All eyes turn to the NorthWest for the annual pride celebrations which commence next week.    A packed programme of events in Leitrim and Sligo are planned.    The parade takes place on Saturday through Sligo’s town centre and from past experience (I’ve been to five!)  is the nicest dander with lovely receptive crowds lining the street and community singing outside the town hall at the end.

NorthWest Pride is the first pride event in Ireland to genuinely make access a priority –  the group haveit’s own access officer and have assessed all events and widely publicised the service  and is to be highly commended for this initiative.   After the disappointment of last weeks Gaze Film Festival in Dublin and it’s inaccessible venue it’s great to see a small non hipster community based organisation postively reaching out to lgbt’s with disabilities and offer assistance to enable people to attend and fully participate.  Congratulations to Isolde Carmody and her colleagues for all their efforts, maybe they can teach the rest of the lgbt community how to do this including the Pride events with large bank balances and more media hype.