News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Wednesday 15th February 2017

Another Garda whistle-blower demands inclusion of their case in public inquiry

Keith Harrison claims he and his girlfriend endured surveillance and referrals to Tusla?

    

A second Garda whistle-blower has demanded that his case is included in a public inquiry into an alleged smear campaign against Sgt Maurice McCabe.

Another Garda whistle-blower has demanded that his case is included in a public inquiry into an alleged smear campaign against Sgt Maurice McCabe.

Keith Harrison claims he and his girlfriend endured covert and overt surveillance, referrals to Tusla – the Child and Family Agency, and that they were the victim of rumour, innuendo and malicious falsehoods.

Garda Harrison issued a lengthy statement through his solicitor after Taoiseach Enda Kenny confirmed a tribunal was being set up into the scandal of unfounded and false sex abuse claims being peddled against Sgt McCabe.

Mr Harrison claimed there is an “orchestrated system and culture” among senior management of the force that dictates the treatment of whistleblowers.

Mr Harrison said: “The efforts of this Government to restrict the inquiry/commission of investigation to the very traumatic story of Sgt McCabe absolutely ensures we will not get to the bottom of the culture of management failures and ill-treatment of whistleblowers within An Garda Síochána. ”

Effectively forced

The Government was effectively forced into ordering the tribunal with hearings to be public.

The decision was taken after Mr McCabe and his wife Lorraine said they would not accept any investigation into the controversy being held behind closed doors.

“There’s nothing worse in this country than to be called a sex abuser, nothing worse,” the Taoiseach told the Dáil.

The terms of reference of the tribunal are expected to be finalised in the next 48 hours, with the Government now under deepening pressure to extend it to include other whistle-blowers.

Who is Sgt Maurice McCabe?

In 2008, Sgt Maurice McCabe raised concerns about quashing of penalty points. In 2012, he was banned from using Pulse, the Garda system through which he identified questionable quashing. Controversy over his treatment led to resignations of Garda commissioner Martin Callinan and minister for justice Alan Shatter. In due course, Sgt McCabe was vindicated over his main complaint.

The Garda whistle-blowers: We found this helpful a Yes No

Garda Harrison, who was previously nominated for a Scott Medal for bravery but has been on extended sick leave, was stationed in Athlone when he stopped a colleague on suspicion of drink-driving in 2009.

He also raised concerns about drug-dealing investigations.

In the statement issued on behalf of Mr Harrison and his partner Marisa Simms, their solicitor claimed that since then both he and his family suffered victimisation, bullying, and intimidation.

Disciplinary action?

He has also faced disciplinary action and threatened criminal prosecution.

The officer was prosecuted for having no insurance on his car and he was reported to Tusla.

Garda Harrison has spoken out before and some of his claims have been put on the record in the Dáil.

“It is our belief that senior management within An Garda Síochána set out to attack and destroy our family because I sought to speak out about malpractice within the force,” Mr Harrison said.

“In doing so they tried to discredit me, and also reported ‘concerns’ regarding the wellbeing of my partner’s children, leading to a Tusla investigation, which revealed no risk whatsoever.”

Garda Harrison said his treatment bears similarities to the experience of Sgt McCabe and his family.

“It is clear to us the incidents contained in the disclosures of Supt (David) Taylor and Sgt McCabe are not isolated but rather, along with our experience, identifies a common approach within the senior management of An Garda Síochána to whistleblowers,” Mr Harrison said.

Under pressure

Amid the second whistle-blower going public, the Government is under pressure for Ministers, including the Taoiseach, Tánaiste and Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald and Minister for Children Katherine Zappone, to formally explain what they knew and when they knew it, regarding the McCabe affair.

The sergeant was at the centre of an unfounded and false report on a Tusla file of an allegation of sex abuse against a colleague’s daughter.

A counsellor working on behalf of the agency has claimed the error was made when details from a different case were cut and pasted on to a file.

Sgt McCabe has rejected an apology issued by the Health Service Executive at the weekend.

A horrific ordeal?

And in a four-page statement issued on Monday, Sgt McCabe accused Garda Commissioner Noirin O’Sullivan of privately discrediting him while publicly declaring her support over his horrific ordeal.

The officer claimed the Garda chief’s lawyers set out to discredit him at the O’Higgins Commission which investigated and vindicated a series of allegations by Sgt McCabe of negligence in policing in the Cavan-Monaghan district.

Irish Cabinet approves new Irish drink-driving laws

    

The Cabinet has approved new laws that will automatically ban all those caught drink driving from the roads.

Currently, first-time offenders are not necessarily disqualified and can pay a fine and get three penalty points.

Transport Minister Shane Ross said that this sends out the wrong road safety message.

Welcoming the decision to approve the General Scheme of a Road Traffic (Fixed Penalty – Drink Driving) Bill 2017, Minister Ross said: “The evidence shows that despite a perception to the contrary, drink driving continues to be a very serious issue in this country.

“We can no longer be ambivalent in our attitude toward this destructive practice.”

“What I am now proposing is that the existing provision allowing people to get penalty points rather than a disqualification for drink driving sends the wrong message and should go.

“Instead of three penalty points, such drivers will get a three-month disqualification. This is quite proportionate.

“Drink driving is serious, and potentially fatal. Even a small amount of alcohol can impair people’s reactions, and that cannot be tolerated when people are behind the wheel of a car.”

The Minister expressed his hope that this Bill can be passed quickly and without amendment.

Minister Ross added: “It is important to get it out there and working, and with it the message that drink driving will no longer be without serious consequences.

“This is an important step on the road to enacting what will be a focused, timely and urgently needed piece of legislation which will ultimately save lives.”

The General Scheme will now be submitted to the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel for formal drafting, with a view to its publication as soon as possible.

In line with Government policy, the Minister will also refer the General Scheme to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport, Tourism and Sport for its consideration.

New Irish tenancy laws confuse both the tenants and landlords

     

The Planning and Development (Housing) and Residential Tenancies Act 2016, announced before Christmas, aimed to bring a greater level of predictability to the rental market. However, confusion remains for both tenants and landlords.

Housing Minister Simon Coveney last month announced an extension of the existing list of rent pressure zones (RPZs). The list now includes most of Galway City as well as 23 smaller commuter towns, including Cork City suburbs such as Douglas and Ballincollig.

While tenants will welcome the new measures in a climate of rapidly rising rents, many landlords see them as curtailing their potential rental income and their ability to manage their properties.

What does it mean if I live in a RPZ?

For those properties now located within a RPZ, rent rises are capped at 4% per year for three years. There is also a set formula which landlords must use when calculating the reviewed rent. This cap doesn’t apply if the property was vacant (before the current new letting), and was not let at any time in the 24 months before the area became an RPZ. The cap also won’t apply where there has been a substantial change in the nature of the accommodation since the rent was last set. For example, if major refurbishment works have been undertaken which would change the market rent applicable for that property.

How often will landlords be able to review rents?

The Residential Tenancies Amendment Act 2015 had restricted a landlord’s ability to review rents to once every two years, so many tenants may now be confused as to when their rent can next be reviewed. The new legislation means that, in the case of existing tenancies within RPZs, the cap on rent rises will apply when the next rent review falls. So, if you are currently within a rent review freeze, the RPZ designation will become relevant once those two years are up. When that next review occurs, rent reviews will then be allowed annually, rather than every two years.

What happens when I have rented a property for six months or more?

Once you have lived in a property for more than six months, a part 4 tenancy occurs, entitling you to remain for a further three-and-a-half years. This right is separate to any lease agreement with the landlord, so even if you have a one-year lease, after six months, you also have part 4 tenancy rights. After four years, if you remain in the property, a further part 4 tenancy begins.

The landlord can only terminate a part 4 tenancy on certain specific grounds, for example, if they require the property for their own use, for that of a family member, or if they plan to substantially refurbish the property.

Two main changes have been introduced to give tenants greater security of tenure.

The first is the extension of the cycle from four to six years, for tenancies that began after December 24, 2016. For any part 4 tenancy beginning before that date, a four-year cycle remains but, as soon as that ends, the further part 4 tenancy will be a six-year cycle.

The second change relates to how a part 4 tenancy can be terminated. Previously, once the first cycle was up, a landlord was entitled to terminate the tenancy at any time in the first six months of the further part 4 tenancy, without needing to fall within one of the above termination grounds.

That six-month window has now been removed. For all tenancies, which began after December 24, 2016, once the further part 4 tenancy commences, the stated reason for termination must also be one as set out in the legislation. This is expected to be extended shortly, to tenancies which commenced on or before that date.

Landlords who wish to avoid having to give specific grounds will need to time the termination correctly so that it falls before a further part 4 tenancy begins.

To achieve this, they will have to serve notice before the current part 4 tenancy ends, with the notice period expiring on, or after, the tenancy’s end-date. This ensures that a further part 4 tenancy does not occur.

Anything else that we should know?

A further provision, which has not yet commenced, is a restriction on landlords seeking to terminate tenancies on the grounds of “intention to sell”. This is where they propose to sell ten or more units within the same development, either at the same time or within a six-month period. This will be of interest given recent media attention around “vulture funds” buying up loans from banks. As they now wish to sell off properties they hold as security, these vulture funds are serving notices on multiple tenants within the same development of “intention to sell”.

Landlords will soon only be able to rely on these grounds if they can prove that selling the property with the tenant still remaining will reduce the market value by 20% below what it would be, if sold with vacant possession. They also need to prove it would cause undue hardship on the landlord.

Irish Water reveals households wasting less than it was previously thought

Managing director Jerry Grant: 765m litres a day still being lost in public pipe network

    

Metering is said to have identified that “by far the most beneficial gain” in Irish Water’s activities was in fixing leaks “on the public side” of the pipe network.

Information gathered from the State’s water-metering programme has led Irish Water to conclude households waste less water than previously thought.

Jerry Grant, managing director of Irish Water, told the Oireachtas Committee on the future of water charges the utility was “forced to rethink” its calculations on water usage, after the metering programme revealed individual water use was about 110 litres per day, at the lower end of international comparisons.

It had previously been estimated that individuals used in excess of 140 litres per day, but metering had identified that “by far the most beneficial gain” in Irish Water’s activities was in fixing leaks “on the public side” of the pipe network.

Mr Grant told the committee on Tuesday that domestic meters measured “flow” to households “for a variety of uses”, but he said “it was a government decision to charge” for that water.

Drinking water supply?

He said Irish Water provided about 1.7 billion litres of drinking water to homes and businesses a day. Of this, 600 million litres were consumed by households and 300 million litres went to “non-domestic” premises.

He said these figures were dwarfed by the 765 million litres a day which were still being lost in the public pipe network – about 45% of overall water production.

The use of domestic meters had already identified leaks of 77 million litres per day on the householder’s property, which had been fixed under the utility’s free “first fix scheme”.

Already conserving water?

The data the company had got from 800,000 water meters had shown most households were already conserving water – but one per cent of households used over 20% of all domestic water. Five% of households accounted for use of one third of domestic water supplies.

Mr Grant said metering had helped the utility establish that some households had “continuous night flows”, which indicated leaks.

Some 28,000 homes had availed of the utility’s free “first fix” scheme, resulting in savings of 70 million litres of water per day.

He said about a half a billion euro had been spent on domestic water meters when the scheme was suspended, and the remaining fund of about €150 million had been redirected to invest in the network, largely in new connections.

One domestic leak under a driveway could typically see consumption rise to that of 20 households, he said.

“The information is telling us the fundamental gain is about fixing leaks,” Mr Grant said.

He added the greatest gains in water conservation over the next 15 to 20 years will not be from individual household conservation measures, but in fixing leaks and installing district meters.

Mr Grant was asked by Anti Austerity Alliance TD Paul Murphy why water meters were used to gather information on households, while district networks used other tools, from “listening sticks” to technology, to establish water flow.

Mr Grant said Irish Water could gather data from 80,000 meters in two months, collecting by the use of technology-equipped vans, whereas to send out individuals to seek access to individual properties and stopcocks would take a multiple of that time.

A lust for life and why sex is better in your 80’s

Sexually active older people are considered a curiosity, but a new survey suggests that lovemaking is often more fulfilling for ‘sexual survivors’ than those in middle age

     

Dr David Lee says ‘sexual survivors’ are probably ‘the healthiest people in older age’.

Dr David Lee, a research fellow at Manchester University’s School of Social Sciences, calls them “sexual survivors” – people over the age of 80 who still enjoy an active sex life. In a report written with Professor Josie Tetley, using data from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, he notes that while physical challenges (erectile difficulties, for instance) occured more frequently with age, the emotional side of sex appeared more fulfilling for people over 80. Men and women in this age bracket reported more shared sexual compatibility and emotional closeness than those in their 50s, 60s and 70s – which sounds like good news for anyone going through a drought in middle age.

Sex isn’t defined by penetration, says Lee – some older people find more imaginative ways to keep their sex lives active. “We saw quite a lot of adaptation in the older people, saying they no longer had penetrative sexual intercourse and were more content with kissing and cuddling and general intimacy. We kept a very broad definition of sex. We saw what appeared to be adaptive behaviour in the older members of our sample.”

Don’t bank on hitting your sexual peak so late, though. The problem is, having a sex life at all in your 80s is far from guaranteed. Only about one in 10 women aged 85 or older, and nearly one-quarter of men of that age, enjoy one. “They’re a minority, clearly, but they’re an interesting minority,” says Lee. “Among those who were [sexually active], it was quite interesting that they seemed happy with their sexual lives.”

Lee is studying what it takes to become a sexual survivor. There is likely to be a range of factors, he says. Having a partner is important, of course, and many people in their 80s have been widowed. “I would envisage that these [sexual survivors] are the healthiest people in older age,” he adds. Medication, for instance, can interfere with sex drive and ability.

Sexually active octogenarians are still considered such a curiosity that documentaries are made about them (such as Channel 5’s Party Pensioners, which featured an octogenarian burlesque dancer, and Sex and the Silver Gays, a film about older gay men who go to sex parties). Sites aimed at millennials run interviews with them, too – in 2015, Vice published an interview with an 82-year-old called Chris Wilson about his exploits on Grindr (he said he found the hook-up app “especially helpful when travelling. When I was in London, England, I got hit on by about 40 guys. I had sex eight times in seven days!”).

Lee says we need to get used to the idea that some older people may want a fulfilling sex life – and take seriously the means to allow them to achieve this. “We’re simply trying to broaden the discussion around sex and saying, irrespective of age, there is a need for joined-up healthcare services that people can access if they wish. We’re seeing from the comments in our survey [that] when older people try to access healthcare [for] sexual problems they have come across dismissal: ‘You should expect it at your age.’” But Lee has also seen how it becomes internalised in older people: “They think: ‘It’s not relevant to me anymore.’” Better, instead, to know you could enjoy a later-life sexual peak.

First live birth evidence in a group of dinosaur relatives found

 

It was adapted for a fully aquatic lifestyle

Scientists have uncovered the first evidence of live births in the group of animals that includes dinosaurs, crocodiles and birds.

All examples of this group, known as the Archosauromorpha, lay eggs.

This led some scientists to wonder whether there was something in their biology that prevented live births.

But examination of the fossil remains of a very long-necked, 245 million-year-old marine reptile from China revealed it was carrying an embryo.

Jun Liu, first author of the new study in Nature Communications, said that the animal would have measured between three and four metres long, with a neck that was about 1.7m long.

The embryo may have been around half a metre long and is positioned inside the rib cage of the adult Dinocephalosaurus fossil, which was discovered in 2008 in Luoping County, Yunnan Province in southern China.

Researchers had to consider whether the smaller animal might have been part of the adult’s last meal. But it’s facing forward, whereas swallowed prey generally face backwards because predators consume the animal head first to help it go down the throat.fossil embryo appears to be facing forwards; ingested prey often end up facing backwards

Another line of evidence in favour of the live birth idea is that the small reptile inside the mother is clearly an example of the same species.

Co-author Prof Mike Benton, from the University of Bristol, told BBC News that the fossil was important because the Archosauromorpha form one of three large groupings of land-based vertebrates (backboned animals), each including about 10,000 species.

