Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG update

2015 on track to be Ireland’s best-ever year for tourism

   

2015 is set to be a record year for tourism, according to a new report from the CSO.

Figures show that more than 1.5 million trips were made to Ireland by overseas visitors in the first three months of 2015.

That represents a 13% rise on the same period last year.

The news comes as Fáilte Ireland is reminding towns that today is the closing date for entrants to apply to the 2015 Tourism Towns Award.

Alex Connolly from Fáilte Ireland said that that these figures are good news for tourism operators across the country.

“The American market is extremely strong – that’s been helped by the fact that the American economy is improving – but also by the fact that the currency is currently working in favour of American visitors,” he said.

“Also the UK market, the British market, is very strong at the moment.

“We’ve recently surveyed the tourism businesses in Ireland and eight of 10 tourism operators are telling us that they reckon their business will be up this year.

“We could be looking at the best tourism year on record.”

Drumm, Fitzpatrick, McAteer, Whelan (The notorious four) given inquiry date

 

Former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern asked to appear on July 16th, before former Anglo executives.

Former Anglo Irish Bank executives David Drumm, Sean Fitzpatrick, Willie McAteer and Pat Whelan have been directed to appear before the Oireachtas Banking Inquiry on July 29th.

Other high-profile Anglo executives John Bowe and Tom Browne have been directed to appear on July 24th. Mr Bowe was a former head of capital markets at the bank and featured prominently in the Anglo Tapes controversy.

Mr McAteer and Mr Whelan were found guilty last year of giving illegal loans to 10 developers to buy shares in the bank and ordered to do community service. This followed a 48-day trial.

In addition, former Irish Nationwide Building Society chairman Michael Walshhas been directed to attend on September 2nd, along with John Stanley Purcell, a former director with the institution.

Anglo and INBS received €34.7 billion in bailout cash from Irish taxpayers following the crash of the Irish financial sector in late 2008.

However, no date has yet been set for the appearance of INBS’s former chief executive Michael Fingleton, who was issued with a notice to attend the committee on May 21st.

Other high profile players in the financial sector before and after the crash who have yet to be given a date include, Alan Dukes, the former chairman of Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, Mike Aynsley, IBRC’s ex chief executive, Gillian Bowler, a former chair of Irish Life & Permanent, Gary McGann, a former director of Anglo, Fergus Murphy, a former head of EBS Building Society who is now an executive with AIB, and Matt Moran, an executive with Anglo.

These directions were issued late yesterday as part of the latest tranche of communications by the Inquiry to witnesses to appear before the committee, which is investigating the events that led up to the financial crash in 2008.

The 11-person committee is being chaired by the Labour Party’s Ciarán Lynch.

Former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has been asked to appear on July 16th while the current holder of the office Enda Kenny will appear a week later, along with jobs ministerRichard Bruton.

Tánaiste Joan Burton will appear on the same date along with the former Labour Party leader Pat Rabbitte.

The Minister for Finance Michael Noonan is set to go in front of the committee on September 10th.

It now remains to be seen if all of those directed to appear will actually turn up at the committee, in particular Mr Drumm, who moved to the United States after his exit from Anglo and has shown little interest in returning to Ireland.

Rethink again how you eat your vegetables

    

We’re always being told to eat our greens, pack our diet full of fruit and vegetables and get much-needed nutrients into our bodies.

But while many of us think that pinging a steam fresh bag of veg in the microwave or popping a few florets of broccoli in a pan to go with our dinner will do the job, it turns out that a lot of our storing, preparation and cooking methods of vegetables are actually diminishing their nutritional value.

In her new book Eating on the Wild Side: The Missing Link to Optimum Health, journalist Jo Robinson has shared some top tips on how to make sure you are getting the most out of the veggies you eat.

Cook tomatoes for longer. The longer you cook tomatoes for, the more nutritious they become because the heat changes the lycopene within them into a form our bodies can process a lot easier. This means that canned tomatoes have more nutritional benefits than the fresh variety thanks to the cooking and canning process.

