Plans to establish an independent environmental protection agency in Northern Ireland have fallen through after the DUP opposed the measure. As John Manley writes in the Irish News
Andrew Muir has effectively conceded there will be no independent environmental protection agency (EPA) established within this mandate due to blockage by the DUP, which the minister claims is “without rhyme or reason”…His party is now exploring the possibility of a private member’s bill to bring Northern Ireland’s environmental governance in line with Britain and the Republic, however, time constraints mean it is unlikely to progress before the next Assembly election in May 2027.
The proposed EPA was intended to be a “non-departmental public body (NDPB) of the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) (which) would allow for better and more accountable environmental protection and regulation” as Muir described it. Last November when a non-binding motion regarding the proposed regulator was put before the Assembly, former Agriculture Minister and current DUP deputy leader Michelle McIlveen said the following
“We are not short on oversight, but we are short of results. There is a tendency in the Chamber to tag Lough Neagh into every motion on the environment, and we need some honesty on that issue. Creating another agency will not clean up Lough Neagh; it will not improve water quality. It will create another costly layer of bureaucracy — another structure with its own staff, offices, reports and headlines, but very little delivery on the ground. We do not need more committees, commissions or quangos; we need results. We need a system that actually works.
Rather than token gestures or bureaucratic reshuffles, if the Minister truly wants to lead on the environment, he should start by fixing the system that he already controls. That means ensuring that the NIEA is properly resourced and empowered to act. It means cutting through departmental silos so that agriculture, infrastructure and environment policies work with rather than against each other. Importantly, it means holding senior officials and Ministers to account for delivery and for their failures.”
This suggests that the DUP’s concerns are focused on the cost of creating a new agency and the lack of accountability to the Assembly they claim such a body would represent. On the other hand, critics of the DUP seem to suggest the party’s opposition is rooted in a desire to maintain as much influence as possible over environmental regulation and an independent body could frustrate that objective.
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