10 years on and Paisleys going.

There are natural ends to things, having just passed through 10 years of the good Friday agreement you do have to take stock. Consider what has changed what has stayed the same.

While many things have stabilised, there is something I have noticed recently. Maybe it's to do with the eclectic mix of people I work with or am friends with. A lot of people have been having babies recently and as with each new life coming into Northern Ireland I was thinking about while these children will not be brought up within the context of the troubles they are still victims of it. Many of them live in segregated areas, they will go to different schools have different friends and have very little opportunity to mix with people from other religions and social classes. What kind of backdrop this will give to greater understanding I wonder?

Is it just ignoring part of the issues there are? So what about the schooling issue? some grammar schools are holding out for special status. Having come through the system myself I had always thought that we had a great education system. It's the myth I grew up with and yet I didn't really stop to consider issues for those people who could not get access to it. Working in Belfast all these years has helped me realise the cost of the system to those in areas of deprivation.
Many with multiple disadvantage what kind of opportunity is it giving them access to? Very little, do the people who want special status for grammar schools care? They don't really seem to, as long as their children get access to a good education they don't seem to care about what sort of society those children will grow up into and the impact a segregated schooling system has.

So what has this got to do with Paisley retiring? when I went to collage over the the UK twenty years ago I remember being asked whats going to happen to N.I, is there ever going to be peace? At that time I said in my lifetime there will be a change, many of my N.I colleagues disagreed saying peoples views were too entrenched it was never going to shift. I'm glad to say I was right and Paisley going is another page turning. I just wish a few more pages would turn at the same time.