The Clare People Archive

THE Equality Tribunal has dis- missed a further 16 cases brought by Travellers under the Equal Status Act against Clare County Council.

The cases were dismissed after the Travellers failed to turn up at the hearing.

A previous ruling to dismiss four cases by Travellers has been ap- pealed to the Circuit Court and these have yet to be heard. The latest deci- sions are also likely to be appealed.

The dispute concerns claims by the

Travellers that they were discrimi- nated against by named officials of Clare County Council and the coun- cil itself on the Traveller Community eround. They also allege that they were harassed contrary to section 1] of the Equal Status Act.

A council spokesman said, “These cases involve a huge amount of ad- ministrative work which could be better used in a number of ways.

The council would still incur legal costs in spite of the Travellers failing to turn up.

He pointed out that each equality

tribunal sittings demand the attend- ance of several council officials.

In a sample decision, the Equality Tribunal officer stated, “The com- plainants’ representative was noti- fied orally by me on October 20, 2006 that I was arranging a callover on December 4, 2006 of all the cases referred against the respondents, in- cluding the cases of the complainants oaKeabee

‘The representative applied for an adjournment of the matters on the grounds that she was out of the coun- try on holidays and would be unable

to notify the complainants of the callover.

“The adjournment was granted and the parties were notified that the callover would take place on January 15, 2007.

“Tt should be noted that during the course of other hearings of cases against Clare County Council listed for the week of 16 to 20 October 2006, the complainants’ representa- tive submitted a letter on behalf of all of the complainant family groups, including the complainants in this case, requesting that I withdraw from

hearing the cases.

““T informed her that I would not be acceding to the request. At the com- mencement of the callover on January 15, 2007, the complainants’ represent- ative made a further application for an adjournment and also stated that she wished to judicially review my deci- sions 1N previous cases.

“On the basis of the foregoing, I find that the complainants have not established a prima facie case of dis- crimination and accordingly their cases cannot succeed,’ the decision concluded.

A CONTENTIOUS planning deci- sion described as “unbelievable” by a senior member of Clare County Council has been appealed to An Bord Pleanala.

Last month, the council’s decision to refuse planning permission for a €40 million housing development in Kilkee prompted Cllr PJ Kelly (FF) to claim that if the local authority was a company, it would be wound up by now.

Cllr Kelly, who is a long-time critic of the planning process in Clare, said, “As a result of this unbelievable deci- sion, the council has forfeited around €4 million, including €2.5 million towards the provision of a new relief road for Kilkee.”

The council turned down a plan- ning application for 196 homes on zoned land at Kilkee Upper by Colm Kennedy, Noel Gallivan and James Rael after strong opposition against the proposal.

The three developers were seeking

full planning permission on the 25- acre site for 116 homes and outline planning permission for a further 80 elt one

The plan also included the con- struction of a childcare facility and nursing home.

However, it attracted 24 separate objections and was subsequently re- jected by the council planning de- partment.

In the appeal lodged with An Bord Pleanala by Byrne O’Donnell Scully architects, the developers state that

they are prepared to provide a relief road joining Dunlickey Road to the Carrigaholt Road.

‘The council themselves were very keen to have the entire relief road, as described on Kilkee maps as far back as 1972, constructed to allevi- ate traffic congestion within the town of Kilkee especially during the sum- mer period.

The developers also asked the council to consider the possibility of a ‘split decision’, to grant permission for houses numbered one to 46 which

are accessed and separated from that part of the proposed development di- rectly affected by the construction of the proposed relief road.

They are also seeking permission “for the remainder of the develop- ment subject to the satisfactory out- come of the now stalled negotiations with adjoining landowners and the satisfactory completion of the relief road joining Dunlickey Road to the Carrigaholt Road”.

A decision is due on the appeal later this year.

BEEF factories are coming under increasing pressure to increase the price being offered to farmers with a farmers’ ‘hold back’ now a serious possibility.

The IFA National Livestock Com- mittee Chairman, John Bryan, com- mented last week that in over two years he had not witnessed as much anger against the meat factories in the severe way they had blackguard- ed winter finishers this spring.

“The factories’ latest moves this week to cut prices was a real kick in the teeth to winter finishers who have

endured losses of in excess of €100 per head this winter,” he said.

