Councillor helps remove offensive graffiti

Graffiti mocking the death of the two British soldiers murdered in Antrim on Saturday night on a North Belfast gable wall has been described as ‘insensitive and hurtful’ by a local Sinn Féin councillor.
Local people living in the area attempted to remove the writing themselves with paint stripper but when it couldn't be erased they contacted Sinn Féin councillor Tierna Cunningham who asked Belfast City Council to have it removed.
“I was approached by local residents about the graffiti who asked me to contact council on their behalf to have it removed," said Tierna Cunningham.
“They made it clear that they did not want to be associated in any way with the tragedy in Antrim on Saturday night and I immediately contacted council to have it removed.
“People in this area have made a big effort to improve the local environment and they certainly don't want anyone to paint insensitive and hurtful slogans like this on their walls."

The current economic crisis facing the people of Ireland was caused by greed - Gerry Kelly

By Gerry Kelly
Last week the Executive gave another £7.5m to people in need to help them with household fuel bills.
This had the effect of increasing the number if people eligible for the £150 payment from 100,000 to 150,000.
In total the Executive has made £22.5million available for some of the poorest and most needy people in our society.
Home heating bills have rocketed over the last 18 months and although oil, gas and electricity prices have at last fallen back some they remain well above what many households can pay to properly heat their homes.
There are still far too many people in our society who are being forced to make the choice of ‘to eat or to heat’.
My party colleague Jennifer McCann MLA recently met an 84-year-old woman, a constituent, who sat in a local shopping centre day in day out because she couldn’t afford to put the heating on in her home during the day.
No one should have to leave their home in order to stay warm in this day and age but this has been the reality for many of our older people.
Sinn Féin lobbied hard in the Executive for the household fuel payments.
The original proposal from DSD minister Margaret Ritchie fell way short of what we believed could be done.
The DUP agreed with us, and 36,000 more pensioners were included in the fuel payment scheme announced before Christmas making 100,000 people in total eligible for the payment.
It was still Sinn Féin’s belief that yet more could be done.
We returned to the subject of fuel poverty in talks with the other parties who make up the Executive and argued that the scheme should be further extended.
We argued that although the initial sum of £15m would be a very practical way to enable the poor and the needy to heat their homes, particularly over the cold winter months that more could be done.
I welcome therefore the decision by the Executive to further extend the scheme to cover another 50,000 people.
This was a good result for our people and shows once again what can be achieved by the local administration if the other parties are prepared to put their shoulder to the wheel.

The current economic crisis facing the people of Ireland was caused by greed, fraud and corruption in the financial and banking sectors aided by the Irish government’s mismanagement of the unprecedented wealth created during the era of the Celtic Tiger.
They showered riches on their pals and cronies in the golden circle of the financial elite in tax breaks and billions of euros in huge bonuses.
This meant that many of the richest people in Irish life often paid little or nothing towards the cost of health, education and other frontline services.
As a result the government failed to tackle disadvantage, poverty, inequality and failed to build the infrastructure needed for the future stability of the Irish economy.
The Irish state is also as far away as ever from a universal health service.
This is obscene.
This government protects its wealthy friends while targeting the sick, the elderly and children.
It has failed the people. It has picked their pockets while mugging the lower and middle-income earners.
It is time for the fraudsters and white collar criminals to face due process and its is well past time for the Irish government to do its patriotic duty and go.

Local republican legend passes away

Legendary New Lodge republican Billy Kelly sadly passed away last weekend Saturday February 28 aged 71.
Billy Kelly spent over a half a century involved in the republican struggle.
Billy was born in North Queen Street into a republican family. Winifred Carney, stationed in the GPO during the 1916 Easter Rising, had stayed in Billy’s parents house in North Queen Street and was his mother’s bridesmaid.
Billy joined the IRA in 1955 and was interned for three and a half years from 1957 during the Border Campaign .
Involved in the Civil Rights campaign Billy was to the forefront of the IRA’s efforts to defend nationalist areas during the late ‘60s and ‘70s.
He and his brother John, a former Sinn Féin MLA?who died in 2007, travelled to Dublin along with Free State Army Captain James Kelly to brief Taoiseach Jack Lynch on the situation in the North.
Billy remained active in the IRA in the North during the early ‘70s.
In October 1973 an IRA-commandeered helicopter landed in Dublin’s Mountjoy Gaol and IRA Chief of Staff Séamus Twomey, IRA Quartermaster JB O'Hagan and Kevin Mallon boarded the chopper as part of an IRA early-release initiative.
Billy Kelly was arrested after the daring escape in Dublin and taken to the Bridewell, where he was accused of being one of those on the helicopter which broke out the IRA volunteers.
Eventually captured in the North Billy was interned again. After his release he took a back seat for a time in the struggle to care for his wife Kathleen and five children.
However, the blanket protest and hunger strikes threw Billy back into the Republican struggle, organising marches and demonstrations.
Billy’s daughter Kathy was jailed in the 1980s for possession of explosives. She later served as a Sinn Féin councillor and MLA.
Billy remained a strong republican and supporter of the struggle to the end of his life. In an interview last year with Nuacht an Tuaiscirt he supported tough decisions made by the Republican leadership.
“I am optimistic, you have to be. I think the current direction is the only one that could have been taken.”

Bairbre de Brún's daily account of her trip to Gaza

Sinn Féin MEP Bairbre de Brún has written a daily account of her experiences as part of a European Parliament delegation to the Gaza Strip in Palestine from February 24th to March 1st.

You can read Bairbre's account of the devastation and suffering in the Gaza Strip by visiting www.westbelfastsinnfein.com then clicking on the 'latest news' section on the right hand side of the screen.