Boiling vegetables. Most of us will have heard before that boiling vegetables like spinach is wrong because water soluble vitamins like vitamin C seep out during the process. However Jo reveals that antioxidant levels also lower when boiled. Instead, try steaming, sautéing or roasting your veg to keep it nutritious.

Don’t cook chopped garlic straightaway. If you put chopped or minced garlic in a hot pan as soon as you’ve prepared it, you stand little chance of absorbing any allicin, the beneficial compound that makes garlic such a fundamental part of a healthy diet. This is because it hasn’t had chance to activate, so leave it for ten minutes after preparing before putting it on the heat as this will give the enzyme a chance to do its thing.

Cutting carrots before cooking. We’re all guilty of this mistake at some point: cutting carrots before cooking them. While it seems like the logical thing to do, cooking them whole, then chopping them into your desired shape helps keep more nutrients in the little orange numbers. Jo adds that cooked carrots are better for you than in their raw form, as it helps break down the cell walls, which means the nutrients are easier to get to.

Some 7,700+ patients on Irish Hospital trolleys during May

    

It’s the highest May figure since records began

Over 7,700 patients were left waiting on trolleys for an inpatient bed last month – a 31% increase on the same period last year, new figures have shown.

According to the latest ‘Trolley/Ward Watch’ figures from the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO), 7,713 patients were left waiting on trolleys during May of this year compared to 5,891 during May of last year.

These are the highest May trolley figures seen since records began in 2006. In May of that year, 4,214 people were left waiting on trolleys, therefore last month’s figure of 7,713 represents an 83% increase.

The hospitals with the highest number of patients on trolleys last month included Dublin’s Beaumont Hospital (782), Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda (718), University Hospital Limerick (538) and University Hospital Galway (524).

The INMO pointed out that in recent weeks, two patients who were over 100 years old, were left waiting on trolleys for more than 24 hours. However, it insisted that ‘every day is the same inside Emergency Departments (EDs), with elderly people on trolleys lined up, head to toe, along small narrow corridors’.

The organisation said that there are not enough nurses to care for these patients and at this point, many of its members are ‘embarrassed to have to face patients and their families who have to suffer this indignity’.

INMO general secretary, Liam Doran, described the treatment of these elderly patients as ‘a damning indictment of our society’.

“While some investment has been made recently, it is only the tip of the iceberg. The Government as a whole needs to take responsibility for this ongoing crisis as we continue to see a deterioration in the figures month on month,” he commented.

He added that the stated target of having a reduction in the level of daily overcrowding in EDs by October 1 ‘is merely a pipe dream’, unless there is major investment in acute beds, step-down beds, community services and recruitment initiatives for nursing and other staff.

Six care workers in court for alleged assault of Áras Attracta patients

  

Case put back until July 14th to allow disclosure of TV footage and various documents

Six people appeared in court on Friday for allegedly assaulting patients who are intellectually disabled at the HSE-run Áras Attracta centre in Swinford, Co Mayo

Six people appeared in court on Friday for allegedly assaulting patients who are intellectually disabled at the HSE-run Áras Attracta centre in Swinford, Co Mayo.

The cases against all six, five women and a man, were put back until July 14th for mention by Judge Mary Devins at a sitting of Ballina District Court.

The cases against the defendants were put back to allow for disclosure of TV footage and various documents and papers that the State is seeking to rely on.

The six accused, Joan Gill (62), Dublin Road, Swinford; Patrick McLoughlin (56), Lalibella, Mayfield, Claremorris;Christina Delaney (35), Seefin, Lissatava, Hollymount;Kathleen King (56), Knockshanbally, Straide, Foxford; Joan Walsh (42), Carrowilkeen, Curry, Co Sligo and Anna Ywunsong Botsimbo (34), Lowpark Avenue, Charlestown, were all present for this morning’s brief court hearing.

An intensive garda investigation into allegations of assault was mounted following a Prime Time TV investigation late last year.

Footage, which was secretly filmed by an undercover reporter, showed residents at the centre being forced fed, physically restrained, shouted at and slapped.

The assaults allegedly occurred in November at what is known as ‘Bungalow 3’ in the Áras Attracta complex.

One of the accused, Ms Gill, faces five assault charges, the others one each.

