The meeting of the Ireland Network took place at The River Lee Hotel in Cork City on Tue 15th February. This was the first regional meeting of the ALF Ireland Network and attracted a record number of attendees. Many of the participants travelled to Cork from other parts of the country and several people who are looking at becoming members in the future came mostly from Cork itself. Having Richard Shotton and Nancy Barrett from the UK ALF Network in attendance was particularly beneficial as representatives from the Ireland network were unable to attend the HoN mtg in Brussels in December because of severe weather conditions. Richard Shotton gave a detailed and thorough presentation on the meeting there and the discussions and conclusions that arose. There were lots of questions from attendees regarding the ALF strategy 2011-2014 and great interest in the upcoming campaign. Some of the attendees came up with campaign ideas during the meeting and planned to work together to further those ideas. They are looking forward to hearing final details of the campaign.

By having Richard and Nancy in attendance, we discovered that the ALF ireland and UK networks have much in common and are at a similar stage in their development. Both Triskel and Manchester University are relatively new HoNs and feel their mission is to try to consolidate their membership and encourage new ones. Lots of ideas were mooted in this regard. It was ultimately decided by the attendees that one idea - that of having a Facebook page for the Ireland Network - would not be a good idea for security reasons. The UK network is developing a web page for their members and have suggested that perhaps we could join forces on this. This was greeted by much enthusiasm by attendees and we hope that the UK network will also welcome the idea.

Stephen Spillane, a young Irish blogger reported back on his participation in the ALF Forum, and the conclusions from that forum. Also, the ALF Report on Intercultural Trends was discussed. The overall impression was that the conclusions of the Report - specifically the point that it was by meeting people from different countries and cultures that made a difference to attitudes. Thus it was felt that the Common Operation proposed for Ireland - involving young people from different parts of the country and from different cultural backgrounds - got much approval.

The plan is to bring young people from Belfast, Dublin and Cork together in an event titled 'Hip Hop to Cork' on Sunday May 1st. One of the Ireland network members will facilitate workshops on the theme of intercultural dialogue with three groups from the three different parts of the country during the months of March/April. The young people from Belfast and Dublin will then travel to Cork to showcase a hiphop activity arising from the workshops (for example - rapping, dancing, beatboxing). The venue for the workshops in Dublin will be the Chester Beatty Library (CBL is a network member and its library, located in Dublin Castle, has a hugely impressive collection from the great cultures and religions of the world). The young people will be asked to look at ways of responding to this collection. They will then be invited to discuss their findings in a session lead by the workshop facilitators. Many of these young people will have come to Ireland from other countries and most will never have travelled outside their home cities. Budget permitting, it is hoped to involve local Cork hiphop artists later on the same day to entertain the young people. We will have further details on the hiphop event in due course and would like to look at involving other network countries in similar events in the future.