The Northern Ireland Assembly was dominated on Tuesday by a landmark ministerial statement from Education Minister Paul Givan, who unveiled a sweeping reform of GCSE, AS and A-level qualifications, alongside significant statements on waste water enforcement and a legislative consent motion to remove the two-child limit in Universal Credit. The session also heard heated exchanges over fuel prices, the First Minister's conduct and road safety concerns.

Minister Givan set out a new policy framework for general qualifications in Northern Ireland, describing it as a "once-in-a-generation opportunity" to reshape the education system. The centrepiece of the announcement is a move to make most GCSEs linear rather than modular, retaining modularity only for English, maths and science, which he described as "passport qualifications". The controversial AS level will be abolished as a stand-alone qualification and replaced with a new two-year modular A-level structure containing three units, one of which can be taken at the end of year 13 and will count for 30% of the final grade. Givan said the current system puts Northern Ireland pupils through up to 18 exams across two years to achieve the same A-levels as pupils in England who sit just six. "Is that fair? Is that good for mental health and well-being?" he asked the Assembly. First teaching of reformed GCSEs will begin in September 2029, with an estimated cost of £15 million over several years.

The proposals drew significant pushback from opposition members. SDLP MLA Matthew O'Toole questioned whether the shift to more linear assessment contradicted the feedback from young people and parents, and asked whether the reforms had been discussed at the Executive table. Sinn Féin's Pat Sheehan challenged the Minister on what he called a contradiction between his stated concern for exam anxiety and his continued support for the academic selection test sat by ten and eleven-year-olds. Sinn Féin's Liz Kimmins also pressed the Minister on his rationale for concentrating more assessment at the end of year 12 and year 14. Givan defended his approach, saying he had taken a "bespoke, balanced" position that rejected both England's fully linear model and the Republic of Ireland's approach, which he described as "totally linear". The Minister also argued that coursework is now compromised by artificial intelligence, saying "when a student can generate a polished essay in seconds, coursework stops measuring learning and starts measuring who has the best access to AI".

Agriculture and Environment Minister Andrew Muir made a lengthy statement outlining eight actions his Department is taking to strengthen regulation and enforcement of waste water pollution. He confirmed his intention to introduce a Fisheries and Water Environment Bill in May that would raise the maximum fine for water pollution to £50,000 and introduce fixed penalty notices. He also signalled his intention to withdraw the Northern Ireland Environment Agency from the Statement of Regulatory Principles and Intent, a 2007 arrangement with NI Water that he said had amounted to a "licence to pollute". Muir said only 29% of surface water bodies now achieve good ecological status, down from 2011, while more than 20 million tons of untreated sewage enter waterways each year. He expressed frustration that plans for an independent environmental protection agency had been blocked: "I am gutted that it has not been permitted to proceed."

The waste water statement also prompted a sharp exchange when DUP MLA Jonathan Buckley raised recent media allegations about pollution incidents at AFBI's Hillsborough site, an arm's-length body of Muir's Department. The Minister said inspections found only a low-severity pollution incident that had been addressed, with Red Tractor accreditation maintained. He added: "I saw your commentary in the media at the weekend, and some of the comments that you made about civil servants were disgraceful." Later, Ulster Unionist MLA Robin Swann's colleague Jim Gaston pressed Muir to meet journalist Dougie Beattie over the Hillsborough Forest allegations. Muir responded: "I will meet serious journalists. GB News is neither."

The Assembly approved a Legislative Consent Motion allowing Westminster's Universal Credit (Removal of Two Child Limit) Bill to extend to Northern Ireland. Communities Minister Gordon Lyons told MLAs that around 13,700 households in Northern Ireland are currently affected by the two-child policy, covering 47,690 children, of whom 17,450 are not currently eligible for the child element of Universal Credit. Removal of the limit is expected to increase Universal Credit entitlements by approximately £3,650 per year for each additional child beyond two, at an estimated additional cost to Treasury expenditure of £59.6 million for 2026-27. The Committee for Communities Chairperson Colum Gildernew confirmed the Committee supported the motion, while also calling for a strengthened anti-poverty strategy to accompany the measure.

Member statements reflected the sharp impact of rising global oil prices on Northern Ireland households. Alliance MLA David Honeyford said gas prices had risen by over 30% overnight and called again for home heating oil to be brought within the remit of the Utility Regulator, arguing that Northern Ireland is "the most exposed part of these islands to shocks in global oil and gas". DUP MLA Paul Frew opposed retail market regulation, warning it would spread the cost of price spikes over time rather than reflecting them accurately, and argued that consumer choice in heating should be protected. Sinn Féin MLA Emma Sheerin drew a direct line between support for military conflict and rising prices, criticising what she called "cheerleading for Netanyahu, Trump and the world's other war leaders".

The conduct of the First Minister also featured prominently. DUP MLA Jonathan Buckley criticised Michelle O'Neill for twice declining to attend Cabinet Office briefings on the Middle East crisis, saying she appeared "to be the First Minister for nobody". SDLP leader Matthew O'Toole echoed the criticism but spread it equally between the First Minister and deputy First Minister, arguing that neither had agreed a joint statement on energy prices, stranded citizens in the Middle East or other local consequences. "Those two parties never see the public good," he said, calling for the leaders of the Executive to "grow up and serve the public rather than party political interests".

During Question Time on infrastructure, Minister Kimmins confirmed there had been no delay to the delivery of Belfast Rapid Transit 2, pushing back against suggestions from O'Toole that the 2033 full completion date represented a significant setback. She said the current phased works, including extensions on southern and northern routes and a park-and-ride facility, remain on track for completion by 2030, and she pointed to over £40 million in additional roads investment since December alongside a new digital roads survey to guide maintenance targeting. On road safety, she acknowledged the road network was in a "terrible state" but cited unprecedented rainfall, years of underinvestment and recruitment vacancies in her Department as contributing factors, while outlining plans to front-load her budget from April.

The Justice Minister Naomi Long introduced the Criminal Justice (Sentencing etc) Bill at First Stage, a wide-ranging measure covering sentencing discretion, suspended sentence orders, life sentence tariff principles, a new offence of assaulting a public worker, sentencing aggravations for offences against particular groups and vulnerable victims, and amendments to road traffic offence penalties.