More Action and Less Talk for The people of The Shankill

Now that we are going to have a new man at the helm of the good ship DUP, what will it take for the Unionist Politicians of the DUP and the UUP to rekindle support from the People of the Shankill Road?

What I think they need to focus on:

Jobs:
Not just any job! But well paying permanent jobs. Not short contract jobs in some other part of Belfast or Northern Ireland but well paying permanent jobs here in North and Unionist West Belfast so the people of the Shankill can easily make there way to work and not have to pay a fortune out in transport costs.

The Health Service:
The need for proper provision of health care and drugs treatment for everyone but greater emphases on the elderly health care at home and in hospital, also the issue of Hospital Cleaning and Infections (MRSA) Clostridium Difficile (C-Difficile) need to be addressed.

Education:
Funding of third level education for low income homes and the pay and conditions for education workers and there support staff.
On the question of the 11+, for me it’s surly not to get rid of the grammar schools, but to properly invest in and improve our secondary and primary schools.
We know that grammar schools have far better facilities than secondary schools.

We need to have this anomaly of lack of facilities in secondary schools address. What is needed is proper investment in secondary schools and primary schools and leave the grammar schools to get on with what they do best.

There also needs to be proper investment in vocational opportunities. Not all children want to go down the academic route, however McGuinness and Ruane have gone down the road of one size education fits all. We know that is not the best case for the children, all we need to do is look across the water to England and look at the comprehensive education system in melt down they have there.

Why not get children to continue with the 11+ and at the age of 14 any who are achieving at school and in an academic atmosphere let them continue to grow and flourish. Those who show little academic flair can then go into a vocational school, where from the age of 14 they can learn to become hairdressers, plumbers, beauticians, electricians, IT engineers, mechanical engineers and builders etc.

To get entry into these schools they must spend a minimum of 3 hours a day on the core subjects of English and math’s. The rest of the day can be spent learning their vocational skills. They don’t need to get involved with other subjects just the core of English and math’s and gain a recognized qualification in their vocation and in the 2 core subjects.My understanding is that this model of education has been used in Germany since WWII and their economy and society seems to be in a better state than ours.

We also need to break the cycle of no or little interest in their children’s education from poor income families. This change in attitude to education from low income homes; would go a long way to improve the education outlook of their children. This change should include an improvement in helping the parents of poor income homes to go back to education to improve their life chances and helping their children’s, and a destigmatization of the low education attainment of low income homes.

This improvement in children’s and their parent’s education could be incentivized through the tax credits and benefits system.
At the moment you get your tax credits and benefits as a matter of course. However, why not give more to those who improve their education and their children’s education?

This would have a secondary benefit as it would filter down into the hole of society by making the country better educated and therefore more likely to be wealthier, reduce benefit claimants, reduce crime and reduce the pressure on the Health system?
I know this sounds and smacks of that dreaded social engineering. However, if we do nothing we could be condemning millions of children form poorer families to a poorer adulthood with the likely outcome of going back to the bad old days of larger and larger families relying on the benefits system.

Planning, Social Housing, Water Charging and Rates:
We want suitable affordable housing in well planed out streets and proper housing infrastructure, we require a guarantee that low income homes do not subsidise the well off in Water Charging and Rates.

The Rape of the Shankill has been by and largely halted however, a new breed of leeches has descended on the Shankill and again the planers and developers are playing with peoples lives on the Shankill. And again the planers, developers and the politicos have not taken into account of the needs of the Shankill people? The healing will be slow from the wounds inflected by bulldozers, planers, (there is a contradiction in terms) politicos who fained interest and form government departments who treat the Shankill as some type of irrelevant back water.

The question again has to be asked why did the planers and the council permit the developers to build a block of flats (I refuse to call them the non entity of apartments) with shops. We need more flats like the MLS’s need more expenses.

We need proper 2, 3 and 4 bedroom well laid out social housing with properly planed and laid out streets.

Crime:
We want the causes of crime to be addressed (No Jobs and education under achievement) and the sentencing of the convicted to reflect the crime. An immediate end to 50% remission, and drug dealers need to be removed from circulation for a very long time.

The National Stadium debate! Tourism, Transport and Investment.
We have two events in 2012 that if the political will was there could give us a great National Stadium along side two excellent tourist attractions in museums to both the Titanic and Shipbuilding and our Great Sporting Personalities.

All this on the shores of Belfast Lough and located in North Belfast at the old Belfast land fill site at Dargan Road, the now named Giant’s Park Belfast. One complex along with Lough side bars and restaurants and a landscaped Eco park, incorporating old Shipyard Cobbled Roads with Tramlines, Gas Lighting (taken from the land fill site) and wind turbines, with the added advantage of Belfast city centre restaurants, bars and shops all within walking distance.

