Funding bonfires – burning public money or a necessary investment in good relations?

Good Morning Ulster picked up on the minutes of a report from Belfast City Council’s Good Relations Partnership to the council’s Strategic Policy and Resources Committee on Friday 17 October. Belfast – in common with many councils – provides grants to bonfire organisers to fund community programmes (often street entertainment, bouncy councils, fairground rides) organised on the side of loyalist and republican bonfires. However strings are attached: the bonfires mustn’t be built with hazardous material and flags and emblems mustn’t …

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