Ulster Unionist Party economy spokesperson and South Antrim candidate Steve Aiken has said that despite the DUP’s protestations of innocence, the latest revelations linking Arlene Foster directly to disastrous policy decisions on RHI are damning.

Steve Aiken OBE said:

“Arlene Foster’s confidence that the Public Inquiry will clear her name is contradicted by the latest revelations directly implicating her with the policy decision not to bring in cost control measures at an early stage of the Renewable Heat Incentive scheme.  The civil service minute of October 2015 backs up the testimony given by a senior civil servant to a Stormont committee in February 2016 directly linking Mrs Foster with the disastrous decision not to insert costs control measures into the RHI.

“Even before Sir Patrick Coghlin’s Inquiry convenes, there is a wealth of information in the public domain all pointing to direct Ministerial involvement in policy decisions on RHI.

“We know that a consultation document which had a foreword written by Mrs Foster as Enterprise Minister ran from July to October 2013.  It included various suggestions including the idea of degression as a cost control measure.

“We know that a senior Civil Servant told the Stormont Enterprise Committee on the 9 February 2016 that in relation to not introducing cost controls in 2013 after the consultation, “the Minister decided that the priority should be on the introduction of the domestic RHI scheme.  So resources were devoted to that.”(John Mills, Head of Energy Division, DETI https://soundcloud.com/niassembly/eti-09-february-2016 1:33:55)

“The record already shows that, on several subsequent occasions, Mrs Foster did get personally involved in policy matters relating to RHI.  She intervened to change the regulations to allow a number of businesses who had previously benefited from Carbon Trust loans to avail of the RHI scheme.  

"She also, by her own words when introducing the domestic RHI scheme, made it more lucrative in Northern Ireland.  She told the Assembly on 8 December 2014, “With biomass boilers and stoves, you get an upfront payment of £2,500, which helps you to purchase the equipment, and then you get help for seven years. That is a good way to bring in the domestic RHI. It is done differently in Great Britain, which just has the tariff incentive but does not have the upfront payment, which I felt was needed.”  

"So one minute Mrs Foster claims credit for and gets personally involved in the implementation of the RHI schemes, the next she claims she cannot be expected to be over every 'jot and tittle' of the policy.  She can't have it both ways. We expect the Public Inquiry to get to the bottom of all these issues, but it is clear from what is already in the public domain, that Mrs Foster and her DUP Special Advisers will have an awful lot of explaining to do.”