Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG update

AIB to cut variable mortgage rates by 0.25% for all customers

Bank reports H1 profits of €1.2bn on back of significant writebacks

  

AIB said on Friday that it will cut its variable mortgage interest rate for both new and existing customers by 0.25 %, as it announced first half pre-tax profits of some €1.2bn, up by 50% on the same period in 2014.

AIB said on Friday that it will cut its variable mortgage interest rate for both new and existing customers by 0.25 per cent, as it announced first half pre-tax profits of some €1.2bn, up by 50 per cent on the same period in 2014. It is the third rate reduction from the bank in recent months and follows pressure from Government and public interest groups alike to bring variable rates in line with Euro zone norms.

Customers on a € 200,000 mortgage should save €27 a month or € 325 a year from the latest cut AIB said, which will bring the bank’s standard variable rate down to 3.65%; the rate at Haven will fall to 3.72%; and at EBS to 3.7%. Some 156,000 customers across AIB, EBS and Haven are expected to benefit from the reduction which will come into effect on October 1st. AIB’s chief executive, Bernard Byrne, said, “We committed to keep mortgage rates under constant review and to reduce these rates for both new and existing customers if and when AIB’s funding conditions allowed. Fortunately, we are again in a position to do so today.’’

The bank also announced its H1 results for the six months to June 20th 2015, revealing pre-tax profits rose by €0.8 bn to €1.2bn, on the back of signifcant writebacks of some €540m. AIB said the writebacks reflected “progress in case by case restructuring of impaired loans and the improved economic environment”.

The bank’s net interest margin, excluding the eligible liabilities guarantee (ELG), rose to 1.92 per cent, up from 1.60 per cent in the same period in 2014. Fees and commissions rose by 6 per cent due to increased levels of customer activity. Lending rose by 21 per cent to €6.9bn, while impaired loans fell to € 18bn, down € 4.2bn since December 2014 and by € 11bn since December 2013.

AIB chairman Richard Pym said: “The financial outcome for the half-year is significantly ahead of the expectations we had at the beginning of the year and reinforces our endeavours to see all of the €20.8 billion invested in AIB by Irish taxpayers repaid. Whilst any decision on a future sale of AIB is entirely one for the Irish Government, the results so far this year significantly improve the prospects for a successful transaction whenever it happens.”

The bank said its loan to deposit ratio of 99 per cent was broadly unchanged since December 2014, and net loans were also broadly in line with December 2014 at €64bn.

Minister for Finance Michael Noonan welcomed the results, noting the performance puts the taxpayer in a “strong position” to recoup its € 20.8bn investment.

“I welcome the strong set of results announced by AIB today and their confirmation that they are well positioned to start returning material amounts of capital to the Irish State. This morning’s comment from the bank’s CEO that subject to regulatory approval, the bank is strong enough to do this now, means that the State’s finances should receive a significant benefit in the coming year independent of any decision to sell some of our shares in the bank.”

Inspection of children’s homes is criticised by Ombudsman

Monitoring appears to be ‘discretionary’

  

The way in which children’s residential homes are inspected and monitored has been severely criticised by the Ombudsman for Children.

There are currently around 100 private and voluntary children’s residential centres in Ireland, which cater for some 340 children. They are monitored by Tusla – the Child and Family Agency – and formerly the HSE.

However, an investigation by the Ombudsman found major gaps in how these centres are registered, monitored and inspected. These gaps included:
-Delays in inspections due to a shortage of inspectors
-Little evidence of unannounced visits
-No evidence of visits at night or weekends
-No national protocol on how often monitoring visits should take place
-No agreed policy on access to inspection reports, which are not published in any format.

In fact, the Ombudsman, Dr Niall Muldoon, said that the monitoring of these centres appeared to be viewed as a ‘discretionary activity’. He has recommended that inspections should be transferred to the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) ‘without delay’.

HIQA is already responsible for the inspection and monitoring of State-run children’s residential centres, with Tusla providing the same service within non-statutory children’s centres.

“The process of inspecting, registering and monitoring these residential centres is an important safeguard for children who are living there. Failure to carry out these functions effectively can potentially have an adverse effect on those children. By seeking to have HIQA take over this process I am looking to create confidence in the independence and consistency of the process for overseeing the homes of some of our most vulnerable children,” Dr Muldoon commented.

