Skip the NI Direct Bar
Skip navigation

Anderson launches Children’s Shared Spaces project

OFMDFM Junior Minister Martina Anderson today launched the Early Years Faces and Spaces – Children’s Shared Spaces project at the Verbal Arts Centre, Derry.
~ Friday, 27 January 2012

The project, which aims to address community relations across some of the region’s most deprived areas, has been funded jointly by OFMDFM and Atlantic Philanthropies Contested Spaces programme.

Speaking at the event Junior Minister Anderson said: “The division and segregation that remains across some areas of our community has a harmful impact on the quality of all our lives. No one is more aware of this than the people who live and work in areas of historic tension, and no one has a greater desire to resolve the problems of the past to secure a better future for our children and our community.

“In the draft Programme for Government the Executive has placed at the heart of its vision the need to build a strong and shared community. This means building relationships between all sections of society, encouraging active citizenship and tackling crime and abuse. It means unlocking and celebrating all that is positive about our cultures and traditions so that we can create a community that is strengthened by its diversity.”

Notes to editors:

  1. The Faces and Spaces Project aims to develop community partnerships and early intervention schemes involving pre-schools, primary schools, post primary schools and Sure Start initiatives across five of the region’s most deprived and historically contested areas.
  2. The Atlantic Philanthropies are dedicated to bringing about lasting changes in the lives of disadvantaged and vulnerable people. Atlantic focuses on four critical social problems: Ageing, Children & Youth, Population Health, and Reconciliation & Human Rights. Programmes funded by Atlantic operate in Australia, Bermuda, Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland, South Africa, the United States and Viet Nam. To learn more, please visit: http://www.atlanticphilanthropies.org
  3. Media enquiries to the OFMDFM Press Office on 028 9037 8120. Out of office hours please contact the Duty Press Officer via pager number 076 9971 5 440 and your call will be returned.
  4. You can view photos of the event on the Executive's Flickr site