9.

asked the Minister for Social Development what percentage of appeals are successful against decisions by the Social Security Agency to reject claims for disability living allowance.

(AQO 884/01)

The Minister will be brief.

In the current financial year, 55% of appeals against decisions to disallow disability living allowance were successful. However, 25% of all appeals against disability living allowance decisions, including those in dispute of awards at lower than the maximum rate, were successful.

Given the percentage of claims that are successful and the fact that those disputing disability allowance decisions are the most vulnerable, is it acceptable that it should take 11 months for some appeals to be heard?

That is a cause for concern. However, the latest figures show that on average it takes 72 days to prepare each appeal and to pass it to the appeals service. There have been 615 appeals this year, in comparison with the 1,219 appeals that awaited referral to the appeals service at this time last year. The situation is improving, but I would be happy to examine any specific cases that the Member wishes to draw to my attention.

Thank you, Minister. Your time is up.

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. The Minister for Social Development referred to the provision of publications in Irish by the Minister of Health, Social Services and Public Safety. From a sitting position, his party leader referred to the publication of documents in Chinese and Taiwanese. Will you examine Hansard and read those comments in the light of racial equality requirements and the need to publish documentation so that proper services are provided for everyone?

I did not hear those remarks, if indeed they were made. However, the Speaker's Office will examine Hansard.

Further to that point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. Will you rule that Mr Molloy's comment was not a point of order and had nothing to do with the Minister's reply. Mr Dodds simply drew attention to the amount of money that is spent on translating documents into the Irish language?

Mr Molloy's point of order related to a remark that was made from a sedentary position. However, we should not take up any more time.

Review of Public Administration

Go raibh maith agat, a LeasCheann Comhairle. As a Member for Mid Ulster, a constituency west of the Bann, I wish to address the need to rebalance the distribution of Government services and jobs to ensure that everyone has proper access to them. The Health Service west of the Bann has undergone tremendous change as a result of a lack of provision and available finance. The Hayes review examined the matter, but, unfortunately, it was of little benefit. The Hayes review, the Burns Report and the relocation of Civil Service jobs and Departments should be regarded as part of the review, but they are separate.

The purpose of the review of the public service is to make the Departments and the Administration more accountable. The Administration must be democratically elected, and I agree with Mr Dalton that we should remove the health and education boards. That drastic step would quickly create a democratic system. Their functions should be transferred to Departments and local government bodies. However, if any new increased powers are to be transferred to local government, we must ensure that clear guarantees are incorporated. Those powers were removed from local government because the Unionist Government in Stormont misused them. Therefore a d'Hondt-type structure is needed to ensure equality at all levels, within the Assembly and in local government. We must wipe out quangos and ensure that we do not replace them with another type of quango that would undermine the system of local government.

We need to look at alternatives. We are in a period of transition. Whatever new structures are put in place, be they local government, the Assembly, or whatever the review may recommend, they must be matched up with the all-Ireland structures. A number of councils are grouped with other councils on the other side of the present border. That system continues to ensure the delivery of services.

We are considering the delivery of the waste management strategy and European programmes. There is no reason for those groups of councils on both sides of the present border not looking at the delivery of the Health Service, infrastructure, education and various other different roles that involve government structures on both sides of the border. Those structures need to be developed economically, as European money will eventually dry up, and we need to ensure that similar structures are in place to manage the present transition to all-Ireland structures.

There is a need to get on with the review. The Departments and the Office of the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister are meeting the Programme for Government aim to put the review in place by spring. However, we need to see not just the outline programme, but the implementation of the review put in place and delivered on. It is not just a matter of reviewing; it is a matter of dealing with the development of that programme.

We need to make sure that that structure is well in place before the next local government elections. Last year, we had the debacle of whether the council elections should be put back for a year or two to allow the review to take place. The review may be subject to Boundary Commission hearings. Various different structures may be proposed. Local government elections should not be put back for another year while these factors are determined.

This is a great opportunity to develop and put in place a new, modern structure for local government and local administration, whether it be here at the Assembly or at local government level. It is also a great opportunity to ensure that quangos are not maintained. Some Members this morning mentioned better training for those involved in quangos. I would rather see democratically elected, accountable members. I would like to ensure that quangos are wiped out, rather than have their members retrained. We need to move into a new structure with accountable government. I say that in the broadest terms.

