction like proposals for carbon capture and sequestration or solar radiation management given serious attention, consideration and funding.

“Addressing our planetary crisis calls for more radical, structural transformation, not ‘greening’ business as usual.” economics. Revealing the ideological assumptions underpinning mainstream economics (there is no ideology-free up a long overdue opportunity for debate and discussion between different forms of political economy. We live in democracies after all where we have differences in how the state should operate, so why should it be any different in respect of the economy?

The pandemic as befits a major crisis has made once marginal proposals possible and worthy of serious debate, whether university basic income, a jobs guarantee, nationalisation of parts of the economy or rethinking state finances as suggested by modern monetary theory. We need to maintain and defend this space against the calls for a ‘return to normal’ of the dominance of neoclassical business as

Finally, the oppositional, non-conformist and sometimes outright confrontational character of such non-state actors contain the energy and insight for improvement and societal progress. As George Bernard Shaw astutely commented (and we will forgive him the sexism of his time): “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” Perhaps, just perhaps, with ‘our house on fire’ (Greta Thunberg) it might be time for us to be ‘unreasonable’ and do what is necessary?

John Barry is a Professor of Green History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics and Queens University Belfast.

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Towards a Climate Change Act Environment, waste and water report

The Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs is to gauge public opinion on whether it should aim for net zero carbon emissions by 2050 or the 82 per cent reduction recommended by the UK’s Climate Change Committee (CCC).

The two options form the basis of the public discussion document launched by the Department in December in preparation for the first climate-specific legislation for Northern Ireland.

The consultation was launched around the same time the UK Government’s advisory body responded to the Minister Edwin Poots’s request for an assessment of Northern Ireland’s required contribution to the UK’s net zero carbon by 2050 target.

The CCC has indicated its belief that an 82 per cent reduction in all greenhouse gases in Northern Ireland “represents equivalent effort and a fair contribution to the UK net zero target”.

The two options set out in the consultation are for a: •

•

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Northern Ireland Climate Change Bill setting interim emission reduction targets and a long-term target of net zero emissions in Northern Ireland by 2050 (long-term target does not consider expert climate change advice); or Northern Ireland Climate Change Bill setting interim emission reduction targets and a long-term target for Northern Ireland by 2050, the long-term target is an equitable contribution to achieving UK-wide net zero by 2050 (long-term target considers expert climate change advice).

In Northern Ireland, greenhouse gases have reduced by around 20 per cent since 1990 levels largely driven by progress in the energy sector through the generation of renewable electricity via onshore wind technology. However little progress has been made in the largest emitting areas of agriculture (27 per cent) and transport (23 per cent).

has accepted that there is a climate

Northern Ireland does not have specific climate change legislation; however, the UK Climate Change Act 2008 extends to Northern Ireland, which accounts for around 4.3 per cent of UK GHG emissions.

to the Assembly in October which she

At the beginning of 2020, the New Decade New Approach deal to restore the Northern Ireland and Executive and agreed by all five main parties, pledged to bring forward a Climate Change Act to give environmental targets a strong legal underpinning. In February, the Assembly followed the UK’s decision in 2019 and declared a climate emergency.

open until 1 February.

On 21 July 2020, the Northern Ireland Assembly passed a motion on the introduction of a Climate Change Act within three months. Around the same time Minister Poots had said that officials in his department did not accept the terminology “climate crisis” or “climate emergency”. However, following criticism, the Minister received an apology from his Permanent Secretary for the briefing he was given and Poots

everyone in Northern should have their

crisis.

However, he described the three-month timeframe to introduce legislation as “impossible”, stating that he was committed to action and not words.

In response, Green Party leader Clare Bailey submitted a Climate Change Bill said had cross-party and crosscommunity support.

The Discussion Document on a Northern Ireland Climate Change Bill is

“Climate change is a defining issue of our time on a global and national scale,” said Poots.

“It is vital that Northern Ireland’s climate change legislation is well informed and based on sound evidence and science.

Climate change effects everyone, and say in what climate change legislation for Northern Ireland should look like.

Now is the time to act and it is crucial that we do all that we can to protect our planet and secure a greener cleaner future for both current and future generations to come, and a Northern Ireland Bill is a step in the right direction.”

Adopting a box system will cost ratepayers an extra £90 million per year boxes, so the inevitable knock-on effect of this is shorter collection rounds, more collection vehicles and crew.”

Since Covid-19, changes have been made to the kerbside sort scheme, due to health and safety implications. Paper and card are now co-mingled in the top box, plastic, metals and tetra packs are co-mingled in the middle box and glass in the bottom box.

“The positive impact of a co-mingled collection, including glass for dry recyclates in a wheeled bin, is not fully appreciated. This recycling service option delivers the greatest rates of landfill diversion,” explains Doherty.

“The Welsh model, which uses a box sorting system, is often held up as having the third highest recycling rate in the world. However, in a DEFRA parliamentary committee meeting this year, Daniel Roberts, LARAC West Midlands Representative/Vice Chair/Policy Lead, noted that Wales’ recycling performance is calculated to include recycled material from ‘incinerator bottom ash’, which adds 5.5 to 6 performance points to their figures. If this was done in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, it would put our recycling performance well ahead of target.

“The net cost of the services in Wales has also doubled in 13 years, with the Welsh Government funding the services for 2.5 to three million people, to a tune of £60 to £70 million a year. A similar scheme proposed for Northern Ireland would cost ratepayers £90 million, to introduce the system and fund new infrastructure.”

Doherty refers to the DAERA LAC Municipal Waste Report 2018/19, which confirms that a co-mingled collection including glass, delivers up to nearly 30 per cent of the participating councils’ recycling rates and that Northern

Ireland’s top five recycling councils provide their householders with a comingled recycling service, including glass. In a Lucid Talk survey* conducted across the 11 councils last year, 81 per cent of householders in council areas offering co-mingling with glass, said they were happy with the service and 35 per cent said they’d recycle less if they had to place their glass in a separate caddy.

He advised that we should be consulting with these top performing councils, to facilitate and encourage overarching lessons to be learnt from best practice, in order to help local authorities, move towards the best possible recycling service for their area.

Doherty adds: “It is clear that a kerbside sort system does not deliver either the same volume of recyclates or landfill diversion rates, so councils, ratepayers and the environment will pay the price, if kerbside sort is enforced.

“There are 751,197 households in Northern Ireland, if a co-mingled collection including glass was introduced across the board, it is our estimation that c.138,000 tonnes of dry recycling could be captured. This is nearly 35,000 tonnes more than what was captured in 2018/19 (103,417).”

Environment, waste and water report

Full consideration has not been given to a co-mingled recycling service option, currently the most popular choice of councils in Northern Ireland, for increasing recycling rates of household waste, according to Joseph Doherty, Managing Director of Re-Gen Waste Ltd.

Doherty questions the implication that high-quality recycling is reliant on having materials sorted directly by householders, as opposed to mixed or comingled collections. He says: “Since co-mingling of materials is happening, even in the kerbside sort system, the argument that co-mingling isn’t producing quality materials, is moot.

“And the biggest misconception is, that the kerbside sort system doesn’t contain contamination. Contamination is still present in this collection system; the difference is that it is left in the box and the householder empties it into their residual bin. This material then ends up in landfill at a cost of £120 per tonne, resulting in an increased cost to councils.

“Tens of millions of pounds has been invested in Re-Gen’s plant, which is designed to deal with any level of contamination, in tandem with producing high end products that are being sold to manufacturers in Northern Ireland, or where we can get the best price for the materials, a positive for council budgets and the ratepayer.

“We don’t have to reject any waste from councils and where it is simply impossible to recycle contaminated material, it is passed over to SRF production, where it offsets fossil fuel use in cement kilns.

“Convenience, simplicity, education and value for money, is key to increasing council recycling rates,” he concludes.

T: +44(0)28 3026 5432 E: info@regenwaste.com W: www.regenwaste.com

Moreover, he says: “A kerbside sort system is actually more expensive to deliver on an annual basis than a comingled system. It is my understanding that it takes three times longer and more manpower to empty and sort kerbside

* Research commissioned by Re-Gen Waste Ltd. Polling was carried out by Belfast based polling and market research company LucidTalk.

The project was carried out online for a period of 7 days from 13th March to 20th March 2019.

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Credit: Source IISD RS

Environment, waste and water report

The IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C Co-Chair of the IPCC working group III, Jim Skea, discusses the report on limiting global warming to 1.5oC and the pathways required.

The 2015 Paris Agreement invited the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to provide a special report in 2018 on the impacts of global warming of 1.5oC above pre-industrial levels and the related global greenhouse gas emissions pathways.

Skea suggests a simplification of the reports purpose to that of addressing two key questions: What were the impacts of global warming of 1.5oC? And what were the related greenhouse emission pathways?

The IPCC looked at how the level of global warming impacted and/or the risks associated with the reasons for concern and selected natural, managed and human systems.

Skea explains that the major finding was that a difference of 1.5oC to 2oC was significant. Highlighting an

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example, Skea points to that of tropical corals, where current levels of warming have already seen huge risks. “Even at 1.5oC we could lose most of these corals, but at 2oC they will be virtually all gone,” he states.

Another example is that of the arctic region: “If we were to warm by 1.5oC we would have an ice free arctic about once every century. If we warm by 2oC it will be once every decade. Areas of particular sensitivity in these scenarios are coastal flooding and low latitude fisheries but further knock-ons would occur in crop yields, for example.

Skea’s working group III paid particular attention to the emission pathways question and the transitions consistent with 1.5oC warming.

The IPCC does not have a research function and so its reports are based on

existing research. Skea explains that within the existing research the IPCC found a range of scenarios that were consistent with global warming of 1.5oC, all of which fell within the trend line of global emissions of carbon dioxide shown in Figure 1.

Skea points to two strong messages coming from the research of: •

CO2 emissions need to fall by ~45 per cent by 2030 on the path to limiting global warming by 1.5oC;

•

CO2 emissions need to fall to “net zero” by mid-century to limit global warming to 1.5oC

The IPCC report outlined that emissions from other climate forcers, outside of carbon dioxide, also need to fall, but not to zero.

“Emissions of non-CO2 forcers are also

reduced or limited in pathways limiting global warming to 1.5oC with no or limited overshoot, but they do not reach zero globally,” says Skea, highlighting substantial fall in methane emissions and black carbon emissions, as well as a lowering of nitrous oxide emissions, although not to the same extent.

Figure 1: Global total net CO2 emissions

Environment, waste and water report

The Co-Chair explains that a key point made by the IPCC within the report was that more than one way to limit global warming to 1.5oC. The report identified four illustrative pathways for carbon dioxide emissions, showing the kind of choices that might be faced if limiting warming to that level.

Skea highlights an awareness from many countries that efforts to limit warming should happen in the context of sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty.

Emphasising the absence of a quick fix, Skea points to the reports findings that limiting global warming to 1.5oC “would require rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all systems”.

“There is almost nothing which can be left off the table of you want to limit global warming to 1.5oC. An incremental approach won’t do. It needs to be a big effort,” he says.

Unprecedented change, identified in the report include: •

a range of technologies and behavioural changes;

•

scale up in annual investment in low carbon energy and energy efficiency by factor of five by 2050;

•

renewables supply 70-85 per cent of electricity in 2050;

•

coal declines steeply, ~zero in electricity by 2050;

•

oil and especially gas persist longer – gas use rises by 2050 in some pathways;

•

deep emissions cuts in transport and buildings;

•

changes in land use and urban planning.

Carbon dioxide removal Another important element identified in all pathways that limit global warming to 1.5°C with limited or no overshoot is that they involve the re-use of removal of carbon dioxide (CDR) from the atmosphere. CDR can be used to compensate for residual emissions in difficult sectors such as aviation, heavy

Source: IPCC Special report on global warming of 1.5oC

“There is almost nothing which can be left off the table of you want to limit global warming to 1.5oC. An incremental approach won’t do.

It needs to be a big effort.” industry and freight transport, but also to achieve ‘net negative emissions’.

supply, energy demand or land use and

Skea explains that the report confirms the general understanding that the larger and longer the overshoot, the greater the reliance on CDR will be later in the century. He also highlights that bioenergy with carbon capture and storage feature in most scenarios and are only avoided in a few. This he explains would have implications for land, food and water security, ecoystems and biodiversity.

would impact on other sustainable

how the exercise of these options development goals.

“The clear message was that it was the energy demand measures which had the most positive outcome,” states Skea. “There are most synergies with the sustainable development goals. It is a bit more of a mixed picture on the land side but some of the biggest difficulties actually come on the energy supply side, with some of the

Sustainable development

technologies that would be exercised.

The IPCC took a number of mitigation options, alongside 17 sustainable development goals and look at measures that applied to either energy

demand side really matters if we’re

“There is a clear message that the going to reconcile climate mitigation with sustainable development more broadly.”

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Developing a circular economy isn’t solely to do with behaviour at home.

Environment, waste and water report

“Quite often we only talk about dealing with our territorial emissions but clearly we really need to address what’s happening overseas as well,” he states.

Gulland stresses that the reduction of waste is not only key to ending the emissions behind the climate crisis but is also an opportunity to create sustainable jobs and businesses.

This understanding was key to Scotland’s launch of their circular economy, which began in 2014 with macro-economic research on the opportunities of a circular economy for Scotland and culminated in the Government’s ‘Making Things Last’ strategy in 2016, one of the first circular economy strategies across the globe.

Gulland explains that the strategy laid the groundwork for a comprehensive programme of supports and influences across key sectors, individual businesses, communities, and public sector partners to embed circular economy thinking and enable innovations.

Chief Executive of Zero Waste Scotland, Iain Gulland discusses the challenges and opportunities of the pandemic on Scotland’s progress towards becoming a circular economy.

Outlining some key initiatives on this front, Gulland highlights that Zero Waste Scotland has established a growing level of circular cities and regions across Scotland and explains that many of these are done in partnership with chambers of commerce, creating both an interface with local businesses and providing a platform to facilitate strategic opportunities.

Gulland outlines his belief that the pandemic has highlighted that in the face of a global crisis, business can be done differently, and this is worth noting when thinking about tackling the climate emergency.

Additionally, the publicly funded company has developed Revolve, Scotland’s re-use quality standard with around 150 individual outlets now certified.

The Chief Executive of the Scottish Government- and EU-funded company, set up to lead Scotland to use products and resources responsibly and focusing on where we can have the greatest impact on climate change, says that while the Covid pandemic demands urgency in the short term, the climate emergency and the associated 84

biodiversity emergency remain the greatest challenges of our lifetime.

Gulland identifies overconsumption of the earth’s natural resources as the cause of these challenges, highlighting that 80 per cent of Scotland’s carbon footprint is caused by the vast amount of goods, materials, and services the country produces, consumes and then throws away.

