200,000 Irish children now ‘living below the poverty line’
(right) A woman begs with a child on the streets of Dublin
More than 200,000 children in Ireland are living below the poverty line while 500 vulnerable youngsters were recorded as homeless on Census night.
Charities have demanded Government action after official figures revealed almost a fifth of households with children were struggling to survive below the breadline – and warned the rate would soar to 38% without family allowances.
The income of households with children also fell four times more than childless households between 2009 and 2010, found the latest survey on income and living conditions by the Central Statistics Office (CSO).
Dr Sean Healy, director of Social Justice Ireland, said the child poverty figures were profoundly disturbing and a scandal. He said: “It is crucial that government recognise the scale of child poverty and take effective action to reduce it dramatically by focusing on cutting the number of households in poverty.”
The at risk of poverty rate for those living in households with children was 18.7% in 2010, compared to 11.8% for those in households without children, said the CSO. But the level soared to 26% among homes with 12-17-year-olds.
Dr Healy added: “Any level of child poverty is of concern but the rise in child poverty to these levels in recent years is profoundly disturbing and does not augur well for the future of Irish society. It is crucial that, even in difficult economic times, government protect poor children who are among the most vulnerable in Irish society.”
Fergus Finlay, of the charity Barnardos, said: “There are increasing numbers of families for whom some level of social welfare support is essential in making sure there is food on the table and electricity to heat their home.
“We cannot afford to lose sight of the human face of the recession. Social welfare acts as a defence for many children who without it would suffer the kind of deprivation that has not been seen in this country in a long time.”
Caroline Fahey, of the charity St Vincent de Paul, revealed 60% of calls for support are from mothers with children. “About half of families getting child benefit are on social welfare, so the debate on child benefit needs to focus on the huge amount of children in Ireland living in poverty,” she added.
Elsewhere, newly-released Census figures revealed 503 people under the age of 18 were homeless on April 10, 2011 – 14% of the 3,800 without a permanent home. The majority were in hostels or shelter.
Providence Resources Irish oil find could be twice the original estimates
Oil in place at the Barryroe oil field could be twice original estimates and may be closer to two billion barrels, according to the latest analysis by field owner Providence Resources.
And the field could produce as much as 100,000 barrels of oil a day over a 25-year period based on proven estimates alone.
Shares in Providence, which have trebled in value so far this year, rose slightly on the news from the company but stockbroking analysts viewed the latest analysis from Providence’s technical director John O’Sullivan as very positive.
The latest upgrade of the estimates of oil in place at the field are based on fresh seismic data analysis and older limited drill results form deeper reserves.
Mr O’Sullivan said it is clear more data are required but said the numbers are potentially material and provide room for significant resource growth in the Barryroe project in the longer term.
“In the meantime, we look forward to providing shareholders with an update on recovery factors from the dynamic modelling project.”
The field has proven reserves of between 1,043m barrels and 1,612m barrels in its Middle Wealden and Basal Wealden reservoir zones and the latest data indicates that there may be between a 778m barrels and 1,165m barrels more at other deeper levels in the field which will require actual drilling to prove.
London-based Cenkos Securities said that while the final development plan for the field has yet to be agreed the studies outlined to date have been extremely encouraging and suggest that a development concept involving horizontal wells has the potential to deliver significant oil production rates at Barryroe.
“Given the size of the field and assuming a 25-year life, daily production peaking at over 100,000 BOPD is a real possibility,” Cenkos said.
However, just how much of this oil will be recoverable and eventually brought on-shore remains to be determined.
Davy analyst Job Langbroek said: “The news is positive for the stock albeit that the resource identified has a lower technical confidence level than the Basal Wealden in-place resource identified at the end of July. The next news from the Barryroe project is likely to be the recovery factor data for the Basal Wealden which now looks like it will be completed during October.”
An end to free Irish travel perk would easily make sound financial sense
When you stay in the Merrion Hotel and commute to the Department of Finance across the street, free travel is not important. Officials from the EU, ECB and the IMF cross Merrion Street to the Department of Finance earlier this year for the regular three-month check-up of Government finances
The troika has repeatedly demanded that the Government curtail the generous subsidies available to the elderly, so it should come as no surprise that the Department of Social Protection has set up a working party to examine the free travel scheme which currently allows a quarter of the population to take buses and trains at other people’s expense.
We are often told there is no such thing as a free lunch, and there is certainly no such as thing as free travel, which has always been a misnomer. The scheme means it is the taxpayer who must pick up the tab for journeys made by some of our wealthiest citizens.
Less affordable
As the population ages, the perk which dates back to the 1960s becomes less and less affordable.
Despite this, restrictions on when the elderly can travel have been rolled back when the logical thing would have been to tighten the rules.
What the troika wants it gets, and the over-66s should prepare to start buying tickets like the rest of us after December’s Budget.
While this all makes perfect sense from a financial point of view, it makes little sense from an emotional or social point of view.
