Month: February 2012

CLARE farmers may be forced to assemble every animal on their farm for all future cattle inspections, should new inspections requirements being put forward by the Department of Agriculture come into force.

The new assembly rules were just one of the main sticking points when a team of senior officials from the Department of Agriculture met officials from the farming organisations in Portlaoise last week.

The other main point of conflict was unannounced inspections, with IFA Deputy President, Eddie Downey, strongly rejected the idea that any spot checks should take place.

“Unannounced inspections are totally unacceptable and IFA is demanding that no inspector arrives on a farm without reasonable prior notice. There need to be better coordination of inspections and the avoidance of duplication as well as increased tolerances, reduced penalties and a strict adherence to prompt payment deadlines. Farmers will not tolerate a repeat of last year, where applicants selected for inspection encountered long payment delays.” he said.

“The assembly of animals involves a major additional workload, creates undue stress, adds considerable costs, and is an additional and unnecessary farm safety risk.”

Downey, who described some of the new proposals as “way over the top” saying that the department inspectors should be able to obtain a reasonable sample of tags without the necessity to bring all animals into the farmers’ yard.

He also called on the Minister for Agriculture, Simon Coveney (FG), to intervene to ensure a more farmer friendly inspection regime. Pressure is also being placed on the Minister for Agriculture to ensure that the delays caused by maps and digitisation not be repeated in 2012.

“There is now significant advantages in submitting on-line SFP applications. Apart from the commitment to be processed and paid earlier by the Department, farmers and their agents can make changes to their applications and maps on line,” said Downey.

“Given the importance of direct payments to farm income it was vital that farmers make sure that their SFP application is made correctly and on time.

“This application is necessary for all schemes including the Single Farm Payment, Disadvantaged Areas, REPS 4, AEOS, Sheep Grassland, Suckler Cow Welfare, Dairy and Beef Discussion groups – it is absolutely essential that no mistakes are made.”

AFTER four years at the helm of the largest farming organisation in the county, Ennis farmer Michael Lynch has called time on his period as Clare Chairperson of the IFA.

At last week’s IFA AGM in Ennis, Michael handed over the reins of power to Ardnacrusha farmer Andrew Dundas.

Over the last four years, Michael has overseen some of the most interesting times in Irish farm history. After taking over from long-term IFA stalwart Seamus Murphy in 2008, he was immediately put to work dealing with falling commodity prices, disastrous weather conditions and pressures both from Brussels and the WTO.

“I think 2008 and 2009 were the most difficult years. We had very difficult weather conditions in those years and a collapse in prices, especially in 2009. It was a very expensive year, feed was scarce and the weather was so bad. A lot of farmers lost a lot of money in that year,” said Michael.

“There has been so much going on in farming over the last few years and a lot of challenges. Even when the prices and the weather started to improve, we had the cutbacks in all the schemes – in the REPS, the Retirement Schemes and the Installa- tion Aid for new farmers.

“There are always problems but I guess that 2008 and 2009 were the busiest years – we were certainly kept going then. I had a very good team of officers around me, which makes it a lot easier, and a good staff as well.

“It was an enjoyable experience though. A lot of the time you might be cursing, trying to round up people to go to Dublin for a protest when people are busy and don’t want to do. It is demanding but there is great ca- maraderie with the people that you meet, both in Clare and at the national level.”

Michael also paid tribute to incoming chairman Andrew Dundas.

“Andrew is a good chap. He’s a good farmer and he has plenty of experience. The organisation is in very safe hands for the next few years,” he said.

“He is a very capable and intelligent guy who is a good operator himself and will make a great job of it.” In next week’s Clare People , Andrew Ha milton spea ks to the new IFA cha ir person Andrew Dunda s who will la y out his vision for fa r ming in Cla re over the next t wo yea rs.

A SPECIAL concert to help save the life of an 11-month-old baby who needs a life-saving operation in America will take place in Ennistymon’s Teach Ceoil this Sunday afternoon, February 19.

