Much to everyone’s expectation, Westminster’s Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves has once again left the North of Ireland out in the cold to fend for itself. The latest budget, like many others before it, merely tip toes around the profound issues facing the North.
Public infrastructure is beyond breaking point and in complete shambles. Hospital waiting lists plague the population, with over 26 percent currently awaiting treatment. The appalling state of roads are clear to the naked eye. The drainage system in Belfast consistently fails to withstand heavy rains.
The reality is that billions of pounds of increased funding is desperately needed from Westminster to tackle the major issues facing the working class and youth. Talks about the North receiving higher fundings in proportion than the rest of the UK is farcical, given the state of the infrastructure and the high rate of deprivation.
Reeves has promised a paltry increase of £370 million over the next three to four years. This is merely a drop in the ocean as Stormont already had an overspend of £400 million in 2025 alone! The increase in the national hourly ‘living’ wage of a measly 50p is an insult to people struggling to resist poverty. Already 18 percent of children in the North are growing up in poverty. An utter disgrace!
Assembly representatives across the political spectrum – from the DUP, UUP, AP and SDLP – have all cried foul over the crumbs being handed down by the British government. SF Finance Minister John O’Dowd described the increase as “welcome” but it “falls far short of what is needed to support the delivery of front line public services.”
Their complaints have been met with complete indifference by the British ruling class. Northern Secretary Hilary Benn patronisingly explained that “Northern Ireland is going to have to live within its means, and it needs to produce a balanced budget… and if it wants more funds it can seek to raise them.” Put simply: if you can’t balance the books, then implement more austerity attacks on the working class.
Astonishingly, O’Dowd has proposed a multi-year draft budget for the North where he is doing just this! His proposal includes a regional rate increase for households of 5 percent which will deliver another blow to struggling workers, already reeling from the sudden interest rate hikes.
This latest budgetary debacle speaks volumes to the Northern statelet’s incapacity to repair its crumbling infrastructure, mired as it is in a chronic budgetary blackhole driven by Westminster. Meanwhile the politicians in Stormont have no solution to the mess other than throwing tantrums and inflicting more pain on the masses.
The stark reality is that British capitalism is in a deep structural crisis with no way out. The capitalists are demanding austerity and attacks while the working class – already stretched to breaking point – is resisting further cuts. The only solution is for the workers and youth to rip the wealth away from the bosses and landlords in a revolutionary overthrow of capitalism – to create a society that serves the needs of the masses instead of the greed of the capitalists.
