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01 May 2008

The Community Relations Council has given its annual 2008 Award for Exceptional Achievement to Anne Carr.

Anne Carr and Tony McCusker, Chair of the Community Relations Council

Anne Carr is Chair of Community Dialogue, a cross community organisation in West Belfast which she helped establish in 1997 and where she was formerly a development officer. In the early Troubles she organised peace rallies with women from Catholic and Protestant backgrounds for an end to violence. She was actively involved in Women Together for Peace from 1990. She co-ordinated ‘listening circles’ to support inter-community exchanges between Protestant and Catholic women across NI.  She has been very involved in the early highlighting of the acknowledgement of and support for victims and was involved in the first working group which led to the establishment of the Bloomfield initiative. Anne has promoted increased participation of women in politics and helped set up the Women’s Coalition. He was elected on behalf of the Women’s Coalition as a councillor to Down District Council (1997-2001).  As a Protestant married to a Catholic she has been a long-time campaigner for integrated education and has been a Chair of the Board of Governors of All Children’s Integrated Primary School in Newcastle, the first integrated primary school established outside Belfast.

The award was made by CRC Chair Tony McCusker at the CRC’s Policy Conference on 30 April at the Europa Hotel.

This annual award, in the form of a bronze sculpture, was created in 2006 and is traditionally awarded during Community Relations Week. There have been two previous winners.

The criteria for consideration of nominations for the Community Relations Award are:

• Evidence of exceptional, sustained and long term commitment to community relations work
• Evidence of commitment beyond single community across Northern Ireland and/or across the Border
• An embodiment of CRC values
• Evidence of impact on the thinking around community relations issues.