As part of the investigation, the Ombudsman assessed inspection reports from 49 centres and monitoring reports from 60 centres. These all related to the period between January 1, 2012 and August 31, 2013.

“It is hoped that this investigation will positively influence the ongoing reforms of Ireland’s child and family support services. Given the importance of independent inspection and of ensuring that all children in the care of the State receive the same standard of care, it is important that the transfer of these functions to HIQA is progressed without delay,” Dr Muldoon added.

Meanwhile back in Co Mayo:

Aras Attracta unit given 28 days to avoid closure

Hiqa issues closure notice for five bungalows at Co Mayo facility

  

Part of the controversial Áras Attracta home for people with learning disabilities has been given 28 days in which to make improvements by the State’s health watchdog or else face closure.

The Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa) has issued the facility with a notice of a proposal to cancel the registration of one of the centres on the campus.

The notice was issued last Tuesday following a two-day unannounced inspection by Hiqa staff of the facility in Swinford, Co Mayo, on July 12th and 13th. This followed previous critical reports on the facility published by Hiqa over the last two years.

The closure notice affects one of the three centres at Áras Attracta, comprising five bungalows. Bungalow 3, which featured in an undercover television documentary last year showing residents being abused, is one of the units affected.

The issues raised in relation to the centre largely relate to governance shortcomings and poor management, it is understood.

The HSE, which operates the facility, has 28 days in which to show it is remedying the fault identified in order to avoid closure.

Staff were expected to be briefed on Thursday on developments.

Six people are facing charges of assaulting residents as a result of a garda investigation begun after last year’s documentary, which showed residents being force-fed, slapped, kicked, physically restrained and shouted at.

Homeless families kicked out of temporary accommodation as council credit card is maxed out

  

The homeless crisis in Dublin

It has emerged that a number of homeless people were kicked out of temporary accommodation in Dublin this week after the credit card used by the local authorities to secure temporary accommodation was maxed out.

The incident highlights how vulnerable many people have become in the homeless crisis gripping Dublin.

Cllr Jack Chambers (FF) was contacted by one woman who was forced to sleep in an industrial estate with her three children last night as a result.

The Homeless Executive, which processes all homeless accommodation requests on behalf of the four local authorities in Dublin, have confirmed that their credit card was maxed out for two days.

Cllr Chambers called it an extremely disturbing development.

“Homeless families were literally turfed out onto the streets this week because the funds were not there to provide temporary accommodation.

“This is a damning indictment of the Government’s attitude to the homelessness crisis,” he said.

Cllr. Chambers said that Dublin is facing a shortfall of €18.5 million in funding from the Department of the Environment for homeless services this year.

“This will have a ripple effect right across the Capital.  Unless it is addressed, more and more families will be forced to sleep rough,” he said

The family of man who died on daughter’s wedding day express thanks

‘To all who helped on tragic occasion’

   

Kilronan Castle.

The family of a man who collapsed and died on his daughter’s wedding day have expressed their thanks to everybody who helped on the tragic occasion.

Sean McCauley (70) walked his daughter Anne up the aisle, just hours before he collapsed and tragically passed away.

The tragedy struck the McCauley family of Co Donegal on their big day at Kilronan Castle in Ballyfarnon, Co Roscommon.

Mr McCauley’s brother-in-law Liam McGowan expressed thanks on behalf of the family to all who helped on the tragic occasion and noted in particular the attendance of three members of the staff of Kilronan Castle Hotel at Sean McCauley’s funeral.

“Given time, I’m sure the family will get over their great loss”, he told the inquest.

The band had finished up playing at the wedding reception and the disco had started after midnight on May 17 last.

“We were having a great day and about 1.20am the disco had started and we went to say goodbye to Sean and the family. Sean was on the dance floor with his wife and as I turned away a man behind me went to shake Sean’s hand”, Mr McGowan said.

At that moment Sean collapsed and emergency medical help was summoned.

Dr David Swan, who was a wedding guest, attended him as well as two paramedics who arrived following an emergency call for an ambulance.

The medics worked on Sean for 30 minutes, but he was unresponsive and he was pronounced dead shortly afterwards.

Consultant pathologist, Dr Caroline Brodie carried out a subsequent autopsy and told the inquest that Sean had a previous history of cardiac problems. He had suffered a heart attack.