Baby Sergio O’Connor was born on March 5 last with a rare condition which prevents him from eating, drinking or swallowing. Sergio, who is half of a set of twin boys, has only left hospital on two occasions since he was born, one being Christmas Day which he was able to spend with his family and twin brother Tadhg.

Sergio and Tadhg were born into one of Ennistymon’s best loved traditional music families, with his father Donal, his grandmother Ann O’Connor (nee Dillon) and his uncle, the former TG4 Young Musician of the Year, Liam O’Connor, all taking part in countless comhaltas sessions over the year.

While Sergio’s family are now based in Dublin, they still retain the original family home on Church Street in Ennistymon, where they spent much of their summers before Sergio was born.

“The little boy has only had two short trips out of the hospital since he was born. He got out for a few hours on Christmas Day but they had to take all of the gear with them from the hospital – he is dependent on equipment to breathe and be fed at this point,” said local comhaltas member Joe Rynne.

“Everyone who is performing at the concert is doing so free of charge and they have been really great to offer their services for the day. We do sessions in Ennistymon during the summer and we put on a great show.

“As well as the music, we will have a good lot of comedy on Sunday – we will have seanf hocail, storytellers, dancers, singers and loads and loads of musicians. We will have a lot of local talent but, as well as that, we will some people travelling from Galway and other places for it. So it should be a great show.

“The O’Connor’s have been part of the sessions in Ennistymon for years and years. Even before they got the building in Ennistymon, going back maybe 30 years or more, they used to attend sessions that we hosted out in a café in Lahinch. They would have been playing at the sessions and, when they were very small, they would even have been dancing ‘The Siege of Ennis’ and taking part in everything.”

A number of other fundraising events have taken place, both locally and in Dublin, in an effort to raise money for baby Sergio’s operation.

A bag-packing event took place in Fitzpatrick’s SuperValu in Ennistymon last weekend, while another fundraising event took place in Willie Daly’s Pub in Ennistymon the January.

Tickets are available at the door on the night for € 10.

LAHINCH artist Michael Hanrahan will meet with American ambassador to Ireland, Dan Rooney, later this Tuesday and present him with a one-of-a-kind painting to mark the historic visit of Barack Obama to Ireland last year.

The painting, which illustrates Obama’s famous ‘Is féidir linn’ speech in College Green last May, will be brought by Ambassador Rooney to Washington later this year where it will be hung in the White House to commemorate the historic visit.

This completes a famous hat-trick for Hanrahan after both the Queen and former Irish president Mary McAleese accepted a painting marking their famous state visit last year. Hanrahan will become the first Irish artist to have paintings hanging in Áras an Uachtaráin, the White House and as part of the Royal British Collection in Buckingham Palace at the same time.

“It really has been an unbelievable six months for me,” said Mr Hanrahan yesterday. “I was contacted by Trina Vargo, founder of the US-Ireland Alliance, and she asked me to complete two paintings – one which I am donating to the George Mitchell Foundation and another which will be going to the White House.

“The painting for the White House is taken from the famous ‘Is féidir linn’ speech which took place in College Green. The painting is in the back of the car now and I will be presenting it to Dan Rooney tomorrow morning [February 14], and the Ambassador will then bring it to the White House. Dan Rooney has Clare connections – his brother Pat Rooney has a house in Lahinch.

“It really has been an amazing six months for me. I’m not being paid for any of these works. It’s such a great honour to be able to donate these paintings.”

Michael’s rise in Irish artistic circles has been nothing short of meteoric. He came to art late in his life, having worked as a banker in both Ireland and the UK. After taking early retirement from his position in the bank, long before the financial collapse, Michael set about creating a new career for himself as a painter.

Over the last five years, the Lahinch native has gone from strength to strength – culminating in him being chosen as the only artist to be granted official accreditation for the official visit of the Queen last year.

LOCAL authorities in Clare have less than three months to sign up to the Croke Park Agreement under which public service workers are obliged to increase their working hours.

