Member's statement: National Year of Reading: St Bride's Primary School
Member's statement by Ms Kate Nicholl on .
- MLA
- Ms Kate Nicholl
- Party at the time
- Alliance Party
- Date
- 12 May 2026
- Type
- Member's statement
- Business
- Members' Statements
- Heading
- National Year of Reading: St Bride's Primary School
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5528244
Read the official Assembly record
Text
It is the National Year of Reading, and it was wonderful to see in the news St Bride's Primary School in south Belfast open its new library. Principal Cathy Hunter, students, parents and local bookshops all came together to create a wonderful library in the school. I loved the interview with the student librarian Saskia who said that it felt really good because all the staff and kids have put so much work and thought into the library, and it is amazing to see how it turned out. It is amazing to see the library. When I met the National Literacy Trust last week, I was told that 41% of our primary schools do not have a dedicated library space, which is shocking. We know that fewer than three in 10 children aged between eight and 18 enjoy reading — seven out of 10 do not. We know that we have very poor adult literacy rates. One in five adults has very poor literacy, and, if they cannot support their children with reading, the cycle will continue. Reading is so important, not just for literacy and understanding, but because it allows for imagination. If you can imagine yourself as someone else, that allows you to visit different worlds and widen your experience as a human being. Crucially, it creates empathy: it allows us to imagine what it is like to be another person.
If we as an Assembly want to create confident, curious, literate young people, we have to make sure that they have libraries in their schools.
I give credit to Libraries NI, which does fantastic work. It has been working with the National Literacy Trust. However, there is a lack of data. The National Literacy Trust has come up with the statistic of 41% of primary schools not having libraries, but that is a conservative guess. The Education Authority needs to record that data. It would be simple to do, and we would be able to understand where the gaps are and how we can support them. The National Year of Reading is important because it is a time to reflect on the importance of reading, but it is also a time for us to focus minds and see how we can make sure that every primary school has a library. They really should.
386 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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