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TWENTY-ONE local artists will descend on Ennistymon next week in preparation for the third annual Trading Spaces Exhibition. The ex- hibition takes the innovative step of using spaces in the town’s famed shop fronts as exhibition spaces. This show crosses all genres from photography and sculpture to film projections and performance pieces. “I’m really excited about this year’s show. I think that it will be the best yet in terms of variety and energy,” said co-organiser Rob Henderson. “People are looking at the shop fronts anyway – it’s signposted on the way into Ennistymon and on count- less postcards sent all over the world.

It’s part of Ennistymon. So it makes a perfect place for an exhibition.

“It’s also about our own personal connection to the town. Like for my- self, Pll be using the window in Ha- ran’s pub and I remember spending hour after hour listening to singing in Haran’s pub.”

In this years Trading Spaces artists are being encouraged to tailor their work to be a real part of the shop front it is being housed in.

“When we did it the first year we had such a short amount of time that we didn’t encourage people to do site specific works or installations. But since then we have been looking at creating more site specific works – that works alongside the people in the place to the history of the site,”

said co-organiser Jackie Askew.

“It comes with a brief – you have to work with the shopkeeper and in the space provided so the art really evolves in the space.

“It can be a bit last minute – the artists will have the ideas but you can never be sure what is going to happen until you start actually doing it in the window.

“Tt’s important to recognise all the shopkeepers who give up their space for the exhibition – without them it just wouldn’t be possible.”

The artists taking part in this year’s Trading Spaces are; Jackie Askew (Dalys), Marie Connole (Gilnas Optometrist), Maeve Collins (The Square), Mary Fahy (Noinins), Sarah Fuller, Maria Kerin and Vanessa Earl

Maguire (TBC), Tabatha Gravener (The Medical Centre), Rob Hend- erson (Haran’s Pub), Lynne Hoare (TBC), Des McLoughlin (Old Fit- Zpatrick’s), Kevin Mulligan (Cool- eys), Josie O’Connor (Chinese Take Away), Fiona O’Dwyer (TBC), Ash- ley O’Neal (TBC), Judy O’Sullivan (The Courthouse Studios), Mary Queally (TBC), Patsy Ricks (Cool- eys), Fergus Tighe (Eugenes/Cool- eys), Anne Vaughan (TBC) and Vin- cent Wall (TBC).

Trading Spaces will run from July 17 to 31.

THE Government’s commitment to tackling environmental offences such as litter and graffiti was emphasised by Minister of State Tony Killeen following the allocation of €34,000 in grants to Clare County Council for public education and awareness initiatives in relation to both litter and graffiti.

Stating that this represented a 33% increase on last year’s allocation, Minister Killeen said that under the Litter Pollution Acts, local authori- ties have a responsibility to prevent and take remedial action in relation to graffiti.

‘The criteria for selection of suit- able projects under this scheme have

been expanded in 2008 to include anti-graffit1 awareness initiatives, in order to support local authorities in their work in this area.”

“Clare County Council and the town councils in Kilkee, Kilrush, Ennis and Shannon have taken great strides to progressively combat litter pollution, but much still remains to be done. Therefore, I would encour- age Clare Local Authorities and communities across the county to continue to work together to clean up their localities.”

He urged all local authorities to continue to take all practical steps to raise public awareness of the en- vironmental damage caused by lit- ter pollution and educate the public about their responsibilities.

THE Labour Court has ruled that a Shannon-based company unfairly dismissed an employee who brought his wife home after she was dis- missed by the same firm.

The court has recommended that Reagecon Diagnostics Ltd pay the man – who is not named – €5,000 in compensation.

According to the Labour Court, the worker’s wife was dismissed due to complaints being made against her.

The report states: “The worker

claims to have brought his wife home on the day she was dismissed as she was very upset. He claims he was given permission to do so by his su- pervisor on the day.

“It is further contended that when he returned to work, after three days of pre-arranged annual leave, he was dismissed. His position is that man- agement informed him that he had effectively resigned when he left the premises with his wife on the day of her dismissal.”

Last January, the worker referred the issue to the Labour Court and

agreed to be bound by the court’s recommendation. The company de- clined an invitation to attend the Labour Court investigation into the dispute on the basis that there was no dispute and it would not take part in or be bound by the court’s recom- mendation.

At the Labour Court hearing in April, the worker argued he received permission from his supervisor to take his wife home on the day of her dismissal.

The worker was subsequently ab- sent on pre-arranged annual leave

and was summarily dismissed on his return to work.