The needs of the local community have to be taken into account. Targeting social need is important when the structures of administration are being reviewed. We need to target social need - it should not just be three letters at the end of the review. We have to ensure that areas west of the Bann have a system that will make local government accountable and accessible and will deliver to the people.

One of the problems with the quango system, especially the health and education boards, is that no matter what a Department may say, an area board has the final say in the allocation of money and what provision is made in that area. A small area such as the Six Counties should be one administrative area. While we do not want to see one big board based in Belfast allocating all the money east of the Bann, we do want to ensure a fair distribution of the available resources.

We need to ensure that this happens quickly and in an accountable manner so that that in a short time we will be sitting here with a new structure of administration. Go raibh maith agat.

I welcome the review. It is now time to consider tightening up public administration in Northern Ireland. The review should have two principles enshrined at its heart - democratic accountability and democratic control. We must leave behind the residue of direct rule and by that I mean the large number of non-elected quangos that the Government used to run Northern Ireland before the creation of the Assembly.

Whatever system of public administration is adopted, it is important that it should dovetail with the Assembly. At present the Northern Ireland councils exist like an older, parallel level of administration. I have great admiration for, and sympathy with, the councils, because I served on one for many years. Young Members could learn the pros and cons of local administration by serving for a term on councils. It would do them no harm, and it should be an enshrined principle that Members serve on local government bodies.

Any new system should work to, be accountable to and support Stormont. Unlike one of the Members from a reputable party who spoke - I will not name him, because I do not want to get caught up in catcalling - I do not believe that we can have too much democracy. We need more democracy, not less, because it is lacking in many areas. I remind everyone that the Assembly was created by an agreement, which was a sort of peace treaty that was negotiated at the end of a long war. We should never forget that. Having a large Assembly at Stormont is preferable to what we had before.

We must consider many issues in addition to the number of councils. We want to create as professional a public representation as possible. That raises issues about the optimum size and number of councils. It is also important to build watchdog bodies into any new system. It is crucial that the whole architecture of public administration in Northern Ireland should be clear cut, easily understood and, above all, democratic.

The delay in bringing the legislation forward was mentioned this morning. We know where the blame for that delay lies. Too many times in the past three years people attempted to bring the Assembly down, and it limped from crisis to crisis. That is where time was spent. That is the nub of the matter. Now that the review of public administration is about to start, people ask why it has taken so long. We have only to cast our minds back 18 months to answer that question.

The Assembly must consider many other issues, such as what is the answer to the question of dual mandate. We must face up to reality. We can refer to the devolved Administrations in Wales and Scotland and their dual mandate roles. What is good for one Assembly is good for another. I do not care what people in other circles think - accountable democracy is the one thing that is to the fore in most people's minds. Accountable democracy is all things to all men. We must ask where our loyalties lie. I listened to other Members, and many were talking to suit themselves. - [Interruption].

My remarks are starting to bite home.

We have a wealth of talent in Northern Ireland. People have had a good introduction to politics, and the sooner we return to accountable democracy the better. The most important consideration is the return to the days of "one man; one job". Those were the good old days, and the sooner we get them back the better, and I hope - [Interruption].

TOP

What good old days?

That is going back a long time, but the sooner we get back to that the better. No matter what the circumstances are, Northern Ireland has come through a crisis. Whether we like it or not, the situation is better now than it was three years ago.

The Assembly has a big responsibility to ensure that the review is carried out fairly. The Assembly prides itself on its democracy. The sooner accountable democracy returns to Northern Ireland, the better.

As a member of the Committee for the Environment, I endorse the initial comments on the terms of reference that were agreed by the Committee at its meeting on 21 February. The Committee Chairperson submitted them to the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister.

The SDLP is engaged in exhaustive internal and external consultation on the matter, and it will publish its conclusions in due course. Every conclusion will reflect the aims, objectives and policies of the SDLP and will flow from its unique philosophy and principles. The SDLP's principles are based on its passion for social and political justice. The party is firmly anti- sectarian and seeks to achieve true unity and equity by consent. It is absolute in its defence of and promotion of human rights. It respects, cherishes and accommodates difference. It looks towards the creation of true partnerships.

