Search Results for 'Seamus Weir'

The HSE West has overspent by €34.6 million in the first four months of the year and this debt could reach €100 million by December, a meeting of the HSE West Forum was warned this week.

Independent councillor Michael Kilcoyne put forward a motion at the monthly meeting of Mayo County Council calling on the authority not to issue full payment to contractors until they have paid all subcontractors. This is to be included as a clause on contracts issued to main contractors. The motion received huge support from Cllr Kilcoyne’s fellow councillors this week.

The HSE West will make a saving of €19.2 million in 2011 due to the continuation of the ban on recruitment.

The controversial N59 project which includes a bypass of Crossmolina looks like it will remain in limbo for some time to come. At the February meeting of the Ballina Electoral Area, the elected members agreed a route for the N59 from Ballina to Crossmolina and further on to the west of the county. However the route was not approved when it came to a full meeting of Mayo County Council, following a large volume of opposition from people in Crossmolina because it would bypass the town. By not approving the proposed route at the full council meeting, the members have sterilised the land around original five proposed routes which were put before the members. However even if they do this, it will still leave the project and the lands effected by this in limbo.

Mayo County Council has agreed to invite a delegation from the Turf Cutters Association to address it at the next meeting of the local authority, after a number of councillors expressed their disgust at the recent Department of Environment directive banning turf cutting on a number of Mayo bogs. Fine Gael councillor Seamus Weir proposed the invitation, saying: “I’m asking the council to invite the members to allow the Turf Cutters Association to address us in relation to how this new legislation is going to effect them and their tradition.” His party colleague Cllr Patsy O’Brien told the members: “We need the support of all the councillors on this, the amount of natural resources being stripped away at the stroke of a pen is crazy. I’d say cutting turf is the most natural thing for the people of Mayo to do, there is going to be a revolution if this isn’t stopped.”

The hepatitis C scare that arose for Mayo patients following a ‘media leak’ about an infected health care worker at the weekend is not expected to result in any public contamination, according to a medical official.

A number of Ballina based councillors expressed their anger that the stalled N26 project has been left in limbo. Fine Gael councillor Seamus Weir told a meeting of the Ballina Electoral Area committee of his frustration at the silence on the issue since it was refused planning permission by An Bord Pleanála. He asked the council executive if there was an update on the project. “We had a meeting two months ago and we spoke at length about it,” he said. “I have heard nothing since about it, we adopted this plan in 2002 and since then we have had landowners having their lands frozen and now they still don’t know what is going to happen. It’s just not fair on them. Is this project dead in the water or what? The reality of this is that we do need this road, the people need the road. I’d favour downgrading the road from a dual carriageway if it made it easier for it to go ahead.”

Mayo County Council have announced details of rationalisation plans which aim to bring down the cost of operating their two landfill sites.

For the second time in a week, the controversial new development levy scheme for all new developments in relation to water and sewerage contributions was passed by a local authority in the county, but only after a number of councillors expressed their opposition to the decision. Last week Ballina Town Council passed a reduced rate levey of €3,500 per housing unit while the council was looking for a €4,500 levey. The levey passed by the county county council according to the managers report on the scheme break down the costs so that for large schemes, the amount of the council’s contribution to the total cost of the scheme will be divided by the number of new houses to be served. While for small scheme’s it will be, the amount of the council’s contribution to the total cost divided by the number of new houses to be served, averaged over five recent small schemes developed by the council.

The members of the Ballina electoral area welcomed the progress reports they were given on the Knockmore and Attymass sewerage schemes at their meeting this week. Mr Brian O’Reilly, senior engineer with the water services department, told the meeting that the Knockmore scheme will have capacity for an extra 80 houses. The project is expected to cost in the region of €1.2 million and will be carried out under the small schemes programme.