‘At a time when prices were rising in our main market in the UK, it was a scandal that Irish factories were at- tempting to cut prices. It is an even bigger scandal that some factories are importing cattle and telling their farmer clients that they must cut the eon

The UK market is returning the equivalent of €3.24/kg (116p/Ib) or 95 per head more than Irish prices. The IFA livestock leader commented that winter finishers had provided an all-year-round beef supply at very high costs to enable factories to serv-

ice high-priced consumer markets. The response from the factories now is to take advantage of the situation for their own gain.

Meanwhile, the ICSA beef chair- man Robin Smith has warned that midlands farmers may be tempted to hold back their cattle until prices steady a bit. “Prices in the mid- lands are back a penny this week, to €2.80/kg for Os and €2.94/kg for Rs. Yet when you look towards Donegal, better prices are available. These signs of hope from Donegal may very well encourage other farm- ers to hang on a bit longer.”

The ICSA has also laid the blame

for the low prices square at the feet of the EU.

“The low prices being quoted to Irish farmers over recent months is a direct result of EU negligence,” says ICSA President Malcolm Thompson. “Over 270,000 tonnes of Brazilian beef were imported into the EU last year, and this sub-standard product is having a huge effect on Irish beef prices. However, this figure is likely to be up substantially in 2007. In March, for example, Brazilian beef exports globally were up 33 per cent year-on-year. The USDA has also forecast a significant increase in Bra- Zilian beef exports.”

THE future of the Irish sheep indus- try hangs in the balance this week as continued low prices offered by factories 1s on the verge of causing a mass exodus from the sector. The IFA has called on factories to up the price offered per lamb by as much €10 per lamb as a matter of urgency. Speaking following a _ meeting with the lamb factories in Dublin on Thursday, IFA National Sheep Committee Chairman, Henry Burns, said on sheep farmers need a price increase of €8 to €10 per lamb from the meat factories over 2006 price

levels just to stay in business.

‘Unless the factories are capable of returning a viable price to farmers for lamb, above the costs of produc- tion, the sector will continue to de- cline. Farmers are not going to sub- sidize lamb production by eroding their single farm payment,” he said.

‘Factories and agents talking down prices and trying to buy lamb cheap- er are acting highly irresponsibly and inflicting further damage on an already difficult situation.”

An IFA National Sheep Committee delegation led by Henry Burns met with representatives of Meat Indus- try Ireland including Kepak, Irish

Country Meats and Dawn Meats on the excessive cuts in lamb prices last week.

With production costs for spring lamb running at €90 to €100 per head, Burns commented that the meat factories know and accept that farmers cannot produce lambs at un- viable prices below the costs of pro- duction.

He continued that the IFA put the economic facts very strongly and clearly to the meat factories. “The meat plants accept that lamb prices must rise in order to restore viability at farm level,’ he continued. “The factories indicated they expect pric-

es to stabilise for the month of May. Last year lamb prices were in the or- der of €4.50/kg for most of May.

‘The factories said all of the main retailers will complete the changeo- ver to spring lamb this week and this should drive consumption and boost demand.”

He continued to say that Bord Bia have brought forward to this week a nationwide radio advertising cam- paign on Radio | and 16 local sta- tions, which should also increase domestic demand and that there was a major level of responsibility on the factories to stabilise the market and ee (one

CLARE senator and general elec- tion candidate, Timmy Dooley (FF), yesterday criticised his party leader, Bertie Ahern, over the decision to hold the general election on a Thurs- day.

Senator Dooley, who alongside Tony Mulcahy (FG) and James Breen (Ind) was given a five star rating by the National Youth Council of Ire- land, said he would like to have seen the election take place closer to the weekend to accommodate students

living away at third level institu- tions.

“Personally I am _ disappointed. I haven’t made a big issue out of it but personally I would have liked to have seen the election take place on a Friday or even on a Saturday,’ said Senator Dooley.

“It is a situation creating a balance between the students who want to vote and the people in the cities who would be going down the country for the weekend.”

Dooley was one of only five Clare general election candidates to re-

spond to a survey on young people’s issues conducted by the National Youth Council of Ireland. Each can- didate was rated according to their answers to a series of youth related question and given a Star rating.

Senator Dooley received a maxi- mum five star rating along with Tony Mulcahy and James Breen, while Madeleine Taylor-Quinn (FG) and Brian Meaney (Green) received four Star ratings.

Each of the respondents, except for Madeleine Taylor-Quinn, responded ‘yes’ when asked should the vote be

given to 16 and 17 year olds.

‘“T have had the view for a long time that children are more educated now than they were 20 or 30 years ago. With the improvements in technol- ogy and communications they know more about voting and politics than ever before,’ said Dooley.

