The Clare People Archive

A MAN smashed an ambulance and insulted paramedics in protest at the location of a temporary exit from Ennis General Hospital last year, a court has heard.

Paul Daly (50), with an address at 41 Sandfield Centre, Ennis appeared at Ennis District Court charged with public order and criminal damage offences.

Mr Daly was charged with engaging in threatening, abusive or insulting behaviour with intent to provoke a breach of the peace and causing damage to an ambulance and jeep, both belonging to the Health Services Executive (HSE).

The charges relate to an incident that occurred yards from Ennis General Hospital on Sandfield Road in Ennis on October 23 (2011).

Linda O’Rourke, advanced paramedic in Ennis Ambulance Station, told the court that she was working as a sole responder on the night in question.

She said the services received an urgent call to respond to a patient who was lying on the footpath on Sandfield Road.

Ms O’Rourke explained that after the ambulance had left with the patient, she started to compile a report on the incident.

As she did this, Ms O’Rourke said, she heard shouting and banging on the jeep.

She said she then saw a man kick the side of the jeep. She added, “I got such fright, I dropped everything.”

Ms O’Rourke called for the gardaí and also for the ambulance to return to the scene.

Alan Massey, a paramedic in the ambulance services in Ennis, said that when arrived back on Sandfield Road, he heard three loud bangs on the side of the ambulance.

He said, “I could see a gentleman in the road just about to kick the vehicle.”

Mr Massey said he was forced to restrain Mr Daly “for his own safety” after he tried to punch him.

He added, “He called me an English c*** and to f*** off home or I’ll kill you.”

In court, Mr Daly denied trying to punch Mr Massey and denied using those words against him.

Tom Casey, Fleet Manager with the HSE West, told the court that € 1,100 worth of damage was caused to the jeep while € 500 worth of damage was caused to ambulance.

Garda Marguerite Wright told the court that Mr Daly behaved “ex- tremely aggressively” towards Mr Massey. She said that Mr Daly fully cooperated with gardaí.

Solicitor Daragh Hassett told the court that his client had made a number of complaints to gardaí regarding an exit on Sandfield Road that had been in use during recent construction work at the hospital.

The court heard that Mr Daly, who is originally from Dublin, moved to Clare six years ago. He admitted in court to banging and kicking the vehicles.

He said he had been very frustrated over the exit and the noise generated by construction work at the hospital at night.

Mr Daly added, “I snapped just enough to go out and have a go at them.”

The court heard that Mr Daly has 18 previous convictions, mainly for public order offences.

Mr Hassett said his client was a complex individual who would benefit from involvement with the probation and welfare services.

He said HSE staff should not have to deal with that level of abuse.

In convicting Mr Daly, Judge Patrick Durcan said the paramedics had been doing their jobs when they were “set upon, abused and put, I imagine, in fear of their lives.”

He said Mr Daly had referred to Mr Massey in the most unbecoming of terms.

He described the comments as some of the “most appalling” he has heard during his time on the bench.

Judge Durcan ordered Mr Daly to engage with the probation and welfare services. He adjourned sentencing until May 9.

LOCAL services across the county are set to be slashed because of Clare’s response to the government demand for householders to pay the € 100 household charge.

Figures secured by The Cla re People this week have shown that less than 15,000 of those liable to pay the controversial property tax have done so.

This means that there are over 20,000 property owners in the county who have failed to register with Clare County Council or the Local Government Management Agency to pay the levy introduced by the Minister for the Environment, Phil Hogan.

These figures have come to light, after a leading member of Clare County Council released countywide payment figures for the household charge to members of Kilrush Town Council on Thursday night last.

“The most recent information available indicates that circa 37 per cent (leaving a shortfall of 63 per cent) of the estimated properties liable to the household charge in Clare have paid,” revealed Seamus Halpin, nearly two weeks after the government deadline for the payment of the charge passed.

“The department have yet to indicate the reduction if any in the Local Government Fund arising form the collection rate, however, if the household charge payments are not received the government will have less money to allocate for the delivery of local services,” Clare County Council’s administrative officer for finance added.

Mr Halpin made his comments in response to a notice of motion tabled by former Mayor of Kilrush, Cllr Tom Prendeville (FF) at the monthly meeting of Kilrush Town Council at which it was claimed that those who paid the € 100 charge are now being targetted for a raft of other payments.

