Category: News

NEWLY released figures show that the Clare Motor Tax Office issued a total of 126,600 tax discs during 2011. The figures represent a seven per cent decrease in the total number (135,800) of tax discs issued during 2010.

While the figure looks excessively high, particularly when considering that the most recent census population figures for Clare have the entire population of the county at 116,000, the high number of tax discs for the county is explained by the incidence of two-car families. It has also been noted by motor tax officials that more and more people are now taxing their cars for short periods of time, with three-month and six-month discs proving very popular.

The Clare Motor Tax Office, which moved from Francis Street in Ennis to Aras Contae an Chláir in late 2011, is responsible for the issue of all vehicle licences and driver licences for County Clare.

Clare County Council has also issued an appeal this week to motorists to consider using alternative payment methods, including the postal and online tax services. The Clare Motor Tax Office this week witnessed an increase in the number of customers and phone calls, leading to longer queues and waiting times.

Pauline Keane of the Clare Motor Tax Office praised staff who had successfully managed to keep waiting times at local area offices down to a minimum during 2011.

“Waiting times could be further reduced by members of the public choosing to use alternative payment methods including our online tax service which is operational 24 hours a day, seven days a week at www.motortax.ie. Customers may also avail of the Motor Tax Department’s postal service,” she explained.

The service was the first Motor Tax Office in the country to receive a Quality Service Management Award (Q-Mark) in 2004. In late 2009, the service was named overall winner of the Government Health and Social Services category at the National Quality Excellence Awards.

CLARE County Council estimates that it will take three or four months to replace lead water mains at three residential areas in Ennis.

Last week, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) stated that all lead pipe replacement works must be carried out in compliance with a European Union limits deadline of December 2013.

The Council is aiming to undertake work to replace lead piping at 82 houses in Ennis comprising 64 at Marian Avenue and 18 at Linnane’s Terrace (Carmody St), and Ahern’s Terrace (Kilrush Road).

The EPA served a direction on the Council to replace these lead mains by September.

In a detailed statement, Senior Engineer Sean Ward, explained that the “Council sought tenders for the works, and applied to the Department of Environment, Community and Local Government (DECLG) for funding. Tenders have been received and studied, and a preferred tender has been identified”.

In December, the Department of Environment Heritage and Local Government announced that it had approved € 200,000 for lead pipe replacement in Ennis.

Mr Ward stated that there is no specific funding programme for replacement of lead pipes.

He continued, “The DECLG will allocate funds under this (Water Conservation) programme, but there is a major gap at present between this allocation and the amount of the preferred tender for the works.

“We are in discussions with the DECLG in an effort to close this gap so as to allow work to start. The work should take around three to four months to complete. The EPA’s directed date has passed, but we are keeping the EPA informed of the situation”.

Mr Ward explained that there are very few water mains for which the Council is responsible. However, he said there are “probably thousands of lead service pipes i.e pipes connected to the main and bring water into single premises in Clare including at least several hundred in Ennis”.

He added, “Clare County Council is responsible for the part of the serv- ice pipe from the point of connection to the main as far as the property boundary; the owner or occupier of the premises is responsible for the part from the property boundary into the premises”.

The Council has no programme for planned replacement of lead service pipes in Ennis, which it estimates would cost well over € 1 million

Mr Ward stated, “The Council will, commencing in mid 2012 approximately, be carrying out a major mains replacement project in Ennis under the national Water Conservation programme.

“If and when we encounter lead service pipes while doing this work, our policy will be to replace the service pipe with a plastic or other pipe,” Mr Ward stated.

IN LIGHT of recent figures that show a jump in the number of farm related accidents, Clare farmers are being urged to attend rural health and safety conference.

Organised by the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (IOSH), Western District Committee, a seminar on farm safety will take place at the Greenhills Hotel, Limerick, on Tuesday, January 17, at 7pm.

The event will cover a number of topics including: the challenges of health and safety in farming; practical approach to farm risk assessments; safety covers and pesticide approval and the safety aspects of pesticide use.

Speakers on the night will include: John McNamara, Teagasc health and safety officer; Aidan Brennan, farm manager, Teagasc, Moorepark, Fermoy; Gerry Graham, Reliance Bearing and Gear Co, Limerick.

A speaker from the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine will be in attendance.

Geraldine Gregan, IOSH Western District Committee member, called on Clare farmers to attend the seminar. She said there needs to greater awareness of the dangers of operating farm machinery.

She said, “As professional safety officers we decided last September the need to organize a seminar on farm safety. Most industrial fatal accidents occur on farms. Traditionally farms are family units and there needs to be more of an emphasis on the fact that farms are mechanized industrial units.”

According to figures released last week, a total of 55 workplace deaths were reported to the Health and Safe- ty Authority (HAS) in 2011. During 2011 there were 22 killed while working in agriculture compared to 25 in 2010.