Since we now know that no fundamental biological barrier to live births exists in this group, palaeontologists would be “looking very closely” at other fossils. He suggested one target would be a group of aquatic crocodile relatives – whose mode of reproduction was not well known.

Prof Liu, from Hefei University of Technology in China, said the discovery pushes back evidence of reproductive biology in the archosauromorphs by 50 million years.

The mode of reproduction in Dinocephalosaurus also points to how the sex of its offspring was determined.

Co-author Prof Chris Organ, from Montana State University, added: “Some reptiles today, such as crocodiles, determine the sex of their offspring by the temperature inside the nest.

“We identified that Dinocephalosaurus, a distant ancestor of crocodiles, determined the sex of its babies genetically, like mammals and birds.”

Prof Benton explained: “This combination of live birth and genotypic sex determination seems to have been necessary for animals such as Dinocephalosaurus to become aquatic.

“It’s great to see such an important step forward in our understanding of the evolution of a major group coming from a chance fossil find in a Chinese field.”

The possibility that an eggshell once surrounded the embryo but was not preserved in fossilisation could not be ruled out, said Prof Benton. But living Archosauromorphs all lay eggs very early in embryonic development, whereas this embryo is very advanced, with well developed bones.

Furthermore, the team says Dinocephalosaurus’s long neck and other features of its anatomy suggest it could not have manoeuvred easily out of the water, meaning a reproductive strategy like that of turtles – which lay eggs on land before returning to the water – was probably not an option.

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Saturday 29th October 2016

Some 170 Garda stations not connected on to the Pulse system

Best practice shows there are too many stations for effective service, says Sinn Féin TD

    

The Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald: says enhancing rural access to the Garda network by connecting non-networked sites to the network is being examined.

Many Garda stations are not connected to the Garda Pulse network, according to Department of Justice figures.

Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald said 167 stations were not connected to the Garda computer network, but that Gardaí can “contact the Garda Information Services Centre to provide relevant details to trained civilian call-takers who enter the details on the Pulse system”.

Enhancing rural access to the Garda network by connecting non-networked sites to the network was being examined, she said.

Sinn Féin justice spokesman Jonathan O’Brien, who sought the information in a parliamentary question, said Garda management “want to close as many stations as possible”.

Gardaí in non-Pulse connected stations report into a centralised centre in Connacht. The Garda Inspectorate and the Garda Commissioner favoured a regional model, he said.

Mr O’Brien, who was appointed justice spokesman after this year’s general election, said “it’s not politically popular but international best practice has shown and the Garda Inspectorate has said that we have too many Garda stations for an effective policing service”.

The 2016 election manifesto?

This conflicts with Sinn Féin’s 2016 election manifesto, which says “we will reverse the closure of Garda stations – these closures have provided minimal savings to the State of €556,000 per annum and are a shameful legacy of this government”.

However, the Cork North-Central TD said the Garda Inspectorate view was that “to have an effective police service in the 21st century, you’re going to have some stations that are going to have to close”.

Referring to the Garda Inspectorate’s report on the service, he said: “You don’t need an actual police station to have a police presence.”

Mr O’Brien pointed to the inspectorate’s call for a civilianisation programme of elements of the service, which he said “could release 1,500 Gardaí for active duty in a matter of months”, while the force would be recruiting 600 to 700.

Gardaí should not be at the front desk in a station to deal with passport applications, he said. That was a job for civilians.

He said Gardaí on duty reporting and investigating crimes should not actually be designating what category of crime is involved, in part because of excessive paperwork and also for improving crime classification.

Mr O’Brien said a “Garda in Cork might designate a crime as burglary while another garda elsewhere might report it as trespassing even though it’s the same type of offence”.

The Minister pointed to the launch in June of the Garda Síochána Modernisation and Renewal Programme 2016-2021 which aimed to “professionalise, modernise and renew An Garda Síochána” to meet current and future challenges.

The AAA-PBP surges to record high of 9% acording to Red C Poll

Party is up 3 points to 9% following attempts to pass abortion referendum bill

   

The Anti-Austerity Alliance and People Before Profit party has seen its support surge to its highest level in the latest Sunday Business Post/Red C poll.

It is up by three points to a record 9% after extensive coverage of its attempt to pass an abortion referendum bill in the Dáil this week. The bill was defeated but party TDs such as Brid Smith, Ruth Coppinger, Paul Murphy and Richard Boyd Barrett all featured prominently in the debate.

The poll of 1,000 voters, which was carried out between Monday and Thursday last week, is also the first to show the impact of the Budget on party support.

Fianna Fáil, which played a key role in budget negotiations, has actually dropped in support by one point to 26%. It has now lost support in the last four Red C polls in a row. However, it still remains the most popular party among those polled.

Fine Gael did not make any gains from the budget two weeks ago with its support unchanged at 25%. But the Independent Alliance is up by two points to 6%. Support for other Independents, which includes the likes of Children’s Minister Katherine Zappone, Communications Minister Denis Naughten and Independent TDs in opposition, is unchanged at 10%.

While the AAA-PBP party has made gains, they appear to be at the expense of Sinn Féin, which is down by two points to 13%, and Labour, which drops by two points to 5%. The Green Party is up by one point to 3%, while the Social Democrats are down by one to 3%.

For a full breakdown and analysis see below.

How they stand:

Fianna Fáil 26 (-1)
Fine Gael 25 (no change)
Sinn Féin 13 (-2)
Independents 10 (no change)
AAA-PBP 9 (+3)
Independent Alliance 6 (+2)
Labour 5 (-2)
Social Democrats 3 (-1)
Green Party 3 (+1)  Totals 100. 

What do families who have already scattered the ashes of loved ones do now?

  

I remember calling to Glasnevin to pick up the urn containing my beloved father’s ashes and wondering what to do with it; I couldn’t put him in the boot, so I strapped him into the back seat as we drove to Kerry,

What are we going to do now? the families of the faithful who have already scattered our loved ones’ ashes? Can we assume that the new Vatican ban on the practice won’t be applied retrospectively?

Can we also ask if the Catholic Church is bent on alienating us, the relatives of the 1,300 people cremated in Ireland annually?

About 50% of all people who die in Ireland are cremated and, of those, about a quarter choose to bring the ashes home, or to scatter them.

Not all of those people are practising Catholics and many may simply choose to ignore the new guidelines issued by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and approved by Pope Francis. But for the observant, it is now against Church regulations to scatter the ashes of our departed relatives in the air, on land, at sea, or in some other way.

The measure is designed to counter so-called New Age ideas that death is a “fusion” with Mother Nature, or the “definitive liberation” from the prison of the body.

The new rules also consider it non-Christian to preserve ashes or bone fragments “in mementos, pieces of jewellery or other objects”.

That last instruction is, let’s say, interesting when you consider the bone fragments of saints that have, for centuries, been preserved “in mementos, pieces of jewellery or other objects” in lavishly made Church- approved reliquaries. You can visit them in the treasury houses of the bigger Catholic churches and cathedrals all around the world.

I love visiting those wonderful repositories, packed, as they are, with rings, chasubles, copes, beautifully illuminated books, crosses, crucifixes and breath-taking reliquaries. They offer a tantalising peep into the past.

They also show the deep human need for ritual in life but, more importantly, in death.

Of course, the key difference between the Church’s collection of mementos and those held by its grieving faithful is that the former are held in a sacred place. That is one of the central concerns behind the latest Vatican document — it insists that ashes should be kept only in sacred places, such as cemeteries.

In truth, the Catholic Church never fully endorsed cremation. It reluctantly allowed it as recently as 1963, so it is not entirely surprising to hear the Church say now that burial is the most “fitting way to express faith”.

I won’t be alone in feeling a deep sense of betrayal in that understandable U-turn. I say “understandable” because this measure is all about exercising more control and we have come to expect that from the Catholic hierarchy.

Though, it has to be said the softening of the rules on eulogies at funerals some years ago was a heartening step. In fact, only last week, at the funeral of a dear friend’s mother it struck me that Catholic funerals were one of the few truly inclusive Church occasions.

There is something genuinely comforting about allowing family members stand on the altar to recall their loved ones in those moving self-penned prayers and eulogies that are often delivered in quavering voices.

It is to the credit of Irish clergy that they allow a little of the profane to be included at the edges of their sacred rites. Allowing those family tributes has neither diluted the funeral liturgy, as was feared, nor turned religious ceremonies into some sort of a This is Your Life show. If anything, it has heightened the integrity of the sacrament and made it more meaningful to relatives and friends.

Thanks, too, to those understanding priests who bend the rules on hymns and music. My wonderful Auntie Mary went out to the strains of the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, a nod to her love of jazz and her visit to New Orleans.

But now? What about those committed Catholics who have passed on believing that the ashes of their living spouses would be scattered as theirs were, in some favoured beauty spot?

Or those deeply Christian people, now departed, who would be rocked to their core to discover that they had contravened some Church regulation?

Of course, they could not possibly know that the Church would move the goal posts, yet it is still not clear if the guidelines are retroactive or not. Worse, there is no explicit instruction on what Catholics should do if they scattered their loved ones’ ashes in a practice now deemed improper.

In the ten years since we, as a family, scattered my father’s ashes, it comforts me to think that he got the dignified funeral that he had wished for. He was a committed Catholic but more than that, he was a truly Christian man in the broadest possible sense. One of the balms during his illness were the regular visits from local priests. They, too, were Christian in the broadest sense — those kind, generous, men helped us navigate some sort of a path through those final bewildering months.

There were lots of bewildering moments in death, too. I remember calling to Glasnevin Cemetery to pick up the urn containing my beloved father’s ashes and wondering what to do with it; I couldn’t, in all conscience, put him in the boot, so I strapped him into the back seat as we drove to our native Kerry. I am almost afraid now to say exactly how we dispensed with those ashes, but I can say that, to us, it was sacred and fitting and solemn.

The Catholic hierarchy has already alienated so many with its indifference to the child abuse scandals and its continuing refusal to include women, to mention the most damaging examples. Many, however, are still happy to dance around the fringes and join in during those important times in a Catholic’s life — baptism, Communion, Confirmation, marriage and death. But for how long?

The Catholic Church is not a democracy, of course. Still, I can’t help feeling these new guidelines will prompt even more people to vote with their feet.

Irish among the biggest consumers of calories per day

    

People in Ireland consume three times more calories per day than those living in India and we are among the biggest consumers of calories in the world, according to a report.

The average daily consumption of calories in the world is 1,398, with the lowest seen in India at 761 calories per capita per day. The highest is Belgium with 2,580 per capita per day.

The Irish national average is at No 12 on a table of 54 countries with 2,307 daily calories per day.

Data analysts, Euromonitor International, reveal that Ireland’s love affair with red meat and baked goods has bumped up calorie intake.

Nutrition analyst at Euromonitor International, Sara Petersson, said the nation’s carbohydrate-heavy diet accounts for Ireland’s high calorie score.

“Most of Ireland’s calories derive from meat, followed by baked goods, with bread being the primary source within that category.

“In third place is dairy, and confectionery in fourth. This pattern is similar to what we see in other Western Countries such as the UK, the US or Canada.

“It differs from Asian Pacific Countries, where rice, noodles or nuts, play a more significant role in the diet.”

The Irish are the biggest carnivores in Europe with the nation tucking into nearly three times as many red meat dinners as our counterparts in Britain.

Irish people ate the equivalent of more than 70 steaks or 140 quarter pounders per head of population last year to become the top beef and veal eaters in Europe just ahead of the Netherlands and Denmark.

Ms Petersson said the passport nutrition data relating to Ireland also shows the country consumes a high number of liquid calories.

“Soft drinks are the seventh highest source of calories in Ireland, providing over 100 calories per capita per day, followed by alcoholic drinks in eighth place, delivering a very similar number, also over 100 calories a day.”

Our overweight and obesity prevalence has risen steadily over the past couple of decades from around 43% of the population in 1996 to 51% of the population in 2015, according to Euromonitor Data.

In terms of just obesity, according to Euromonitor, Ireland was number 53 among 80 researched countries in 1996 and is currently ranked 59 in 2015.

America had the highest rate of obesity followed by Kuwait and Venezuela.

While 43% of the US population is classed as obese, the figures showed that 14.5% of the Irish population was obese in 2015.

Top of the table

Euromonitor Table of Calories Per Capita for last year 2015.

1. Belgium 2,580
2. Austria 2,558
3. Germany 2,519
4. Chile 2,518
5. Bulgaria 2,517
6. Netherlands 2,447
7. Hungary 2,418
8. Sweden 2,348
9. Finland 2,343
10. Romania 2,334
11. Czech Republic 2,321
12. Ireland 2,307

Now revealed the 32 best pubs in Ireland for a drink and a bite

    

Some quality Pub eating houses west of the Shannon above.

If you have built up an appetite as well as a thirst, 32 Irish pubs across 15 counties can provide the solution.

The hostelries north and south of the Border have been named in the prestigious 2017 ‘Michelin Eating Out In Pubs Guide’.

Of the 32 establishments listed, 25 are in the Republic and seven are in the North.

And if you’re in Dublin, the two winners are only about 100 metres apart.

Down dominates the winners with six listings, followed closely by Cork with five, Clare with four and Kildare with three.

Galway, Dublin and Mayo each received two listings, while Antrim, Kerry, Leitrim, Louth, Sligo, Tipperary, Wexford and Wicklow all have one.

The capital’s listings are the Old Spot and the Chop House, both located in Ballsbridge, Dublin 4.

General manager of the Old Spot, Conor Kavanagh, spoke about what it takes to be listed in the guide for the second year in a row.

“We opened at the end of 2014, so we’re really delighted about this,” he said. “We have a real dedication to quality and because we declared ourselves as a gastropub when we opened. I think people wanted to come and see us to check us out.

Offering quality.

“We offer fantastic food in a pub environment, very high quality produce, great wine and a great cocktail list. We’re in a great part of Dublin, right beside the Aviva Stadium.”

Antrim’s listing is Billy Andy’s in Mounthill, near Larne. Clare’s pubs are Morrissey’s in Doonbeg, Vaughan’s Anchor Inn in Liscannor, the Wild Honey Inn in Lisdoonvarna and Linnane’s Lobster Bar in New Quay.

Cork’s listed pubs are Mary Ann’s in Castletownshend, the Poacher’s Inn in Bandon, Deasy’s in Clonakilty, Cronin’s in Crosshaven and Toddies at The Bulman in Kinsale.

Down’s winning pubs were the Pheasant in Annahilt, the Poacher’s Pocket in Comber, the Parson’s Nose and the Plough Inn, both in Hillsborough, Pier 36 in Donaghadee and Balloo House in Killinchy.

Galway’s listings were Moran’s Oyster Cottage in Kilcolgan and O’Dowd’s in Roundstone.

Kerry’s listed pub is the O’Neill’s Seafood Bar in Caherciveen. Kildare impressed with Hartes in Kildare town, the Ballymore Inn in Ballymore Eustace and Fallons in Kilcullen.

Leitrim’s stand-out pub is the Oarsman in Carrick-on-Shannon, while Co Louth’s is Fitzpatrick’s in Jenkinstown.

Mayo’s listings are The Tavern in Murrisk and the Sheebeen in Westport.

Sligo’s top gastropub is Hargadon in Sligo town, while Larkins in Garrykennedy is the premier pub in Tipperary.

Wexford’s listing is the Lobster Pot in Carne, while Wicklow won with Byrne & Woods in Roundwood.

Wild Honey Inn and Toddies at The Bulman both retained an ‘Inspectors’ Favourites’ commendation, described as “establishments found to be particularly charming and which offer something extra special”.

Fossilised dinosaur brain discovered for the first time same as Crocodiles and Birds

   

Scans from the fossil (pictured above right) revealed the brain tissue had distinct similarities to those of modern-day crocodiles and birds.

We’ve long known that dinosaurs existed, mainly because of their fossilized skeletons. However, we’ve never seen a brain until just recently.

Scientists have come across several dinosaur fossils in the past, but never have they seen a fossilized dinosaur brain. Well, this is no longer the case for the first fossilized brain tissue has been found in southeast England.

