WE look back at the stories that were making the headlines this week in the Andersonstown News in 1982
Gene Fitzpatrick presents LPs to winners Phillip Lavery, Paul Lecky and Conor Bradley at St John's GAC Country & Western concert in Andersonstown Leisure Centre
Many are not claiming benefits
FROM Monday night, the Upper Springfield Resource Centre will be launching a Welfare Benefits Campaign in Ballymurphy. This campaign, the first of its kind, aims to change the present situation whereby people are not claiming all they are entitled to.
Between May 17 and June 11 an extensive survey will be carried out in the area to determine what benefits resident should be receiving. The Resource Centre will call at each home in the ’Murph to obtain details of the welfare benefits being paid to householders.
This information is essential to the success of the survey and will be treated in the strictest confidence.
Once compiled all the facts and figures will be studied and then locals will be urged to submit claims for any benefits they are due. During this phase of the campaign, the Resource Centre workers will be on hand to help people cope with any welfare tribunals that may arise.
In a statement, a representative of the Upper Springfield Resource Centre asked for “the full co-operation of residents” and stressed that many people will be benefiting from the survey.
A worker at the Centre told us that a long list of benefits are not being claimed by the people of Ballymurphy because they don’t know they exist. These benefits include family income supplements (a sum paid to husbands on a low wage), rent rebates and clothing allowances.
Earlier this year, many people receiving supplementary benefit, successfully claimed an extra heat allowance to cover increased fuel costs during the severe winter When employees at the dole office first received the forms claiming this extra payment, they were reluctant to accept them, as even they were unaware that such a benefit actually existed.
The progress of the Ballymurphy campaign will be eagerly watched by community workers in other under-privileged areas. And if successful the survey may be introduced to Lenadoon within a few months.
Linda Gregg, Joan Sloan, Dorothy Gregg and Karen Sloan at the Royal Victoria Hospital Geriatric function in the Peter Pan Social Club
North Link vandalism
THE premises of the North Link Playgroup are fast becoming a focal point for teenage louts. In the nine years since its establishment the playschool at the North Link playing fields has, like most places, been vandalised occasionally. The extent of the problem within the last six months however, has been without precedent.
The playgroup, organised under the auspices of Down and Connor, receives some of its financial backing from the fundraising activities of locals. Indeed, over £400 collected in the area was spent on the refurbishing of the outside of the mobile hut premises in January. This job involved the placing of aluminium sheets along the walls and the complete repainting of the building.
No sooner had this job been completed, however, than the vandals, aerosol cans in hand, moved in. Within a short while, they succeeded in completely defacing the school with unsightly graffiti.
The area around the school is also a favourite spot for underage drinkers. Almost every night, a crowd gathers to drink and glue sniff. Locals feel that members of this gang are involved in petty thefts and burglaries. One person who tried to check their behaviour, has since had their property vandalised.
Louise McFadden, Marie Quinn, Tommy Donnelly, Patricia Maginn and Terry Lewsley at Royal Victoria Hospital Geriatric function in the Peter Pan Social Club
New life for mill on Falls
ONLY the pigeons – sole occupants of the Falls Flax Spinning Mill for the last 70 years – are distressed at the news that plans are afoot to turn the old mill into a hive of industry once more.
A group of concerned people who have obtained the long vacant Mill, hope to provide a host of facilities as well as jobs for the people of West Belfast. Fr Des Wilson, a member of the steering committee, appointed by the new owners to oversee the development, are out to provide “the whole works”.
“Social, cultural and educational facilities will go side by side with job opportunities,” according to Des.
The eight vast shop floors and the hundreds of square feet of office space, once the workplace of hundreds in the linen industry’s heyday could become bustling places of work once again.
So far only a motor workshop has moved into the Mill, but negotiations with other interested groups are going ahead.
As it stands inside the Belfast Enterprise Zone, the Mill owners do not have to pay rates and have a virtual free hand as regards planning permission.
That steering committee hope to attract a solid industrial base of workshops. These businesses will pay commercial rates which will in turn finance other projects.
“The venture is to be non-profit making – any money from rents will be paid back into new projects, development, maintenance and if possible, subsidies for cultural and educational schemes,” said Fr Wilson.
Youth employment is to be a priority but this, the committee feels, doesn’t mean paying youngsters token wages for doing unproductive work.
“We don’t want young people to work in a vacuum. They will be beside people providing services and making goods for a living and they will be encouraged to do likewise,” explained Des.
The owners and steering committee have faith in the ability of local people to establish productive schemes.
“Years ago the Falls was dotted with small yards all producing different products and providing various services. Now we are giving people who have sound ideas – but who no longer have their own work space – to set up shop in the Mill.”
At a time when unemployment figures are at their worst ever, the Falls Flax Spinning Mill, standing ironically beside the largest “employer” in the town – the Falls Road ‘dole’ – could prove a welcome boost, not only for the area’s jobless, but also for its morale.
Eddie Finnegan with his weighlifters at Beechmout Leisure Centre, May 1982
