Policy background The Northern Ireland (Anticipation and Adjustments) Act 2019
Following this, the Northern Ireland Civil Service continued to manage the delivery of services in Northern Ireland. This involved the reallocation and reprioritisation of some budgets, and also the allocation of new funding which has become available to the Northern Ireland administration as a result of the funds authorised by Parliament in the UK Estimates process. Parliament’s authorisation for these revisions was provided in the Northern Ireland Budget (Anticipation and Adjustments) Act 2019 in March 2019.
	In addition to providing the authorisations and appropriations for the revised amounts required for the full 2018-19 financial year, the Northern Ireland Budget (Anticipation and Adjustments) Act 2019 also provided authorisations and appropriations for a vote on account. This was to allow Northern Ireland departments and other public bodies to continue to deliver public services into the first half of the 2019-20 financial year.
	This vote on account is a normal process for any Supply and Appropriation Act and did not imply the setting of a 2019-20 Budget for the Northern Ireland departments and other public bodies. Its purpose was to provide access to cash and resources, approximately 70 per cent of the amount authorised for the previous financial year, to ensure that services could continue to be delivered pending the consideration of a Budget Act for the full 2019-20 financial year.
	The amounts authorised and appropriated in the vote on account are expected to begin to be exhausted from 31 October 2019, and the purpose of the Act is to provide the authorisations and appropriations for the balance to complete each department’s full 2019-20 cash and resource requirements. The figures in this Act are based on the draft 2019-20 Budget announced in Parliament for the Northern Ireland departments by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland on 28 February 2019, adjusted to reflect the latest in-year position agreed by the Northern Ireland Civil Service.