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2 Oct 09
Former trade minister and CBI director general Lord Digby Jones said cuts had to be made in public sector pay and pensions
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2 Oct 09
Public bodies must learn to achieve more for less, Northern Ireland’s finance minister Sammy Wilson has warned
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17 Sep 09
Northern Ireland's new finance minister is not a typical politician. A motorcycle enthusiast, he is relaxed, informal and very un-PC. Paul Gosling asks him to map out his plans for the road ahead
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9 Sep 09
A new and more positive relationship needs to be developed between the devolved administrations and the UK government if the Union is to be preserved, leading academics and public officials have been...
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23 Jul 09
A Lords inquiry has issued the latest in a series of official reports calling for the scrapping of the controversial 30-year-old funding mechanism for the UK nations. But replacing it will not be easy
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16 Jul 09
The Barnett Formula must be scrapped, a House of Lords inquiry has recommended
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2 Jul 09
As part of a reshuffle in Northern Ireland, one of the Assembly’s most controversial politicians is to become its finance minister.
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18 Jun 09
Health bodies in Northern Ireland face spending pressures that risk pushing them into deficit, auditor general John Dowdall has warned.
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8 Jun 09
Gross rent arrears with Northern Ireland social landlords rose by 154% in five years, according to a report by the NI Audit Office
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8 Jun 09
Only 7% of participants in a Northern Ireland New Deal programme went on to sustained employment, a report from the NI Audit Office has revealed
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8 Jun 09
Northern Ireland Health Minister Michael McGimpsey has reiterated his commitment to free personal care for elderly people despite it being ‘currently unaffordable’
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8 Jun 09
Northern Ireland’s Child Support Agency had a gross debt of £82.6m in 2007/08, the Northern Ireland Audit Office’s annual report has revealed. Of this, £35.7m was collectable, a rise from £29.9m the...
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8 Jun 09
A £270m Private Finance Initiative hospital for Enniskillen in Northern Ireland has been signed off following months of difficulties in getting funding finalised
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12 Mar 09
The Irish economy, feted by Alex Salmond, might end up needing IMF support packages and could be evicted from the eurozone. Now there is a concern that the effects will spread to Northern Ireland
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19 Feb 09
Domestic rates set by Northern Ireland's district councils are to rise by an average of 5% in 2009/10
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29 Jan 09
The HSBC bank has withdrawn from financing a Private Finance Initiative hospital project at Enniskillen in Northern Ireland
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22 Jan 09
Poor planning delayed three major projects within the £3bn Northern Ireland civil service reform programme and led to extra costs, according to the Assembly’s public accounts committee
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15 Jan 09
A quarter of all men and 23% of women in Northern Ireland are obese, according to a public spending watchdog
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4 Dec 08
The Northern Ireland Executive has given the go-ahead for a rapid transit system for Belfast and a £43.5m allocation for a Titanic visitor attraction
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18 Sep 08
Despite Northern Ireland's political and economic troubles, its new finance minister, Nigel Dodds, is optimistic about the future
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11 Sep 08
Prison officers have threatened to take strike action after it emerged that a computer disk containing the details of 5,000 justice staff had been lost by government IT contractor EDS. Justice...
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10 Jul 08
The political parties have fired the opening shots in the Glasgow East by-election, a contest that is crucial for Labour and Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
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22 May 08
'A riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.' That was Winston Churchill's description of the Soviet Union during the Cold War. It could equally well describe Northern Ireland's post-primary...
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8 May 08
Northern Ireland's public sector is too big and too well paid, according to Sir David Varney's review of competitiveness in Northern Ireland, carried out on behalf of the Treasury. The review could...
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17 Apr 08
East Belfast MP Peter Robinson is to take over from Ian Paisley as Northern Ireland's first minister when Paisley retires in May. Robinson, Paisley's long-time deputy in the Democratic Unionist Party...