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Eastwood calls on OFMDFM Committee to back detailed PfG

SDLP Foyle MLA Colum Eastwood has insisted that costed detail is required in the Programme for Government (PFG) to ensure that targets and projects do not merely become aspirations printed in ink.

Thu 9th February

Speaking at an OFMDFM committee meeting, Mr Eastwood highlighted the fact that the Scottish PfG, only designed to cover the 2011-12 period, contained more pages and detail than the North’s 5 year PfG.

 

Mr Eastwood said: ‘The North’s body politic has been characterised by ambiguity in the recent past. The concept of ‘political fudge’ became a familiar part of our political commentary. As we know this ambiguity was often necessary in the interests of providing an acceptable political accommodation’.

 

  1. ‘We are now in a different place. The embedded stability of the devolved institutions demands that government move away from this way of doing business. Amidst the continuing fragility of the economy it is imperative that Stormont provides governmental clarity. A detailed, costed Programme for Government would do just this’.  

 

‘Even in terms of documented text the North’s Programme lacks detail. Renewing Scotland: The Government’s Programme for Scotland which only covers the 2011-12 period, unlike the North’s which runs to 2015, contains more pages’. 

 

‘At the committee on Wednesday I argued for the inclusion of budgeted and timetabled detail interwoven into the PfG. I will continue to do so’.

 

‘If devolution is to fully deliver on the promise of peace, I am of the firm belief that it is this culture of governance which needs to become instilled’. 

 

The consultation on the draft PFG ends on the 22nd of February.

 

Colum Eastwood

Colum Eastwood MLA

Email colum.eastwood@sdlp.ie
Tel 028 7135 0045

Press Office

Tel 028 90 52 1837

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