Category: News

THE number of people on the Live Register in County Clare is set break the all time record when new figures are released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) later this week. The figures will be released just days after one of Clare’s landmark hotels, The Clare Inn, went into receivership on Friday last.

Two hotel’s from the Lynch Group, including the Clare Inn, were placed into receviership last week but Managing Director Michael B Lynch said he will work with the banks to protect the jobs.

Managing Director Michael B Lynch told The Clare People yesterday “that the West County Hotel will remain under Lynch management and that it’s business as usual”.

Shannon-based company EI Electronics announced on Friday that it would be letting between 30 and 40 employees go at the end of February.

This follows a number of other jobs losses around the county in January with Finsa in Scariff announcing the loss of 52 jobs and east Clare builders Tom Hayes Ltd going into liquidation with the loss of 20 jobs.

According to Paul Woulfe of the Clare Citizens Information Service, he has seen a sharp increase of recently unemployed people using the service since Christmas.

“We have seen a large increase in the number of people coming to see us with questions about redundancy and issues related to losing their jobs. For many of these people, their companies cannot afford to pay them redundancy so they have to go through the long process of applying to the Social Insurance Fund,” he said.

THE pioneering work of renowned Clare musician Peadar O’Loughlin dating over 50 years has been brought to a new generation of traditional music lovers thanks to a decision by Na Piobairí Uilleann to re-release of the storied Seancheol ar an Seannós album.

The famous album, originally recorded in 1960 on the short-lived SPOL label set up by Breandán Breathnach, featured the legendary Kilmaleyman on flute and east Galway fiddler Aggie White.

“It is a measure of the musicianship of both Peadar and Aggie and indeed the depth of appreciation of Breandán Breathnach that this beautiful recording resonates today,” a spokesperson for Na Piobairí Uilleann told The Clare People .

In describing the recording as “an archival gem”, the Piobairí Uilleann has called the historic recording as “a perfect blending of fiddle and flute these two musicians illustrate in well chosen melodies the richness of Irish folk-music”.

“In his original sleeve notes, Breathnach extols the virtues of this wonderful duet and details Peadar and Aggie’s contemporary achievements as prominent traditional musicians during the 1950s.

“Aggie Whyte, who hails from the Ballinakill district in Galway, comes from generations of musicians; her father, Tommy Whyte, was a member of the famous Ballinakill Céilí Band. She was awarded the Gold Medal in the competition for traditional fiddle playing at the Oireachtas in 1958 and in the same year with Peadar O’Loughlin won the competition for duets at this musical festival.

“Peadar O’Loughlin, who had four years previously won the competition for flute playing, comes from Kilmaley, County Clare. He is an all-round musician, having many firsts to his credit for flute, fiddle and pipe playing,”

‘Seancheol ar an Seannós’ was officially launched as as part of the Breandán Breathnach Commemoration at Henrietta Street in Dublin. O’Loughlin, a longtime member of the Tulla Céilí Band, was awarded the Hall of Fame Award at the annual TG4 Gradam Ceoil awards in 2005.

FORMER Minister for Defence and Clare TD Tony Killeen (FF) has been given the un-coveted job as National Director of Elections for Fianna Fáil.

The Corofin man, who is retiring from politics at this election due to health concerns, told The Clare People that he wasn’t surprised when the call came from Fianna Fáil’s new party leader Michéal Martin on Sunday.

“I have some reservations in being able to do it, both physically and in terms of experience, but I have a strong team around me,” he said.

“The downside of this is that I will have to spend a lot of time outside Clare and in Dublin during the election, but I will be there in Clare as much as possible supporting the two candidates.”

A BUNRATTY singer has thrown his hat into the ring, in an attempt to represent Ireland in this year’s Eurovision song contest.

Gari Deegan (27) is involved in one of the acts vying for a place in the competition in May, having received an phone call from a music promoter a few weeks ago. Gari is part of a four-person band which will take to the stage on The Late Late Show on Friday week to participate in the Irish final of the competition. Although Jedward are the hot favourites to secure the right to represent Ireland in the Eurovision, nevertheless Gari believes that he is in with a shout.

His call-up came out of the blue and he grabbed the opportunity to shine on the national stage.

