EQUALITY & COMMUNITY RELATIONS

Spokesperson: Eileen Bell MLA

Community Relations Spokesperson: Stephen Farry

Last updated: 30 April 2004

Northern Ireland remains a deeply divided society. But rather than these communal divisions being addressed and overcome, they are becoming institutionalised.

Sectarianism and segregation remain major scars on Northern Ireland, and have even intensified in recent years.

Sectarian attitudes are not restricted to those in and around interfaces, but permeate throughout society. Sectarianism is about prejudice, scapegoating, and putting people into boxes.

The dominant view, both from the Agreement and many aspects of Government policy, is that Northern Ireland is permanently divided into separate Protestant/Unionist and Catholic/Nationalist communities.

The state caters to these ‘separate communities’ with needlessly duplicating facilities, wasting resources that could otherwise be used to improve the quality of services.

Yet there is substantial evidence that a clear majority of the people in Northern Ireland would like to have mixed facilities in which to live, to work, and to be educated. Almost a quarter of Protestants and a third of Catholics do not wish to be described as either Unionist or Nationalist. Furthermore, the 2001 Census showed that 14% of the population do not wish to be described as either Protestant or Catholic.

Skilful conflict management of a so-called ‘benign apartheid’ cannot be sustained. With little or no common bonds, it is relatively easy for ‘separate communities’ to go their different ways with any major crisis.

The healing of our communal divisions must be the greatest priority for our political institutions, and thus lies at the heart of Alliance’s policy agenda.

Alliance will promote equality of opportunity, equality of treatment, equality of access, and equality under the law for all people, irrespective of:

• Gender
• Age
• Marital or family status
• Religious belief
• Disability
• Perceived race or ethnic origin
• Nationality
• Sexual orientation

We are opposed to all forms of unlawful and unfair discrimination.

MANIFESTO PLEDGES (2003 NI Assembly)

• Develop a new community relations strategy for Northern Ireland. This should challenge how we live and learn, work and play together as a community.
• Actively encourage de-segregation and communal integration, through appropriate policies and by placing a duty upon all government departments and public sector agencies. This includes areas such as planning.
• Introduce a new form of policy proofing, called Policy Appraisal for Sharing over Separation (PASS). This would ensure that the impact of any new policy upon community divisions would be assessed and taken into account.
• Appoint an Integration Monitor. This person would be charged with monitoring progress on the above proposals, and producing an annual audit of the costs of providing separate facilities.
• Provide support for the work of the Community Relations Council, and significantly increase its budget, in order to expand its project work. Alliance would increasingly concentrate community investment funds on projects with a strong cross-community element.
• Achieve a target of 10% of children being educated in integrated schools by 2010. We set out how we will accomplish this in the Education section of this manifesto.
• Make the promotion and maintenance of mixed housing an explicit objective of the Northern Ireland Housing Executive.
• Urge the police and criminal justice agencies to adopt a more pro-active policy of protecting and serving those individuals who choose to mix with others, in the name of preserving a common civic space.
• Enforce the civil duties on public agencies, such as the Road Service and the Housing Executive, to ensure that their property is free from paramilitary, sectarian or racist flags, murals and graffiti.
• Ensure that public sector agencies build new leisure, educational, health, social and community facilities with an explicit objective to encourage mixing. Best practice should also be developed, regarding the design of the urban environment, in order to maximise cross-community integration.
• Promote Northern Ireland as a distinct region within a decentralising British Isles and an emerging Europe of the Regions.
• Propose new symbols to be devised to give expression to this regional identity, including a new flag for Northern Ireland. Greater use should also be made of the European flag.

Equality

• Ensure the development and passage of a Single Equality Act. This will provide a holistic approach to combat discrimination and other forms of unfair treatment.
• Amend Fair Employment Monitoring Regulations, to stop people being assigned as either ‘Protestant’ or ‘Catholic’ against their will. Similarly, Alliance will prevent the next census from pigeon-holing those who do not declare a religious belief to a ‘religious community’ against their will. Alliance stresses that people should be able to hold open, mixed and multiple identities.
• Propose that the list of organisations exempt from Fair Employment Regulations be revised. In particular, the ability of schools to hire teachers and other staff from one or the other ‘community background’ should be reviewed.
• Develop an inclusive inter-departmental strategy on gender equality.
• Ensure that the interests and needs of persons belonging to ethnic minorities are included in the broader framework of community relations.
• Support measures to eradicate age discrimination. This includes the voluntary extension of work, and the provision of health and social services.

Policy Papers

Building A United Community or view as webpage (HTML)