The small clump of the rock-looking object most likely comes from a dinosaur that lived 133 million years ago. According to scientists, what they have found is a small brain tissue of a leaf-eating dinosaur, a large one at that. Researchers are not 100 percent confident of the type, but it could be similar to an Iguanodon.

According to a report released by the Geological Society of London, the specimen is the first brain tissue found for a dinosaur, so there is a chance of finding more, but those chances are rather slim. Furthermore, scientists say the fossilized brain tissue has similar characteristics to that of crocodiles and birds.

“What we think happened is that this particular dinosaur died in or near a body of water, and its head ended up partially buried in the sediment at the bottom,” said David Norman from the University of Cambridge. “Since the water had little oxygen and was very acidic, the soft tissues of the brain were likely preserved and cast before the rest of its body was buried in the sediment.”

Here’s the thing, these findings could potentially shed light on how dinosaur brains and the brains of other ancient creatures have evolved over millions of years. This has always been a problem for researchers, but things could change for the better.

One of the reasons why scientists haven’t come across dinosaur brain tissue in the past is the fact that brains are the first part of a body to decay. It’s quite surprising this clump of brain tissue has been found, considering the circumstances.

More Findings On The Horizon?

This finding should allow scientists to have an idea of what to look for when seeking out fossilized dinosaur brains. They know where to look now, so it’s only a matter of time, no matter how long, before another clump of brain is located.

How Smart Were The Dinosaurs?

Where the brain fossil was located in the skull should give scientists an idea of how intelligent the ancient creatures were. However, they are hesitant at coming to any conclusion based on a single fossil. We’re guessing if more fossils are found in the future, researchers will make an announcement. Don’t be too surprised if these creatures were as smart as a crocodile. That would be scary, right?

A New Dinosaur Species

Recently, we reported the discovery of a new species of plant-eating dinosaur in Australia. This is the first to ever be discovered in the country, and we’re sure it won’t be the last. We understand the creature is a long-neck Sauropod, and spans nearly half the length of a basketball court.

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Tuesday 4th October 2016

Irish Cabinet agrees to set up all-Ireland group to prepare for Brexit next Spring

Trade unions, non-governmental organisations and business groups will meet next month

  

Taoiseach Enda Kenny said an all-island civic group would meet next month to discuss Brexit after the Cabinet agreed to set up an “all-island Civic Dialogue on Brexit”, with the first meeting in Dublin on November 2nd.

It will be hosted by the Taoiseach and the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and a broad range of “civic society groups, trade unions, business groups and non-governmental organisations as well as representatives of the main political parties on the island” will be invited , according to a Government statement issued on Tuesday.

The Cabinet also agreed to intensify a series of initiatives to prepare for the British exit, after the Taoiseach brought a memorandum to Tuesday morning’s meeting.

These include a series of discussions with interested groups in particular sectors, such as agriculture, education, etc, and measures to “Brexit-proof” next week’s budget.

The Government also reiterated its intention to continue its programme of intensive diplomatic engagement with EU institutions and other EU member states. The European Commission’s chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier, is expected to visit Dublin shortly.

The decision to go ahead with the all-island dialogue flies in the face of thepublic rejection of the idea by the Northern Ireland First Minister Arlene Foster at a meeting of the North South Ministerial Council during the summer.

On Monday, the DUP MP Jeffrey Donaldson again criticised the Taoiseach’s determination to push ahead with the forum, suggesting it was driven by domestic political reasons.

It is understood that the First Minister’s office had not been briefed in detail in advance of the Government’s announcement.

The dialogue will be asked to produce a report and recommendations which will be used to help inform the Government’s position on issues related to the UK’s exit negotiations, according to the Government statement.

It is expected that business groups, trade unions, community and voluntary NGOs from North and South will be invited in the coming days, along with organisations such as the British-Irish Chamber of Commerce, the Institute of European Affairs and the European Movement.

Local authorities in Border areas are also likely to be invited, as well as some Government agencies and universities and higher education institutions. The main political parties North and South will also be asked to attend.

New Garda whistle-blower disclosures made to Tánaiste

Officers claim concerted campaign to discredit previous Garda whistle-blower?

    

Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald has confirmed that disclosures have been made to her under whistle-blower provisions in recent days.

Allegations of a concerted campaign within An Garda Siochana to discredit a whistle-blower have been made by two other members of the force.

It is understood of the two Garda officers who have now come forward, one has said he took an active part in targeting the whistle-blower because he had been ordered to do so.

Tánaiste and Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald has confirmed in response to queries from the media that disclosures have been made to her under whistle-blower provisions in recent days.

However, while she has not disclosed their content, it is understood they centre on allegations of a concerted campaign to discredit a previous whistle-blower.

It is alleged efforts were made to monitor the whistle-blower, including his activity in the Garda’s PULSE database and to discredit him by negatively briefing journalists and politician and that intelligence about him was gathered.

The veracity of the claims, made last week, has yet to be tested.

However, with two Garda officers having turned whistle-blower about efforts to undermine a previous whistle-blower, questions will be raised about whether the Garda culture has absorbed the impact of recent controversies.

Garda Commissioner Nóirín O’Sullivan has previously said that anybody coming forward with complaints or allegations about the Garda would be listened to and their complaints acted on.

In reply to queries on the latest allegations, which emerged in the Examiner Newspaper, Commissioner O’Sullivan reiterated that stance.

‘’I have on numerous occasions expressed my support for any employees who have issues and concerns,” she said. “As Commissioner I have actively asked employees to bring forward issues and concerns. We learn by listening.”

The Tánaiste confirmed the disclosures have been made under the Protected Disclosures Act, 2014, under which Garda members must be protected from any negative reaction to their coming forward.

A statement from her office added: “Any such disclosures will, of course, be fully considered to determine what further action may be appropriate.

“The maintenance of confidentiality in relation to protected disclosures is fundamental and, in line with the statutory obligations under the Protected Disclosures Act 2014, it is not possible to make any further comment.”

In the past when complaints or disclosures have been made they have been examined, usually by a barrister appointed by the Department of Justice, before a full investigative process has been begun.

New RTE boss to be open to working with Irish media rivals

      

Dee Forbes left pic, the new director general of RTE. and Pat Kenny right pic.

RTE is to put an emphasis on creating more original Irish drama and increasing its international footprint, new director general Dee Forbes has said.

She also opened the door to working with the station’s rivals as the Irish media landscape becomes more “busy”.

“RTE has a duty to develop and encourage more great Irish talent. For me Irish drama is something we’re looking at to see how can we do more of it.” She added: “There was a time when every broadcaster had to go it alone, I don’t think that’s the case any more nor is it the prudent thing to do because there are times where partnering with your rival is the right thing to do.”

Ms Forbes was speaking at the tenth annual Women Mean Business (WMB) Awards, where she spoke of her plans for her new role.

“I hope I’ll bring a more international and external facing aspect to the role because I do think we’re a small nation, we’re a small media landscape, and really it’s getting very busy here in terms of the media landscape.”

She also touted the idea of a centralised Irish media hub, but said it was merely a thought. The Cork native will also look to capitalise on the Irish diaspora, of which she said only five million out of 40 are engaged with Irish media.

Ms Forbes has enjoyed a hectic start to life at the Montrose station with potential losses set to reach €20m this year. Last month the former Discovery executive was also told by Communications Minister Denis Naughten that she must deal with the station’s weakening finances without the help of an increase in the licence fee.

RTE has had to deal with the departure of four senior staff members over the last number of months, including former head of news and deputy director general Kevin Bakhurst.

Six awards were presented at the WMB conference in the Shelbourne Hotel in Dublin yesterday.

Complete Laboratory Solutions founder Evelyn O’Toole scooped the overall businesswoman of the year award, while Polar Ice’s managing director Alison Ritchie received the WMB entrepreneur of the year award.

Other winners included FoodCloud co-founders Iseult Ward and Aoibheann O’Brien, who received the Newstalk social entrepreneur award.

Space Technology Ireland founder Professor Susan McKenna-Lawlor picked up the FEXCO woman in technology award while Silicon republic co-founder Ann O’Dea received the Boots empowering women accolade.

Dublin Cookie Company founders Elaine Cohalan and Jenny Synnott scooped the Sodexo newcomer award.

Ben Stiller reveals how prostate cancer diagnosis (PSA Test) saved his life.

      

Ben Stiller said the PSA test “saved my life”

Hollywood star Ben Stiller has revealed he was diagnosed with prostate cancer but is now cancer-free.

The Zoolander star was diagnosed with a growing tumour in 2014 and now wants to share his story in support of the controversial test that saved his life.

In an essay on the website Medium, Stiller described the moment of his diagnosis as “a classic Walter White moment, except I was me, and no one was filming anything at all”.

He wrote: ” I got diagnosed with prostate cancer Friday, June 13 2014. On September 17 of that year I got a test back telling me I was cancer free. The three months in between were a crazy roller coaster ride with which about 180,000 men a year in America can identify.”

He said straight after he was diagnosed he immediately researched high-profile men who had survived and died of the disease.

He added: ” As I learned more about my disease (one of the key learnings is not to Google “people who died of prostate cancer” immediately after being diagnosed with prostate cancer), I was able to wrap my head around the fact that I was incredibly fortunate. Fortunate because my cancer was detected early enough to treat. And also because my internist gave me a test he didn’t have to.

“Taking the PSA test (prostate-specific antigen test) saved my life. Literally. That’s why I am writing this now.”

Stiller said he was not offering a scientific point of view on the test but said without it he would not have been diagnosed as quickly as he was.

He wrote: ” The bottom line for me: I was lucky enough to have a doctor who gave me what they call a “baseline” PSA test when I was about 46. I have no history of prostate cancer in my family and I am not in the high-risk group, being neither – to the best of my knowledge – of African or Scandinavian ancestry. I had no symptoms.

“What I had – and I’m healthy today because of it – was a thoughtful internist who felt like I was around the age to start checking my PSA level, and discussed it with me.

“If he had waited, as the American Cancer Society recommends, until I was 50, I would not have known I had a growing tumour until two years after I got treated. If he had followed the US Preventive Services Task Force guidelines, I would have never gotten tested at all, and not have known I had cancer until it was way too late to treat successfully.”

The actor said the test is criticised because it can lead to unnecessary “over-treatment” but argued men should at least be given the option so they stand a chance of early detection.

Angela Culhane, chief executive at Prostate Cancer UK, said: “There are over 300,000 men in the UK who, like Ben Stiller, are living with or after prostate cancer. However, despite the numbers, it’s a disease that, due to its nature, is often swept under the carpet. We applaud Ben for his courage in talking openly about his personal experience.

“The disease kills one man every hour in the UK but if it is caught early, it can more often than not be treated successfully, which is why awareness like this is so important. It is crucial for every man to acknowledge the threat that prostate cancer can pose to his life.

“Some men in particular face a higher than average risk and so if you are over 50, black, or have a family history of prostate cancer, it’s important that you to speak to your GP about the disease.”

Irish women who reach the age of 80 are likely to live another 9 years

  

Mother and daughter in the right picture?

New statistics show that if an Irish woman reaches the age of 80, she is likely to live an extra nine years. A man is likely to live another seven years.

The figures from Eurostat show that people in France have the longest life expectancy and can expect to live an extra 11 years if they reach the 80 mark.

Spanish nationals were close behind in the study with an extra 10.4 years.

Ruth Deasy of the EU office in Dublin says the Eurostat figures reveal that women across the European Union are living longer than men.

“Well it shows if you reach 80 years of age you’ve a very good chance of living several more years, almost nine if you are a woman in Ireland and almost seven if you are a man.

“But if we look at the European figures, about two thirds of the over 80s are women and just one third are men.”

Dinosaur footprint among the largest on record discovered in the Mongolia’s Gobi Desert

    

Professor Shinobu Ishigaki (above left) lying next to a dinosaur footprint in the Mongolian Gobi Desert.

Scientists have unearthed in Mongolia’s Gobi Desert one of the biggest dinosaur footprints ever recorded, measuring over a metre in length.

The enormous print, which measures 106cm (42 inches) in length and 77cm in width and dates back more than 70 million years, offers a fresh clue about the giant creatures that roamed the earth millions of years ago, scientists from the Okayama University of Science said.

One of several footprints discovered in the vast Mongolian desert, the huge fossil was unearthed in August by a joint Mongolian-Japanese expedition in a geologic layer formed between 70 million and 90 million years ago  in the late Cretaceous Period, researchers said.

A drawing illustrating the dinosaur that may have left a footprint in Mongolia’s Gobi Desert.

It was naturally cast, as sand flowed into dents that had been left by the creature stomping on the once muddy ground, news agency AFP reported.

“This is a very rare discovery as it’s a well-preserved fossil footprint that is more than a metre long with imprints of its claws,” said a statement issued by Okayama University of Science.

The footprint is believed to have belonged to a Titanosaur, a group of long-necked herbivore sauropods that lived in the Late Cretaceous period, and could have been more than 30 metres long and 20 metres tall, according to Shinobu Ishigaki, a professor from the Okayama University of Science, and the leader of Japan’s research team.

“A whole skeleton of a giant dinosaur that left such a massive footprint has yet to be uncovered in Mongolia,” professor Ishigaki told the Asahi Shimbun. “A fossilised skeleton of such a dinosaur is expected to be eventually discovered.”

“Footprints are living evidence of dinosaurs,” Masateru Shibata, a researcher with the Dinosaur Research Institute at Fukui Prefectural University, told the Japanese daily.

“There is a lot of information that can be obtained only from footprints, including the shape of dinosaur feet as well as the ways in which they walked.”

Titanosaurs were the most diverse and abundant large-bodied herbivores in the southern continents during the final 30 million years of the Mesozoic Era.

Titanosaurs species range from the weight of a cow to the weight of a sperm whale or more, according to scientists.

One of the paleontologists lies next to the femur of sauropod discovered in Argentina in 2014.

Several Titanosaur species are regarded as the biggest land-living animals yet discovered.

In 2014 remains of a gigantic Titanosaur were discovered in southern Patagonia, Argentina. According to palaeontologists, the Dreadnoughtus schrani, as the species was named, was the biggest dinosaur ever to walk the planet.

Donie’s Ireland daily news BLOG

Sunday 21st February 2016.

Michael Collins would be very ‘p****d off’ with the current crop of Irish politicians?

Aidan Quinn (Actor) RIP right below might claim? who died last month after a battle with cancer at the age of 69

  V 

Michael Collins might not be very pleased with the current crop of Irish politicians, according a star of the 1996 hit film that tells his story.

Irish-American actor Aidan Quinn RIP, who was raised in both Dublin and Offaly, said the Irish icon would have split feelings when it comes to modern politicians.

“A part of him would be proud and part of him would be dismayed and pissed off, like the rest of us,” he said.

The ‘Elementary’ star admitted he’s not as familiar with Irish politics as he used to be, since he spends most of his time living and working in America.

Quinn joined a variety of cast and crew members from ‘Michael Collins’ to mark 20 years since the film debuted, as part of the part of the Audi Dublin International Film Festival.

Director Neil Jordan was among the crowd celebrating the film’s anniversary and agreed that Collins would be no fan of contemporary politicians.

“I think it’s lucky he’s not around actually. The landscape has changed so much really,” he said.

The Sligo native said he was fond of People Before Profit Alliance candidate Richard Boyd Barrett. “He’s not Michael Collins either,” he added.

The movie, which will be released on Blu Ray for the first time next month, also starred Alan Rickman, who died last month after a battle with cancer at the age of 69.

The English actor, who played Eamon DeValera, made his final public appearance in Ireland at last year’s film festival. Quinn, who played republican politician Harry Boland, said Rickman’s Irish roots were very important to him.

“Year’s after filming, I met [Alan] in Whelan’s at a concert and I realised he had a huge affinity for all things Irish that he loved.

“He was a lovely man and an incredible talent and he’ll be missed.”

Jordan, who also directed ‘Interview With The Vampire’ and ‘Crying Game’ said both the film and playing DeValera on screen were very important to Rickman.

The Audi Dublin International Film Festival runs until the 28 February.