“I got a phone call from Willie Kavanagh of EMI in December. I thought it was a joke. I had recorded with songwriter Ray Fean who is originally from Shannon and who is based in Belgium. EMI got hold of one of the songs I sang, ‘Ode To A Woman’. He said he had put together a group and asked was I interested in getting involved. I was honest and said I was not a fan of Eurovision but I said I would go and see how it goes. He asked me to go to Dublin and we recorded at Windmill Lane Studios,” he explained. Gari and his fellow band members, Shane Creevy (Dublin), Marlyn Bane (Galway) and Tammy Browne (Kildare), have been signed up by EMI records and their grouping has, as of yet, not received an official name – Gari refers to them as a “mystery quartet”!

“We are not going to have a name until nearer the time,” Gari told The Clare People .

Gari did not know any of the others prior to meeting them to record the Eurovision entry, but has enjoyed getting to know them over the past few weeks and says their four voices blend well together. They will sing a motown-type song titled ‘Shine On’, in their efforts to win votes.

Gari has performed musically for several years, while he also models with Assets in Dublin. He features in television advertising, the most recent of which has been his role in the 3 mobile advertising campaign. He is also a DJ with Spin South West and divides his time between the midwest, Dublin and London. Although a big music fan, he has never had any major fondness for the Eurovision – but is slowly coming around and has enjoyed the past few weeks! “I have got rid of all the hesitation of Eurovision now and will go for it,” he said.

In advance of the live performance on The Late Late Show on Friday week, Gari and his fellow Eurovision hopefuls will feature in a documentary to be shown on RTÉ television this Friday evening. Gari is urging the people of Clare to support him on Friday night week, by casting their votes. “The vote will be divided into 50 per cent from a jury of industry professionals and 50 per cent public vote,” he said.

“The focus will be on Jedward. They are favourites to win it but you would never know. We are going to go and enjoy it. The song is good,” he said.

TWO West Clare water treatment plants provided approximately 2,000 cubic metres per day of water to Ennis and Clarecastle during the freezing weather, despite suffering severe leaks.

According to figures from the Water and Sanitary Services in Clare County Council, before the thawfreeze problems at the end of December and beginning of January, the combined production of the two Doolough treatment plants were approximately 13,500 cubic metres per day.

During the period December 20, 2010, to January 6, 2011, the average production was approximately 20,700 cubic metres per day – an increase of 53 per cent on normal supply.

As about 2,000 cubic metres per day of this water was sent to the Ennis area to ensure domestic and industrial supply in Clarecastle, the amount of water being lost in the area to leaks was estimated at 18,700 cubic metres squared.

During the later half of this month the two plants were continuing to lose 25 per cent of their combined normal supply to leaks indicating that there was still a lot of work to be done in locating and repairing leaks at west Clare’s largest treatment plants.

The Gortglass Lake treatment plant lost 500 cubic metres, or 50 per cent of its usually supply, every day during the bad weather due to leaks.

Council officials attributed the relatively few cases of water loss in west Clare this winter to “good spare capacity” in west Clare treatment plants and the large sizing and relatively new condition if much of the network.

There was therefore little or no need for overnight shut-offs to allow reservoirs to replenish as had to be done in the rest of the county.

“However, even though consumers may not have been as directly affected, the leaks and losses of treated water caused by the weather were, and still remain, just as important an issues in west Clare as in the rest of the county,” explained Sean Ward, Senior Engineer with Clare County Council.

“Unsustainable additional expense has been and is being incurred in locating and repairing leaks, and in treating and pumping the additional quantities of water being demanded by the network.”

CLARE’S only retiring member of Dáil Éireann, Deputy Tony Killeen, is set to receive over a quarter of a million euro lump sum for his years of service in Leinster House, which also takes into account his time as being both a Minister of State and full member of Cabinet.

The lump sum pay-off to Fianna Fáil’s biggest vote-getter in Clare over the past two decades with 19 years Dáil service to his name is part of overall payments to retiring TDs, which is set to cost the Irish exchequer over € 10m during the next cou- ple of years.

Deputy Killeen will receive a € 276,163 once off payment for the 19 years he represented Clare in the Dáil, while his pension will be worth € 68,984 when it kicks in.

Deputy Killeen first entered political life when he was elected to Clare County Council in 1985. He retained his seat in the 1991 election and he served as both chairman of Clare County Council and the Shannon Status Committee before winning his Dáil seat in 1992 and retaining it in subsequent elections in 1997, 2002 and 2007.