“I would argue that giving them the vote at an early age would get them more involved and make them more interested in politics. If people were allowed to vote from 16 it would goa long way to tackling the problem of apathy in a lot of voters.”

yesterday that it would be a very different story if the election was not so close.

“I don’t see any point in the PDs pulling out now, not at this stage. We don’t know what has gone on yet, maybe it will come out before the election and maybe it won’t,” he said.

‘As a PD, I believe we were elected to hold up honesty and integrity in government.

“But at this late stage, I don’t see any advantage in collapsing the Gov- ernment just for the sake of it.”

The Fianna’ Fail/PD coalition looked destined to collapse over the weekend when a meeting of the Pro- gressive Democrats’ high brass was called to discuss revelations con- cerning the personal finances of the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern.

Mr Ahern’s then partner, Celia Larkin, is reported to have received £30,000 from Manchester business- man Michael Wall in 1996 towards

the renovation of a property.

This property, which was owned by Mr Wall, was rented to Ahern at a nominal fee.

Tm stcKmoeeoe mer Mbsom\y Eble tence businessman bequeathed the prop- erty to Mr Ahern in his will.

“It’s a difficult position for Mc- Dowell to be in. He is going to be criticised no matter what position he takes on this.

“We should hold a firm position on this. Only for it is so close to the election, it could be a very different StOry.

‘The grassroots members and gen- eral election candidates haven’t been

informed of what information Mc- Dowell has yet.

“This is a decision that will be made at ministerial level.”

Meanwhile, the Green Party yes- terday put pressure on Michael Mc- Dowell to put the information he has about the Taoiseach’s finances into the public domain.

“Michael McDowell also has a re- sponsibility in the national interest to put the information he has into the public domain, so that the statement from Bertie Ahern can be judged in the context of what Michael McDow- ell knows,” said party leader Trevor Sergeant yesterday.

THE soon to be introduced new Ear- ly Retirement Scheme (ERS) should significantly change the situation for farmers who apply under the joint management rule with particular ref- erence to the state pension, accord- ing to the IFA Rural Development Chairman, Padraic Divilly.

“A joint management application allowed the spouse of the farmer to apply for the ERS even though they did not own the land. This was par-

ticularly relevant where the farmer was older than his/her spouse and, as a result, secured a greater number of years of payment from the scheme,” said Divilly.

“However, when the older farmer qualified for the state pension that amount of money was deducted from the ERS, thus reducing the value of the EU pension.”

Following discussions on the new scheme, transfers of lands to the younger spouse will be allowed be- fore joining the scheme and, as a

result, the deduction of the state pen- sion from the ERS will not arise.

In the old scheme, such arrange- ments were not possible unless they were done prior to the introduction of the scheme.

The IFA Rural Development chair- man said that in ERSI and ERS2 many farmers felt aggrieved that the state pension had an effect on their EU pension and this change in the new scheme will avoid a repeat of this anomaly.

Divilly called on the Agriculture

Minister Mary Coughlan to intro- duce the new scheme without any further delay.

“The scheme negotiated as part of the partnership agreement last Oc- tober involves an annual pension of up to €15,000, and a more flexible arrangement for transferees with a widening of the age limit to qualify the retiring farmer.

“The new scheme must be imple- mented in a more flexible manner than previous schemes,” Divilly con- cluded.

FEARS that hundreds of Clare farm- ers would miss out on this year’s Single Payment/Disadvantaged Ar- eas Scheme were allayed this week as the Minister for Agriculture and Food, Mary Coughlan, announced an extension of the closing date for receipt of applications.

With farmers taking advantage of the recent spate of good weather to get work done on the land, it had been feared that thousands would lose out on valuable revenue because of not having the application in on time.

The scheme is a vital source of revenue for many Clare farmers and missing out on the scheme could have had a disastrous effect on farm- ing in the county.

Minister Coughlan has extended the final deadline for receipt of ap- plications under the scheme until this day week, Tuesday, May 15.

“IT have decided that the closing date should be extended to Tuesday, May 15, the latest date for receipt of applications as provided for under the governing EU Regulations,” said Minister Coughlan.

Despite the extension to the closing deadline, the processing of applica- tions under the 2007 Single Pay- ment/Disadvantaged Area Schemes worth over €1.6 billion annually to Irish farmers was already well under way in the Department of Agricul- ture.

However, the Minister indicated that by extending the date she was ensuring that farmers could not be

penalised for submitting a late appli- cation provided they submitted their application by the new deadline.

