It was entirely appropriate that Sir Keir Starmer should arrive in Belfast last night, barely 48 hours after his crushing victory in the UK general election saw him confirmed as Britain’s first Labour prime minister for 14 years.
He obviously has a range of major priorities to address elsewhere, but he is well aware that he also faces several particularly urgent decisions with long-term implications for the Stormont administration.
The most pressing in the context of rapidly approaching deadlines is the Casement Park project, a massive opportunity in sporting, economic and symbolic terms which ultimately comes down to a judgement call for Starmer.
As a proposed 34,000, all-seater complex, it involves enormous sums – although they have yet to be finally calculated, may not be as high as some have speculated, and are capable of being effectively recouped in the coming years.
Casement Park has been quite a saga since the DUP ditched what was widely regarded as a visionary blueprint for a multi-sports stadium, with a 40,000-plus capacity, at what is officially known as the Maze/Long Kesh (MLK) site, carrying an estimated price tag of up to £200m back in 2008.
The way in which the Irish Football Association and Ulster rugby were instead able to successfully finalise the expansion of their own individual grounds, while the GAA ran into a series of setbacks – some predictable but many, like the Covid crisis, unavoidable – has been well documented.
It is still possible that Casement Park could be completed in line with stringent UEFA specifications just in time to host matches in the 2028 European Championship, bringing unprecedented financial benefits to Belfast and leaving the city with a state of the art facility capable of hosting top class GAA, IFA and IRFU fixtures, as well as concerts by international performers, for decades ahead.
The ultimate bill, allowing for inflation and the sums already allocated to Ravenhill and Windsor Park, would be broadly comparable to the investment promised to the unfulfilled MLK scheme almost two decades ago, with no impact on separate public spending commitments in areas like health, education, roads and the environment.
No-one will have forgotten that the outgoing Conservative secretary of state, Chris Heaton-Harris, publicly guaranteed last year that the money would be provided, only to subsequently and cynically remove himself from the debate when pressures emerged.
While his successor, Hilary Benn, offered an optimistic update yesterday, he was not in a position to specifically declare that the new Casement would be open in time for the 2028 Euros.
Starmer can display that he observes higher standards than the Tories and sign off on an amazing asset which will benefit all sections of our divided community, but he probably needs to act within weeks, if not days, if it is to become a reality.
Starmer can display that he observes higher standards than the Tories and sign off on an amazing asset which will benefit all sections of our divided community, but he probably needs to act within weeks, if not days
