Suffolk Lenadoon Interface Group

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Youth Achievement Acknowledged

8th December 2010

The achievements of young people from Suffolk and Lenadoon in outer West Belfast were marked at an awards ceremony in Belfast City-Hall.

The Youth Achievement Awards 2010 toke place on Wednesday 24 November. The awards are organised by the Network for Youth which brings together all the youth providers in both Suffolk and Lenadoon, including the Suffolk Lenadoon Interface Group (SLIG). This is the second year of the awards.

There are seven award categories in such fields as Sport, Health and Well Being, Citizenship and Culture and Arts. One of the awards is named in memory of Robert Weir, a young Suffolk man, an award recipient from last year, who sadly is no longer with us.

The Lord Mayor, Councillor Pat Convery (SDLP) delivered eloquent appreciation of the young award recipients and the organisations involved in the the Youth Achievement Awards scheme, including SLIG.

Lenadoon men, Paddy Gallagher who won a gold medal and Tom Mc Carthy, who won a silver medal for boxing at the recent Commonwealth Games, along with current Miss Northern Ireland, Lori Moore, who comes from Suffolk, presented the awards. All three of them were also award winners.

Councillor Convery indicated before the ceremony that he was “greatly heartened to have found out how, in recent years community, youth and other workers on the ground in Suffolk and Lenadoon have alleviated mistrust and suspicion. How you have gradually got together to create structures and strategies to improve the lives of young, old and those, like myself, somewhere in between.”

Cathal Tolan,, SLIG’s Network for Youth representative, who has organised the event in conjunction with the network’s Chair, Paul Niblock, said: “The Youth Achievement Awards represent a growing joint and cross-community effort by the youth provider organisations in Suffolk and Lenadoon who are coordinating their work and pooling their resources. As such, the awards are an important staging post towards our shared future.”