Over the last number of years the high fatality rate in agriculture has resulted in the authority increasing inspections and awareness raising activities in that sector. A new awareness raising campaign aimed at encouraging farmers to stop taking risks has just been launched.

THERE have been calls to convert Ennis’ oldest inhabited house into a museum.

Archaeologists believe that the McParland’s building on Parnell Street is one of Ireland’s earliest surviving examples of a timber-framed house.

A local councillor believes that there is potential to develop the site as a major tourist attraction.

Councillor Paul O’Shea (Lab) is calling on Ennis Town Council to seek funding to open a medieval museum at McParland’s and to offer a County Clare passport to every visitor to the town.

According to Cllr O’Shea, the initiative would “entitle the passport holder to discounts at other major touristic attractions, in addition to shops and restaurants throughout Ennis and the county.”

The matter is due to be discussed at today’s meeting of Ennis Town Council.

Ms Irene Clune’s house, known as McParland’s, is long understood to have been the oldest inhabited house in the Clare County capital. The building’s triple diamond stone Jacobean chimney has been an icon of medieval Ennis for centuries.

The house was first inspected in 2008 by Clare County Council’s conservation officer, who recommended that the property undergo structural repair work. Following detailed technical analyses by the National Monuments Service, officials from Ennis Town Council and consulting conservation engineers, it was concluded that the structure was unstable and represented a danger to the general public.

Ennis Town Council, using its statutory powers to deal with dangerous buildings, commenced a € 170,000 project to make the building safe and to protect and restore the historic fabric of the structure. A grant of € 85,000 was procured under the Structures at Risk Scheme from the Department of the Environment towards the restoration project.

During October 2011, the gable and chimney were carefully recorded, taken down and stored. At present the historic gable is being re-built using the original stones bedded in an authentic hydraulic-lime mortar, the floor of the house having been archaeologically excavated prior to this.

Last November, archaeologists discovered an oak frame structure, which they described as “potentially one of the most exciting urban archaeological discoveries in Ireland in recent years”.

KILRUSH Town Council has finally resolved to flush away the public toilet in the town centre that costs over € 200,000 to operate over a fiveyear period, while netting less that € 10,000 in income for the local authority over the same period.

The council has issued formal notice that it is to extricate itself from a 20-year agreement for the public toilet on Martyr’s Square in the town, by terminating the contract for the facility with JCDecaux Street Furniture Limited. The toilet will still be in operation in 2012 at a rental cost of € 35,910, but to terminate the contract later in the year must pay € 60,382 to Street Furniture Limited.

At the September meeting of Kilrush Town Council it was revealed that the town authorities were tied to a 20-year contract for provision of the toilet that was signed in 1999 and doesn’t run out until 2019.

The figures provided by the local revealed that the provision of the toilet cost € 201,301.51 between 2005 and 2010. Over the course of the same six-year period income to the council from the public’s use of the facility was just € 9,940.49 – figures that led independent councillor Paul Moroney to describe it as “the most expensive piece of retail property in Ireland”.

Mayor of Kilrush, Ian Lynch led calls for the council to extricate itself from this contract, which he said was “a huge drain on Kilrush Town Council’s resources at a time when we need every penny we can get”.

Now in light of a council report, which revealed that annual receipts from the superloo are about € 1,200, councillor have unanimously agreed to terminate the contract which will save the local authority € 239,401 in rental charges for the remaining six years and eight months of the contract.

“We thought long and hard about this, but it needs to go,” said Cllr Marion McMahon-Jones (FG). “We cannot justify the expense and we have no statutory obligation to provide a public toilet. It is necessary now to terminate the contract.”

ONE OF the world’s all time favourite Christmas songs ‘The Fairytale of New York’ was actually written about County Clare – according to Pogues frontman Shane MacGowan.

According to the mercurial Mr MacGowan, the 1987 classic was originally written from the perspective of a West Clare sailor looking out across the Atlantic and dreaming of life in New York. The Clare People has also learned that the song, which was made world famous as a duet performed by MacGowan and the late great Kirsty MacColl, was also written with a Clare woman in mind.

Instead of MacColl, early versions of the song were performed by formed Pogues singer Cait O’Riordan, who father hailed from Lahinch and who used to spend much of her summer time as a girl in North and West Clare.

The Clare connection with ‘The Fairytale of New York’ was revealed as part of an hour-long interview with Shane MacGowan conducted by the BBC over Christmas. This change of emphasis from West Clare to New York was also confirmed by Pogues banjo player Jem Finer, who admitted the song took nearly two years of hard work to perfect after the decision to move the song to New York was made.

According to Pogues guitarist Philip Chevron, the song developed well in its orioginal format but the band was never able to quite finish the ‘Fairytale of West Clare’.