The report goes on, “Management claimed at the time that the worker had resigned his position on the same day his wife was dismissed. This is not the case.

“The worker attempted to explain the situation to management on his return to work but was given twen- ty minutes to leave the company’s DERN ee

In its recommendation, the Labour Court inspector stated, “The court finds it regrettable that the employer

failed to attend the hearing to inves- tigate the worker’s claim; neither did it furnish a written statement setting out its position.

“On the basis of the oral and writ- ten submission made by Ms Mairead Carey BL on behalf of the worker, the court is satisfied that his employ- ment was terminated in an unfair and inappropriate manner.

“In the circumstances the court recommends that the employer pay the claimant compensation in the amount of €5,000 in full and final settlement of his claim.”

THE number of adults unemployed in Clare has jumped by more than one third in the last year, and by 9.3 per cent in the past month accord- ing to figures released by the Central Statistic Office.

As many as 5,505 people were sign- ing on last month in County Clare, 1,375 people more than during the same month last year.

The number of people on the live register in the Tulla area has in- creased by as much as 52 per cent from June 2007 to last month.

Unemployment in Ennistymon has increased by 40 per cent with 806 people signing on the register.

In the county town of Ennis there are now 32 per cent more people un- employed than this time last year, as 3,293 people are signing on.

In Kilrush the unemployment in- crease is the lowest in the county, but it has still increased by almost 20 per cent.

There are now some 1,067 more men unemployed in the county than i (eyenles tb

Fine Gael TD Pat Breen said this was only the tip of the iceberg with more Clare workers set to join the dole queues over the coming months.

“For the past twelve months jobs have been haemorrhaging from County Clare however in spite of nu- merous warnings this Government have sat idly by while the crisis de-

veloped,” he said.

“Unemployment in Clare has grown by 33.3 per cent in the year from June 2007 to June 2008 and especially worrying is the fact that the number of those unemployed under 25 has increased by 46.6 per cent from 759 in June 2007 to 1,113 in June 2008,” the TD added.

“The truth is that ordinary workers are bearing the brunt of this Govern- ments economic ineptitude and this is especially true here in County Clare. We are also now witnessing how the lack of connectivity from Shannon to

London Heathrow is adding substan- tial costs to local businesses as a re- sult of the Government’s failure to act to secure the service,” he said.

“My call for a regional strategy to address this crisis has fallen on deaf ears. In fact this Government has sleepwalked it’s way through much of this crisis. Next week following months of not recognising that there is a crisis, the Government will out- line to the Dail how they intend to deal with the current crisis.”

AN EIGHT year old boy had a mi- raculous escape in Kilkee yesterday after his head was wedged between the road and the tyre of a moving vehicle as he tried to retrieve a ball from beneath it.

The accident happened shortly be- fore 4 o’clock yesterday at Geraldine Place in Kilkee when the boy was playing near the four wheel drive sport utility vehicle (SUV). The child had attempted to retrieve a ball from under the vehicle when it began

to move forward, pinning him un- derneath.

The boy screamed in agony alerting the driver who stopped immediately.

The owner jumped from the vehi- cle to find the young child wedged between the wheel and the ground. An ambulance and local doctor were summoned to the scene but the local ambulance in Kilrush was respond- ing to a medical emergency also near Kilkee so an ambulance had to be despatched from Ennis.

As the ambulance would have tak- en more than half an hour to get from

Ennis to the scene, the child’s parents carefully placed him in the vehicle and drove towards Ennis to meet the ambulance. A local doctor was also sent to the scene but the child was on the way to Ennis before he arrived.

The vehicle pulled in just outside Kilrush where they waited for the ambulance crew who by now were only seconds away. He was assessed by medics before being rushed to Ennis General Hospital for treat- ment. The child arrived at the hospi- tal shortly after 5pm.

It is understood that the youngster

sustained “road rash” injuries and scrapes to his head and face but re- mained conscious throughout the incident and during the journey to hospital.

He was treated at Ennis Gen- eral Hospital and it was hoped that he would be released last night or early this morning after treatment. He received stitches to a number of wounds.

The child’s parents, who followed the ambulance to the hospital, are said to be very upset by the acci- elem

“TM NOT LYING EYES.” That was the message delivered to the jury by Sharon Collins, who told the trial that her life had been stolen.

Una Ni Raifeartaigh, BL, for the prosecution, put it to her in cross-ex- amination, “You are lying eyes.”

