The latest shenanigans over the Stormont Budget have effectively “kicked the can down the road” (in that phrase beloved of Storocrats and Eurocrats alike) until October, during which several important things should happen. One of the many is the passage of John McCallister’s “Opposition Bill”, which will likely remain so named but is actually better presented as a “Collective Government Bill”.

For “Collective Government” (therefore, really, just “Government”) is what Northern Ireland lacks at devolved level. An inevitable consequence of Collective Government is, of course, an Opposition – but the lack of Opposition is the symptom of the problem, not the cause. The cause is allowing Ministers and parties to sit in “Government” while actually disagreeing with it…

The whole thing is a daft facade and the public know it. In the real world, Governments raise their own money and agree collectively on its allocation and on the policy and legislative framework in which that allocation will take place. In Stormont Fantasyland, on the other hand, the Government holds out the begging bowl to another Government and then randomly allocates it to a bunch of pet projects (often overly inefficient and even corrupt ones at that).

The first, most obvious intervention has to be proper, independent enforcement of the Ministerial Code. This is the norm in London and Edinburgh yet somehow Stormont has survived without it, relying on Ministers to investigate their own Special Advisers and Committees loaded with the Minister’s own colleagues to assess the outcome and such other ludicrous nonsense.

The second, almost equally obvious intervention has to be proper, transparent publication of party donations. Of the parties in our “Government”, only the Alliance Party does this. Shame on the other four, hiding from the taxpayers, the ratepayers and the electorate at large exactly what the sources of their money are. The potential for favours and outright corruption is clear to anyone.

The third, now increasingly obvious intervention has to be to stop the ludicrous nonsense of Ministers being allowed to vote against the Budget under which their Department is funded. Anywhere else in the democratic world, this is a resigning offence (for the whole Government, if they cannot get their Budget through the House). The most straightforward move towards real Government in Northern Ireland’s devolved institutions would be for the requirement after an Assembly Election to be a power-sharing Executive able to agree a Programme for Government and a Budget – anyone who does not agree with it, forms the “Opposition”.

That is where John McCallister’s Bill comes in. Clearly, it is technical and it still needs to be fully drafted and then the principles broadly agreed – but no one should withhold that broad agreement given the obvious need for the third intervention above. It will contain clarity that parties choosing to disagree with the Programme and the Budget will be looked after (in the sense of priority allocation of Committee Chairs/places, speaking rights and perhaps also research services and the like). It will in effect enforce “Cabinet responsibility”, not least because there will be an Opposition in place to challenge any irresponsibility on competence grounds as much as anything else. It will make the relevant arrangements for adequate Technical Groups to be formed and treated fairly.

If, in order to achieve cross-community consensus or qualified majority vote the requirement is for constant horse-trading, so be it. It is quite possible that Denmark will soon be governed by a coalition commanding just 53 of 179 seats (less than 30%), willing to work with different groups in parliament to govern on the basis of the broad popular will but knowing that 90 will ultimately be enough; this is a far cry from a government elected with 105 of 108 seats (97%) which cannot make a decision about anything because diametrically opposing views have to be brought together every time an attempt is made on any subject!

It is of course necessary to ensure in the context of Northern Ireland that any majority is cross-community and qualified, which does make it a slightly trickier place to govern. This is not the same thing, however, as saying that absolutely everyone must agree on everything; indeed, the whole purpose of a functioning democracy is that we respect decisions made by elected representations and their enforcement by the police and the law courts even when we disagree with them. By enforcing a requirement for collective responsibility in government, not least when setting a Budget, it is inevitable that not all will agree – those who don’t should form an Opposition and seek to overturn the decisions they do not like by appealing to the people at the ballot box, just as happens everywhere else in the Western World.