Statement by TUV leader Jim Allister:
“I have long contended that the failure of some departments, particularly DCAL, to get DFP approval for the business plans of their North/South bodies, renders their ongoing expenditure unlawful.
“The legal position is very clearly set out in The North/South Co-operation (Implementation Bodies) (NI) Order 1999. It decrees that such grants as these bodies pay must be “with the approval of the Department of Finance and Personnel.” Further, Annex (A.2.3) of the DFP manual on public expenditure, ‘Managing Public Money Northern Ireland’, is equally prescriptive. A.2.3.1. “Where legislation specifically requires DFP consent, any expenditure or resource consumption without such consent is illegal.”
“Yet, though challenged on this matter, no later than by me in the Assembly on 3rd June 2014, the DCAL minister refuses to seek such DFP approval. Now, in an important development the Comptroller and Auditor General has qualified DCAL’s resource Accounts 2013/14 on this very point. Noting the failure to get requisite DFP approval the CAG has declared that over £8million spend on Waterways Ireland and the North/South Language Body is “irregular”. At page 82 of the Resource Accounts, laid in the Assembly on 4 July 2014, CAG says, “As business plan approvals were not in place the Department has incurred irregular spend in 2013/14 in relation to grants amounting to £3,213,000 paid to Waterways Ireland and £5,258,000 paid to the North/South Language Body.”
“The refusal to sign off the department’s accounts is a serious matter. The issue should now be referred to the Public Accounts Committee. But there is also a challenge here to the authority of the DFP minister. The law requires the DCAL minister to get his approval for North/south expenditure. She is defying the law, so, what will the DFP minister now do to ensure she complies? Indeed, what if her ministerial code obligation to honour the law?”