The Stormont executive’s long-awaited draft programme for government will focus primarily on nine areas ministers regard as priorities.
The policy plan for the remaining two-and-a-half years of the current mandate was signed-off on Thursday at the first scheduled executive meeting after the summer recess.
However, details of the document, which comes seven months after the restoration of the devolved institutions, will be kept under wraps until revealed to the assembly on Monday, as convention dictates.
Once published, it will go out for an eight-week public consultation, ahead of being formally adopted.
The areas the document will target to improves people’s lives include housing, health and the reform and transformation of the region’s public services.
If approved after the consultation, it will be the regional administration’s first programme for government since 2011-15.
The executive has faced criticism for the delay in producing the policy blueprint, which First Minister Michelle O’Neill described as a “significant strategy” and “wide-ranging programme”.
The Sinn Féin deputy leader acknowledge that the programme had been agreed under tight financial constraints.
She said the document acknowledged the budgetary challenges.
“I think we all recognise that we are bringing forward a programme for government in a very difficult financial circumstance,” she said.
“We all equally recognise that since we have a new government in London, that Labour are continuing with a policy of austerity which makes it a very challenging environment for us all to operate, but as Naomi had indicated this is a very scalable programme for government.”
Deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly also cited the “difficult budget situation” but insisted the executive could “improve lives in a meaningful way by focusing on a small number of prioritised actions that will make a real difference”.
“The Northern Ireland Executive working together has a determination to deliver for people throughout Northern Ireland that will require all four parties in the executive working together,” she said.
“And I welcome the fact that this was a four party agreement in the executive today, we look forward to listening to people, to speaking with people, but importantly, delivering for people on the issues that matter most.”
Justice Minister Naomi Long said people should not underestimate the challenge of delivering on the document’s pledges by the end of the mandate.
Health Minister Mike Nesbitt said any programme for government is “to some extent aspirational” but he said he was pleased at round table agreement on the need to “link it really closely to the budget”.
Opposition leader Matthew O’Toole, who appeared at Stormont with the SDLP’s alternative programme for government, said the executive had “proved adept at PR but deficient at clarity or delivery”.
“The public might have expected more clarity not just on vague aspiration but what exactly the executive intends to do, how and when,” he said.
“What is the target for reducing waiting lists, how will that target be achieved and when can patients expect to see meaningful improvements in the failing health service?”
The nine priority areas in the programme for government are:
:: To grow a globally competitive and sustainable economy;
:: Deliver affordable childcare;
:: Cut health waiting times;
:: Ending violence against women and girls;
:: Better support for children and young people with special educational needs;
:: Provide more social, affordable and sustainable housing;
:: Safer communities;
:: Protect Lough Neagh and the environment;
:: Reform and transformation of public services.
