Lunn says he is still reflecting on his wife’s employment

Local Alliance MLA Trevor Lunn has said that he is still reflecting on whether he will continue employing his wife as his Policing Board researcher.

Last week he declared that he acted within the Policing Board guidelines by employing a relative.

His comments come after SDLP’s Conall McDevitt stepped down from politics last week when he had initially not declared that a member of his family was employed by him.

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In a statement Mr Lunn MLA said: “Following my appointment to the Policing Board in May 2011, I took the decision to engage my wife in undertaking research support services in support of my role.

“In line with the requirements of the scheme I made the appropriate declarations to the Policing Board. The fact that I had done so is reflected in the Policing Board’s annual report.”

He continued: “At all times I have acted within the Policing Board guidelines. As this was a matter for the Policing Board there was no requirement for me to declare this in the Assembly register of interest.”

Mr Lunn took over the Alliance candidacy for Lagan Valley from Seamus Close, a longtime representative for the area. In an interview he told the BBC that he had not initially identified his wife as he viewed it as a “private matter”.

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“It’s not a secret, but there is privacy involved,” he said.

“I took the view I shouldn’t be talking about it, I don’t like to call my wife an employee but I shouldn’t really be talking about my employees in public.

“I was persuaded by the party on Thursday that the best thing to do was to bring it into the open and have done with it.”

Mr Lunn said that he sits on many committees and it is his wife that helps him deal with the many volumes of paperwork connected with it.

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Mr McDevitt resigned last week, after admitting that he had not declared a £6,750 payment from his former company Weber Shandwick after he was appointed as a South Belfast MLA in 2010.

It was also revealed that Mr McDevitt’s wife received £30,000 in the last two years by working for him on the Policing Board.

When he resigned he said “In early 2010 I received payment from my former employers. I’d been managing director of a company and I received payment in order to help the new management team bed in. That should have been declared and it wasn’t. That’s a serious breach, in my opinion, of the code.

“I have rectified it today.”

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