Young People and Interfaces Report - Institute for Conflict Research

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YOUNG PEOPLE AND INTERFACES If you were going in on your own it would be different like (Young Catholic male). One young male spoke of his continuing reluctance to go in to the nearby Protestant area unless some of his new Protestant friends were with him: I would feel comfortable going in with ones from the other side, but I wouldn’t feel comfortable going in with (another Catholic young person in the group). Just because we are both Catholic. Even though nothing would happen, you’d just feel uneasy in case something happened (Young Catholic male). One cross-interface community organisation have been working in recent years to build relationships between young people. As a result of the engagement over the past two years in one interface location in North Belfast, a number of Protestant young people from one particular area reported feeling safer and would now use a local garage which they would not have done before as they had previously perceived it as ‘Catholic territory’. Indeed, some young Protestants now use a local drop-in centre which is also located in a predominantly ‘Catholic’ area. As such improved relationships between some local young people across the interface led to them asking one another questions about their culture or religion, a process which one youth leader felt was a more ‘natural’ development over time rather than part of a more artificial attempt to bring young people together prematurely. While these young people now used the shop at the garage on the Antrim Road in the evenings with their friends, again other young people who traversed the interface tended to do so as part of a more formalised youth group or with school, and they would not feel as comfortable doing so with their friends on their own initiative. At various times some young people also felt very aware of which parts of the area would be ‘off-limits’ for individuals from ‘their community’, and felt they could ‘tell’ someone’s community background based on how they moved around an area: That’s what I am saying walking up to the Antrim Road, that’s how you know if you’re Catholic or Protestant, what side of the road you walk on…If you walk on one side you are Protestant if you walk on the other you are a Catholic (Young Protestant male). You’d stay on this side of the doctors (Young Catholic male). These issues in terms of being able to ‘tell’ someone’s community background impacted upon which services and facilities some young people felt they could access. 3.6 Accessing services and facilities The restricted movement associated with living at an interface impacted upon the majority of young people, and it seemed to be the case that this impact was particularly significant for young people from what could be termed enclave interface communities such as Suffolk or Short Strand. For young males in Suffolk in particular, their dentists and GPs were all in Dunmurry and Finaghy and very few services in wider nationalist West Belfast on the Stewartstown Road and beyond were utilised. Rather than using the nearest leisure centre which was situated in Andersonstown, they spoke about travelling to Lisburn: We are surrounded basically...We can’t go to certain places that the likes of them can. They can go up and round us. They don’t necessarily have to walk down Black’s Road, it’s the quicker option, but they can walk round it (Young Protestant male). 22
YOUNG PEOPLE AND INTERFACES At the same time, some young Catholics of the Lower Whitewell area reported a reluctance to use Tesco’s in Newtownabbey given its close proximity to Rathcoole and most young people would not walk down the Shore Road to go in to town: And even when you are over at Tesco’s you keep your eyes open because that’s where people get jumped most. Round that area and round Tesco garage (Young Catholic male 1). I’d go and be careful. Like I wouldn’t go to Tesco’s on my own, I would make sure someone was with me (Young Catholic female). Perhaps more positively a young person in the same focus group felt more comfortable accessing Abbeycentre now than they had done in the past: You used to be a wee bit cautious going over to Abbey(centre) but now you don’t really. They (Protestants) always used to hang about at McDonald’s (Young Catholic male 2). Several young participants in this group did not use the Valley leisure centre given its close proximity to Rathcoole and they contrasted this with the sense of security they felt when using the gym at Bawnmore given that many of their friends and family from their community lived in the area. Conversely some young Protestants spoken to in Whitecity did not feel comfortable walking down the Whitewell Road to use shops or services there, although one young Protestant male did so as he attended school there and felt that he knew people well enough to feel safe. However, on going to visit his father in another interface area in Belfast he commented: I hate going through Short Strand. My dad lives up that direction. I know quite a lot of people there, my bus goes through the area. Some of them go to my school and some I know quite well. I would just keep my head down and never let on (Young Protestant male). Elsewhere in North Belfast, some young Catholics from the New Lodge felt that KFC was closer to the Tiger’s Bay side of the interface, although they still reported using it. Several Catholic young people referred to wanting to use the new Grove Wellbeing Centre but felt unable to do so given the location. One young female in particular spoke of not using the Grove, Asda or Lidl given the fact that they were on what she saw as the ‘Protestant’ side of the interface: You wouldn’t be able to walk to it (the Grove) and Asda like to do shopping...My mummy walks up like. My mummy and my sister would get their shopping and walk back and it’s nothing. But I personally wouldn’t. And I’d love to be able to use the Grove (Young Catholic female). However, another young Catholic male interviewed in a different part of North Belfast did use the Grove and felt comfortable doing so. Youth leaders and interface workers tended to highlight that there were still difficulties for many of their young people in terms of accessing particular shops and services depending on where they were located. In particular one youth worker from West Belfast felt that young people still tended to use shops located within their own ‘side’ of the interface or alternatively would at times go out of their way to feel comfortable. Along these lines, one young Catholic male from West Belfast commented: Tesco Ballygomartin. I wouldn’t use that one…I would go to the one way over at the Valley in Newtownabbey (Young Catholic male). 23
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