I would like you to imagine visitors to our city sailing up Belfast Lough or flying into George Best Belfast City Airport. One of the visitor’s first views of Belfast would be our new innovative and impressive sports stadium and landscaped Titanic and shipyard themed Eco Park with museums.The events we need to be setting our sites on are the centenary of the sinking of the Belfast made RMS Titanic, and the UK/London Olympics.

The Government has stated that all the regions of the UK will not miss out on the befits of the Olympic experience, and only Belfast can claim to be the birth place and original home for the largest man made moving object in the world at the time, RMS Titanic. Here is my out of the box thinking that may not be obvious to the politicians of this land.

With the suggestion of central Government money being made available for new regional Olympic venues, add to this Belfast City Councils money for a rival National Stadium, and the redevelopment of Giant’s Park by Belfast City Council and any national lottery money being made available for the Titanic commemorations put all this money together and make a facility that we all can be proud of and what will be a national and international tourist attraction.
A National Stadium with museums to the Titanic and shipbuilding and our Great Sports Personalities, all at the one location in an Eco Giant’s Park on the shores of Belfast Lough.

The advantages are a National Stadium and Museums near to Belfast City centre. With improved bus links and a possible new rail stop at Fort William, the tourist’s form the increasing number of cruse ships can easily see our new Stadium, as they sail up Belfast Lough and the visitor flying into George Best Airport can view the Stadium as they fly into Belfast, and all the visitors to our country can easily make their way to the Stadium and Museums, as there is a good road infrastructure already in place. We could incorporate the use of the last remaining link to the Titanic, the Nomadic as a visitor attraction. Samson and Goliath the two existing landmark cranes of the Shipyard can be used as a backdrop to the Stadium and Museums.

The Museum to the Titanic and Shipbuilding could feature all the great things from the shipyard that were involved in the building of the Titanic. We could inform the visitor that the Titanic was built in the largest shipyard in the world at that time. Belfast had the world’s largest rope works to service the world’s largest ships. We can incorporate the last of the steam derricks that helped build the Titanic and many of the other great ships from the yard, the dry-docks the tramlines the cobbled roads the gaslights and most importantly of all the thousands of statistics on the building of the Titanic and the stories and yarns form the men and women who help to build the Titanic and the other great ships. Everything Belfast needs to a museum of shipbuilding all in the right place.

We could also show the visitor the innovation of the people of Northern Ireland by using Wind Turbines and the Methane Gas from the landfill site to heat and light the Giant’s Park making it an Eco Friendly Facility.The museum to our Sporting greats could feature the late greats, of our one and only George Best, our Golf Open Champion Fred Daly, our Greatest Biker the one and only Joey Dunlop, our World Class Rally Driver Bertie Fisher, our Boxing greats and World Champions of Rinty Monaghan and Barry McGuigan, Rugby Heroes of Willy John McBride and Mike Gibson, Olympian Gold Medallist Mary Peters, and our golden booted footballer Northern Ireland’s David Healy and all the other sporting greats that we have past and present, too many to mention. The proposal I have made would mean that when the stadium was not in use by any of the sporting codes, the museums could pull in the revenue from home grown and foreign tourists to the museums.

In my view the issue of building a stadium at the Maze located 4 miles from the nearest city, Lisburn and 22 miles from Belfast. The transport and roads infrastructure costs associated with that stadium it would be better invested in a package that would be more sustainable over a longer period, and the facility would be more efficiently used as a combined Stadium and Museum than just a sport Stadium and with Belfast’s shop’s bars and restraints with in walking distance.

To me it makes the business case for the stadium in Belfast and not the Maze?

The Giant’s park site is owned by Belfast City Council so costs for the land are nil. We therefore need to only find the building costs, add to this the Eco aspect in an industrial area within walking distance of Belfast City Centre and you seem to cover all the bases? A Sports Stadium, Museum’s, Re-use of a Landfill Site with Eco potential and a national and International Tourist attraction promoting Northern Ireland and Northern Irelands sporting personalities and historic landmarks?

The Mundane:
Stop Quangos, and Non Elected and Non Accountable Boards.

There is a dragging off collective political feet, with review after review on the major issues and the mundane issues. Delays in implementing important day to day decisions on issues here in Northern Ireland that are stifling our economy and the growth of our children,
year’s of indecision must stop and a collective political finger must be pulled out. The politicos in the big house make positive decisions to move Northern Ireland into the 21st Century!

We need more involvement of the Shankill people and more action and less talk.