The Government of Northern Ireland, as exemplified in the Assembly, is a goulash. It is a highly seasoned stew, a complicated melange of right, left and centre, from far right to soft centre, democrat, totalitarian, libertarian, fascist, socialist, fundamentalist, religious, quasi-religious, atheist, humanist, ethnic, indigenous and intrusive. Public administration in Northern Ireland must take account of the complexities of that mixture and, as far as is possible and reasonable, accommodate those differences.

My initial personal comments will eschew the particular and be limited to a few generalities. The first relates to the dangers of unprincipled prediction or, more accurately, the self-fulfilling prophecy. How often does that fulfilment create difficulty, disorder and sometimes despair? How many of Northern Ireland's young people have had their lives blighted and unfulfilled because they were deemed a failure at the age of ten? We run the risk of messing up the process if we take undue account of the predictions of self-appointed savants in the media, and even in the Chamber, who claim that their solution is inevitable and right. Those people call for the removal of councils, boards, trusts, quangos and partnerships. However, what would replace them? Would there be a lean, mean Government machine? As they say in Magilligan "Aye, likely".

That bout of cynicism is, for the large part, a response to the trumpeting about what must be done about councils. It is claimed that if the number of councils were cut to five or six, the problem would be solved. Perhaps 26 councils are not needed. However, before the Assembly butchers an elected and truly local administration - a community service that, however flawed, maintained a degree of sanity and democracy in this torturous society for 30 years - it must be sure that its replacement will be better. The decision must be based on neither mathematics nor population engineering, but on people - on individuals and their need to be able to communicate face to face with their leaders.

The sadist who contrived the appalling acronym "quango" virtually guaranteed that those bodies would not be taken seriously. "Quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisation" is a pretentious term, but "quango" is a ludicrous one - it is like a cross between a duck and a dingo. We are right to criticise the undemocratic nature of remote, appointed and imperfectly accountable bodies. However, the Assembly must acknowledge the need for public bodies that draw together and make good use of the talents of people, elected and non-elected, who by their special experience, expertise and commitment might give valuable service to a Government of the people. However, to give those groups stupid names would spoil their purpose.

I shall conclude with a litany. Public administration must be efficient, effective, economic, open, transparent, accountable, democratic, equitable, inclusive and compassionate. If we get those few things right, we shall have it made.

I am sure that the House was very entertained by the last speech. We shall have to take another look at the hybrids that were so picturesquely described. We did not think that they had such a genealogy or that they were of such importance to those who study birds, beasts and other creatures. We were glad to hear that contribution. I am glad that I am not on, nor have ever had the pleasure of being on, any of those bodies. I am glad that I am excluded from them. Thank God for that. That is one thing to say on Monday - thank God for that.

As Chairperson of the Committee for Agriculture and Rural Development, I shall speak on the Committee's behalf. The Committee met last Friday to discuss and consider the review and asked me to make this agreed statement.

Public administration in its broadest sense lies at the heart of the Committee's weekly deliberations in this Building and elsewhere and features much in the business of the House. The Committee welcomes the statement that the involvement of the Assembly and its Committees from the outset will be essential to the review's success. However, there are issues about how individual Committees might be involved. In his reply, I want the Minister to outline how he thinks he can compel Committees to make a vital contribution to the review.

Members and their parties have a wide variety of views. We heard a ringing call from the Front Bench to Mr Trimble to give up his seat in Upper Bann. He may not have much trouble doing that - somebody may take his seat from him. What we heard from the Front Bench of the Unionist Party would then be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The Member strangely advised us that we should all have dual membership of the Assembly and local councils, where we could be taught the ABC of public administration. However, that duality should be banned upon election to higher places such as the Westminster Parliament, or even the European Parliament, because we would be unfit to take in what was going on in the Assembly and in council meetings. It is nice to hear such a ringing call from that Member about the resignation of his leader. I trust that the leader of that party will consider it and act accordingly.

