West Clare

AS Kilmurry McMahon prepares to stage a fundraising Mr and Mrs night on Friday, Martin Keogh, who will present the evening along with Debbie O’Shea, has offered some sound advice on how a man can keep his wife or partner happy. “Always say ‘yes’ anyway,” Mr Keogh, a former Shannon Gaels, Clare and Munster footballer, advised. The Tullycrine man’s words of wisdom didn’t cease there.  “Agree to everything and make sure to give them breakfast in bed once a year, for the first year of marriage,” he added. Mr Keogh even has a strategy for putting off jobs that his wife, Mary, feels he should be immediately seeing to. “Tell them what they want to hear, especially when jobs have to be done. But at the same time, try to put things on hold for as long as you can. When you are getting all picture and no sound, it’s time to get it done. Or make some shape anyway,” …

The Department of Education, in conjunction with Clare Education Centre, has approved two summer courses specifically designed for primary school teachers to run at the Loop Head Hedge School during July and August. Each programme is designed around the Loop Head natural environment and consists of a suite of ICT related workshops,  covering the Loop Head coastline, pathways into folklore writing and a combination of creativity workshops designed to incorporate literacy, numeracy and ICT across all curricula areas. The programme has been developed and approved in response to requests from primary teachers,who have attended the Loop Head Summer Hedge School modules over the past two years. The programmes are delivered by artist, author and habitat researcher, Carmel Madigan together with author and masters graduate in writing, Patricia Byrne.  

A KILRUSH mother of a former drug addict has told The Clare Champion that drugs have been available in the town for as long as she can remember. “Drugs have been in this town since I’ve been a kid, starting from LSD to ecstasy. That’s going back to when I was 11. I could see it then. When I got into my teens, it became more prominent, as my brother had got into it. I remember passing a comment to a then councillor, who is no longer there. I said ‘you’d want to start doing something about drugs in the town.’ I was told back then, ‘will you go away and stop talking rubbish. There’s no such thing as drugs in Kilrush’,” she recalled. Aside from her son, the mother has other younger children whom she is trying to ensure do not take drugs. “You can’t be there holding their hands all the time. The one thing I instil into …

By Peter O’Connell A Kilrush mother thinks people who seek treatment, locally, for heroin addiction have obstacles placed in their way. “There isn’t a methadone programme in Kilrush. Kilkee is only a small seaside town and they’re getting methadone up there,” she said, before detailing what is involved, locally, in the programme. The woman, whose son has received treatment for drug addiction, said, “It’s normally a two-year programme. To get you off the heroin, they’ll put you on a dosage of methadone and, over a period of two years, they’ll lower the dosage. Once a week, you’ll pick up your prescription. I think you take it in liquid form on the premises. Then you have the after-care, which is in Limerick. “So if you’re on heroin and you want to go on the programme, you can’t get the methadone or the after-care in Kilrush. “While you’re doing the programme, you have no facility in Kilrush to help you to come …

Lissycasey county councillor PJ Kelly (FF) won his eighth successive election to Clare County Council when he was elected on the eleventh count. “It was good I got elected. I’m delighted. It was awful cheeky to go for eight in a row but I made it. There are a lot of lessons to be learned from this. If we were to have predicted who would win or lose, the bookies would have been in for a good day,” he said of a day of twists and turns in the west Clare race. Meanwhile Bill Chambers (FF) was equally relived to have pulled through at the same stage of the day long count. “It feels great and I’m delighted with the result but I’m really sorry too that we’ve lost two marvellous colleagues in Oliver Garry and Patrick Keane. Two thorough gentleman,” he commented. He described the new west Clare constituency as a challenging one geographically. “It has proved we were …

There are signs of a Fianna Fáil resurgence in West Clare as party men will occupy four out of the eight council seats in the electoral area for the next five years. Sitting councillor Michael Hillery (FF) was elected in the 11th count. He puts part of his vote down to the elimination of Fine Gael’s Corofin-based candidate Gerry Kennedy. “When the tally came in yesterday and I had almost 1400 votes I thought I was in fourth position so I thought I was quite safe. Looking at the overall tally I knew there were a lot of candidates in the Southern section of the area and when they would be eliminated I wouldn’t get many votes from that particular area and that is what would happen but when Gerry Kennedy was eliminated that is when the thing changed around and it looked good from there on in and I’m delighted that it resulted in me being elected in Clare,” …

Councillor Richard Nagle, (FF) has been re-elected to Clare County Council. Shortly after 6pm Councillor Nagle was elected as the second councillor to West Clare, after Christy Curtin (NP). Councillor Nagle paid tribute to his canvassers and all who had helped him get elected, especially his family, “who have seen very little of me over the last three months and did everything possible to support me and put up with my moods during the campaign.” “It is equally as tough on family members as it is on the candidate because during a long campaign, extending over three months candidates have various mood swings going from highs to lows and the people living with them have to put up with those mood swings and everyone in my family helped out in several ways, not just in one way and it is as difficult, if not more difficult, for family members as it is for the candidate. Today is one of the …

A clearly emotional Bill Slattery hugged an even more emotional Senator Martin Conway at the count centre in Ennis after the former was deemed elected shortly after 6pm on Sunday. Councillor Slattery was co-opted to a seat in North Clare electoral area after Conway, then a county councillor, was elected to the Seánad in 2011. Councillor Slattery ran in the local elections in 1999. “I went with Martin Conway and geographically we weren’t situated that well, I being from Lahinch and he being from Ennistymon…I didn’t get elected and I haven’t been involved in politics until I was asked to go for co-option in 2011, after the election of Martin to the senate. I was very reluctant that time because I had left politics but since I was co-opted I put my head down and worked very hard for the last three years to get where I am today and it has paid off with the work I have done …