Northern Ireland’s parliament returns today after two years of deadlock over power-sharing. Meanwhile, public services are collapsing, with nearly a third of patients seeking medical care waiting more than two years for their first appointment with a consultant.
by Joely Santa Cruz and Daniel Dunford, data journalists
Saturday 3 February 2024 03:02, UK
Without political intervention, it would have been impossible to pass many important decisions regarding budgets and public sector salaries.
Stormont’s spate of outages over the years has contributed to long-term problems in the public sector, with impacts across all areas of the public service.
But perhaps nowhere is this more true than in health care and social care.
There are currently more than 420,000 people waiting for their first consultant-led outpatient appointment following a referral, an increase of more than five times since 2008.
It’s possible that people waiting for another treatment may appear on the list more than once, but this is still a large number in a population of 1.9 million people.
The latest figures available to the end of September show half of them have been waiting to see a consultant for more than a year, up from 5% in June 2015.
Additionally, almost one in three patients have waited more than two years for their first appointment, up from 0.1% in September 2015.
Health and Social Care Figures for Northern Ireland are not directly comparable to the NHS in England, which uses a different measure (from referral to treatment rather than first appointment).
However, as a rough comparison, waiting times were also terrible in the UK in November, with only 4.7% of people waiting more than a year from initial referral to complete the entire treatment period, and less than 0.01% waiting more than two years. was.
Patient and Customer Council (PCC) chief executive Meadbouba Monaghan told Sky News: “The challenges facing Northern Ireland’s health and social care (HSC) services are significant and diverse, they have been building up over a long period of time and will not be resolved overnight.
“Through our work supporting the public, we can clearly see that many people are concerned about how they are communicated with and how they experience services. , including the quality of care they receive and how long they have to wait to receive that care.”
“Our physical and mental health is fundamental to our wellbeing and the current pressures on the HSC system and staff will have a negative impact on individuals and their families.”
What happened in the political vacuum?
The devolved governments have been suspended five other times since first taking office in 1999 following the Good Friday peace agreement, with the longest suspension lasting four and a half years from October 2002 to May 2007. Ta.
But against the backdrop of a post-pandemic recovery and an unprecedented cost-of-living crisis, recent suspensions have become “much more difficult”, according to recently retired senior civil servant Andrew McCormick.
MPs divided over Stormont deal
“Civil servants can make day-to-day decisions to make things go as well as possible, but that’s very limited,” a former executive director of international relations and a former permanent secretary at the economy ministry told Sky News.
“I know that my former colleagues have found the last few years incredibly difficult, with the cost of living and inflation making things even more difficult.” [than the last suspension of 2017-2020].
“That is an absurd position and a complete abdication of responsibility.”
Even in the absence of ministers at Stormont, the Westminster parliament can pass legislation and is responsible for the budget and other special areas of legislation.
Despite unusually high levels of inflation over the past two years, budgets for ministries and agencies have plateaued.
And a vacuum has emerged in which civil servants are unable to make day-to-day decisions of a political nature.
This includes participating in public sector pay agreements. This is because any commitment would force departments to exceed their current budgets.
public sector salary
Last month saw the largest strike in Northern Ireland’s history, with an estimated 150,000 public sector workers marching and taking to picket lines across the country to demand a pay settlement to their disputes.
The median salary for public sector workers across the UK increased by 20% between 2016 and 2023, from £30,540 to £36,708. In Northern Ireland, salaries increased at a slower rate of 16.1% over the same period, increasing from £31,570 to £2023. At 36,651 people, it is currently below the UK average.
In its latest employee income report, the Economy Ministry noted that real income in the public sector fell by 7.2% in the year to 2023, compared with a 1.4% increase in the private sector.
Carmel Gates, general secretary of NIPSA, Northern Ireland’s largest public sector union with around 45,000 members, told Sky News: “Frankly, what we are seeing is civil servants coming from Northern Ireland. “It’s leaking and it’s leaking into other parts of these islands.” It is better for them to receive a better salary or go abroad.
“The problem has not only come to the fore in the last two years, Northern Ireland has been underfunded for quite some time.
“The September 18th strike was perhaps the most galvanized and united the trade union movement here has ever been, with nearly every public employee union participating.”
After years of turmoil over Brexit, coronavirus, the cost of living crisis and an extended period of no governance, many have announced plans within days to stabilize the situation in Northern Ireland. We look forward to swift and decisive action by the Chief Executive, who has returned to the United States.
“As soon as they come back, you need to set up a budget, which is very helpful in the short term,” says Andrew McCormick.
“Then they have to face long-term problems. More needs to be done when it comes to stabilizing public services.”
of data and forensics The team is a multi-talented unit dedicated to delivering transparent journalism from Sky News. Collect, analyze, and visualize data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite imagery, social media, and other open source information. Through multimedia storytelling, we aim to better explain the world while showing how journalism is done.