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Cost/Benefit Analysis of Devolution
They're coming from all sides today.
O'Neill's ever-watchful eye has picked up that Wales's GVA per head is only 77% of the UK average, (down from 79% when the Assembly was set up in 1999 and 84% back in 1991) despite receiving more than £1bn of EU aid to boost economic activity, placing them firmly at the bottom of the UK league table. Never mind, as long as the Bank of England, the Olympic Delivery Authority and the Carbon Trust have to "deliver services" in Welsh, what does wealth matter?
Meanwhile, in Northern Ireland where the GVA is 81% of the UK average (that figure is unchanged since 1997 and currently sees us tying with north-east England for second-last spot), devolution seems to be having similar levels of success. According to a MORI poll conducted last month (spotted by Chekov in a report in the Belfast Telegraph):
- 21% of people polled think the Executive has done a good job in the last year since it was reinstated while 28% rated their collective performance as poor.
- 72% of people asked thought devolution had failed to make any difference on their lives.
- 46% thought devolution had had no impact on Ulster's economy and 10% thought it had made it worse.
- The Health Service fared even worse: 67% thought devolution had had no impact, while 16% thought devolution had improved it and another 16% thought it had made it worse.
The BBC's Mark Devenport claims the "most obvious achievement of the current executive is that it is still in existence" and our own First Minister yesterday extolled the current setup as "not perfect and not wholly democratic, but the best [he] could get for the people of Northern Ireland" - not exactly glowing recommendations, are they?
Perhaps now would be a good time to reflect on the bill for devolution.