Social Development Minister Margaret Ritchie MLA is continuing her tour around Northern Ireland with her Public Forums. She resumes in Strabane  on 28th October, and Cookstown 11th November following requests from people at her other public meetings. Below is a message from the Minister and sets the theme for the meetings.

I am holding a number of public meetings throughout Northern Ireland to engage people around the question of how – in practical terms – we move from a segregated divided society to one that is shared and at ease with itself. It is part of a number of public ‘Social Development’ forums I am holding in at least ten venues right across Northern Ireland.  I’m asking some big questions and looking for help with the answers.

As Minister I have responsibility for ‘social development’. This includes things like housing, urban  regeneration and supporting communities, but also a much wider remit for how our overall society develops generally.  And it is this wider issue I want to consult people about.

We’ve had an end to the campaigns of violence.  Guns have been largely silent for some years now. We also have an unprecedented degree of political stability, with Unionists and Nationalists locked together solidly in government.  We have made a lot of progress in recent years. So with the violence gone and with political institutions in place, you would think that our society could now ‘move on’.  That, what John Hume called the ‘healing process’, could begin.  Yet, if we are honest, we have moved on very little in recent times despite the relative success of the Peace Process.

 

We still live apart, we are educated apart, we mostly socialise apart - and that is just not normal. It may have become our norm, but it is not the behaviour of a normal society.

In Belfast our divisions are openly on display in interfaces and peace walls – but there are the same divisions right across the North even where they are less visible or masked by a superficial civility between people.

We have established tolerance and even respect between our communities but peaceful co-existence is no substitute for a Shared Future.

And I believe if we do nothing, then the cycle just repeats itself and all of our prejudices and fears and behaviours just get handed on and repeated by the next generation.  Surely we owe it to future generations  to somehow break this cycle.

 

I’m not in a position to speak for the whole of the Executive and ‘moving on’ is not the sole responsibility of DSD, but it certainly struck me that in my own area of responsibility, for example in housing, we could do something more to reduce the extent of segregation. Likewise when it comes to urban regeneration, we don’t just need the shiny new buildings, we need to create more shared spaces.  

Essentially this is about our society developing and moving on.  We know we have to start this conversation.  And we also know the change we need will not come about of its own accord.  Who has got the ideas that will take us forward?

I have some ideas of my own but I want to hear local views so that I can feed them into DSD policy-making and into the Executive.

I thank the many hundreds who have made positive contributions at the meetings so far. All comments are logged and will influence my thinking on the better shared future we all want to see for Northern Ireland.

Keep an eye in your local press for details of a Public Forum near you or find dates on this site.