He had a complete blockage of the right coronary artery and Dr Brodie determined the cause of death to be cardiac failure.

The inquest jury returned a verdict in accordance with the medical evidence and Roscommon Coroner, Desmond O’Connor expressed his sincere sympathy to the McCauley family.

Mr O’Connor described it as “an unfortunate and very sad start to married life” for Mr McCauley’s daughter and he hoped that the family could put it behind them in time and look forward to better days.

Mr McGowan said the family wanted to express their thanks to all who had helped on the tragic occasion.

New shrimp-like species found off southwest coast of Ireland

Deep-sea crustaceans have ability to strip a pig carcass of meat in a matter of days

   

The paracallisoma alberti species of amphipod.

Two new species of shrimp-like crustaceans have been discovered off the south-west coast of Ireland by British researchers.

The two species are amphipods, small scavenging crustaceans around 3mm in length. Their discovery was reported in the scientific journal Zootaxa, in a paper by researchers Dr Tammy Horton and Dr Michael Thurston of the National Oceanography Centre in Southhampton.

What the researchers say is most notable about the newly identifed species, given the names Paracallisoma idioxenos and Haptocallisoma lemarete, is their scavenging patterns.

Amphipods generally move in swarms to strip the carcasses of marine animals including whales and fish, and these new species have the ability to strip a pig carcass in a matter of days.

Dr Horton named the species in honour of the late taxonomist Roger Bamber, who died in February of this year.

“I gave the species name ‘lemarete’ to one of the amphipods because it translates from Greek to ‘Bold and Excellent’, which is the motto on Roger Bamber’s coat of arms.”

Dr Horton described amphipods as “incredibly diverse and adaptable”, with over 10,000 known species.

Professor Andrew Gooday at the National Oceanography Centre said that amphipods like those discovered are highly common and found in large numbers. “They occur from shallow waters to the deepest part of the ocean.”

These newly discovered species are only found in deep waters, over 2.5 km below sea level.

“There’s no danger of paddling in the sea and encountering flesh-eating crustaceans,” Prof Gooday added.  

Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG

The two-year-old boy who climbed from his cot,

and walked a mile from his home, & reunited with his parents at 4am.

  

A young man has been hailed a hero after helping to reunite a toddler with his family after the boy dramatically disappeared from the family home in the early hours of this morning.

The two-and-a-half-year-old opened the front door of his home in Garryowen and walked about a mile along the Dublin Road at around 2.20am.

A 21-year old man found the boy wandering along the road and alerted Gardaí.

Gardaí at Henry Street station took the boy into protective custody as they tried to ascertain where his family lived.

According to Gardaí, a door was left open at the boy’s house which was what led investigating officers to the parents of the toddler who were completely unaware the toddler had left home.

Gardaí woke the occupants, who were shocked to learn that the boy had climbed out of his cot before letting himself out the front door. The boy, who turns three this summer, was reunited with his shocked but delighted parents at around 4am in the morning.

According to Gardaí he was unharmed.

“He was absolutely fine thankfully, nothing untoward happened, and his mother was delighted and relieved to be reunited with him,” Chief Supt Sheahan said.

He also praised the actions of the hero passer-by who alerted the gardaí and who went on to search a number of estates near where he had found the child.

“That little boy is incredibly lucky. It’s amazing he managed to get out of the house like that, and it’s even more fortunate he wasn’t knocked down by a car or worse, kidnapped,” a local man said at hearing the news.

(IMHO) Group reports massive upsurge in mortgage deals

 

€195,000 mortgage write down believed to be the largest so far?

A group involved in the brokering of deals between banks and distressed mortgage holders has reported a “monumental upsurge” in activity.

The Irish Mortgage Holders Organisation (IMHO) said it had recently negotiated 97 deals involving AIB customers which included some form of debt write-down.

In one case, involving a couple in Cork, the bank had written off €195,000 in mortgage debt while allowing the couple and their two children remain in the house.

The deal is believed to be one of the largest mortgage write-downs agreed by the lender.

The couple had originall y borrowed €478,000 to purchase their home.

Under the terms of the deal, the family will now have to service a new 30-year variable rate mortgage of €200,000, with €100,000 being warehoused and €195,000 written off.

