The Marshes ICA Guild recently visited Leinster House where they met with local Senator Mary Moran.
Senator Moran, who will run for the Labour Party in the next General Election, showed the ladies around Government buildings and a great day was had by all.
Senator Mary Moran
A local senator was caught up in a water charges protest outside the houses of the Oireachtas last night.
Senator Mary Moran was forced to abandon her car when demonstrators, protesting against water charges, staged a sit-down protest on Kildare Street.
Tipperary Senator Denis Landy was also affected.
The house authorities have requested the presence of the Garda Commissioner Noirin O’Sullivan today to ensure access to Leinster House for TDs, Senators and staff, with protesters expected to return to Kildare Street this morning as debate over water charges amendments resumes.
Moran told TheJournal.ie she was “horrified at the violence and animosity shown to gardaí” and described the experience as “frightening”.
She added that it was “a very sad day for democracy”.
The scene on Kildare Street yesterday
Students and teachers from St Joseph’s National School in Muirhevnamor visited Leinster House yesterday.
They were greeted on the day by local Senator Mary Moran, who said: “I was delighted to welcome students and teachers for a tour of the Houses of the Oireachtas.
“I was also delighted to be able to afford the students the opportunity to address Oireachtas colleagues following a recent debate competition. The students’ knowledge and preparation was very impressive. I would like to commend the students and teachers involved on their hard work.”
On Wednesday Senator Moran was one of a number of local representatives who took part in the Job Shadow Day 2015, which seen Louth natives Conor McIntyre and Maria McCabe shadow her around Leinster House for the day.
Gerry Adams
Following a recent meeting in Drogheda with Jacqueline Millman of Carers’ Ireland Louth, local TD Gerry Adams welcomed a group of 15 family carers to Leinster House yesterday.
Having spoken with them about their experiences, the Sinn Féin president said it was now time to overturn cuts to allowances which had hurt carers in recent years.
He said: “I want to commend the crucial role played by carers in our society. Without their dedication and commitment many of our most vulnerable citizens would face huge difficulties and even greater hardship.
“There are around 60,000 people in receipt of a carer’s allowance and it is estimated that there are almost 200,000 family carers across the state. Cuts to the Carers’ Allowance, to Carers’ Benefit and to the Respite Care Grant have caused huge hardship for families.
“In opposition Fine Gael and Labour opposed similar cuts by Fianna Fáil but embraced austerity and imposed further cuts when they came to power in 2011.
“In 2013 the Respite Care Grant was cut by almost one fifth and the Household Benefits Package has been slashed by 40% since 2011.
“During this time the government has re-orientated healthcare to move disabled or elderly or sick citizens out of hospitals and institutionalised care and back into the community.
“This is in part because of the crisis in hospital Emergency Departments where there is a shortage of beds because of delayed discharge patients, and because community care and care in the home is cheaper. But the government is failing to provide a satisfactory income for carers or suitable services for those they care for.
“According to the Carers’ Association there are over 7,000 people waiting on a Housing Adaptation Grant, Mobility Aids Grant or Housing Aid for Older People. “There are almost 9,000 older people, people with disability or medical conditions on the housing waiting list. And under Fianna Fáil and then under Fine Gael and Labour over one and a half million home helphours have been withdrawn.
“In the National Carers’ Strategy 2012 the government promises that: ‘Carers will be recognised and respected as key care partners. They will be supported to maintain their own health and well-being and to care with confidence. They will be empowered to participate as fully as possible in economic and social life.’
“The impact of government cuts to key supports for carers means that it has failed to deliver on this commitment.
“It is patently clear from my discussions with Jacqueline and with the group I met yesterday that carers are simply not receiving the support that they deserve from this Government. They have to fight for every benefit and support. They speak of spending endless hours trying to fill in forms and negotiate red tape, and of feeling isolated and lonely.
“This is unacceptable, particularly when we consider the vital role which carers fulfil every single day. Carers’ Ireland estimates that each family carer saves the HSE in the order of €72,500 per year through the care they provide to loved ones.
“Across the State it is estimated that each year family carers provide €4 billion worth of care and support to people who are ill, frail or suffer from disabilities.
“The combination of stealth taxes, including the family home tax, cuts to welfare payments, and a significant reduction in support services, has meant that carers have seen their income drop, their costs increase and available services have been slashed. This is unfair, unacceptable and an attack on the most vulnerable in our society.
“Sinn Féin is calling for the full restoration of the Respite Care Grant and for an increase of three weeks to the fuel allowance. We believe the 24,000 family carers on the half-rate Carers’ Allowance should be recognised by the government as a core social welfare payment and it should be protected. And we have called for increased investment in Health Services for their loved ones.”
Concluding Deputy Adams said: “Carers provide a vital service for society. It is time their exceptional role as care givers was recognised by government and the necessary supports and funding provided to ensure that all of our citizens enjoy a decent quality and standard of life.”
