The British Labour Party has made it emphatically clear that neither Sinn Féin nor the SDLP will have it as an ally in their battle to compel the British government to row back on its welfare reform proposals for Northern Ireland.
The Labour shadow Northern Secretary, Ivan Lewis, said Northern parties should accept the current political realities and agree an accommodation on welfare reform so that all aspects of the Stormont House Agreement can be implemented.
Mr Lewis, in an interview with The Irish Times at the weekend, said he did not want to engage in the "blame game" over who was chiefly responsible for the deadlock that is threatening the Stormont institutions. But it was evident from his stark comments that he believes that Sinn Féin and the SDLP must alter position to end the logjam.
“All the parties, including Sinn Féin and the SDLP, have to demonstrate a willingness to make responsible, tough choices and not to look at the Westminster government and expect blank cheques,” he said.
Welfare cuts
Under the Stormont House Agreement more than £560 million was to be set aside over six years to mitigate the effects of welfare cuts. Sinn Féin, having initially endorsed the agreement, subsequently withdrew support because, it said, this figure would not maintain benefits at current levels.
The Sinn Féin and SDLP opposition to the welfare change is holding up implementation of the Stormont agreement, with its promise of £2 billion in extra funding to facilitate proposals such as devolving corporation tax-setting powers to the Executive, support for victims and a major public service redundancy scheme.
Mr Lewis said that in terms of alleviation measures Northern Ireland was being offered “a far more generous scheme” than was available to his own Bury South constituents in England.
“Parties need to understand that there will be no extra money coming from Westminster for welfare. Therefore, if they are going to have a viable budget they are either going to have to make further savage cuts [to the Northern Executive budget] or they are going to have to reach an accommodation on welfare,” he said. “I think it is time that they reached an accommodation on welfare.”
‘Smell the coffee’
Mr Lewis also indicated he didn’t believe Northern parties had any chance of shifting the British government from its current welfare policies. He said, “We share some of the concerns that Tory welfare policy is driven by ideology and that there are vulnerable people suffering as a consequence of that. We hate it, but we failed to persuade the British people to vote for us in the UK and so have to smell the coffee. That is what happens in a democracy.”
He said that even had Labour won the election and Ed Balls was the British chancellor of the exchequer the situation would have been little different. "Had we won the election I would not have been able to knock on Ed Balls's door and said 'We needs loads more money for Northern Ireland.' So why would I now pretend that that would be the case?"
He was also dismissive of some suggestions that the British government might alter its stance to prevent the potential collapse of the Northern Executive and Assembly.
“No UK government can be writing blank cheques or be seen to be blackmailed . . . No UK government wants to go back to direct rule.” But, he added, “the implicit threat which is always there that if we don’t get what we want the institutions will collapse cannot be allowed to shape the government’s response”.