“It is being used to get more money out of people,” said Cllr Paul Moroney (Ind).

“I met a woman in Knockerra, who told me she registered early for the charge and within a month had a number of visits to her house which is in off the road and very hard to find.

“The TV licence person came around, someone came to inspect her septic tank and she had a water metre put outside her door. They called because they now have her details,” he added.

HOLIDAY homes in Lahinch and Doonbeg could be sold for as little as € 50,000 each, according to Allsop Space, the British-headquartered estate agents that will have four properties from the county up for grabs at its latest auction of distressed properties.

Details of the Clare properties were revealed this week, with houses in Ennistymon and Crusheen also included in the auction of 106 lots from throughout the country that will take place in the Shelbourne Hotel in Dublin on May 3 next.

In the catalogue for the auction, a four-bedroomed bungalow on Station Road in Lahinch has been given a reserve price of just € 50,000. The property, which is just a couple of minutes’ walk from the centre of the village, also comes with planning permission granted by Clare County Council in December 2010 to demolish the house and build three townhouses in its place.

The Doonbeg property is a semidetached, four-bedroomed house in Dun na Mara on the White Strand Road, which has a reserve of € 45,000, while the Ennistymon property is a two-bedroomed apartment with a reserve price of € 80,000. The final Clare property is a four-bedroomed house in Crusheen that has a reserve price of € 75,000.

In 2011, Allsop held four sales of distressed properties, with the lowest price for any property in the country being in Clare when a site in Cloughleigh with planning permission for a shop unit and two apartments was sold for € 11,000.

LAHINCH surfer Ollie O’Flaherty has been shortlisted for one of the biggest prizes in world surfing for riding a massive wave in Sligo last month.

Ollie, who is a member of the West Coast Surf Club, has been nominated along with four other surfers for the Biggest Wave category of the Billabong XXL 2012 contest.

The competition, which carries a top prize of $15,000, recognises the surfers who tackle the biggest waves in world surfing, including Aileen’s Wave under the Cliffs of Moher, Riley’s Wave near Kilkee and the Mullaghmore Head wave where Ollie qualified for the competition.

“The wave was probably 50 foot, so it was a big wave. You can’t paddle into a wave that big so you need someone on a jet-ski to tow you, you hold onto a rope and get whipped into the wave that way,” he said last week.

“It is dangerous enough but we have done a lot of training and put in a lot of time on much smaller waves. Myself and my tow-mate, Peter Conway, have put in a lot of time on this to get everything right.

“Being on the wave is like slow motion. Everything kind of stops and you try not to fall off. You hold on for the ride as long as you can. The ride is surprisingly short – it might only last 15 or 20 seconds on a wave that short but the sheer intensity of it, you could be buzzing for a week or two after it.

“Coming off the wave can be pretty violent but a lot of training goes on behind the scenes. I spend a lot of time training so I don’t drown. You have to have a healthy body and healthy mind. You hit the water hard but you wear impact vests, to stop you breaking any ribs or anything like that. And once you’re under, you could be under for anything up to 20 or 30 seconds. If a another wave is coming, it could be longer that that.”

Ollie is up against Devon-based surfer Andrew Cotton, Garrett McNamara, Basque surfer Axi Muniain and Australian surfer Damien ‘Taco’ Warr for the competition.

SPECIAL deals done between governments and individual TDs have been blamed for the slow pace of reform to mental health services in Ireland.

Minister of State for Health, Kathleen Lynch told a meeting in Ennis last week that it was “scandalous” that people would cut deals to the detriment of vital services just to keep a government in power.

Ms Lynch said, “I think governments were too reliant on single TDs in different constituencies.”

The Labour TD for Cork North Central, whose areas of responsibility include mental health, told the meeting that implementation of mental health reforms contained in the 2006 ‘Vision for Change’ document was often impeded during previous administrations “because votes were too tight”.

Ms Lynch was the guest speaker at a forum on mental health held in the Old Ground Hotel in Ennis last Tuesday.

Ms Lynch told the Clare meeting that she had received the most recent report from the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS).

She said that while annual detailed records are available for all young people accessing CAMHS, such records are not available in adult mental health services.

