Speech by David Vance on the economic situation

Let me start by asking if you know what day it is today.
Saturday , yes,   13th November, yes,  TUV Annual  Conference yes, but it’s something more.......
You see today is designated World Kindness Day,  and so to all our political opponents out there and to all our friends in the media in here , I wanted to say - IN A KINDLY MANNER  how much we appreciate your concern for  the well being of TUV but to paraphrase  the great Mark Twain  reports of our political demise have been greatly exaggerated.

TUV is still standing and looking forward to the future.  

That’s more than can be said for - OUR ECONOMY – which brings me to the motion in front of us....   

“TUV condemns the utter failure of the Stormont Executive to agree a coherent strategy for dealing with Public Sector Cuts and rebalancing the Northern Ireland economy in a fiscally sensible manner”
Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow – that’s been the motto of the dysfunctional Executive and the wreckage of our economy is proof of it.

By the autumn of 2007, the writing was on the wall for our economy. At Stormont they all  watched the debt fuelled property bubble inflate and then ...burst. What did they do? Nothing. When the PRIVATE sector subsequently haemorrhaged jobs what did they do? Nothing.

Memo to Arlene Foster – getting your picture in the local press business section every day is a poor substitute for actually doing something useful for business. 

Here are the grim facts.

Between 1998 and 2007, there were 25,000 new jobs created, mostly in the public sector.

Between 2007 and now, there have been 25,000 job losses, mostly in private sector. Is that re-balancing the economy?
We NOW live with pre-Belfast Agreement levels of unemployment.

It gets worse.

Between now and 2014 most economists estimate we’ll lose ANOTHER 25,000 jobs. This time, the public sector will shrink just as the private sector has. That will place 73.000 people on the dole. Young people with no hope. Graduates with nowhere to go.  Pensioners fearful for the future, working families dreading redundancy – THAT – my friends - is what Stormont politicians have delivered.

We are in an economic mess but it is about to get a whole lot worse. Because the public sector cuts are coming and they cannot be postponed.

Yet there was a chance for the Executive to DO something to alleviate this before it became a crisis.

They all KNEW we were over reliant on the Public Sector but they did nothing to encourage small business. Instead they increased rates, they pushed through burdensome bureaucracy, they lavished cash on quangos, they wrote cheque after cheque and now, we all pay.

Consider how the Scottish Government dealt with the same issues back in 2008 - they sat down and worked out an agreed strategy for economic revival. It took 3 months from start to finish. Almost 3 years on, the NI executive has NO agreed economic strategy.  DUP tweedle-dees say one thing, Sinn Fein tweedle-dumbs another.

It could have been different. They could have prepared better, could have made better choices.  They could have chosen fiscal probity, they didn’t. And now faced with around £2billion of cuts over 4 years they are like headless chickens, or maybe turkeys given this time of year.

TUV has distinct positive ideas on how we deal with their mess. 

Cut the North-South bodies NOW and save half a billion!  This would get us 25% upfront saving instantly without losing ANY vital frontline jobs. Cut the quangos and remove the fatcats from their gilded thrones. Millions more saved. Cut the size of the government bureaucracy, move jobs from areas of inefficiency and into the private sector, so boosting it whilst supporting employment. Let’s cap the salaries of those earning VAST sums in the Public sector before they sacrifice those lower down the ladder.

Let’s make sure we shrink the empire building ambitions of politicians and bureaucrats whilst we raise the ambitions of entrepreneurs and local business people.

It’s never too late to start afresh – Northern Ireland has many great assets, primarily the energy in local people, but I have to be honest and say I would like to create a few job redundancies - at Stormont - and get TUV MLA’s in there who can work for the betterment of the people.

I commend this motion to you.