However, he also highlights that over half of these items that become waste are imported from overseas, meaning that the impact of waste on Scotland’s biodiversity, habitat and water security

“It’s an attractive badge to hold, and this is now being rolled out across a wider range of businesses than the notfor-profit third sector where the Revolve standard began, with major charity retailers and now private sector businesses successfully achieving certification,” says Gulland.

“The logo assures customers that they are buying from a great re-use retailer

committed to providing only the highest quality second-hand products and excellent customer service.”

Zero Waste Scotland has invested almost £9 million in around 30 individual businesses to develop new circular economy opportunities and provided business support over 200 individual companies in assessing new business models.

Another example is a facilitated collaboration between a local brewery and bakery, whereby the bakery is making biscuits from the brewery’s spent grains. Gulland sets out that this partnership is not simply the identification of one common opportunity but rather an example of how bringing businesses together collaboratively in cities and regions can create a different dynamic to partnerships.

“Clearly there is an opportunity to tackle common problems but more importantly to identify common opportunities,” he says.

Covid-19 Gulland admits that Covid-19 has been disruptive to the circular economy journey and to the businesses involved but stresses that it has also helped to unearth some opportunities.

Highlighting that the pandemic has helped identify supply chain resilience and weaknesses in relation to re-usable or re-purposed materials. Highlighting the example whereby many breweries in Scotland switched production to hand sanitiser earlier in 2020, Gulland states that it soon became clear that it was in fact bottles that became the critical material in the supply chain, and this brought about interest in re-usable and re-fillable opportunities. Explaining that Zero Waste Scotland have worked with companies to develop a pilot around refillable systems within hospitals over the winter, he adds: “These are the types of examples where people are beginning to think differently about single use and thinking more about how re-fill, re-use and how the circular economy could help plug some of the gaps.”

Reducing waste is just one of the

opportunities identified by Gulland, with another being jobs. As unemployment rises as a result of the pandemic, hitting young people hardest, Gulland sees an opportunity to develop skills and to connect young people eager to learn with businesses looking to recover, around the circular economy.

Scotland has set an ambitious target of a 75 per cent reduction in carbon emissions by 2030 and Gulland believes that knowledge and skills development around the circular economy now will be crucial to future success.

Waste management Discussing the opportunities in waste management, Gulland believes that the Government’s strategy has helped bind two spheres of the circular economy.

The first being businesses and entrepreneurs excited about new circular economy opportunities and the second being waste management, which he says now have a common cause under the strategy.

Outlining that refuse collectors are now more accurately recognised as skilled resource managers, harvesting the valuable materials for a growing circular economy which feeds in to the national and global economy, Gulland says that the pandemic has highlighted the importance of waste material management.

“The challenges over the past months of maintaining our frontline services helped to provide a focus that it wasn’t just health issues that needed to be dealt with but that we had to continue provide the materials into the economy and to ensure that we didn’t lose ground on the circular economy progress we’ve made in terms of material stewardship,” says Gulland.

“It has brought to the fore the existing supply chains and the fragility of some of those supply chains and possibly exposed a lack of resilience in some areas. However, it has allowed us and

government to target those areas where fragility is greatest and build opportunities going forward.”

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Highlighting some examples of early successes, Gulland points to Renewable Parts, a company that refurbishes wind turbine parts, and which alongside a growing wind industry, has seized an opportunity to re-manufacture and repurpose parts which would usually be retained until end of life and then disposed of.

“Clearly there is an opportunity to tackle common problems but more importantly to identify common opportunities.”

Gulland explains that resources have been made available to a number of companies in recent months in this regard to facilitate the building of capacity but also to diversify into new markets and materials.

A further major step for addressing fragilities in the circular economy supply chains is the recent Scottish Government announcement that £70 million is to be made available to local authorities in 2021 to not only reestablish recycling services but to go further and “ensure that we are collecting the materials that we can make the most of in Scotland”.

Key to this will be the establishment of a consistent national household recycling service, which Gulland explains is something that has been in development for some time, recognising that 32 local authorities operating individual systems has not been optimal for circular economy development. Zero Waste Scotland have been working in a national recycling charter, which the Chief Executive believes will provide a roadmap to collection consistency.

Concluding, Gulland looks to the future and outlines the ambition to establish more re-processing infrastructure in Scotland. Pointing to an understanding that for every one job in collection in Scotland, there is potentially a further eight jobs in re-processing, repurposing or re-manufacturing materials back into the economy, he describes this as “a prize that we would very much like to secure”.

“Covid has shown us that we can all do things differently which is exactly what is needed, not just to embed the circular economy but to move on our own ambitions around the climate change and biodiversity emergency,” he adds.

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Meeting Ireland’s climate change challenge John FitzGerald, Chair of the Republic’s Climate Change Advisory Council (CCAC), contextualises the climate change challenge facing the island of Ireland.

Setting the scene, FitzGerald highlights that since around 2000, there has been a disconnect between emissions and national income. That is to say that economic growth has occurred without necessarily increasing emissions. “The real problem is that there has only been a slight fall in emissions over the last decade. Our objective is to cut emissions by 40 per cent by 2030 and get to net zero by 2050. There is a massive challenge there,” the CCAC Chair asserts.

“The target is framed in terms of the cumulative total between 2013 and 2020 and even with Covid, we are not going to meet that target of a 20 per

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cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. We set ourselves a target for 2020 and we’re not going to meet it. We are not on the right path.”

The challenge In 2019, the Irish Government published its Climate Action Plan. Now, the triparty coalition government has increased the ambition for 2030 and set a net zero target for 2050, consistent with EU obligations. As such, the Climate Action Plan, which designed to meet the original targets is no longer sufficient.

Meanwhile, the EU 2030 Climate Target Plan has yet to be legislated for. “It

could shake up the 2030 targets. It represents a major change in policy measures which, if accepted, could alter the policy environment in the Republic and actually make meeting targets slightly easier,” FitzGerald remarks.

To hit the 2030 target, each policy contained within the Climate Action Plan will need to be implemented, while taking into account the “very important role of land use change, sucking carbon out of the atmosphere”.

More will be required, the CCAC Chair contends, to meet the current 2050 goal of an 80 per cent reduction in emissions. “The Climate Action Plan

would get us to the existing 2030 target but then the effectiveness would peter out. There is a lot to do if we are to meet our goals and our obligations in terms of climate change,” he adds.

The policies While acknowledging that the 2019 Climate Action Plan represented a “major leap forward”, FitzGerald advises that the CCAC is “already

in the offshore wind sector. To successfully exploit these opportunities, investment in the necessary infrastructure is essential.

“Infrastructure needs to be put in place to allow renewables to work. When I sat on the Northern Ireland Authority for Energy Regulation, we negotiated the all-Ireland electricity market expecting that the Republic would deliver on the necessary electricity interconnector

many of these investments won’t reduce emissions by 2030 but if we don’t undertake them now, they won’t reduce emissions by 2050 either,” he insists.

Agriculture Within agriculture, FitzGerald maintains that there is an opportunity whereby emissions can be reduced while simultaneously enhancing farm income

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“It looks likely that Great Britain will ban fossil fuel vehicles from 2030 onwards. Northern Ireland could become a dumping ground for dirty vehicles, unless it follows suit.” cautioning that some of the measures may not be sufficient to do achieve the targets”. The first task is to implement the measures in the plan.

The first priority of the CCAC is to provide independent advice to government. As such, one of its initial suggestions was to raise the Carbon Tax. As per Budget 2021, the Carbon Tax is now set at €33.50 per tonne of carbon, rising by between €6 and €7 per annum until 2030, when it will reach €100 per tonne.

“The reason why this is important is because when you tell people to cut their emissions, you won’t get much action; it needs to be profitable. Now, that’s not sufficient to bring about change. But if they’re not going to save money, it’s not going to happen,” FitzGerald observes.

As fuel prices rise, a minimum of onethird of the additional revenue will be required to offset the potentially regressive impact on low-income households. The CCAC Chair maintains that a combination of welfare changes and the retrofitting of social housing will offset any negative impact. “The ESRI’s analysis shows that, actually, the combination is broadly progressive rather than regressive,” he emphasises.

Electricity Significant progress has been made on the decarbonisation of electricity across the island with the accelerated closure of coal- and peat-fired electricity generation plants. Now, there are new opportunities to produce electricity from renewable energy sources, particularly

between Northern Ireland and the Republic. I feel kind of betrayed by the Republic in its failure, so far, to implement that. Now, I think that Northern Ireland provided some obstacles there. We need other changes too, including increased interconnection to France,” FitzGerald comments.

Transport In order to meet its demanding target for electric vehicles, the CCAC Chair contends that it must utilise tax revenue alongside subsidies. The total cost to reach this target, as estimated by the Department of Finance, is around €10 billion. “The State could not support that. So, the tax system needs to change to provide much more encouragement for people to buy electric vehicles,” he says.

The CCAC has also recommended that those who live in rural areas and commute greater distances should be prioritised because “there will be a bigger saving and therefore a bigger return in terms of reduced emissions”.

FitzGerald also emphasises the role of public transport. “A key component of the changes for 2050 is the National Planning Framework. Housing development must be controlled so that it takes place in major urban areas with public and active transport connectivity.

The future lies in public transport rather than people driving to work.

“As a priority, the Government is going to rejig the bus system through the BusConnects programme, alongside Metro Dublin. The problem is, however,

security. “There’s a potential win-win here. On average, farmers in the Republic make nothing out of raising cattle. Farmers in Northern Ireland make nothing out of raising cattle. If they used some of their land to plant trees, to move into forestry biomass, they could make more money and have a more secure stream of income. At the same time, the emissions from methane and nitrates from fertilisers would be reduced,” he argues.

Incentives for such a transition could be delivered in the Republic through the reassessment of Common Agricultural Policy. “Unfortunately in Northern Ireland, I don’t think there’s any plan for the next four years to change the existing legacy regime in terms of the Common Agricultural Policy. In England, there are major changes coming where all compensation for farmers will be allocated in terms of environmental benefits,” the CCAC Chair notes.

Furthermore, the CCAC recommends that the role of farmers in managing carbon stocks be acknowledged.

“Farmers need to be rewarded for sucking carbon out of the atmosphere as an important component of offsetting the damaging emissions from methane from cattle.

“The Government should also introduce measures to significantly reduce nitrogen use by 2030 because nitrogen oxide (NOx) gases are a significant component of Ireland’s emissions. In fact, over one-third of Ireland’s emissions as recorded for EU purposes originate through agriculture.”

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instance, the Republic should ban the sale of coal and peat. However, if you ban it in the Republic and not in the North, there will be massive crossborder trade in coal and peat. If the Carbon Tax reaches €100 per tonne of carbon on heating oil in the Republic, there will be a similar mismatch,” FitzGerald stresses.

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Likewise, If Northern Ireland’s approach does not develop consistent with the approach in Great Britain, it will create additional challenges. “For example, it looks likely that Great Britain will ban fossil fuel vehicles from 2030 onwards.

Northern Ireland could become a dumping ground for dirty vehicles, unless it follows suit. Of course, Northern Ireland has the devolved responsibilities in terms of the environment,” he adds.

“Policy is going to fail unless it is seen to be fair… If people feel that it is unfair; that the burden is falling on people who cannot afford to pay, then there will be major resistance.”

Built environment The Irish Government plans to undertake a major retrofitting project, comprising 500,000 homes, by 2030.

However, FitzGerald notes that unless the Carbon Tax rises, it will not be profitable to do so. “As resources are limited, the Government needs to target buildings which will most benefit from emissions reductions. These tend to be vulnerable households, including those in social housing. The State is the largest landlord and so it has a duty to make those changes, which is going to be very expensive,” he says, adding: “Homes currently heated by coal, oil or peat, which tend to be in rural areas should also be targeted first because gas fired central heating is less damaging in urban areas.”

Overall, high rates of retrofit will not be achieved unless there is low-cost

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finance for households. That is a major obstacle. “You’re talking about households having to spend maybe €50 billion over the next 30 years to retrofit their houses, if we are to get to net zero. That is a massive investment by households. Making this happen efficiently and helping households to do it; the State cannot finance it. The State will have to finance the houses that it does own in terms of social housing.”

Progress Any progress must be made on an allisland basis. The lack of cohesion between the jurisdictions on the island during the Covid-19 pandemic has exposed the vulnerabilities of the climate action strategy.

“Over time, policy in the Republic will be less effective if Northern Ireland’s approach does not develop. For

Likewise, if the Republic bans the sale of coal and peat in the absence of a similar initiative in the North, or if the Carbon Tax reaches €100 per tonne of carbon in the Republic, it could create a significant cross-border trade which circumvents the intention. As such, the rate of change could well be dictated by the climate action laggard among the administrations in Britain and Ireland.

Conclusion In his concluding remarks, FitzGerald asserts that the increased ambition to tackle climate change in the Republic must be matched by the implementation of new measures to drive decarbonisation.

“Even the Climate Action Plan of 2019 isn’t enough. We need to do more in agriculture in terms of reducing the national cattle herd, which wasn’t part of the plan. We need to do more in terms of heating, retrofitting and finding alternative ways to reduce emissions.

We need to more, not just on electric cars, but in other areas of public transport if we are to meet our 2030 target.

“Finally, policy is going to fail unless it is seen to be fair. The just transition is really important and that’s why, in terms of the revenue from the Carbon Tax, when the Minister sets out in his budget what is going to happen, he also sets out where the money is going to go. If people feel that it is unfair, that the burden is falling on people who cannot afford to pay, then there will be major resistance,” he remarks.

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Regional impacts of Covid-19 Research into the regional impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and its associated shutdowns has shown that Northern Ireland was likely to see “a more severe initial impact”, followed by “a faster recovery than the UK average”.

Analysis by the University of Strathclyde’s Fraser of Allender Institute found that Northern Ireland’s economy, when weighted, contracted by 22.5 per cent in quarter two of 2020, before rebounding with a 21.5 per cent growth in quarter three. In comparison, the UK economy, when weighted, shrank by 19.8 per cent in Q2 before growing by 15.6 per cent in Q3.

Notable sector statistics within these overall figures include: accommodation and food services, which suffered Q2 contraction of 130.6 per cent and 85.8 per cent in Northern Ireland and the UK respectively, before bouncing back with Q3 growth rates of 392.8 per cent and 454.5 per cent; and in Northern Ireland, construction shrank by 47.5 per cent in Q2 and grew by 20 per cent in Q3, in

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the UK these figures were 35.8 per cent and 41.9 per cent.

The hits taken by sectors such as manufacturing (26.6 per cent shrinkage in Q2, 19.1 per cent growth in Q3) in Northern Ireland can perhaps be best gauged through the employment impacts in council areas whose economies are most dependent on manufacturing, such as Derry City and Strabane and Mid Ulster. In terms of percentage of 16-64 population claiming unemployment benefit, Derry City and Strabane has the highest rate of all 11 council areas, 7 per cent as of November 2020. This is a slight decrease on the 7.4 per cent recorded in May 2020, when business contraction was its peak. The May 2020 rate was the highest unemployment

rate recorded in the area since February 2015. In February 2020, immediately prior to the outbreak of Covid-19, the area’s rate sat at just 2.9 per cent.

