Category: News

TENS of thousands of extra Chinese tourists look set to flock to North Clare this year – and possibly for many years into the future – following discussion on establishing educational links between the Cliffs of Moher and a number of Geoparks in China.

The link was suggested by China’s president elect, Xi Jinping, during his historic visit to the Cliffs of Moher on Sunday morning. While in conversation with the manager of the Cliffs of Moher Visitors Experience, Katherine Webster, the Chinese vice president suggested forming a number of education links between the Burren and a number of Geoparks in China.

“I told him that the Cliffs of Moher and the Burren had recently been granted UNESCO Geopark status and he was very interested in this. He suggested that a major educational exchange be set up between the Geoparks in China and the Cliffs of Moher. This would be a very significant development for us and something that we definitely intend to follow up on,” said Katherine.

“He was very interested in the history of the Cliffs and in the natural landscape of the area. He told me that he has previously seen the Cliffs in a film, which must have been Harry Potter, and he told me that he had been looking forward to coming to see the Cliffs even before the state visit was announced.

The Cliffs of Moher has already recorded a dramatic increase in the number of Chinese visitors using the North Clare facility so far this year. More than eight Chinese tours, amounting more than 250 holidays makers, have visited the Cliffs of Moher since January – and this figures is expected to swell into the tens of thousands once the tourist season gets into full swing.

Thousands of extra Chinese visitors are also expected in North Clare during this year’s London Olympics.

“We have already seen a large increase in the numbers of Chinese visitors coming to the Cliffs this year so we are very hopeful of what will come this year,” continued Katherine.

“He will be taking a bit of Clare back home with him – we presented him with a painting of the Cliffs set in a Liscannor Flag frame and I know that the Mayor of Clare, Pat Hayes, spoke to him about Irish music and gave him a few CDs of traditional music. So there will some Martin Hayes heard in Beijing soon no doubt.”

CLARE TD Michael McNamara (LAB) has denied that the outburst that earned him a suspension from the Dáil was a publicity stunt but was instead an attempt to get answers for the people of Clare.

The East Clare Deputy was expelled from the Dáil last Thursday and will now lose three days of wages for refusing to sit down when asked by the Ceann Comhairle. The dispute arose when Deputy McNamara was unable to get details on the effect that the cuts in the health budget will have in the mid-west from Minister for Health, James O’Reilly (FG).

This is the third time in recent weeks that Deputy McNamara has been critical of his coalition partners, having openly criticised both Jimmy Deenihan (FG) and Phil Hogan (FG) concerning Blake’s Corner in Ennistymon.

“I was told by the minister [O’Reilly] that the information I asked for was not readily available from HSE West. I was very surprised at that as I have been told by people in HSE West – by managers and unions that work in the area – that that information is readily available,” said Deputy McNamara.

“I don’t think that the minister is not providing the information But I would be very concerned if the minister is being told by the HSE that certain information is not available when in fact it is. There is a disconnect there that I am very worried about. It wasn‘t a publicity stunt. There was no vote that I wanted to get out of. This was a matter of accountability. We were elected on a promise of in- creased accountability and I believe that I need to take a stand on that. I think that if any TD asks a question about any state agency, they should be given that information. That is the only way that we will be able to hold them to account.”

Despite a number of public spats between Labour backbenchers and Fine Gael ministers, Deputy McNamara claims that relations are still good between the coalition parties.

Deputy McNamara is due to restart his full duties in the Dáil this Wednesday.

IT WAS a case of 40 minutes of fame for farmer James Lynch and his family on Sunday as they were the toast of Chinese vice-president Xi Jingping during his short stopover on their 215-acre holding in Cappagh, Sixmilebridge.

“He’s a pure gentleman,” said Lynch after giving Mr Xi a guided tour of his farm, the crowning glory of which was when he was shown a new-born Friesian heifer calf named after him.

“It arrived just in the nick of time,” said Mr Lynch to his host. “He was very knowledgeable and very interested in learning more about the quality of the grass and how Ireland produces high quality milk and beef. He even went to see the silage and wanted to know when it grew and when it was cut.

