Dr. Anthony Soares:

I thank the Chairman and members of the joint committee for the invitation to discuss the Towards a New Common Chapter project and the resulting New Common Charter for Co-operation Within and Between these Islands. With the Chairman's agreement, I will begin by offering a brief overview of the Centre for Cross Border Studies and the project before handing over to Ms Farrell from Longford Women's Link and then Mr. Campbell from the Rural Community Network who will tell the committee a little bit about their organisations and their involvement in the project. Before I do so, I draw the committee's attention to the New Common Charter for Co-operation Within and Between these Islands which will ultimately be the focus of our conversation today and future conversations and in which rural concerns are particularly evident.

Since its creation in 1999, shortly after the signing of the Belfast or Good Friday Agreement, the Centre for Cross Border Studies has sought to contribute to increased social, economic and territorial cohesion of the island of Ireland by promoting and improving the quality of cross-Border co-operation. The centre’s pursuit of its mission has been framed by two primary public policy imperatives: the European Union’s cohesion policy and strand 2 of the Good Friday Agreement. Throughout its existence, therefore, the centre has been deeply concerned with community, social and economic development and co-operation, particularly on the island of Ireland but also between the island of Ireland, Great Britain and beyond. From the beginning this concern informed the desire to initiate the Towards a New Common Chapter project which began in late 2014 and has been made possible by the generous support of the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust, the Northern Ireland Community Relations Council and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s reconciliation fund. The project has looked to support and inspire grassroots community commitment to cross-Border co-operation in all of its dimensions, including co-operation at the Border, where rurality is a predominant characteristic; wider North-South co-operation on the island of Ireland; and east-west co-operation between the island of Ireland and Great Britain. It has worked towards having a bottom-up vision of the importance and role of cross-Border co-operation within and between these islands, while also noting the need for community groups to possess the necessary skills and capacity not only to engage in their own cross-Border initiatives but also to enter into more productive dialogue with relevant local, regional and central Government policies and strategies that may affect them.

The New Common Charter for Co-operation Within and Between these Islands which members should have before them is the result of a series of intensive conversations between a range of community groups from Northern Ireland and Ireland and, more recently, with groups from England, Scotland and Wales. The new common charter represents a shared desire to maintain and strengthen relations between communities across these islands, to work together on issues of common concern and to advocate for the provision of the requisite structures and means to co-operate within and between these islands in whatever circumstances may arise. The Chairman has alluded to the circumstances that may potentially arise in the political dimension.

In light of this committee’s specific interests, and given that the sets of relations envisioned within the New Common Charter for Co-operation Within and Between these Islands are both the product of and supportive of rural communities, we ask members to support it. We ask them to work with us in ensuring all administrations across these islands put in place policies and funding structures to encourage cross-Border and cross-jurisdictional co-operation at grassroots community level. We hope that today’s meeting will offer an opportunity to discuss in greater detail the work undertaken as part of the project, and how members of this committee and political representatives more generally can champion the objectives of the new common charter for co-operation.

These are outlined in more detail in the series of recommendations within the supporting information provided to the committee. Those objectives include how capacity-building measures should be introduced to improve how all levels of government and public bodies across these islands engage with community organisations in the development of policies and strategies with a cross-Border or cross-jurisdictional dimension and that such policies and strategies should be rural-proofed. The charter also calls for a comprehensive assessment of the current funding landscape for cross-Border and cross-jurisdictional co-operation initiatives aimed at community organisations and what that landscape should look like in future. Crucially, we would also like to see concrete support in advancing the work undertaken in the Towards a New Common Chapter project, bringing it to a wider audience. It might also, perhaps, look towards a platform for cross-Border, cross-jurisdictional dialogue for community organisations that recalls the structure provided for governments and administrations across these islands through bodies such as the North-South Ministerial Council and the British-Irish Council. These are issues that we may explore further during today’s meeting, but I will hand over now to Tara Farrell of Longford Women’s Link.