Mid Ulster has similarly suffered; having had an unemployment rate as low as 1.7 per cent as recently as March 2020, this rose to 4.5 per cent in May 2020 and stands at 4.1 per cent as of November 2020. 4.5 per cent is the highest unemployment has been in the region since August 2013.

Claimant counts stood at 6.5 per cent overall for November in Northern Ireland, an increase of 0.8 per cent from September. The lowest rates are in Lisburn and Castlereagh (3.6 per cent) and Fermanagh and Omagh (4 per cent). In Lisburn and Castlereagh, the 3.8 per cent recorded in both May and

Confirmed redundancies by local council area, November 2020 1,400 1,200 1,000 800 600

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400 200 0 Jan

Feb

Ma r

Apr

Ma y

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Antrim and Newtownabbey

Ards and North Down

Arma gh City, Banbridge and Craigavon

Belfast

Causeway Coast and Glens

Derry City a nd Strabane

Fermanagh and Omagh

Lisburn and Castlereagh

Mid and East Antrim

Mid Ulster

Oct

Nov

Newry, Mourne and Down (Source: NISRA)

August 2020 is higher than any rate recorded since January 2005; Fermanagh and Omagh’s 4.5 per cent rate in May 2020 was its highest since April 2014. The 5 per cent recorded in Ards and North Down in May was also its highest rate recorded post-January 2005. Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon’s May 2020 rate of 4.7 per cent had not been since August 2013.

Unsurprisingly, every council area is recording unemployment rates unseen in years. The 4.9 per cent rate recorded

by Mid and East Antrim in May 2020 is higher than any rate recorded since January 2005. Causeway Coast and Glens’ 5.9 per cent May rate is its highest since December 2012, Belfast’s 6.6 per cent rate in May is its highest since March 2014 and Newry, Mourne and Down’s 5.9 per cent in May is higher than any rate recorded since 2005.

The regional effect of Covid-19 can be further interrogated when the redundancy data by council area is examined. In the first two months of 2020, 80 redundancies were confirmed, 60 in Belfast in January and 20 in Causeway Coast and Glens in February. In March alone, that 80 was

“In the first two months of 2020, 80 redundancies were confirmed, 60 in Belfast in January and 20 in Causeway Coast and Glens in February. In March alone, that 80 was tripled to 240.” tripled to 240 (10 in Ards and North Down, 190 in Belfast, 10 in Derry City and Strabane and 20 in Lisburn and Castlereagh). After the total monthly number of redundancies fell again for April, May and June, numbers have begun rising since July. October is the worst month of 2020 for which data is available, with a total of 1,240 confirmed redundancies.

Across the nine councils for which October data is provided (Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon and Mid Ulster), only Derry City and Strabane recorded zero confirmed redundancies for the month. Most notable in October were the redundancies in Ards and North Down, where 90 redundancies

had been confirmed in 2020 prior to October; the area recorded 410 confirmed redundancies in October.

For the year up to November, a total of 4,450 redundancies have been confirmed with 10,720 proposed. The NI Chamber of Commerce Quarterly Economic Survey and Covid-19 Business Impact Tracker report found that 36 per cent of local, smaller firms have closed their operations temporarily during the pandemic and that 38 per cent have had a “significant decrease” in their workforce, signalling the gargantuan work that will be required to return the local economies of Northern Ireland to their pre-pandemic footing.

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Mid South West collaboration lays down plans for a prosperous future How the input of local and central government can help to deliver on the ambitions of the Mid South West Regional Economic Strategy

Pictured, from left, are: Councillor Robert Irvine, Chair of the Mid South West Region Governance Steering Group, Roger Wilson, Chief Executive of Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council, First Minister Arlene Foster MLA, Minister of State for Northern Ireland, Robin Walker MP, Minister for the Economy Diane Dodds MLA, Alison McCullagh, Chief Executive of Fermanagh and Omagh District Council, deputy First Minister Michelle O’Neill MLA, Anthony Tohill, former Chief Executive of Mid Ulster District Council and Councillor Cathal Mallaghan, former Chair of the Mid South West Region Governance Steering Group.

A unique collaboration bringing together three Northern Ireland councils and the private, third level and education sectors has produced a strategy aimed at supercharging economic growth across the region in the coming years.

Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council, Fermanagh and Omagh District Council and Mid Ulster District Council have joined forces to form the Mid South West (MSW) Region with the primary aim of creating the optimum conditions to attract investment and drive economic growth.

To realise this ambition, they have developed a Regional Economic Strategy (RES) which has identified the areas where funding can be most effectively invested to address a range of challenges and ultimately boost

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economic growth opportunities.

Launched at a socially-distanced event at Edge Innovate in Dungannon on 9 September 2020 by First Minister Arlene Foster MLA and deputy First Minister Michelle O’Neill MLA, the strategy was developed following extensive research and analysis of the region’s economy and was informed by engagement with the major employers located in the region.

Governance Steering Group, said. “Its success relies on the continued input from all stakeholders to help keep our growth trajectory on course and to feed back on the needs of businesses operating in an ever-changing world.

Further collboaration from both local and central government will be necessary to help make, shape and support the case for change.

“By working closely together over the next few years we will be able to boost productivity in the Mid South West Region and create more and better jobs.

This region has proved itself to be the engine room of the Northern Ireland economy; our aim is to turbocharge the engine and create a more prosperous future for everyone.”

“The Regional Economic Strategy has been borne out of collaboration across the councils, across sectors and across geographies,” Councillor Robert Irvine, Chair of the Mid South West Region

The strategy identifies challenges and opportunities for the region and sets out four pillars to guide investment and grow the collective economy. The pillars are: future proofing the skills base, enabling

Implementation of the RES will enable the Mid South West Region to leverage financial investment from a range of sources, such as the Growth Deal funding announced recently by the UK Government and Northern Ireland Executive, the PEACE PLUS Programme, the UK Government’s Shared Prosperity Fund, Innovate UK and other central government funding.

The Mid South West Regional Economic Strategy in detail The Regional Economic Strategy sets out a path to grow the economy of the Mid South West Region and Northern Ireland. It was an important initiative when work first began on it in 2018 and it’s even more important now as the region deals with the economic effects of and recovery from the Coronavirus pandemic.

“The strategy has been developed in close consultation with government departments and agencies, Invest

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infrastructure, boosting innovation and digital capacity and building a high performing tourism economy. By focusing on these areas, the overriding goals of increasing productivity, driving business growth, fully realising sectoral strengths and opportunities, creating more and better-paid jobs and ensuring the ongoing internationalisation of MSW can be achieved.

Northern Ireland, Tourism Northern Ireland, skills bodies, business representative groups, educational institutions, universities and, crucially, businesses from a wide range of sectors.”

The key to its success is putting businesses and the MSW economy at the heart of plans to ensure that funding support, whether public or private, is invested in the most responsible and effective manner.

Significant investment will be required to deliver the strategy with a total commitment to date of a quarter of a billion pounds towards a Growth Deal 4

“We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to create an even better place to live, work and invest across the Mid South West Region,” Councillor Irvine adds.

“This co-ordinated, bottom-up approach ensures that we will leave no stone unturned in our pursuit for economic growth and we call upon all stakeholders across all sectors including the public, private and education sectors, to join us in putting a shoulder to the region’s economic wheel.”

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from the UK Government and the Northern Ireland Executive. As previously stated, MSW will also pursue a range of other funding opportunities, such as investment through PEACE PLUS and the Shared Prosperity Fund, to name a few.

The strategy is structured around four intervention pillars: 1. ‘Future Proofing’ the Skills Base 2. Enabling Infrastructure

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3. Boosting Innovation and Digital Capacity 4. Building a High-Performing Tourism Economy The interventions will be geared towards delivering exponential and long-term benefits including: • increasing productivity levels and closing the productivity gap; • driving business growth; • protecting our unique sectoral advantages and realising sectoral opportunities; • creating more, better paid jobs;

“We want to make it a positive moment in our history. the beginning of something transformative which builds on the region’s creativity and innovation.”

• rebalancing the regional economy; • increasing our global impact and underlining the benefits to the Northern Ireland economy.

The MSW pillars ‘Future Proofing’ the Skills Base Future proofing the skills base is becoming ever more important and was a top priority emerging from engagements with businesses during the development of the RES. MSW wants to ensure the requisite skills are available in scale and profile to underpin the region’s ambitions and those of the successful businesses which already exist there.

As well as requiring significant financial investment, the strategy seeks to drive change in four policy areas: • access to labour/lobbying for a differentiated migration policy; • policy changes to ‘off-the-shelf’ apprenticeships; • extending the range of higher-level apprenticeships and degree apprenticeships available in the region; and • a greater focus on shared apprenticeship schemes.

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Enabling Infrastructure Investment in infrastructure is critical to drive economic growth across MSW. Strategic road infrastructure enables businesses in the region to access all areas including ports and distribution points. The strategy has pinpointed where improvements are needed: the Armagh East Link; the A29 Cookstown bypass, the A4 Enniskillen Southern bypass, as well as the development of the A3 Armagh North & West Link, the A29 Dungannon bypass and the A32 Omagh to Enniskillen.

Investment will also be targeted at: • addressing broadband, mobile coverage and reliability; • transforming our high streets to be places of choice for our local communities; • enabling access to available industrial land; • driving investment in electricity supply; and • supporting opportunities for regeneration and site development.

Boosting Innovation and Digital Capacity Advanced manufacturing is one of MSW’s big success stories and has enormous potential. The region is placing its ambitions in this area into the Northern Ireland-wide ‘ecosystem’ and at the centre of what is being discussed within the City/Growth Deals (i.e. the Advanced Manufacturing Innovation Centre in the Belfast Region City Deal and the Centre for Industrial Digitalisation, Robotics and Automation in Derry/Londonderry City Region). The ambition is to create an innovation and skills academy delivered by the South West College in Dungannon. In relation to agri-food, the impact of the strategy is global. The RES will support CAFRE in the development of a Northern Ireland Agri-food Robotics Centre at the Loughry Campus and work in collaboration with AFBI to develop a centre for Agri-Tech Innovation. It will develop agri-food incubation space to support food development for smaller SMEs, an area currently being explored by the Southern Regional College. The strategy also sets out plans to develop a network of Digi-Hubs to support the sector’s growth. In addition to exploring

a number of potential health innovation proposals with the region’s two leading and acute teaching hospitals, MSW is also exploring a new-build Health and Care Centre in Cookstown.

Building a High-Performing Tourism Economy

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The MSW has a host of tourism offerings: the Fermanagh Lakes, the Sperrins, our literary heritage, the cultural significance of Ireland’s oldest city, Armagh, where Patrick established his first church, the Ulster American Folk Park, Marble Arch Caves UNESCO Global Geopark and more besides, including the recent announcement of the commitment to the Game of Thrones Legacy Project.

MSW’s aim is to invest in the development of its tourism product, including cross-border, in actions that stimulate/de-risk and expedite quality hotel investment as well as improving infrastructure for routing/ signposting and visitor engagement.

The future MSW has already engaged extensively with businesses and key sectors, with politicians locally, regionally and nationally, with central government, with education and the wider stakeholder community, and that will continue.

“We will continue to work closely with the other Northern Ireland City/Growth Deal regions to ensure complementarity and to take advantage of any synergies which may exist and continue to welcome the input and guidance of our industry/business base,” Councillor Irvine explains. “We need their continued engagement with this initiative as we move through the next stages in development.

“The collaboration of our three councils to develop the Mid South West Regional Economic Strategy is a model of what can be achieved by people working together for the common good. We are living in truly life-changing times. In years to come, people will look back on 2020 and the Coronavirus pandemic and see it as a challenging experience for us all.

“We want to make it a positive moment in our history. The beginning of something transformative which builds on the region’s creativity and innovation.”

For further information: E: info@midsouthwestregion.org W: midsouthwestregion.org Twitter: @MSW_Region 95

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Skills and regional balance A “missing middle” of those possessing medium level qualifications appears to be one of the most pressing challenges facing each of Northern Ireland’s regions as the economy looks to rebuild at the beginning of a decade rocked by Brexit and Covid-19.

In a 2019 series of sub-regional skills barometers compiled by Ulster University and the Department for the Economy, each of the five sub-regions were found to have a “missing middle”, a lack of those with qualifications between National Qualification Framework (NQF) levels 3-5 forecast to enter the labour market in the decade 2017-2027. In the Belfast area, it said that “most” people in possession of these qualifications proceed onto further study, in the North sub-region (a combination of Derry City and Strabane and Causeway Coast and Glens council areas), 43 per cent of those possessing the qualifications were projected to do the same.

In the South sub-region (Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon and Newry, Mourne and Down), only 26 per cent of

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those so qualified are forecast to enter the labour market, while demand is forecast at 39 per cent. In East (Mid and East Antrim, Antrim and Newtownabbey, Lisburn and Castlereagh and Ards and North Down), demand for NQF levels 3-5 qualified employees is predicted to be 38 per cent, but the rate of those entering the labour market is forecast to be 27 per cent.

found that only 18 per cent of adults here indicated a willingness to do so, compared to the OECD average of 24 per cent and England’s rate of 25 per cent. Commitment to upskilling and retraining will be necessary in the decade to come as an OECD report predicts that the main challenges for Northern Ireland will be digitalisation, demographic change, globalisation, and Brexit.

Similar to Belfast, the West sub-region (Fermanagh and Omagh and Mid Ulster) is predicted to also have a shortage of mid-level qualifications due to those possessing the qualifications progression onto further study.

The OECD skills strategy for Northern Ireland has found that the region “has made significant progress in strengthening its skills and economic performance” in recent years but warns that “the Covid-19 pandemic will likely reverse much of this performance”. The report states that skills policies will be an “essential component” of any exit strategy from the damage wrought by

Compounding this missing middle is an apparent unwillingness within adults in Northern Ireland to participate in lifelong learning. The OECD report

the pandemic. Skills development, it states, “can have a positive impact on the economic recovery, and a resilient and adaptable skills system can help to mitigate economic and social shocks in the future and could help to prepare for challenges posed by megatrends”.

There is hope that the city deals of Belfast (which covers six council areas) and Derry City and Strabane (covering a seventh area) will deliver the type of investment needed to address these imbalances. The Belfast Region City Deal features the City Deal Apprenticeship Programme, a framework to pilot new approaches in priority areas such as digital, manufacturing, health, construction, and tourism sectors. The City Deal also features the Digital Skills Programme, aimed at creating a “pipeline of talent” to address the digital skills shortage in the region.

Similarly, the Derry City and Strabane City Deal features investment in programmes such as the Apprenticeship and Skills Hub, the Skills Growth Fund, the Youth Investment Programme, the Intermediate Labour Market Programme and the Integrated Work and Health Programme. These investments are aimed at increasing the skills capacity and addressing the economic inactivity within the region, with the Apprenticeship and Skills Hub planned as a “one stop shop for targeted investment in apprenticeships and skills focused on key sectors such as digital/IT and advanced manufacturing”.