“In the earliest incarnation it took place not in New York, but in the west coast of Clare. If you listen to the early demos we did of that song at a certain point, in each case, they kind of just stop developing. They just fall into a hole where they can go no further,” he said.

According to Finer, it was the record producer Steve Lillywhite who persuaded his then wife, Kirsty MacColl, to perform the song as a duet with MacGowan.

“We tried to record it twice before it finally got it nailed with Steve Lillywhite,” he said.

“So it went through a lot of revisions. There were always things that didn’t quite work and Shane did a lot of editing of the lyrics, coming back to it again and again over a period of about two years, and we played about with the arrangement until it sort of sat properly.”

Despite being more than 24 years old the song continues to beguile listeners and reached an impressive Number 7 in the Irish singles charts this year.

FUNDING for small local arts festivals in Clare has been slashed by more than 50 per cent for the first half of 2012, with similar cuts also expected for the second half of the year.

According to figures obtained by The Clare People , the total investment by the Arts Council in Clare festivals for the first half of 2012 has been cut to € 20,500 – down from € 41,500 for the same period of 2010. Funding for two traditional music festivals in North Clare have been cut completely with a number of adjustments taking place in the funding for other events. Both the Corofin Traditional Music Festival, which was last year granted € 8,000 in funding, and the Russell Memorial Weekend, which was granted € 2,000 in 2011, have not recived any funding this year.

According to records received from the Irish Arts Council, Clare County Council was also granted € 14,000 in 2011 for Scoil Cheoil an Earraigh – which is not funded as part of the 2012 budget. The Iniscealtra Arts Festival also saw a reduction in its Arts Council budget from € 11,000 in 2011 to € 9,000 this year.

Despite the overall reduction however, the growing popularity of the Ennis Book Club Festival was recog- nised with a funding increase from € 6,500 last year to € 8, 500 in 2011. The Doran Tionol Festival was also granted € 3,000 in funding, having not received any funding for 2011.

“While it’s always disappointing when funding in decreased. I think that the strength that we have here in Clare with our festivals means that they will continue and will grow,” said Clare Arts Offices, Siobhan Mulcahy. “It was encouraging to see that some of our festivals received more than the average amount and some even received a small increase which I think goes to vindicate the quality of the programmes which take place at festivals in Clare.”

The Arts Council releases it funding for small local festivals in two tranches – each covering a six month period of the year.

The second allocation of funding is due to be announced early next month with festivals such as the Clare Festival of Traditional Singing, the Ellen ‘Nell’ Galvin Traditional Music Weekend, the Feakle International Traditional Music Festival, the Music in the Glen Festival, the Willie Keane Memorial Weekend and the Winter Music Weekend Festival all hoping to retain some level of funding.

An announcement for larger years grants schemes – including the annual Arts Council Investment in Glór – will also be made in mid-February.

MORE than 50 West Clare residents and members of the Clare Fracking Concerned group packed the public gallery of Clare County Council last night to express their support for moves by the elected members of the local authority to ban fracking in Clare.

Despite a number of procedural objects from the executive of Clare County Council, the councillors voted unanimously to amend the County Development Plan to specifically ban fracking – making Clare the first county in Ire;and to take such a step.

Councillors also voted unanimously to write to the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Pat Rabbittee (LAB) asking that the process of fracking be banned in Clare. This follows a motion put forward by West Clare councillor Gabriel Keating (FF) – calling for a ban to fracking in Clare.

This follows as address by fracking export, Aedín McLoughlin, at last nights January meeting of Clare County Council. Ms McLoughlin restated a number of potential problems concerning fracking, such as the pollution of water supplies and the possibility of localised earthquakes but also identified a number of less publicised difficulties – such as the destruction of a natural barrier from radon and the production of radio active uranium during the drilling process.

Speak on the proposal Cllr Joe Arkins (FG) said that fracking was “raping the natural environment for the benefit of “gamblers” in the petroleum industry. “I say this as a land owner but in reality we don’t own the land, we hold it in trust for the next generation. It is bad enough that we have managed to bankrupt the next generation never mind poisoning the land as well,” he said. Meanwhile, in a separate motion, Cllr Brian Meaney (GP) criticised what he described as a lack of support from the executive of Clare County Council to change the County Development Plan to include a specific ban on fracking. “We need to put into action the words that we have said today. I completely reject the directions coming from the executive of Clare County Council regarding the change of the County Development Plan – I reject this out of hand,” said . “This actions bring Clare into the spotlight of the petroleum industry’s attempts to scrape the bottom of the barrel. Clare is the bottom of the barrel for these people. We have an opportunity to send a clear signal that we are not willing to participate and sit idly by.” A spokesperson from Clare County Development Plan said that because Clare County Council does not have a role in granting planning permission for fracking developments that it would be meaningless to change the 2011 to 2017 plan to include a ban on fracking. Despite these objections councillors voted unanimously to amend the county development plan.

