by Sam McBride
But above all, the six-week period in December 2016 and January 2017 showed the power of public opinion in a democracy. Whether what has happened leads to lasting change or there is a reversion to the old ways will depend as much on the public as on politicians. If voters in Northern Ireland care more about constitutional or tribal disputes than good government or integrity in public life, it is quite logical for politicians to act in line with those wishes. In a democracy, the politicians tend to be reflective of society even if many people like to think otherwise. After decades of constitutional politics, RHI involved sustained cross-community public fury about a financial scandal, contributing to the collapse of devolution. On 6 December 2016, the day of Spotlight, anyone suggesting that RHI could lead to Stormont falling within 34 days would have been looked upon as a melodramatic and deluded fool. In time, RHI may be viewed as a warning to the leaders of unionism that if they do not learn from what has happened and change their ways, there is the potential for a far greater collapse: that of Northern Ireland itself.
KEY PLAYERS
Jonathan Bell. Foster’s successor as DETI minister, in post until May 2016.
Stephen Brimstone. DUP special adviser to First Minister Arlene Foster. Removed a domestic biomass boiler to install a non-domestic boiler in his garage – which heated his home and allowed him to claim RHI.
Tim Cairns. Bell’s spad who admits he tried to delay RHI being reined in, but he says on the orders of others in the DUP.
Sir Patrick Coghlin. Retired Northern Ireland Court of Appeal judge who chaired the public inquiry into the scandal.
Andrew Crawford. Foster’s special adviser (spad) throughout her time as DETI minister and Finance Minister.
DETI. Stormont’s Department for Enterprise, Trade and Investment (Renamed the Department for the Economy, DfE, in May 2016), which set up and oversaw the RHI scheme.
Arlene Foster. DETI minister from 2008 to May 2015, then Finance Minister until January 2016, then First Minister until January 2017.
Fiona Hepper. Head of DETI’s energy division when RHI was being set up and for its first year. Left in November 2013.
Seamus Hughes. Immediately beneath Wightman in DETI’s energy division. Succeeded Hutchinson, arriving in June 2014 and a key figure as RHI fell apart.
Peter Hutchinson. The mid-ranking DETI official under Hepper most involved in designing and overseeing RHI until he left in May 2014.
Timothy Johnston. Special adviser to every DUP First Minister and the party’s most powerful backroom figure.
Dr Keith MacLean. Energy expert appointed by Coghlin to act as the inquiry’s technical assessor, a role in which he quizzed witnesses.
Andrew McCormick. As permanent secretary, DETI’s top official from July 2014, arriving just months before RHI ran out of control.
Joanne McCutcheon. Hutchinson’s boss. The only key player not to give evidence to the RHI Inquiry.
John Mills. Succeeded Fiona Hepper as DETI’s head of energy division in January 2014.
Dame Una O’Brien. Former permanent secretary of Whitehall’s Department of Health, appointed by Coghlin to assist him as a panel member at the inquiry.
Ofgem. The Office of Gas and Electricity Markets, the GB energy regulator, which also runs some government schemes and was contracted to run RHI day to day by accrediting applications and making payments.
Janette O’Hagan. A businesswoman who saw RHI’s perverse incentive and tried to warn DETI. Sometimes referred to as the first whistleblower, but saw herself as a ‘concerned citizen’.
Chris Stewart. From August 2014, directly beneath McCormick as deputy secretary (head of policy group) at DETI.
Stuart Wightman. Worked under Mills, having replaced McCutcheon as head of energy division’s energy efficiency branch in June 2014, about eight months before it began to run out of control.
ABBREVIATIONS
AME – Annually Managed Expenditure, money which is funded directly from the Treasury in London and is effectively limitless.
DEL – Departmental Expenditure Limits, the budget allocated to each Stormont department.
CEPA - Cambridge Economic Policy Associates, an economic consultancy.
CHP – Combined Heat and Power plants, mini electricity stations which utilise the heat which would otherwise be a by-product of generating electricity.
DECC – Department of Energy and Climate Change, the Whitehall department which ran the GB RHI scheme.
DETI – Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment, the Stormont department which set up and oversaw Northern Ireland’s RHI scheme.