Members of other parties will bring their individuality, political ingenuity and political findings to the debate. However, bearing in mind that each Statutory Committee has a scrutiny, policy development and consultation role to play on behalf of the Department with which it is associated, there is an argument that participation by Committees in the review should be limited to the consideration of matters concerning their related Departments. Will each Committee have the opportunity to review the reviewers? Will Committees be able to summons them to appear before them to find out why the reviewers are making the representations they are?

We do not know who those people are. The debate would have been more interesting had the First Minister announced their names. We could then have examined their credentials and asked why they were appointed.

Some time out of the blue, the First Minister will tell us who they are at a meeting in the Long Gallery. It will certainly not be first announced in the House. Nothing is first announced in the House.

Members also noted that rural proofing is mentioned in the suggested parameters to inform those who will be conducting the review. The joke is that last Friday the Minister told the Committee for Agriculture and Rural Development that the group that she had set up to examine rural proofing had not yet come to a final opinion on what it really is, so if no one knows what rural proofing is, how can parameters be set? Members of the Committee are concerned that little if any progress has been made on implementing the policy on rural proofing, because it has not yet been defined. That was, and is, an integral part of the Programme for Government, but so far, two years later, nothing has been done.

I lay aside my cap as Chairperson of the Committee for Agriculture and Rural Development to make representation on matters about the debate that concern me and members of my party. We should all be concerned that the progress boasted about by all the members of the pro-agreement parties has not taken place. If Mr Close had made his statement at the time of the referendum, he would have been up to date. Many of the things he said during the referendum debate were retracted in his speech today. I did not hear many of the pro-agreement parties crying out about 10 Departments having become 11 with the setting up of the Office of the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister. It was all "jobs for the boys", and everyone had to get in, because if they had not done so, there would have been no agreement. No one would have been let in unless there was enough to go round. Unfortunately, they hung themselves up on the recommendation from Europe on how that should be done. It was never thought that two of the seats could fall to the Democratic Unionist Party, as perhaps could a third. We were told about rogue Ministers who would not be allowed to take their seats. However, it did not work out that way, because some of us were wise enough to investigate the legal position.

As one of the boys who did not get a job, could we not have been arguing to ensure that the Democratic Unionist Party was represented on a power-sharing Executive? We are disappointed that it has not taken its seats. Does the Member recognise that we are debating a review whose credibility lies in the fact is that it is prepared to look at everything and ensure that ratepayers and taxpayers get best value for money?

TOP

I am not responsible for the Member's not getting a job. It was a member of his own party who kept him from getting a good job in the Assembly. Do not blame the DUP; he should look to his own kennel and deal with the person who treated him so disgracefully. The DUP is blamed for many things, but it cannot be blamed for that. That had nothing to do with the DUP. I wish that everything could go the Member's way, but it will not do that, and part of his statement admitted that.

This review is not open, above board and transparent. First, it will be under the control of the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister. The First Minister and his former Deputy First Minister did not have much regard for the Committee of the Centre.

They have attended one of its meetings. Two junior Ministers were appointed to help the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister, but neither could be present at the meetings. Therefore, the Committee of the Centre has not received great encouragement.

Mr Gallagher told us that the Committee of the Centre should not be allowed to review the review. It is little wonder; he knows that the Committee would introduce independent thought into how the review should take place.

The first thing that we should do is make a representation to the Westminster Parliament that the Committee of the Centre should become a Statutory Committee with powers equivalent to the other Committees, so that it can do its job thoroughly. Until we have a Statutory Committee to look after the Office of the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister, we will not have fair play, transparency or equality in the Assembly. We can be sure of that.

The First Minister has told us nothing today. We do not know who these people are. We do not know how much they will be paid. We do not know when they will meet. We do not know how they will be monitored. We do not know whether a Committee will be able to call them before it. We do not know anything. We are just told that the review is being set up. Given all that, the First Minister has the cheek to tell us that it will be made up of independent people. I am sure that when we examine their credentials, we will know where their independence lies.

The previous Member who spoke jovially said a great deal about quangos. However, you do not get to be on a quango because you have intelligence. You get to be on a quango because you are a safe person who will do what the powers that be want you to do. To qualify for a position on a quango you must nail your colours to the mast; you must fight a seat; and you must ensure that a Democratic Unionist candidate is standing for that seat. The Democratic Unionist candidate will beat you, and, when you are beaten, you will then get a job on a quango.

