Blaming civil servants for £2.5bn overspend on capital projects ‘huge mistake’

Blaming civil servants for a £2.5 billion overspend in the delivery of major capital projects in Northern Ireland is a “huge mistake”, the Finance Minister has warned.

John O’Dowd said he was not underestimating the scale of the issues identified by auditors, but said there were many factors that had caused the financial overcommitment.

Last year, the NI Audit Office reported that Northern Ireland’s major capital projects portfolio will cost £2.45 billion more to complete than originally estimated.

The report by Comptroller and Auditor General Dorinnia Carville examined problems related to the delivery of several key Stormont projects, including the upgrades of the A5 and A6 roads, Belfast’s rapid transit Glider service, Belfast’s new transport hub, the Maternity and Children’s Hospital in Belfast, the regional and sub-regional stadia strategy, and the Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Learning and Development Centre in Cookstown.

DUP MLA Cheryl Brownlee pressed the Finance Minister on the issue during Assembly question time on Monday.

She asked Mr O’Dowd what steps he was taking to address “critical skills gap” within the Northern Ireland Civil Service that, she said, were “clearly impacting on the delivery of major capital projects”.

In response, Mr O’Dowd said: “Well, can I say I’ve heard some of the public discourse about this issue, and I think it’s a huge mistake and also wrong to blame the Civil Service on this. We’re all responsible for the delivery of public projects and capital projects.”

He suggested that introducing another “layer of bureaucracy” in an effort to tackle the problem could actually result in further delivery delays.

“I would urge caution on this matter and say that sometimes you don’t need new governance, you have to ensure the governance that’s in place is properly implemented and delivered,” he said.

“So the priority is to get the project delivered as much in budget as you possibly can, as quickly as you can.

“And the other factors in relation to increased budgetary costs are this – over this last number of years, we’ve had Covid, we’ve had the Ukraine war, we’ve had a significant increase in construction inflation, which has caused projects to rapidly increase (in costs), and we also face a number of our projects with significant legal challenges as well.

“So, yes, there’s a role for the Civil Service, there’s a role for politicians, there’s a role for us all, but I would caution members of pointing the sole finger of blame on our Civil Service.”

Ms Brownlee said no one was placing “sole blame” on the Civil Service but she said £2.45 billion could not be dismissed as “small change”.

The minister replied: “I’m not in any way underestimating or undervaluing the over-commitment of £2.45 billion. It is huge. But let’s understand all the aspects of how we got there. And when you understand all the aspects of how you got there, then you will find the answer and the solution more readily available, rather than a headline (of) blaming civil servants.”