The President of the National Students' Union writes for Belfast Live
After two years I can hardly believe that I’ve reached my final week in office as the leader of Northern Ireland’s student movement. I hoped that I might be handing over my presidency in calmer circumstances than I received it, but with a cost of living storm brewing it feels like Northern Ireland is sleepwalking into a crisis once again.
Students’ unions have been doing the kind of frontline crisis work since their creation. It’s the same kinds of work that thousands of charity workers, healthcare staff, employers, community volunteers and family members also do daily, often unseen by governments and the media. In 2011 the Trussell Trust reported that they ran two foodbanks in Northern Ireland. This year they reported running 41, and giving out over 60,000 food parcels in the last year.
While communities and civic society keep on coping, the cracks in the system get deeper and wider, and more people start falling through. And eventually those makeshift safety nets will start to rip as well. Now in the face of yet another economic crisis, the same people who have been holding communities together are expected to do so again. This is not sustainable.
As our society slowly becomes more individualistic, they serve as a reminder of the great sense of community we have here. But in reality many of those same people are as far from tireless as they can be – they are exhausted.
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