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THE Kilmurry Ibrickane player whose participation in the eagerly awaited All-Ireland Club semi-final against Portlaoise on February 21 is under threat will know his fate after a special hearing that takes place in Croke Park this Thursday.

The player, who was called to ap- pear before a GAA disciplinary meeting arising out of an incident in the All-Ireland quarter-final win over Tir Chonaill Gaels on Janu- ary 24 last, has not been named by GAA chiefs or Kilmurry Ibrickane officials.

However, speaking to

Matchmaker blames recession

published below.

The former Dublin South TD’s resignation from the Dail yesterday (Monday) was greeted with shock by his close Fine Gael colleague Pat Breen TD who described him as a great loss to politics and the party.

“He was an honourable man, obvi- ously this decision was preying on his mind for some time; and yet he took the time to honour a commitment he had given to me to deliver the key note address at the Kilrush Chamber of Commerce dinner on Friday night last,’ said Deputy Breen.

Mr Lee, who gave no clue of his 1m- pending decision at the chamber din- ner, did, however, signal his unease at his dual role of being a politician and economist.

In pointing to the need for solutions

to the current recession, he said that people were always “giving out” in the Dail.

“IT think, fair enough, that is Irish politics. But we really need to change. We need to work on solutions. These are going to be very difficult solu- tions. Finding the solutions to where we are now is new. It is difficult be- cause we have never been in this situ- ation before,’ he said.

Yesterday the former TD claimed that despite his best efforts, he had virtually no influence in shaping Fine Gael’s economic policies and felt he had no option but to go.

“Being a crowd puller can be a pret- ty hollow thing,’ said the man who addressed 140 people in the Kilrush Golf Club 60 hours earlier.

Deputy Breen last night expressed his sadness at his colleague’s deci- sion.

“T got to know George very well as we both sat along side one another in the Dail Chamber for voting, where we chatted on a daily basis.

“George was driven by passion and his address on Friday night reflected his knowledge of the problems that the Irish economy is facing for the future.

“TI believe that George found it dif- ficult to adjust to his new life in poli-

job from his previous lifestyle as economics correspondent for RTE,”

tics, it is a very difficult and tough he added.

“T respect his decision and I believe that the world of politics and the Fine Gael Party is at a great loss follow- ing his departure and I would like to take this opportunity to wish George and his family every good wish for the future.”

Clare TD Joe Carey said he was equally shocked by Mr Lee’s deci- sion “to resign from politics after such a brief time as an elected mem- ber of Dail Eireann”.

“He had the potential I believe to make a sizeable contribution to po- litical life in Ireland. However, polli- tics 1s a difficult profession requiring persistence and patience. The way the Irish political system works and Operates, no one person can change things overnight. I myself was lucky to have the benefit of cutting my po- litical teeth as a county councillor before being elected to Dail Eireann and that experience greatly helped prepare me for life as a TD. I wish Mr Lee every success in his future career.”

THE Government has revealed that ‘certain EU issues’ are holding up progress for an international logistics transport hub at Shannon Airport.

Last year, the Shannon Airport Au- thority (SAA) and the Lynxs Group signed a Memo of Understanding (MOU) for the purpose of jointly developing a major international lo- gistics hub and business facility at Shannon.

The agreement was seen as a Sig- nificant step towards the delivery of a state-of-the-art international cargo facility on a 200,000 square-feet site at Shannon Airport.

The Shannon-based Atlantic Way organisation believes that the devel- opment of a global freight logistics centre has the potential to create and support over 10,000 new jobs within a five to ten year timeframe.

However, chairman of the Task Force, Denis Brosnan said that in order for the hub to proceed, €7 mil- lion needs to be given to the Shan- non Airport Authority, which has not eleetiw Kee

He said: “The debate has been go- ing on for 12 months or longer, but the money hasn’t appeared.

In the Dail, the Minister for State at the Dept of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Dara Calleary said that the Tanaiste, Mary Coughlan has discussed the Lynxs project with the Minister for Transport, Noel Demp- TAs

He said: “It appears that certain EU issues need to be resolved if progress is to be made. We are addressing them at EU level.”

Minister Calleary said: “The Lynx Cargo Group and the Dublin Airport Authority are now completing an ex- amination of the feasibility of devel- oping a major cargo facility there.”

Fine Gael Limerick East deputy, Kieran O’Donnell said: “During the Dail debate, the minister, Deputy Willie O’ Dea, said that an announce- ment on the Lynx Cargo project was “imminent”. I would like to know how the Minister of State, Deputy Calleary, would define “imminent”, as he appears to be suggesting that an announcement is a little further ee Nl

Clare Fine Gael deputy, Joe Carey said: “The potential benefits of de- veloping the Lynx international car- go facility at Shannon are endless. We are now at a critical juncture as rising unemployment and the loss of

inward investment means action is jLeXer (ore EDEN TL ONT

“In order to make this a reality Government must put their shoulder to the wheel and drive this project until it becomes a reality.

