Cost of segregation

Robin Sheeran The Politics Show Northern Ireland

Sign up for the Northern Ireland Newsletter

Read some of your comments on the programme here...

Robert Frost: respected American poet and literary icon

The American poet, Robert Frost, is a big hit with English teachers.

Many people can still recite chunks of "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" or "After Apple-Picking" decades after learning them by heart for the dreaded exams.

In "Mending Wall", another GCSE favourite, Frost quotes the proverb, "Good fences make good neighbours".

It is a thought that many people in Northern Ireland find comforting, although Frost used the phrase ironically.

This week, Politics Show from Northern Ireland considers the cost of segregation.

Election hobbyhorse

This has been something of an Alliance Party hobbyhorse, particularly at election times.

The party claims that £1bn of public money is spent each year on maintaining a divided society.

Their estimate includes policing riots and civil disturbances, the provision of separate services and facilities including schools, leisure centres and GP surgeries.

Kieran McCarthy: Alliance mantra on social divisions restated

Bus stop

One Alliance party election broadcast drew attention to what it claimed were separate Protestant and Catholic bus stops.

The Strangford MLA, Kieran McCarthy, used this week's row over provision of extra care for the elderly to refer back to the Alliance mantra on social divisions.

"We led the battle in the Assembly for the introduction of free personal care for older people.

"If the Executive worked to end segregation now, we could provide free care very quickly instead of waiting for years, like the Health Minister Michael McGimpsey wants us to."

So, could you really just tear down the peace walls and use the money saved to pay for hospitals and schools?

Claims realistic?

Politics Show reporter Rosy Billingham asks how realistic the claims are that millions could be saved.

For instance, the ending of duplication of services would require the building of new, shared social facilities.

And do people have the necessary confidence to share with the other community?

The Northern Ireland Office ordered more research to be carried out into communal division off the back of its Shared Future report on community relations.

The new research is currently in the hands of the Office of the First and Deputy First Minister and is due for publication in the next few weeks.

Jim Fitzpatrick presents the Politics Show Northern Ireland

Politics Show

Be sure to join presenter Jim Fitzpatrick for Politics Show from Northern Ireland - Sunday 03 June 2007 at 12:00 BST on BBC One.

You get a second chance to see the programme again that night, at 22:55 GMT on BBC One.

Let us know what you think.

---