We are inviting members of the public to sign the open letter to the Executive which was drafted based on the shared input and collective sentiment from a workshop hosted by the Northern Ireland Anti-Poverty Network regarding the draft anti-Poverty Strategy.  “Dear Executive Ministers,  The undersigned agree that the Northern Ireland Executive's draft Anti-Poverty 'Strategy' does not meet the criteria of a reasonable strategy. It fails to fulfil what oversight bodies, including the NI Audit Office and Public Accounts Committee, outline as the basic elements of any strategy.   The NI Audit Office said that "an integrated cross departmental anti-poverty strategy [should] ensure that the focus is on a number of properly defined and more specific actions" and “it should include an action plan containing clearly defined indicators and targets aimed at quantifying and reducing poverty."   The Public Accounts Committee said that there is a "clear need for targets and outcomes that are quantitative, qualitative and time-bound to properly measure performance and demonstrate the impact of strategic actions." It also considered that "a strategy which does not have specific resources devoted to it is never going to be as effective as it could be."   We acknowledge that the Minister has indicated that an action plan with targets and specific actions will follow at a later, unspecified date, but every expert, every oversight body is clear that a strategy must include measurable and time bound targets within or alongside the strategy.     Once again, we urge you to meaningfully engage with the huge volume of research that has been produced by the Independent Expert Advisory Panel (2020), the Anti-Poverty Strategy Co-Design Group (2022), the Welfare Reform Mitigation Review (2021), the Discretionary Support Review (2022) and the hundreds of pages of Northern Ireland specific evidence produced by organisations and academics that provides clear evidence of the interventions that work to tackle poverty.    We are committed to working with you in good faith to eradicate poverty in Northern Ireland, and therefore, we are asking the NI Executive to withdraw their support of the draft Anti-Poverty Strategy, on the basis that it is more harmful to have a strategy that will not address poverty, than no strategy at all. Our children, families and communities – your constituents – deserve better.   Yours Sincerely, 50+ organisations and the undersigned”

Last night, Gordon Lyons issued a public statement highlighting that families who had been terrorised out of their homes in Ballymena had taken shelter in Larne Leisure Centre. Hours later the Leisure Centre was attacked, its windows smashed and the building set on fire. He’s already been reported to the Standards Committee, and right now calls are mounting for him to resign.  Words matter, and at times like this, good political leadership can make all the difference to people’s safety. This is not it. Right now, we have a chance to put a marker down. Politicians need to know that holding public office is not compatible with issuing statements that bring communities who are already under attack into further danger. And that there has to be consequences for that.

In the early hours of the 9th June, the Israeli military unlawfully attacked and captured a civilian ship, the Madleen, carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza - the 12 volunteers on the ship were unlawfully detained and the life-saving aid confiscated.  Israel is blocking aid from entering Gaza, in defiance of international law. This is what the Madleen was all about - taking action to expose and end the starvation of people in Gaza, and the weaponisation of aid that has led to Israeli forces shooting dead Palestinians at so-called food distribution centres.  We, the undersigned, in solidarity with the Madleen and call for Israel to end its starvation of Gaza today. 

The genocidal attack on Gaza isn't just fought with weapons; it's fought with money. Every penny to Belfast City council (rates, events in the Waterfront & Titanic, employee wages, etc.) goes through Barclays Bank, which is profiting from the genocide, and handling Israeli war bonds. Barclays Bank holds the tender for Belfast City Council banking services, and we call on the Council to take its money, your money, elsewhere. Since October 2023, Israel has raised nearly $20 billion through government bonds, explicitly stating it's for the war. Major financial institutions, including Barclays and the Central Bank of Ireland, have played a direct role in this, facilitating the sale of these bonds as ‘primary dealers’. And investors, like Allianz, have poured in hundreds of millions of dollars. We need to ask ourselves: what are the ethical implications of profiting from bloodshed and conflict?

I was in collision with a large agricultural vehicle on the Killaughy Road between Downpatrick and Newtownards last September. The car, a Volvo 740 Estate was wrecked and written off. The agricultural vehicle was also wrecked. I survived because that Volvo was one of the strongest and robust cars on the road. In most other private car I would have been cut in two. A tragedy is waiting to happen. In a similar collision, I can see a young family being wiped out in an instant.

Moy Park, the North's first £2 billion company , is making record profits while poisoning our precious waterways that feed into Lough Neagh. Nutrient pollution from industrial factory farming is  one of the main causes of the blue-green algae suffocating Lough Neagh. In 2024 the Save Lough Neagh campaign held a protest against Moy Park’s sponsorship on the Antrim loughshore. BBC Spotlight uncovered hundreds of pollution incidents from Moy Park, and how little punishment they received. The company has a history exploiting workers, such as underpaying minimum wage workers, and even scandals over a worker’s death. The Lough supplies most of the city's drinking water - big agricultural corporations, such as Moy Park, are putting our right to water at risk.  This is greenwashing at its very worst - using the Belfast Marathon, and the tens of thousands of people who run and cheer on their loved ones from across the city, to distract from their brutal business practices.   Follow the Save Lough Neagh campaign on: https://instagram.com/saveloughneagh https://www.facebook.com/saveloughneagh We, the undersigned, call on you and the organisers of Belfast City Marathon to drop Moy Park as a sponsor of Belfast City Marathon and Half-marathon today.  

