The Department for Economy has defended a decision to launch new proposals to tackle zero hour contracts and other employment legislation ahead of Thursday’s General Election.
Economy Minister Conor Murphy announced the consultation on the ‘Good Jobs’ Employment Rights Bill in the Assembly on Monday, tackling a range of issues including the use of zero hours contracts, which allow employers to retain employees with no set minimum number of hours.
Official guidance on the ‘purdah’ period issued by The Executive Office sets out guidelines for civil servants and government departments ahead of an election.
“New public consultations on significant policy proposals should generally not be launched during the general election period,” the guidance states. “Although consultations on less sensitive matters (such as specialist or technical proposals) may be able to proceed as normal.”
It also states: “Where a proposed announcement would involve consultation with UK Government Departments, the general presumption is that it should be deferred until the new UK Government is in place.”
A spokesperson for the Department for Economy said it was convention for ministerial statements to be made in the Assembly adding “and no Assembly sittings are scheduled after the general election until September”.
“Planning has been underway since the spring for the announcement to be made this week and early engagement has already taken place with a range of stakeholders.
“Today’s consultation document sets out a range of issues on which views are invited from the public. No decisions will be taken on the issues until after the consultation period.”
Meanwhile, the SDLP criticised the Stormont Executive after it announced a funding monitoring round ahead of the General Election.
On Monday the Executive agreed allocations of over £300m as part of the June 2024/25 monitoring round including funding for education, health and new build social housing. It came despite despite the volume of available funding not being confirmed by the UK Treasury due to the absence of a sitting UK Parliament.
Leader of the Opposition Matthew O’Toole said: “Today’s action by the finance minister, along with the first ministers, is a shocking and shameless abuse of civil service impartiality and a clear breach of the Executive’s own rules on the pre-election period.
“To announce hundreds of millions in spending allocations three days from an election, while acknowledging that the funding is at risk of not being confirmed by the Treasury, is anything but routine business.
“The text of the minister’s own statement acknowledges the significant risks associated with the announcement being made – but she and her colleagues pressed on regardless in the desperate hunt for pre-election publicity.”
Finance Minister Caoimhe Archibald told the Assembly she had ‘considered carefully’ whether the funding round should go ahead but that it represented ‘normal and routine’ Executive business.
“There is also an urgent need to provide funding certainty to departments and even a short delay presents risks,” Ms Archibald said.
“Not proceeding could have resulted in departments taking decisions that would not have been needed had an additional allocation been confirmed.”