My party has no seats on any quangos. It has been lied to by Secretaries of State; it has been lied to by the Prime Minister; it has been lied to by officers in various Governments. It is represented on the Housing Executive only because the Northern Ireland Housing Council appointed the person that it nominated.

Mr Close complained that he did not get a job. The Alliance Party got plenty of jobs on the quangos. If you are a defeated member of the Alliance Party, you are on your way, and you do not need to serve a year in local government to gain experience. As was recommended by the spokesperson of the Official Unionist Party, you can get in immediately. It is a safe journey to a place on a quango.

Quangos have eternal life. Their membership, which is made up of safe men, is renewed from time to time. Someone brought me a list from a certain Government office, and I had a look at the names that are considered each time new appointments are made to the quangos. It made for most interesting reading. I wondered why so many people were on so many bodies. I discovered that this was the overall list used every time an appointment needs to be made to a quango. Therefore, a job on a quango is a job for life.

Nothing will be done to these quangos. In fact, we are setting up another quango today. It is a review quango that the Assembly knows nothing about. It does not know who will be on it. Does the First Minister know who will be on it?

Perhaps the Deputy First Minister can assist us by giving some clue as to whom he plans to appoint to the review body. It would liven up the debate if he could tell us a bit more. We are like Oliver Twist, sir; we are asking for more. The Deputy First Minister should tell us something more about that wonderful organisation. Of course, the review body will not report until after the next election, which is a wonderful scenario.

Once they have been defeated and have licked the dust in the local government elections, just look at how many men will be lining up and saying "Quango for me please. I fought my seat but I lost it, so there must be a quango for me." Why shall we not hear anything from that body before the election? Is it because those people are so capable, as the spokesman for the Official Unionist Party told us today? Many people in local government are very capable. However, is it through fear that some Members will lose out in the election that causes the review body to be careful before it reaches out its hands to the council?

Northern Ireland councils spend £260 million a year, which is only 3% of the country's total Budget. Therefore, why does everyone blame the councils? The boards' expenditure is £8·5 million. The expenditure of the trusts, area boards and other major non-elected quangos amounts to almost half of the country's Budget. The quangos do not give us value for money so they should go. Democracy can control expenditure only if elected representatives are in charge of it.

I love to listen to all those people attacking politicians. Politicians are evidently the worst people in the world. The only reason that such people attack politicians is that they cannot be politicians themselves. Those people cannot get elected. I know them; I have met them, and I have seen the miserable votes that people cast for them. I have seen them standing with faces longer than a Lurgan spade when the election baskets are opened. I know all about them, and I wonder why they are so against the politicians. However, if the politicians that are elected to the Assembly have their hands tied, they cannot be blamed for what happens in the country. We cannot be blamed if half of our budgets are given to non-elected bodies - to quangos.

The review must first look at the Assembly, the way in which it works and what is expected of it. It must put the Assembly into the driving seat of politics in Northern Ireland. Here is where the decisions should be made, but they cannot be made under the present system. I was amazed when I received the 'Draft Terms of Reference and Parameters for the Review of Public Administration'. It is a great document. I recommend that Members read it tonight when they go to bed - they will be asleep within one minute. I see the Deputy First Minister smiling, because he knows what I am about to say. The document says that that quango will do something - it will

"Reform" is a good Protestant word. The Member who spoke before me did not refer to a single Catholic or Protestant when he spoke of the membership of those bodies. I am glad to say that I am a Protestant. I do not need to wear that across my chest - everyone knows that I am a Protestant.

I shall read more from this interesting document:

I want the Minister to be honest with the House and tell us what the arrangements and principles of the Belfast Agreement are. Then I want the Sinn Féiners, the Alliance Party, the Women's Coalition - who are absent - and the other absent Members to tell us what those arrangements and principles are. Finally, I want to ask the five different parties in the Official Unionist Party about their opinions on the arrangements and principles of the Belfast Agreement. [Interruption]. I say to Mr Kennedy that confession is good for the soul. They do not know - that is the trouble with the Belfast Agreement. Just as in the book of Judges, every man does what is right in his own eyes. They all have different views, and where the agreement can be twisted to mean something that suits certain people, it will be twisted.