Ms Lynch described this lack of detailed information as a “scandal.”

The meeting heard that there are currently 60 CAMHS teams working in Ireland, 39 less than the target outlined in Vision for Change.

Ms Lynch said that € 35 million had been ringfenced in this year’s budget for mental health services.

She said that an additional 19 CAMHS posts had been allocated for this year.

Ms Lynch told the meeting that mental health had always been the “Cinderella” of the health services but that increased awareness “will take it out of the shadows”.

A NEW support group that encourages people to take control of their mental health problems will open in Ennis later this month.

Details of the Wellness Recovery Action Plan (WRAP) were outlined at a forum on mental health held in Ennis last week.

WRAP facilitator Liam Minogue was among the speakers at the event that encouraged “honest conversation” about mental health issues.

Mr Minogue, the co-founder of the Ennis WRAP support group, told the meeting that he had suffered with depression and anxiety, saying that he had “spent many years in a dark place.” He said the discovery of WRAP had enabled him to take control of his battles with depression.

He said WRAP is based around five key concepts – hope, personal responsibility, education, self-advocacy and support.

He added, “When you are in a place of depression, you need to have your voice heard.”

Mr Minogue availed of training as a WRAP facilitator from the Irish Mental Health Recovery Education Consortium in 2009. In 2010, he undertook the position of Volun- tary Co-ordinator for the Clare area with the Community Reconnect and Recovery Network. Their aim is to develop a regional network of peer support groups in the mid-west region of Ireland. The Emotions Peer Support Group will open at the Clon Road Business Park, Ennis, at the end of the month.

The meeting at the Old Ground Hotel heard that, according to figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO), 386 men took their own lives in 2010, compared to 100 women.

Citing figures from a survey compiled by the support group Aware, Dr Mairead McGovern said that 45 per cent of people experience depression at some point in their lives; 55 per cent of people who experience depression did not tell family or friends; while 75 per cent said they withdrew from family and friends.

Dr McGovern, who works with Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS), said that in many cases, people did not talk about depression because they felt “scared, ashamed and overwhelmed.”

Dr McGovern said parenting; school counselling and local services are vital to helping young people suffering from depression.

WHILE the county’s hurlers are making progress on the pitch, Clare Labour TD, Michael McNamara, has been forced to cut short his own hurling come-back after a spat broke out between the East Clare deputy and Labour’s National Organiser, David Leach, at the recent Labour VS Fine Gael charity hurling match.

Deputy McNamara, who last played hurling for the Scariff Junior B Team in 2006, saw red after a disagreement with the Labour team manager, David Leach, and walked off his party’s team.

According to McNamara, the Labour manager was packing the team with young Labour staff members and only allowing the party’s TDs “cameo” run-outs during the match. McNamara has a loud disagreement with his own manager before leaving the field, without pucking a ball in anger.

The tactic clearly worked for the Labour team, who ran out comfortable winners on a score-line of 68 to 1-12, but left a sour taste in the mouth of the East Clare TD.

“It was billed as a match between TDs on both on both sides. Instead, the Labour manager, one of the [party’s] head back room staff, decided to play young researchers, advisers and secretaries with the TDs making cameo appearances, against a team of FG deputies,” he said yesterday.

“Labour won very easily and Fine Gael, managed by Jerry Buttimer, complained that the format was unfair. It is five or six years since I played a game of hurling, with the

Scariff Junior Bs, and I

was looking forward to

the game. Oh well, may

be next year.”

The Labour team in

cluded just only one

elected member, 66

year-old Kildare TD and

goalkeeper Jack Wall, in

their starting line-up for

the seven-a-side clash.

In contrast to this Fine

Gael fielded six TDs,

including Clare’s Joe

Carey, in their starting line-up, but were no match to the young ringers in red.

Despite conceding six goals, the man-of-the-match award went to Labour Jack Wall, the oldest man from any party to take the itch on the day. It is as yet unclear whether Deputy McNamara intends making a surprise comeback to bolster Scariff’s hopes in their Division 5 A opener against Kilmaley this weekend.

Deputy McNamara’s ‘Tevez moment’ was the talk of Leinster House, with even Miriam Lord mentioning his disagreement in her Irish Times column last Saturday.