DfE – The Department for the Economy, the department which replaced DETI in May 2016 as part of a reorganisation of devolved departments.
FoI – Freedom of Information, the law which allows members of the public to ask for government documentation, subject to certain exemptions.
kW – kilowatt, a unit of energy. In biomass boilers, the higher the kilowatt number of the boiler, the more energy it can use and the more heat it can produce.
kWh – kilowatt-hour, a unit of energy (in the same way that distance can be expressed in feet, metres or miles, energy can be expressed as calories, therms, kilowatt-hours, etc).
MLA – Member of the Legislative Assembly, Stormont’s equivalent of MPs.
MW – Megawatt, equivalent to 1,000 kilowatts
NIRO – the Northern Ireland Renewables Obligation, another public subsidy used to encourage wind turbines, anaerobic digestors and other technologies.
Ofgem – Office of Gas and Electricity Markets, the GB energy regulator which also runs some government schemes and was paid by Stormont to handle accreditations, payments and inspections under its RHI scheme.
PAC – the Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee, a cross-party group of MLAs which scrutinises public spending.
RHANI – The Renewable Heat Association of Northern Ireland, the group set up to represent RHI boiler owners in early 2017.
UFU – the Ulster Farmers’ Union, the representative body for farmers in Northern Ireland.
TRIM – Stormont’s data management system into which all significant documentation ought to be saved.
TIMELINE
2008
Stormont decides to opt out of an RHI scheme being developed by Westminster.
2012
June: Ofgem warn the officials in Arlene Foster’s Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment (DETI) designing RHI that their scheme was seriously flawed.
November: Rather than delay the scheme to fix the problems, DETI presses ahead and launches RHI.
2013
August: Businesswoman Janette O’Hagan warns DETI officials and Arlene Foster about RHI’s perverse incentive.
2014
May: O’Hagan again attempts to raise the alarm, offering to provide proof of abuse.
March: O’Hagan yet again seeks to raise the alarm, pleading with DETI to listen to her.
December: DETI consciously chooses to delay introducing cost controls and instead expands RHI to domestic properties.
2015
March: It becomes clear to DETI that RHI is running beyond budget.
June: New DETI minister Jonathan Bell is told about the problem for the first time.
July: A submission goes to Bell arguing for urgent cost controls. No decision is taken until September – and then it is for further delay.
July: Arlene Foster’s adviser Andrew Crawford forwards to relatives a confidential ministerial submission revealing the looming cost controls.
September–November: A huge spike in applications sees the number of RHI claimants double in the final few weeks before cost controls.
November: A basic form of cost control is finally implemented.
2016
January: Crawford tips off poultry giant Moy Park that RHI is to shut for good, giving it weeks to pile into the scheme, driving a second spike in applications.
January: A whistleblower gives Foster a note alleging systemic abuse of RHI to the extent that a farmer is in line to get £1 million for heating an empty shed.
February: After rows between Foster and Bell, RHI is finally shut – but only after closure is again delayed.
July: The Northern Ireland Audit Office reports on ‘serious systemic failings’ projected to cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of pounds.
September: Stormont’s Public Accounts Committee begins public hearings as it launches an inquiry into the scheme.
December: A BBC Spotlight exposé of what happened triggers a political crisis. Nine days later, Bell does an unprecedented televised interview with Stephen Nolan in which he alleges senior DUP figures stopped him shutting the scheme.
Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness calls on Arlene Foster to step aside as First Minister so that the allegations can be investigated.
2017
January: After Foster refuses to stand aside, McGuinness resigns, ejecting her from office and triggering a snap Assembly election.
After weeks arguing against a public inquiry into the scandal, Sinn Féin’s Finance Minister sets up a public inquiry under Sir Patrick Coghlin.
MLAs pass legislation to retrospectively slash RHI payments.
March: After an Assembly election in which the DUP loses 10 seats and unionism loses its Stormont majority for the first time, devolution cannot be restored.
November: Public hearings of the RHI inquiry begin.
2018
December: The public inquiry concludes its public hearings, but its investigations continue.