This follows on from a survey of local authority working hours around the country which has shown that the average working week of public service working in Clare local government is one of the lowest in the country.

Staff in Clare local authorities are working just 33 hours a week, in comparison with staff in the private sector who work a 39-hour week.

This figure is shared by Meath County Council and Galway City Council. At Galway County Council, the figure is even lower with staff working 32.92 hours a week.

When contacted by The Clare People , Clare County Council that the deadline for local authority workers to fall into line with workers in the private sector is two months away.

“This is a national issue that remains outside of Clare County Council’s control as reform has been delayed due to an ongoing national dispute with unions,” said Eddie Power, Senior Executive Officer, Clare County Council.

“This point has already been made publicly by the Office for Local Authority Management (OLAM). The implementation date for the standardisation of working arrangements across the local government sector is April,” he added.

The increase in working hours that is expected to come into effect in April comes in the wake of staffing levels at Clare County Council hav- ing been reduced to just over 800 over the past six years.

In 2006 there were 1,002 people working in Clare County Council with the reduction over the past six years amounting to a 20 per cent, while payroll costs have been pared back from € 44.8m to € 36.8m in that time.

It is expected that there will be further reductions in staffing levels in 2012, while Taoiseach Enda Kenny has warned that local authority workers in all counties will have to sign up to the terms of the Croke Park Agreement.

CLARE’S Irish Wheelchair Association is to lose two thirds of its Community Employment (CE) funding this year.

The organisation that supports people with limited mobility throughout the county has had its funding slashed by € 16,000, from € 24,000 to € 8,000.

As many as 16 people are employed through the CE scheme providing administrative assistance to the charity as well as driving the buses, organising events and courses and providing support and assistance to the service users.

Up to now the local IWA was allocated € 1,500 for each CE participant – € 500 for training and € 1,000 for materials.

Johnny Crawford, Supervisor with the Irish Wheelchair Association in Clare, explained that this funding provided a vital role in delivering services to IWA users.

“In our context we have quite a lot of mandatory training to do, especially relating to heath and safety, manual handling, adult and child protection. We have a menu of mandatory courses to do that pretty much eats into the training budget. Beyond that if there is funding left over we offer it to people for something they want to do themselves outside of the mandatory courses,” he said.

The € 1,000 allocation is used to help fund the running costs of the office, help pay the rent, put diesel in the buses and cover other material costs.

It is through this funding, and the work of the 16 dedicated CE workers, that the IWA in Clare can provide outreach services in Cois Na hAbhana, Ennis, on Tuesday, Miltown Malbay on Monday and alternate between Kilrush and Ennistymon on Wednesday. An outreach programme is also provided in the family resource centre in Killaloe and Friday night is the social gathering for the younger people.

“Everything we do is driven by desires of service users. It is their programme,” he said.

He added the cut in funding would put added pressures on the charity’s fundraising, which has already been affected by the recession. “The loss is huge and it will affect the services without a doubt,” he said.

The CE programme is designed to help people who are long-term unemployed and other disadvantaged people to get back to work by offering part-time and temporary placements in jobs based within local communities.

A MOTHER took items from a jewellery shop in Ennis to pay off moneylenders, a court has heard.

A six-month prison sentence was imposed on Mary Ann Jackson at Ennis District Court on Wednesday.

Jackson (39) with an address at 35 Hyde Avenue, Ballinacurra, Limerick, had previously pleaded guilty. The court previously heard that Jackson, who has 118 previous convictions, entered Collins Jewellers, O’Connell Street, Ennis, on January 18. She took a tray of bracelets, placed them in her handbag and left the shop. The court heard that Jackson was stopped by the owner who called the Gardaí. The accused admitted taking the bracelets, which were all recovered.

Insp John Galvin told the court that the bracelets were valued at € 1,800 and were fit for re-sale.

