Ulster Unionist Leader, Mike Nesbitt MLA, says the Chair of the Regional Development Committee, Trevor Clarke MLA, needs to study his brief, rather than waste people’s time on gratuitous attacks on Regional Development Minister, Danny Kennedy MLA.
Mr Nesbitt said:
“Yet again, Mr Clarke is on our airwaves, spouting ill-informed opinions about what is going on in the Department he is supposed to scrutinise. This time, he fails to understand that the issue with NI Water staff working to rule, is the implementation of an Executive policy on pensions, and it would be ultra vires, or beyond his powers if the Minister took any action that would breach an Executive agreement. Either Mr Clarke fails to grasp the simplest of political positions, or he is making a fool of himself in order to cover for his DUP colleague, the Finance Minister, Simon Hamilton MLA, who is the one person who could make a telling intervention.
“Mr Clarke is no stranger of media faux pas. Recently, I heard him tell an interviewer he could not comment on a consultation by the Department of Regional Development on a new multi-million pound footbridge over the River Lagan from the Gasworks to Ormeau Park, because he did not know enough about it. There can be no more telling condemnation of a Committee Chair than their failure to have even a basic grasp of what the Department they are supposed to scrutinise is up to. I suggest he gets up to speed on his brief before making any further ill-advised public comment.”