This article is from page 4 of the 2007-11-13 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 4 JPG
DEMANDS were made last night that the Taoiseach, the Minister for Transport and Aer Lingus CEO, Der- mot Mannion come to Clare and ex- plain themselves before a full meet- ing of the county council. Councillor Madeleine Taylor Quinn (FG) made the demand at last night’s meeting of the local authority, in a motion before the council in which
she also urged the council to express its “grave concern relating to Gov- ernment inaction on the proposed withdrawal by Aer Lingus of the Shannon/Heathrow routes next Janu- ary” and to abhor “the Government’s lack of understanding or apprecia- tion of the negative fallout this will have on County Clare and the west of Ireland.
“I’m absolutely confounded by the Government’s inaction – they are act-
ing with total arrogance…members of this council must demand an im- mediate meeting,’ she said.
Cllr Tony Mulcachy (FG) support- ed his party colleague. He said that Clare’s TD’s “should at least have abstained in the Dail vote’, on Aer Lingus.
Cllr Michael Kelly (FF) said there were “so many people fighting to stop Shannon becoming a backwater air- port, and they are getting no help”.
Cllr Pascal Fitzgerald (Lab) praised the mayor and Director of Services, Ger Dollard for their efforts to re- verse the Aer Lingus decision.
‘The Government must know that people are not going to forget this one in four years time because jobs are being lost,” he said.
And Cllr Gerry Flynn (Ind) ap- pealed to Mayor Patricia McCarthy not to “let the fight peter out. There was atime when the grassroots of F1- anna Fail would be listened to but not any more”’.
Cllr PJ Kelly (FF) said that having met with both the Taoiseach and the minister, “I don’t believe there is a simplistic solution. I think the Public Service Order is the only real alter- native at the moment”.
Mayor McCarthy said that she wanted to assure the councillors “that the fight 1s not going out under any circumstances”.
She told the meeting that the pos- sibility of a legal challenge was still being investigated but “once we go down that road, we will not be able to debate the issue at all”.
The meeting passed both motions.
A second motion on the Shannon/ Heathrow slots loss from Cllr Pat McMahon (FF) and Cllr Richard Nagle (FF) was amended slightly to call on the Government to provide the necessary finances for Shannon to actively press for the acquisition of slots to Heathrow.