Sinn Féin Education spokesperson Michael Ferguson

Lenadoon education cuts slammed

Sinn Féin Education spokesperson Michael Ferguson MLA has criticised a decision not to fund Level Three Education programmes delivered by Lenadoon Community Forum Training & Education Project and first chance opportunities to adults.

The decision not to allocate European Structural Funding to the project will have an adverse impact on 540 students over a two-year period.

"Lenadoon Education and Training Project is one of those local delivery mechanisms which has been monitored and evaluated and shown to be best practice. It is located in what the Department of Social Development calls a Neighbourhood Renewal Area. But despite meeting all of the criteria for funding they have been refused," Ferguson said.

He said the current funding agencies are, like the direct rule administration, undermining the educational entitlement of children and young people in schools on one hand while on the other closing down community and voluntary based organisations like the Lenadoon Forum, providing second chance opportunities to adults.

"Decisions like this make a farce of the Department of Employment and Learning's gremlin ads‚ that we see every night on TV. In real terms there is no delivery to working class communities," said Ferguson.

"It is time that we had an end to Direct Rule and determined our own future, set our own priorities and ensured the allocation of Department budgets and European funding is allocated on need meeting our own strategic targets," he said.