“He was very much at ease with us, chatting with my mother and he even drank an Irish coffee. He came across as a very friendly and modest man and an extremely courteous one,” he added.

As vice-chairman of Dairygold Coop, last November Mr Lynch went to Chinia as part of an Irish agricultural trade mission, travelling to the city of Hothot in inner Mongolia and its dairying hinterland.

During the Mr Xi’s visit to Sixmilebridge, he also visited the Lynch homestead, chatting with James, his wife Maura and his mother, Ann, and met the couple’s three children, fiveyear-old James, three-year-old Olive and nine-month-old Ronan.

They were accompanied by Minister for Agriculture Simon Coveney and a host of Chinese civil servants, television camera operators, photographers and representatives from the agrifood business.

“Having the opportunity to bring the Chinese vice-president to a family farm in Ireland will leave a lasting and positive impression of the natural source of Irish agrifood products,” said Minister Coveney.

“Ireland is renowned for its high quality and safe food production and was strategically placed to provide increasing volumes of quality food to China given the higher levels of increased production of dairy products, meats, sea-food and beverages that will take place over the coming years in Ireland. The Chinese associate Ireland with high quality and safe food.

“This visit will help with expanding dairy production in the next few years as EU quotas are abolished. We plan for an increase in dairy production of 45 per cent between now and 2019,” he added.

These words were echoed by the president of the Irish Farmers Association, John Bryan. “Mr Xi sees Ireland as a good source of food imports for China. His visit here is hugely significant,” he said.

THE President of Ireland, Michael D Higgins, has failed to accept an offer made by Clare County Council to host a Civic Reception in his honour, more than three months after the invitation was originally made.

President Higgins, who spent many of his formative years living in Newmarket-on-Fergus, was invited to be honoured by the local authority on November 14 last, but has yet to indi- cate whether he will be interested in receiving the honour or not.

This apparent snub comes after President Higgins topped the poll in Clare during last Octobers election, receiving 20,828 first-preference votes.

A spokesperson from Clare County Council confirmed to The Clare People yesterday that no response, beyond the standard acknowledgment letter for all correspondence, has yet been received from Áras an Uachtarán.

It was confirmed last week that President Higgins will become only the third free citizen of Galway City, joining Ireland’s first president, Douglas Hyde, and Burmese pro-democracy leader, Aung San Suu Kyi. While no official date has been set for this ceremony to take place, it is understood that it will happen before the end of April this year.

The invitation to the Civic Reception was suggested by former Labour councillor Christy Curtin (IND) who yesterday said that he understand that President Higgins has had a very busy couple of months.

“I am very confident that he will come to Clare. He has been a regular visitor to Clare over the years and has visited the Willie Clancy Week up here in Miltown on a number of occasions,” said Cllr Curtin.

“I have no doubt that he will come and see us in his own good time. It has been a very busy few months for him and I am not disappointed that he has not been in touch [with Clare County Council]. I am very optimistic that he will make it down to Clare for the reception.”

PPS NUMBERS may soon appear on Clare gravestones instead of names if the current approach to naming roads and other public areas continue, according to one Clare County Councillor.

A plan to encourage community groups to put up their own local name signs was last night accepted by Clare County Council after a number of councillora criticised the roll-out of road numbers which they claim “depersonalise” local communities.

According to Cllr PJ Kelly (FF), the current ethos will see PPS numbers being used instead of names on gravestones in the near future.

“If this continues, we will have a time when we forfeit our own names and just go with our PPS numbers. In times to come, we will have tombstones that read ‘here lies 07235762’,” said Cllr Kelly. “And God help a man who is lost in the middle of the night and can’t find a turn-off for Crusheen or Ballinruan and he doesn’t have a computer with him to tell where the L367865 road leads to.”

Cllr Kelly also described as “discrimination” the process which sees some villages granted signs while others are not.

“I would not have my village discriminated against just because it is on a national primary or secondary road – that is discrimination against villages and I don’t think that this council should be party to this kind of discrimination,” continued Cllr Kelly.

“I sincerely hope that we join together to bring back the culture of our county and our villages.”

