Newry launches bid for city status
Newry is taking its bid to become the fourth city of Northern Ireland.
Its campaign is being launched by Newry and Mourne District Council in conjunction with Newry Town Centre Management Partnership and Newry Chamber of Commerce and Trade at a reception in Westminster in London tomorrow.
To mark the Queen’s Golden Jubilee next year one town in each of the four parts of the United Kingdom will be granted city status.
In Northern Ireland Ballymena, Carrickfergus, Coleraine, Craigavon and Lisburn are also bidding to win the honour.
Newry and Mourne Council said the reception, to which MPs and members of the House of Lords have been invited, was to advance the town’s reputation ‘‘as a town which is going forward into the 21st Century in a spirit of optimism, as a town which has strong business and community confidence in the future, and as a town where people want to live, work and visit’’.
In its pitch for city status Newry and Mourne Council cited its industrial expansion and multi-million pound retail development in recent years which had, they said, made it a retail centre second only to Belfast.
They added that for a town with over 1,000 years of history, it had recently come a long way in a short time.
‘‘With a growing self-belief and a common purpose, Newry has become a town where local authority business and the wider community are responsive to local aspirations.’’
