Justice minister 'misspoke' on £119m sum for PSNI data breach payouts

The justice minister has said she "misspoke" when she announced that the Stormont Executive had agreed to set aside £119m to settle cases brought by police officers over a major data breach.

On Wednesday, Naomi Long said the executive would set aside the money if the Treasury would not.

On Thursday, Long clarified: "That was my error in saying the money was agreed by the executive, rather than agreed by the Department of Finance."

The data breach, in 2023, involved the accidental release of some personal details of all 9,400 officers and staff.

Long said the executive is meeting next week to discuss the issue and said "there was broad agreement and understanding that this was the best way forward".

"Formally it won't be agreed until next week, so I don't want to mislead anybody into thinking that the money is done and dusted, but I am optimistic," she said.

"I would never claim that it's a foregone conclusion, because the executive has a mind of its own, and that will have to go through the due processes, but people, I think, recognise that the sooner we get this settled the better it is for the people who have made those claims."

"There are still challenges facing the executive next year in terms of our overall finances. That will all play out next week."

Speaking on The Nolan Show on Thursday, Long said: "I'd misspoken, I have to be honest and upfront with people."

"When you make a mistake - we all do it - you have to be honest and upfront," she added.

"What I should have said is we agreed with the Department of Finance and that they had agreed and come back and agreed that they're going to put it to the executive."

Long said that she had since spoken to the PSNI chief constable. "I said to him I just got carried away because we had so much good news for once and that's unusual in my line of work."

The Ulster Unionist Party's Doug Beattie, who is also a member of the justice committee, said: "We're not any further forward in regards to the money for the data breach."

In October, the Treasury rejected a second request from the executive to help with the cost of paying hundreds of millions of pounds in compensation.

But on Thursday morning, Beattie told Good Morning Ulster: "The executive should re-approach the Treasury again to try and get the funding for this."

He said that officers feel "even more demoralised now with the system".

Matthew O'Toole, of the Social Democratic and Labour Party, said Long was "letting down PSNI staff with unprofessional mixed messaging".

He said: "This is symptomatic of an executive that rushes to claim credit for the most modest of achievements and then runs from responsibility like it's a plague."

He said the expectations of police officers and staff had been raised and then "dashed hours later because the minister was more concerned with headlines than delivery".

Chief constable Jon Boutcher said there was "real optimism" the Executive will soon agree £119m in funding to settle compensation claims related to the 2023 major data breach.

He was speaking at a meeting of the Northern Ireland Policing Board.

He said he did not want to focus on "an innocent mistake" made by the Justice minister Naomi Long, who has admitted she misspoke by prematurely announcing the deal.

"We all make mistakes," he said, adding: "I hope it's a premonition."

The PSNI has already accepted liability for the data breach, which occurred in August 2023, and talks over the settlement have been taking place for more than a year.

The data breach occurred when the PSNI accidentally released details of its workforce in response to a Freedom of Information request.

The details were published on a website and later obtained by dissident republicans.

Details of what could be offered to individuals have not been made public.

But a previously published PSNI estimate put the bill at more than £100m.

Six test cases for damages are currently being heard at the High Court.

Meanwhile police officers will be given a pay rise as Stormont Ministers have agreed the distribution of about one hundred million pounds in extra funds.

The Justice Minister Naomi Long confirmed this in a social media post this afternoon.

Officers will get the money in their January pay packets after the DoJ acquired more than 11 million pounds on Tuesday.