Kilcooley Community Forum: New Decade for Development

FORUM

29 Jan, 2010

Europe Says “No Community Safety for Kilcooley”

An application was submitted to the Peace 3 Partnership to address a number of community safety issues, not only within Kilcooley but across the wider borough and the Peace 3 cluster. The aim was to carry out research on what community safety initiatives work and which do not, and where best practice is identified, to try to roll out these initiatives into other areas.

This particular project would have helped gel relationships with bodies such as the District Policing Partnership, the PSNI ‘led’ PACT Programmes (Partners and Communities Together) and would also have incorporated a good relations aspect to its overall content. The project was developed when it became evident that the North Down Borough Council ‘led’ Community Safety Partnership since it was established in 2003/4 has failed to contribute any money into Kilcooley or Kilcooley projects to concentrate on its remit of addressing crime and the fear of crime. When approached about this the North Down Community Safety Partnership Manager said they had spent money in Kilcooley but after further investigation it was proved this was completely untrue.

Kilcooley Community Forum, North Down Alternatives and the North Down & Ards Intercommunity Forum all met with a North Down Community Safety Partnership representation to highlight their concerns but nothing concrete nor substantial came out of the discussions. It was then raised on a number of occasions with the Northern Ireland Office Community Safety Unit, who have ultimate responsibility for managing the Community Safety Partnerships, and they have failed to address the concerns raised or to meet with representatives from Kilcooley.

Now that the intended initiative to bring community safety support to Kilcooley and other areas has been knocked back it has sent a message to groups such as RESPECT that yet again certain working class Protestant areas within North Down are being targeted for discrimination, exclusion and what is perceived as State sponsored abuse. When the Forum raised this matter with representatives from the borough-wide group RESPECT (Retaining Equality Supporting Protestant Ethos & Cultural Traditions) they said, “When will the people of this borough waken up and see what is going on all around them. If people do not stand up against these injustices we will all become subject to this disgraceful and inequitable treatment. It is time to protest and voice your concerns.”

Kilcooley Community Forum will be meeting with Pat Colgan Chief Executive from Special European Union Programmes Body and MEP Diane Dodds to yet again raise these issues and if nothing is agreed the Forum will ask Mr Jim Allister to highlight their concerns via the media.

We will keep you updated if final recognition is ever awarded to Kilcooley for their unfunded efforts to promote community safety. Let’s hope Europe say “YES.”

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