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Verbatim report of proceedings
Monday, 10 September 2018 - Strasbourg Revised edition

The impact of EU cohesion policy on Northern Ireland (debate)
MPphoto
 

  Terry Reintke, on behalf of the Verts/ALE Group. – Thank you, Mr President. ‘I have been living here my whole life. I don’t want to go back to how things were before. I cannot do that. I cannot live in this neighbourhood if we go back to how it used to be.’ This was the very simple message from a woman from a heavily segregated area in Belfast whose neighbourhood and community had benefited from peace funds, where a big community centre had been built, and slowly but surely things started to change, things started to develop. She told us about her experiences, about her life, about the history of the place where she grew up. She told us about the violence, the division, the economic devastation. She didn’t have any political agenda. She probably didn’t even have a strong opinion about the European Union. All that she wanted us to know was her story and for her story to be taken into consideration when we take decisions here in the European Parliament.

When we went to Northern Ireland, with a delegation from this Parliament, no matter where we went, no matter whom we talked to, the message was always very similar. The peace funding has played an integral role to build peace in a conflict-ridden area in Europe, not only to rebuild infrastructure and the economy, but also to bring people together who had been segregated and separated for decades. Peace is very hard to build and very easy to destroy. As Europeans we have learnt this lesson over and over again in the past centuries. Now for me, it is very clear, we have to make sure that the peace funding will not be lost. We cannot let this Brexit disaster mess up the peace in Northern Ireland. As Europeans we have a responsibility, a responsibility to protect a hard-earned peace.

 
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