Every country has eccentricities, and the scheme has long been something that made it worth living here.
The cost of this benefit is only €75m, or roughly the amount that Bank of Ireland managed to lose every two days in the first six months of the year.
Abolition of free travel, which means so much to 1.1 milion people, will be a black day for the elderly and everybody else. Free travel is a small luxury, but it is a luxury that we should easily be able to afford. It is hardly caviar; more like putting a Flake in your 99.
The fact that the Government has been forced to look at scrapping such a cost-effective present to the elderly and the handicapped is an unpleasant reminder that the loss of our economic sovereignty means we will have to implement many penny pinchingcost-saving measures as we get our house in order.
It is a small, squalid victim in an otherwise just war. On balance, it is essential for our economic well-being that the present coalition has to follow the bailout programme, but it can also lead to stupid cruelty at times.
Trichet’s views on bank guarantee would be truly enlightening
WE are one of the few nations in Europe where the people cannot even visit their parliament without going cap-in-hand to an elected representative to gain access to the chamber and watch a handful of TDs debate the legislation that shapes our lives.
Few countries make less effort to operate transparent government than Ireland and few departments are less transparent than the Department of Finance.
It was therefore more than a little amusing to see Finance Minister Michael Noonan tell the ‘Sunday Independent’ this week that he would like to see the publication of correspondence between the late Brian Lenihan and former European Central Bank president Jean-Claude Trichet.
Mr Noonan claims he would like to publish letters sent in the lead-up to the bailout but cannot do so because the department’s freedom of information unit has ruled that the letters should not be published.
He appears to have forgotten that TDs have granted themselves immunity from most laws and he could simply read the letters into the Dail record whenever he chooses. The question is not whether he can make the letters public. The question is only whether he should make them public and what purpose this would serve.
Speculation in some newspapers about Mr Trichet’s letters has, until now, thrown up nothing illicit.
Continentals do not share our aversion to confrontation so we should hardly be surprised that any letters made Mr Trichet’s concerns clear — especially when the ECB had pumped billions into our banks. Any other approach would have been a serious dereliction of duty.
It is unlikely that publication of the letters will do much to solve the question of whether Mr Lenihan was somehow bounced into a bailout through dark and sinister threats.
Those who distrust the ECB will doubtless draw consolation from the wording of some parts of the letters while others will doubtless believe that Mr Trichet was doing his job by trying to protect the ECB’s money and simply spelling out the blindingly obvious.
The entire issue is a canard anyway. In retrospect, there is no way the eurozone’s most indebted country could have avoided a bailout. It was always just a matter of timing. The real question is: what was said by Mr Trichet and a dozen other actors in the lead-up to the bank guarantee in 2008?
There was nothing inevitable about that decision, although it ensured that the 2010 bailout was inevitable. It is this decision that needs thorough investigation because it sealed our fates.
A chink of light and this time no-one rushing to claim credit
THE reluctance of many investors and politicians to acknowledge that the economy is showing muted signs of stabilisation is, at first sight, curious.
The purchasing manager’s index and a host of other indicators, from consumer confidence and retails sales to house prices and the national accounts, all indicate that the economy has finally found some sort of level.
With one in seven people out of work, thousands emigrating every month and hundreds of thousands living in houses where the mortgage is not being paid, there is no room for complacency but there is room for hope.
We have seen many false dawns and many spurious claims from Brian Lenihan’s infamous corner to Michael Noonan’s comical rocket but that does not mean that the very slow pick-up since the beginning of the year, is not real.
With so many clouds gathering abroad, this recovery may be short lived.
It may even be coming to an end already but it shows that austerity has worked despite the claims to the contrary from the left and some politicians inside Fianna Fail with exceptionally short memories or exceptionally cynical dispositions.
Even the Government appears unwilling to claim any credit, perhaps because it believes that playing the poor mouth will yield dividends at the Ecofin meeting in Cyprus next week.
It certainly makes a refreshing change after five years of false dawns, to see the odd chink of light and nobody queuing up to take the credit.
Prostate cancer is not just an old man’s disease
Philip Keenan: “Physically, I am doing well but I am constantly reminded of what I have been through.
What do I tell my wife, we only found out she is pregnant?
‘FIVE YEARS ago my mum died from kidney cancer. She had a cough for a few weeks and when she went to have it checked out, she discovered she had a tumour. It was the same week we found out that my wife, Lorraine, was pregnant with our first child. Mum died five days after Jack was born. Since then I have made a point of getting checked out every so often.
Last October, I saw a special offer on full health screening so decided to have one done. The doctor highlighted that my PSA (prostate specific antigen) reading was high at 3.8 and said it was most likely to be an infection, so I should come back in six months for a re-test.
But in January, my PSA measurement popped into my head, and I made an appointment with my GP to get his opinion. He also said it was most likely to be an infection as there was a very low incidence of prostate cancer in men under 50.
