Foreword

By Mr Bernard Allen T.D., Minister of State for Youth Affairs

I am very pleased indeed to have been invited to contribute to this Directory produced by the Cork Local Voluntary Youth Council. I am very much aware of the worthwhile contribution that the Council has made to the development of youth work services in Cork in the relatively short period since its inception.

A very effective partnership with the Education Department of University College Cork has already produced valuable research to underpin the work of the Local Voluntary Youth Council and this Youth Directory represents a further step in empowering local interests to play a positive role in the development of responses to the needs of young people in their areas.

I am confident that the Youth Directory will prove to be an invaluable resource for those who work with young people and for young people themselves. In addition, it will serve to raise the profile of those groups and organisations providing excellent service for our young people throughout the city and county.

In Cork, as in the rest of the country, youth work provision has depended largely on the active participation of a dedicated body of volunteer workers. To applaud this work is, of course, appropriate but, in my view, scarcely sufficient. I believe that volunteers should have a significant role to play in the future of youth work. To this end, the youth service legislation which I intend to introduce at the earliest possible date, will provide for the evolution of Local voluntary Youth Councils in terms both of their structure and of their involvement in the formulation and implementation of youth work policy.

I am pleased to see that Cork Local Voluntary Youth Council is also looking to the future and intends to make this Directory available "live" on computer. I have no doubt that the widest possible access to this repository of information will serve to highlight youth work services and to support and facilitate voluntary effort in Cork.

Le gach dea-ghuí.