Search Results for 'Gerry Coyle'

Like marathons, election campaigns are long journeys more often suited to the long distance runner then to the sprinter. As on all long journeys events can happen and change predictions that seemed definite at the outset, this is especially true when it’s a political journey. Bear that in mind as we begin the coverage of the local election campaign scheduled for next June. If Madame Editor allows, this scribe will return to my predictions when the ballots are cast and counted to see how wrong (or right!) I was!

The members of Mayo County Council paid tribute to the two men who were killed in a car accident outside Belmullet last weekend. Cllr Gerry Coyle led the tributes to Garda Terence Dever and Stephen Conway who lost their lives in the tragedy.

The Belmullet area saw the largest influx of new voters into the area following the redrawing of the boundaries last year. An extra 2,249 people were planted into the area from both the east and south of the old constituency. The decision to move Newport east from the Westport electoral area into Belmullet and its population of 1,021 was enough to see sitting Newport based Fianna Fáil councilor Frank Chambers decide not to run again, after seeing his home base split between two different electoral areas. While to the east of the old constituency, Ballycastle, Bunaveela, Kilfian west and Lacken north have been added from the old Ballina area.

The tricolour was held high in the Ruby Room of the TF Royal Theatre on Sunday after the last Belmullet electoral area seat was taken by Sinn Féin’s Rose Conway Walsh. This resulted in the loss of outgoing Fianna Fáil councillor Tim Quinn’s seat. He topped the polls in 2004 with first preference votes, while against the county trend Fine Gael failed to secure the three seats which it was contending.

The news that ICT Eurotel is to close its Belmullet base of operations has come as a huge blow to the area. The closure of the call centre will see 82 jobs lost and will be a detrimental blow to the community in the area. ICT Eurotel employed 39 full-time and 43 part-time staff in its Belmullet operation and is expected to have completely wound down its operations by October this year.

The workers at ICT Eurotel in Belmullet yesterday were meeting with their employers as they tried to thrash out a fair redundancy deal for themselves. The company, which does not recognise trade unions, refused the workers’ request for a union representative to help them work out the terms of their redundancy and asked instead for six workers to be sent forward to hammer out the deal.

“Law and order is on the verge of breaking down in the county,” according to Swinford councillor Joe Mellett, while Belmullet councillor Gerry Coyle said that “thugs should be put behind bars”. These were just some of the indignant comments made by councillors at Monday afternoon’s county council meeting after a motion was put forward by Fine Gael councillor Michael Burke for the council to call on the Minister for Justice to provide more gardaí in Mayo, to fight the ongoing crime and anti social behaviour.

From the initial planning stages it has been a long struggle for the Mayo County Development Plan 2008 to 2014 to come to fruition to the satisfaction of the elected members and the Department of Environment and Local Government under the direction of Minister John Gormley. But last Monday the new development plan, which has taken up many hours of planning, discussion, meetings and angry exchanges across the country, finally came to a conclusion when the elected members voted in favour of a new ministerial directive issued by Minister for the Environment John Gormley on September 16 2009, overturning his previous directive of July 11 2008.

The decision by Mayo County Council to send the Cathaoirleach and two other councillors to the USA for St Patrick’s Day, saw a heated debate in the council chamber on Monday. Independent Councillor Gerry Ginty wanted his opposition against the trip noted saying it was a waste of public money. The council agreed to send Cathaoirleach John Cribben and fellow councillors Damien Ryan and Michael Burke on the trip.

The Bangor Erris region was left reeling in shock after local businessman Frank Brogan passed away suddenly on Monday evening at his residence.