2019
March: In the absence of devolution, Westminster passes legislation which involves punitive retrospective tariffs for RHI claimants.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I am grateful to my editor at the News Letter, Alistair Bushe, deputy editor Ben Lowry and news editor Rod McMurray for their unstinting support for my work on this story, facing down the inevitable threats.
My thanks also go to Stephen Walker who has been a deep well of wisdom on book publishing and the process of writing. His advice has made this project far smoother than otherwise would have been the case, as has the support of my publisher, Conor Graham of Merrion Press. This book would be very different without Conor’s immediate and sustained belief in the importance of the subject, his patience with my relaxed journalistic interpretation of deadlines, his willingness to accept a manuscript which is 40% longer than planned and his commitment to excellence. While my name is on the book, my editor at Merrion, Fiona Dunne, copy editor Samantha Kelly and proofreader Anna Benn have contributed enormously to the accuracy and readability of the text. Thanks to the work of indexer Fionbar Lyons, you can skip the boring parts. My thanks also to the wise counsel of the lawyers who have advised on the manuscript and on the threats from five senior DUP figures – Arlene Foster, Timothy Johnston, Andrew Crawford, Peter Robinson and Mervyn Storey – who refused to answer my questions but instead responded with a solicitor’s letter which ended with the charming message: ‘In the event that publication of inaccurate and defamatory material occurs our clients are fully prepared to issue appropriate legal proceedings which will of course include the publishing house as a co-defendant. Please take careful note of the position in this regard and notify the publishing house accordingly.’
My longsuffering wife, Anna, not only toiled through every chapter spotting errors and inconsistencies but put up with losing me for unreasonably long portions of the last two and a half years because she appreciated the significance of these issues.
But the people who have contributed most to this story have been you, the readers. From the earliest reports in the News Letter in 2016, it was the online – and then print – figures which gave my editor confidence that we were reporting an important story which deserved significant resources. In turn, readers fed through hundreds of pieces of information which prompted further investigation and more stories.
Often the public can feel helpless to effect change when reading newspapers or watching news programmes. But with online analytical tools which like never before pinpoint the stories with which the public engages, RHI demonstrates the part which can be played by ordinary people in encouraging investigative journalism. Outside of the BBC, news is a commercial business and if no one is reading important stories it becomes harder and harder to justify them. If you click on clickbait, expect to get more of it. If you click on serious journalism, or buy a newspaper, or subscribe to an investigative news outlet, then you are likely to get more of it. So thank you for buying this book.
INDEX
abuse and potential for fraud, 96, 123, 139, 140, 142, 163, 208–9, 211–12, 217, 220, 229, 231, 240–2, 314; due to higher subsidy payments, 67, 70, 71, 158, 230, 234; and reports of heating empty buildings, 154–5, 162, 190, 200
accountability and discipline within the Civil Service, 326–7, 329
accountability for spads, 336–9
Action Renewables, 59, 73, 230, 231
AD (Anaerobic Digester) plants, 292, 293
Adams, Gerry, 256–7, 268, 269, 270
Adams, Jeremy, 227
addendum business case document for future and retrospective expenditure, 187–9, 190
AEA Technology consultants, 25, 45