Judge Devins put back all the cases to July 14th for mention to allow disclosure be provided. A date for a full hearing will be decided thereafter.

Solicitors for five of the accused requested that an application for free legal aid be deferred until a later date.

On the instructions of the DPP charges against all six defendants have been brought under Section 2 of the Non Fatal Offences Against the Person Act.

The penalties for conviction are a fine of €1,905 or six months in prison.

The State was represented at the hearing by the State Solicitor for Mayo, Vincent Deane.

Polar bears develop a taste for dolphins as the Arctic warms up

   

Norwegian scientists have seen polar bears eating dolphins in the Arctic for the first time ever and blame global warming for the bears expanding their diet.

Polar bears feed mainly on seals but Jon Aars at the Norwegian Polar Institute has photographed dolphins being devoured by a bear and published his findings in the latest edition of Polar Research this month.

“It is likely that new species are appearing in the diet of polar bears due to climate change because new species are finding their way north,” he told AFP.

The first incident he documented was in April 2014 when his team came across a polar bear feeding on two white-beaked dolphins.

Although dolphins are regularly seen in the Norwegian Arctic in the summer when the ice has melted, they have never been observed during winter or spring when the sea is usually still covered in sheets of ice.

But Norwegian scientists have reported a strong retreat of ice and two nearly ice-free winters in recent years which they said could have attracted the dolphins further north, where they probably became trapped by the sudden arrival of dense ice blown into a fjord by strong northerly winds.

Aars said the bear he photographed had probably caught the two dolphins when they surfaced to breathe through a tiny hole in the ice.

“Even if they saw the bear, the dolphins did not necessarily have any other choice,” he said.

In the photos a skinny old male bear devours one of the dolphins and appeared to have stored a second one under snow for later – something which scientist had never seen before.

“We think that he tried to cover the dolphin in snow in the hope that other bears, foxes or birds would have less of a chance of finding it. Maybe to be able to eat it a day or two later, once he had digested the first one,” Aars said.

After the first incident in 2014, a further five cases of dolphins stranded or captured and then eaten by bears have been reported.

“I don’t think that this signifies a great upheaval” in the diet of the carnivores, Aars said. “It’s just that the polar bear is coming into contact with species they have not been used to meeting until now.”

Polar bears are opportunistic predators that are also known to feed on small whales if the opportunity arises.     

Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG update

Aer Lingus sale will create jobs, so says the Minister for Transport Donoghue

  

Opposition sharply critical of move to sell 25.1% State stake in Ireland’s airline.

Minister for Trasport Paschal Donohoe: “It is envisaged that by the end of 2016, a new net 150 jobs will have been created in Aer Lingus , rising to a new net total of 635 jobs by 2020.”

The sale of the State’s Aer Lingus share would create jobs, Minister for Transport Paschal Donohoe told the Dáil. “It is envisaged that by the end of 2016, a new net 150 jobs will have been created in Aer Lingus , rising to a new net total of 635 jobs by 2020,” he said.

The Minister said the Aer Lingus brand would be protected and its head office retained in Ireland. The airline would operate all its scheduled international air transport services under the Aer Lingus name, he added.

Mr Donohoe said the sale would strengthen Aer Lingus’s competitive positions, reduce risk to the company and provide it with the opportunity with a larger group to face the challenges in a changing aviation environment.

It would promote Ireland’s wider connectivity, he added, and could bring growth to our airports. It was anticipated the move would bring benefits to both Aer Lingus’s long-haul and short-haul networks within the IAG group.

“There will be a focus on sustaining and growing routes from Dublin, Cork, Shannon and Knock,” Mr Donohoe added.

He said Aer Lingus was no longer our national flag carrier. That decision was taken nine years ago when 75 per cent of the shareholding was sold.

“Nor is the State the majority shareholder in the company. We own a minority 25.1 per cent shareholding and I want to use the opportunity now to maximise the benefit of that residual shareholding to put the company on a firm footing for the future while protecting key general national interests.”