Commenting on the meeting with Deputy Adams, Dundalk-based carer Lisa Marie Hodgins said: “I was delighted to visit the Dáil to meet Gerry Adams. I have a 6 year old daughter called Séanadh who has been diagnosed with a rare chromosomal condition called 3p Syndrome.
“Our family has faced an uphill struggle to access support services for Séanadh, in particular speech and language therapy which is so essential for her development. I have brought this issue to the attention of Gerry Adams and he has assured me that he will raise it with the Government.”
Gerry Adams
Local TD Gerry Adams has raised the issue of homelessness in the Louth in the Dáil today, claiming that between 30-40 people are sleeping rough throughout the county on a regular basis.
Speaking in Leinster House following the death of homeless man Jonathan Corrie in Dublin, the Sinn Féin leader said: “The number of people sleeping rough in Dublin surged by 20% this year. This Christmas, 168 people are expected to sleep on the streets, which is three times the figure recorded when records began in 2007.
“Some 30 people are sleeping rough in my constituency and 800 children across the State are housed in temporary emergency accommodation.”
Following the debate Deputy Adams said: “The fact that 30-40 people are regularly sleeping rough across Louth is of great concern to me.
“I now intend to contact the relevant agencies in Louth to seek a resolution to this crisis.
“This, coupled with ever growing waiting lists for social housing, present the real picture of the housing crisis across this state. Sinn Féin has called on the Government to immediately begin a major house building scheme to alleviate pressure on families in housing distress.”
Dundalk filmmaker Marcus Howard has put together a new documentary on the Tuam mother and baby scandal.
Marcus, who directed and edited the piece, travelled from Dundalk for the marsh and candlelit vigil outside Leinster House last Wednesday and uploaded the documentary earlier today.
The half hour independent recording looks at some of the international media reaction to the Tuam scandal as well as poignant speeches and music from the Justice for the Tuam Babies March and Vigil on June 11th. The names of the 796 deceased babies are also features.
You can view the documentary above.
The Dunleer Train Station committee
Minister for Transport Leo Varadkar will this evening meet with the group hoping to reopen Dunleer Railway Station.
The Dunleer Mid-Louth Railway Station re-opening committee will meet with the Minister in Leinster House at 7.30pm where they will outline why they feel the station – which has been closed for 30 years – needs to be reopened.
Chairman Niall Gallen and his ‘Stop At Dunleer’ group will ask the Minister to ensure that the Department of Transport explores the proposal following strong campaigning throughout Mid-Louth in recent months.
The committee was set up last March. At the time Irish Rail said reopening the station is not in its current investment plan and it does not feature in the current programme for government.
A spokesperson said the only option would be a developer-led initiative but this would have to be subject to a business case being put forward.
Dunleer Railway Station was closed by CIE in 1984
Gerry Adams
A former IRA man who shot dead Detective Garda Seamus Quaid in 1980 claims Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams and the North’s Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness ordered him to transport explosives to the UK two days before the murder.
In an interview with the Sunday Independent yesterday, Peter Rogers, who served 18 years of a life sentence for Det Gda Quaid’s murder, told how he met Mr Adams and Mr McGuinness in the sports ground of Trinity College Dublin on October 11, 1980.
Two days later his van was stopped by Det Gda Quaid and his colleague, Donal Lyttleton, late at night on a road near the Ballyconnick quarry in Wexford.
As the detectives searched the van, Rogers pulled out a gun and, in an exchange of fire, shot Det Gda Quaid, who lay bleeding on the ground. The father of two died 15 minutes later.
The detectives knew Rogers was an IRA man, but did not know he was transporting explosives at the time. They were responding to an alert after the IRA robbed two banks in Callan, Co Kilkenny, earlier that day.
At the time of the shooting, Rogers says he had been working as a “logistics” man for the IRA, moving weapons and “personnel” between Rosslare, Wales and France.
He worked for a while on the Brittany ferry before setting up his own parcel delivery service, partly as a cover for his IRA activities.
In October 1980, he became concerned that explosives he was ordered to transport to England for a bombing campaign were in a dangerous state. After he refused to move the explosives because of his concerns, Rogers says he was ordered to come to Dublin, where he met with Adams and McGuinness.
Rogers told the Sunday Independent: “I was summonsed to Dublin as to find out why there was a delay in moving stuff. It was the stuff that I was caught with.
“I was extremely unhappy about it. The explosives was weeping and there was a heavy smell of marzipan off it. You daren’t touch it, but your hands were soaking wet with the nitroglycerine coming off it. It was dangerous, highly dangerous.
“I didn’t want to move it for the simple reason I was afraid, number one, of losing the route into England and I was also afraid that if it was compromised that the active service unit might have been caught in England.