Deputy Killeen’s distinction of holding down junior ministerial and full-ministerial portfolios over the past seven years will ensure that he will benefit from better pension terms than retiring deputies who were backbench TDs.

Under the pension structures for retiring TDs, former ministers are deemed to be office holders and are therefore paid an office holders’ allowance on top of their TDs salary.

Deputy Killeen was elevated to ministerial rank by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern in 2004 when he was made Minister of State for Labour Affairs. After the 2007 election he became the first ever Minister of State for Environment and Energy, while in 2008 he became Minister of State for Fisheries and Forestry. His elevation to full Cabinet status came in 2010 when Brian Cowen became Taoiseach and made him Minister for Defence.

Deputy Killeen is one over 40 current Dáil deputies, who have announced their retirement ahead of the General Election, the most high profile of these being the man who appointed him to Cabinet, Taoiseach Brian Cowen.

LABOUR’S hopes of winning a Dáil seat in Clare for the first time since 1992 received another major boost this week with the confirmation that a second member of what party leader Eamon Gilmore has called “our extended family” has come out in support of Michael McNamara’s bid to be elected to the 31st Dáil.

Labour’s most successful candidate at local government level elections in Clare over the past half a century, former county councillor Martin Lafferty has backed McNamara’s campaign to become only the third Labour candidate after Paddy Hogan and Dr Mosajeé Bhamjeé to be elected to Dáil Éireann.

“I’ve met him and I’m impressed with him,” Lafferty told The Clare People this week, “and I’m backing him to get elected to the Dáil. I will do my canvassing in my own way and I have been out looking for support for his bid to get elected to the Dáil and I will be asking all the people who voted for me down the years to vote for McNamara,” added Laffterty, who was a member of Clare County Council for 33 years between 1974 to 2007.

Lisdoonvarna man Lafferty was elected as a Labour Party candidate in the Clare County Council elections of 1974, 1979, 1985 and ‘91, before leaving the party in 1992 in opposition to the party decision to go into coalition with Fianna Fáil.

“I left Labour because before the General Election in 1992 party leader Dick Spring said that ‘the culture of Fianna Fáil was a cancer of Irish society’. Labour said they wouldn’t go into coalition with Fianna Fáil but they did, so I owed it to my supporters to leave. But now I’m supporting the Labour candidate, because I am impressed by his credentials,” added Lafferty.

Lafferty’s is the latest former Labour stalwart to embrace the party’s cause in Clare once more, following on from the decision of former mayor of Clare and current member of both Clare County Council and Shannon Town Council, Cllr Patricia McCarthy to back Mr McNamara’s Dáil bid.

“The support of the extended Labour family is crucial to the party’s chances of winning a seat in Clare,” party leader Eamon Gilmore told The Clare People on a visit to the constituency two weeks ago.

Meanwhile, current mayor of Clare Cllr Christy Curtin, who is another former Labour Party member, has declared that “the jury is still out on who I will support in the election”. However, The Clare People can reveal that party activists are hopeful that behind the scenes the county’s First Citizen will back Mr McNamar’s Dáil bid, without compromising his independent status.

IN LAUNCHING his campaign to be elected to the 31st Dáil, Independent candidate Cllr James Breen has told The Clare People that expenses for TDs should be “abolished altogether”, forcing them to live off their salary € 90,000 a year.

Cllr Breen, who became the only Independent to top the poll in a Clare election in 2002 and the first nonparty member to be elected in the county in 54 years, has called for the abolition of expenses as part of “a complete reform of government”, both at national and local level.

“It’s not an election gimmick,” Cllr Breen told The Clare People this week. “There has to be a complete reform of politics, a meaningful reform of government and that includes Dáil and county council level.

“There are 166 TDs in Dáil Éireann. That’s too much. Dáil representation should be reduced.

“The Senate should be meaningfully reformed or abolished. The numbers of county councillors should be reduced.

“We should reduce the numbers of foreign conferences that’s costing the country millions of euros every year. We should reduce Dáil expenses and abolish them altogether and oblige TDs to live on their salary with no expenses,” added Cllr Breen.

The Clare County Council website, which publishes county councillors’ expenses on-line, shows that Cllr Breen claimed € 28,739.89 from June 2009, when he was re-elected to the local authority, to June 2010.

