Statement

WEIR WELCOMES DEFENSE OF NORTH DOWN PUBLIC SECTOR JOBS

Posted on: February 15, 2010

"I welcome the decision of both the Finance Minister, Sammy Wilson, and the Assembly as a whole, the decision to reject proposals to implement the Bain Report on relocation of public sector jobs. This report, if fully implemented would have led to massive disruption for many civil servants throughout Northern Ireland, at huge public expense. Areas such as North Down would have been massively disadvantaged, and would have led to the removal of Rathgael House in the long run. The Bain report is fatally flawed as North Down is lumped in as part of Greater Belfast, and thus our figures are massively distorted by civil service posts in the centre of Belfast. In North Down we have a lower than average number of public service jobs based in the constituency, yet because of this flawed analysis, we would have faced the prospect of this number being reduced further, with jobs being redistributed to far flung parts of Northern Ireland.

For many civil servants who are based in North Down, they have sought to be located here for a range of reasons, often to cope with family caring responsibilities. Had Bain been implemented, this would have created an imtolerable position for many of these employees. Bain would not have created any new jobs, but rather redistributed jobs, in a region where there is already a reasonable spread of public sector jobs. It would have been particularly lidicrous to put forward these proposals at a time of economic recession, when to implement Bain it could cost up to £40 million. When there is pressure on health and education budgets there are clearly better ways to spend this money. Non implementation of Bain is a victory for common sense and good news for North Down."