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DUP manifesto: Analysis of key policies

Posted on by darion

The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) has published its election manifesto for 2024.

The party that won the most seats in Westminster in Northern Ireland at the last general election runs candidates in 16 of Northern Ireland’s 18 constituencies.

She decided to stand aside in North Down and Fermanagh and South Tyrone to give other unionist candidates a better chance of winning the seat.

This will be Gavin Robinson’s first election as leader, and his manifesto includes a pledge to continue to push for better financial support for Northern Ireland and promote union.

Here are some of the DUP’s policies analyzed by BBC Northern Ireland experts.

Remove barriers in the UK

It has been exactly eight years since the UK voted to leave the EU.

Despite the Leave campaign in this referendum, the DUP has spent much of the last five years arguing that the UK-EU agreement sets Northern Ireland apart.

They said they managed to achieve these changes in February this year. which, as then leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson claimed, would mean “zero checks and zero paperwork” when transporting goods from Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

However, this black-and-white (or rather red-white-blue) manifesto made it clear that the agreement did not correspond to the party’s arguments at the time.

It states that the DUP will “continue to fight for the full restoration of Northern Ireland’s place in the UK”, including removing the application of EU law and the emerging internal maritime border.

This commitment fits in with the more cautious language used by current DUP leader Gavin Robinson, who recently admitted that the details of the deal needed to be “more cautious realism”.

It also allows a party divided over the return to Stormont to present a united front when it comes to fighting for votes in this election.

As for whether the DUP can deliver further change, much will depend on the appetite of the next government, which may already be Brexit-weary after the events of the last decade.

The DUP manifesto looks in two directions on migration.

Suggests a more liberal approach to legal migration is needed to help address labor shortages in Northern Ireland.

He also wants the government to respond to a recent court ruling that struck down much of Northern Ireland’s illegal migration bill, including deportations to Rwanda.

It found that the bill breached human rights protections under the Good Friday Agreement and further supported by the Windsor Framework.

On legal migration, the DUP says the current work visa system does not meet the needs of smaller businesses in Northern Ireland and suggests measures including a review of the salary threshold for migrant workers.

The DUP wants a policy on illegal migration that “applies uniformly across the UK”. These ambitions would be helped by a Labor government that pledged to abandon its Rwanda policy.

Get sustainable funding for public sector awards

This is something the DUP has been campaigning on for some time.

Last month, the Northern Ireland Executive and the UK Government agreed to review the way public services are funded in Northern Ireland.

Public spending per head in Northern Ireland is higher than in England because it costs more to provide public services of an equivalent standard to a smaller population.

The deal will mean Northern Ireland will receive a “needs-based” amount on top of its normal funding allocation.

Independent experts from the Northern Ireland Fiscal Council have estimated that Northern Ireland needs around £124 per head for every £100 per person spent in England.

To return to the estimated level of need, the government agreed to increase all allocated funds by 24%.

It also means Stormont will not face a financial ‘cliff’ in 2026 when one-off funding from the £3 billion devolution recovery funding package runs out.

The executive has been given assurances it will be funded “as needed” in 2026, but how much this will amount to will not be clear until the next government conducts a UK-wide spending review.

Thanks to the financial package, many public sector workers, including healthcare workers and civil servants, have been offered pay rises this year.

Of the £3.3 billion deal to restore power sharing, around £600 million was earmarked for public sector wages.

However, trade unions have expressed concerns about what will happen when the one-off funding ends.

Work to increase farm subsidies

It is no surprise that the DUP has committed itself to the financial certainty and stability of farmers, pledging to seek “an increased, ring-fenced and multi-annual budget for farm support and development”.

The party has long been seen as a champion of agriculture, fishing and the agri-food industry, although it no longer holds this position.

Stormont is already implementing a new Future Farming Support and Development Programme, which aims to create a more financially and environmentally sustainable framework for agriculture.

The DUP manifesto pledges to oppose any cuts to compensation for bovine tuberculosis (bTB), which makes up the lion’s share of the £50m annual bill.

It also pledges to support “robust” eradication policies, including badger culling, after a court quashed an order by former minister and DUP MLA Edwin Poots last year.

Food security was put in the context of a just transition (which refers to the need for a just transition to climate-friendly policies) with a warning that “the needs of our farmers cannot be sacrificed for other policy goals.”

In the face of current constraints on farm development, the manifesto emphasizes that “investment in agriculture and primary production is essential to increase productivity, create jobs and ensure progress on environmental goals.”

Oppose assisted suicide and improve access to health services

It is only in the last sentence of the DUP’s manifesto on health that the party makes perhaps its most unexpected and interesting pledge in just 10 words.

The party says it “will also strongly oppose efforts to legalize assisted suicide.”

The emotive and controversial issue of how Northern Ireland will resolve it is still in its early stages, but, as elsewhere in the UK, the debate is starting to gain momentum.

Scotland, Jersey and the Isle of Man are considering changing the law to allow terminally ill people to end their lives – it is hard to imagine how political parties and the public could reach consensus.

Elsewhere, there has been mention of looking beyond Northern Ireland to the rest of the UK to provide solutions to local healthcare issues.

There is no specific mention of cross-border healthcare, which former health minister Edwin Poots started in 2012, offering pan-Ireland cardiac care for children.

Instead, the DUP said it was trying to improve patients’ access to NHS services and treatment available in other parts of the UK, although it did not specify specifically which services and how many used them.

To “reduce” waiting lists again, partnerships with “independent national suppliers” should be established.

This suggests knocking on private doors, but it is unclear who, where and how.

When I asked for clarification, the DUP member explained that this could include, for example, “what they do in the south when they use independent/private providers to do imaging tests – something like that”.

Endometriosis, rare diseases and cystic fibrosis are mentioned and provide better treatment for GPs.

While the manifesto touches on many pressure points, its implementation will require funding, cross-party/ministry cooperation and out-of-the-box thinking.