Speaking on the motion, Cllr Brian Meaney (GP) said that road numbers were necessary to help emergency services to locate fires and other incidents quickly.

“I fundamentally disagree with this motion and the way it is being talked about here today. There is a stark need for an all-Ireland approach to this issue,” he said.

“I know that there is a certain amount of impersonality involved with these road numbers but if someone is sitting in a centralised emergency dispatch service – maybe down in Cork – these local names mean nothing.

“I don’t care what you want to stick on stones on the corner of the road in a village, but what has to happen is that these numbers need to exist and every house should be digitally identifiable.”

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.

CLARE County Council have refused to provide year-round rubbish bins on the Lahinch Promenade, despite making more than € 220,000 each year in parking charges and fines in the area.

At present, the local authority remove the litter bins from the beach after the busy summer season, leaving locals to fend for themselves during the winter months.

According to local Cllr Bill Slattery (FG), this has led to a breakdown in the usual beach bylaws at Lahinch, with people refusing to clean up after their dogs because there are no bins available.

The motion was put forward jointly by Cllr Tony Mulqueen (FG) and Cllr Joe Arkins (FG.

“My concern is that in Lahinch there are parking charges for 365 days of the year and a total income of € 220,000 for this council. A lot of people visit Lahinch over the winter months – there are five surfing schools in operation there – and yet we seem to think that people only visit over the summer months.

“This car park is generating a huge amount of money for the council. I can’t imagine why the council can not continue to service the prom all year round.”

Responding to the motion, Director of Service, Nora Kaye, said that she would not be proposing a year-round bin service at Lahinch.

“Litter bins are provided at Lahinch generally from Easter to October. These bins are serviced by the Ennistymon area staff.

“Presently one employee is assigned to servicing these bins, in addition to other duties in the area. If a litter bin service was provided during the winter months, it would incur additional expenditure on a seven-day-week basis,” she said.

“Litter bins are not provided during the winter season as the number of visitors to Lahinch beach is considerably reduced during this time. The funding for the provision and servicing of litter management facilities at beaches including Lahinch beach is provided under street cleaning in Clare County Council’s revenue budget and is fixed for 2012.

“Therefore, any increase in expenditure in winter will result in a decrease in the summer service. This expenditure cannot be justified in the current economic climate and with a staffing moratorium in place.”

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.

A FORMER Clare footballer was hit with a glass in the face during a “melee” in an Ennis pub 14 months ago, a court has heard.

Des Molohan, who last played for the county team in 2010, required treatment for cuts to his face, forehead and the area around his eye when he was struck with a glass in Knox’s Pub on December 18, 2010.

At Ennis District Court last Wednesday, Ronan Nalty (34), with an address 5 Sandfield Mews, Ennis, pleaded guilty to assault causing harm contrary to section three of the non-fatal offences against the person act.

Molohan told the court that he had been standing on the stairs in Knox’s when he was punched in the face by another man.

He said Nalty then followed over the man’s shoulder with the glass. Molohan said that he then hit the other man. He said he had made a full recovery and that the assault had left him with “minor scars”.

Insp John Galvin stated that jurisdiction had been accepted in the matter.

Solicitor Tara Godfrey told the court that another man, who has not been brought before the court, had been involved in the incident.

She said her client never intended to hit the injured party with the glass and had become caught up in a “melee situation”.

Judge Aeneas McCarthy replied that the glass had not jumped out of the accused’s hand and hit someone in the “face of its own accord”.

Ms Godfrey said Nalty, an unemployed blocklayer with no previous convictions, had made a full apology. “This is something he regrets hugely,” she added. The court heard that Nalty is a talented golfer and golf coach.

Ms Godfrey asked the court to acknowledge, that, given her client’s “lifestyle”, there is “a very low risk of him re-offending”.

Judge McCarthy said the act of striking a person in the face with a glass is “an extremely serious matter” that the court cannot ignore. Imposing a four-month suspended sentence, he ordered the accused to be of good behaviour for a period of two years. Recognances were fixed in the event of an appeal.

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.