The Deputy First Minister has an impossible task. He intends to bring forward options for reform consistent with the arrangements and principles of the Belfast Agreement. Which version of the Belfast Agreement? Which spectacles does one put on? Does one put on the very green spectacles of Sinn Féin/IRA, the less green spectacles of the SDLP or the tinctured orange spectacles of some members of the Official Unionist Party? What glasses do you wear?

Everybody in this country knows that this is yet another review to put matters on the long finger, to delay matters until after the elections or until the people have to vote in a vacuum and in darkness, and then to speed on to gain control. It will not work, and that is clear from the fact that we are having this debate today.

Mr Close made a valid point that I was going to make myself. This is an interesting year - we were to have a review anyway. That is not something new, but we are not going to have it this year. We will have an announcement of a review this year, not the review itself, and we will not receive the report or have the finish of that review for many days to come.

Yet, face up to it - do Members not receive representations from the sick in their constituencies about the state of the Health Service? Do Members not go to the hospital wards and see people, not in a waiting room, but on a trolley? Do Members not see the sad state of our Health Service and talk to nurses, doctors and GPs about that matter? Do such people not come to Members? I could tell story after story about what is happening at this very moment in our Health Service. Surely the Assembly should not be engaged in review; rather it should be engaged in action. The Assembly should say "The Health Service needs our attention; let us put our best into that". That issue crosses the entire political, religious and sectarian divide. Those people need help immediately - they cannot wait.

We have troubles in education. Broken-down mobile classrooms, which defile the schoolyard, are still being used to school our children. People cannot believe that they are school classrooms. Education has problems, so should we not be attacking that? People who are not housed, who cannot get jobs or who bear the burden and heat of the day surround us, and yet we are discussing a review - a review with experts. We need somebody with enough expertise to help us to deal with the challenge of the present hour.

Remember, this House and its Members - no matter what we may think - will go. There is nothing like the election and the ballot box for giving people the chance to say what they think - and they will say what they think. We have an opportunity to do something. Instead of talking about something far off in the future, we should open our eyes to the present predicament. The House should decide that the time for action has come, not after the election but immediately. We should apply ourselves to good administration to save our Health Service, our education, our local services and all the rest. Those are the prime things to which we must direct our attentions.

Go raibh maith agat, a LeasCheann Comhairle. I welcome Dr Paisley's emphasis on the health crisis and on underfunding in the Health Service. It was useful to hear that. I also seek clarification on whether Dr Paisley was offering to engage in direct dialogue with Sinn Féin about the principles underpinning the Good Friday Agreement. In engaging both Mr Molloy and myself directly, I felt he was clearly inviting us to take part in direct dialogue. If that is the case, I accept that invitation on behalf of our party.

Cuirim fáilte roimh an díospóireacht seo, nó is ábhar fíorthábhachtach é agus sinn sa Tionól ag pleanáil modh rialtais don todhchaí.

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this crucial debate. The point has already been made that it is overdue. When will the review be formally launched? Perhaps the Deputy First Minister can be specific about that. What will the timetable of the review be, bearing in mind that the next scheduled date for council elections is May 2005? New arrangements would have to be implemented before or by that time. Will the review be truly root and branch, because we all agree that an unduly complex mosaic of agencies and bodies administers the small area that is the Six Counties?

Mr Molloy reminded us that we are part of a society in transition. We must consider public service delivery models and mechanisms that will result in efficiency and effectiveness. I am drawn to the section of the 'Draft Terms of Reference and Parameters for the Review of Public Administration' that states:

I particularly welcome that. This is where the North/ South dimension, underpinned in the Good Friday Agreement and in the new political institutions, must loom large in new arrangements. This should be aimed at avoiding precisely what we should avoid - the duplication of provision; it should aim at judicious expenditure of resources and at avoiding wastefulness.

Two systems on one small island for practically everything is an economic nonsense. The review of public administration should look beyond the border of the Six Counties. Partnerships, group systems and amalgams should be looked at similarly in the North and beyond. Presently there are many partnerships, or fluid collectives, such as the Irish central border area network, dealing with waste management, promotion of tourism and infrastructure development. We must look at models of good practice elsewhere in Ireland and Europe.

