If you haven’t already discovered this little gem then I suggest you add it to the list of favourite websites. The Northern Ireland Assembly’s Answers Booklet is published on a weekly basis and consists of answers to the written questions posed by MLAs from all sides of the House.
Here’s a taster summary of what you can discern from simply glancing through one of the weekly answer booklets:
March 26th 2010 (my summaries)
• There are a helluva lot of bands receiving up to 5k for new instruments via DCAL;
• One third of Integrated schools do not meet the minimum threshold regarding number of pupils drawn from the respective minority community required to be actually recognised as ‘integrated’;
• The number of children being educated at home is increasing;
• The number of apprentices is increasing significantly year on year across the north, with the largest number of apprentices located in Fermanagh South Tyrone and West Tyrone;
• Jeffrey Donaldson wants the DEL Minister to pressurise St. Mary’s College to join UCAS;
• There have been 77 vehicles clamped or seized in the Larne area in the last 12 months;
• Inpatient admissions per 1000 population is steadily increasing year on year, from 163 to 170 from 2006/07 to 2008/09;
• There are approximately 1100 GPs working in Northern Ireland;
• An hourly Enterprise Service between Belfast and Dublin would require three additional operational trains costing £40m and annual operational costs of £5m, costs which would be shared with Iarnrod Eireann.
Go read for yourself and join the anorak club.
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