AECOM Pöyry consultants, 21–2
Agnew, Steven, 60, 222
Aiken, Glynis, 115–16, 346, 348
Aiken, Joseph, 115, 118, 145, 146–7, 148, 149–50, 246, 276
air source heat pumps, 24, 100, 103–4, 162
Alderdice, Lord, 327
Alexander, Ian, 43
Allister, Jim, 167, 168, 242, 243–4, 335, 338
Alternative Heat Ltd, 174, 260
AME (Annually Managed Expenditure), 35–7, 38, 53, 116, 117, 133, 136, 153, 163, 192, 321, 323
Anderson, John and Lilian, 239
Anderson, Mark, 45, 149, 228, 264, 272, 314
applications for the RHI, 74–6, 89, 91, 92–3, 106, 119, 141; and court appeals by aggrieved claimants, 308–11; and the rapid installation of boilers, 160, 171; and spike in demand before the introduction of tariff rates, 8, 133, 141–2, 156, 161, 171–2, 176–7, 179, 181, 185, 191, 205, 211–12, 213, 216, 249, 260
Arlene Foster Holding Things (website), 348
Arthur Cox (law firm), 39
‘assurance statements,’ 120
Aston, Wesley, 263
Attwood, Alex, 69, 70, 253, 290
audits, 199, 212, 219; and delays in, 314, 316, 317; for non-compliance, 241, 243, 244, 245–6, 313–14, 316 (see also Northern Ireland Audit Office, the)
Avis, Keith, 56, 57
Balcas Ltd, 174, 228, 260
banks and loan support for RHI, the, 67–8, 69
Barker, Greg, 72, 75
Barnett Formula, the, 116
Batch, John, 96, 170–1
BBC broadcast interviews, 1–8, 12–15, 18
Belfast News Letter (newspaper), 68, 150, 194, 248, 249–50, 256, 259, 260–1
Belfast Telegraph, The (newspaper), 222, 250
belief in maximising Treasury funding to Ulster, the, 31–2, 34, 36, 46, 52–3, 109, 111, 116, 136, 141, 142, 157, 191, 321–2, 323, 324–5
Bell, Elliott, 172; and claims to the Assembly that RHI was a success, 215, 216
Bell, Jonathan, 1–7, 80, 94, 139, 141, 156, 160, 168–9, 186, 189, 192, 220–1, 224, 239, 253, 262, 264, 271, 299, 331, 337, 339; and blame for RHI, 14, 15, 68, 202; and the closure of RHI, 212, 214, 216; and delays to tariff controls, 8–10, 14, 15, 16–18, 131–2; and interview for The Nolan Show, 1–7, 206, 252; and perceptions of misleading, 167–8, 183, 214, 215; and questions about secret recordings, 11–12; and relations with Arlene Foster, 14, 15, 68, 132, 195–6, 202, 207, 216–18; and relations with Timothy Cairns, 125–8, 129–30, 131, 132–3, 165–7, 169, 204, 331, 339; and sense of responsibility about RHI, 135–6, 156, 164–5, 183, 187, 189, 276; and suspicions
of colleagues, 202, 205–6, 224, 278; and testimony before the public inquiry, 11–12, 131, 197–8, 276, 277–8, 280–1; and the US trade mission, 202–4; and use of private email accounts, 197–8, 341
biogas subsidies, 293–4
biomass heating systems, 42, 43, 61, 77, 79, 80, 87, 102, 106–7, 141, 145, 146, 174, 179, 200, 295, 297, 301, 305; and boiler size, 42, 65, 72–3, 91, 103, 107, 209; and maximising subsidy rates with multiple smaller boilers, 54, 65, 70, 80–181, 95, 96, 103, 137, 148, 158, 186, 209–10, 250, 313–14; use of by DUP members, 235–43, 244–5, 248–9 (see also subsidy rates and the cost of fuel)
Bissett, Alan, 39–40, 54
Blair, Tony, 336
block grants, 35, 37, 52, 142, 220
Bloomfield, Sir Ken, 325
boiler size and the lucrativeness of tariffs, 42, 65, 72–3, 91, 103, 107, 209
boiler usage, 79, 80, 123–4, 235–43, 244–5, 248–50 (see also poultry farmers’ usage)
boycott of media by the DUP, the, 249–50
Bradley, Karen, 312
Brankin, Bernie, 36–7, 109, 163
Brazil trade mission, 288–9
breakfast row between Jonathan Bell and Andrew Cairns, the, 127–31
Brennan, Mike, 153, 192
Brexit, 167–8, 251, 344, 353
Brimstone, Aaron, 239
Brimstone, Stephen, 144, 195, 199, 227, 235–43, 244–6, 352
Browne, Andrew, 276
Bryson, Jamie, 152, 153, 224, 316
BS Holdings, 65, 66, 79, 155
Buchanan, Tom, 258
Buckler, Chris, 5, 7, 12–13
Bullick, Richard, 8, 11, 13, 128, 195, 199, 217, 234, 242, 261–2, 263, 266, 283, 337, 348; on Jonathan Bell, 130, 168; and relations with Arlene Foster, 69, 232, 233, 253–4; role as a spad in the DUP, 331–2