Ms Collins replied, “I’m not. I sup- pose you can say that. It’s your job to bring in a guilty verdict. I’m not lying eyes. I didn’t go into lyingeyes. I didn’t know anything about lyin-

geyes until the guards told me. I cer- tainly wasn’t accessing a hitman.”

“IT wrote to the DPP and asked for somebody to investigate the theft of my life, but they chose not to do that,’ she said.

“I think the position I find myself in 1s ludicrous. I don’t believe for a moment that anyone ever intended to kill three people. I think if some- body would set out to do something like that, they would try to cover their tracks,” she added.

Counsel said the discovery of the

poison ricin would suggest that, to which the defendant replied, “I don’t know anything about that, but I can certainly say I didn’t intend to have three people killed.”

She rejected suggestions by Ms Ni Raifeartaigh that “it’s fabrication from start to finish. It’s not a story,” said Ms Collins.

She said that she sent €15,000 re- lating to a blackmail “to an address I was given. I didn’t know anything about Essam Eid. I think if I was paying somebody to kill, it would

be very obvious to me that it would be traceable,’ she said. Asked about calls between her phone and Essam Eid’s number, she said that a man was blackmailing her.

“T think at the time, I couldn’t be sure if if was One man or two men. I don’t know who was ringing me. It was very hard to know where the calls were coming from,” she said.

Ms Ni Raifeartaigh put it to her that some of the language used in the emails was similar to Ms Collins’ language.

The defendant said she accepted that, “but I don’t know what was go- ing on, but some of it was definitely not my language.”

When one of the emails sent by lyingeyes was read out to her in court, she said, “It’s dreadful, but certainly not written by me.”

She said she would never get over the shock of the emails. Earlier, asked by her own Senior Counsel Paul O’Higgins did she solicit or conspire with anyone, she said, “Ab- solutely not” and shook her head.

CLARE County Council may be fac- ing the prospect of jobs cuts and cut- back in services due to the slowdown in the local economy.

That’s the view of Clare Green Party councillor Brian Meaney who was speaking yesterday after figures from the Department of the Environ- ment confirm a continuing downturn in the Clare construction sector.

“The slowdown in housing will have an exponential impact on coun- cil finances and with a significant de- crease in applications, there could be rationalisation of council services,” he said.

Cllr Meaney pointed out that there was a Significant deficit in the De- partment of the Environment budget at present and he speculated this would have a major impact on coun- cil finances.

‘The situation is going to get a lot worse before it gets better,” he said.

The Department of the Environ- ment housing figures confirm yester- day that new house registrations for the first five months has dropped by 83 per cent on the corresponding pe- riod in 2007.

In figures published by the Depart- ment of the Environment yesterday, they show that there was only 10 new house registrations for the month of

May and this compares to 129 new house registrations for the same month in Clare last year.

The new house registrations for the first five months of 2008 show that 89 new homes have been registered in Clare and this compares to 527 new house registrations for the cor- responding period last year, a drop of 83 per cent.

Separate figures in relation to house completions also confirm a downturn

in the local housing sector.

According to Department of the Environment figures, the number of new house completions for the month of May in 2007 has dropped from 188 to 99 for May of this year, a drop of 47 per cent.

The figures for the first five months of this year show that the number of house completions had dropped by 36 per cent going down from 748 to 474 house completions.

THE recent CO2 emissions/motor tax changes brought good news for many diesel models, but bad news for some top of the range petrol models.

Subaru’s new Tribeca is in the lat- ter category. This massive SUV with a 3.6 litre engine, saw its price rise from €69,250 to €75,995 on July Ist. At present only a petrol model 1s available in Ireland.

The Tribeca, which takes its name from an area in the Manhattan dis- trict of New York City, was first in- troduced in 2006. Built on Subaru’s Legacy platform this latest model is a fine comfortable motor. The main changes are to the front and rear styl- ing. But it couldn’t have come to Ire- land at a worse time now that we are going green.

In hindsight this motor would prob- ably have sold better when the Celtic Tiger was at its peak. However, we

still have thousands of millionaires living in this island of ours and you just never know what way the market will work. But I’m told that rich peo- ple also like bargains.

Externally it looks like a regular SUV and has a tidy look to it. But I have never seen such a beautiful in- ternal design. There are no corners in the front section of the car as the dash literally blends into the doors and you get an amazing wrap-around effect. There is plenty of glass and a sun-roof which helps to give the car a really bright feeling.

As usual with these massive SUVs you might need a small step ladder to climb on board. But when you get inside the cabin the view of the road and indeed the fields are fantastic. And with the massive power that a 3.6 engine brings, you certainly will feel like a ‘king of the road.’