This figure includes his basic salary of € 8,361.96 for the last six months of 2009 and € 9,717.75 for 2010. During the 12 months he also claimed € 4,368.61 for attending conferences, while he availed of the annual allowances in those two six month periods of € 2442.13 in 2009 and € 2,947.44 in 2010.

“We need openness and transparency in government, which we haven’t had over the last number of years,” continued Cllr Breen in championing a overhaul of the expenses regime. “The TD earns nearly three times the average wage of people and they should be able to live on that. The person driving to and from Shannon working on the average industrial wage is getting no travelling time.

“I have no qualms if expenses are abolished in the morning. It’s not a gimmick to get elected. It’s something I believe in,” added Cllr Breen.

During his five years in Dáil Éireann from 2002 to 2007, Cllr Breen was entitled to the Independent TDs allowance. Currently the allowance given to Independent members of the Dáil is over € 40,000 per annum.

GARDAÍ are urging homeowners to be vigilant following an increase in the theft of home heating oil around Clare.

A Garda spokesman explained that thieves are targeting oil tanks that are not fitted with locks.

“The theft of home heating oil and other fuels is on the increase across the western region in County Clare. A feature that has been noticed by the investigating gardaí is how easily accessible the openings in storage tanks are. We are appealing for people to be extra vigilant and to take extra security measures to protect their fuel from being easily stolen.

He added, “Locks should be on the openings and where large storage tanks are located, access to them should be strictly controlled. Where large vehicles are parked overnight we appeal for the drivers to park them in well lit areas or in secure compounds and parked in such a way that the opening of the fuel tanks is easy to access.”

Gardaí have also issued a warning in relation to a computer scam. “A number of people have been rang by someone claiming to represent Microsoft or other well known computer firms and informing the person that a problem has risen with their com- puter. They claim that they can fix this problem over the phone by getting the owner to enter certain data on their computer. No problems have been noticed by the owner before the phone call. However they look for credit card details first as they claim a small charge is necessary before proceeding,” said the spokesman.

“Sometimes the caller asks you to download a file to ensure that the “so-called problem” is identified and tackled. You could be downloading a virus or spyware, which will allow the caller to access your computer at will. This is a scam and is purely designed to obtain the details of the owner’s credit card and other personal details.”

Gardaí say that anyone who suspects they may have been the victim of the scam should report the matter to the Gardaí or the data commissioner.

ONE young west Clare man is fighting back against the current cynical reaction to politics by preparing to put his own name forward for the General Election.

Brian Markham, a member of the well know Kilmurry McMahon family, is determined to have his name on the ballot sheet on polling day as an Independent candidate.

The 23-year-old told The Clare People he “wants to make a difference” and “go out and do something”.

A qualified PE teacher, he currently works in O’Flaherty’s Electrical Shop in Ennis.

A keen sportsman, he has represented the county and province in athletics at international level.

He has been involved with Shannon Gaels and Coolmeen GAA clubs and is known for organising several Community Games events for local children.

A past pupil of St Flannan’s College in Ennis, he attended university in London.

“During these four years I began to learn how important it is to make your opinions heard and how important it is to have a representative that you can trust in. I was an active member of the Students Union where we were told about the issues troubling the student body. It was then our duty to convey the thoughts of the students to the relevant boards and do our best to get different rules and improvements implemented,” he said.

“I have now been back home in Ireland for five months. During this time I have witnessed possibly one of the worst periods in Irish politics. The country is in an extremely poor state and this is primarily down to mismanagement and big name politics.

“In the time I have been home I have seen several of my friends unwillingly being forced to leave our wonderful country in search of employment and what looks to be a better future than the one that is in store in this country,” he added.

“I would like to make clear that I do believe in co-operating with big business and foreign multinationals because of the jobs and growth they bring to our country. However, pandering to the banks has resulted in a loss of sovereignty, in that we are bound by conditions imposed by the EU and IMF bailout, high unemployment and a generation of our best and brightest leaving by the day. This is where traditional politics has let us down.”

He believes that Independent TDs will be very influential in the next Dáil.

Among the issues that he believes the election campaign should be fought on are the demise of Shannon Airport and the Shannon area, the future of Ennis General Hospital and the need for improvement to local infrastructure.