Mr Denis Brosnan, Chairman of the Mid West Taskforce has outlined how beneficial this project could be.

“The €7 million investment re-

quired from government would cop- per fasten the deal with Lynx and would be money well spent as it will create and sustain jobs into the fu- ture. Yet there is a total lack of ur- gency shown by government towards this project.”

He added: “There has been enough talk about this project. We now need to see the investment required from

government. The Lynx cargo facil- ity represents a viable way forward for the development of a major inter- national hub at Shannon. Action is needed immediately to make this a reality.”

THE Government has been accused of “blackguarding” the Doolin Unit of the Irish Coastguard by misleading them as well as elected officials about the ring-fencing of funding for a new coastguard facility in north Clare. This follows the revelation that more than €1.5 million promised by government for the development of the rescue centre is not ring-fenced, and the Irish Coastguard will have to make a case for the money to the Department of the Marine.

Speaking at last nights meeting of Clare County Council, Cllr James Breen (IND), accused successive ministers of deceiving both himself and the Doolin Coastguard.

“The minister has blackguarded the people up in Doolin for the last few years and he has no intention of putting forward this development,” he said.

““T raised this matter on a number of occasions when I was in the Dail and I was always happy with the answer I got back. But what has been done’ He has done absolutely nothing.

“It is not good enough for the vol- unteers up there to be operating out of a building which is essentially a cow shed. I am calling on the min- ister to honour what has been prom- ised and make sure that this facility goes ahead soon.”

A deputation from the Office of Public Works (OPW) met with mem- bers of the Doolin Unit of the Irish Coastguard in January to show them a number of proposals for the new facility.

It had been expecting that planning for the facility would be lodged to-

wards the end of last month but no application has yet been submitted to Clare County Council.

Speaking on a motion calling on the Government to clarify its position on funding for the project, Cllr Martin Conway (FG) said that the members of the Doolin Coastguard were not being treated fairly.

“These people are risking their lives to go out there and bring in 30 or 40 bodies a year and they deserve more than what they are getting at the moment,” he said.

For the last number of years, volun-

teers for the Doolin Unit of the Irish Coastguard have been working out of a 150-year-old shed for a number of decades and are forced to store much of their equipment off-site. This could potentially cause delays in emergency situations.

The proposed new centre has been delayed for years as the OPW had difficulty in obtaining a site locally. A source close to the coastguard ad- mitted that it would be “very unlike- ly” that the coastguard could raise enough money to proceed with the project by themselves.

Shannon transport hub hits snags

THE Ennis woman behind a popular Facebook page has said she is over- Wwhelmed by the response it has at- tracted so far.

“You’re a true 30-something from Ennis if you remember…’ invites people to share their memories of growing up in Ennis.

The thread was posted on the social networking site Facebook by local woman Fiona O’Sullivan in early Jan- uary. So far it has attracted over 5,000 comments from the almost 1,000 people who have visited the site.

Fiona said she decided to set up the internet thread after seeing a similar one posted about the Cork town of Carrigaline. “I was using Facebook to keep in touch with friends and family. My husband is from Cork and I saw that there was a Facebook page about growing up in Carrigaline. It had got about 30 hits when I saw it and I thought Ennis could probably do a bit better.”

Fiona said she has been amazed by the popularity of the site.

“T never thought it would be this popular. It’s amazing the amount of people that have been on there. It has

918 friends and over 500 people have posted comments on it. It’s not do- ing so bad. And people are putting up pictures and links to YouTube, which is great. It really adds to it,” she said

‘I’d never heard some of the stories. I’ve laughed an awful lot at some of them. I loved the ones about the old characters from town and the old games like skipping and things like that. I loved the stories about old shops like Bridie Quigley’s chip shop.”

The site has attracted comments from Ennis people now living in various parts of the world. “There

are people living in Dubai and Aus- tralia who have put stories. There are people using it who I wouldn’t have seen in years. It’s great to see people using it to chat and catch up on old mbes lone

One of the Ennis characters re- membered is the late Michael Tier- ney. Fiona has now started a new site calling for a statue to be erected in memory of Mr Tierney in the market area of Ennis.

“It started off as a bit of a laugh but so far about 350 people have logged onto it so it’s getting kind of serious,” she said.

EVEN at knock down prices, Clare County Council is unable to sell its affordable housing stock as numbers on the housing list exceed 2,400. New figures provided by the coun- cil show numbers on the housing list have increased by 40 per cent from 1,716 to 2,408. However, that figure includes those on rent allowance, who in order to qualify for the allow- ance must go on the housing list. Excluding those who are on the list to secure rent allowances, there were 1,594 on the list on January | — an in- crease of 30 per cent on the 1,218 that were on the list at the start of 2009. Special Policy Committee Chair- woman, Cllr Patricia McCarthy (Ind) said the increased numbers were “extremely worrying and a cause of

concern’.

