‘Anyone who still believes that austerity is a natural phenomenon will be surprised by today’s financial package which underpins the DUP / Tory deal’, the Workers Party has said.

‘When benefits were being cut, public sector workers made redundant, hospital waiting lists lengthening and banks bailed out with public money, we were told that the collapse of the economy had forced austerity on us all. Not so it seems.’

‘When the Tory Party needs to hold on to power, money is no object’

‘When the dust settles on today’s agreement Northern Ireland will be better off by over £1 billion but how much that will actually contribute to an improved quality of life and a better society is very questionable’, the Party said

• £50 million to address ‘immediate pressures in health’ is likely to go the way of previous waiting list initiatives: straight into the pockets of private healthcare companies while the root causes of the problems are ignored.

• Not one penny of the £50m earmarked for education will go towards implementing an integrated system. It will be used instead to shore up division.

• £400m worth of infrastructure projects will see the delivery of several high profile projects but not the 40,000 new homes that Northern Ireland needs over the next two years

• £20m a year for the next five years for deprived communities will re-assure no one familiar with the funding of projects like the Social Investment Fund.

• ‘City Deals and Enterprise Zones’ are also presented as a solution to high unemployment and the absence of an indigenous manufacturing base. They are the failed brainchild of the late Margaret Thatcher. Offering reduced rates of tax, deregulation and minimal government involvement they have failed in the past providing little employment, skills, training or support for local people’

‘Today’s additional funding has the potential to make some progress on a number of major issues. However, using it to fund private sector companies and pay for lower business taxes while failing to make long term investments in health, education, and public housing will see it frittered away’

The immediate priorities for the major parties in Northern Ireland now are to agree a working Executive as quickly as possible and bring forward a strategic plan to strengthen and improve public services, invest in education, skills and training, develop an indigenous manufacturing base and set out a programme for full employment,’the Party statement concluded.

We have the staff and the potential to provide a world-class service

The Workers Party has called for the final scrapping of Northern Ireland’s Health and Social Care Board arguing that it has never provided value for money, has not improved services and at a cost of £27 million a year is draining already  scant resources. It was due to be wound up last April.

“Cllr Pat Convery should now vacate his north Belfast council seat in the wake of his resignation from the SDLP”, Gemma Weir of the Workers Party has claimed.

Women are subjected to verbal abuse and intimidation

Grenfell: what price pubic housing in one of the richest  boroughs in one of the richest cities?

‘The Northern Ireland Housing Executive must move quickly to further re-assure residents in high rise apartments that they are safe following the Grenfell fire in London’, Workers Party representative Chris Bailie  has said

He has also expressed concerns that the assurances given to date about the materials meeting a number of British Standard quality regulations are now insufficient in the light of the west London inferno.

Act quickly                                                                                                    “While the exact reason why this high rise building burnt so quickly and with such intensity has yet to be established it is important that the Housing Executive are ready to act quickly in the event that the cladding was a major contributor to the blaze. It is also very important that the NIHE is given all the resources it requires to undertake safety testing and take immediate remedial action if that is required”, said Chris

‘Beyond the immediate safety concerns there are also questions which need to be answered in relation to the use of cladding on this type of building.”, he said.

‘Some of the very understandable anger being expressed by relatives, residents and survivors of Grenfell questions the use of  cladding  as a  cheap way of protecting the brickwork rather than securing the safety of the residents.

Members of the Fire and Rescue Service  had expressed serious concerns  about the cladding of at least two hi-rise buildings in Belfast a few years ago – but both those projects went ahead.”, Chris pointed out.

More regulation – not less                                                                             ‘Some Conservative MPs, many of them private landlords, have been arguing  for less regulation, inspection and controls dismissing them as unnecessary red tape. The Grenfell fire proves otherwise”, said Chris.

‘ It is now very important that the bereaved and the survivors receive all the help and support that they need . They must also be given absolute guarantees that they will be rehoused in London,  in or as as close as possible to the Kensington & Chelsea area  and that the site of Grenfel House is not acquired for private development but remains a pubic housing area’, Chris concluded

Community cooperation and partnership the only response

Workers Party representative Chris Bailie has condemned those involved in circulating lists of names of alleged drug dealers in north Belfast as ‘people who have no contribution to make, nothing to offer and only their own self importance to worry about.’

‘There is a serious drug problem in communities right across the city and beyond’, said Chris, ‘ but this type of behaviour does not bring us one step nearer to overcoming it’.

The so called ‘Communities Against Drugs’ group is as faceless as the dealers and the criminals they claim they are opposed to.

‘I welcome comments from some community organisations  distancing themselves from this ‘wild west’ style activity and fully support community led initiatives working in co-operation and partnership with the statutory and voluntary bodies’, Chris said.

‘This is the only way forward’, he added

‘I would call on anyone who has information about drug dealing to contact the PSNI and I am calling on those responsible for circulating this list to stop their activities immediately and to recognise the legitimate role of the wider community and other agencies in tackling the drug dealing scourge’, Chris concluded

A large step backwards

We are now faced with the most polarised election results in a generation or more.

Ironically, as many commentators were identifying a more ideological, left/right, battle between Labour and the Conservatives, in Northern Ireland we took several large steps backwards into the past.

Over half a million people here have voted for one form or another of conservative nationalism. They have done so in preference to addressing unemployment, a failing health and social care system, child poverty, a crisis in housing, segregated education and, more importantly, the causes of those problems.

Politics of fear and division                                                                            Sinn Fein and the DUP have fueled and then traded on the politics of fear, difference and division. Now, the possibility of DUP support for a Conservative minority government spells further regression with social policies the likely first casualty.

Given the mandate that both parties have received they now have a responsibility to re-instate the Executive and get the Assembly up and running without delay.

The reality of ‘the morning after the night before’ is that child poverty, unemployment, low paid jobs and zero hours contracts haven’t miraculously disappeared. Health education and housing all remain in crisis. Benefits remain cut, funding to youth services, arts and community groups remain reduced and thousands of low paid working people need to have their wages topped up by the state.

These are the realities, This is why working people, more than ever, need a Workers Party.