Future Search Conference - 5 February 2009

I am pleased to join you all today as you embark on three days of intensive, interactive and collaborative work on this Future Search exercise.  

I am also pleased to see such a strong cross section from the city and the wider region gathered together here in common purpose. This sets the scene for genuine cross sector dialogue and, just as importantly, for direct engagement between local citizens and those in the various sectors who are working to provide them with services and resources.

The regeneration of our towns, cities and communities is, and must remain an important priority. My Department has, as some of you may know, played a central role in setting the agenda for, and driving Derry’s urban renewal.

Our track record includes the redevelopment of some 750 sites including 600 buildings in Derry, the direct delivery of £200M in funding and the levering of a further £400M in private sector investment resulting in the creation of many hundreds of jobs in the city.

Within the past few years my Department has acquired a number of additional sites in Derry including Clooney and Fort George to strengthen its regeneration programme for the city.  These sites have been carefully master planned and will be transformed into regeneration assets that deliver social, economic, educational and environmental benefits for the people of Derry.

For example at the Northern gateway to the city Fort George, under the management of Ilex, will provide a mix of knowledge based industry, offices, leisure facilities, residential accommodation and public space creating a new, exciting and sustainable urban environment of real presence.

In the heart of the city’s Waterside area the former Clooney lands will facilitate a high profile, high quality educational campus and enable the development of sporting/recreational facilities of excellence that will complement those proposed for the nearby St. Columb’s Park by Derry City Council.  

My Department has already helped to kick start that wider redevelopment by providing a state of the art, third generation pitch for St Columb’s Park.  The new pitch has already become a successful and much used addition to the sports facilities in the area.

Also, in the Waterside I have in recent weeks announced my intention to acquire the former Clondermot School Site from the Western Education and library Board. My officials are already working with colleagues from the relevant Departments, Derry City Council and the Community Sector to bring about the earliest possible redevelopment of this site, in ways that will improve public service provision within the area and create new employment opportunities.

While it is important to recognise the achievements that have been made, the process of urban renewal must continue to be widened and strengthened.  Combining economic success with social justice in a sustainable urban environment remains, therefore, a major priority for my Department.

However, this is not just a task for Government alone.  Local leadership and entrepreneurial action will be crucial if Derry is to improve its economic performance and fulfil its proper role as the driver of the regional economy.

The scale of the global economic downturn makes it more important than ever that we understand the challenges now facing us and learn from the different experiences of regeneration as we seek to formulate our response.

If those challengesare enormous so is the potential of our people to address and overcome them and we should not downplay thescale of regeneration that has been achieved in Derry over the past 25 years.

The urban area has been expanded significantly with new, high quality, public and private housing most of which is less than thirty years old.The city centre, which once saw a third of its buildings destroyed in bomb attacks, is now bustling again thanks to a series of recently completed developments and more are either underway or in the pipeline.

Everyone accepts that partnership is the key to successful regeneration.  But a series of questions must inevitably flow from that understanding.  

Until recently, with one or two notable exceptions, local peoplehad limited involvement in the regeneration process.  Now in 2009, we have an opportunity to engage in a broad based process which will allow those who live in Derry, those who work there, and those in positions of authority, to collectively help inform and shape how Derry will develop over the next 25 years.

It is my belief and guiding principle that the process of regeneration must promote the wellbeing of all.  Its success, therefore, will be judged on how well it creates the sort of sustainable urban environment I spoke of earlier - one that is capable of accommodating both economic success and social justice.  

I am aware that Future Search is an established process and that over the next three days you will work through a number of stages before arriving at a shared understanding of goals and a commitment to act on these.

There will of course be some who question the need for yet another vision and planning process and I do fully expect to see significant progress on existing regeneration plans and projects including the development of Fort George, Ebrington and the new foot and cycle bridge.

Nonetheless I would also encourage everyone here to actively participate in this Future Search exercise.

I know that Derry people in particular have plenty to say about their city and I want to hear those views.

Then let’s widen our aspirations and work to achieve our goals together.

Thank you