Plans for a north Belfast football pitch to be shared by two teams are to go ahead with nationalists voting for and unionist against.
At the full monthly meeting of Belfast City Council on Monday night, a divided council voted to make an application to the Football Fund supporting Newington Football Club to use Ballysillan Playing Fields as its home ground, alongside Ballysillan Swifts, who are the grassroots home club in the area.
Forty two councillors voted in favour of the proposal while 17 voted against. Councillors who voted in favour were from Sinn Féin, the Alliance Party, the SDLP, the Green Party, and People Before Profit, while those who voted against were from the DUP, the UUP and TUV.
At Monday’s meeting, one Sinn Féin councillor said the business case “recognises Ballysillan Swifts as priority user ... but there is no mention in that business case at all about exclusivity.”
However, a DUP councillor said the Urban Villages plan is about “investing in a community, investing in Ballysillan and Ardoyne. Newington is completely outside that area of influence”.
Belfast City Council last month confirmed work will shortly begin to upgrade Ballysillan Playing Fields, with potential for a new stadium, as part of a £9 million investment.
Representatives for Ballysillan Swifts said they were shocked to find that plans for the upgrade of the pitch at Ballysillan Park appeared to change in recent months, and believed it meant they were no longer going to be the priority user at the new facility. The side had been involved in meetings, consultations and site visits since 2017 as part of the Urban Villages plan.
On Monday, council Chief Executive John Walsh announced that a ‘procedural call-in’ had been made regarding a proposed letter supporting Newington Football Club by the council – a proposition originally put forward with majority support at a in-house committee meeting away from the public and press last Friday.
That committee agreed “to provide a letter of support to Newington Football Club in relation to a new home pitch, in principle, at Ballysillan Playing Fields, to enable its application to the Football Fund”. On a vote, 15 elected members voted for the proposal and five against and it was declared carried. The DUP made the call-in on the decision before the full council meeting on Monday.
Sinn Féin Councillor Ciaran Beattie said at the full council: “Effectively what is being attempted here is the derailing of a letter being given to a football club to obtain funding, as an asset to the city. And the reason behind this is something that we all know – the whole city knows why they are obstructing this.
TUV Councillor Ron McDowell said the decision to involve Newington was “deeply damaging to the reputation of Belfast City Council in the Ballysillan area”.
Councillor Ryan Murphy said: “This has the potential for the council to own a Championship and Premiership standard stadium in a council facility. We don’t have too many of those across the city of Belfast. It is an opportunity to have one right in the middle of the Oldpark ward. In Ballysillan. When we talk about the business case from Urban Villages, which recognises Ballysillan Swifts as priority user, nobody is saying we should take them out of it.
“They should be a priority user. But there is no mention in that business case at all about exclusivity, that they should be the only users on that site. That’s where there seems to be a bit of confusion on this. This is about maximising the usage on that site.”
He added: “Nobody is trying to stop Ballysillan Swifts from playing there. It is their home, it is right on their doorstep. They should be able to access that facility when they need to, they should be proud of that facility, and it will be their home.
“All we are talking about here is having a pitch sharing arrangement, where another team within the North Belfast constituency can come in and use it, to be able to play home games in North Belfast. I don’t think that is too much to ask.
“I think most people can see this for what it is – there is a problem from where the other team is coming from, the background of that team. And we should be calling it out for what it is, if it actually encourages others to show leadership on this issue.
“We look at the threats at Ballysillan in regards to the team that is trying to access this, and we know that council staff have also been intimidated in regards to this. All of that should be called out. This should be a positive news story for North Belfast.”