Independents soar in the latest poll’s state of the parties

Figures indicate Fine Gael and Labour to fall far short of required 80 seats for government

  

Unless there is a dramatic shift in opinion in the final days of the campaign the country is heading for a period of political instability after the general election.

The final Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI poll of the campaign, conducted on Friday and Saturday, showed little change for the Government parties since the first poll of the campaign.

On the basis of the figures Fine Gael and Labour will fall far short of the 80 seats needed to form a majority government.

They will also be well short of the number they require to put together a stable administration backed by Independents.

Fianna Fáil has gained support since the campaign began and has closed the gap with Fine Gael to five points, but it is hard to see how the party can win the number of seats required to lead a government.

The only way this could come about would be if Fianna Fáil, Sinn Féin and a majority of Independents combined to form a coalition but, given the wide range of views across the Independents and smaller parties, it is hard to see this happening.

In any case Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin has been unequivocal about not going into coalition with Sinn Féin, and if his party does well he will be in a position to impose his will on the elements in the party who do not share his views.

Unstoppable march

The apparently unstoppable march of the Independents and smaller parties is the standout feature of the poll.

At 28% nationally, the category is level with Fine Gael and in Dublin they far outstrip every other party with an astonishing 41% of the vote.

This 41% breaks down into a number of categories, with pure Independents on 9% in the capital, closely followed by the Social Democrats and the AAA/PBP on 7% each, Shane Ross’s Independent Alliance on 6%, the Greens on 4%, Renua on 3%, and other groupings on 3%. A final 3% are not sure which of the Independent categories they support.

The poll indicates that the election counts in all the Dublin constituencies could provide unexpected results if the Independents and smaller parties transfer to each other in any significant fashion.

The Independent brand is not as strong outside Dublin but they still poll a significant share of the vote right across the country.

The disparate nature of the Independent/Others vote could be a lifeline for Fine Gael as a very broken field could allow the candidates of the main government party to stay in the race as various Independents go out.

In Dublin, Fine Gael is in second place, well behind Independents/Others, on 22 per cent. The party gets 26 per cent in Connacht/ Ulster, 30 per cent in the rest of Leinster and 33 per cent in Munster.

Fine Gael’s strongest support is among middle-class AB and C1 voters, where it gets 35 per cent and 33 per cent respectively. It drops back among C2 and DE categories but jumps to almost 50 per cent among farmers.

The party also has a reasonable spread across the age categories, peaking at 37 per cent among the over-65s and dropping off significantly among those aged under 34.

Labour struggling

The news for Labour is grim on all fronts. Its national level of support, at 6 per cent, is about a third of what it won at the last election and almost all of its seats are in danger.

The party does best in Dublin where it is on 9 per cent. Its next best region is Munster where it hits 6 per cent, but it is at only 4 per cent in the rest of Leinster and Connacht/Ulster.

In class terms, Labour is strongest among the AB group but struggling among the other social categories.

The poll is very good news for Fianna Fáil, with the party making gains at precisely the right moment. It can now have serious hopes of emulating its local election performance when it hit 25 per cent of the national vote.

What will encourage the party is that it has extended its lead over Sinn Féin to eight points with the election finish line in sight.

However, one point of concern for Fianna Fáil is that its vote in Dublin remains at just 13 per cent. The party has no seats in the capital at present and, on that share of votes, will be lucky to win a handful.

Strong in Leinster

In the rest of the country the picture is better. Fianna Fáil’s strongest region is the rest of Leinster where at 31 per cent it is marginally ahead of Fine Gael.

It is the same story in Connacht/ Ulster, but in Munster the party is well behind Fine Gael.

In class terms Fianna Fáil is strongest among the least well off C2 and DE categories and weakest among the better off.

In age terms it has pulled ahead of Fine Gael among the under-34s but is behind among the older age groups, particularly the over-65s.

It seems Micheál Martin’s positioning of Fianna Fáil as a slightly left-wing party has gained traction with poorer and younger voters and that has helped it eat into the Sinn Féin vote.

Support for Sinn Féin has dropped back significantly to 15 per cent with the party’s vote in Dublin under pressure from the rise of AAA/PBP as well as Fianna Fáil, while in Munster it has dropped back in tandem with the rise of Independents.

Sinn Féin is now on 14 per cent in Dublin and Munster and 17 per cent in the rest of Leinster and Connacht/ Ulster.

The Sinn Féin vote is massively concentrated among the poorest C2 and DE social categories and among people aged under 34.

Ex Fianna Fáil Minister Mary says voters should not be expecting election promises to be fulfilled

    

A former Fianna Fáil Minister has warned voters that no political party will be able to keep all their election promises.

Mary O’Rourke has said there is too much emphasis on candidates’ ability to make changes, if voted into power.

She also has said no one can keep the economic recovery going at the current rate.

With less than a week for people to decide who they want to vote for, Mary O’Rourke is reminding us to be realistic: “I think there has been an overemphasis on promises, on the green fields beyond when life is going to be very good, it isn’t.

“All the promises will never be fulfilled, never ever, because the growth rate is not going to continue at 3.1/2% for five years.”

Facebook launches a new feature of preventing suicide tool in the UK

    

Facebook has launched a new feature in the UK to offer support to users who may be considering suicide.

The Suicide Prevention tool has been developed with support from charity Samaritans, and works by asking users to flag and report posts from friends that cause concern. These posts will then be reviewed by a special team at the social network, with help options sent to those the reviewers deem to be struggling.

A message appears when the person in question next logs in that reads: “Hi, a friend thinks you might be going through something difficult and asked us to look at your recent post.”

Talk-talk-talk options

The user can then choose to talk to someone – either a friend or helpline worker, or be sent tips and support directly. There is also an option to ignore the offers altogether.

Facebook’s safety policy manager in the UK Julie de Bailliencourt said: “Keeping the Facebook community safe is our most important responsibility. We worked with organisations including Samaritans to develop these tools, and one of the first things they told us was how much connecting with people who care can help those who are struggling to cope – whether offline or online.

“People use Facebook to connect with friends and family, and that’s why we’re evolving the support, resources and advice available to people who are in distress and their concerned friends and family members.”

A powerful resource tool?

According to the social network, more than half the UK’s population is on Facebook (36 million) and this resource makes it a powerful tool to connect with those most at risk.

Samaritans chief executive Ruth Sutherland said: “Social media is a great thing, it provides an outlet for many people and it’s a great source of information and support. It’s a way that we connect with our friends, a way of communication. Samaritans welcomes Facebook’s commitment to keeping their users safe in this environment.”

‘Ireland well placed to be a world leader in addressing climate change issues’

    

Ireland is well placed to be a world leader in addressing climate change, according to John Muldowney, Agricultural Inspector with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine.

Speaking at the Agricultural Science Association’s (ASA) Climate Change Forum in Tipperary recently, eh said that “by 2050, the planet will need to produce 70% more food with less land, water and energy while also reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” and that he believes “Ireland is well placed to continue showing leadership in the creation of innovative solutions where climate action is at the centre of sustainable food production”.

Muldowney was joined by Oisín Coghlan, Director of Friends of The Earth; Paul Nolan, Computational Scientist at the Irish Centre for High-End Computing; and Pat Murphy, Head of Environmental Knowledge Transfer at Teagasc along with more than 70 delegates.

The forum background:-

The forum was held against the backdrop of the unanimous agreement among the 195 nations represented at COP 21 about the urgent need to address climate change with specific targets to keep global warming well below a +2°C rise in temperature compared to pre-industrial times and pursuing efforts to limit this increase to +1.5°C.

As part of this agreement, the EU has committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) by 40% by 2030 and Ireland, as part of the EU, will have its own GHG emissions target to achieve.

Irish agriculture represents one-third of total Irish GHG emissions and, with its ambitious Food Wise 2025 objectives, climate change target compliance is a key consideration for the sector.

Friends of the earth focus.

Oisín Coghlan, Director of Friends of The Earth focused on COP 21 and the importance of addressing the climate change challenge in all sectors.

He said that the Paris Agreement increases the pressure on Ireland to come up with a credible plan to cut emissions, and as we now face into EU negotiations about how to divide up the emissions budget across the EU, the question is whether the Irish Government will continue to seek exemptions for Irish agriculture placing a heavier burden on other sectors to reduce their emissions, and whether the Commission or other Member States will be in any mood to reward Irish inaction, especially now that we are the fastest growing economy in Europe”.

The impact of climate change?

Computational scientist Dr. Paul Nolan from the Irish Centre for High-End Computing (ICHEC) presented the results from a recently released climate change impact study Ensemble of regional climate model projections for Ireland funded under the EPA research programme and carried out at ICHEC and UCD in conjunction with Met Éireann.

It analyses the impacts of global climate change on the mid-21st-century climate of Ireland and he discussed data of future rainfall, temperature, frequency of storms and growing season length as part of his presentation.

“It is our intention in the near future to set up collaborations with agricultural policy makers and researchers in order to provide more detailed projections on the effects of climate change on the Irish agricultural sector.”

The advisors

Speaking about up-skilling advisors on environmental needs to help them better inform and prepare farmers to be more climate change aware, Head of Environmental Knowledge Transfer at Teagasc Pat Murphy said: “The success in reducing Irish agriculture emissions will be largely determined by the degree to which agricultural advisors of all types manage to engage farmers to address the problem.

“Therefore, reducing the carbon footprint of Irish Agriculture can only be achieved through an effective combination of increased efficiency at farm level, supportive policy to incentivise mitigation and regulation. The agricultural advisor/consultant has a key role in improving the effectiveness of all three approaches and their efforts will be critical in reducing agricultural emissions.”

ASA (Agricultural Science Association’s)

According to ASA vice-president Mary Delaney, the purpose of the event was to provide a platform for information sharing and meaningful debate around what is a very important issue for Irish agriculture. “Climate change will have far-reaching, long-term consequences for the Irish agri-food industry,” she said.

“Today provided us with an opportunity to hear four different perspectives on climate change, investigate current research and explore how knowledge transfer can help instigate action. All of the presentations and resulting discussions were centred on hard-hitting facts and projections that affect the industry as a whole as it strives to increase production in line with Food Wise 2025 objectives.

“Changes in weather patterns and pressures to reduce our GHG emissions will have significant implications for our agri-food sector and agricultural science will play an increasingly important role in finding practical solutions to this challenge.”

Before the dinosaurs an ‘Ugly reptile named pareiasaurs’ in China once roamed the earth

     

Hefty herbivores called pareiasaurs ruled the Earth 260 million years ago; Have been described as the ‘ugliest fossil reptiles’ thanks to knobbly skin

Long before the dinosaurs, hefty herbivores called pareiasaurs ruled the Earth. Now, for the first time, a detailed investigation of all Chinese specimens of these creatures – often described as the ‘ugliest fossil reptiles’.

Pareiasaurs have been reported from South Africa, Europe (Russia, Scotland, Germany), Asia (China), and South America, but it is not known whether there were distinct groups on each of these continents.

In a new study published in the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, Professor Mike Benton of Bristol’s School of Earth Sciences shows there are close similarities between Chinese fossils and those found in Russia and South Africa, indicating that the huge herbivores were able to travel around the world despite their lumbering movement.

Professor Benton said: “Up to now, six species of pareiasaurs had been described from China, mainly from Permian rocks along the banks of the Yellow River between Shaanxi and Shanxi provinces. I was able to study all of these specimens in museums in Beijing, and then visit the original localities. It seems clear there were three species and these lived over a span of one to two million years.”

Pareiasaurs were hefty animals, two to three metres long, with massive, barrel-shaped bodies, short, stocky arms and legs, and tiny head with small teeth. Their faces and bodies were covered with bony knobs.

It is likely the pareiasaurs lived in damp, lowland areas, feeding on huge amounts of low-nutrition vegetation. No stomach contents or fossilized faeces from pareiasaurs are known to exist, but in Russia, pareiasaurs have been found with evidence they had made wallows in the soft mud probably to cool off or coat themselves in mud to ward off parasites.

The new study confirms that the three Chinese pareiasaur species differed from each other in body size and in the shapes of their teeth.

Professor Benton added: “My study of the evolution of pareiasaurs shows that the Chinese species are closely related to relatives from Russia and South Africa. Despite their size and probably slow-moving habits, they could walk all over the world. We see the same sequence of two or three forms worldwide, and there is no evidence that China, or any other region, was isolated at that time.”

Pareiasaurs were the first truly large herbivores on Earth, and yet their tenure was short.

As in other parts of the world, the species in China were wiped out as part of the devastation of the end-Permian mass extinction 252 million years ago, when 90 per cent of species were killed by the acid rain and global warming caused by massive volcanic eruptions in Russia.

Without forests, landscapes were denuded of soils which washed into the seas. Shock heating of the atmosphere and oceans as a result of the massive release of carbon dioxide and methane also killed much of life. The end-Permian mass extinction killed off the pareiasaurs after they had been on Earth for only 10 million years.

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Thursday 29th October 2015

‘Its unforgivable’ for Ireland’s left wing parties not to join a pact,

Says Mary Lou McDonald

Sinn Féin enters vote transfer deal with parties, Independents linked to Right2Change

   

Sinn Féin deputy leader Mary Lou McDonald has said it would be “unforgivable” if other left wing groups did not grasp the “opportunity” of a broad policy platform and transfer pact.

Ms McDonald confirmed Sinn Féin is to enter into a vote transfer pact with parties and Independents who sign up to the Right2Change policy platform, which has developed from the anti-water charges movement.

However, some left wing parties, such as the Socialist Party-Anti Austerity Alliance, have indicated they will not return the favour by asking their supporters to transfer to Sinn Féin.

“I can only speak for Sinn Féin,” Ms McDonald said. “Others now need to do likewise but let me reiterate. There is an expectation and an appetite that is unmissable amongst communities right across this State who want those of us who have argued so strongly against austerity, who have argued investment, who have argued for relief for low and middle income families.

“There is an expectation on all of us to do things and actually make that happen. We await the response of others but I would say it would be unforgivable, literally unforgivable, to miss an opportunity such as this.”

Support levels

Ms McDonald denied the move was an act of “desperation” on behalf of the party, which has dropped back to support levels of about 16 per cent in recent polls.

“Far from it. This document and this initiative of months and months of meetings and collaboration and I think that it is a recognition of us and by us, not just to talk about an alternative but to actually do things in a constructive way that make an alternative possible.

“We are satisfied that our electoral base, that it has grown, that it is robust. We will look of course to grow it even further in advance of the election.”

However, she added Sinn Féin is “of course” seeking to maximise its transfers but said the “driving impulse for this, in the first instance, is about the alternative politics we have been talking about and advocating over the course of the current Dáil”.

She said Sinn Féin will have its own manifesto and will seek to increase its own support but said the pact was about maximising “the number of progressive TDs elected to the next Dáil”.

“This movement has moved from the initial sole concern around water into considerations of other issues and, as a result of very long discussions and consultations, a platform has been agreed of broad policy principles which we in Sinn Féin are happy to have signed up to and endorse.

“We believe there is a great opportunity in the forthcoming election. We believe we need an alternative and a progressive government.

“Sinn Féin wants to be part of that and we believed that parties and candidates who share that platform and agree on these principles should, while attending to their own election campaigns, should equally encourage people to transfer to other like minded candidates.”

The Right2Change movement has indicated those looking to sign up to its principles have until Friday to do so.

“For people who have been devastated by austerity, for people who have been alienated from the political process, they are not really interested in small, petty squabbles,” Ms McDonald added.

“What they are interested in is the big idea, and the big opportunity for change and arguably we have never had the opportunity that presents itself now because it is not just Sinn Féin and other political parties and Independents.”

Party councillor Paul Donnelly, who is standing in Dublin West, said he will encourage his supporters to transfer to deputy Ruth Coppinger of the AAA even if she declined to reciprocate.

Google pays €28m in Irish tax last year

    

Google paid €28.6m in Irish corporation tax on international sales of €18.3bn last year, new figures show.

The internet services giant has its Europe, Middle East and Africa headquarters in Dublin.

The latest figures for Google Ireland Ltd show turnover rose nearly 8% last year to €18.3bn; mainly driven by a rise in advertising revenues, generated by Google websites and Google Network Members’ websites.