I've worked at Portadown Integrated Primary School (PIPS) for 3 years as an SEN teaching assistant. The compassion, forbearance and dedication of the staff is truly inspiring - especially given the complex needs of many pupils. PIPS aspire to be best in class when it comes to the holistic needs of SEN pupils. Staff have moved mountains in my time, but no amount of care can make up for the lack of amenities at the current school site. I'm one to one with an autistic boy with severe attachment disorder. He would benefit from being in the recently formed LSC 2 class, but the room is so small it can only accommodate 4 pupils. He currently must sit out of class all but 1 hour of the day. He loves running, and playing football, but there is no pitch. He would benefit massively from playing a team sport, but his self-esteem is too low for competitive sport. The school sends a group of students to football tournaments throughout the year, but they've never won a game. I believe that with a football pitch and facilities to train, all these situations would be improved. The proposed new state of the art school building will meet a need sorely lacking in our community.  In order to raise awareness of the challenges faced by SEN pupils and staff, I'm willing to take on this personal physical challenge, the Gaelforce West challenge: https://gaelforceevents.com/en/gaelforce-west-route 

The Northlands Centre in Derry supports thousands of people and families suffering from addiction. The care and support they provide to people at their lowest point saves lives, it helps their families and their communities.  The Department of Health recently withdrew core funding for Northlands despite the life saving work they do in our community.  We are calling on the Executive to now honour the commitment in New Decade New Approach, an international agreement signed by the British and Irish Governments, to provide additional financial support for Northlands. The Department of Health is betraying the letter and spirit of that agreement by withdrawing funding. The million pounds promised to Northlands needs to be delivered now. 

The destruction is vast - with nesting birds and insects and precious peatland being harmed, and the lives of people living nearby and first responders put at risk. Back in 2021, the Mournes experienced the worst wildfires we’d seen at that time, and promises were made that a fire prevention plan would be put in place urgently. But nothing happened, and now the Mournes are facing devastation all over again. Some are calling for the Minister to review the legal burn period which is the period where farmers and land managers are allowed to burn vegetation such as heather, gorse, whin or fern. The Mournes are so beloved - the backdrop to trips and holidays and enshrined in song. But they are precious in so many other ways too - rich in peatlands which store carbon and combat climate change - they’ve been described as our equivalent to the rainforest. We, the undersigned, call for the Minister Andrew Muir to do more to protect our Mourne Mountains today.

The UK government announced plans to drastically cut benefits for disabled and sick people across the UK - including Northern Ireland.  These changes are cruel. More people receive disability benefits such as Personal Independence Benefit (PIP) here than the UK average. So these brutal cuts will cause huge distress and hardship for those of us who live with a disability or illness in the North. No matter who you are, or where you come from, we all deserve support when we are sick or have a disability. Many charities and even 80 Labour MPs – a fifth of the party – oppose these plans. We, the undersigned, oppose these cruel cuts to benefits and call on Keir Starmer to reverse plans NOW.

We all want to have good health, clean drinking water and a flourishing countryside. But your attempt to open up Northern Ireland for dirty mining will put all that at risk. Caoimhe Archibald’s Department for the Economy has awarded SEVEN licenses that give big mining companies the right to explore and drill for minerals such as gold, copper and diamond in County Armagh, Fermanagh and Tyrone. And one of those companies is Dalradian, who are pushing hard to build a toxic gold mine in the Sperrin Mountains. Just weeks ago, we submitted this petition calling on Caoimhe Archibald to block these licenses - but the consultation report is out - and even though 99.5% of those responding opposed the licenses, they’ve gone ahead regardless. And it makes a mockery of the Department’s consultation process. Mining is a filthy business. It pollutes our water and land with chemicals, harms our health and destroys our beautiful ecosystems. Approximately 12% of Northern Ireland’s land has been opened up for mining exploration across Country Armagh, Derry, Fermanagh and Tyrone. There is The North would become a sacrifice zone while filthy mining companies make billions in profit. For these companies, this was always the plan for Northern Ireland. In 2015, the Dalradian CEO said “I’m not talking about a single mine. We are working on building a mine camp here [in Northern Ireland].” We, the undersigned, call on the Minister Caoimhe Archibald to u-turn and reject the following licenses. We need her to listen stop even more corporations who want to mine, regardless of the damage it does to our health, and to our climate: • Mineral Prospecting Licence Application - KDRA4/25  • Mineral Prospecting Licence Application - OMA4/25 • Mineral Prospecting Licence Application - DGA4/25 • Mineral Prospecting Licence Application - DGA3/25 • Mineral Prospecting Licence Application - CA3/25 • Mineral Prospecting Licence Application - CA1/25 • Mineral Prospecting Licence Application - KDRA1/25

Last October, Derry & Strabane District Council approved planning for one data centre, with three more already having outline permission. While data centres power much of our online world, they also come with huge environmental costs. While still in the early stages, the expansion of data centres here in NI will place immense strain on both electricity and water resources. Data centres are energy-intensive and also require vast amounts of cooling, consuming either millions of litres of water or huge amounts of electricity to keep them cool. Massive corporations like Amazon, Google and Facebook are behind many of the data centres being built - dumping a vast amounts of useless data in these centres while draining local energy and water sources. What's more, as more and more data centres are built, there is a real risk that we will be unable meet to our legally-binding emissions target under the Climate Change Act 2022. Not only that, we are deeply concerned that large scale wind farms will be fast tracked and built on Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs), damaging those protected areas in order to keep up with the electricity demands of these centres. We demand an immediate review of the planning and approval processes for data centre developments in Northern Ireland and a comprehensive public consultation before they expand further. https://www.savethemoat.com/blog-post