Good start half the battle for hands-on minister
Building roads – an important and routine function for any government – was a political tool in the hands of the unionist administration that ruled the six counties after partition.
They had a policy of road building that was every bit as discriminatory as their allocation of votes, jobs and houses.
Nowhere was this more evident than the decision in the 1940s to build the M1 from Belfast, abruptly stop it at the River Bann close to Lurgan, then in the 1960s extend the road to Dungannon before another halt. To go further into the west may have benefited the majority nationalist population.
The fact that this discriminatory policy also impacted on the unionists in Tyrone and Fermanagh was irrelevant to the architects of discrimination.
Their objective was to impoverish nationalist areas and if unionists suffered collateral damage so be it.
In recent times the DUP was more concerned to improve the roads around Ballymena than, for example, the road from Belfast to Dublin, a major arterial route and economic corridor between the country’s two capital cities.
Back then the ‘road’ to Dublin carried political overtones that were anathema to the DUP.
Today, a short few years later, politics on this island is changing fast. Not an eyelid was batted by unionists when Peter Robinson, leader-in-waiting of the DUP and first minister-designate, recently warmly welcomed Taoiseach Brian Cowen to unionist east Belfast.
In these changing times the current minister responsible for building roads, among many other things, Conor Murphy, is keen to reverse the impact of the partisan road-building policy.
One of his priorities as minister for regional development is to eradicate the legacy of regional imbalance and disparity for nationalists and unionists, living east and west of the River Bann, as well as linking road development in the north with the Irish government’s road-building programme in the rest of the island.
He is guiding the day-to-day work of his ministry with a philosophy rooted in delivering equality, social justice and prosperity using this key department as an economic driver now and for the future.
He is a ‘hands-on’ minister, as was evident from his approach when east Belfast was flooded in a heavy rainfall within days of him taking over his responsibility last May. He visited the homes worst affected by the flooding and was praised for doing so.
Those he met were unconcerned that he was a leading Sinn Fein figure from south Armagh and rightly so.
His department automatically applies an equality impact assessment to all of its projects whether they are free travel passes for the elderly or multi-million-pound projects such as the new roads from Aughnacloy to Derry and Derry to Belfast.
The procurement guidelines are also rigorously enforced – capital projects have to benefit socially, economically and environmentally those most in need.
Since May of last year some of the high-profile projects Conor Murphy has introduced include ruling out privatisation of the water service. The executive is considering further proposals that, if implemented, will honour Sinn Fein’s manifesto pledge that people would pay once and once only for water usage.
Over the next three years £650 million will be invested in the water and sewerage infrastructure. This will improve environmental standards and maintain high levels of clean drinking water and alleviate the risk of flooding.
New trains and the railway network will benefit to the tune of almost £140 million with the investment ban on the Derry railway track lifted and £64 million for track relaying between Coleraine and Derry and the line between Belfast and Dublin upgraded by £40 million.
And all of this just one year into office – an ambitious start or, as they say in Irish, tús maith leath na hoibre – a good start is half the battle.
LinkBack URL
About LinkBacks
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by nineteensixtyseven