This Thursday, 5 March, there will be a Sinn Féin event - Eyewitness Accounts from Gaza - in the Culturlann, beginning at 6.30pm.

Bairbre de Brún will speak publicly about her experiences and a representative from the Irish Medical Aid for Palestine (Irish MAP) charity, Dr. Saeb Sha'ath, who is from Gaza, will also speak at the event at which money raised by Sinn Féin activists to provide urgent medical supplies in Gaza will be officially handed over.

All are welcome to attend.

MLA wants rapid transit system for North Belfast

North Belfast Sinn Féin MLA Carál Ní Chuilín said that a rapid transit system that will see a dramatic improvement in traffic flow across the city must be extended to North Belfast.
Ní Chuilín is set to have a meeting with the director of the Belfast Rapid Transit Project Ciaran de Búrca later this month to ask that the scheme, which is planned for west, south and east Belfast also be rolled out in North Belfast.
Last year Sinn Féin minister for regional development Conor Murphy announced the three pilot routes for the scheme, which will include rapid transit buses and light rail.
However, the local MLA said that with the announcement that the University of Ulster is to move the majority of its classes to just north of the city centre and the growth in local tourism that North Belfast should be included in the scheme.
“The Rapid Transit Project will provide the city with a fast reliable and modern public transport service,” said Ní Chuilín.
“I am meeting with the project director Ciarán de Búrca asking to discuss extending the scheme to the north of the city.
“I believe there are three possible routes in North Belfast for a light rail scheme.
“The Shore and Antrim roads are obvious links between North Belfast and the city centre and have access to sea ports, the city airport and the motorway.
“The proposal to relocate much of the University of Ulster’s Jordanstown campus to the Cathedral Quarter and York St area will also require enhanced modern transport links to facilitate this massive regeneration project.
“The Crumlin Road is another route with huge potential. Belfast is only beginning to open up the tourist potential of the Crumlin Road Gaol site and courthouse and the flagship development of the Girdwood site should ensure the volume of passengers needed to make this route viable.”
Ní Chuilín said extending the project to include North Belfast was a necessary investment in the area’s future.
“The University of Ulster’s decision to relocate to the north side of the city centre is a huge vote of confidence in the people of this area.
“It’s vital that infrastructure projects beginning in the near future create sustainable jobs which will help communities through the current economic downturn.
“However, it is just as important that projects which have been well-thought out also provide us with a platform to regenerate North Belfast in the future.”

£7m for deprived areas welcomed

Sinn Féin MLA Carál Ní Chuilín has welcomed news that £7m is to be spent in deprived areas over the next two years, ending months of speculation and uncertainty that key community posts were to be axed.
“I welcome the announcement by the Social Development minister that jobs in the Neighbourhood Renewal scheme are to be continued until 2011,” said Carál Ní Chuilín.
“This will mean an extra £7m for some of the most deprived communities in the North.
“Sinn Féin has been lobbying since August last year for an extension to the posts of people working in Neighbourhood Renewal as they have been providing vital services in areas which are suffering most from poverty, neglect, discrimination and social inequality.
“The announcement that these jobs will now be supported until 2011 will also bring to an end the uncertainty which has hung over the future of these posts and the services they deliver like a dark cloud.
“We hope that these workers can now get on with the task of ensuring that those most in need can continue to avail of their services.”
Carál Ní Chuilín also said that the two-year breathing space provided by the announcement now needed to be used well.
“The work carried out by people working to renew and rebuild deprived communities cuts across several government departments,” she said.
“Tackling poverty, neglect and deprivation is clearly an issue of social justice.
“All departments, which have a role in ending the inequalities which flow from these social evils, must use the next two years well to make the transition from Neighbourhood Renewal as seamless as possible.”

Easier to Register to Vote in Birmingham, Alabama than the North

Sinn Fein MLA Carál Ní Chuilín said this week that it is easier to get on the electoral register in Birmingham Alabama than it is in the North of Ireland.
“Sinn Fein contacted officials in the Elections Division of the Office of the Alabama Secretary of State to enquire about the process involved in getting onto the electoral register in Alabama,” said Ní Chuilín.
“An Alabama election official confirmed to us that extra identification evidence is not required in Alabama on top of filling in a registration form.
“In the 1960s Birmingham, Alabama, was the centre of the Civil Rights struggle for African Americans. It was a place where discrimination was institutional.
“Now today we find that the process involved in getting registered in Alabama is much simpler and easier than the process in the North of Ireland.
“All you need to do in Alabama to get on the register is fill in an electoral registration form and send it in.
“Yet here, in the North of Ireland, even after filling in a registration form and providing their name, address, date of birth, national insurance number and signature, people are still been denied their place on the register.
“In the year from Dec 2007 to Dec 2008, over 3,500 people were denied their rightful place on the electoral register after their forms were rejected.
“This is unacceptable and is a clear denial of the right to vote and we have to question the motives of the Electoral Office which is accountable to, and funded by, the NIO.
“The Electoral Office has access to lists of deaths, of people who will be turning 18 and Central Services Agency, council and NIHE databases which deal with changes of address. This access to information should allow the Electoral Office to track changes themselves.
“Many people are turned off by the complex process involved in getting registered. These are largely people from disadvantaged areas, who already feel detached from the system.
“The Electoral Office must end their excessive demands on individuals for unnecessary additional evidence and they must prioritise getting those people who are not on the electoral register onto the register.
“In particular, the Electoral Office needs to be proactive in bringing forward initiatives to bring increased numbers of people from disadvantaged areas onto the electoral register.
“These are the people who are suffering most from the excessive demands of the Electoral Office.’’
“I am sure that people will be shocked and alarmed that it is easier to register to vote in Birmingham, Alabama, once the centre of discrimination against African Americans, than it is to register in the North of Ireland.’’