OECD research has previously found Northern Ireland to be the region of the UK most at-risk in terms of job losses through automation. Manufacturing and agriculture jobs are known to be under an especially grave threat, which does not bode well given that Belfast is the only one of the five sub-regions where the manufacturing sector is not a top five sector for employment. The West sub-region could be hit hardest, with the manufacturing sector the largest employer in the area and agriculture the fifth biggest.

30,000

25,000

20,000

15,000

enterprise and economic development report

In terms of challenges, the OECD found that Northern Ireland “continues to experience high rates of economic inactivity”, with a labour productivity rate that is 17 per cent lower than the UK average, and an economy characterised by large, low value-added sectors and current and projected skills imbalances.

Expansion demand and replacement demand by sub-region, 2017-2027

10,000

5,000

0 Gross demand

Expansion demand Belfast

North

Replacement Filled from labour Net replacement demand ma rket demand South

East

We st

Source: Department for the Economy

“In terms of challenges, the OECD found that Northern Ireland ‘continues to experience high rates of economic inactivity’, with a labour productivity rate that is 17 per cent lower than the UK average, and an economy characterised by large, low value-added sectors and current and projected skills imbalances.”

A large increase in pensioners looks to be a key challenge for the economy to meet, with the share of people aged 65 and over expected to rise from 17 per cent in 2020 to 21 per cent by 2030. Of the local government areas, Causeway Coast and Glens (29 per cent), Ards and North Down (30 per cent) and Fermanagh and Omagh (28 per cent) had rates of workers aged 50 and over higher than the average (26 per cent) in the 2011 Census, meaning they are the areas most under threat in this regard.

In terms of Brexit, as NISRA reported in 2019, 57 per cent of Northern Ireland’s exports go to the EU, 38 per cent to the Republic of Ireland, and this threatens almost all sectors. The OECD writes that the subsequent “economic disruption may be deeply felt” but also that Brexit may “open a number of new positive scenarios” and that “where tighter rules over immigration may create skills pressures for employers, they may also generate better job prospects for adults who are able to develop the skills in demand”.

The OECD’s Skills Strategy contains

within it four key recommendations to strengthen the Northern Ireland skills capacity in the wake of these challenges: reduce the skills imbalance through funding model reforms and a regional approach to attracting skilled migrants; create a culture of lifelong learning by publishing a single strategy for adult learners, establishing a ringfenced skills fund and extending the offering of blended education; transform workplaces to make better use of skills by developing a new strategy for management and leadership capabilities, ensuring sufficient provision of management and leadership programmes within micro and small business and improving information on business support programmes; and strengthening the governance of skills policies by committing minister and decision makers to sustainable funding for skills, increasing co-ordination in skills policy by introducing a capital oversight body and implementing a central skills needs advisory body.

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Simple connections Better return connections which ultimately led to reduced times for buyers searching for suppliers.

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Over 600 organisations across Northern Ireland are now registered on the portal, including Ryobi Aluminium Castings (UK) Ltd.

Picture taken pre Covid-19. (L:R): Christine McGrath, Nathan Montgomery, Ryobi; Anne Donaghy, Chief Executive of Mid and East Antrim Borough Council; and Heather Montgomery, Ryobi.

BuySupplyNI, the online portal aimed at simplifying the process of connecting manufacturing, engineering and construction companies to potential suppliers across Northern Ireland, has proved its worth since its launch in February 2020.

Developed by companies on Mid and East Antrim Borough Council’s Manufacturing Task Force (MTF), the Northern Ireland-wide portal has been linking local buyers and suppliers as part of their business-as-usual operations.

Since June, it has been helping them navigate issues brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic through establishment of a dedicated PPE buy and supply section.

For buyers, the benefits of using the portal include reduced costs of sourcing materials and components, improved procurement speed and efficiency, as well as reduced lead times for delivery.

For suppliers, the benefits include the potential to increase sales, opening direct lines of communication with buyers and developing the capacity to meet current demand and plan for future needs.

Graham Whitehurst, Chair of the MTF,

comments: “Responding to a clear need identified by our Manufacturing Task Force, the BuySupplyNI portal has helped increase the responsiveness of procurement by assisting in the identification of local suppliers. This is just one of a number of initiatives the MTF has developed over the last six months.

“Covid-19 has highlighted the requirement for companies to diversify and forced many industries and businesses to augment their operating models and practices. Part of this has been the rethinking of their supply chain and procurement strategies and in recent months we have seen the portal play a key role in this.”

BuySupplyNI had the flexibility to adapt quickly and proactively during the initial Covid-19 outbreak. It proved itself as a means to link buyers with suppliers to access PPE and products needed to ensure the safety of employees and customers, especially as businesses returned to work.

Featuring dedicated areas where manufacturers and distributors of PPE and other relevant products can register and upload the products they can supply or detail the products they require, BuySupplyNI facilitated instant

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Christine McGrath, the firm’s materials manager, outlines how beneficial the portal has been: “By sourcing materials at a local level, cumbersome and expensive logistics are taken out of the equation and lead times are greatly reduced. Ryobi has benefited by saving time and money in sourcing products through BuySupplyNI, all the while helping local suppliers expand their customer base.”

With supply chains across the world being drastically impacted due to the Covid-19 pandemic, McGrath believes BuySupplyNI has unlimited future potential.

“Whilst we source materials from overseas markets, including the US, Asia and Europe, it will be increasingly important for us as a business to source at a more local level, especially in a post-pandemic and post-Brexit world.

Ryobi is now introducing BuySupplyNI at an internal level and steering our suppliers towards it as well.”

Commenting on the firm’s commitment to the platform, McGrath adds: “Part of our aim is to help support the local economy and that’s something we can achieve with BuySupplyNI.” One such supplier that McGrath has helped to bring on board the portal is leading distributor of industrial maintenance, repair and overhaul products, Brammer. Managing Director Ciarán Hallinan explains how the portal has benefitted them: “BuySupplyNI has allowed us to open up communication channels with organisations that we didn’t know existed, yet alone engaged with before. That, coupled with the ability to provide better insight into our own procurement pipeline for the future, has proven to be very beneficial to us.”

To find out more about BuySupplyNI, visit www.buysupplyni.com.

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Recovering tourism’s momentum Tourism in Northern Ireland was on trend for a record breaking 2020, having breached the £1 billion mark for the first time in 2019, but the Covid-19 pandemic put paid to those hopes. agendaNi analyses how the industry is preparing to bounce back.

Figures released by NISRA in October 2020 showed that tourism in Northern Ireland had, for the first time, generated £1 billion in revenue in 2019. The figures showed that tourism revenue had risen 8 per cent year-on-year, with overnight trips from the Republic of Ireland increasing by 28 per cent and visitor spend from the Republic increasing by 31 per cent. Spend from the Republic has been a particularly notable improvement in tourism performance, having doubled in just three years.

John McGrillen, Chief Executive of Tourism NI, said that the figures,

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viewed in October 2020, were “bittersweet” and that they “show how well the tourism industry was performing before the current crisis”.

Just how much Northern Ireland tourism loses due to the Covid-19 pandemic, of course, remains to be seen, but a recent study published by the Northern Ireland Tourism Alliance estimates the damage done in 2020 to be about £600 million in visitor spend.

It is estimated that the initial lockdown period from March to June resulted in over £300 million in visitor spend being lost to the economy. The £600 million loss estimated is from overnight trips,

while it should be noted that the £1 billion of 2019 does not include daytrip revenue, which is estimated to add between £400–£600 million in a normal year.

The tourism sector accounts for over 65,000 jobs in Northern Ireland, about 10 per cent of jobs in the economy, and 80 per cent of those remained on furlough by the end of August 2020.

Over 40,000 jobs are classified as being at-risk, with this severely impacting coastal communities where tourism is heavily relied upon for the local economy. Adding to the worries of the sector, 79 per cent of businesses within

were found to be ineligible for Executive Grant Schemes and business rates relief by the study published in October 2020.

The Tourism NI-operated scheme was aimed specifically at existing tourism businesses operating in Northern Ireland. Under both schemes, businesses were able to apply for £8,000 grants before the 30 November deadline for applications.

In April, at the height of the pandemic’s first wave, Economy Minister Diane Dodds announced the establishment of a Tourism Recovery Steering Group to “lead the planning and preparations for the recovery of tourism”. While the membership of the group was not specified, it was announced it was that

Support for tourism have also been forthcoming from other corners of government, with Infrastructure Minister Nichola Mallon announcing a £5.7 million support package for Belfast City Airport, City of Derry Airport and the airlines that were operating passenger services in May. Joint-funded by the Executive and the Department for Transport, the package was provided as a means of ensuring that the air bridge between Britain and Northern Ireland remained open. In November, Belfast International Airport announced that it would be closing for several hours per day when no commercial flights were scheduled to take place.

The airport had remained open 24/7 during the period of the first lockdown but estimated that this had cost it “roughly” £65,000 per day.

In its strategy for recovery, published in July 2020, Causeway Coast and Glens Brough Council refers to tourism as a “mainstay” to the local economy, “providing many thousands of jobs and millions of income” to the area. The strategy mentions the possibility of the area’s £72 million Growth Deal providing the “opportunity to develop

new projects which could augment the many points of interest along the Causeway Coastal Route”.

One possibility mooted is the development of cycling tourism, which could suit Northern Ireland’s rural and mountainous terrain and be replicated outside of the borough; cycling tourism has been estimated to be worth an excess of £500 million per annum to Scotland’s economy.

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In the same month, the Executive announced two new schemes, one administered by Tourism NI and the other by Invest NI, aimed at helping businesses mitigate the damage wrought by the pandemic. The Invest NI scheme was designed specifically to contribute to the cost of having an adviser carry out an analysis and strategic review of businesses, with applicants required to be “micro or small to medium enterprise” whose annual turnover is at least £500,000 and who saw their turnover fall by at least 40 per cent between April and June 2020.

it would be led by the Minister, with “representation from key public and private industry stakeholders”, with the group’s work supported by a working group chaired by McGrillen.

In Causeway Coast and Glens’ Tourism Development Document 2015-2020m tourism was said to account for 12 per cent of local employment (4,751 jobs in total) and to be worth £110 million in overnight spend per annum. Given the growth in tourism that has occurred since 2015, especially within the borough that hosted international events such as the Open Championship and contains within it pop culture tourism sites such as Game of Thrones locations, it is fair to assume that these figures had only risen since then.

For now, as the boroughs and Executive seek to facilitate recovery, attention will turn to industry demands such as the removal of air passenger duty for Northern Ireland, the extension of VAT cuts and the development of a retention and development programme for staff in order to get Northern Ireland tourism back to its previously booming position.

“The tourism sector accounts for over 65,000 jobs in Northern Ireland, about 10 per cent of jobs in the economy, and 80 per cent of those remained on furlough by the end of August 2020. Over 40,000 jobs are classified as being at-risk, with this severely impacting coastal communities where tourism is heavily relied upon for the local economy.”

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The economic effects of the Northern Ireland Protocol A research paper published by the Department of the Economy on the economic effects of the Ireland/Northern Ireland Protocol prior to the agreement of the Brexit deal gives the public a view of the roads taken and not taken.

The implementation of the Protocol will have a serious impact on trade in Northern Ireland as it retains the EU’s customs rules and regulatory standards while Britain potentially eschews them, meaning these standards and regulations will now be applied to trade between Britain and Northern Ireland.

Britain accounts for 60 per cent of Northern Ireland’s goods purchases and 43 per cent of its sales, the Republic of Ireland accounts for 14 per cent of purchases and 20 per cent of sales, and the rest of the EU accounts for 14 per cent of both sales and purchases. The Department, whose minister Diane Dodds campaigned for Brexit, notes that the Protocol “will have a potentially significant impact on the purchase of goods from Great Britain” and that the impact on Northern Ireland businesses looking to sell into the British market “is expected to be

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much more contained given the UK Government’s ongoing commitment to unfettered access to the Great Britain market”. Unfettered access, however, does come with the warning that associated fluctuations in price will “have long lasting implications for jobs, consumer choice and prices more generally”.

The three scenarios laid out in the report are: Scenario one, the scenario that has since come to pass, where the UK and EU agree to a free trade agreement, with the Protocol remaining in place, where it is assumed all tariffs are eliminated for modelling purposes, although the paper recognises that “in reality there may be a smaller number of tariffs remaining for ‘at risk’ goods arriving to Northern Ireland from Great Britain”; Scenario two, where the UK would trade with the EU on WTO terms with non-tariff measures only, and the

Protocol would have remained in place, resulting in “more onerous checks and delays relating to customs and regulations on trade flows between the UK and EU/NI”; and Scenario three included the no deal of Scenario two, but examined the consequences of Northern Ireland having to apply all EU customs tariffs on imports from Britain.

Scenario one Under the agreement of a free trade agreement between the UK and the EU, with Northern Ireland remaining under the Protocol as has now come to pass, the analysis finds that there will be a “material adverse long-term impact in the Northern Ireland economy”. GDP will be 1.7 per cent lower than would be otherwise expected and imports from Britain would fall by 5.6 per cent.

Exports to the rest of the world from Northern Ireland, the Republic and EU

15-Year Brexit impacts per scenario Private investment imports from GB Employment CPI Interim exports from GB Rest of world imports Rest of world exports

enterprise and economic development report

Regional exports Regional imports Investment GDP expenditure measure -14 .0 0%

-12 .0 0%

-10 .0 0%

-8.00 %

-6.00 %

NI NIP & UK No D eal (N TM & Fu ll tarrifs)

-4.00 %

-2.00 %

0.00 %

NI NIP & UK No D eal (N TM Only)

2.00 %

4.00 %

6.00 %

NI NIP & UK FTA

(Source: Department for the Economy)

included, would be reduced by 5.3 per cent. Employment levels would fall by 1.1 per cent, which equates to 10,000 jobs based on 2018 employment levels.

Under this new reality, all sectors of the economy are expected to suffer decreases in both gross value added (GVA) and employment numbers. Food and drink is forecast to be the hardest hot sector in this scenario, with a 5.5 per cent reduction in GVA and the loss of 1,200 jobs. Agriculture would also be significantly affected, with GVA falling by just under 5 per cent and total employment numbers also decreasing by just over 4 per cent.

Scenario two The forecast for Scenario two, where the UK and EU’s relations would have reverted to WTO rules with non-tariff measures only, would have seen the Northern Ireland economy “be impacted in broadly the same manner [to Scenario one] albeit more significantly”.

As with the free trade agreement, imports from the rest of the world would have increased, this time by 2.6 per cent, a stat that “highlights the likely reorientation of some supply chains to make up for the reduction in regional imports from Great Britain”.