“I have already ensured that each farmer concerned was written to by my department, in order to ensure that everyone knows precisely the implications for their entitlements, should they fail to lodge an applica- tion under the 2007 Single Payment Scheme,” she continued.

‘Farmers are already aware of the exciting development of online regis- tration, following earlier correspond- ence from my department. The on- line application has several benefits, from the built-in validations, which will result in fewer errors in applica- tions being lodged, to the acknowl- edgment of receipt of the application by my department.”

The move was welcomed by Chair- man of Clare ICMSA, Martin Mc- Mahon.

‘Many farmers have run into prob- lems in relation to getting sufficient land in order to draw down entitle- ments and the extra period of time will give these farmers the oppor- tunity to maximise their payments under the Single Farm Payment,” he said.

“The problems in accessing land clearly highlighted the need for further improvements in the con- solidation arrangements and ICMSA would continue to argue that, in order for farmers to be able to draw down their full entitlements going forward, the conditions for consolidation need to be expanded and ‘the heat’ taken out of the rental land market.”

FINAL preparations for the parish mission are underway in Ballyna- cally and Lissycasey.

Services will commence Saturday May 12 in Ballycorick Church and Lissycasey Church.

It is the fist time in four years the mission is being held and it is hoped that people new to area will get in- volved. Fr Tony Flannery, Fr Jimmy Buckley, will celebrate masses. In a new departure for the mission a lay- person – Anne O’Toole – will assist with the service.

The population in the area has ris- en to 2,000 and organisers hope that newcomers will come along over the

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Pastoral council member Mary Hestor said there was an open invita- tion to everyone in the parish.

She also hopes the mission will of- fer solace to those people whose lives have been touched by tragedy.

“We hope to appeal to newcomers who might have moved to the par- ish in recent years and those who are living on the periphery. We hope that the mission will also bring sol- ace and healing to those who are bereaved and especially those who have lost young people in the prime of their life since the last mission. We also would like to remember the aged, the housebound and the lonely and those who feel isolated in the

community.”

There will be morning masses in both churches at 7am and 10am. The missionaries will preach at all mass- es on May 12-13.

Mass will take place at Ballycorick church on Sunday, Monday, Tues- day and Wednesday at 7pm and on Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 8.30pm

Mass will take place at Lissycasey church on Sunday, Monday, Tues- day and Wednesday at 8.30pm and on Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 8.30pm.

A series of different services will be celebrated over the week. Mon- day; Christ the healer, Tuesday; social gospel, Wednesday; right of

conciliation; Thursday; youth night; Friday; remembering the dead.

The council is also looking for young people in their mid-teens or early twenties to present the mission on Wednesday night. Names should be submitted by Sunday May 13.

LABOUR Affairs minister, Tony Kil- leen, has expressed his disappoint- ment at An Post’s decision not to re- introduce full services at Kilmaley Post Office.

The minister said that he had re- ceived a letter from An Post which stated: ““We are not aware that the re- cent downgrading of the service has had an undue impact on customers in the area.”

However, according to Mr Killeen, the loss of full services has affected local people and public opinion told him that there was a demand for them

to be re-instated.

‘Nobody wants to lose a vital serv- ice, which is why I can neither under- stand nor agree with An Post’s asser- tion that the downgrading of the post office has had no negative impact on customers in the area,’ he said.

Mr Laurence O’Brien, who took over the running of Kilmaley postal services when the former postmistress retired and the post office was down- eraded, said that the lack of a full service “doesn’t make sense”’.

“If a person is living rurally on their own they might only get a lift into town every few weeks to do their shopping and collect their pension. If

people want to put money in a savings account here we can’t do that. They would have to go to Ennis, which may as well be Timbuktu. If people want to pay their ESB bill we can’t do it. Local businesses can’t even send registered letters or parcels,” he said.

He added that the town has no ATM so there is no facility for withdrawing money between Ennis and Miltown Malbay.

Mr O’Brien said that Kilmaley Post Office had a higher turnover than oth- er small post offices with full services and predicted a huge future demand because planning permission has been granted for over 280 houses locally.

“It seems to me that the Government haven’t thought it out. One man who comes in phrased it perfectly when he said that when we had nothing in Ire- land we had post offices but now with all the money in the country, they are closing them down. It is completely ridiculous.”

Mr Killeen said that he had spoken with the Minister for Communica- tions, Marine and Natural Resources, TD Noel Dempsey, about the situa- wtOyNF

Mr Killeen said that the decision was not “irreversible. It makes perfect business sense to put in place a service that is in demand”.