Big Irish State crackdown on social welfare fraud saves Government a whopping €632 million
Social Protection Minister Joan Burton reveals there were 674 cases taken against fraudsters last year.
The Irish State saved €632million last year following a crackdown on social welfare fraud, a new report revealed.
The Department of Social Protection report for 2013 showed huge success in highlighting fraud and taking cases against scammers.
Social Protection Minister Joan Burton revealed that 674 cases were taken against fraudsters last year following more than 25,000 tip offs from the public.
Initiatives like facial imaging in welfare offices has seen the State claw back a whopping €632million in benefits.
Ms Burton’s department carried out more than one million reviews of welfare payments last year.
The Minister said yesterday that getting people back to work and continuing to crack down on fraud will be the major priorities for her department.
She added: “The best way of reducing welfare expenditure is by getting people back to work – and we are doing exactly that through the Pathways to Work strategy.
“Every 10,000 fall in the Live Register saves approximately €95 million.
“At the end of 2013, 61,000 more people were in work, an employment increase of 3.3% on 2012, while the Live Register continued to fall steadily over the year.
Through Pathways and key reforms such as the new Intreo Centres, where jobseekers can get income and employment supports in the one place for the first time, we will build on that progress this year.”
The report also shows that some 1.5 million people avail of weekly social welfare payments.
The Department of Social Protection forked out more than €20billion last year, but that is expected to drop by €630million this year.
Ms Burton said that her department is committed to protecting the more vulnerable people in society.
She said: “The vast majority of people on the Live Register have an overwhelming financial incentive to work, receiving just €188 or less per week and no additional benefits, and the Department is doing everything it can to help them back to work, not alone assisting jobseekers, but also deepening our engagement with employers to help them with their recruitment needs, as the report demonstrates.
“The annual report also demonstrates that, contrary to some beliefs about how the welfare budget is spent, the largest single block of expenditure is on protecting pensioners – and this will continue to increase in the years ahead because of demographics.
“I have and will continue to protect the State pension because of its crucial importance to older people. We can do this because overall welfare spending is reducing, and the Department is maintaining disciplined control of its budget.”
The new calorie scheme will not work in a busy Irish kitchen
Irish Restaurant owners are cooking up a storm over moves by the government to show the calorie count of each dish on their menus.
Health Minister James Reilly TD yesterday launched the Food Safety Authority of Ireland’s new online calorie calculator (www.menucal.ie), to help customers make more informed choices about what they eat.
The introduction of the calculator requires chefs to voluntarily input data for each dish – a system that has already been implemented in the US.
However, the Restaurants Association of Ireland said the MenuCAL Calculator will prove to be an unnecessary burden on restaurants, as it would be virtually impossible to monitor and will take each chef on average five hours per week, 20 hours per month, to complete a 40 item monthly menu.
Michelin-starred restaurant owner Oliver Dunne said legislation forcing restaurants to display calorie counts on their menus will not be practical.
Mr Dunne said chefs who make dishes to order will not be able to standardise the amount of calories in each dish.
PORTION
“If we’re in a kitchen and there’s a team of chefs and you’re making a portion of mashed potato for somebody, every chef that goes to make it doesn’t weigh out 10 grams of butter for 200 grams of potatoes and stir it to order, the chefs are just putting it in.
“It’ll be so vague from one chef to another,” Mr Dunne said.
In addition, the Irish Hotels Federation (IHF) warned against any attempt down the line to introduce mandatory labelling of calories on menus.
Others welcomed the move.
“American studies show that when calories are listed, people ate an average of 152 fewer calories at hamburger venues, and 73 fewer calories at sandwich bars,” Fine Gael Senator Catherine Noone said.
“Overall, calorie intake fell by 6pc per day and if calorie intake was reduced by this much in Ireland, it would have a positive impact on our obesity levels and our type 2 diabetes problems.
“We are facing remarkable problems when it comes to the health of the nation in the years ahead,” she said, adding any preventative measure should be welcomed.
Ten suicides occur weekly, says Pieta House chief Joan Freeman
At the official opening of Pieta House West in Tuam, Co Galway, yesterday were (from left) chairman John Joyce, founder John Concannon and Dublin taxi driver John Quinn, a fundraiser who introduced Mr Concannon to Pieta House.