If this is a review for the twenty-first century, and if it is projecting decades into the twenty-first century, then we would be well advised to think beyond the parameters of the existing political entity - the Six Counties. It should be about removing the democratic deficit. We have gone some way down that road already, but as regards planning, there is a real democratic deficit. Presently there are no elected representatives from district councils on health and social services boards, for example, but there are elected representatives on the education and library boards. So there is an anomaly there.

What type of individual tends to end up on such bodies? That must be looked at so as to avoid old cultures and old hierarchies. If Maurice Hayes's proposals for the future delivery of health services are anything to go by, then County Tyrone and County Fermanagh will be emasculated in the reconfiguration of public services. Presently Mr Hayes's proposals suggest that there should be a northern set-up, a southern set-up and an eastern set-up within the context of the Six Counties. The western region has effectively disappeared. I would hate to think that Maurice Hayes would be portentous of the future. Social deprivation is often defined by availability of access to essential services, and historically there has been huge underinvestment in and huge neglect of west of the Bann. We all know that. Let us ensure that that is not made permanent in the future.

I am not sure how this should be weighted, but some regard must also be shown for a sense of place - where people work, go to school, shop and enjoy recreation. There is a cultural factor to consider.

I want to hear more detail from the Minister about the democratic input and about how the consultation will be conducted. This review must enable and reach local communities. People talk about numbers and layers, but the ultimate issue is the quality of services. We must strive to achieve better quality provision of public services. Go raibh maith agat.

TOP

As a member of the Committee for Social Development I welcome the review, and I suspect that I am not alone in thinking that it is long overdue in the context of the establishment of the Assembly. I listened with interest to the justification for the terms of reference being drafted in such a way as to allow the review team to address issues that it believes warrant it. I will return to that point.

Before I do, I wish to make some observations and ask a few general questions about the terms of reference, which I feel will be of concern to the Committee for Social Development. I agree that a range of critically important issues must be addressed, but should they not be more clearly identified at this stage?

The Committee for Social Development is keenly interested to know if the review will extend to, and include, Next Steps agencies such as the Social Security Agency and the Child Support Agency? Will it extend to the role of the Housing Executive? That matter was raised by Dr Paisley among others. We would like to know who the members of the review team will be. Who has chosen them, or who will choose them? Will they be paid?

We also want to know whether they will be different from the independent experts referred to. Are the independent experts different from the independent advisors referred to in the letter from the Office of the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister dated 12 February? How much is the review expected to cost? What is the breakdown of that expenditure?

In common with other Members, I am surprised and somewhat disappointed that there is no time frame for the review. Surely the terms of reference for such a review must be focused and should include intermediate milestones and, above all, a date for completion. Otherwise, it will become a nightmare to manage. It could go on forever, and at a significant cost to the public purse. Surely it would have been sensible to produce a definitive list of organisations to be included in the review, and to test that list first on the Floor of the House. We are told that the Office of the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister will look closely at the Assembly about oversight of the review. What arrangements have been made in that regard?

I began by saying that I welcomed the review. I restate that position. However, I want assurances - assurances that the process has been thought through fully, assurances that the Assembly will be fully and properly involved and, finally, assurances about the management of the project, the costs involved and the timescale for its completion.

I welcome the debate, but it is a great pity that the First Minister has not been present for the whole debate. Had he been here for Mr Hamilton's speech, which raised many important questions, he might have realised the degree of concern that exists even in his own party. Mr Hamilton asked many independent questions. He has probably ensured that he will remain an independent Back-Bencher after that speech. It is no use that David Trimble is not here.

The Deputy First Minister has had a long session here today. After resigning as Minister of Finance and Personnel, he probably thought that he had escaped listening to these long debates. However, the First Minister must have pulled rank and said that he had to sit there and listen to all of this. He has had a bit of an eye-opener today. He has had lectures on a political goulash recipe from his friend, Mr Arthur Doherty, and heard a bit about genetic engineering and quangos. He has also heard about crossing ducks and emus, or ducks and dingoes - I am not too sure what it was.

Dodos and emus.

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