The amount of tax paid here by the company last year was up from €27.7m in the previous year.

The latest accounts also show a rise in after-tax profits of €13.3m to €167.9m; while employment here grew 17% to 2,763 direct employees, cementing the company’s status as one of the largest multinational employers in Ireland.

“Our Dublin office is the largest Google office outside the US with more than 5,000 direct and contracted employees.

“Our ability to find people with the skills and talents we need to be able to build a strong business is hugely important and we’re continuing to recruit great talent in Dublin to support our customers across Europe, from sales and marketing, to developer support and user operations,” said Google Ireland chief Ronan Harris.

Google Ireland also invested just shy of €74m in research development and engineering last year.

“We continued to invest in Ireland during 2014 and this investment continues in 2015 with the construction of a second €150m data centre in west Dublin.

“This further strengthens Google’s commitment to Ireland and ensures we can meet our future growth requirements in the Dublin Docklands area,” Mr Harris added.

13.5% rise in Ireland’s summer overseas visitors

      

The number of overseas visitors to Ireland rose by 13.5% this summer compared to the same period last year, according to the CSO.

In the period July to September, the total number of trips to Ireland amounted to 2,770,900 — an overall increase of 330,500 compared to the same period 12 months earlier.

The number of British visitors rose 13.9% to 1,050,400 while trips by residents of European countries other than Britain increased by 14.6% to 987,000.

Trips by US and Canadian visitors to Ireland increased by 12.3% to 550,100 while trips to Ireland from other areas rose by 10% to 183,400.

The CSO figures give added substance to Fáilte Ireland’s annual tourism barometer which shows that last summer was a particularly successful season for most Irish tourism businesses, boosted in part by return visitors and favourable exchange rates.

According to Fáilte Ireland, paid serviced accommodation providers recorded an excellent year, with a large proportion (78%) of respondents to the survey reporting growth. Hotels lead the way, with around four in five (79%) reporting an increase in business, followed by 69% of guesthouses.

Even the B&B sector, which has struggled in recent years, is showing signs of improvement, with 70% of operators saying that their business is up so far this year.

Accommodation providers were not the only ones who enjoyed a buoyant summer and the majority (79%) of tourist attractions have also seen a boost in the number of visitors welcomed through their doors so far this year — with the overseas markets even stronger — 85% registered growth in visitors from abroad.

Restaurants also enjoyed a busy summer, with 58% reporting business to be up overall. Overseas markets have boosted trade for restaurants, with 72% reporting more business from overseas tourists so far in 2015.

Repeat visitors have been driving business so far this year and, as a result, this factor maintains its place as the most frequently mentioned (69%) positive factor this year.

“Tourism appears now to be firing on all pistons with every sector of the industry now enjoying greater growth,” said Fáilte Ireland chief executive Shaun Quinn.

“We have been particularly blessed this year by favourable currency rates but these aren’t steadfast and it will be important for tourism businesses to ensure they are not stranded if that tide goes out,” he said.

Sarcastic people make our offices More Creative,

A Study Suggests

  

Sarcastic people are often dismissed as sneering smart alecs – but having one around can actually be a good thing, at least at work.

There’s just one caveat: everyone has to ‘get the joke’, or it doesn’t work.

New research from Harvard Business School suggests that the process of understanding what a sarcastic person really means can make people more creative.

In other words, the process of ‘working out’ whether someone is being sarcastic helps people to think creatively.

Harvard’s Francesca Gina says, ‘To create or decode sarcasm, both the expressers and recipients of sarcasm need to overcome the contradiction (i.e., psychological distance) between the literal and actual meanings of the sarcastic expressions.

‘This is a process that activates and is facilitated by abstraction, which in turn promotes creative thinking.

The researchers monitored people’s responses to creative tasks while involved in simulated conversations – some sarcastic, some not.

‘Our study suggests that sarcasm has the potential to catalyze creativity in everyone.

‘That being said, although not the focus of our research, it is possible that naturally creative people are also more likely to use sarcasm, making it an outcome instead of [a] cause in this relationship.’

€7m for Sligo’s four ∗∗∗∗ Clarion Hotel

Fine Elizabethan-style former mental hospital opened as hotel in 2005

       The Clarion Hotel in Sligo: costing €45 million to develop, it is the first full-service hotel in the west to come on the market since the economic crash

One of Ireland’s most distinctive hotels, the Clarion Hotel in Sligo, is to be sold at a fraction of the expense involved in converting and fitting out what was originally a mental hospital. Agents Savills are guiding €7 million for the now profitable four-star business which is to be sold on the instructions of Aiden Murphy of receivers Crowe Howarth.

Part of the €45 million in funding for the hotel was provided by KBC Bank and AIB.

The hotel has larger-than-usual public facilities and 162 spacious bedrooms including 89 family suites which are uniquely large and comfortable. It also has a range of food and beverage offerings including the Synergy Restaurant, Kudos Restaurant and Savour Lounge.

Not surprisingly, it is an extremely popular wedding venue with no fewer than two private churches in the grounds – one of them is frequently used for marriages – and seating capacity for 350 guests in the main reception room. .

Aaron Spring of Savills says the Clarion is the first full-service hotel in the west of Ireland to have come on the market since the economic crash.

As such it has a superb health and fitness club with approximately 800 members who use the full-equipped gym, 20m heated indoor swimming pool, sauna and steam room, jacuzzi, aerobics and fitness studio and an “essence” spa.

The much-improved fortunes of the hotel have been greatly helped by the ever-increasing popularity of Sligo as a holiday destination.

Sligo’s location along the Wild Atlantic Way has helped the local tourism industry.

Tom Barrett, head of hotels and leisure at Savills, describes the Clarion as “one of the largest and most profitable hotels in the northwest of Ireland”. He said a new owner would not be tied down by the current management agreement. The handsome Elizabethan-style building dates from 1847 and was originally known as St Columba’s Lunatic Asylum. It took six years to build at an overall cost of €53,199.

The home accommodated up to 1,100 patients from Sligo and Leitrim who no longer had to travel to Ballinasloe “to be confined”.

It closed in 1992 and lay derelict until it was converted into a hotel which opened for business in 2005.

Why did Dinosaurs have feathers?

   

The unprecedented discovery of fossilized dinosaur feathers gives scientists information they’ve been seeking for years.

Answering why dinosaurs had feathers is as tricky as answering why birds have feathers, only it’s harder because all the remaining dinosaur feathers have been embedded in rock for the last 65 million years or more.

On top of that, birds are still technically dinosaurs. We’ll get to that, but for now the point is that not all bird feathers are for flight. Take the ostrich as an example; its feathers help it regulate its temperature in warm and arid climates. Yesterday, research published out of the University of Alberta concluded that the feathers of the ornithomimus served a similar purpose in the late Cretaceous climate of Alberta.

The ornithomimus specimen that led to this discovery was first uncovered in 2009 in Dinosaur Provincial Park, encased in a giant slab of rock. Because the fossil was missing it head and forelimbs, it was mostly left alone in lieu of higher-priority fossils. Lead paper author Aaron van der Reest was tasked with opening up and preparing this fossil as an undergraduate project. In the tail area, Reest discovered that, remarkably, the dinosaur’s feathers, in addition to its bones, had become fossilized. This is extremely uncommon because softer tissues rarely withstand the hardships of fossilization and sitting for millions of years.

The preservation of the feathers turned out to unprecedented among all other specimens found on this continent. Said curator of vertebrate paleontology at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, David Evans, in an interview with The Globe andMail, “It’s drop-dead gorgeous. It is the most completely feathered dinosaur specimen found in North America to date.” Also present was a patch of the ornithomimus’s leg skin, which, similar to modern birds, didn’t have feathers at all.

The basic structure and bodily attachment of the ornithomimus’s feathers bore a strong resemblance to what’s found in ostriches. This led Reest and his co-authors to conclude that the ornithomimus’s feathers were used for thermal regulation, just as ostriches’s do today.

So what’s an ornithomimus? The name literally means “bird mimic” from the Greek words ornith (bird) and mimos (mimic). Don’t get too attached to this etymology, because in terms of how it relates to birds it just confuses things. Another Greek word “sauros” (meaning “lizard”) makes a regular appearance in naming and categorizing dinosaurs, but don’t get attached to this either because as far as reptiles (or more generally sauropsids, which includes both reptiles and birds) go, lizards are more closely related firstly to snakes and secondly to turtles, than they are to crocodiles and dinosaurs (meaning “terrible lizards”). Confused yet? Scientists were too for a long time, and since then the names have all stuck.

So what does the ornithomimus have in common with today’s birds? They’re both saurischian dinosaurs, meaning “lizard hipped” dinosaurs. Saurischian dinosaurs included sauropods (meaning “lizard footed”) such as the long-necked brontosaurus (yes, it’s real again) and theropods (meaning “beast footed”), such as the T. rex and the velociraptor as well as the ornithomimus and modern birds. As far as we can tell, practically all theropods had feathers.

Ornithomimus and modern birds are also belong to a further subgroup called coelurosauria (meaning “hollow tailed lizards”), but here is where they finally split off from each other about 85 million years ago. Modern birds all evolved from a subgroup called the maniraptorans (meaning “hand snatchers”), whereas the ornithomimus belongs to a different subgroup called ornithomimosaurs (meaning “lizards like birds”).

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Sunday 31st May 2015

Plans for new Dublin Airport runway ready for take-off

   

Plans for a €300m second runway at Dublin Airport have gained dramatic new impetus following the IAG takeover of Aer Lingus which includes plans to use Dublin airport to feed traffic from Europe to North America.

Over the next five years IAG plan to boost Aer Lingus feeder traffic through Dublin by an extra 2.4m passengers a year.

But even before the IAG bid for Aer Lingus emerged earlier this year the Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) had reignited plans for a new runway on the 2,500 acre site at Collinstown.

New research released last week by the respected aviation website anna aero shows that Dublin is the fastest growing airport in Europe for long-haul traffic this year

Now plans for the construction of a second runway, which first emerged more than 30 years ago, look set to be fast tracked.

Planning permission for a new east-west runway, 1.6 kilometres to the north and parallel to the existing main runway was granted back in 2007 and remains valid for the next two years.

But air industry sources suggest a new planning application may have to be lodged because the original permission contained 31 restrictive conditions including a requirement that no flights operate from the second runway between 11pm and 7am.

The hour between 6am and 7am remains the airport’s busiest time and a ban on flights leaving a new second runway before 7am is considered impractical. Passenger numbers travelling through Dublin leapt by 8% to 21.7 million last year and are already 15% up on that figure in the first four months of 2015.

A DAA spokesperson said “We are currently examining the various options regarding the delivery of a second parallel runway at Dublin Airport, but have not yet made a final decision in relation to this issue.”

“A second parallel runway has been part of the overall development plan for Dublin Airport for several decades and we’re fortunate that land was earmarked for this project many years ago within the overall Dublin Airport campus.”

“The various options relating to its development will be carefully considered before the company makes a final decision on the best way forward and a second runway remains a central element of Dublin Airport’s long-term plans,” the DAA spokesman confirmed

Dublin Airport now has two flights per day to Dubai and Abu Dhabi with Emirates and Etihad both flying twice a day since last year.

Passenger numbers to the Middle East and North Africa doubled between 2011 and 2013.

The Commission for Aviation Regulation (CAR) has ruled that Dublin Airport will not be allowed to pass on any of the costs associated with the development of a second runway until passenger numbers pass 25 million in a 12 month period.

Between 2010 and 2014, Dublin Airport increased its transatlantic passenger numbers by 42% with seven new transatlantic services during the same period.

This summer, Dublin Airport will be the sixth largest airport in Europe for services to North America with 318 flights per week (159 weekly departures) between Dublin and 15 separate destinations in the United States and Canada.

Fianna Fáil want new law to allow Irish Central Bank to lower mortgage rates

  

Fianna Fáil has said legislation is needed to force banks to lower their variable mortgage rates.

It comes as Bank of Ireland yesterday announced that it is reducing its fixed-rate mortgages by 0.3%.

It has made no announcement on its variable rate however, which stands at 4.5%.

Finance Minister Michael Noonan recently met with financial institutions to ask that they reduce variable rates in line with falling ECB rates.

Fianna Fáil Finance Spokesperson Michael McGrath said that legislation might be the only way to deal with this problem.

“I firmly believe that legislation is going to be required in the Oireachtas to give the Central Bank power to intervene where a market failure has occurred – and one has occurred in the Irish mortgage market – and to put a cap on the level of rates that the banks are charging variable rate customers,” he said.

“This issue is simply not going to go away.

“The Minister met with the banks a couple of weeks ago and, judging by this reaction from Bank of Ireland, those meetings have simply failed.”

Meanwhile back at the bank of money:

Irish Central Bank spends €55,000 on biscuits last year 2014?

The Irish Central Bank spent €55,000 on biscuits last year?

   

It looks like bankers have a very sweet tooth judging by figures released of the Central Bank’s food bill for 2014.

The bill was published in The Sunday Business Post today and shows that €55,000 was spent on biscuits alone last year.

The total is part of a sweet deal for staff which sees their food, tea, coffee and refreshments subsidised to the tune of over €1 million.

Banks bosses said the treats are also snapped up at seminars and meetings as well as press conferences and briefings.

Kidney Health could be a better way to predict heart disease risk

 

Kidney function could be a better gauge of heart attack risk than cholesterol levels and blood pressure, according to a recently conducted study by researchers at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

According to a JHSPH news release, the researchers reviewed data collected from 637,000 patients in 24 studies who had no history of heart disease and found that results from common kidney function tests, which are used to assess levels creatine in the blood and the amount of albumin leaking out of the kidney into urine, improved the successful prediction rate of heart problems.

The amount of creatinine in the blood reflects how well the kidneys are filtering out waste.  Higher amounts of albumin indicate the presence of kidney damage.  In the study’s participants, the levels of creatinine and albuminuria predicted cardiovascular disease in general, particularly heart failure, heart attack and stroke.

Albuminuria was found to be the strongest predictor, outperforming cholesterol levels and blood pressure as a risk assessor for heart failure and death from heart attack or stroke. The study’s lead author Kunihiro Matsushita, MD, PhD, an assistant scientist at Bloomberg School’s Department of Epidemiology, believes that the study’s findings show that health care providers can use data on kidney damage and kidney function to better understand a patient’s risk of cardiovascular disease.

Cholesterol levels and blood pressure tests are good indicators of cardiovascular risk, but they are not perfect.  This study tells us we could do even better with information that often times we are already collecting. People with chronic kidney disease are twice as likely to develop cardiovascular disease as those with healthy kidneys and roughly half of them die from it before they reach kidney failure

While the biological mechanisms linking kidney disease to cardiovascular disease aren’t well understood, Matsushita says that poorly functioning kidneys can lead to a fluid overload that may result in heart failure.

The results of the study were published in The Lancet’s journal Diabetes and Endocrinology on May 29. In other news about heart disease here at Immortal News, treating depression with antidepressants has been shown to lowers rates of death, coronary artery disease and stroke.

ICSA calls for standalone hen harrier compensation scheme

   

The ICSA has called for a standalone scheme to provide proper compensation for farmers with hen harrier designation

ICSA Rural Development Chairman Billy Gray said that while there is some provision for hen harrier designation in GLAS, this covers a maximum of 19ha and is unsuitable for many farmers with larger designated areas.

“ICSA is adamant that there should be no designation without compensation – farmers must be compensated fully and equally for every designated hectare of their land,” Gray said.

The ICSA Rural Development Chairman was speaking after a meeting in Templeglantine, Co. Limerick recently.

Gray also suggested that it was time to revisit the blanket ban on new afforestation on designated ground.

“The scientific basis for this ban is far from categorical. For example, it is now accepted that the first 12 years of a forestry plantation provide ideal cover for the hen harrier.

“As modern sitka spruce plantations can be brought to clearfell in as little as 25 years, and Christmas trees in a far shorter time.

It is clear that there is at the very minimum scope for staggered plantation mixed in with some open ground.