CLARE County Council’s headquarters in Ennis have been described as looking more like “a latter day Fawlty Towers” than the state of the art facility € 27m facility that was opened in 2008.

The claim was made of former Mayor of Clare, Cllr PJ Kelly (FF) after it was revealed that over € 130,000 worth of repairs are needed on the headquarters that was constructed by Michael McNamara & Co, formerly one of Ireland’s leading building contractors that went into receivership in November 2010.

And, during a debate that was sparked by Cllr Kelly’s motion calling on council chiefs to give a breakdown on the Áras an Chláir works, it emerged that Clare County Council could yet be forced to foot the bill for improvements.

This is because, despite a guarantees received by Michael McNamara & Co that it would pay for improvement works for a 12-year period, the appointed

Receiver Farrell Grant Sparks has so given “no commitment” that it will cover the costs.

In his motion Cllr Kelly asked that “a report be made available with regard to repairs” which covered the “cost of repairs to date”, the estimated cost of future repairs” and “who pays the costs”.

In response, senior executive officer Michael McNamara said “work is nearing completion on the rectification of defective parapet capping on the roof at Corporate Headquarters and the contractor will then be attending to the rectifying the cause of the staining to the external wall near the Chamber”.

Mr McNamara also revealed that “payments in respect of their works total € 51,640 and the estimated further cost of completing the works is € 80,000”.

Áras an Chláir was officially opened four years ago this month.

The development, the largest building project in the county since the construction of Moneypoint Power Station, was built to provide accommodation for 300 staff, as well as meeting rooms, a staff canteen, a laboratory, a Mayor’s office, a council chamber, three party rooms for the elected members and 320 car parking spaces.

“Was a commitment got from the receiver that the costs of the work would be met,” asked Cllr Kelly during Monday’s January monthly meeting of the council.

“We have no commitment from the receiver,” admitted

Mr McNamara. “The council has been in correspondence with the receiver with a view to getting money for the works.

“The contractor provided a collateral agreement to meet the cost of remedial works for a period of 12 years from the date of completion of the building – this agreement remains in place until 2020,” he told the meeting.

“There is a legal contract in place and the money can be recouped,” said County Manager, Tom Coughlan.

Former Mayor of Clare, Patricia McCarthy criticised the use of ‘Fawlty Towers’ to describe the council headquarters, saying “with all due respects to Cllr Kelly,

you have to be very careful to describe it in the way he does. We have a fine building and a modern building”.

“People are every impressed with this building,” said County Manager, Tom Coughlan.

“None of them have told me that t looks like Fawlty Towers.

“None of them have said that the place is falling down,” he added.

Cllr Kelly was a Fianna Fáil council colleague of former Michael McNamara & co chief, Bernard McNamara, who served on Clare County Council from 1974 to 1985.

HARDPRESSED ratepayers around the county that go out of business won’t have to pay their dues to Clare County Council for the whole year.

That will the mission statement of Clare County Council going forward if they get the sanction from the Minister for the Environment and Local Government, Phil Hogan.

The new move comes after a motion by Cllr Joe Cooney (FG) that the council would not pursue businesses that cease trading during the year for 12 months of rates payments.

“The reason that I put down this motion,” said Cllr Cooney, “is that in the current climate with so many businesses closing down, the council shouldn’t be looking to charge businesses for the whole year and then refund them money at the end of the year. Businesses should just be charged for the rates due for as long as they are in business. At the start of the rates year they are told that they have to pay rates for the entire year, but it should be a case where that if they cease trading during the year, they only have to pay up for as long as they were in business,” he added.

“The council have to spend time collected the rates and following people up looking for their rates contributions. I think it should be put to the minister that this should change.

“Some businesses that cease trading might start up again to maintain jobs, so it would be a big help if they didn’t have to pay rates for the full year on the first business,” continued Cllr Cooney.

The Fine Gael representative’s mo- tion was backed by Cllr PJ Kelly (FF) who said he knew “several business who were in severe financial difficulty and if they go out of business, they won’t be able to pay rates for the whole year and won’t be able to get credit to pay the rates from financial institutions to pay their rates, even though they would get a refund at the end of the year.

“In view of the current economic climate it makes common sense to change this, because people would stand some chance if the amount of rates that was due for the time they were in business was collected,” continued Cllr Kelly. “We are bound and governed by legislation on this,” said County Manager, Tom Coughlan. “It can be debated in the council, but at the end of the day we are bound by the legislation that’s there.”

After the council resolved to write to Minister Hogan on the issue, the County Manager backed the move as a positive development. “It’s wasting our time as a council collecting rates and then having to refund them,” he said, “and I appreciate what the councillors are trying to do.”