Fianna Fáil spokesman Timmy Dooley said he could not get his head around the necessity, from the Minister’s perspective, to sell the remaining stake in the airline. A decision was taken in 2006 to change Aer Lingus’s semi-State status and trade it publicly, thereby ensuring it would be run on a commercial basis in the best interest of all, including workers, passengers and the country, he added.

“For the life of me, I cannot understand how the Government has failed to realise the importance of retaining the shareholding and having control, although not absolute control, over the direction of the company or an input into it,” Mr Dooley said.

Aer Lingus had successfully emerged from the worst financial crisis in the State’s history, or one of the deepest in the OECD, as a lean and growth-oriented company with very significant cash reserves to take on the kinds of challenges that would arise.

Sinn Féin spokesman Dessie Ellis said it was very sad to express an opinion on what was a done deal that nobody outside of IAG and Fine Gael wanted.

“The Government has made its decision behind the closed doors in a shrewd media operation which shows blatant disregard for the Oireachtas and its role in dealing with issues of such importance,” he added. “No matter what anyone says, the Government will seek to sell its share in Aer Lingus and the weak and cowed Labour Party members will go along with it.”

Diversity of opinion’ not welcome in our mainstream political parties?

Says Lucinda Creighton on Averil Power’s treatment

  

Lucinda Creighton left & Averil Power.

Fianna Fail’s treatment of senator Averil Power illustrates that “diversity of opinion” is not welcome in the mainstream political parties, according to former minister Lucinda Creighton.

The Renua leader today said the events surrounding Ms Power’s departure from Fianna Fáil “sums up everything I know about politics”.

And Ms Creighton admitted that her new party “wouldn’t shut the door” to Ms Power but said they have had no conversations about her joining Renua.

“To my mind it sums up everything I already know about politics or at least the old political establishment, which is that diversity of opinion on really sensitive social issues, that different people have strong opinions on, that diversity of opinion is just not welcome in the old parties,” Ms Creighton said.

“The passion of individuals like Averil Power is something to be welcomed in politics, not something to be feared. So that’s my view on the matter,” she added.

Separately today, Ms Creighton criticised Taoiseach Enda Kenny over conduct towards other deputies in the Dail.

During ‘Leaders’ Questions’ today, Mr Kenny accused Independent TD Clare Daly of going on a “rant” about the proposed sale of the Government’s 25.1pc stake in Aer Lingus.

Later, Ms Creighton said the Taoiseach should “show a suitable respect for our parliament”, adding that Mr Kenny spoke in a “patronising way”.

She added: “I think certainly the Taoiseach does not do himself any justice in speaking to people in that way.”

Earlier in the Dail, Ms Creighton expressed frustration after the Taoiseach did not respond to her claims that Independent TD Catherine Murphy was being “silenced” by Siteserv.

It was reported this week that Siteserv wrote to the Ceann Comhairle seeking tat the Dail record be amended to address what it described as “unfound” and “false” accusations in recent speeches by Ms Murphy.

Ms Creighton called on the Taoiseach to “reject attempts to silence members of the House” by Siteserv and businessman Denis O’Brien.

Ireland’d HSE patients are too frightened to complain ?

Warns the Ombudsman

    Ombudsman Peter Tyndall

Patients also believe complaining wouldn’t make a difference?

Irish patients are afraid to complain about how they are treated by hospitals over concerns their standard of care will be affected.

An investigation by the Ombudsman found that many people refused to lodge complains against hospital staff because they feared repercussions for themselves or their loved ones.

The report, from Ombudsman Peter Tyndall, calls for an independent complaints service for patients.

“I wonder if the tragic events seen in Aras Attracta and Portlaoise hospital could have been avoided if those complaints were dealt with properly,” he said.

A large proportion of those surveyed also believed complaining made no difference.

Speaking at the launch of the report, the Ombudsman recommended that the HSE and each hospital put an action plan in place to “ensure that people have access to an effective independent advocacy service.”

The survey was carried out because Mr Tyndall was concerned that his office was receiving fewer complaints compared to other health service ombudsmans in other countries.

“Despite the high number of interactions with our hospitals, relatively few people complain when they are unhappy with the service they receive. Compared with other jurisdictions, complaints to the HSE and to my Office are very low. I want to find out why this is,” he said in 2014.

