Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 19 May 2022

Joint Oireachtas Committee on the Implementation of the Good Friday Agreement

Engagement with Strive

Ms Mary Nolan:

It depends on the criteria of entry for young people. Many young people are leaving school and not going on to further education. Where Ms Watters' interface is on the Shankill Road, for years, many boys left school and did not go into further education because they had jobs in the shipyard. That was just the way it was. The Protestants got all of the jobs. That is the way kids saw it. There was an entitlement not to go on to further education. Research was done a few years back on the lack of aspiration among young Protestant males. They lacked aspiration because nobody was encouraging them to go anywhere else. It is the same on the other side of the wall when talking about young Catholic men. They are progressing and going on to university. There is aspiration, but there is still a clique of deprived young people who are not going anywhere. They need apprenticeships and skills-based jobs. That can be fluid also. It can start in County Tyrone and end up in County Donegal. An apprentice can move about, but it depends on the criteria for entry because of the difficulties the young people are coming back with.

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