Belfast City Council has approved a library of appropriate reading material for refugee children in the city.
Elected representatives at a City Hall committee meeting this month unanimously agreed to a recommendation by council officials to grant approval for an agreement with the Book Trust and the Belfast Trust’s Family Help Clinic.
They have agreed to build a library of age-appropriate children’s books in the most likely needed languages and for the Family Help Clinic to distribute the materials to families recently located in permanent accommodation in Belfast. The project will cost the council £2,000.
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A council report for the City Hall People and Communities Committee states: “The benefits to children who read in their own language include improved cognition, literacy, communication, socialisation, attachment and cultural confidence. Parental literacy and prioritisation of reading skills for children can be a barrier to child development.
“Temporary accommodation support, commonly in hotels, before refugees move to more permanent accommodation, is no longer provided in Belfast. The duration of hotel stays greatly reduced over the last two years.
“Temporary accommodation is provided in Causeway Coast and Glens Council area. Access to, and information on, the number of children and their needs is highly regulated due to safeguarding requirements.
“Working in partnership through a formal agreement with existing service providers will provide the best solution to supporting literacy for refugee children, once they are located in permanent accommodation in Belfast.”
Temporary accommodation refers to the hotel venues hosting refugee children, their families and other adults on a temporary basis until more appropriate permanent residency arrangements are available. There are no families in temporary residence in Belfast and the contracts with hotels terminated at the end of March 2025.
The Book Trust provides age-appropriate reading materials in the correct languages. Belfast Trust’s Family Help Clinic supports refugee families with registration for education and health care and has access to information on who is recently placed in permanent accommodation within the city.
The council report adds: “Children arriving in Northern Ireland present a high level of need. Given that the number staying in hotels has significantly reduced in the last year, and the fact that children move quickly to permanent accommodation, the priority of needs changes dramatically.
"Service providers advise that the families identify other needs as more significant than reading materials for their children. Their priorities are consistent with any family with very little resources moving to a new empty house.
“They prioritise items like clothing, shoes, furniture, kitchen utensils, personal hygiene items, toys, food vouchers, transport vouchers, connectivity and internet etc.”
It adds: “Reading in one’s own language plays a key role in child development, not just at a cognitive level by acquiring the necessary literacy skills needed to communicate, but also at a social level by the process of developing attachment between children and their carers, and developing a sense of cultural confidence in their own backgrounds.
“During conversations with partners, it was highlighted that while a good idea in principle, parental literacy skills gaps exist where parents might not have sufficient literacy to support children with reading and writing.”
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