By Megan McDermott The Irish Minister for Children Katherine Zappone has recently announced that a programme could be set up to gather voluntary biological samples from potential relatives of the bodies found in an unmarked mass grave at the Tuam mother and baby home, Co. Galway. The Minister has made public an independent report into the home, where unmarried mothers were often sent to give birth. It is believed that 796 children died there with no official record of their burial. The report followed a call from a group of survivors and relatives of women and children formerly at the…

School children from across Northern Ireland will walk out of school tomorrow as part of the largest ever Global Climate Strike. For the past eight months, young people have staged monthly walk outs and protests, as part of the ‘Fridays for Future’ movement started by young Swedish Climate activist Greta Thunberg. For the first time since the demonstrations began in February, the youth strikers are calling on parents, businesses, working people and politicians alike to get behind the strikers and demand urgent action on the climate crisis. One of the local organisers in Belfast, Maia Willis, 18, said: “Our future…

What is community banking? What are the benefits of it and why would it be good for the people of Northern Ireland? A number of organisations and individuals from the community, voluntary and charity sector attended an event yesterday at Queen’s University, Belfast, organised by Our Money Campaign, Co-operative Alternatives and Dr John Barry (QUB), to hear more about how to set up a community bank. John Moore from the Community Savings Bank Association explained to the meeting what a community bank would mean and the benefits and challenges of setting one up in Northern Ireland. Mr Moore also said…

Louise Hagan Louise Hagan, Service Improvement Lead, Palliative and End of Life Care, Belfast Health and Social Care Trust, writes about the challenges she faced when her own father was dying Life is a bit like writing a book. It has a beginning and an end. And in between there are chapters. Some chapters are fast paced, full of adventure. Some chapters are much slower, filled with the everyday motions of life. But every book has a final chapter. When the final chapter looms, it catches us all by surprise, no matter how young or old we are. Life is…