Northern Ireland’s economic development agency is having a limited impact on the province’s productivity and needs wholesale reform if it is to be fit for purpose.
Those are the findings of a withering review of Invest Northern Ireland which recommended “profound change” at the organisation which receives funding of £160 million a year from the Executive in order to grow the local economy. However, despite the critique, it recommended retaining Invest NI as a so-called “arms-length” body as it has “key strengths to be built on”.
Carried out at the behest of former economy minister Gordon Lyons last year, the report said there is “considerable room” for improvement in leadership, structure, operation, control and public accountability at the agency.
