Will Andy Burnham's big ideas apply in Northern Ireland?

This week the new Prime Minister Andy Burnham tried to show voters he had the power to make their lives better in small ways.

A series of early morning announcements covered electricity bills, bus fares and pubs.

The measures also illustrate that for people in Northern Ireland it is decisions taken at Stormont, rather than Downing Street, that will often have the most impact.

Burnham announced that VAT would be removed from household electricity bills for an initial six months.

This will save the typical customer around £45 a year.

However, it will not apply in NI for reasons related to the post-Brexit deal known as the Windsor Framework.

This deal means some EU VAT rules still apply in NI. The government decided it would be too time consuming to negotiate the electricity VAT cut with the EU.

The BBC understands that some Stormont officials believe the VAT cut is completely permissible under the terms of the Windsor Framework and there is no reason the EU would oppose it.

But as things stand it will not be applied. Instead, Stormont will get some additional money from Westminster and will have to come up with its own scheme.

Burnham may favour further intervention in energy markets as part of his intention to exert greater control over the "everyday economy".

Any intervention is unlikely to apply to NI as it has its own separately regulated electricity, gas and water markets.

Burnham announced he was reinstating the £2 cap on single bus fares in England, after it was increased to £3 under the Starmer government.

Public transport is a devolved matter and is operated through Translink, a government-owned company.

There has never been a fare cap along the line of the English model, instead there are a variety of discount schemes.

As a result of the announcement for England Stormont will get some extra money, perhaps up to £15m.

Stormont ministers are not obliged to spend this money on public transport but will face pressure to do so.

Translink is currently consulting on significant service cuts due to budget pressure.

Intervention in the bus market was Burnham's signature policy when he was mayor of Greater Manchester.

Again that "everyday economy" policy has limited relevance to NI as public transport is already under state control.

Burnham announced a 20% discount to business rates for pubs and other venues [Getty Images]

Burnham announced a 20% discount to business rates for pubs, social clubs and live music venues in England.

Rates are a property tax and the discount should reduce the typical payment by around £1,000 next year.

This is another policy area devolved to Stormont so Burnham's measure doesn't apply.

The cut in England will generate a small amount of additional money for NI but not enough to do anything of significance with rates.

NI's regular property revaluation, which is used to set business rates, was thrown into disarray earlier this year.

The hospitality industry forced the Finance Minister to effectively abandon the process as they didn't want to pay more.

For Stormont ministers the most important issue is their budget.

They have been unable to produce a budget for this financial year, saying what they have been given by Westminster is inadequate and would inevitably mean damaging cuts.

They will try to persuade Burnham that Northern Ireland is underfunded and needs additional money beyond what the devolution funding formula delivers.

Burnham is well aware of the intricacies of devolution funding, but much of his focus has been on how the English regions are shortchanged by the current arrangements.

His Chancellor John Healey spoke to Stormont's Finance Minister John O'Dowd this week.

There was no sign of an imminent breakthrough with O'Dowd saying "a different approach is required".

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