Mervyn Storey: I welcome the Minister’s statement and the challenge that he has issued to local government to play its part in ensuring prudence in the financial management of Northern Ireland plc. I also welcome the establishment of the capital realisation task force and the performance and efficiency delivery unit, and look forward to engaging with those units to identify further resources that can be...
Mervyn Storey: Can the Minister indicate what the likely level of local taxation would have been in 2008-09, if direct rule had continued?
Mervyn Storey: I welcome the opportunity for the Assembly to debate the health and growth potential of Northern Ireland’s economy, and I support the amendment. I concur with the Member for East Antrim Mr Beggs that it is crucial for the Assembly to ensure that competitiveness is at the heart of fiscal policies. Every time I speak on this issue, it is in the full knowledge that some of us lack the relevant...
Mervyn Storey: I support the motion, and I concur with the comments made by the Member for Fermanagh and South Tyrone Mr Gallagher about the number of applications for wind farms that are currently in the system. Some have a particular importance and relevance for my own constituency of North Antrim. I concur also with the remarks of my colleague the Member for East Belfast Mr Newton with regard to the...
Mervyn Storey: 7. asked the Minister for Employment and Learning to detail the remaining issues that surrounded the completion of arrangements for the management of the new Job Ready scheme. (AQO 459/08)
Mervyn Storey: Although I understand what the Minister has said, I have been listening to the disquiet among the private training providers who have been hitched to contracts for Training for Success and its Job Ready component, and they still await definitive guidelines from the Department for Employment and Learning. Are those training providers being unreasonable in requesting those guidelines from the...
Mervyn Storey: I welcome today’s statement and particularly the Minister’s reference, in his opening remarks, to the late Joey Dunlop, who came from my constituency. On page 38 of the draft strategy, there is a reference to the: “reduction in the number of district councils from 26 to seven by 2009.” Will the Minister confirm that that is a printing error rather than a DCAL policy statement? Will he...
Mervyn Storey: I beg to move That this Assembly takes note of the first Report of the Committee for Finance and Personnel on Workplace 2010 and the Location of Public Sector Jobs, and the response to the Report by the Department of Finance and Personnel. At its first meeting on 16 May 2007, the Committee for Finance and Personnel agreed to include in its work programme up to the summer recess an initial...
Mervyn Storey: Will the Member give way?
Mervyn Storey: Will the First Minister inform the House who approved the current funding package, and has any further funding been agreed?
Mervyn Storey: 8. asked the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister what plans were in place to bring forward a new blueprint for the victims sector. (AQO 315/08)
Mervyn Storey: The Department responded by explaining that work is ongoing to develop a flexibility model for the “best and final offer” stage of the procurement that will not only secure a competitive price but also demonstrate best value for money and appropriate flexibility.
Mervyn Storey: Many people turn to the co-ownership scheme because of the lack of affordable social housing from newbuilds, housing associations and Housing Executive stock. What plans are there to improve the scheme and the resources that it is allocated?
Mervyn Storey: 14. asked the Minister for Regional Development if he will make a statement on the work carried out by his department to enhance the Belfast to Dublin rail link. (AQO 247/08)
Mervyn Storey: Given the fact that the Member is admitting that he was in the civil rights movement and was engaged in other things, would he tell the House if he was ever a member of the IRA?
Mervyn Storey: Youse bombed it.
Mervyn Storey: In this House.
Mervyn Storey: Given Gerry Adams’s continual problem with accepting the fact that he was a member of the IRA — something that he continually denies — and given the republican movement’s continual denial of its 40-year sectarian campaign, does the Member agree that if a so-called “march for truth” were to be organised, that republicans would be the last people asked to do so, and that Gerry Adams...
Mervyn Storey: On behalf of the Committee for Finance and Personnel, I thank the Minister for his statement. I welcome the Department’s positive response to the Committee’s report on Workplace 2010 and the location of public-sector jobs. The Committee has proposed a take-note debate on its report and the Department’s response. That debate will provide a further opportunity for the House to consider...
Mervyn Storey: Will the Minister set out the total Northern Ireland resource element of the departmental expenditure limit for 2006-07, compared to 1998-99, in real terms? What does the Minister expect the increase to be over the comprehensive spending review period, and how does he expect the Departments to address their priorities in that period?