He said that this is especially pertinent to farmers with large designations in excess of 20ha.

The Rural Development Chairman said that while a more flexible approach to forestry would certainly be helpful, there is no getting away from the fact that there must be a stand-alone scheme covering every hectare of ground affected by hen harrier designation.

“Now that the Government is loosening the purse strings to provide substantial amounts of money for public sector pay rises, there is no good reason why a relatively small amount of money could not be set aside for such a scheme,”

Top gynaecologist warns women to have babies by age thirty.

To avoid the ‘devastation and regret’ of infertility

   

A new mother holding a sleeping newborn infant in hospital

A top UK fertility specialist has said that women who have children after thirty are placing a huge pressure on the British health system and warned them to start having children in their twenties.

Consultant gynaecologist Professor Geeta Nargund believes the UK faces a ‘fertility time-bomb’ as the average age a woman has her first child continues to rise.

The lead consultant for reproductive medicine at St George’s Hospital in London claims that fertility issues encountered by women who begin trying for a baby in their thirties place “costly and largely unnecessary burden on the NHS” as they opt for IVF and other means of conceiving.

In a letter to Education Secretary Nicky Morgan obtained by The Sunday Mail, Professor Nargund wrote: “I have witnessed all too often the shock and agony on the faces of women who realise they have left it too late to start a family.

“For so many, this news comes as a genuine surprise and the sense of devastation and regret can be overwhelming.

“And so often the cry will be “Why did no one warn me about this?”’

Professor Nargund believes that children should be given ‘age appropriate’ information from primary school to university to highlight the importance of having children when they are at an optimum age.

“Information is power and the best way to empower people to take control of their fertility is through education.”

“Ideally, if a woman is ready for a child, she should start trying by the time she is 30. She should consider having a child early because as a woman gets older, her fertility declines sharply.”

“As women get older, they experience more complex fertility problems, so treatment tends to be less successful and more expensive.

“On average, more [IVF] treatment cycles are required for a successful pregnancy. So educating people about fertility is very important for the public purse, because it will help us to get more babies within the same NHS budget.”

In the UK IVF is funded by the NHS. IVFs success rate remains at just one birth per four cycles of IVF which costs the health system £20,000 (€28,000). In 2013, the NHS funded over 25,500 cycles in England and Wales.

Professor Nargund had her first child at 29 and said: “My biological clock was absolutely on my mind.”

The doctor revealed that many women are badly misinformed about their fertility.

“Educated women are not necessarily educated about their fertility,” she said.

The average age Irish women have their first baby is 30.3.

We are drinking dinosaur pee every day we drink water:

    

Here’s Why

Do you drink water? If so, how would you react if we told you that all the water you’ve ever drunk and all the water you are ever going to drink in the future comes from the urine of a dinosaur?

The average American drinks four cups of water every day, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. That is far short of the recommended eight glasses of water every day and is equivalent to around four cups of dinosaur pee.

Whether it is tap, filtered, bottled, sparkling or sourced from the Himalayan glaciers and sparkled with gold dust, you are just actually drinking the liquid wastes of an ancient beast, says science-centric YouTube channel Curious Minds.

A video explaining this theory says a very small percentage of all the water in the world is available for drinking purposes, but it is still a huge amount of water to provide for the needs of every human being that has ever walked on the surface of the Earth for the last 200,000 years.

Every year, around 121,000 cubic miles of water, or about the equivalent of 42 Superior Lakes, falls down on Earth and constantly flows through the rivers, lakes, ground reservoirs and everywhere else it passes through, including inside the guts of people and animals that drink it.

So what do dinosaurs have to do with all this? Unlike humans, who have been on Earth for a tiny fraction of the 186 million years that dinosaurs ruled this planet, the beasts were here far longer than we have ever been. In that long span of time, it is very likely that the dinosaurs have drunk all the water available back then, and all the water available now is simply water that has passed through a dinosaur’s kidneys making its way through the never-ending water cycle.

“Humans consume a lot of water, but our species hasn’t had the numbers or time to process a large portion of the Earth’s water. Dinosaurs on the other hand had a long time to drink water,” the video explains. “The Mesozoic era – the reign of the dinosaurs – lasted for 186 million years.

That gave them time to drink a lot of water. So while most molecules in your eight-ounce glass have never been drunk by another human, almost every single molecule has been drunk by a dinosaur.”

Charles Fisherman, author of “The Big Thirst: The Secret Life and Turbulent Future of Water,” says water molecules are extremely resilient, and it’s likely that all water molecules present now were the same water molecules available for billions of years.

“All the water on Earth has been through a dinosaur kidney,” Fishermantells Marketplace.org. “Every bottle of Evian you drink from is Tyrannosaurus Rex pee. All the water on Earth has been here for 4.5 billion years. It’s all toilet-to-tap at some level.”

Believe it or believe it not?

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Thursday 11th December 2014

Dead babies placed in coffins of unrelated adults until ’80s, HSE says

 

Scale of ‘tandem burial’ practice and how it developed unknown

The Health Service Executive (HSE)has said the practice of “tandem burials” in which the bodies of dead infants were placed in the coffins of unrelated adults was historical but that it did not know precisely the scale of the practice or how it developed in the first place.

However it accepted the practice was likely to have caused “much distress and upset for families both at that time and now”.

The HSE said from the limited information available, it understood that the practice of tandem burials ceased in the early 1980s.

It said it was important to note that the practice did not occur in HSE hospitals today.

The health authority said it was unclear why the practice of tandem burials had evolved.

“The scale of the practice is difficult to determine due to the changed landscape of all healthcare facilities, including maternity hospitals, from that time to today.”

“Furthermore, the record-keeping for such practices was not sufficiently comprehensive in order to allow a full picture in relation to the practice to be established.”

HSE director general Tony O’Brien briefed the Department of Health on the practice at the end of August. This followed enquiries made to the HSE over the summer by a family about deceased relatives.

Mr O’Brien said in a letter to then secretary general of the Department of Health Ambrose McLoughlin it was not certain that the families of both of the deceased babies and adults would always have been informed of the practice.

It occurred in “exceptional circumstances” in the case of a newborn baby who died in hospital and where the other options for burial, in a hospital or religious plot, “were not selected”.

The remains of the baby would then be placed in a coffin of a deceased adult.

The letter, which was obtained by RTÉ under the Freedom of Information Act said: “Our understanding is that the remains would have been placed with adult remains and that ideally the awareness and understanding of both families involved would have been sought, though this is not guaranteed.”

Mr O’Brien stated that the practice had been confirmed by current hospital staff, particularly mortuary staff, who were employed during the period in question.

Fianna Fail health spokesman Billy Kelleher said the revelations raised a number of questions about certain practices in hospitals.

“The information, while vague, will be very distressing for families who may have placed their faith in their local hospital to bury their loved one.”

“We need to establish what hospitals were carrying out this practice, how long did it go on for, and were family members of both deceased notified of the burial procedure. The HSE must be up-front and honest about these issues and ensure that adequate support measures are put in place for all of the families affected.”

Irish economy ekes out growth in third quarter, on track for strong 2014

  

Ireland’s economy grew just 0.1% in the third quarter as an austerity-weary public appeared to refrain from spending, but the country is still set to be the fastest-growing economy in Europe this year, data showed on Thursday.

That was weaker than some analysts expected, but a surge in gross domestic product in the first six months of the year means little if any quarter-on-quarter growth is now needed to meet government projections for GDP to expand almost 5% this year.

“Today’s data confirm the economy has expanded at a rapid pace in 2014 – although not quite as strong as the exceptional breakneck 6% plus some had expected,” said Conall Mac Coille, chief economist at Davy Stockbrokers.

“This confirms we are on course to be the fastest economy in Europe,” said Mac Coille.

Despite the low quarter-on-quarter figure, the economy grew 3.5% compared with the same quarter last year, the data showed. After exiting its EU/IMF bailout last year, Ireland has been outperforming the rest of the euro zone, where growth is faltering.

It was the third straight period of quarterly growth following an expansion of 1.1% from April to June that saw GDP rise a hefty 7.3% year-on-year, the Central Statistics Office (CSO) said on Thursday, revising the figures down a touch.

The government’s austerity drive has helped get the economy back on track, but it has also tested the public’s patience. Tens of thousands of people marched on parliament on Wednesday to protest against the final round of government measures, frustrated at feeling no effect of the recovery they are hearing so much about.

The uneven nature of the recovery was demonstrated in a breakdown of the figures, which showed personal consumption was flat year-on-year having contracted in the second quarter, while exports and investment soared.

A number of economists said the data was surprising given that retail sales volumes rose by almost 5% in the third quarter and consumer confidence hit a seven-year high.

Thursday’s data means the economy has grown 4.9% year-on-year so far this year, the CSO said, a figure finance minister Michael Noonan said kept the government on track to meet its 2014 targets.

The better-than-expected growth in the first half has allowed the government to cut income tax from next month, the first reversal of the austerity drive that began in 2008 and intensified under the bailout programme that Ireland completed last year.

The government wants to bring in further tax cuts in a year’s time, as protests grow 15 months ahead of a parliamentary election. But it will need continued momentum in the economy to do so.

Emergency legislation to be rushed through to close penalty points loophole

 

Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Paschal Donohoe.

TRANSPORT Minister Paschal Donohoe is to rush through emergency legislation to close a penalty points loophole.

The Fine Gael politician announced today that the measures are required to address a “technical issue” in the law governing the system.

“Amending legislation is being drafted to ensure that there will be no interruption to the enforcement of road traffic offences under the penalty points system,” the minister said.

“This legislation will be published tomorrow and progressed through the Oireachtas next week. In the continued interest of road safety, I will not be making further comment until the publication of the legislation, after which point I will make a full statement,” he added.

The loophole has given rise to fears that ten of thousands of penalty points issued in recent months will be rescinded.

The announcement today came after formal advice was received by Attorney General Maire Whelan.

Pill to curb obesity a step closer

  

Dr Gardiner suggested that in humans it might be possible to reduce cravings for glucose by altering one’s diet and a drug acting on this system could potentially prevent obesity.

Scientists have made a significant start towards creating an obesity pill. A team of researchers from Imperial College London have discovered the exact brain mechanism that drives our appetite for foods rich in glucose and could lead to treatments for obesity. Glucose is a component of carbohydrates, and the main energy source used by brain cells.

By studying rats, the team identified a mechanism that appears to sense how much glucose is reaching the brain, and prompts animals to seek more if it detects a shortfall. The researchers believe it may play a role in driving our preference for sweet and starchy foods.

Dr. James Gardiner from Imperial’s department of medicine who led the study, said: “Our brains rely heavily on glucose for energy. It’s clearly a very important nutrient, but in our evolutionary past it would have been hard to come by. So we have a deep-rooted preference for glucose-rich foods and seek them out.”

The researchers hypothesised that an enzyme called glucokinase might play a role in driving our desire for glucose. Glucokinase is involved in sensing glucose in the liver and pancreas. It is present in the hypothalamus, an area of the brain that regulates a variety of essential functions including food intake, but its exact role was unclear.

“This is the first time anyone has discovered a system in the brain that responds to a specific nutrient, rather than energy intake in general. It suggests that when you’re thinking about diet, you have to think about different nutrients, not just count calories,” Dr Gardiner said.

Dr Gardiner suggested that in humans it might be possible to reduce cravings for glucose by altering one’s diet and a drug acting on this system could potentially prevent obesity.

Could this BEE HIVE SEALANT be the cure for baldness?

Insects may answer to hair growth problem

  

Hair today gone tomorrow: Baldy has no use for a brush.

A compound bees use to repair their hives can boost hair growth in a buzzing discovery for bald people.

The natural sealant – called propolis – was tested on mice that had been shaved or waxed, and experts today revealed those that had the treatment re-grew their fur faster than those that did not.

Bees use the substance to seal small gaps in their hives, but now the scientists say the find could help develop new hair loss therapies.

The experts – headed by Dr Ken Kobayashi, of Hokkaido University in Japan – said after propolis was applied, the number of special cells involved in growing hair increased.

They said growth “occurred without any detectable abnormalities in the shape of the follicles”.

Despite using shaved mice rather than those unable to grow fur, the researchers – whose findings are published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry – expect it could also apply to baldness.

They say hair loss often results from inflammation, and propolis contains anti-inflammatory properties.

Crocodiles are closely related to our birds

  

If you had to think of an animal most closely related to birds, perhaps crocodiles would not be your first choice.

But the two are related, according to new research, although crocodiles are apparently ‘stuck in the past’.

Both share a common ancestor that lived about 240 million years ago and also gave rise to the dinosaurs.

But crocodilians – that’s the group which includes crocodiles, caimans, alligators and gharials – have evolved at a slower rate.

In fact, new genome, or genetic code, studies have revealed their unusually slow rate of genetic evolution.

The unspeedy progress of the reptiles has helped scientists build up a genetic picture of the “archosaurs” which pre-dated dinosaurs, pterosaurs, birds and crocodilians.

Fast in life, but not so quick with evolution

US lead scientist Dr Richard Green, from the University of California at Santa Cruz, said: “The ticking of the molecular clock in the crocodilians is much slower than in other lineages we’re used to looking at, like mammals, which means we can see back into their past more cleanly.

“We know from fossils that the body plan of crocs has remained largely unchanged for millions of years.”

The team sequenced the genomes, or genetic blueprints, of three crocodilian species, the American alligator, the saltwater crocodile, and the Indian gharial.

The analysis, published in the journal Science, indicates that the ancestor of all archosaurs had an extremely slow rate of molecular evolution, which speeded up in the bird lineage.

After the meteor strike thought to have wiped out the dinosaurs 66 million years ago, surviving birds experienced a rapid burst of evolution.

This led to nearly all the species of birds seen on Earth today, numbering more than 10,000.

There’s more than 10,000 types of birds in the world

In related studies, also reported in Science, researchers compared the genomes of 48 bird species selected from all major avian groups and including the woodpecker, owl, penguin, hummingbird and flamingo.

Among other findings, they discovered that birdsong evolved independently at least twice.

Birds were also found to have lost their teeth about 116 million years ago, when the dinosaurs still ruled.

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Thursday 4th December 2014

“Bailout of €680m” for HSE the biggest in its 10-year history

 

The Minister for Health Leo Varadkar.

Department says overrun will not reduce funds available to health service next year

The Department of Health is seeking a €680 million supplementary budget for the Health Service Executive next month, the largest in the history of the health service, the Department of Public Expenditure has confirmed.

The figure includes a €510 million minimum overrun on the cost of running the health service, as well as increased costs incurred by the State Claims Agency as a result of a rise in claims.

The larger-than-expected bailout for the Department of Health will mean the equivalent sum is carried forward into next year’s account, though Minister for Health Leo Varadkar insists it will have no impact on the funding available next year.

The amount sought demonstrates the intense pressure on the health budget, and the task ahead for Mr Varadkar should demand for services continue to rise.

A number of other departments have also sought supplementary budgets.

The Department of Health said the extra money sought for the HSE reflected increased levels of activity, such as more emergency admissions, more demand for bed days and more elderly patients with complex needs.

Mr Varadkar said the extra money for the HSE has already been included in the base for next year’s expenditure.

Some €54 million is being sought for payments by the HSE to the State Claims Agency. “The timing of income collection and working capital requirements associated with prior years contributes a further €108 million cash requirement in 2014,” the Department said.

Mr Varadkar said these were once-off costs and would not recur next year.

The supplementary budget also includes €5 million for an early access programme to drugs for high-risk patients with Hepatitis C and €3 million to allow an initiative to tackle delayed discharges start this year. through the release of 300 additional places on the Fair Deal scheme.

“The supplementary budget will have no impact whatsoever on the budget for the Department of Health for next year and the HSE Service Plan announced last week is unaffected and the figures remain unchanged,” the Minister said.

The Department says savings of €4 million will reduce the cost to the Exchequer of the supplementary estimate.

The HSE has required a supplementary estimate in all but two years of its 10-year history but this bailout is the largest since it was set up in2005. In 2010, a €595 million supplementary budget was required to shore up its finances.

