News

A MEETING of creditors is scheduled for later this month to appoint a liquidator to a company engaged in multi-million euro tourism projects in counties Clare, Galway and Kerry.Atlantis Developments Limited, with a registered office at Ballyvarra House in Doolin, opened the newly refurbished Peacock’s Hotel in Maam Cross, County Galway; Tír Gan Éan House Hotel and Holiday Complex in Doolin, the Smerwick Harbour Hotel near Dingle; the Burren Coast Hotel and Holiday Lodges in Ballyvaughan and the Cliffs of Moher Hotel in Liscannor in the last five years.The group is also promoting the famed Joseph McHugh’s Pub in Liscannor and the AA 5-star Ballyvara House in Doolin.The company was also approved planning for the development of park and ride facilities to the Cliffs of Moher from Liscannor and Doolin and for a €25m refurbishment of Ballykilty Manor, outside Quin village.According to insolvencyjournal.ie, a meeting of creditors of both Atlantis Development Limited and the Liscannor-based Burren Coast Hotel Limited is …

ENGINEERS acting on behalf of the proposed new €60 million private hospital on the outskirts of Ennis have claimed it could be safely accommodated by a simple priority-type junction near the facility.Clare County Council has expressed a number of concerns, including traffic and road safety, about plans for the development of a new private hospital including 120 in-patient and 20 out-patient beds.John Stack, Lisdoonvarna, and Pat Bonner, Donegal, lodged a planning application with Clare County Council before Christmas seeking permission for the complex on land at Shanaway Road that is zoned for residential use.If planning permission is granted, the developers predict that over 100 construction jobs will be created and between 400 and 500 full-time jobs directly generated once operational, which is due to be in 2012.In a recent request for further information, the planning authority questioned aspects of the proposed development concerning the scale of the building relative to the site area; the loading of the foul effluent to …

Up to 200 chess-playing children and teenagers, ranging in age from five and 19, will descend upon Ennis this weekend to take part in the 2010 All-Ireland junior chess tournament.Children are expected to travel from all four provinces and from several counties. Connie Danaher, who runs the Killimer-Knockerra Chess Club in west Clare, is organising the event and is expecting a large turnout. “There’s over 150 players booked in at the moment but always at the last minute kids turn up. We’ve bookings from Derry, Cork, Donegal, Dublin, Kilkenny and Longford. Hopefully, every county in Ireland will be represented. There are chess clubs throughout the country and each of the clubs usually send a couple of kids,” Connie explained. Competitors don’t have to pre-qualify and can take part even if they are not affiliated to a chess club. “It’s an opportunity for children to aim for a national title. Those who win are the cream of Ireland and they will …

NUI Galway student society, Draíocht will walk the 70km from Ennis to Galway this week to raise money for a new health centre in a Nepalese village.The students will carry water throughout the walk, in recognition of the challenges people in Nepal and other areas, face when trying to gain access to clean water.The volunteers will leave Ennis carrying five to 20 litres of water each, at 12am on Friday and continue walking 37km to Gort. On Saturday, they will continue their journey and walk the 35km to Galway.The Draíocht volunteers will use the money raised to begin construction on a new healthcare centre in Talamarang, Nepal this summer. Draíocht founder and Ennis native Melanie Hennessy, who is currently studying medicine in National University of Ireland Galway, realises the walk will be difficult but feels strongly about the positive impact the clinic could have on the village.“We know that this walk won’t be easy and that water is heavy. “These …

A MEETING between members of the local community in Ballyvaughan and Harbour Air Ireland took place on Tuesday night, with the company reportedly receiving quite a warm reception.The company is looking to introduce seaplane services between a number of different locations including Galway, the Aran Islands, Limerick and Dublin.Director Emelyn Heaps said they were very well received. “It was a credit to the people of Ballyvaughan; there was a very good crowd there and they put excellent questions to us. There was no ranting. We left it with them, we’re willing to look at bringing business there,” he said.He said they hadn’t been looking at Ballyvaughan as a base but had been impressed by the enthusiasm shown. “We were asked how long people coming would stay and what we said was we would bring people to the quay wall and then it was up to them to get people to stay. For us, it was a breath of fresh air …

WHEN Patrick Pearse and James Connolly led their soldiers into the GPO in Dublin on Easter Monday 1916, they did so with the intention of killing.Their aim was to strike a blow for Irish freedom but they believed they could not do that without killing. They had, of course, no mandate from the Irish people to do that. As a matter of fact, the Rising was opposed by the vast majority of the Irish people and when the rebels were rounded up at the end of Easter week, they were spat on and jeered by the ordinary people of Dublin.There were some terrible things done in the name of Irish freedom in the years that followed the Rising.  Some of those things, including the shooting of people in their beds in front of their wives and families, were ordered by the man many believe was the greatest Irishman of all times, Michael Collins. And many of the people shot as …

THE rise in unemployment in County Clare in a five-year period is reflected in the growing number of families qualifying for the Mortgage Income Supplement Scheme (MISS).In 2005, €96,000 was paid out to Clare social welfare recipients to assist them with interest-only repayments on mortgages but by the end of 2009, the figure had grown to over €1.2 million.Almost 300 Clare families now find themselves in this situation through the breadwinner’s loss of job or decrease in working hours. This is only the tip of the iceberg in terms of the problem on a national scale.The scheme is quite restrictive, in that anyone in full-time employment is automatically ineligible, as are those working over 30 hours a week in part-time employment, while the income of a spouse or partner is also taken into account in the assessment.North Clare councillor Martin Conway has predicted the amount of money paid out under the scheme in the county could reach €3m by the …

COMMENT Environmental campaigners are very terse when confronted with the issue of overpopulation. It is seen as a dangerous area to tackle. Interfering in people’s right to reproduce is seen as somehow tantamount to eugenics but the time is fast drawing near for this issue to come out from the shadows and bask in the glow of public debate.