He prescribed antibiotics and when I re-tested four weeks later my reading had reduced to 2.9, so I stopped worrying. But a month later I had another blood test and it went up to 3.98.
So I was referred to consultant urologist David Galvin for a physical exam and a biopsy. The results came back two weeks later and I went alone as I wasn’t expecting to hear any bad news.
As I was waiting to get the result, I took a deep breath and held it; then I heard the words: “Very unexpectedly, something has shown up.” I released all the air inside me, put my hand on my forehead and began rubbing vigorously. My body immediately began to shake all over. I was transported back to the day we were told my mum had cancer.
The first thing I said was, “What do I tell my wife, we only found out she is pregnant?” Once you hear the word cancer, all sorts go through your head, most notably, am I going to die soon?
After the initial shock the urologist explained that my cancer had shown up in four of the 12 samples taken from my prostate and it was a Gleeson 6 type, which was less aggressive. I calmed down a little and decided that I was going to fight this tooth and nail.
We then discussed options and I nearly jumped out of my seat saying – “Just get it out, I don’t care what it takes.”
For someone my age, an operation was the best route because if you receive radiation therapy and the cancer returns, surgery is no longer an option.
So it was agreed that I should have a radical prostatectomy either as open nerve sparing surgery or laparoscopy. I was very young to have open surgery and when I discovered it came with a high risk of prolonged penile dysfunction and incontinence, it was very sobering.
I then investigated laparoscopic surgery which, although it was done in Ireland, it was very specialised. Then one of the girls I work with sent me a blog of Tony Fenton talking about his prostate surgery in Leipzig, Germany. I contacted him and he told me to get myself to Leipzig Hospital where a technique called endoscopic extraperitoneal radical prostatectomy had been developed by Prof Jens-Uwe Stolzenburg.
I decided this is where I wanted to go and contacted the professor directly. I have private medical insurance which approved the operation and the professor agreed to do my surgery personally due to my age and because I was coming from overseas.
The operation went well and afterwards it is routine for the pathologist to examine the removed prostate and seminal vesicles and give the patient a full report.
A week after surgery I went home and 10 days later got a call to say the pathology results had shown cancer in the seminal vesicles and there was a chance that cancerous tissue had been left behind. This news was worse than being told I had prostate cancer in the first place.
Apart from the physical effects of surgery, mentally I was torn up and I genuinely found it difficult to keep it together.
I was referred to an oncologist (Gerry McVey) for follow-up treatment who, after some investigation, said he did not believe the pathology report from Leipzig, as the scenario was unheard of. Unknown to me, he requested my pathology samples from Germany and had them re-tested. Two separate reports showed that the cancer had not spread to the seminal vesicles – these results were then double-checked in Leipzig. I was so relieved.
It was a genuine mistake but it’s probably the only time I can say Ireland 1 Germany 0. It just shows you that although we have issues with our health system there are world class medical professionals working within.
I went through emotional and mental torture over the past few months as everything with my case seems to have been exceptional.
Whenever I read an article about prostate cancer, I still get the terrors, particularly if it’s about someone dying from it. And I worry will it come back and try to get me. But then I slap myself out of it and get on with trying to cleanse myself mentally of what I have been through.
Physically, I am doing well but I am constantly reminded of what I have been through as I have been left with erectile dysfunction. But with the help of treatment I will eventually conquer it and I am getting great support, particularly from Lorraine.
I have to have my PSA levels checked regularly and the last two tests have been below 0.003 – undetectable – which is fantastic.
Our fourth child is due on the 2nd of October, which will be a great diversion from what has been a pretty horrible year for us.
Prostate cancer is not just an old man’s disease and I am a prime example of that. I would advise all men to get a health screen every couple of years. Early detection is vital. Most screenings aren’t covered by insurance, but stay in for a couple of weekends and put the money aside. It was certainly the best €180 I ever spent.
For more information visit blueseptember.ie
In conversation with ARLENE HARRIS
* Blue September is a campaign aimed at highlighting the cancers which affect Irish men and encouraging them to look for telltale symptoms and seek help if they have any concerns
* Ireland has the highest rate of prostate cancer in Europe with a 60 per cent higher incidence than the European average
300,000 Irish people struggle to pay their energy bills
More than 300,000 households face a daily battle to pay their gas and electricity bills.
Growing numbers of cash-strapped families are installing pay-as-you-go meters so they can constantly monitor their usage.
Even before October’s price hike arrives for energy customers, massive numbers of households are having difficulty in clearing their energy bills on time.
Some 60,000 homes pay for their Bord Gais supplies with the pay-as-you-go meters.
push: Struggling householders must now deal with a new 8.5pc rise in prices for Bord Gais supplies, which will push the average home’s annual costs up by €70 to nearly €1,000 a year.
Bord Gais said 40,617 of its 346,000 residential electricity customers are 60 days or more behind on their bills.
So far it has agreed 46,000 repayment plans.
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