A DUP MLA has said the British government should be "embarrassed" that the Irish Republic is stepping in to fund student nursing and midwifery places in Northern Ireland.
Paul Givan, the party's health spokesperson, said failing to properly finance Stormont is "undermining" arguments for Northern Ireland remaining in the United Kingdom.
The Irish government plans to fund 250 student nursing and midwifery places for the 2023/24 academic year, addressing a shortfall resulting from budgetary problems north of the border.
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Senior civil servants at Stormont, who are currently running public services in Northern Ireland in the absence of devolution, are facing a funding gap running into hundreds of millions of pounds this year.
Stormont's Department of Health had cut 300 student nursing places for the coming academic year as part of a series of cost-cutting measures.
The €10million Irish government plan would create 200 undergraduate places for Republic of Ireland students and 50 places for Northern Ireland students in Queen's and Ulster universities.
Stormont health authorities have welcomed the proposed one-year arrangement, which was first reported by the Irish Times on Saturday.
Mr Givan said the plan "crystallises" the DUP's concerns around "structural failures" in how public services in Northern Ireland are funded from the UK Treasury under the Barnett formula.
He told the BBC's Nolan Show a funding arrangement is needed that "meets the needs of Northern Ireland" as the region's smaller economy makes it "more costly to deliver services".
Mr Givan added: "If we don't have that, then we're not able to fund the likes of the student places for those that want to qualify as nurses, midwives, doctors and all the other medical professions. And that is why we have this shortfall.
"That's why I say that the government should be embarrassed that the Republic of Ireland is putting money into the Northern Ireland university system to finance the training of students, because that should be a United Kingdom priority that they can deliver the nurses and the midwives that we need to deliver services in Northern Ireland, rather than a foreign jurisdiction providing the funding to deliver that kind of training capacity."
The Lagan Valley MLA said the Conservative government's approach is "undermining" the benefits of Northern Ireland's free public healthcare system.
He added: "So it's entirely counterproductive for the Conservative and Unionist Party not to be providing funding on an adequate basis right across the United Kingdom.
"And they are undermining our arguments for Northern Ireland remaining within the United Kingdom when our public services aren't properly financed."
Alliance Party health spokesperson Paula Bradshaw welcomed the Irish government's intervention, saying it boosts "already very strong all-island cooperation in academia and healthcare".
But she hit out at the DUP for blocking Stormont power-sharing since last year in protest over Brexit's Northern Ireland Protocol.
The South Belfast MLA said: "The DUP created this governance gap, and the Irish government have had to step in and show political leadership where the DUP haven't.
"Now we would agree with the DUP in the sense that the current funding formula is inadequate. There's not enough money for our public services.
"But we will only be able to make any traction, any movement on that when all the parties come back together, form an Executive and go with a collective ask to the Treasury so that we can get our public services on a better footing."
Mr Givan said it was "too simplistic" to blame the lack of a devolved government for Northern Ireland's budgetary problems.
"To say that the restoration of the Stormont institutions is going to solve the problems in the health service, or indeed across the other public services, just is not the case," he said.
Mr Givan defended his party blocking Stormont over the protocol, saying that the British government "know what the issues are, and they need to address them".
A Northern Ireland Office spokeswoman said: "This year's budget allocation from the UK Government gave the Northern Ireland Department of Health a total allocation of £7.3billion, an increase of £20million above 2022-23.
"The decisions required to live within this budget continue to rest with the Northern Ireland departments.
"We continue to call on the NI parties to restore locally elected, accountable and effective devolved government as soon as possible, which is the best way to govern Northern Ireland."
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