Search Results for 'Sean Bourke'

There can be few jobs more unpalatable right now than being a Fianna Fáil election candidate - or even a Fianna Fáil canvasser - in the run up to June 5. The party is facing a drubbing at the polls. And whatever doorstep hostility has been there over the past two weeks, it will be nothing as compared to the anger when next month's pay cheque leaves Sean Citizen with a huge hole in what is available to him to pay his bills.

One more seat and three councillors retiring from politics makes the battle for the seven seats in the Castlebar electoral area one of the most interesting races in this year’s local elections. The transfers of Burriscarra, Portroyal and Roslee with their combined population of 1,327 people from the old Ballinrobe area to the Castlebar area has really thrown the race for seats in the county town wide open. There are 12 going to post on June 5 and, with only three sitting councillors going for re-election, there will be at the very least four new faces or maybe three new and one old representing the Castlebar area in the next council.

While the headlines may have been grabbed in the past few weeks with councillors urging the people of the town not to vote for a former councillor who has decided to come back for some more, the race for the nine seats in Castlebar Town Council promises to be one of the most exciting in the county.

A 72-year-old retired man who was followed by gardaí after he stopped in the middle of a roundabout, drove in the middle of two traffic lanes, made a sharp left at another roundabout without indication — where he almost hit the traffic islands — and when stopped failed a roadside breath test, was disqualified from driving for four years at Castlebar District Court on Wednesday.

Figures released by Mayo County Council under the Freedom of Information Act have revealed that Mayo county councillors were paid out €836,212 from January to the end of June 2009, all relating to the six months pre-election. Independent Castlebar Councillor Frank Durcan who sought this information said that these figures are “immoral in the times that are in it”.