“There’s been a monumental upsurge in activity” related to mortgage debt, the IMHO’s David Hall said.

“After six years of banks doing nothing, we have banks doing a combination of good and bad things from repossessions to restructuring deals.”

He said his organisation was dealing with just over 2,000 clients from AIB or its building society EBS as well as 360 KBC bank customers.

However, he said hundreds of customers were agreeing debt write-down deals with the bank independently of the brokerages.

AIB recently announced a new split-mortgage product involving some form of automatic debt write-down.

Under the deal, eligible customers will have their loan broken into three tranches.

The first part, which the customer will be expected to repay, will be based on the current market value of their home, while another will be warehoused, interest free, for settlement at a later date, with a final tranche The number of people who cannot afford food in Ireland has doubled

A worrying statistic from today’s OECD report.

A major report from the OECD has highlighted the growing problem of food poverty in Ireland.

       

Among figures about unemployment, falling incomes and suicides, sits a stark number counting those individuals and families who experience hunger.

A graph shows that the percentage of people in Ireland who say that they cannot afford food has more than doubled to 9 per cent in five years.

In 2006/7, the corresponding data showed a figure of 4.2 per cent.

According to the report, reduced spending on food is one of the main causes of food insecurity, a term that describes a situation where inadequate access to food does not allow all members of a household to sustain a healthy lifestyle.

The OECD noted that the US holds very detailed statistics on food insecurity that are not matched in Europe. However, it said there are unofficial estimates that growing numbers of families and children suffer from hunger or food insecurity in economically distressed countries.

In Greece, 10 per cent of students fall into the category.

Scientists announce new dinosaur discovery

  

The dinosaur had feathers on its arms?

Scientists in the US have announced the discovery of a new species of dinosaur. The fossils offer further clues to how the dinosaurs became extinct 66 million years ago.

Anzu wyliei is a strange bird-like creature that has a bony crest on top of a beaky head and a long tail like a lizard. It was identified from the partial remains of three skeletons collected in North and South Dakota.

The first detailed report about the Anzu wyliei is published today by the journal PLOS ONE.

“We had inklings that there might be such a creature out there, but now with these bones we have 80% of the skeleton and can really look in detail at the structure of this animal and make inferences about its biology,” says Hans Sues, curator of vertebrate palaeontology in the department of paleobiology at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington DC.

“Anzu is really bizarre, even by dinosaur standards.

“The skull has this extraordinarily tall and thin crest with a snout and a huge beak with sharp edges and a strange sliding jaw joint” that could be used to cut up vegetation and meat, he says.

Diverse communities

The size of a small car, the dinosaur also had claws and feathers on its upper arms. It belongs to a group of dinosaurs known asOviraptorosauria. Most evidence of their existence comes from fossils discovered in Central and East Asia.

The Anzu bones are the first detailed evidence that oviraptorosaurs also lived in North America.

The Anzu fossils were found in a geological formation known as Hell Creek which has been extensively explored and is the source of many dinosaur fossils discovered in North America.

Scientists have nicknamed it ‘the chicken from Hell’ because of its appearance and where it was found.

The site is important because it was formed in the last two million years of the Cretaceous period, just before dinosaurs were wiped out by an asteroid strike.

Many researchers have argued that dinosaurs were already dying out because of climate change. But according to Dr Sues and his team, the discovery of Anzu offers further proof that many species were still evolving and dinosaur communities were diverse and flourishing.

“This is consistent with the idea that a mass extinction was caused by the great asteroid impact 66 million years ago. It’s clear that dinosaurs were still quite diverse until the very end,” says Dr Sues.

A thousand species of dinosaurs have been discovered so far. Scientists believe there are many thousands more waiting to be identified, even in heavily excavated formations such as Hell Creek.

The discovery of another species from the site was announced in December last year,

A small raptor called Acheroraptor temertyorum. And scientists have only begun to explore potential dinosaur graves in Central Asia.

Bones in ground

But there’s no magic formula for discovery according to Tyler Lyson, who found one of the Anzu skeletons in 2009 on his uncle’s ranch in North Dakota.