“It was supposed to have been gone on a couple of occasions but different circumstances didn’t allow for it and one of the main ones was the condition the explosives was in.” During the Seventies almost 100 IRA members were killed while moving or making bombs, and Rogers would have been well aware of the dangers.
Rogers said he was summoned to meet Adams and McGuinness because “they were in charge of operations”.
He recalled: “It was the afternoon. There was a rugby match going on at the time. It was October. I let them know I wasn’t happy. The reason that the stuff hadn’t been moved before then was that I wasn’t happy with the condition of it and I was looking for it to be replaced.
“They stepped back from me and they had a bit of a conflab and I was out of earshot. Then they came back and said it wasn’t feasible to get any new stuff.”
Rogers said they then ordered him to transport the explosives, despite the dangers involved.
Describing the explosives, he said: “It’s dynamite, but in the state it was in it was more or less nitroglycerine you are moving. Had I had time I was going to doctor it. I was going to try and encase it in moulding clay and sawdust.”
Sinn Féin refused to respond to a series of detailed questions arising out of Peter Rogers’s claims over the past three weeks.
Last Tuesday morning the Sunday Independent approached Gerry Adams – who has denied ever being a member of the IRA – on the plinth of Leinster House as he concluded a press conference over the controversy on claims made by garda whistleblower Maurice McCabe in relation to An Garda Siochana.
When asked to respond to the claim that he and Martin McGuinness met with Rogers two days before Det Gda Quaid’s murder, Mr Adams said: “I have no recollection of that whatsoever.”
When it was put to Mr Adams that he had given Rogers the order to transport those explosives, he replied: “That’s not true.” When the question was put to the Sinn Fein president again, he repeated: “That’s not true.”
At that point, Mr Adams brought the exchange to an abrupt end and went inside Leinster House.
Under the regulations set down by the House of the Oireachtas, members of the media are specifically prohibited from conducting or attempting to conduct interviews with politicians inside Leinster House without first obtaining permission.
The paper were reminded by Sinn Féin party press officers of this rule as they attempted to pursue him through the door of the Leinster House 2000 annexe which houses the offices of TDs and senators.
Repeated efforts by the Sunday Independent to elicit a response from Martin McGuinness in relation to Mr Rogers’ claims through contacts with his private office at Stormont proved to be unsuccessful.
Rogers, who is now in his late 60s, says he decided to speak out because he was angered at what he described as the “insensitivity” of Sinn Féin’s decision to hold its recent Ard Fheis in Wexford town. The decision prompted the family of Det Quaid, a local hero who represented Wexford in the 1960 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Final, to have a memorial plaque to the slain garda removed from the Opera House.
Rogers wrote to the Quaid family and to Det Garda Lyttleton in 1989 to apologise for his actions. He said he left the IRA the day he delivered the letters to the then governor of Portlaoise Prison, John Lonergan.
He left the IRA wing in the prison and spent the remainder of his sentence serving time with, as he put it, “ODCs – ordinary decent criminals”. He said he was badly beaten up by the IRA over his decision to break ranks and leave.
“I am extremely sorry that it happened,” he said of the murder of Det Gda Quaid.
On Rogers’s release in 1998 he moved his wife and son to Dundalk from Wexford as he did not want to cause further upset to the Quaid family, he said.
His marriage subsequently ended, and he now lives alone in Northern Ireland.
When asked what he thought of Gerry Adams’s claim never to have been in the IRA and Martin McGuinness’s claim to have left the organisation in 1974, Rogers said he believed they continue their denials on legal advice for fear of prosecution for war crimes.
He added: “It amazes me about Gerry. He made that statement himself, but for a man that was never in the IRA he seemed to dress up for every funeral that he went to in IRA regalia. What was that for, to impress people?
“I remember Gerry on one occasion. It was early in the campaign shortly after I joined and I was going down south to pick up stuff and Gerry happened to be in the same car, and we stopped off and he showed me a place, a little sweet shop, and the thing was if you have any trouble on the way up call in there and you’ll be alright.”
Despite his arrest and the seizure of the explosives, the IRA did mount a bombing campaign in Britain in 1981 to coincide with the Maze hunger strikes.
Five people were injured in May that year in bomb attacks on a Territorial Army base and a Royal Air Force base in west London. Two people, a 59-year-old widow and an 18-year-old Irishman working in London were killed in an attack on Chelsea Army barracks in October.
Source: Sunday Independent
It’s Budget Day today and the Dundalk Says No group will be amongst the hundreds expected to descend on the capital to protest against further austerity.
Spokespersons for the local group have said they will maintain peaceful protests this afternoon but despite this security throughout Dublin is huge, with Gardaí surrounding Leinster House since early morning.
Surely it can’t be for all the Kazak supporters in town for tonight’s clash with Ireland?
Last week Senator Mary Moran welcomed students from Castletown Girls School to Leinster House.
The sun shone for their visit with the Senator Moran answering a series of questions from the students about the workings of the house.
Talk of the Town 