All sectors would have once again been negatively impacted in terms of both GVA and employment numbers. Again, food and drink and agriculture would

“Under the agreement of a free trade agreement between the UK and the EU, with Northern Ireland remaining under the Protocol, the analysis finds that there will be a “material adverse long-term impact in the Northern Ireland economy”. GDP will be 1.7 per cent lower than would be otherwise expected and imports from Britain would fall by 5.6 per cent.” have been worst affected, with GVA falling in these sectors by 7 per cent and 6 per cent respectively and 3,000 jobs lost between the two sectors.

Overall, 12,300 jobs were projected to be lost in the long term under this scenario.

In this scenario, “it would be reasonable to expect a more onerous system of checks and standards”, which would have disproportionately affected agricultural produce, as well as food and drink products. It is also noted that more onerous trade friction, e.g., 22 per cent rather than the 10 per cent used in the analysis, would have resulted in GDP falling 2.7 per cent in the long term and led to 17,000 less jobs than originally forecast being available.

Scenario three Scenario three, where no deal reached between the UK and the EU would have

led to full tariffs being implemented, would have “significantly increase[d] the negative overall economic impact of a no deal scenario as the GDP impact is increased by approximately 75 per cent”. This scenario would have also meant 23,000 fewer jobs over the long term.

All sectors would once again have been impacted negatively in terms of GVA and employment numbers, again with agriculture and food and drink bearing the brunt. Food and drink would have suffered worst, with GVA falling by over 16 per cent and employment numbers falling by just under 16 per cent.

The Protocol, the report concludes, will “represent a significant shock to the Northern Ireland economy” regardless of the path taken. With Scenario one now chosen, the damage wrought will only become clear over time.

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Declan Lawn: In the spotlight Former investigative journalist and screenwriter of the UK’s biggest TV premiere of 2020, The Salisbury Poisonings, Declan Lawn, speaks to David Whelan about his transition from journalism, the unexpected success of his screen writing debut and his upcoming feature film.

Not expecting Lawn to draw to much of a link between his upbringing in Northern Ireland and his co-writing of the sensational fact-based drama about the poising of a Russian spy in a sleepy English town, which sparked an unprecedented national emergency, I’m surprised when he tells me that his experiences in Northern Ireland heavily shaped his approach.

“Espionage, spooks and secret agents have cast a long shadow over the place

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that we’re [we being Lawn and his writing partner Adam Patterson, also from Northern Ireland] from over last 30 to 40 years and we endeavoured to tell the story of the everyday heroism of those who just got on with it,” explains Lawn. “We were focused on those who kept within the rails rather than those trying to do the de-railing.

“Every scene of the drama is set on the theme of community versus chaos, which was informed by our upbringing in

Northern Ireland. We didn’t tell anyone that when we were writing it because we didn’t want to freak them out, but we knew it.”

Episode one of The Salisbury Poisonings, a three-part series, which aired on BBC1 in June 2020, was watched by some 10 million viewers, making it the biggest new drama across all channels since 2018.

The fact-based programme re-tells the

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story of the 2018 Novichok poisonings of former Russian military intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury, Wiltshire, which grabbed international headlines and sparked a major international diplomatic crisis between the UK and Russia.

Rather than looking at the high-level political impact, The Salisbury Poisonings drama focuses on the local community and offers a unique insight into how ordinary people and public services reacted to the crisis on their doorstep, including heroism as the city became the focus of an unprecedented national emergency.

Lawn admits that there was some surprise when, given the facts of the story, the writers opted not to script a drama focused on spies, secret agents and efforts to catch the “bad guys”.

“Every scene of the drama is set on the theme of community versus chaos, which was informed by our upbringing in Northern Ireland.” study English Literature at Trinity College

“Our sensibility as writers is completely informed by growing up and working in Northern Ireland. Here you have a community dealing with so much trauma and we felt Salisbury was a similar situation in that there was a community traumatised by this huge event but who looked to see how they could support each other and work with each other to get through this. Northern Ireland totally informed our approach.

in Dublin. He’d go on to do a post-grad

“What was really rewarding when the show aired was not just the viewing figures but actually the reaction that the show got as people related to it in different ways.”

“Having never done any sort of

Lawn’s journey to successful screenwriter is far from conventional. In fact, most people still recognise him for his journalism work for the BBC, rather than the sculpting of TV drama.

career in academia. I viewed journalism

Born in Derry to a mother from Galway and father from Donegal, who opted to move across the border, Lawn’s parents’ careers in banking saw him move to Ballymena as he began secondary school. To this day, he hesitates slightly when someone asks him where he’s from, as he remembers his Derry roots but relates most with his time and friendships in Ballymena.

Describing himself as a “writing and reading buff” at school, Lawn chose to

in the same subject, believing his career lay in academia. However, a dabble in journalism with Magill magazine opened new horizons.

Lawn admits that it was in fact his mother who kickstarted his career when she flagged with him a job advertised for a journalist at Spotlight, the BBC’s investigation programme.

broadcasting I applied for the role, never expecting to be called. At that stage I was around 23 and was starting to get a bit claustrophobic about pursuing a as a good way to get my hands dirty and see the world.”

Upon getting the job, Lawn attests to a bit of “imposter syndrome” believing he lacked the skillset and experience required for investigative journalism.

Explaining how he got over this, Lawn says: “It became evident quite quickly to me that it wasn’t a requirement to possess a particular skill that was needed to be successful, rather it was about talking to people. Lifting the phone, knocking doors, which wasn’t always a pleasant experience, and making connections.”

Spotlight Lawn went on to make over 100 Spotlight programmes and up to 30 Panoramas. Asked if he had a standout memory for his time in investigative journalism, he says: “It’s difficult to pick one as I ended up in some bizarre situations with fascinating experiences.

It’s easy to point to the big personal experiences such as going to Iraq shortly after the invasion, or working in Eastern Europe or the Far East but weirdly, I think it is the bread and butter issues that gives me most satisfaction looking back.

“Highlighting those government policies that were hurting people and potentially affecting long-term change was most rewarding. For example, a standout for me was in and around 2011 when we travelled around the country talking to people for a Panorama on disability work impact assessments and very ill people having to interview for their benefits.

That programme sparked a lot of reaction and people were outraged. I remember thinking, this is what journalism is about, raising an issue that is hurting people and potentially influencing change.”

It was in filming for these investigation programmes for the BBC when Lawn met then director/producer and photographer Adam Patterson. The two hit it off on a personal level and became

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Declan Lawn (right) with writing partner Adam Patterson.

“That first day, having never done live broadcasting, the seconds were ticking by as we prepared to go live, and I just had this ‘I can’t do this’ fear. friends. Having learnt of one another’s desire to do something creative, they decided to team up.

They got the ball rolling with a factbased script for short-film set in north Belfast in 2013, with Lawn admitting that the pair were forced to consult books and online tutorials to guide them in something they had never done before.

A good reception from BBC Drama in Northern Ireland saw them expand the short film into a 60-minute pilot programme and further positive feedback saw the pair hook up with

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London-based agent Camille McCurry, herself originally from Dungannon.

At the same time as undertaking his writing, which Lawn admits was more like a hobby than a secure line of work, Lawn had adjusted his career. Following a decade in investigative journalism he had switched to the “originally daunting” position of presenting live radio in the BBC’s Good Morning Ulster and Evening Extra programmes.

“That first day, having never done live broadcasting, the seconds were ticking by as we prepared to go live, and I just

had this ‘I can’t do this’ fear.

Broadcasting for TV is a lot more structured, but radio is free-flowing and more intellectually challenging. However, after stumbling through the first few I grew to love it. The shift work also meant I could write as well. I was working my socks off.”

Some more screen-writing opportunities emerged but Lawn highlights the call for himself and Adam to go into a writer’s room for the series McMafia as the turning point and the basis of “the biggest risk he has ever taken in life”.

Risk “It had come to a point where we had so much work that we had to make a decision about whether we leave our jobs and pursue this. It was a scary decision leaving a BBC job where you were paid every month to a much-less financially secure career. Thankfully, it’s a gamble that’s paid off.”

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Lawn and Patterson were gaining a reputation in London as two former journalists with a keen eye for detail and good research skills. Dancing Ledge productions thought highly enough of their skills that they paid them to travel to Salisbury for a number of weeks to “find anything interesting”.

Much like the making of a Panorama programme, Lawn says that the two former journalists instinctively set about making a list of people they wanted to speak to, organising meetings and knocking doors.

“A lot of people wanted to talk to us because what had happened was a huge seminal experience in their lives. The production company brought our research to the BBC and the BBC gave the greenlight for us to spend another few months researching the story.”

Lawn acknowledges that the BBC’s decision to make the drama was a “brave one” considering that neither Lawn nor Patterson had any previous credentials of writing for TV. “They could see that we’d done great research, but I suppose the risk for them was that we didn’t write it very well.”

In the end, no such concerns were necessary, in fact, such was the BBC’s confidence in Lawn and Patterson’s early work that the pair were made Executive Producers, meaning that they were embedded on set and had input throughout the entire filming.

Outlining the volume of work a project like this entails, Lawn points out that he has some 50 to 60 drafts of each episode. “A lot of people have a say in the final script, but I think it was important that we retained influence throughout. We didn’t have to fight for that, the BBC understood. We had commitments to accurately depict what happened and to those real people who had shared their story with us.”

Asked about the experience of being on set, Lawn says: “It was odd seeing this huge operation and cast working on something we’d concepted and then having actors like Anne-Marie Duff, Annabel Scholey, Rafe Spall reading the dialogue we’d written.

“It was also obvious early on that what we were doing was quite powerful. Some

“We had commitments to accurately depict what happened and to those real people who had shared their story with us.” of the scenes were very moving, mostly because what we were reproducing were true events, and we felt that on set.”

The Salisbury Poisonings was originally scheduled to air on BBC2. However, the decision was taken to upgrade the drama to BBC1 on the basis of early edits. Even then, Lawn says that they did not expect the show to be the blockbuster it became.

Flagging an initial setback, Lawn explains: “The decision to run the show on BBC1 was taken prior to the pandemic but it was originally scheduled to air in March. Covid-19 emerged, and the decision was taken, and rightly so, to delay that because it was felt that a series involving a public health emergency and a resulting death may have been traumatic.”

Feature film Lawn, now based in Belfast and Patterson, based in London, have not rested on their laurels. In October 2020 their short film Rough, won the Best Irish Narrative Short award at the Kerry International Film Festival and early next year they will begin shooting their first feature film.

Chasing Agent Freegard will star James Norton and is another true story, this time about a conman named Robert Hendy-Freegard who masqueraded as an MI5 agent and fooled several people into going underground for fear of assassination by the IRA. Speaking of the film, Lawn says: “The film is slightly historical, given its setting in the late 90s/early 2000s, but it deals with a lot of topics that are being discussed today such as coercive control, manipulation and narcissism.

We’re really happy with the story and we’re almost finished the script in hope that we’ll be on set by March. It’s a very exciting challenge to get behind the camera and direct a film.”

To date, Lawn’s work on the film has been largely uninterrupted by Covid-19, as script development coincided with travel restrictions. Setting out that he usually spends a number of days in London every fortnight, the father of four admits that there have been benefits to a greater general willingness to conduct meetings virtually.

Lawn says that he has never entertained the thought of uprooting his family to London given his own experiences of moving during his school years, preferring to raise them in one location.

He has other commitments too. Now in his 40s he has rekindled his love of hurling. As well as coaching an underage team at Bríd Óg, an amalgamation of his nearby St Brigid’s, Éire Óg, Ardoyne and St Agnes’ GAA clubs, Lawn has also got back involved in playing the sport through the half paced hurling initiative, encouraging people back into the sport.

Another anchor for Lawn in Northern Ireland is the draw of the great outdoors.

The successful screenwriter can be found a handful of times a year in remote Fermanagh wild camping and brushing up on his bush craft.

“We’re very happy here. Adam and I are focu`sed on the upcoming film, but we have a few other projects that we’ve pitched. We’ve discussed a mutual ambition to set a series in Belfast, a special and unique place. I’d like to do a prime-time TV series set here in Belfast and that’s something we’re working towards.”

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Speaker: Alex Maskey Speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly, Alex Maskey MLA, talks to David Whelan about his elevation to the role, his adaptation to a move out of party politics and the impact of Covid-19 on Assembly business.

A party veteran with some 37 years spent in public office, Maskey, who has long been a key player in Sinn Féin’s negotiating teams, admits that taking on the role of the speaker was an “upending” of his usual position in the “cut and thrust of politics”.

The role of Speaker demands political impartiality, which Maskey explains,

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requires a commitment, especially for someone who has worn his party hat for so long.

“Following the reconstitution of the Assembly and the institutions, Michelle O’Neill asked me if I would take on the role if she proposed it and the Assembly endorsed it. I was fully aware that it was a new era that we were moving in to in

January and that there would be significant challenges. I was also aware that the Assembly itself would be under very significant public scrutiny having not sat in over three years,” he says.

“There was little to consider. I was honoured to be asked and I was very keen to support the party and support the project of having a fully functioning

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Assembly and the other institutions. It is a completely different role from wearing the party hat. Independence and impartiality are the two bookends of the role. I had to have complete integrity in undertaking that and Michelle [O’Neill] has given me that responsibility and enabled me to do that.”

The Speaker’s role is multi-faceted, explains Maskey. In his procedural and most visible role, the Speaker chairs plenary sessions of the Assembly while also chairing the business committee, which is responsible for determining Assembly business. In his corporate role, he chairs the Assembly Commission, responsible for the proper provision of property, staff and services. Additionally, he has a representative role, receiving a wide range of guests to the Assembly, broadening public access through the hosting of events and being the external face of the Assembly at events outside of Parliament Buildings.

Procedurally, Maskey describes his role as one of responsibility to ensure that procedures in the Assembly are fit for purpose and function smoothly. With this, he credits the work of a large “engine room” in the Assembly supporting what the public often see on a day-to-day basis, including those staff working in the Speakers Office.

The Assembly Speaker role relies heavily on the advice of its staff and the value of those staff was brought home to Maskey during the early lockdown when he was forced to shield. “The senior staff and the officials who support the Office of the Speaker really came in to their own and helped ensure that the only thing that I wasn’t able to do in that period was to chair the meetings in the Assembly but I was able to take all of the other decisions.”

Wider than the Speaker’s Office, as Chair of the Assembly Commission, Maskey oversees some 350 staff with a significant budget of £40 million per year to run Parliament Buildings, employs staff and “essentially resources the Assembly to carry out its functions of scrutiny and holding the Executive to account”.

“The two key roles of the Assembly are to scrutinise legislation and to hold ministers in the Executive to account.

They are things we take very seriously.

Speaker Alex Maskey marks International Women’s Day on 6 March 2020, which included a debate in the Assembly Chamber with more than 90 young women representing 33 schools and youth organisations.

“I made it clear that whilst the Assembly would pare back some of its role at the time, that we would be returning as quickly as possible to full scrutiny and holding to account.”

