- Social Investment Fund set to overspend by £13.1m
- Sinn Fein/DUP Executive couldn’t even run a scheme to tackle poverty
Following the revelation that the Social Investment Fund is set for an overspend of £13.1m, Ulster Unionist Party Leader Mike Nesbitt MLA said:
“This has been an astonishing week of revelations of Executive incompetence, ineptitude and mismanagement. It is entirely in keeping that we now hear that the latest scandal regarding the Social Investment Fund is a projected overspend of £13.1m, 16% of the total.
“Remember, SIF was an £80m programme that was to be spent in the last mandate tackling deprivation and physical dereliction, in other words poverty. The fact that the DUP and Sinn Fein couldn’t even run a scheme to tackle poverty, while screaming against the austerity coming from the London Government, tells you all you need to know about their ability to govern.
“Having spent a mere £4m of the £80m in the proposed timeframe, we now hear £80m is to become £93m. I have spoken to Kieran Donnelly, the Comptroller and Auditor General, who assures me that the Northern Ireland Audit Office intend to conduct a thorough review of this expensive farce.”