Complaints to the ombudsman about healthcare represent 20% all complaints received. In Northern Ireland this figure is over 60%, while in the UK it is closer to 80%.

Galway locals build a raft to help swans raise their cygnets

   

Five cygnets have now survived

Hundreds of people in Co Galway have been following the progress of five cygnets born in Oranmore a few days ago.

Locals assisted in the process, by installing a special raft to allow a pair of swans to breed safely.

Engineer Peter Butler led the effort after hearing about how high tides had submerged the swans’ nest year after year.

Using recycled materials, including plastic bottles and wooden pallets, he designed a raft that would withstand tidal fluctuations and allow swans the 40-day window they need to hatch their eggs.

The birds took to the structure and have been nesting on it since early April.

The first cygnet hatched last week, followed by seven others since then. So far, five have survived.

Their parents have been keeping a close eye on their offspring and fending off gulls, herons and wild animals.

It has emerged that the pen, or mother swan, was herself rescued six years ago by volunteers from the local swan sanctuary.

She was cared for by Mary Joyce of the Galway and Claddagh Swan Rescue group for a number of months, before being tagged and released  in October 2009.

The organisation has appealed to people not to feed the swans or the cygnets, as they are able to fend for themselves and do not need human assistance to eat.

The baby swans will spend the next few months on the estuary at the edge of Oranmore before setting off on their own.

Locals hope to leave the raft in place to give the swans a chance to repeat their successful mating next year.

Ireland’s inbound traffic numbers show a big increase

     

The volume of people travelling to Ireland was significantly higher between February and April this year than the same period last year, according to official figures on Wednesday.

The figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) showed that an extra 212,000 trips to Ireland took place during the three-month period.

Overseas visitor numbers were 13.5% higher than between February and April 2014.

Inbound visitors primarily came from Britain and other European countries. Trips by North Americans were up 20.2%, or 237,600, in the period.

Tourism is one of Ireland’s most important economic sectors and has significant potential to play a further role in the country’s economic revival. In 2014, tourism was responsible for a 12% increase in earnings and a 9% increase in overseas visitor numbers.

For 2015, Ireland projects an increase of 6% in overseas tourists.

The Earth’s Ozone is now in Good Shape, say Scientists 

  The arctic ozone without the Montreal Protocol (left) and following its implementation (right) on 26 March 2011.

Earth’s ozone is in good shape, according to scientists, thanks to the Montreal Protocol, which has helped us avoid severe ozone depletion.

After years of dangerous depletion that left a giant hole over Antarctica, our ozone is finally recovering. Once scientists realized that bromine-containing halons and chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs, were eating away at the Earth’s protective layer, leaders enacted the 1987 Montreal Protocol banning such chemicals.

Now we are reaping the rewards, with the ozone layer in much better shape than it would have been without the United Nations (UN) treaty.

“Our research confirms the importance of the Montreal Protocol and shows that we have already had real benefits. We knew that it would save us from large ozone loss ‘in the future’, but in fact we are already past the point when things would have become noticeably worse,” lead author Professor Martyn Chipperfield, from theSchool of Earth & Environment at the University of Leeds, said in a press release.

Concentrations of these harmful substances can survive in the atmosphere for many years. However, the good news is that concentrations peaked in 1993 and have subsequently started shrinking.

In the new study, the researchers used a state-of-the-art 3D computer model of atmospheric chemistry to investigate what would have happened to the ozone layer if the Montreal Protocol had not been put in place.

The researchers suggest that the hole in the ozone layer over the Antarctic would have grown in size by an additional 40 percent by 2013. Their model also suggests that had ozone-depleting substances continued to increase, the ozone layer would have become significantly thinner over other parts of the globe.

Such would have been the case especially during extreme events like the exceptionally cold Arctic winter of 2010-2011.

Without the Montreal Protocol, the new study reveals that a very large ozone hole over the Arctic would have occurred during that cold winter and smaller Arctic ozone holes would have become a regular occurrence.

According to the team behind this new study, scientists must continue to closely monitor the situation to ensure all potential threats to the ozone layer are mitigated.