The Assembly committees have a hugely important role in this regard and that initial work often manifests itself in the chamber but all of that has to be serviced by staff and officials, who ensure that that work is fully resourced,” he explains.

On his representative role, Maskey expresses a disappointment that Covid restrictions have seen the effective closure of Parliament Buildings to the public, stalling a trend of growing footfall over recent years. “It’s critical that the Assembly engages with the general public which we represent and that the public is given maximum access to the Assembly. That’s been a big disappointment this year but hopefully earlier in the new year we’ll be able to return to some degree of normality.”

Style Maskey believes that little has changed in terms of the Speaker’s duties and functions since John Alderdice took the role following the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, however, he is aware that each Speaker tends to impose their own

personality on the role. Asked to define his style, Maskey says: “I’m not one for standing on ceremony. I suppose I would be a bit more casual than some of the others. I prefer substance over style. I’m not the story and I don’t want the spotlight. That might seem odd to say as a Speaker, but my job is to make sure that the Assembly works as a unit. Yes, the buck has to stop somewhere, and I have to make decisions, but I like to think that I do that in conjunction with, and not over the heads of, the people I am surrounded with. I’m very lucky to have a high level of competence and professionalism within the staff.”

He adds: “Each Speaker has left their mark and something I set out to do was to develop the role to more significant types of engagement with the wider general public. I wouldn’t have any concerns about taking some levels of engagement to the edge because we can be safe and secure and do the normal, but I believe the Assembly has to do a greater level of outreach to the public.

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“The Assembly is still under public probation and so I want to make sure that we engage. We have a leadership role and a job to help reconciliation and therefore it’s quite right that the Assembly will quite often have controversial debates. However, I have insisted from day one that those debates will and must be consistent in respect for each member.

“People will rightly have their own political perspectives, but they must address those in a manner that is respectful. Members have to understand that what they do and how they do it impacts on the wider public perception of how the Assembly might work. In my opinion, we have to win the public confidence that the Assembly is a worthy enough institution to value their support.”

Covid-19 As well as closing the building to the public, Covid-19 has had a significant impact on the daily operations of the Assembly. Maskey explains that at the height of the pandemic it was agreed that the work of the Assembly would be reduced with the removal of all “nonessential business”.

Discussing the move, Maskey says: “I made it very clear as a Speaker on behalf of the Assembly that I have to guard the

role of the Assembly in all of this. I made it clear that whilst the Assembly would pare back some of its role at the time, that we would be returning as quickly as possible to full scrutiny and holding to account. That’s our job to protect the Assembly role and I take that very seriously.”

Maskey states that the Assembly has been steadily moving back to that initial level of accountability and explains that where some work of the Assembly was scaled back, other areas where enhanced in relation to Covid, including the creation of a mechanism that brought Executive ministers before the chamber more often.

“As the Executive moved to daily press conferences, we initiated special committees. This effectively turned the Assembly in to a committee for the purpose of scrutiny and enabled us to bring ministers into the chamber much more often on a dedicated discussion on Covid.”

Maskey also oversaw a number of significant changes to the standing orders. Probably the most radical was the enabling of proxy voting. Current regulations mean that only 22 MLAs are allowed in the chamber at any one time and so change was required to move away from the traditional method of individual members physically entering the aye or no lobbies to cast their votes on motions or legislation. Instead, party whips were enabled to vote on behalf of their members with

their consent on an opt in/out basis.

Members were also enabled to participate in Assembly business through technology, which Maskey describes as a great boost.

However, some criticism has been levelled at the delay in the Assembly’s scrutiny of the restrictions brought forward by the Executive. In early November, the Assembly debated regulations putting in place a three-week partial lockdown just days before the regulations were set to expire, some elements of which had already been repealed. A number of MLAs criticised the situation, which the Executive defended by highlighting that the process was on agreed to by MLAs at the start of the pandemic.

Quizzed about the criticism, Maskey sates: “I would always want legislation to come before the Assembly. These restrictions have a big impact on people’s lives and livelihoods and a lot of personal freedoms were restricted to protect people’s health.

“These things aren’t easy, even in a single party government, and it’s been a learning curve. This Assembly gave the Executive the authority to make regulations and to introduce them and then for them to be retrospectively approved or not. Sometimes if the Executive has been nimble and acted quickly then new regulations are introduced that might render the previous ones redundant.

“A number of Private Members’ Bills are currently live and I’m very pleased that this Assembly, even with its short lifespan, will probably pass more Private Members’ Bills than any previous Assembly.”

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this Assembly, even with its short lifespan, will probably pass more Private Members’ Bills than any previous Assembly,” the Speaker says.

Maskey accepts that the short lifespan of the Assembly, with the next election set for May 2022, is a hinderance. Following the return of the institutions in January 2020, the five main parties, through New Decade, New Approach, committed to passing a lot of legislation, some of which has now been set back. Maskey outlines that every department has been disrupted by efforts to tackle the virus.

The Speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly, and President of the Assembly Branch of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, Alex Maskey MLA, marks Commonwealth Day 2020 in March with music and poetry from music and poetry performances from Australia, the Caribbean and India.

“I would always want legislation to be introduced [to the Assembly] quickly and to be given full scrutiny. It has to be the hallmark for the Assembly. That hasn’t always been able to be done given the nature of this virus which has been a public health crisis and the Executive has had to move fast.

“My job as the Speaker and our job as an Assembly is to hold all of that to account, so if it’s not perfect then I’m on record as engaging with the Executive to ensure that we do treat the Assembly with the full respect that it is entitled to and must have. I would say that has been improving.”

It means that by the time the Bill is coming to the chamber a lot of the issues will have been aired and a lot of evidence will have been built up. That’s important when I’m selecting amendments on the basis of the legal and procedural advice I’m given.

“So, yes, it puts more onus on the Speaker to make sure you’re allowing the right amendments to be tabled against any Bill or in support of it and yes, there is a greater spotlight on the Speaker’s role because the members of the Assembly wouldn’t have had the benefit of a committee session.”

Private Members’ Bills Accelerated passage Within his responsibilities, Maskey has a scrutiny role in relation to the competence of legislation prior to the first and final stages of a Bill. Maskey accepts that there is a greater onus on this role given that every Bill that `has been enacted in the current mandate has done so through the use of accelerated passage, a process which skips the committee stage and can see a Bill pass in as little as 10 days.

“One of the main roles of the committees is that they are able to go through in fine detail all the elements of a Bill. This stage usually throws up questions and offers answers. If the system works well, then the relevant minister will be working with the committee to take on board issues and concerns and seek to address them.

Traditionally, the Northern Ireland Assembly does not have a strong track record in facilitating non-Executive Bills.

Maskey is aware of this and says that he is very pleased that in 2020 the Assembly signed off on an enhanced service for Private Members’ Bills, providing additional staff and resources which he believes will give non-Executive MLAs a much greater opportunity to be able to create and pass legislation.

“There are members who are not chairs of committees or who are not ministers and who might never be, but as a member of a legislative assembly must have an equal right to legislate. What we have done is make the process simpler and increase the support of those MLAs. A number of Private Members’ Bills are currently live and I’m very pleased that

Highlighting that the last year of any Assembly mandate tends to be extremely busy he believes that work ahead of this Assembly will be particularly “frantic”.

“Our job is to manage that as best as we can and in engaging regularly with the Executive, to ensure that we have a legislative programme that will keep us all busy,” he adds.

Brexit and the volume of legislation necessary to mitigate any change will undoubtedly add to the time pressures of the Assembly. “I have no doubt that we will have a tough job but that’s what we are there to do. We will have Brexit implications and there will be a lot of legislation to deal with that,” agrees Maskey. “Additionally, coming out of Covid there will be a greater expectation from the public that we deal with other areas of government policy and address their concerns.”

Future Maskey has no interest in talking about his legacy as Speaker, instead stressing that he is focused on the work committed to under New Decade, New Approach.

Admitting that he still has to pinch himself as a reminder that he is not a party politician at this time, he hints at a return to this role in the future.

“I live in and represent West Belfast and I’m proud and honoured to be able to do that. I’ll do that as long as I’m able and as long as the constituency and my party colleagues want me. However, for now, I’m exclusively focused on what I’m doing in the Assembly at this moment in time. There are not enough days in the week for me to do what I would like to in this role, but I will cram in as much as I possibly can,” he concludes.

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The workings of the Assembly

Director of Parliamentary Services in the Northern Ireland Assembly, Gareth McGrath, discusses the issues that are engaging the Assembly in unprecedented times including a fresh political agreement, Covid-19 and Brexit.

Discussing the resumption of normal business of the Assembly in January 2020, McGrath highlights that all those involved were in the unique position of doing so almost three years into an existing mandate.

The context, he suggests, was also different. The finalisation of the RHI inquiry had triggered a number of recommendations for change to how government works, including the strengthening of the scrutiny role of committees. Additionally, the signing of New Decade, New Approach (NDNA) agreement by all the main parties meant significant change and the Assembly was facing a perceived backlog of Executive business, now with less than 16 months until the end of the current mandate.

McGrath leads the teams of staff who provide advice and support to the Assembly’s Speaker, the committee chairs and individual MLAs, while also managing meetings of the Assembly in both plenary session and in committees.

Additionally, his team have responsibility for Hansard, the authoritative record of the proceedings of the Assembly and McGrath leads on the Assembly’s communication, education and public engagement services.

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Highlighting the changes associated with NDNA, McGrath states that while there is a lot of politics around the agreement and its implementation, his interest lies solely in its impact on the business of the Assembly, rather than the extent to which is has been implemented.

Addressing some of those major changes required and how they are being progressed, McGrath points to a number of proposed reforms to the Petition of Concern (PoC), not least that it should only be used as a last resort. The reforms also suggested a change from the existing requirement of the consent of 30 MLAs to trigger a PoC, to that 30member threshold having to be met by two or more parties. Additionally, it is proposed that the First Minister, deputy First Minister, speaker and deputy speakers would not sign a PoC and that it wouldn’t be used in relation to a member’s conduct as a minister or an MLA. While these changes are likely to be implemented in future, McGrath highlights that currently the Assembly are working from the 1999 version of the PoC in the existing standing orders as reform requires primary legislation at Westminster before the Assembly’s standing orders can be amended.

NDNA also outlined a date for a new Programme for Government by April 2020, however, this has not materialised to date and it covers various aspects of rights, language and identity. In respect of the Assembly, it says that Assembly standing orders will be amended to allow any person to conduct their business in the Assembly through Irish or Ulster Scots.

In relation to committees, the agreement made provision for a number of new committees and this has resulted in the establishment of the ad hoc committee to consider the creation of a Bill of Rights, which has now been operational for a number of months.

Finally, it made provision for opposition arrangements, specifically to enable parties to enter official opposition up to two years following the establishment of the Executive. Additional funding would be made available for an opposition and there would be a review of the statement of entitlements, which was previously agreed under the Fresh Start Agreement.

Covid-19 The resumption of Assembly business, of course, has also been disrupted by the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic. Just

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“We’re expecting a very heavy legislative programme and of course, parliamentary time is a scarce resource. There are only a limited number of days in which the Assembly will be sitting between now and the end of March 2022 and that means that an awful lot of business is going to have to be squeezed into a small amount of time, which would place significant pressures on the Assembly’s committee system.” two months after NDNA was signed, the full impact of the pandemic was being felt.

“From an Assembly perspective, this had a major impact on Assembly business and Plenary business,” explains McGrath. “Most notably, the number of members who can physically participate in Assembly business at any one time has had to be drastically reduced, with only 22 members able to be in the chamber at any one time.

“It’s also had an impact on committee business and committees have had to work hard to implement new ways of working and utilising new technologies to support hybrid committee meetings.”

Underpinning these changes are a new set of temporary standing orders (due to expire in January 2021) to enable things such as proxy voting, remote attendance and decision-making.

The Assembly also established an ad hoc committee on the Covid-19 response and prior to the summer, the Assembly’s business committee turned its focus to Executive business, meaning fewer Assembly questions and fewer adjournment debates.

Brexit The overarching context to the Assembly’s resumption and the impact of Covid-19 on Assembly business is the UK’s exit from the EU, which McGrath explains has been a huge focus of work for the Assembly, particularly in committees, with a significant volume of both primary and secondary legislation in Westminster and the Assembly needing to be processed before the end of the transition period on 31 December 2020.

Speaking prior to 31 December, McGrath says: “All of the devolved legislatures and the UK Parliament are starting to focus on the scrutiny of common frameworks, which are the arrangements to ensure

that there is policy consistency and UKwide approaches that are devolved but until now have had consistency through EU legislation.

legislative programme and of course,

“These common frameworks are needed to protect the functioning of the UK’s internal market and to insure compliance with international obligations and to allow the UK to enter in to new trade agreements and they will be implemented either through legislation or through agreement to co-operate, for example Memorandum of Understandings [MoUs].”

between now and the end of March 2022

McGrath outlines his understanding that there could be as many as 41 common frameworks and currently, the focus is on seven priority frameworks, across a broad range of areas including: hazardous substances, nutrition and health claims, the ETS, company law, radioactive substances, recognition of insolvency proceedings, food and feed safety and hygiene law.

parliamentary time is a scarce resource.

There are only a limited number of days in which the Assembly will be sitting and that means that an awful lot of business is going to have to be squeezed in to a small amount of time, which would place significant pressures on the Assembly’s committee system.”

Additionally, McGrath and his team are focused on building the Assembly’s capacity for the future. Highlighting some ongoing work in this regard, the Director of Parliamentary Services says that his team are putting a lot of time and effort in to building expertise to strengthen the scrutiny capacity to support committees, particularly for research and legislation, while also building the capacity of the Assembly’s research service.

As well as the internal workload, the Assembly also facilitates a large volume of research material and continuous updates through its online presence, including its EU Matters portal.

He also highlights a continuing focus on

Future

publishes information on MLAs and the

transparency, a key element of the business of the Assembly. The Assembly Information Management System (AIMS), the central database which records and procedural business of the Assembly, is

Looking towards the end of the mandate, McGrath says the Assembly is expecting a heavy legislative programme to come forward from the Executive in the last 16 months of the lifetime, something which has been a feature of previous mandates.

However, a significant difference this year is the potentially large volume of nonExecutive business coming forward as well.

key in this regard and McGrath would like to see a greater awareness of the depth and volume of information within this.

Concluding, McGrath also points to work to establish a youth Assembly in 2021.

“For many years, a number of MLAs have been advocating for a youth Assembly, as have a wide range of groups

Currently, the Assembly has 29 proposals for Private Members’ Bills in the system, five of which have been subject to consultation and are now in the public domain.

representing the youth sector. In July of

“So, we’re expecting a very heavy

in the new year.”

2020, the Assembly Commission agreed that a youth-led youth Assembly would be established, and we are working very hard at the moment to establish that early

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All Party Group: Fair Banking and Finance Chair of the recently launched All Party Group (APG) on Fair Banking and Finance, Pat Catney MLA discusses the origin of and potential for the new group established to help manage the financial impact of Covid-19 on Northern Ireland’s economy.

