Funding for Londonderry and Strabane’s city deal will be in the bank and ready for spending later this week, the Foyle MP Colum Eastwood has said. The city deal, one of four in Northern Ireland, had been in doubt after it emerged on Friday that the UK government had paused funding ahead of a spending review.
However on Saturday it was back on, with Secretary of State Hilary Benn posting on X that he “looks forward to signing the financial terms of the Derry City and Strabane Deal – in the coming days”.
Mr Eastwood said Friday’s announcement had been “a bungle” that “came out of the blue”.
“It has been a mess, nobody has come out of this well and it can’t happen again,” the outgoing SDLP leader told BBC Radio Foyle’s North West Today programme.
“We are in the right place now,” he said. “It hasn’t been smooth sailing for the last 10 or 15 years, but we are here now. We can start spending money on Thursday.”
‘Unsatisfactory way of doing business’
Derry City and Strabane District Council confirmed its financial deal would be signed off “as planned on Wednesday”.
The council said it followed “correspondence received from the office of the secretary of state for Northern Ireland over the weekend”.
A portion of the money expected from the Derry City and Strabane deal has been earmarked to help fund the medical school in Derry.
The £300m deal also involves plans to redevelop Strabane town centre; establish a DNA museum in Derry and open a centre for innovation in data analytics, advanced manufacturing and robotics.
City deals are regeneration funding packages worth more than £1.5bn, with about £600m coming from central government.
There are four deals in Northern Ireland: the Belfast City region, Derry City and Strabane, Mid South West region and Causeway Coast and Glens.
On Sunday, Stormont’s Finance Minister Caoimhe Archibald said regeneration funding packages in Derry and Belfast were expected to go ahead – leaving Mid South West and Causeway Coast and Glens under threat.
East Londonderry MP Gregory Campbell, from the Democratic Unionist Party, said he learned of the UK government’s intention to pause funding through the media on Friday.
“It really is a totally unsatisfactory way of doing business,” he told BBC Radio Foyle.
‘Ear of the chancellor’
“Part of the problem has been that the Belfast and Londonderry and Strabane deals have been slightly ahead in terms of time and preparation – but not by much,” he said.
Mr Campbell said there was now an onus on Mr Benn to ensure the deals still under threat get the go-ahead.
“The key player here is the secretary of state,” he said.
“He is the person that has the immediate ear of the chancellor, and he has got to do his bit to try and ensure that where he sits at the cabinet table, which is batting for Northern Ireland, that he carries out his duty.
“That’s what needs to happen today, tomorrow and going forward.”