GOVERNMENT SHOULD GIVE SUICIDE ‘THE SAME ATTENTION IT GIVES TO DEATH ON OUR ROADS
The Government needs to take suicide prevention as seriously as road safety, given that at least 10 people are taking their own lives every week, Pieta House chief executive Joan Freeman has said.
Speaking at the opening of Pieta House’s first centre in the west, Ms Freeman said the organisation was dealing with almost 60 new cases weekly.
The Central Statistics Office figures for suicide “don’t reflect the true numbers”, she said, as they do not account for drownings and single car fatalities which may be related.
“If the Government gave suicide the same attention and resources it gives to death on our roads, imagine the difference this would make to communities around Ireland,”Ms Freeman said yesterday.
“It appears suicide is a warm blanket used by our politicians during the cold days of campaigning, only to be shrugged off when elected,”she said. “Every adult should be made familiar with the signs and symptoms of suicide, and how to respond to same. We know that men don’t talk, and don’t seek help, but there is often a great sense of relief if someone intervenes to get help on their behalf,” she said. Eight of the 10 weekly fatalities are male.
The new west coast centre will open six days a week, and aims to work towards a seven-day service, including bank holidays, with free counselling and no referral from GPs required.
A Tribute
M/s Freeman paid tribute to Tuam-based businessman and philanthropist John Concannon, who inspired the fundraising campaign that supported Pieta House West’s foundation.
Mr Concannon pledged the first €25,000 towards the centre after recalling his experience of the impact of suicide during RTÉ’s The Secret Millionaire series. The non-governmental organisation now has nine centres, with almost €400,000 being raised for the Tuam facility.
“This is enough to refurbish a house and fund the service for 18 months,” Ms Freeman said.
Pieta House will host its fundraising walks event on May 10th (darknessintolight.ie).
Breathing and hydration is fuel for the body during exercise
Whether a walker, jogger or runner, you must follow this advice – don’t forget to breathe. Here are some tips on breathing that can be incorporated into training in the lead up to the Flora Women’s Mini Marathon.
Focus on the exhale, as you will always remember to breathe in. Exhaling will empty your lungs and create a vacuum for air to rush back into the lungs. This is an excellent technique to use if you get short of breath while training or find it hard to maintain a steady rhythm.
Take deep breaths (“tummy-breathe”) with the aim being to draw your breath into the lower part of your lungs. Oxygen delivery to the blood is optimal here, meaning improved performance.
Good posture will make breathing easier, as it allows your chest cavity to expand and retract as required. Maintaining an upright posture and avoiding slouching or hunching forward is best. If you struggle to do this on a daily basis, I recommend performing pilates to strengthen core and stabilising muscles. Drop your shoulders back and down, away from your ears, to automatically relax your upper body. Do this several times a day – at work, in the car, at training.
Pains: One of the other essentials to life (and training), is water and we cannot survive without it. Performance can be adversely affected by complaints, such as stomach pains, bloating and diarrhoea, which can be avoided with good hydration. Water is the best fluid choice for events lasting under 90 minutes.
Maintaining a hydrated state allows nutrients to circulate, wastes to be effectively removed and temperature to be regulated.
During exercise, sip on water by carrying a sports bottle when running/walking or bring a water bottle to your place of training. A pinch of sodium (i.e salt) can be added to your drink to assist in replacing electrolytes lost in sweat and improve fluid retention in the body. Slices of citrus fruits or frozen berries can improve taste.
Once you are breathing and your body is hydrated, it is time to turn your attention to fuel. Most importantly, remember you can never out-exercise a bad diet.
Without adequate nutrition, exercise will actually weaken the body and can lead to fatigue and injury. A well balanced diet of carbohydrates, protein, fat, vitamins and minerals will restore the body and allow you to reap the benefits of the hard work done in training.
4,500 year old boat among Viking artifacts hoard discovered in Lough Corrib
Battle axes and weapons among raiders hoard, found in Lough Corrib, County Galway, to be part of Battle of Clontarf anniversary exhibition.
Twelve boats, dating from 2,500 BC to the 11th century AD, along with other Viking artifacts have been discovered in Lough Corrib in Connemara, County Galway.
Archaeologists have used radiocarbon dating to establish that one of the boats dates from 2,500 BC. Other items that were found include several battle axes and other weapons.
