Cookstown - Languages, Culture & Arts

There should be an Irish Language Act and protections for Ulster Scots
Sign Language (British & Irish) should be protected languages
Government subsidies should be made available for foreign language courses
More funding should be made available for the Arts Council to make available for grants
Adequate support for the Arts Council should be put in place so they are in a position to process more grant applications & within more appropriate timescales
Government should seek to provide studio spaces in towns & cities for creatives to use, including incentivising building owners to offer empty properties as spaces if they are temporarily unused
Comments
  • We need more Public Artwork and we need to fund the Arts appropriately and proportionately. Healthy and vibrant cultures and communities have healthy and vibrant Art scenes. Cookstown, where I am standing, has no public Artwork and many of the schools no longer do performances or musicals. This was not the case, in the 1990s, when I was growing up and in High School but this is what is happening now. It saddens me that the Arts are shown so little respect by our councils and in many of our schools. We need the Arts and they are being neglected and mistreated, more needs to be done to support and nurture Artists in the North.