Archive for the ‘cian ocallaghan’ CategoryERROR: Can’t connect to www.cianocallaghan.com:80 (Bad hostname ‘www.cianocallaghan.com’)Saturday, July 24th, 2010Why is the grass so long?Wednesday, May 26th, 2010
This summer the Fingal County Council Management have decided to stop cutting grass in a number of areas including open spaces within housing estates. Their plan is to remove a crop of hay at these locations at the end of the summer to reduce the fertility of the soil and then to commence with bulb, wild flower seed and tree planting to turn these areas into meadowlands rather than open grass spaces. The Council management are claiming that this practice of not cutting the grass is in the interests of “biodiversity”.
In other areas the Council has severely reduced the frequency ...
Proposed trip to Bermuda is outrageousTuesday, May 11th, 2010
At yesterday’s Council meeting item 30 J on the agenda was a conference in Bermuda.
With my full support my colleague Cllr. Patrick Nulty requested a roll call vote to remove this conference from the list of approved events that councillors can claim expenses and travel costs for. Incredibly a number of councillors defended this “conference” in Bermuda and a decision on approval has being deferred until our June meeting.
At a time when the Council is removing the bin tag waiver from pensioners and people who have become unemployed and when local businesses are struggling to pay their Council rates I find this staggering.
The ...
Labour is committed to abolishing Fianna Fail’s Water TaxTuesday, April 20th, 2010
The Labour Party unanimously adopted a motion on Saturday at conference in Galway commiting the party to abolish water tax when Labour is in government.
Here is the text of a letter that I signed together with a large number of my labour colleagues from around the country today:
As Labour Party Councilors, we wish to state our opposition to Minister John Gormley’s plan to introduce water charges.
Labour reaffirmed our opposition to water charges at our Party Conference in Galway last weekend. We believe in the provision of water as a fundamental human right and that the cost of providing an EU ...
Council spends over 90 K on conferences and travelTuesday, April 13th, 2010
The evening herald today runs with a story on councillors in Fingal claiming over 90,000 euro in expenses for conferences and foreign travel: http://www.herald.ie/national-news/councillors-notch-up-836490k-bill-on-freebie-foreign-trips-2135676.html For the record I pay my own way to any conferences that I attend and I have never claimed a cent of expenses for attending any conference. However these articles are problematic. They spread apathy about politics. They give the impression that all public reps are the same and are just in it for themselves. They give the impression that all conferences attended by councillors are attended as “junkets”. And more importantly these ...
Council spends over 90 K on conferences and travelTuesday, April 13th, 2010
The evening herald today runs with a story on councillors in Fingal claiming over 90,000 euro in expenses for conferences and foreign travel:
http://www.herald.ie/national-news/councillors-notch-up-836490k-bill-on-freebie-foreign-trips-2135676.html
For the record I pay my own way to any conferences that I attend and I have never claimed a cent of expenses for attending any conference.
However these articles are problematic. They spread apathy about politics. They give the impression that all public reps are the same and are just in it for themselves. They give the impression that all conferences attended by councillors are attended as “junkets”. And more importantly these ...
Clongriffin Dart Station due to open (finally)Wednesday, April 7th, 2010
The news in today's Irish Times that the new Dart Station at Clongriffin is due to open on April 19th is very welcome: http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/commercialproperty/2010/0407/1224267823114.htmlIt is normal practice in Western European countries for schools, parks, train stations and other key pieces of community infrastructure to be delivered before residential units are built. This means that these facilities are available to new residents and families from the day that they move in. There is no good reason why the Irish government cannot change Irish planning law to ensure the same good practice in Ireland is compulsory.Rumours that have been circulating there would ...
Council income and expenses for 2009Wednesday, March 31st, 2010
I will be publishing details on an annual basis of the income and expenses that I receive from Fingal County Council on this website.My expenses and income from Fingal County Council for 2009 is as follows:Representational Payment: 9,735.81Conferences and seminars: NilAnnual Allowance: 3,591.36This income and expenses put me joint lowest on the league table of councillors elected in June 2009 to Fingal County Council. Full details of the expenses and payments made to all councillors can be found at: http://www.fingalcoco.ie/YourLocalCouncil/LocalDemocracy/CouncillorsExpenditureElections09/In contrast my ...
Brickfields and Seagrange Park rezoning defeatedMonday, March 15th, 2010
Fingal County Council voted unanimously today for my motion against the proposed re-zoning of Brickfields and a section of Seagrange Park for residential development.Given the oversupply of residential zoning, the empyt housing units in Baldoyle and unfinished housing estates there was simply no case for zoning these lands for residential. Even if there was a need for more residential zoning, it would be simply unacceptable to zone these lands. The thin strip of land between the railway track and Seagrange Park is completely unsuitable for residential development. I am further strongly oppossed to building housing on our public parks and ...
Development Plan Howth and SuttonSunday, March 14th, 2010
Over the last 3 weeks we’ve had 8 meetings to discuss the draft development plan and over 30 hours of discussion. And we still aren’t finished!I have consistently opposed further residential re-zonings and given the current over supply and the number of unfinished housing estates I have been appalled and shocked at the support for these proposed re-zonings from several but by no means all Fianna Fail, Fine Gael and Indepedent councillors. The development plan only comes up every 7 years and is one of the few areas where councillors have significant power. The importance of the development plan is ...
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