HSE secretary general Tony O’Brien has argued that half of this year’s overrun is due to issues beyond its control, such as unspecified pay savings and a pensions excess. However, hospital overspending is projected to hit €273 million by the end of the year.

Bishops say same-sex marriage would be

‘A grave injustice’

 

Bishop Kevin Doran, Bishop of Elphin, and Bishop Liam MacDaid, Bishop of Clogher and chair of the Council for Marriage and Family of the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference at the media launch of The Meaning of Marriage, a pastoral statement by the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference.

The leaflet highlights ‘uniqueness of the role of husbands and wives’

Allowing same-sex marriage would be a “grave injustice” and a disservice to society, according to members of a representative body for Catholic bishops in Ireland.

Speaking at the launch of a leaflet entitled “The Meaning of Marriage” in Maynooth, high-ranking clergy from the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference set out the church’s stall in the run-up to an expected referendum on same-sex marriage next spring.

“The view of marriage as being between man and a woman and for life, that’s not something which is particular to Catholics and Christians. There are people of all kinds of other religious beliefs, and of none, who believe in that,” said Bishop Liam MacDaid of Clogher, who is chair of the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference council for marriage.

“To put any other view of marriage on the same level as Christian marriage would be a disservice to society rather than a service,” added Bishop MacDaid, who was flanked by fellow bishop Kevin Doran of Elphin following the organisation’s two-day winter conference in St Patrick’s College.

“While there’s sort of an assumption that this referendum [passing] is a no-brainer, in some societies the legislature has legislated for same-sex marriage, but in other societies- almost everywhere there has been a same-sex referendum- it has been rejected… Our hope would be that the referendum would be defeated,” saidBishop Doran, who courted publicity last week for his concessionary stance on inheritance rights for same-sex couples.

The bishops’ remarks came upon the release of the eight-page leaflet on marriage, which contends that “it is a grave injustice if the State ignores the uniqueness of the role of husbands and wives, and the importance of mothers and fathers in our society”.

Placing a heavy emphasis on the responsibility of a functioning, heterosexual relationship in the child rearing process, the publication states that the “upbringing of children is uniquely possible” through conventional, church-endorsed marital relationships.

It goes on to say that “the union of marriage provides for the continuation of the human race and the development of human society”, and that “marriage of a woman and a man is a fundamental building block of society which makes a unique and irreplaceable contribution to the common good and to society as well”.

It is thought that today’s comments from church officials marks the opening salvo in a concerted effort to sway public opinion against same-sex marriages ahead of next year’s referendum. According to the latest Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI poll, 67 per cent of Irish people support the notion of same-sex marriage being constitutionally enshrined, with just 20 per cent of respondents opposed to such a move.

Sligo hospital issues apology to Sally Rowlette family

 

Saolta hospital group says services have improved in maternity unit since her death.

Sean Rowlette and his children who’s wife, Sally Rowlette (36), died in child birth at Sligo Regional Hospital.

Sligo Regional Hospital and the Saolta hospital group of which it is a member have apologised to the family of Sally Rowlette, who died in the hospital last year.

In a statement offering their condolences, they said they were apologising “for the events related to her care that contributed to her tragic death”.

Maternity and ICU services in the hospital have improved over the past number of years, according to the statement, and the delivery of quality safe patient care continues to be a priority.

The national maternity early warning score has been implemented for all pregnant women attending the hospital and will help ensure the early detection of any deteriorating patient, it says.

A post-natal communication process has been established for women with severe Hellp syndrome, an acute form of pre-eclampsia, and all incident reports are analysed as part of a risk management process.

On Wednesday, a jury returned a verdict of death by medical misadventure in the case of Ms Rowlette, who died in February 2013 a day after giving birth to her fourth child. The inquest heard evidence that she was a victim of a “broad systems failure”

UPC to acquire wi-fi provider Bitbuzz for some €5-€6 million

 

Bitbuzz managing director Shane Deasy above

Telecoms provider snaps up Irish-owned wi-fi company

Broadband provider UPC Ireland is to acquire Irish-owned wi-fi company Bitbuzz for an undisclosed sum thought to be in the region of €5-€6 million.

Bitbuzz, which is headquartered in Dublin, specialises in offering wifi to the tourism, retail and leisure sectors, notably hotels and cafes in Ireland and Britain.

It recently won contracts with stores operated by the Cork-based wholesale group Musgrave, Insomnia and Costa Coffee.

UPC Ireland chief executive Magnus Ternsjö confirmed the deal at a media lunch hosted by the company on Thursday.

He declined to disclose further details of the acquisition but said it would be a cash deal and that the wifi service would continue to operate under the Bitbuzz brand.

Bitbuzz founders Shane Deasy and Alex French are to leave the company following the acquisition.

Providing internet services via wifi has become increasingly competitive with a number of high-profile companies vying for market share.

UPC’s move is designed to strengthen the company’s presence in the hospitality, health and education markets, where Bitbuzz is prominent.

With Bitbuzz’s market position and UPC’s fixed-line capacity, the deal is perceived to deliver significant synergies.

Bitbuzz passed something of a milestone when revenues break the €1 million mark in the first half of this year.

Its managing director Shane Deasy said recently the company planned to hire about a dozen more staff by the end of the year as part of an expansion of its activities in Ireland and Britain.

Crows show tendency to be left or right beaked after a study of skills put to the test

  

Scientists have been examining the tool skills of crows

Crows famous for their tool-wielding show a tendency to be left or right beaked that mirrors handedness in humans, scientists have found.

Individual New Caledonian crows display a preference for holding a stick tool on the right or left side of their beaks.

Researchers believe the birds may be trying to keep the tip of the stick in view of the eye on the opposite side of their heads.

Lead scientist Dr Alejandro Kacelnik, from Oxford University, said: “If you were holding a brush in your mouth and one of your eyes was better than the other at brush length, you would hold the brush so that its tip fell in view of the better eye. This is what the crows do.”

New Caledonian crows have surprised experts with their ability to use sticks to extract larvae from burrows and, in captivity, retrieve food placed out of reach.

The new study, published in the journal Current Biology, also suggests that the birds’ unusually wide field of vision actually helps them to see better with one eye.

Co-author Dr Antone Martinho, also from Oxford University, said: “We thought that their binocular fields would facilitate binocular vision, perhaps allowing the birds to judge the distance from tool tip to target. It turned out that, most frequently, they only see the tool tip and target with one eye at a time.”

Dr Kacelnik added: “Birds and humans face similar problems in tool use and many other activities. Studying similar problems across species helps to put all of them in perspective.”

Stegosaurus skeleton to give up its dinosaur secrets

  

Scientists have begun the most detailed analysis ever carried out on a stegosaurus skeleton.

Although stegosauruses are one of the most well-known dinosaurs, it is among those scientists know the least about.

There are only six partial skeletons of the creature, which lived around 150 million years ago.

This specimen, nicknamed “Sophie”, has been acquired by the Natural History Museum in London.

A UK team has scanned each of its 360 bones into a computer and has digitally reconstructed the animal.

Professor Paul Barrett, who is leading the research, told BBC News more about what they were hoping to find out.

News Ireland daily BLOG by Donie

Sunday 24th November 2013

Twenty-nine senior voluntary hospital manager’s enjoyed salary top-ups and allowances

 

Right picture the Master of the National Maternity Hospital Dr Rhona Mahony who received €182,000 of a top-up.

Twenty-nine senior voluntary hospital managers have been paid more than €1m in contributions to their private pension funds out of public funds in the past three years,

A confidential HSE report shows a number of managers are receiving contributions equal to half their salary, far higher than normal employer contributions.

The report, which has been seen by Health Minister James Reilly, said the “continued payment of public funds into private pension schemes is of concern”.

It can also be revealed that 12 senior hospital executives have each been receiving gold-plated private health insurance of up to €5,300 a year, despite their leading roles in the public health system.

Last week, the Master of the National Maternity Hospital Dr Rhona Mahony said she had been “vilified” after it emerged she received a number of additional payments on top of her basic salary of €182,000.

Yet, today we uncover the true scale of the top-ups and allowances enjoyed by a coterie of 191 senior health executives in our leading hospitals and care centres.

A significant proportion of the controversial allowances paid every year are unauthorised and granted without any HSE/departmental sanction, and many managers are in receipt of more than one top-up on top of their salaries.

Also, a number of hospitals repeatedly refused to disclose salary and allowance details requested by the HSE audit department, the report states.

The document, written by Dr Geraldine Smith, assistant national director of Internal Audit HSE, also reveals that three hospital managers – one from Cappagh Hospital, one from the National Rehabilitation Hospital and one from Our Lady’s Hospice – have shared €174,000 in Medical Board allowances.

The report reveals:

1. In total, €3,223,950 was paid out annually to 191 managers in allowances out of HSE funds. In addition, €912,472 was paid out to 34 managers in salary and allowance top-ups from private funds.
2. One Dublin teaching hospital (which we have confirmed to be the Mater Hospital) paid €25,625 in additional remuneration to its CEO Brian Conlon, in “respect of the hospital’s development programme”. The Mater boss also gets €3,500 in a car expenses allowance. The Department of Health said that no documents in which approval is given for such payments exist in their records.
3. €304,718 in allowances to senior managers who assumed additional duties.
4. €173,000 was paid to 17 managers in undisclosed allowances. “Agencies did not provide the title of the allowances,” the report said.
5. Two executives in Our Lady’s Children Hospital were paid €53,065 extra for taking on additional management duties.
6. Two managers in St James’s Hospital received two top-up allowances for assuming extra duties.
7. Four senior executives in the Royal Victoria Eye and Ear hospital were paid €89,415 as a contribution to the Hospital Management Group.
8. One executive from Our Lady’s Hospice received €12,700 to manage another location.
9. Two managers in Beaumont were paid €14,146 in an allowance to bring their salaries up to deputy general manager scale;
10. One senior figure at St James’s Hospital received a post-graduate co-ordinator allowance of €51,617; the Hospital’s Haemophilia unit director got €43,468 in a top up; while the hospital’s director of clinical audit unit got €36,417 on top of their salary.
11. Four senior managers at the Dublin Dental Hospital got €86,400 in external on-call allowances.
12. One manager at Our Lady’s Children Hospital got a €27,931 allowance for advising on ‘clinical risk’.
13. One hospital said allowances paid to 26 managers were done so in accordance with Department of Health guidelines but the department disputed that claim saying “no records were found in relation to agency/hospital approved allowances or for any of the allowances listed for the 26 senior management posts”.
14. In total, 14 managers in four hospitals had part of their salary paid for out of private funds at a cost of €409,631, or €29,259 each. St Vincent’s Hospital Dublin failed to disclose how much it was paying in salary top-ups out of private funds.
15. Of the privately funded allowances, 23 of the 34 managers identified receive one type of top-up payment, 10 receive two types and one manager received three types.
16. €396,376 in private funds was used to pay allowances to 18 managers in the following hospitals – the Coombe (one manager), the Mater (one), Holles Street (four), National Rehabilitation Hospital (one), Rotunda (five), South Infirmary (one), CRC (one), Our Lady’s Hospice (three), Our Lady’s Children Hospital (one).
17. On-call allowances were also paid to non-clinical management.

In relation to the use of taxpayers’ money to fund private pension contributions for 29 managers in nine hospitals, the report said the practice has continued despite six of the nine hospitals being covered by the public sector pension scheme.

“The rate of pension contributions from public funds to these private pension funds by these agencies range from six per cent to 46 per cent of salary,” the report revealed. Some of the centres involved include Brothers and Sisters of Charity institutions throughout Ireland.

While some of the allowances are deemed to be legitimate, Dr Smith determined that both salaries and allowances were paid without proper sanction from either the HSE or the Department of Health.

“This practice is in contravention of HSE and Department of Health policy.

“There is no current arrangement in place whereby employers are authorised to supplement the approved rate for any post, senior or otherwise,” the report said.

She also concluded that where senior managers’ pay differed from consolidated salary scales, hospitals and agencies said they relied on “verbal approval” from the Department of Health which was given.

However, having checked, the report concluded that no documentation of such agreements exist in Department of Health files.

Five senior executives at the Stewarts Hospital for the disabled are in receipt of up to €5,347 in private health insurance top-ups every year.

The audit report also stated hospitals in various regions either refused or repeatedly failed to disclose properly the full extent of the payments to senior managers.

The report concluded that “there is no current arrangement in place whereby employers are authorised to supplement the approved rate for any post, senior or otherwise”.

Dr Smith added that the Department of Health “had not located any papers dealing with the terms and conditions of existing individual CEOs or senior post holders in these Section 38 agencies”.

She added: “The lack of records is a concern.”

It is also reported that 34 of 63 disability service providers who receive HSE and other funds confirmed that the pay of their CEOs was in excess of stated HSE rules, with 13 of those bodies saying the breach in the pay scales exceeded 15 per cent.

Crucially, the report determined that financial emergency legislation introduced by the Government requires all public sector bodies to recoup any salaries paid which are not in accordance with approved public sector rates.

However, Dr Smith’s audit concludes “no system yet exists within the HSE to retrieve such overpayments”.

On foot of her investigations, Dr Smith made 22 key recommendations in her report.

They include:

* A clear need for health sector allowances to be reviewed, rationalised and for a definitive list of allowances to be issued.

* All non-standard allowances must be fully sanctioned by the HSE/Department of Health and should be regularly reviewed.

* Sunset clauses should also be applied to any sanctioned allowance.

* Discussions between the Department of Health and hospitals should conclude “as soon as possible” in order to end the payments of public funds into private pension schemes.

* Pay rates of CEOs “do not necessarily reflect the comparable size, scale and complexity of each organisation today”. All salaries should be reviewed immediately.

* All future appointments to CEO or senior management posts should require sanction to approve the entirety of the remuneration package and any deviation must have approval.

* The HSE must develop a proper system of recouping unsanctioned or excess payments.

* It also said there must be a “clear and unambiguous policy on the issue of providing additional remuneration to senior managers from private sources”.

Annelies Ilena/Atlantic Dawn ship detained in Killybegs for Irish waters infringement’s

 

The Irish navy escorting one of world’s largest fishing vessels to Killybegs for alleged fishing infringements

The Atlantic Dawn being escorted by pilot boats into Dublin Port in 2000.

The Naval Service ship LÉ Roisín has detained one of the world’s largest fishing vessels, the former Atlantic Dawn , for alleged infringements in Irish waters.The 144-metre supertrawler, which is now Dutch-owned and registered and renamed as Annelies Ilena , was escorted into Killybegs, Co Donegal, last night as part of a joint Naval Service – Sea Fisheries Protection Authority(SFPA) surveillance operation.

The vessel, which is the largest ever detained in an exercise of this type in Irish waters, was handed over to the Garda Siochána for suspected infringements relating to “high grading” of fish.

“High grading” involves selecting only the largest of a species and discarding the smaller catch by factory vessels at sea.

The vessel was detained shortly after 11am today some 100 nautical miles north-west of Tory island.

It is the 13th vessel apprehended this year for alleged infringements of fisheries regulations, and the 922nd vessel board by Naval Service patrols in 2013.

The vessel sparked a political controversy after it was built in Norway and delivered to Ireland in 2000 for late skipper and fleet owner Kevin McHugh at a time when theEuropean Commission was trying to reduce overall fleet sizes.

After Mr McHugh’s death, it was sold by his family firm Atlantic Dawn Ltd to a Dutch consortium six years ago Parlevliet and Van der Plas, and has been fishing in international waters.

The Donegal company secured government approval to retain its license and substantial quota allocation.

One third of Irish people admit having had sex with a colleague as a result of a Christmas party

   

A third of Irish employees have admitted to sleeping with a colleague at their Christmas party.

According to a new festive survey by GiftsDirect.com, the curse of the office Christmas party is still fresh in people’s minds.

One in three workers have admitted to having sex during, or after, their annual bash,

The study also showed Christmas shopping habits with Co Wicklow emerging as the most generous area in Ireland, sending the most presents annually.

Dublin sends the fewest number of gifts.

One fifth of Irish people will buy all their presents online, while 13% will be using tablet devices for those purchases.

