Thurles Information

Dáil Bar.

A website for the controlling of information, being input on The Household Charge, ended up last week with the children of households & dead persons receiving threatening communications. Postage alone for these reminders has cost the tax payer in excess of €14,000. This correspondence also required those who had already paid the charge to contact a lo-call number to tell those compiling this database, that they had already paid.

Now another new website is to be launched today to fulfil the commitment under the Programme for Government & which will supposedly measure the Government’s performance across a number of key areas. Areas to be measured include in particular our countries progress on the economy, transport, innovation and the environment.

The website we are told will make the workings of Government more transparent and will use data gathered across the public service. (Where are they going to get the staff ?)
This pilot site, Ireland Stat, will show what the present Government has achieved, how much it cost and how Ireland compares overall internationally. (I wonder will it include the cost of so called ‘job creation.’) Health & Education should also make interesting reading when data is eventually uploaded.

Education:

Some 50,000 third-level students are still waiting to hear whether they have qualified for a grant, even though their academic year started last month. The Irish Independent reports that SUSI, latter the new on-line system website used to process Student Grant Applications, is in chaos. The system was designed to speed up the Student Grant process, but today’s news claims only one in 16 grant applications has been so far approved.

Health:

The Tipperary Star Newspaper also reports this week that ten respite beds in the Hospital of the Assumption, promised for last Friday, will remain closed and have no prospect of being reopened possibly before 2014. This is despite a public promise from Tipperary Fine Gael TD Noel Coonan, at a public meeting in the Thurles Tipperary Institute three weeks ago. Obviously Noel forgot to check the facts with Minister for Health Dr. James Reilly, before stunning a packed lecture theatre with his statement, which everyone else present was aware hadn’t a hope in hell of being sanctioned. Will this health statistic failure be now ‘etched,’ on this new pilot site?

Heard A Good Joke Today:
It seems a Tipperary T.D died and went to heaven. He stood in front of the Pearly Gates & while queuing, noticed a large wall of clocks in the reception area behind St. Peter.
While being checked in the T.D asked curiously “Peter why all the clocks?”
St. Peter answered, “Those are Deceiver-Clocks. It is not publicly known on earth, but everyone who has ever lived has a Deceiver-Clock. Every time you lie, the hands move on your particular personal private clock.”
Oh, said the T.D, shocked “Whose clock is that then?”
“That clock is owned by mother Teresa,” replied St. Peter. “Note the hands have never moved, which would indicates that she has never told a lie.”
“This is truly incredible,” said the T.D, “and who owns that clock?” he pointed.
St. Peter replied, “That is President Abraham Lincoln’s clock, note the hands have moved only twice, thus informing us that Abraham only told two lies in his entire life.”
“Where is my clock?” asked the T.D.
St Peter replied. “Jesus has it in his office. He is currently controlling the temperature by using it as a ceiling fan.”

I wonder if we quit voting, would they all just go away?

As my old granny used to say “I don’t like political jokes…. because too many of them get elected.”

An Post bore my first piece of bad news today, it was a nice letter, sent from Screw Fix Direct, thanking me for my sincere interest in their company, but explaining they were, not as I had supposed, a Dating Agency.

That’s another stamp wasted and it all began because of my startling discovery made earlier in the week, while rooting through my girlfriend’s underwear drawer.  The discovery of a French Maid’s outfit, a Nurse’s outfit and a Police Woman’s uniform complete with slim leather baton, alarmed me, forcing me to immediately cancel any sincere belief that I had found at last “the one,” for me. Well as I said to Pat over a pint last Wednesday, “If she can’t hold down one decent job, in these recessionary times, she’s just not serious about any long term relationship,” & hence my excuse for having sent the damned correspondence, to the above named company in the first place.

Is Barry’s Bridge the beginning of the promised Thurles Skateboard Park?

My favourite newspaper that great Sunday employer of washed out politicians, their ex concubines & so called celebrities, better known as the Irish Independent was the bearer of my next piece of sad tidings. I do not know why they bother really, upsetting us every morning, it’s as if the people of this presently governed EU / IMF State cared a tinkers curse, one way or the other.

The article read; “Almost two-thirds of TDs didn’t bother turning up for half of the much vaunted “Friday Sittings,” of the Dail so far this year, despite the Government heralding it as a major political reform. Oireachtas authorities have said the sittings cost an estimated €90,000 per day, and opposition parties have described them as a “sham” since there are no questions to ministers or Dail votes, except on rare occasions.” writes Fiach Kelly Political Correspondent. (Who, I hasten to add, should not be categorised under the heading of any of the above named employees.)

Our own Tipperary North TD Noel Coonan is not recorded as having clocked in on any of the Fridays, but he himself only last night insisted he attended at least two of the stated days, between January and the end of June. Records compiled by the Irish Independent show that of 135 TDs presently employed, who ‘have to,’ clock in, 82 or 62%, are recorded as clocking in for three or fewer of the six Friday sittings held between January and June.

These Friday absences might explain why trainee footpath planners working with the National Roads Authority (NRA) or North Tipperary Co. Council, have almost succeeded in blocking the entrance for motorists attempting to exit from Barry’s Bridge to Emmet Street here in Thurles. While many swear this has been specially designed by Thurles Town Council for their forgotten dreams of a ‘Skateboard Park,’ recently muted and was a ‘Monday morning job,’ I would swear in a court of law that this pestiferous erection was designed on a Friday, so Noel could not possibly have observed it, as he rushes home on a Thursday.

One good piece of news however, Director of Corporate Enforcement Paul Appleby states that tax cheat Mick Wallace will escape any future prosecution and will keep his Dail seat, despite admitting he knowingly fiddled his Company’s VAT returns. Well it makes us all feel safe in our beds with the knowledge that at least one TD will be present in the Dail on a Friday. The Wexford TD said he would give up half of his Dail salary of €92,000, to pay the Revenue their €2.1m settlement over the next 87 years as a sitting TD.

Of course former company director Mr Sean Hartigan of Prestige Recycling, latter who was jailed for three years, for defrauding the State of a mere €200,000 in taxes and another decent man, Mr Paul Begley, of the country’s biggest fruit and vegetable wholesale company, Begley Brothers, who was recently jailed for six years for a mere €1.6m garlic fetish, may both feel slightly upset.

Other sad news learned today; Dublin City Council, who failed to get full agreement with North Tipperary Co Council, to move Lough Derg, from Tipperary to our Capitol city, have been forced to close lanes 5, 6, 7 & 8 of all Dublin Swimming pools, with immediate effect, thus conserving water. While on the topic of water, some other rather suprising news; three Irish men recently diving on the ill fated Titanic, were amazed to find that the ships swimming pool was still full after over 100 years.

Well as you can see little or nothing has changed here in Thurles since we dumped Fianna Fáil.