The ancient items were discovered by Captain Trevor Northage, a marine surveyor mapping the lake to update British admiralty charts. The Underwater Archaeology Unit (UAU) from the National Monuments Service then carried out a series of investigative dives.
The 4,500-year-old log boat settled into the mud when it sank and was covered over time. A mixture of organic sediment and lake water assisted in the preservation process. Even the seats in the boats are preserved.
The three Viking-style battle axes will form a centerpiece for the National Museum of Ireland’s Battle of Clontarf commemoration exhibition, marking the 1,000th anniversary of the battle and the death of King Brian Boru.
The weapons, including bronze spearheads and a rare wooden spear, have been recovered for conservation by the National Museum. As yet, there are no plans to raise the boats.
The oldest of the vessels is the Annaghkeen log boat, which is 4,500 years old, close to the age of the Pyramids of Giza in Egypt. Northage pointed out, while speaking to the Irish Times, that it had been at the bottom of the lough for 3,500 years when the Vikings arrived.
The 12-meter boat is very similar to the Lurgan boat found in 1902 and the Carrowneden boat found near Ballyhaunis, in County Mayo, in 1996.
UAU archaeologist Karl Brady said, “The Annaghkeen boat was made from a very big tree, and it took a lot of skill and effort to make it.
“The fact that all three boats were located within 30 miles of each other would suggest that they were made by the one builder, or that there was a vogue for early Bronze Age boats of this type.”
Brady believes that another boat, dating from the 11th or 12th century, found near Carrowmoreknock on the Lough, may have been on a raid when it sank. They believe the warriors were Irish.
Ireland’s Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Jimmy Deenihan, called the find “exceptional” and said all the artifacts are protected on the National Monuments Act.
He also commented on the fact that the artifacts provide “a unique insight into a wide range of prehistoric and medieval activities, including raiding, hunting, wood working, boat building, trade, travel and transport.”
The Pesky fruit fly insect escapes by using fighter jet maneuvers
What does a tiny fruit fly have in common with the world’s most advanced fighter jets like the U.S. Air Force’s F-22 Raptor? More than you might think.
Scientists using video cameras to track a fly’s aerial maneuvers found the insect employs astonishingly quick mid-air banked turns to evade predators much like a fighter jet executes to elude an enemy.
Their study, published on Thursday in the journal Science, documents aerial agility in fruit flies such as the capacity to begin to change course in less than one one-hundredth of a second.
The fact that flies are airborne acrobats should not surprise anyone who has ever swung a flyswatter at one, only to watch the little insects easily escape.
The researchers at the University of Washington synchronized three high-speed cameras operating at 7,500 frames a second to learn the secrets of what the flies do to make themselves so elusive.
They tracked the mid-air wing and body motion of the fruit fly species Drosophila hydei, which is about the size of a sesame seed, inside a cylindrical flight chamber after the insects were shown an image that suggested an approaching predator.
The flies produced impressive escape responses, almost instantaneously rolling their bodies like a military jet in a banked turn to steer away. While executing the turn, the flies showed that they could roll on their sides by upwards of 90 degrees, sometimes flying almost upside down.
“They generate a rather precise banked turn, just like an aircraft pilot would, to roll the body and generate a force to take them away from the threat,” said University of Washington biology professor Michael Dickinson, who led the study.
“That happens very quickly. And it’s generated with remarkably subtle changes in wing motion. We were pretty astonished by how little they have to do with their wing motion to generate these very precise maneuvers,” he said.
The fly flaps its wings about 200 times a second, and in almost a single wing beat can reorient its body to maneuver away from the threat and continue to accelerate, Florian Muijres, another of the researchers, said in a statement.
“I suspect that these are very ancient reflexes,” Dickinson added. “Very shortly after insects evolved flight, other insects evolved flight to eat them. Circuits for detecting predators are very, very ancient. But this one is just being implemented in a high-performance flight machine.”
A lot of light was needed to accommodate the cameras’ extraordinarily high shutter speeds, but because a fly would be blinded by the necessary amounts of normal light, the researchers used very bright infrared lights. Like people, fruit flies do not see infrared light.
“I’ve always been fascinated by flies. Everybody thinks that they have a simple nervous system, but I think it’s exactly the opposite. They just have a really tiny one. But it’s incredibly compact. They do so much with just this brain the size of a salt grain,” Dickinson said.
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