When reversing a rear-view cam- era 1s activated and you get colourful guiding lines on the display screen on the dash. A nice idea, one I first experienced in the Nissan Primera.

The Tribeca can seat five adults and at least two small children in a cute little third seat at the back. In real- ity most buyers will probably leave down the third row and use that space for storage. I don’t think the Irish birth rate is going up, but the extra seat would be ideal for trans- porting young boys or girls to sports events. Buy two Tribecas and you would have enough space for a soc- cer team and a few subs.

To try and save petrol you could

use the cruise control or to take your mind off the petrol bill, play some relaxing CDs by using the futuristic- looking display on the dash.

The five-gear automatic gear box is a bit lazy, but if you prefer you can also change gears manually. I didn’t get an opportunity to bring the Tribeca off road, but with all-wheel drive it should be able to handle any

terrain.

It’s a gorgeous motor and I took it to Cork for the Munster football fi- nal. Maybe I should have detoured via Carlow and visited that lucky newsagent where they sell so many winning lottery tickets. That’s the only way I, or most other Irish people are going to be able to afford to buy a Tribeca.

Under the new C02 emissions rules the Tribeca comes in at the top of the range *G’ section, which means a whopping €2,000 road tax per an- num. I really enjoyed my time in the Tribeca, but unfortunately it’s very thirsty and very expensive.

ENNIS based politician Paul O’Shea is heading for Baghdad to take up a humanitarian mission with the Unit- ed Nations.

Mr. O’Shea, who is standing as a Labour party candidate for next year’s local elections in Ennis, de- parted for Jordan on Sunday.

He will travel to Iraq this week to work on a humanitarian mission with UNICEF, the United Nations Children’s Fund. Mr O’Shea, who is a member of the Department of For- eigen Affairs, Rapid Response Corps is to be the first Irish aid worker to be deployed with UNICEF. Mr O’Shea will spend six months working in the region.

The Rapid Response Corp is part

of an additional initiative designed to respond to emergencies. There are currently 10 Irish members deployed in Ethiopia, Kenya, Darfur, Demo- cratic Republic of Congo, Nepal, Burma, Sri Lanka and Iraq.

There are an additional 50 people with specific skills on the register who are trained to respond to emer- gencies who are ready to be deployed within 72 hours.

Mr O’Shea will work as part of the child protection unit aimed at reach- ing out of school children, youth, working children, street children and other vulnerable children. Working with Iraq ministries in Baghdad and Erbil as well as non governmental organisations and local partners, the project aims to get children back into to educational programmes.

In co-ordination with a rehabili- tation team, UNICEF will provide necessary school equipment, teach- ing materials, health and hygiene kits. Mr. O’Shea completed a two week security awareness training programme organised by defence forces at the United Nations Training School at the Curragh.

The programme included a naviga- tion and radio communication, 4×4 driving, hostage taking, land mine clearance and first aid.

Despite working in politically un- stable regions, Mr O’Shea admits Baghdad will be a totally new ex- perience. He said, “This will be my first mission to the middle east, hav- ing worked in Africa and South East Asia for a number of years. I expect it will be very different culturally”.

The situation in Iraq has calmed somewhat in recent months though Mr O’Shea and other members of the UNICEF mission will receive armed escort when traveling around the oltielsa’s

Mr O’Shea said the training he re- ceived in the Curragh was first class and but is hoping he won’t have to put all of his new skills into practice.

“It was very good and pretty inten- sive. We were given courses in four wheel drive, communications, sat nav even hostage taking. Obviously I’m hoping not to encounter any situ- ation like that. But definitely, it will be an interesting experience”.

Mr O’Shea also recently worked in Kosovo as the Irish long term elec- tion observer with the council of Eu- rope.

A BIZARRE Ennis conspiracy to murder trial, which has heard refer- ences to a hitman website, swingers clubs, prostitutes, transvestites and a fake marriage certificate is expected to conclude today.

The jury in the trial of Sharon Col- lins (45) and Essam Eid (52), who deny conspiring to murder her part- ner PJ Howard and his sons Robert and Niall in 2006, will resume delib- erations this morning. The jury was sent to a hotel for the night after de- liberating for over three-and-a-half hours yesterday, as the trial entered its eighth week.

Ms Collins, of Ballybeg House, Kildysart Road, Ennis, has also pleaded not guilty to soliciting Mr Eid to kill the three businessmen.