A CLARE company will later this month become the first group in the world to create a touring van which runs completely on electricity. Vanderlust, which is based on the Quin Road in Ennis, are currently re-engineering a Renault Kangoo van to be the world’s first electric tourism van.

The company, which is run by Ennis man Dave Hanley, plan to launch a series of eco-friendly touring routes in Clare later this month, with several different overnight trips already identified. They aim to complete each route without using petrol or diesel.

“The electric camper van is a totally new thing and this will be the first one anywhere in the world. Our van is based on the Renault Kangoo van and we are reworking that to include a seating area that folds into a sleeping area for two, a cooker, a sink, a fridge – basically everything you need for a camping holiday,” said Dave.

“Everything in the back of the van will be run using solar panels so the van will be powered by electricity and all the amenities will be powered using solar power. So it is totally electric.”

It is estimated that the van will be able to reach 170 km before it needs to stop and be recharged.

“I have put together a number of routes which include a charge point every 100 km so there will never be an issue of running out of juice. People can charge their vehicles in the camp sites on the routes and they will be all ready to go the next morning,” continued Dave.

“We are still working on the van at the moment. We have been developing the conversion using a diesel version of the Renault Kangoo and that went well so we would hope to be able to convert the electric version quite quickly.

“We want to have this van on the road by June at the very latest. We have set out a nice route which people can follow if they want to take a seven-day trip around the west and never run out of electricity.”

THE number of businesses that went into liquidation has been cited as the main reason for the level of uncollected commercial rates in Ennis.

Latest figures show that as of March 23, Ennis Town Council had just over € 2.4 million of “temporary uncollectible rates.”

In 2011 the council had “irrecoverable” rates of € 502,755, a decrease of € 26,175 on last year’s figure.

A report on the schedule of uncollected rates 2011 was presented at last week’s meeting of Ennis Town Council.

Town Clerk Leonard Cleary explained, “In 2011, Ennis Town Council had irrecoverable rates of € 502,755, which represented 6.99 per cent of rate demand for 2011.

“These irrecoverable rates related to rates which were not legally collectable e.g. demolished / vacant properties, charitable organisations, properties occupied by the HSE etc.”

Mr Cleary continued, “At December 31, the temporary uncollectible rates stood at € 2,901,37 which represents 40.32 per cent of the rate demand for 2011.

“However, € 474,000 has been col- lected in rates to March 23. This temporary uncollectible balance is made up of a number of accounts, each with considerable balances owing.

“Ennis Town Council is making every effort to recover these monies by agreeing payment plans to allow people make phased payment or by proceeding through the appropriate legal channels including service of court summons”.

He added, “It should be noted also that a number of companies, who owe rates, have gone into liquidation over the last number of years.

“Ennis Town Council must await the decisions of liquidators to establish the amount of outstanding rates will be recovered from these companies.”

Town Manager Ger Dollard told the meeting that he was quite satisfied with the amount of money collected by the council to date in 2012.

However, he added that rate collection is still an issue for the council.

He said the council is willing to make “reasonable arrangements” with people regarding the payment of rates.

The court heard that the council has issued 70 summonses in relation to outstanding debt.

SINCE Scariff Community College has new personnel in its two most senior posts, it was thought appropriate to mark their arrival by planting commemorative trees.

The idea emanated from the Green Flag Committee, which has already put in place many commendable initiatives in the realm of ecology.

Oaks were chosen for the occasion honouring the start of tenures of Angela McNamara as college principal and Brian Crossan as deputy principal.

Green Flag Committee member Frank Blake, who is no stranger to public appearances – he was one of the stars of last December’s ‘All Shook Up’ staged in the college hall by East Clare Musical Society – was chosen to set the tree-planting in motion and in a brief address explained the purpose of the occasion after formally welcoming the new appointees on behalf of staff and student cohort.

Representing the Parents Council was Regina Roskam while Mary Cassidy and Liam Furlong were there to show the appreciation of Tuamgraney Development Association which works on ecological matters with the Green Flag Committee.

One of the latter initiatives is the restoration of a row boat to be installed in the village as a garden fea- ture. Soon the college’s Green Flag Committee will be the subject of a documentary in the Ear to the Ground television series. The RTÉ One programme is being devoted to the rainwater conservation scheme installed in the college through the committee’s research and planning.