Pat Catney begins by outlining his belief that the All Party Group, officially launched in October 2020, is somewhat unique in its efforts to enable banks and the financial services sector to work closer with businesses, civic groups and government to ensure policy that sustains local enterprises, improves access to financial services and helps build a future economy.

The cross-party group with 15 members from the Northern Ireland Assembly has a remit “to put forward policy recommendations to the government to promote sustainable enterprise, business 114

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growth, and inclusive access to financial services”.

Former UK Prime Minister and the longest serving UK Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown gave the keynote address at the official launch, which also included input from a range of senior figures, including Finance Minister Conor Murphy MLA and Co-Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Fair Banking at Westminster, Kevin Hollinrake MP. The APG on Fair Banking and Finance is coordinated by APG Secretariat Ltd, which provides a secretariat service to the

group. Executive Director Ken Bishop says that the financial impact of Covid-19 has brought a greater necessity for banks and financial services sectors to work closer with businesses, civic groups and government to ensure policy that sustains local enterprises, access to financial services and helps build a future economy.

Stressing the need for innovation in this regard, Bishop suggests the need to explore and develop new financial structures which could support the existing financial system to support “a green and inclusive recovery”.

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Highlighting the job creation potential and economic benefits of Northern Ireland building a green economy, he adds that green economic development will enable Northern Ireland to create a new unique selling point. “The APG is important strategically because it facilitates not only the addressing of concerns on the business and consumer relationships with the banking and financial sector but also a basis for forward thinking and a focus on what can be achieved with collective buy-in.”

The group aims to engage equally with all stakeholders who have an interest in the strength and resilience of SMEs and the financial sector more generally, with an emphasis on providing a platform to bring these voices together to work towards implementing constructive reforms to the commercial lending market.

Catney outlines the importance of ambitions to help create a level playing field between businesses and their lenders, while also protecting the public purse.

“Businesses require a finance and banking system that allows innovation and enterprise to flourish. We’re aiming for a finance sector that truly serves the interests of the businesses that constitute the lifeblood of the economy,” says the MLA. The core aims identified by the group are: •

•

helping manage the financial impact of Covid-19 on Northern Ireland’s economy; promoting fair access to banking and financial services;

•

continuing to strengthen and balance the relationship between relevant groups and the banking/finance industries through collective group workstreams; and

•

encouraging, identifying and supporting the diversification as well as the innovation of private and public finance.

Although still in its infancy, the APG has already achieved a major milestone, securing the extension of the UK Business Banking Resolution Service (BBRS) to Northern Ireland SMEs. Catney says that on top of this, the APG has already started working with local

Officers and Members of the APG on Fair Banking & Finance Group (Chair) Pat Catney, SDLP (Vice-Chair) Rachel Woods Green Party (Treasurer) John Blair, Alliance Party (Secretary) Cara Hunter, SDLP Jim Allister, TUV Clare Bailey, Green Party Paula Bradley, DUP

banks and stakeholders to develop workstreams in collaboration with business communities.

One important workstream underway is the opportunity for Northern Ireland and its banking sector to “demonstrate bold leadership and play a central role in catalysing international action on climate change” ahead of the November 2021 hosting by the UK of the COP26 in Glasgow.

The APG is aiming to develop a set of policy recommendations ahead of COP26 designed to create a regulatory environment “that enables banks to play their part in financing the net-zero” transition, with evidence gathered during this period being made available to all stakeholders while also being presented at the COP26 and to the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Robbie Butler, UUP Jemma Dolan, Sinn Féin Paul Frew, DUP Dolores Kelly, SDLP Maolíosa McHugh, Sinn Féin Sinead McLaughlin, SDLP Mike Nesbitt, UUP Claire Sugden, Independent

Concluding, Catney stresses his desire to ensure that the APG is not simply a “talking shop”. Setting out his belief that the ‘neutral platform’ composition of the APG can ensure the magnification of Northern Ireland’s regional voice at Westminster and more globally, he adds: “Where an individual MLA may struggle to make change, the structure of the APG and its network of connections presents real opportunity to get into the heart of government and ensure that a common purpose approach can be heard and acted upon.”

The Northern Ireland Assembly All-Party Group on Fair Banking and Finance is cross-party group, bound by the rules set out by the Assembly. It does not have statutory powers, official status, or charitable status nor is it funded by Northern Ireland Assembly.

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Allister’s SPAD Bill moves to next stage unionist, nationalist or other, are distinctly unimpressed with what has gone on in Stormont in recent years with not even basic matters such as the keeping of minutes of meetings being addressed.”

Despite Allister’s specific mention of the keeping of minutes, the Consideration Stage saw the removal of a provision that required the maintenance of minutes for all ministerial meetings and of a record of all ministers’ meetings with lobbyists.

The Bill seeks to amend sections seven and eight of the Civil Service (Special Advisers) Act and Article 3 of the Civil Service Commissioners (Northern Ireland) Order 1999, to repeal the Civil Service Commissioners (Amendment) Order (Northern Ireland) 2016, amend section 17 of the Assembly Members (Independent Financial Review and

One year on from its introduction, Traditional

Standards) Act (Northern Ireland) 2011.

Unionist Voice leader Jim Allister’s Bill to

would be the halving of the number of

tighten government functions around special

to four, the nullification of any SPAD

advisers (SPADs) remains under scrutiny,

Stormont Code of Conduct, the creation

having passed through the Assembly’s Consideration Stage in November 2020.

The practical effect of those changes SPADs in the Executive Office, from eight appointment that doesn’t comply with the of a register of interests for ministers and SPADs, the restrictions of SPAD pay to Grade 5 of the Civil Service pay bands and making SPADs subject to the disciplinary code of the Civil Service.

Sinn Féin’s opposition to Allister’s Bill has

The Functions of Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill is the most progressed Private Member’s Bill in the Stormont Assembly. The Bill, which seeks to increase accountability around the recruitment and behaviour of SPADs in the wake of the RHI scandal and the wider tightening of appointments and conduct across the Civil Service, was subject to scrutiny over the course of 2020, with the Assembly sitting into the early hours of the morning to debate its provisions in late November 2020.

Allister is satisfied that his Bill had “emerged relatively unscathed”, saying that he expected the legislation to pass, even if it was to be slightly diluted. The

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amended version of the legislations that has come through the Consideration Stage has the support of the DUP, SDLP, UUP, Green Party and People Before Profit, but is still opposed by Sinn Féin and the Alliance Party.

been rooted in its assertion that the new

Speaking after the late-night scrutiny session, Allister said: “It was always going to be necessary to take the concerns of others on board and seek to build as wide a consensus as possible and I am grateful that members from all sides of the chamber, apart from Sinn Féin, have found merit in at least some of my proposals. There is undoubtedly acknowledgment across the chamber that the people of Northern Ireland, whether

that codes of conduct have “demonstrably

code of conduct for SPADs introduced by Minister of Finance Conor Murphy is sufficient for curbing the excessive power wielded by SPADs that the RHI scandal exposed. Allister has, however, argued failed”; the RHI inquiry found that previous codes relating to both appointments and conduct had not been followed. Allister has consistently argued that only legislation can tackle the issue, with the Bill set to enter the Further Consideration Stage, the penultimate stage of scrutiny, his view could soon be put to the test.

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Scrutiny in the Assembly

Bills receiving accelerated passage 2017–2022

The removal of the committee stage from all of the Bills that have been enacted in the current mandate raises questions around the scrutiny role of the Northern Ireland Assembly, writes David Whelan.

5/5 Budget Bill Private Tenancies (Coronavirus Modification) Bill Budget (No. 2) Bill Executive Committee (Functions) Bill Housing (Amendment) Bill

One of the most stark findings of an inquiry into the heavily flawed Renewable Heat Incentive Scheme, which provoked a three-year absence of the devolved institutions at Stormont, was the absence of meaningful scrutiny on a scheme that would come at a heavy cost to the public purse.

bodies and MLAs are afforded the time to scrutinise each clause and schedule of the Bill, before discussing possible amendments. While the committees have no power to amend the Bill, their reports for the Assembly are often used to inform the wider cohort of MLAs prior to debate in the Assembly.

Worrying then is the realisation that the RHI scheme legislation was afforded more opportunity for scrutiny than any Bill which received Royal Assent and become an Act in the current Assembly 2017-2022 mandate.

Other Bills, not using accelerated passage, are in the pipeline. For example, the Domestic Abuse and Family Proceedings Bill, introduced at the end of March 2020 is awaiting scheduling of its final stage. The Pension Schemes Bill, the Licensing and Registration of Clubs (Amendment) Bill and the Criminal Justice Bill have also been introduced without the requirement for accelerated passage. However, no Bills, Executive or non-Executive, have passed in to Acts without the use of accelerated passage in a mandate that began in 2017.

The RHI scheme’s obvious flaw, that it incentivised some participants to generate more renewable heat than necessary for financial gain, was not identified by Stormont’s scrutiny committee at the time and was passed after only a few minutes of debate in the Assembly.

The fallout of the scheme and subsequent investigations raised questions about the competence of MLAs in their scrutiny of legislation. Pledges were made to do better. However, it is difficult to see how lessons have been learned. RHI should at the very least have signalled a move for MLAs to be more rigorous in their scrutiny of forthcoming legislation. Instead, it appears less is being done given that all five of the Bills (a sixth is awaiting Royal assent) to pass into Acts in the current Assembly mandate, did so through accelerated passage procedure.

Accelerated passage enables a Bill to pass all stages in as little as 10 days and skips the Committee Stage. Usually, the Committee Stage is the opportunity for evidence to be taken from interested

Rationale for the extensive use of accelerated passage in 2020 is obvious.

Not only is there a backlog of necessary Executive legislation following a threeyear hiatus, but Covid-19 has also been cited as a reason for the Executive to rush through legislation. However, it would be remiss to think that the use of accelerated is a new phenomenon. In the short-lived 2016–2017 mandate, the only Bill to pass into an Act was done so through accelerated passage. In the 2011–2016 mandate, almost one-third (18) of the 60 Executive Bills used accelerated passage procedure, while only one of the eight non-Executive Bills did so.

Committees, while largely relied on for scrutiny of legislation, often to a greater extent than should be the case, do not bear sole responsibility for this function.

2016–2017 1/1 Budget (No. 2) Bill

2011–2016 18/60 Executive Bills

1/8 Non-Executive Bills

Each MLA holds a scrutiny role as legislation comes to the Assembly.

Some have suggested that in providing this role, Northern Ireland’s MLAs are hampered by a legislative/representative imbalance. A 2017 study by the journal of legislative studies found that MLAs spent an average of 28 hours per week on constituency work. Variation between parties differed little. The figure is above average than in the likes of the England, Scotland and Wales but is similar to that of TDs in the Republic of Ireland, where there is a recognised preoccupation with constituency work.

A solution, perhaps, to enhancing the scrutiny role of MLAs, is a rebalance of this time, giving greater emphasis to their role in legislative scrutiny.

Whether lessons have been learned from scrutiny oversights in flawed legislation, such as RHI, remains to be seen, however, what is clear is that mechanisms which avoid full scrutiny are still being deployed.

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In defence of the Assembly Politics Professor at the University of Liverpool, Jonathan Tonge, highlights how, despite being suspended for some 40 per cent of its lifespan and only being uninterrupted for two terms, public support for the institutions has held remarkably firm.

As a legislator, the Northern Ireland Assembly has not been as bad as is often portrayed, states Tonge, who highlights that the public in Northern Ireland has stayed faithful to the idea of devolved power-sharing and its principles.

This, he says, is despite the Assembly being suspended for around 40 per cent of the time since its establishment in December 1999 and only two of the Assembly’s six terms being free from suspensions.

Tonge says that a case for a defence of the Assembly lies in the volume of legislation it has passed, despite the

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many hiatuses. “When the Assembly has been sitting it has been quite good at passing legislation, particularly for a part-time Assembly,” Tonge states.

The academic points to the passing of 70 Bills in the 2007–11 mandate and 67 Bills in the 2011–2016 mandate, the only mandates to be uninterrupted. The total of 137 Bills passed over this period falls only slightly short of the 153 Bills passed by the Scottish Parliament over the same period and is well above the 51 Bills passed by the National Assembly for Wales.

Tonge does acknowledge that such figures fail to differentiate between the

necessary legislation, such as Budget Bills, and what he describes as “pioneering legislation”. Scotland, for example, has produced a range of legislation that has been copied by Westminster, whereas Northern Ireland, with the exception of the plastic bag levy, cannot claim similar. “I would argue though, that I don’t think it was the job of the Assembly to produce pioneering legislation. It was to produce governance and to park a deadly conflict within an area where people could at least cooperate. To that extent, given the huge constitutional differences that there are, we should give credit where it is due.”

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Tonge notes the findings of the Economic and Social Research Council’s General Election 2019 study that only 27 per cent of the Northern Ireland electorate believed the parties have cooperated well in the Assembly and the Executive.

However, party cooperation perceptions, he highlights, have not been reflected in the public’s faith in the institutions.

Analysing General Election 2017 and 2019 studies, Tonge and his colleagues found that when posing the question to electors of whether the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive should be restored, the high 70 per cent who ‘strongly agreed’ or ‘agreed’ in 2017 actually rose to 81 per cent in 2019.

“Even almost three years into the latest

Power-sharing principles The 2019 study also looked to gauge the public’s view on the principles of powersharing and posed the question of whether legislation should require support from a majority of unionist and nationalist assembly members.

Explaining the findings, Tonge says: “Although the figures are not as extensively in support as that of restoration, there was an acceptance across unionism (59 per cent) and nationalism (62 per cent) that this should be the case. Even a majority of the neithers (54 per cent), who typically don’t like the binary framework, agreed. The use of cross-community consent requirements is actually rare in the Assembly but the data shows that there

PoCs were tabled across 31 Bills in the 2011-2016 mandate, with 84 per cent of these used across just 14 items of legislation (mostly welfare legislation). Of these the DUP accounted for 86 (82 of which they tabled alone, as the only party with the numbers to do so), Sinn Féin and the SDLP each tabled 29 and the UUP tabled two.

The January 2020 New Decade, New Approach deal explicitly stated the need for PoC reform and the parties co-signed the agreement stating: “The parties will publicly commit to tabling or supporting PoCs only in the most exceptional circumstances and as a last resort.”

The academic highlights some existing concerns around the use of similar language in agreements of the past,

“The perception that Northern Assembly is an institution that is paralysed by cross-community requirements does not stack up. The vast majority of Assembly divisions from 1999 through to the current Assembly have been done by simple majority, so this is not an Assembly that is paralysed but actually one that gets on with the job of legislating.” suspension, what we saw was a rise in the number of people who wanted the institutions restored. What was also clear was that this was a broad consensus across each section of Northern Ireland’s population with 89 per cent of unionists, 83 per cent of nationalists and 80 per cent of neithers (40 per cent of the electorate), all agreeing that they should be restored in 2019.”