Solicitor Daragh Hassett said his client had borrowed from moneylenders to pay for fuel for her father. He said she had taken the bracelets, as she had no way of paying the money back. He said that Jackson, a mother of one, “was under huge pressure to pay back these people”. The court heard that the accused suffers from diabetes and serious heart problems.

Judge Aeneas McCarthy noted that the accused does not have a good record. Acknowledging Jackson’s plea of guilty and other mitigating factors including the accused’s health, Judge McCarthy imposed a six-month sentence. He said the sentence is to be served concurrent to a nine-month sentence Jackson is currently serving.

A SHANNON graduate has been told he cannot take part in the muchpublicised Government Internship Scheme because of his disability status.

Padraic Hayes is in receipt of the allowance and therefore according to the rules of the scheme he is not entitled to get the much-needed work experience.

Under the programme, participants must be on job seekers allowance to avail of the support.

“I am getting my qualifications, but at the end of the day you apply for positions and they look for experience, and I am willing to work for the experience but because I can’t apply to get the experience I am stuck,” said the frustrated LIT student.

Padraic already has an honours de- gree in Office Management Systems and completed an ECDL course to make him more employable.

He has returned to college to do a higher diploma and said next year he will do his masters degree if he cannot find work, but he would prefer to find a job.

He has applied for numerous positions and has come close to success on a number of occasions.

In recent weeks he was second in line for a job but lost out to a candidate that had more experience.

The young graduate also registered with the Clare Supported Employment Service.

“I looked into an internship with my job coach but he found out that you had to be on job seekers allowance or job seekers benefit to qualify for an internship,” said Padraic.

Alice O’Carroll, Team Leader with the Clare Supported Employment Service, said she was surprised to discover that Padraic had no access to an internship.

“It is not right to be excluded from anything. He should have that opportunity to prove himself like everyone else,” she said.

“There is a recognition that people with disabilities should be included in the labour force, and I would like to see people with disability having access to internships.”

Fine Gael Senator Tony Mulcahy, a long time advocate for people with disabilities, described the situation as “ridiculous”.

“This is something that has to be sorted out and added to the programme,” he said.

“The Government has to take responsibility for this and I am part of that Government. The issue needs to be addressed,” he added.

A GARDA was driven 500 metres down a country lane in Whitegate while on the bonnet of a car, a court has heard.

The incident occurred as two gardaí attempted to interview a man they had stopped driving a black BMW in Whitegate on March 2, 2011.

As Sgt Joe Fallon inspected the front of the car, the driver, Frank Shanley, drove forward with Sgt Fallon on the bonnet, Clare Circuit Court heard last week.

Shanley (36), formerly of 8 Church View, Boyle, Roscommon, had previously pleaded guilty to four counts arising out of the incident.

Shanley, who is currently serving a sentence in Cork prison, was charged with unlawful use of a mechanically propelled vehicle; dangerous driving; giving a false name and failing to stop at Cappa, Whitegate, on March 2, 2011.

Garda Gerry Slattery told the court that gardaí had received a call from their colleagues in Clifden about Shanley.

He said, that after telling the accused that he was arresting him for theft, Shanley drove forward.

Garda Slattery said Shanley ignored his pleas to stop the car. Garda Slattery said he threw a rock to break the window of the car. He told the court that travelled 500 metres before stopping. “He didn’t give Garda Fallon any chance to get off the car,” he added.

Garda Slattery explained that the owner of the house in which Shanley had been staying had called gardaí. He said the owner had also blocked the entrance of the house with his jeep to prevent Shanley from leaving.

Counsel for Shanley, Enda O’Neill, told the court that his client had been staying in a remote rural location and had been “put on edge” when he saw the jeep parked across the entrance.

He said that psychiatric assessment of Shanley determined that “when he is stable psychiatrically, his legal problems decrease significantly”.

Shanley told the court that he was scared and that he dialed 11850 and 999 because he didn’t know what was going on. “I was tense and frightened,” he added.

