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Burned. Sam McBride
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But despite the fact that Nolan had been late, Foster now took her time in appearing. Nolan sat and waited as the clock ticked down on what he knew was already a tight timetable until the interview aired. When Foster did arrive, she just said: ‘Stephen. You have been a busy boy’, and sat down. As her microphone was fitted and technicians checked the lighting and sound, the First Minister said nothing to Nolan and kept her head to the side, choosing not to look at the broadcaster.
Unseen by viewers at home, Foster’s two key spads, as well as Gordon and DUP Press Officer Clive McFarland, had positioned themselves at the back of the room in Nolan’s eyeline. But, just minutes into the exchange, it was Foster who was visibly uncomfortable, breathing heavily and speaking over the interviewer’s questions. With cables running out of the castle to a satellite truck, footage of the interview was being viewed live in the BBC newsroom in central Belfast where Buckler was communicating directly to Nolan via an earpiece.
Foster presented a simple version of events in which officials had failed to ever raise problems with the scheme during her tenure and she had made no mistakes. As Nolan probed her about the fact that on her watch the scheme was launched without cost controls and then a proposal to put in cost controls was abandoned, Foster facetiously said: ‘Yes, Stephen, so I’m supposed to have a crystal ball in relation to these issues?’
Nolan went on to ask her: ‘Do you know why there were these delays [in introducing cost controls], then?’ Foster shot back: ‘I’ve no idea.’ An incredulous Nolan said: ‘You haven’t asked?’ Laughing nervously as she replied, Foster said: ‘No, that’s a matter for Jonathan. Why would I ask? I was Finance Minister at the time.’ Pressed on how she could not have enquired, given the scale of the overspend, Foster pinned the blame on her colleague, saying: ‘I am bemused as to why he would leave it open for such a period of time.’
Under acute pressure from the interviewer, Foster was asked: ‘So let me get this right – we are hearing now of people who have been putting boilers into sheds and blasting heat into the sky. We know that these delays were a factor. And as our First Minister you still haven’t asked what the delays were about. You still haven’t briefed yourself.’ Again with a smile on her face, Foster replied: ‘No, because Jonathan signed off on a submission on the 4th of September …’
Nolan cut across her: ‘Do you not want to know?’ Again shifting the focus to Bell, she replied: ‘Well, I’m sure you’ve asked him the reason why he’s left the scheme open for that period of time. I’d be very interested to hear why he has said that …’ Foster went on to deny Bell’s allegation that she had shouted at him to keep the scheme open, and counter-alleged that it was Bell who had ‘used his physical bulk to stand over me in quite an aggressive way … he is a very aggressive individual’.
Foster presented the final two-week delay in closing the scheme – a point after cost controls were in place but which led to a multi-million pound increase to the bill for taxpayers – as being down to civil service and legal concerns. It would later emerge that in reality that delay had been a political price extracted by Sinn Féin. Even at this stage, when fighting for her political career, Foster was still trying to cover the full story to protect the DUP’s relationship with Sinn Féin – a fact republicans would soon forget as they rewrote history and presented her as someone with whom it was impossible to work.
As soon as the interview finished, Foster took off her microphone and left the room, without saying goodbye. Johnston immediately got to his feet and approached Nolan, threatening legal action over Bell’s allegation about his role in the scandal.
After the interview aired, the broadcast returned live to Nolan in the studio with BBC NI’s political editor, Mark Devenport. Devenport, a hugely experienced journalist not given to exaggeration, began by saying: ‘Words are almost failing me.’ The programme ended with a flurry of rights of reply from those named by Bell, all of whom denied wrongdoing.
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Later at the public inquiry, Foster was grilled on why she had told Nolan she had ‘no idea’ why cost controls were delayed. By then it was clear that her closest aides – who spent hours preparing her for the major interview – had been aware of the allegation that it was her spad who was responsible. She told the inquiry that McCormick had not spoken directly to her about that prior to the interview, but she ‘became aware of his belief after the recording of The Nolan Show … once the recording was over, I went into the junior minister’s office … and Andrew sheepishly said it was his belief that Andrew Crawford had delayed the scheme’. She went on to say that it was ‘certainly … after The Nolan Show that I spoke directly to Andrew about the issue’. Hamilton, who was also there that night, gave similar evidence to the inquiry about a conversation with McCormick ‘definitely after the interview’.
However, McCormick said that if that conversation did occur it could not have been after the recording – and therefore would have to have been before Foster told the public she had ‘no idea’ why cost controls were delayed. The civil servant – who, like Foster, was giving evidence under oath – said that Foster and Hamilton’s version of events ‘could not possibly have happened’. Speaking gravely, he told the inquiry: ‘I’m very concerned by what I’ve had to say this morning.’
The credibility of McCormick’s explanation was strengthened by what had been his immediate reaction to Foster’s interview when it went out that night. After watching her ‘no idea’ answer, he texted DUP spads in shock to say: ‘Difficult to understand why she said she had no idea … when I have said I would have to tell [a Stormont committee] that.’
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On the day after the Spotlight programme went out, Bell discussed the issue by phone with North Antrim DUP MP Ian Paisley – a figure removed from the party leadership, and perhaps an indication that by this stage Bell was looking beyond the party hierarchy for advice. According to Paisley, they discussed the situation on 7, 8 and 9 December with the contact taking the form of a phone call, a conversation in Parliament Buildings and then a personal visit to Bell’s home.
Paisley found a ‘troubled’ party colleague who ‘was concerned about his future’ but insisted they never discussed an appearance on The Nolan Show. During a ‘rambling’ discussion over tea in Bell’s home the MLA advised with characteristic self-importance that he had ‘a team of the greatest legal minds in Britain working on the case for him’, Paisley later told the inquiry. In Paisley’s evidence to the inquiry – by which point he knew that his former colleague’s DUP career was over – he said he had listened in ‘amusement’ to Bell’s claim that he had ‘recordings and documents’ that proved corruption. Naming senior DUP colleagues, Bell claimed that some of them were making vast sums of money out of RHI, Paisley said. The MP said that ‘frankly it was quite sad’ but they ‘parted on good terms’. Paisley went on to discredit his former colleague’s version of events, saying: ‘I was aware I had just met Walter Mitty in the flesh.’ However, the fact that Paisley had such extensive contact with Bell at the point where he was about to go public with his allegations was in itself striking. For years, there had been enmity between Paisley and the DUP leadership.
By contrast, Bell was closer to Robinson than any other DUP MLA and was reverential towards him. Bell employed Robinson’s son, Jonathan, as his constituency office manager and Robinson’s daughter-in-law as his part-time secretary. At a time when, as DUP leader Robinson felt under internal threat, he rewarded his friend’s loyalty, promoting him to junior minister in 2011 and then a full Stormont minister in 2015 – a decision which inadvertently led to Bell taking responsibility for RHI at the point where it was about