THE WELSH and Scottish Governments have launched a formal objection with the UK Government over Theresa May’s £1bn deal with Northern Ireland’s DUP.
Both of the devolved governments say the Prime Minister’s grubby deal to secure the support of the 10 Ulster unionist MPs to prop up her minority government, means they should be due billions of pounds.
The Welsh Government’s Finance Secretary Mark Drakeford and the Scottish Government’s Finance Secretary Derek Mackay say the Barnett Formula means the extra money for Northern Ireland should means more cash for them.
They’ve now invoked the formal dispute resolution process through the Joint Ministerial Committee (JMC).
Mackay said that by rights the Scottish Government’s coffers should now have an extra £2.9billion. “The Scottish Government fundamentally disagrees with the way in which this additional funding for Northern Ireland has been allocated. We have repeatedly made the point that all areas to which the £1billion funding package has been allocated are devolved matters and therefore the Barnett Formula should apply.
“Despite this, the UK Government argues that there should be no Barnett consequentials from this deal and refuses to acknowledge that Scotland, Wales and England will be short-changed by billions of pounds.
“That cannot be right – and the deal goes against the principles of the UK Treasury’s own statement of funding policy.
“Any suggestion that this funding arrangement is similar to previous funding for city deals in Scotland is wrong and not in any way comparable. City deal funding is conditional on match funding from the devolved administrations’ own budgets and also requires contributions from local authorities and other regional partners.”
Professor Drakeford said the people of Wales were missing out on £1.67billion of spending.
“We have been clear with the UK Government that any additional funding for Northern Ireland must respect the established funding principles and rules around the Barnett formula.
“The UK Government has abandoned these well-established arrangements to the detriment of Wales and other parts of the UK.”
He added: “For all its faults the Barnett formula is supposed to be clear and rules based. It is simply inexcusable that the UK Government is willing to “bypass” those rules. That is why we have begun the formal dispute resolution with the Government so that Wales is treated fairly alongside all nations of the UK.”
The last General Election saw May lose her already slim majority, leaving her without enough MPs to form a government.
In the mad scramble to form an administration she went cap in hand to the DUP.
The party, led by Arlene Foster agreed to a confidence-and-supply arrangement with the Tories in return for the £1billion additional funding and relaxed spending rules relating to a further £500m previously committed.
Already May’s reliance on the DUP has reportedly forced her to delay any major new laws until the Autumn to avoid a clash with the Orange Order’s marches in Northern Ireland.
Senior No10 figures told The Sun, that the last two weeks in Westminster have been fairly light, “because they are unable to rely on their ten ally Ulster unionist MPs being there to create a majority.”
“One rule we have discovered is don’t do anything in the Commons during the marching season, because they won’t be there,” a source told the paper.
Under the Memorandum of Agreement signed up to by the UK government and the three devolved assemblies back in 2012, the JMC will now, in the next month, organise a meeting between Scottish, Welsh and UK government officials, with the aim of finding an agreement to take to Ministers.
If no deal is reached it could then go to the annual plenary meeting of the JMC meeting, where the decision “is final and there are no further stages within the dispute resolution process”.
Last month, in his analysis of the deal, David Eiser, from the Fraser of Allander Institute, said that while there seemed to be no contradicting of any rules or laws “on a technical level” this was a huge sum of money and the first time the government had bypassed the Barnett “explicitly to secure the votes of a particular party at Westminster.”
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