‘There are real people behind these statistics. There is no way that the council can keep up with the de- mand, but we are managing as best we can. The numbers on the list are high and will continue to get higher,” she said.

The council completed 87 social houses in 2009 and 91 in 2008. A further ten affordable houses were provided through agreement with de- velopers but with the collapse in the housing market, the number of af- fordable homes completed under this scheme dropped to just two.

The council expects to complete 16 affordable homes in 2010 in Shan- non, where there is a strong demand for affordable homes.

However, uncertainty surrounds the number of new house starts for

2010 as local authorities are await- ing a capital allocation for 2010 from the Department of the Environment in relation to the social housing con- struction programme’.

The council has also confirmed that it has 15 unsold affordable homes for sale dispersed over eight locations.

A council spokeswoman – said: ‘These have been for sale for an av- erage of one year. The council has responded to changing market cond1- tions by reducing the purchase price of affordable homes. The reduction in price varies but averages at 15 per cent to 20 per cent below the market price,’ she said.

HARD work and dedication are pushing one group of science enthu- siasts towards a place on the podium at the annual Fl in School’s competi- tion.

Team Firedragons are one of two entrants from St Flannan’s College, Ennis, who will take part in the re- gional finals of the competition in Cork on March 2.

This is the fifth year for the com- petition to run in Ireland under the guidance of the Irish Computer So- ciety (ICS) in partnership with Dis- cover Science & Engineering.

The Fl in Schools challenge is an international competition, which now attracts more than 90,000 stu- dents from across the world.

The competition 1s open to sec- ondary schools to design and manu- facture model racing cars. Student teams will compete against each other in a national championship to determine the best-engineered and fastest car in Ireland.

Team members Tim Janssan, Nor- bert Rosik, Eric Mullaly, Christo- pher Ogbonna and Jack O’Dea are hoping the months of hard work and preparation they have devoted to the project will pay off in Cork.

Team Manager, Norbert Rosik de- scribed the work the students have done to get to this stage in the com- petition. “The team has been very consistent and very committed to the project even with the increasing amount of school work due to three of the team members preparing for the Junior Certificate. The qualitfy- ing stage consisted of submitting a five-page plan on how the Firedrag- ons intended to create their project of a 25cm balsa wood Formula One car by showing their research, proposed

budgets, designs etc. In this compe- tition our team will be using com- pressed air canisters to power their model car to achieve scale speeds in excess of 350kmph.”

Artistic Manager, Christopher Og- bonna said the team decided to de- sign a logo in order to set their de- sign apart from competitors. “The Firedragons came up with this logo because it defines us from other

teams as we have a fiery passion for what we do. Apart from this our logo is very unique as it 1s extremely in- tricate.”

Norbert believes the team deserves to get through to the national finals and win because of the amount of ef- fort put in and the results so far ob- tained. He also thanked the group’s science teacher, Michael Horgan, who has encouraged both teams

from St Flannan’s throughout the de- sign process.

The Fl in Schools National Finals will be take place in April. Visit www. linschools.ie for details.

IF the names of Brid and Roger Fahy are familiar to you it’s probably be- cause youve heard them _ before. Located on the Flaggy Shore of Fin- varra, at the very northern tip of the Burren, the pair set up Linnalla Ice Cream back in 2006.

As we all know farming is a tough gig. Besides the hard work and unso- cial hours – dairy farmers also have to live with the prospect of selling milk to Co-Ops for less than it costs to produce it.

Brid and Roger may just have found a solution to this problem. There new idea, a milk vending machine, could soon allow farmers to sell their milk directly to the customers in a hygi- enic, safe and ultimately profitable EN

By cutting out the middlemen and constructing a machine which allows farmers to sell directly to consumers, the pair might just have cracked one of the biggest problems facing dairy farmers today.

Although largely unknown in Ire- land, the Latteria of milk dispenser has become popular in mainland Eu-

rope and in Italy, where it 1s made.

Besides providing consumers with the freshest possible product, the Latteria also gives farmers a chance of getting a fair price for their milk and cut down in transport costs and emissions and cuts down drastically on packaging.

The local shop owner would receive a “fair” price for hosting the Latteria but the overheads of unnecessary transport and other cost associated with the large Co-Op would be re- moved.

The Fahy’s have received €3,000, sponsored by Clare Ireland recycling, for taking first prize in the Clare Farm Idea Awards Competition and will now go forward to represent the county at the national competition.

Linnalla ice cream started produc- tion in 2006 and the specialty ice- cream is now available in shops and restaurants in the Clare and Galway eer he

In 2005 they met Pat Shannon from the Clare Enterprise Board who en- couraged them to develop their idea.

Over the next two years they had planning approved, secured LEAD- ER funds, worked with officials from the Department of Agriculture and soon were on the way to starting a new and innovative business.