And it’s not just about presents – “mass times” will hit 5,000 Googlesearches in December, a dramatic hike in comparison to the rest of the year.

Amsterdam pay their alcoholics with beer and tobacco to clean up the city

  

Officials in Amsterdam say a program that pays alcoholics in cash, tobacco and beer to clean the streets is helping the city learn how to fight addiction.

The program came about in response to complaints about a group of as many as 40 alcoholics loitering in Oosterpark, near the city center, making the park unsafe for visitors, Spiegel Online reported.

Caspar Itz, spokesman for the Oost district government, said the city tried banning alcohol in the park but began about a year ago — with help from addiction experts — to pay alcoholics $13.50 a day, along with half a pack of rolling tobacco and as many as five cans of beer to clean streets and parks.

“These people get something to do, a structured daily routine,” Itz said. “And they’re gone from the park.”

So far, 19 people have sign up for the program. Critics say the city is enabling the alcoholics.

“It certainly makes sense to give alcoholics a task, and thus a fixed daily structure,” said Christa Merfert-Diete, spokeswoman for the German Central Office for Questions of Addiction. “But we don’t see why you should give out tobacco and alcohol along with money.”

Itz said Amsterdam residents are worried about whether it’s ethical to provide beer to alcoholics, but the city has been learning how to fight addiction throughout the process of developing the program.

“It works like giving heroin to addicts,” he said. “An addiction expert is always there and controls how much each individual is getting.”

Dead Minke Whale, & a poorly conditioned turtle called Leon stranded on Irish beaches

  

News reports on the sad story of a nine-metre long minke whale found dead on the beach at Magilligan Point in Derry.

According to the Irish Whale and Dolphin Group’s (IWDG) Pádraig Whooley, minke whales have been “reported with increased frequency off the Antrim and Down coast” and there have been sightings in the past week off Donegal.

The incident marks the third whale stranding on the Northern Irish coast since September, when two died after beaching in North Antrim.

In more positive marine wildlife news, a loggerhead turtles is being cared for at the Galway Atlantaquarium after stranding in a bad condition in Co Clare during the week.

The Irish Independent reports that the turtle, named Leon after the famous Quilty shipwreck, was recovered after a local woman alerted marine wildlife experts.

“You might see a loggerhead turtle wash up every couple or three years but not very often at all,” said Dr Simon Berrow of the IWDG, who said the turtle may need several months’ rehab before its fit to return to the wild.

That’s an issue that presents its own challenges due to its smaller size and distance from its usual tropical waters.

Dinosaur that terrorised the Tyrannosaurs found

 

A new giant meat-eating dinosaur that terrorised the early relatives of Tyrannosaurus rex (above right) has been discovered in Utah

A new species of predatory dinosaur that was so big it would have terrorised early Tyrannosaurs has been discovered.

Siats meekerorum, named after a mythical man-eating monster, is thought to have grown up to 40ft long, making it one of the three biggest meat eating dinosaurs to have lived.

The dinosaur lived around 98 million years ago and as the top predator of its time would have dominated over relatives of the Tyrannosaurus rexfor millions of years.

The discovery suggests that Tyrannosaurs were far from being the most fearsome predator in the food chain for much of their history.

However, T. rex itself, which appeared around 30 million years later, would still have dwarfed the new species and probably weighed twice as much.

Dr Lindsay Zanno, a palaeontologist at North Carolina State University and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences who led the study of the fossils, said: “Contemporary tyrannosaurs would have been no more than a nuisance to Siats, like jackals at a lion kill.

“It wasn’t until carcharodontosaurs like this bowed out that the stage could be set for the evolution of T. rex.”

The researchers who made the discovery have described Siats as a type of carcharodontosaur – a group of large meat eating dinosaurs that lived up to 100 million years ago and had enormous jaws filled with serrated teeth up to eight inches long.

Fossilised remains of Siats were discovered during an excavation in the Cedar Mountain Formation in Utah.

Among the fossilised bones recovered were vertebrae, a hind leg bone and part of the creature’s pelvis.

Dr Zanno and her colleagues, whose study is published in the journal Nature Communications, believe they belonged to a juvenile that would have been more than 30 feet long and weighted at least four tons.

They believe that adults could have grown up to 40 feet long. They named it Siats – pronounced see-atch – after the cannibalistic clown like monster that appear in legends of the Ute American Indian tribe.

The Meekerorum part of the name is after a family with the surname Meeker who have sponsored some of the work by the researchers in the past.

The scientists say Siats and earlier carcharodontosaurs such asAcrocanthosaurus would have dominated as the top predators for much of the Cretaceous period.

While there is no evidence that they actively hunted and killed smaller tyrannosaurs, experts believe clashes between the species over prey.

Siats would probably have preferred slow moving herbivores as prey, but it may have fought tyrannosaurs off its kills in the same way lions will with jackals.

It was not until the final 20 million years of the age of the dinosaurs that these were then eclipsed by the Tyrannosaurs.

Dr Zanno said: “Carcharodontosaurs reigned for much longer in North America than we expected.

“It has been 63 years since a predator of this size has been named from North America.

“You can’t imagine how thrilled we were to see the bones of this behemoth poking out of the hillside.”

“There were large plant-eating dinosaurs living alongside Siats, including an iguanodontian known as Eolambia.

“It probably did not hunt tyrannosaurs – why hunt another small predator with teeth and claws, when you can track a giant plant eater for lunch?”

Her colleague Peter Makovicky, from Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History, added that Siats would have been far larger than any other predators at the time.

He said: “The huge size difference certainly suggests that tyrannosaurs were held in check by carcharodontosaurs, and only evolved into enormous apex predators after the carcharodontosaurs disappeared.

News Ireland daily BLOG Tuesday

Tuesday 16th July 2013

Nuns say they will not pay compensation to the Magdalene laundries fund

Four congregations will not contribute to fund, which could cost State up to €58 million

     

The four religious congregations that ran the Magdalene laundries have told the Government they will not make any financial contribution to the multi-million-euro fund set up to recompense former residents.

The Mercy Sisters, the Sisters of Our Lady of Charity, the Sisters of Charity and the Good Shepherd Sisters have informed Minister for Justice Alan Shatter in recent days that they will not pay into the fund, which could cost up to €58 million.

However, it is understood they have said they are willing to assist fully in all other aspects of the package recommended by MrJustice John Quirke in his recent report, including the assembly of records and looking after former residents who remain in their care.

A spokeswoman for Mr Shatter said he was “disappointed” with the decision of the four orders not to make a financial contribution.

He will brief his ministerial colleagues about the situation at the weekly Cabinet meeting this morning.

No comment
Three of the four orders contacted through a spokesman were not prepared to make any comment at this point in time.

The Government announced the scheme last month after Mr Justice Quirke had conducted an examination of the various options to compensate the women who lived in the laundries, many of whom are now elderly.

The minimum payment was €11,500 for women who spent three months or less in a laundry and the maximum approved was €100,000 for those who were residents for 10 years or more.

Groups representing the women argued that higher awards should have been made available to those who had been long-term residents.

There was no onus on any applicant to show they had suffered hardship, injury or abuse. Some 600 women are reckoned to be eligible. The scheme is expected to cost between €34.5 million and €58 million.

When the scheme was announced, Mr Shatter said taxpayers expected the four religious orders to share the burden and make a contribution to the scheme. He would not be drawn on the amount he expected them to contribute.

State apology
The scheme follows on from a full apology on behalf of the State made to the survivors by Taoiseach Enda Kenny in the Dáil this year, in which he said that nobody should have been subjected to the conditions they endured.

That apology came in the wake an investigation by former senator Martin McAleese into the running and conditions within the laundries which were in operation for the best part of a century.

The report also established that the State had played a significant role in the continued operation of the laundries.

Fewer Irish people saving now as austerity erodes our disposable income

 

Proportion of people not saving at all increases to 46 per cent as austerity bites

Fewer Irish people are saving money because of the ongoing pressure on disposable income caused by austerity and recent hikes in Dirt tax.

According to the Nationwide UK (Ireland)/ESRI Savings Index, regular saving has declined across all age groups with only 32 per cent of people putting money aside regularly compared with 36 per cent a year ago.

The proportion of people who are not saving at all increased to 46 per cent in June from 43 per cent a year ago.

The overall index remained flat at 86 in June but was down 15 points on the same month last year on account of “increasing negativity about the amount being saved and the environment for saving”.

The report suggested negativity towards saving, however, was different for each age group.

People under 50 are concerned with the amounts they are currently saving, with 68 per cent saving less then they think they should and only 12 per cent happy with the amount they are saving, the report revealed.

In contrast, those over 50 are more concerned with the savings environment as 62 per cent believe that Government policy discourages saving, an increase from 53 per cent a year ago.

Managing director of Nationwide UK (Ireland) Brendan Synnott said: “In the past year sentiment towards saving has decreased considerably as people continue to manage their way through austerity.

“We are now seeing clearly diverging opinions being expressed by those aged under 50s compared to those aged over 50.”

“The younger consumer is clearly not satisfied with their ability to save, presumably due to their on-going day to day expenses and reduced disposable income.”

“The over 50s are the traditional saver in the economy and this group has seen the return on their savings reduced as Dirt tax has increased and savings rates for the most part have decreased.”

“Despite these immediate concerns around saving, the fact that 37 per cent of people would save any spare cash available is a positive indicator about the overall savings culture in Ireland. ”

Pension bonanza for retiring senior members of An Garda Siochana

Assistant Garda commissioner received golden handshake of over €200,000 last year

New figures show that one retiring assistant Garda commissioner received a golden handshake of over €200,000 last year as part of a pension arrangement.

According to figures released by the Department of Justice under the Freedom of Information Act, the State paid out €41.94 million in lump sums to retiring gardai of all ranks last year. This followed a lump sum pension pay-out of €46.81 million in 2011.

The pension lump sum payout last year is slightly more than the entire Garda overtime bill of €41.5 million in 2012.

The figures show that the only assistant commissioner to retire last year received a lump sum of €207,927 with five chief superintendents receiving pension lump sums of between €170,000 and €183,005.

The department confirmed that 81 retirees received lump sum payments of over €100,000 in 2012.

The statistics show that the top 25 recipients – made up of the assistant commissioner, five chief superintendents and 19 superintendents – last year shared a pension payout of €3.8 million.

The department also confirmed that there are five retired members of the force receiving annual pension payments in excess of €100,000 with a further two receiving annual payments of between €70,000 and €79,999.

The figures reveal that 30 retired members are in receipt of annual pension payouts of between €60,000 and €69,999, with 120 in receipt of pension payouts of €50,000 and €59,999 per annum.

The deptartment did not disclose the location details of the top 25 recipients “as it may lead to identification of the individuals concerned”.

Last year, 462 gardai retired receiving on average lump sum of €90,799 each.

Separate figures provided by Minister for Justice Alan Shatter show that last year one assistant commissioner retired along with five chief superintendents and 19 superintendents.

They were joined by 24 inspectors, 119 sergeants and 294 rank and file gardai.

The 462 gardai who retired last year followed 480 who retired in 2011. This followed 407 who retired in 2010; 776 in 2009 and 341 in 2008.

Since 2008, 143 members of the force with a rank of superintendent or higher have received the bumper pension lump sums after retiring from the force.

According to Mr Shatter in a written Dail response to Fine Gael TD Andrew Doyle, 95 superintendents have retired; 34 chief superintendents; 12 assistant commissioners; one deputy commissioner and one commissioner have retired during that time.

Fianna Fail justice spokesman Niall Collins said yesterday the large number of retirements from senior ranks from the force “has left a leadership vacuum in the force and it is demoralising for the force to see vacancies unfilled up along the chain of command”.

Mick Wallace TD calls for stronger oversight of the An Garda Síochána

  

Independent TD Mick Wallace has proposed radical changes to the system of oversight of An Garda Síochána.

At a news conference, Mr Wallace claimed there is a serious lack of democratic accountability of the force.

  In the Dáil today, he proposed a bill aimed at strengthening the independence of the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission.

He it was motivated by any antipathy to the force, saying he had a good relationship with the force.

He insisted that the increased accountability would make for better policing, and that a return to what he called policing by consent would make for a better force.

Six in 10 cancer sufferers in Ireland beat the disease

 

SIX out of 10 people are now surviving cancer in Ireland thanks to advances in early detection and treatment.

The Irish Cancer Society said that while cases are rising, more people are surviving cancer and going on to live a normal and healthy life.

Figures show that there are now 100,000 people living with cancer here, meaning there is a growing need to understand the “life-changing implications a cancer diagnosis brings,” the charity said.

The society is set to hold a free conference in Dublin for cancer survivors and their families, which will address the needs of cancer survivors across the country.

The two-day National Conference for Cancer Survivorship event will run on September 21 and 22 at the Aviva Stadium, with up to 800 cancer survivors attending.

Dublin to host cancer survivors’ event

 

Up to 800 cancer survivors and their families are expected to attend a free two-day event in Dublin this September.

The National Conference for Cancer Survivorship will take place on September 20 and 21 at the Aviva Stadium, with the theme ‘Living Well with Cancer’.

More than 60% of Irish people diagnosed with cancer in Ireland survive for five years or longer.

Although the number of cancer cases is increasing in Ireland, with around 100,000 people living with the disease, advances in early detection and treatment have led to more people going on to live a normal and healthy life.

Olwyn Ryan, Patients Support Services Manager at the Irish Cancer Society said: “The transition from cancer patient to cancer survivor can be difficult for those on a cancer journey.

“While many people adapt well, others experience problems in adjusting to life after a cancer diagnosis.

“Access to information and support to deal with issues such as fear of the cancer coming back, financial strain and long-term side-effects of treatment is vital.

“The aim of this unique conference is to identify the issues and support patients and those close to them need to make the necessary adjustments in order to live as well as they can following a diagnosis.

“Delegates will be offered the opportunity to engage with experts in the field of cancer with a particular emphasis on psycho-social adjustment and keeping well into the future.

“Bringing survivors together so that they may befriend, help and support each other is a powerful way of improving the lives of those living with cancer.”

The two-day programme includes practical information on treatment advances, dealing with fatigue, exercise and diet as well as dealing with the emotional and psychological effects of cancer.

There will also be separate tracks for healthcare professionals and affiliated support groups.

Tyrannosaur left a tooth behind in another dinosaur

 

Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, even when you are the King of Dinosaurs. A dinosaur discovery points to the hunting strategy of Tyrannosaurus rex.

• Tyrannosaurus rex was a massive meat-eating dinosaur that lived 66 million years ago
• A T. rex tooth left lodged in the healed tail of a plant-eating hadrosaur dinosaur says it was a hunter

Even Tyrannosaurus rex missed a meal now and then, paleontologists report Monday, noting the discovery of a big tooth left in the tail of a plant-eating dinosaur.

Some 40 feet long at full size, T. rex was surely a fearsome beast, famed for its massive jaws, but how much of its diet consisted of captured prey as opposed to scavenged has remained unclear. But this discovery shows T. rex tried to take a bite out of a live hadrosaur, or duck-billed dinosaur, and lost a tooth in the process, says the tooth discovery team led by Robert DePalma of the Palm Beach Museum of Natural History, in Fort Lauderdale.

“We now have conclusive evidence that T. rex indeed engaged in predatory behavior,” they say in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal. Looking at two healed tail bones of the roughly 66 million-year-old hadrosaur uncovered at the Hell Creek site in South Dakota, the team reports the discovery of a T. rex tooth — “indistinguishable,” from ones in the fossilized skulls of other T. rex specimens — lodged therein. This hadrosaur managed to escape from T. rex and keep a souvenir, a dagger-like tooth crown about 1.5 inches tall and 1 inch wide, the discovery team reports.

Modern predators, such as wolves and lions, lose their prey 45% to 62% of the time too, notes the study. So, T. rex can still hold its head high.

Past dinosaur discoveries such as crunched up hadrosaur bones found in the belly positions of T. rex fossils have already pointed to T. rex being a hunter, notes paleontologist Thomas Holtz of the University of Maryland, who was not part of the study team. “So this isn’t the One Key Specimen, but it *is* an important specimen in the argument,” he says, by e-mail.