Judge Caroll Moran said, “The most serious matter is that Mr Shanley drove a car for 500 metres without stopping with a person on the bonnet and as to whether Mr Shanley didn’t realise it was a garda, it doesn’t matter, he should have stopped.” Judge Moran imposed a three year sentence backdated to September 26, 2011, for the unlawful taking of a vehicle. Court Reporter A MAN has appeared in court charged with wasting Garda time arising out of a three-week search for a missing person in Ennis last summer. Bernard Flaherty (37), with an address at 3 Lifford Lodge, Ennis, was arrested in Ennis last week. At Ennis District Court on Wednesday, Sgt Catherine Houlihan gave evidence of arrest, charge and caution. Sgt Houlihan told the court that after being cautioned, Flaherty said, “I’m sorry for wasting your time.” Jurisdiction of the case was refused

and a book of evidence will now be served on the accused.

It is alleged that on June 24, 2011, at Ennis Garda Station, Flaherty did knowingly make a false statement tending to show that he had information material to Garda enquiries and thereby causing the time of the Gardaí to be wastefully employed.

Solicitor John Casey made an application for legal aid. He said there was no objection to bail.

Sgt Houlihan told the court that Gardaí received a report of a missing person on June 20, 2011. She said that in an interview, Flaherty told Gardaí that he had not seen the person in question. She said a major Garda operation was underway at the time to locate the missing person.

Insp John Galvin said the deceased body of the person was subsequently found by Gardaí in an apartment occupied by the accused. The court heard that the person died of natural causes.

Details of the Garda investigation and search were heard in court. Sgt Houlihan said 40 people were interviewed while Gardaí viewed 50 hours of CCTV footage. Eight Gardaí carried out door-to-door enquiries and 14 separate searches took place, the court heard.

Sgt Houlihan said community and voluntary groups had been significantly involved in the search. She said members of Clare Civil Defence had searched the River Fergus on a daily basis. Insp John Galvin said the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) had approved summary disposal of the case.

Judge Aeneas McCarthy refused jurisdiction, saying he did not deem the matter fit to be tried summarily. He fixed bail and remanded the accused on bail to appear at Ennis District Court on March 14 for service of the book of evidence. Judge McCarthy said the usual reporting restrictions apply.

A NEW initiative to help regenerate the old traditional shopping streets of Kilrush by improving the streetscape has been introduced by the local authority.

Kilrush Town Council has agreed to fund up to € 750 of the cost of giving shops on Moore Street and Henry Street a facelift.

The Shop Front Initiative will follow on from the resurfacing of Moore Street last year.

The town council is working with the Chamber of Commerce, Shannon Development and the Tidy Towns in this second phase, which will encourage new business in these streets and assist existing businesses in improving their shop fronts.

The scheme will apply to owners and occupiers of existing businesses and also to new businesses in Moore Street and Henry Street.

The scheme will operate on a points basis with the maximum number of points being awarded in the case where new businesses are created.

Traditional shop fronts will be encouraged as will hand painted signs.

People will also be encouraged through the scheme to paint all of the buildings’ façades.

All applications for assistance under the fund must be received by April 30 and all works must be completed by August 2012. Following an assessment of applications, approval in principle will be given to successful applicants and monies paid out on the satisfactory completion of the works, together with evidence of invoices paid and signed declaration of owner or occupier. The maximum grant that will be available is € 750 or 50 per cent of the cost of the works, whichever is the lesser value. However applications for premises where arrears of any statutory local authority charges are unpaid will not be considered. Kilrush town councillor and local business woman Mairéad O’Brien said she was more encouraged by the scheme once she realised that people did not have to completely overhaul their shop front, and that those that under took painting work could also apply. She said, however, that she did not believe it would attract new businesses. “I don’t think 20 businesses will take it up because they won’t have the where with all to pay 50 per cent,” she added. Town Manager Nora Kaye said, “The scheme is intended to be flexible to encourage people to do up the buildings.” There is a budget of € 10,000 available for the project.