A quote worth remembering

PS The “Ms says…” line was for cynic

“So……….the ends justify the means? That is actually want you;re saying.”

Err no. A general disnterest in means is not the same as advocating/supporting the use of any means. The public seem to work on the assumption the means are within the accepted bounds, an assumption based on the fact it almost always is and they reserve the right to be seriously displeased if they discover otherwise.

Cynic

“Agreed but the Auditors will have to ensure that the expenditiure was “regular” and “proper” ie complied with all revelant controls inclduing the Executive’s own rules.”

Yep. However my hunch is that if senior civil servants weren’t satisfied money wouldn’t be flowing, a minister’s powers are not limitless.

The civil service do fuck up but not usually on something like this. An urgent civil servant usually gets the job done. It is when you give them time, committees and consultants etc that they manage to waste big sums that takes a lot of work

The Raven

Read about McDonaldisation theory got put onto this last week interesting when applied to civil service processes.
Ms says there is a statutory basis for such payments, it appears the necessary ministers have communicated and there is a mechanism to get around the 2.4 issues that Mick highlights.

NIAO cost NI around £27m over a two year period. When asked how much fraud they uncovered for £27m, they could only say “we don’t count it up – our job is to assist public bodies look after their money.”

Place not your faith in auditors. Auditors, in Northern Ireland, are 30% of the reason why nothing gets achieved here. Just an observation. Carry on, there.

Agreed but the Auditors will have to ensure that the expenditiure was “regular” and “proper” ie complied with all revelant controls inclduing the Executive’s own rules.

“Ah, I see. The ends justify the means.”

Eyes roll. No you don’t see. Generally people don’t care about how the paper was shuffled nor will read a statement explaining how it got shuffled, it is what the paper shuffling achieved is what they usually want to know.

I doubt if a statement of the practical implementation of rule 2.14 as a subsection of rule 2.4 etc would have made an exceedingly dull statement. A decison has been took and something is getting done always works much better.

“The Finance Minister gave the go ahead to Executive Colleague Sammy Wilson to set up the emergency package ”

So did Dodds or Wilson write to OFMDFM? Who took a decision and who was just submitting a view? Or did the both take a decision with the others view being consulted? Were Ritchie and Murphy consulted by the consulting Minister?

Its very difficult to portray this as the Executive working efficiently when the scheme has a statutory basis from as far back as 1992, then the DUP press office claim this as their victory (in very partisan way, almost boasting about single party collusion) all to a background of no Executive meetings for months on end.

“That sets out what a single minister can do”

Not by my reading of it. Simply one minister has to take on the role of “responsible minister” with the other(s) fitting into “the views of any other Ministers with a relevant interest”.

I’m pleasantly surprised and will make good use of the money down at the liquor store.

Is it a SF boycott or a DUP boycott? If I say “I’m not allowing a meeting unless you put my stuff on the agenda!” and you say “I’m not allowing a meeting unless you take your stuff off the agenda!”, which one of us is boycotting?

There is another part of the Ministerial code you may have overlooked:
Urgent decisions
2.14 Where a decision is required to be taken so urgently as not to be able to await consideration at the next Executive Committee meeting, the responsible Minister must set out in writing to the First Minister, the deputy First Minister and the Secretary to the Executive the decision to be taken and, so far as is practicable, the background to the issue, the views of any other Ministers with a relevant interest, the position of any other interested administrations and the consequences of deferring the decision in question pending the next Executive Committee meeting and of not taking it at all. The First Minister and deputy First Minister, acting jointly, will consider the decision in consultation with the responsible Minister, and notify him/her of the outcome of their consideration of the matter. A matter dealt with in this way will be deemed to have been dealt with in accordance with paragraph 2.4 of this Code. Where the urgent decision is the responsibility of the First Minister and deputy First Minister and, acting jointly, they agree that decision, the decision will be deemed to have been dealt with in accordance with paragraph 2.4 of this Code.

Paul Priestly, Permanent Secretary at DRD, has set up three investigations into the ferry fiasco yet I’d have thought it would have been more appropriate for the NIAO to carry out an investigation independent of the two (or more) departments which are involved in the affair.

“…executive approval is needed for anything that covers the remit of two or more executive department.”

7

You’re a fine advert for the Canadian education system, Steve.

The Canadian education system and I never really got along, like most educational systems it values conformity above all else and I don’t accept other peoples arbitrary rules too well.

Nice to see you do though