“We were just walking along when we saw some dinosaur bones poking out of the ground,” he says. “I knew right away that they belonged to a meat-eating dinosaur because meat-eating dinosaurs have hollow bones, and these bones were hollow. We carefully made a plaster jacket to wrap the specimen and get it back to the lab. After several hours cleaning it, we knew we had found something new. It was unlike anything else we had ever seen before.”

Dr Lyson is part of the Smithsonian team and the founder of the Marmarth Research Foundation, which promotes the study of fossils. He discovered his first dinosaur bone when he was just six years old. The other two Anzu skeletons, which include a skull, were discovered by private collectors.

“You just have to spend time out there,” he says. “The bones come to the surface and then break up into little pieces. You get a trail of broken bits of bone which you follow, and if you’re lucky you’ll see bones sticking out of the side of the hill – and that’s exactly what we found here.”

Although the Anzu skeletons were discovered several years ago, scientists work in “deep time”, says Dr Lyson. Bones have to be catalogued and compared with other specimens while scientific evidence has to be peer-reviewed. It can take a decade before any official announcement is made.

All three Anzu skeletons are housed at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, which collaborated with the Smithsonian to identify the new species.

How people can live a long life

  

If you want to live a long and healthy life, then ditch high heels, switch from fresh fruit to frozen — and take off all your clothes – these are Dr David Agus’s surprising tips.

According to a new book by one of the world’s top cancer specialists, these small changes could dramatically increase your longevity.

Strip off and go naked

  Take a good look at yourself naked in front of a mirror — front and back. This will help you  spot trouble on the horizon in the form of body oddities you didn’t have before and signs of skin cancer.

And once in a while, take a visual inventory of every square inch of yourself, including your hair, nails and the inside of your mouth.

Bin your high heels

Uncomfortable shoes cause unnecessary inflammation in your feet that can have an impact on your whole system. Inflammation has been linked to some of our most troubling degenerative diseases, including heart disease, Alzheimer’s, cancer, auto-immune diseases, diabetes and accelerated ageing.

Wake up with a coffee

Drinking coffee or tea in moderation has long been shown to confer positive benefits on our health.

Eat at the same time

If you don’t eat when your body anticipates food, it will sabotage your efforts to lose or maintain an ideal weight.

Have a flu shot

Just one to two weeks of an inflammatory storm, which is  what will take place if  you contract flu, can increase your lifetime risk for obesity, heart attack, stroke and cancer.

People still falsely think the vaccine has side effects, that it doesn’t work, can cause the flu or  even contains toxins or poisons. All this is rubbish!

Stand up

There is a profound link between more time sitting and   a greater incidence of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and early death.

Way back in the Fifties, a comparison of London’s double-decker bus drivers and conductors in the Fifties found that the ticket takers, who climbed stairs all day, had a much lower incidence of heart attacks than the drivers.

Stop slouching

Apart from neck and back problems, poor posture can also cause headaches, arthritis, poor circulation, muscle aches and pains, difficulty breathing, indigestion, constipation, joint stiffness, fatigue, neurological problems and poor physical function in general.

Take aspirin daily

Many high-quality research studies have confirmed that the use of aspirin not only substantially reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease.

But make sure that you discuss it with your doctor first as there are side effects such as stomach bleeding.

Frozen fruit & veg

We may be able to access pretty much any type of food all year long, but it comes at a cost: nutrition.

By the time most of it reaches your supermarket, it doesn’t contain nearly the same amount of nutrients as when the crop was picked.

Unless you can buy truly fresh local produce that’s in season, opt for frozen fruits and vegetables.

Avoid vitamins

Many studies on groups of more than a thousand people in the past few decades have shown that taking vitamin supplements is correlated with an increased risk of serious diseases such as cancer, and it produces little benefit to health.

The body likes to create free radicals to attack ‘bad’ cells, including cancerous ones.

If you block this by taking copious amounts of vitamins, especially those touted as antioxidants, you block your body’s natural ability to  control itself.

Have children

If you have children you’ll be more likely to live longer than your childless counterparts.

That’s because raising a child compels us to remain active and mentally challenged.

Sip a glass of wine

Moderate alcohol intake, especially red wine, can reduce the risk for heart disease.

Aim for no more than one drink a day if you’re a woman and two if you’re a man.

GIVE US A SMILE

Smiling will boost your mood. It will trigger the release of pain-killing, brain-happy endorphins and seratonin, which reduce harmful stress levels.

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