Tonge highlights that in both studies of the 2017 and 2019 elections, Assembly and Executive restoration was in the top four most important issues for electors.

“The study found that Brexit, the NHS, constitutional issues and the Assembly’s restoration were by some distance the leading issues for people leading up to the 2019 General Election,” he states.

“What that tells us is that people want devolution. They might be cynical about party cooperation within the institutions but that didn’t drain the support.”

is little opposition to the principle,” explains Tonge.

Examining the principles of powersharing in Northern Ireland more closely, Tonge highlights that around 81 per cent (660) of Assembly division votes were done by simple majority between 1999–2000 to 2020–21 compared to 145 by cross-community division and 10 by parallel consent.

He adds: “The perception that Northern Assembly is an institution that is paralysed by cross-community requirements does not stack up. The vast majority of Assembly divisions from 1999 through to the current Assembly have been done by simple majority, so this is not an Assembly that is paralysed but actually one that gets on with the job of legislating.”

Looking at one of the biggest criticisms levelled at the workings of the Assembly, use (or misuse) of the Petition of Concern (PoC), Tonge outlines that 115

such as the Fresh Start Agreement, where little change was achieved.

However, he believes that the changed Assembly make-up, including the reduction of seats from 108 to 90, the absence of a unionist majority for the first time and seat increases for the Alliance Party and SDLP, have all but ended any potential use of PoCs. “The NDNA agreement rules out the use of the PoC by a single party, meaning that at least two would have to come together but that is now a reality anyway because no party now has enough MLAs to meet the threshold on their own. I think the PoC is a problem that was of the past and will be less of a problem of the future,” states Tonge.

Highlighting the evolution of the Assembly in terms of the divisive legislation it deals with, the academic points to a pre-2007 dominance of conflict/legacy issues, which he describes as first phase. With the major exception of a continued inability to deal

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public support of the institutions has remained high, Tonge highlights that the stark alternative is direct rule. Only around 9 per cent of those surveyed in the 2019 General Election wanted Direct Rule to return.

“I believe the memory of direct rule contributes to why those figures favouring the restoration of the Executive and Assembly are so high.” satisfactorily with families of victims, second phase (post-2007) are of a more cultural or social nature, such as abortion, same sex marriage and welfare reform. And RHI was simply botched policy, whilst Brexit is both a sovereignty and a cultural issue.

He says: “I don’t underestimate the difficulties of these more cultural divisions, the Irish Language Act being a prime example, but they are of a different order than those pre-2007 challenges.

We shouldn’t lump these all together and say that it has been the same type of issues that have been responsible for the Assembly problems. Those issues have been very different in nature from Assembly to Assembly.”

The role of the MLA A further defence of the Assembly issued

by Tonge is the work of MLAs, even when the Assembly is not sitting. Tonge points to work carried out by his colleague Seán Haughey for the Journal of Legislative Studies in 2017 which shows that MLAs spend an average of

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28 hours per week on constituency work, a figure which compares equally well with similar self-reported figures for Welsh AMs and Scottish MSPs. However, Tonge is also aware of arguments that MLAs in Northern Ireland spend too much time on constituency work and that a better balance should be struck between constituency work and the legislative scrutiny work of the Assembly.

Tonge states that the findings do not show any clear trend around the marginality of an MLA and the work they do in their constituency, meaning that no evidence exists to suggest that an MLA who narrowly won their seat or who would not necessarily be deemed as safe, come the time of re-election, has different patterns to those elected by a large majority. Similarly, age does not tend to be a defining factor, with Tonge highlighting that the data shows that the oldest MLAs were doing as much constituency work as the youngest.

Turning back to the question of why

Outlining what Direct Rule actually meant for governance in Northern Ireland, Tonge explains that historically, Northern Ireland-only legislation passed at Westminster was done so overwhelmingly via Orders-in-Council, which offered no room for amendment and could only be approved or rejected.

It also meant that there was no committee or report stages for scrutiny and the result was that around 20 Orders-in-Council were passed on average each year, half without any opportunity for debate. Of those that were debated, the usual time limit for discussion was 1.5 hours.

“In a typical year, the Commons spent 21 hours debating Northern Ireland matters and this figure was nine hours for the House of Lords,” adds Tonge. “I believe the memory of direct rule contributes to why those figures favouring the restoration of the Executive and Assembly are so high.”

Concluding, Tonge says that while he understands the cynicism that often surrounds the Assembly and Executive in Northern Ireland, he believes there is a stronger case for the Assembly to be made than is commonly done so, even if the Executive is subject to unsavoury episodic wrangling or even collapse.

“That’s not to gloss over the like of RHI or the botched introduction of Covid-19 regulations, for example, but to argue the case for a realistic portrayal of the Assembly and how it has operated in the last 20 years, amidst the political grandstanding.

“Contrary to regular vox-pops, public support for the devolved institutions was never lost. The fact is that the Assembly has been quite good at passing legislation and MLAs do a lot of constituency work.

“Changes to the institutional rules, I’d argue, are less important than party attitudinal changes but scrutiny performance has been underwhelming at times, as RHI indicated, and changes are needed.”

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Collective is the corrective

(L:R) Declan Kearney, Sinn Féin; Claire Hanna, SDLP; Gerry Carroll, People Before Profit; Stephen Farry, Alliance Party; Rowan Tunnicliffe, Green Party; and Steve Aiken, UUP.

Collective bargaining in Northern Ireland has been in gradual decline for some time and this trend needs to be reversed, argues the ICTU’s John O’Farrell.

On 29 March 2017, the day Theresa May triggered Article 50 and marked as “the moment for the country to come together”, NIC-ICTU hosted a policy conference on the theme of ‘Workers must not pay the price of Brexit’. Among the activists and experts was a panel of politicians from every political party in Northern Ireland, with one exception.

Prominent politicians channelled their party views on Brexit and all, without exception, made a commitment to support the mirroring to Northern Ireland of any EU Directives which would improve workers’ rights.

It so happens that such a Directive is under discussion in Brussels right now.

“The EU Commission adopted in October a new framework in the form of a Directive to ensure that workers in all member states are protected by adequate minimum wages irrespective if they are applying a system of statutory minimum wages or collective agreements,” reports the Brussels Times.

employer(s) concerning matters to do with their pay and other terms and conditions of employment.

There is a connection between low wages and bad terms and conditions in places where collective bargaining is the exception, rather than the norm.

Compare and contrast the quality of working lives in countries with wide reaching collective bargaining arrangements and those without. The proportion of workers (even those not in unions) with collective bargaining coverage stands at over 90 per cent in countries like Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Slovenia and Sweden. It’s at below 40 per cent in less favourable states such as Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, Lithuania, Latvia, and (need we add?) the UK.

“All member states are required to promote collective bargaining on wage setting and to report annually to the Commission. The idea is that the Directive will promote transparency and enable comparisons by country which might lead to some kind of conversion and a more predictable wage setting.”

Wherever the proportion of workers in unions that are covered by collective bargaining is higher, the issues of low pay and indecent work are not as acute.

As a recent NERI blog on low pay notes: “This is not a new phenomena. Indeed, it has got precious little to do with the Covid-19 crisis. Rather it has more to do with our longer-term failure to take seriously the issue of low pay and ensure that the returns from work are decent and can sustain the livelihoods of workers.”

Collective bargaining is the conduct of negotiations between workers who freely choose to be represented by an independent trade union and their

Trade union density in Northern Ireland was 35.7 per cent in 2008. In 2016 the figure had fallen to 29.1 per cent. In the public sector density was 61 per cent in

2016, but was as little as 15.5 per cent in the private sector in 2016. Collective bargaining in Northern Ireland has been in gradual decline for some time and this trend needs to be reversed.

The high-road economic model that exists in many European countries shows that collective bargaining is consistent with high levels of productivity and strong economic performance.

There is no intrinsic tension between collective bargaining and economic efficiency. Alongside this, international research shows that collective bargaining strength is positively associated with a higher labour share and with lower economic inequality.

That is why collective bargaining is such a key aspect of the ICTU’s cross-border campaign, ‘No Going Back’, alongside our call for a permanent engagement forum involving unions, employers, and state agencies, such as that created by Economy Minister Diane Dodds at the onset of Covid-19 to advise and support the Executive to protect workers and the economy. Such a forum is needed beyond times of crisis to ensure a fair and prosperous economy for Northern Ireland.

Another vow made by our political class was in New Decade New Approach. On page 44 under the heading, Appendix 2 – Programme for Government, Workers’ Rights Section X states: “There will be an enhanced focus within the Programme for Government on creating good jobs and protecting workers’ rights. The parties agree that access to good jobs, where workers have a voice that provides a level of autonomy, a decent income, security of tenure, satisfying work in the right quantities and decent working conditions, should be integral to public policy given how this contributes to better health and wellbeing by tackling inequalities, building self-efficacy and combating poverty.”

We couldn’t have put it better ourselves.

It’s not even that radical, but the norm in successful European states and regions.

It’s time for a new paradigm between our state, our enterprises, our services and those who deliver them.

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Political Platform Matthew Oâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Toole MLA Former Downing Street advisor and Westminster commentator Matthew Oâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Toole was co-opted into the South Belfast Assembly seat to replace the Westminster-bound Claire Hanna. The Downpatrick-raised MLA is a nephew of former SDLP leader Mark Durkan and has pointed to Brexit frustrations as his main reason for joining party politics.

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Outline your background /

Downpatrick. But until I entered the

Treasury and ultimately to Number 10

career to date

Assembly, virtually all of my career had

Downing Street, where I led on Brexit

been in London, where I started as a

communications before and after the

My background is slightly

journalist, then in my late twenties

2016 referendum. It was ultimately my

unconventional for a local politician. I

became a Whitehall press officer. My

profound frustration at the impact of

was born in Belfast and grew up in

Civil Service career took me to the

Brexit on the island of Ireland that led me

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to leave the Civil Service in 2017 and starting to write and talk about the issues at stake. In addition to which, for the last few years, until I joined the Assembly, I’ve had a role at a communications consultancy in the City of London.

What inspired you to get into politics?

I had never really planned to be in party politics. It was the jolt of Brexit, which I happened to be in the middle of, that prompted me to first leave a career in the Civil Service and then develop a profile writing and commentating on Brexit and its effects on Northern Ireland, and relationships on these islands more broadly. And in a sense that was the thing that inspired me to accept the chance to put my name forward to join the Assembly, an abiding belief in a pluralist vision of our future.

Who do you admire in politics or public life / political role models?

John Hume remains not only the outstanding political figure in modern Ireland, but the moral and intellectual one too. One of Hume’s closest advisors, Mark Durkan, is my uncle, and Mark’s integrity and breadth of intellect and insight are inspiring. Going back in history, a mini political hero is the remarkable Al Smith, former Governor of New York, who completely overhauled his state’s government, opposed prohibition and helped inspire Roosevelt’s New Deal.

“It was ultimately my profound frustration at the impact of Brexit on the island of Ireland that led me to leave the Civil Service in 2017 and starting to write and talk about the issues at stake.”

What are your key priorities for your constituency / what are the key issues facing your constituency?

Like everywhere else, South Belfast is facing huge public health and economic challenges from Covid-19. We want to recover quickly, especially given our high volume of hospitality and independent retail, but we also want to ‘build back better’ to use what is becoming cliché but is still essential. That means accelerating the move towards a more liveable city, whether that means more bike lanes, quieter streets or greater investment in public transport (including the extension of Glider to the south of

the city). We also have acute housing challenges in the constituency, ranging from social housing pressure to growing unaffordability.

What are your interests outside work?

It’s hard to remember a pre-Covid age when ‘outside work’ had more potential meaning. I read a lot, and though I don’t write as much anymore, I enjoy doing occasional book reviews for The Irish Times. I enjoy watching football, and hope when the world returns to normal, I can go to the theatre again.

What drew you to the SDLP? First of all, I’m a social democrat. My politics are firmly in the tradition of the European centre-left. And my view of the constitution, and how we remove the border in Ireland, is grounded in a belief in the need for true reconciliation inside Northern Ireland, and across both islands.

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Covid-19: Mental health impact Newly appointed interim Mental Health Champion for Northern Ireland Siobhán O’Neill highlights the longer lasting mental health impacts of Covid-19 and says that now is a good time to think about what our pandemic story will be.

It has certainly been quite the year for mental health in Northern Ireland. In January 2020 the New Decade, New Approach agreement saw the restoration of the Executive, and brought the promise of a Mental Health Action Plan for Northern Ireland. The Plan was delivered by the Department of Health in May and included various commitments to tackle issues such as suicide prevention, crisis intervention and the development of a 10-year strategy to overhaul mental health services.

One of the actions in the plan was the establishment of a Mental Health Champion to “to champion and enhance mental health in all aspects of public life”. In July I was asked to adopt the role on an interim basis until the appointment process was complete.

I am excited by the opportunity to build on my 20-year career as an academic, to create impact and meaningful change for people across Northern Ireland. Since then I have been working with the support of a small highly motivated team to establish the Mental Health Champion’s Office.

The role coincided with the publication of the first waves of data on the impact of the Covid pandemic on the mental health of the population.

As predicted, large proportions of the population experienced significant acute

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stress and anxiety as we entered the first lockdown. Whilst the majority of people returned to pre-lockdown states of contentment, evidence was emerging of the potentially longer lasting mental health impacts on particular groups.

These groups include people who had been infected with Covid-19, children and young people, people living in poverty and deprivation and people with existing mental illness or risk factors.

The pandemic has lasted longer than many had hoped, and several outstanding issues require attention to protect vulnerable populations. Many people in care homes have been unable to have visits from loved ones. Several key health services, and services for people with disabilities continue to be suspended. Children and young people face uncertainty and stress about their examinations. Lockdown and restrictions have brought significant stress and pressure to whole communities, and the pressure is being felt acutely across the business and hospitality sectors. Lost jobs and businesses are a significant cause of poor mental health and it is vital that we work to reduce the economic impact, and give back, by supporting our local businesses.

Many are facing a more isolated and lonely winter and we all need to redouble our efforts to protect our wellbeing. We should retain those social connections with loved ones and build those in as an important element of our daily lives.

Physical activity is also essential, and it is important that we make time for any form of movement, such as walking, wheeling, or even dancing, to rebalance and reduce the effects of stress. We should consider how we can use this time to learn or give back in some way, and increase our focus on the things that are good in our own lives, whilst reducing our exposure to unhelpful media.

There is much room for hope, so now is a good time to think about what our pandemic story will be, what will get us through and what we will most appreciate when the time comes that we can mix again safely.

Professor Siobhán O’Neill is on 80 per cent secondment from her current post as Professor of Mental Health Sciences at Ulster University.

“Lost jobs and businesses are a significant cause of poor mental health and it is vital that we work to reduce the economic impact, and give back, by supporting our local businesses.”

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