Stalled Assembly costs almost €3m a month

The Northern Ireland Assembly is costing £1.93m (€2.74m) a month to run - despite devolved government being suspended, Northern Ireland Secretary Paul Murphy disclosed tonight.

He told Ulster Unionist David Burnside in a that salaries of Assembly Members, office cost allowances, travel and subsistence expenses and party allowances totalled £830,000 (€1.18m).

The rest was being spent on “general administration”, he added.

It compares with the £2.64m (€3.75m) monthly cost of running the Assembly when it was last fully operational – before suspension 14 months ago.

Hopes of a speedy restoration of devolution suffered a serious setback last month when elections saw the Democratic Unionists and Sinn Féin sweep ahead of the Ulster Unionists and the SDLP respectively as the biggest Assembly parties on either side of the sectarian divide.

The British Prime Minister Tony Blair is meeting party leaders at Downing Street this week in a bid to map out plans for a New Year review of the Good Friday Agreement.

Mr Burnside was elected to the Assembly last month.