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O’Loan: Culture cuts are crude salami-slicing

SDLP Finance spokesperson Declan O’Loan MLA said a four-year programme of savings being proposed for the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure (DCAL) amount to little more than a series of top-down, across-the-board cuts.

Thu 2nd September

Mr O’Loan is vice-chair of the DCAL Committee, said: “From what I can see, the Department of Finance is handing down percentage targets for cutbacks and the department is applying the same percentage figures to its various sectional activities with a few tweaks. They intend to achieve cumulative savings of 18% over four years.

 

“The officials who came before the committee talked of a ‘fundamental review’. That would suggest to me that they were going to take a look at all their activities, decide which they were going to continue to do and then decide how they were going to do them more efficiently. But they intend to achieve cumulative savings of 18% over four years across the existing range of services by taking a bit off each. They say front-line services will be affected, which is of course inevitable given their approach.

 

“A fundamental review would be activities-based and not just number-based and would seek to protect front-line services which were not being discontinued. This is crude salami-slicing with a bent knife.”

Declan O'Loan

Councillor Declan O'Loan

Email declanoloan@gmail.com
Tel 07764 220 533

Press Office

Tel 028 90 52 1837

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