Law « Thurles Information

JobBridge Interns To Fix Garda Vetting Unit

As part of the controversial JobBridge Internship Scheme, jobs are now being offered to unqualified interns to take up employment in the Thurles Garda Central Vetting Unit, which deals with highly sensitive and confidential information. The jobs, (No Experience Required) entitled ‘General Office Administrator‘ will involve the use of internal Garda IT systems.

The 16 positions being advertised will earn each successful applicants approximately €50 a week more than they currently obtain through their current social welfare payments and applicants are required to have a high level of competency and proficiency in computer and keyboard skills, as well as proficiency in interpersonal and communication skills.

According to the advert posted on September 27th, the person recruited will also be assigned a ‘Mentor,’ to monitor their progress over a nine-month period of employment. These new recruited staff will be indirectly responsible for determining whether certain prospective employees are suitable to be allowed to work with children or other vulnerable people.

The advert on JobBridge emphasises the discreet nature of the job, requesting that the employee must: “Have a high level of personal responsibility and integrity and the ability to observe confidentiality in respect of the work conducted at the Garda Central Vetting Unit.”

This initiative has been criticised by members of the Gardaí, who state that it does not seem appropriate that such personnel would have people literally coming off the dole temporarily into what has to rank as a most sensitive area of activity, with access to the PULSE garda system (Police Using Leading Systems Effectively) to undertake routine background checks on members of the public.

The JobBridge Scheme has come in for much criticism since its launch in July, with a number of the country’s most profitable companies using it to fill vacancies, thus raising concerns that employees were simply being laid off and replaced with cheaper State subsidised staff.

Recently Aer Lingus was forced to dismiss concerns when it sought an “Air Safety Assistant” under this internship scheme, following concerns that the candidate would be used to oversee safety management. Tesco Supermarket were also forced to defend itself, having advertised for six interns to fill shelves according to its merchandising plans and to ensure that customers do not have to queue.

This recruitment comes at a time when only 400 of a recommended 1,000 redundancies sought in the Gardaí and required by the IMF, have been achieved.

Journalist Awarded Legal Costs Against Lowry

Michael Lowry

The journalist and broadcaster Sam Smyth has been awarded legal costs against local politician Michael Lowry following his successful defence in a defamation case that was before the Courts this week. The defamation case related to comments made by Sam Smyth, in a national newspaper and on television, that Michael Lowry had been “caught with his hand in the till” and went on to suggest that he was a thief, a corrupt politician, dishonest, untrustworthy and unfit to have been a Minister and a TD.

In the defamation case Michael Lowry had alleged Sam Smyth had made false and defamatory remarks about him in the Irish Independent newspaper and on TV3’s ‘Tonight With Vincent Browne’ current affairs programme last year.

However, during the court case Sam Smyth had defended his comments and argued that they were true and based on his honest opinion and constituted fair and reasonable publication in matters of public interest. He has also claimed that what had been discovered about Michael Lowry during the McCracken and Moriarty tribunals had led inevitably to the conclusion that he was indeed corrupt, dishonest, untrustworthy and both unfit and unsuitable to be a minister and TD.

In Court this week, Judge Margaret Heneghan told Counsel for Sam Smyth that his client was entitled to his costs and refused to grant a stay on her order pending an appeal of all issues to the High Court. The legal costs awarded to Sam Smyth are understood to be in the tens of thousands of euros.

Source: RTE.ie

Dear God Please Help

Thurles,
Co.Tipperary,
Ireland.
27th September, 2011.

Dear God,

I trust you and yours keep in good health. I did not intend to write to you until tomorrow, but every day living in this State, we appear to become more silent, corrupt and greedy.

Please understand, that I am aware that You and Your Guardian Angels are very busy at the moment, what with famine in the Horn of Africa, the state of the Euro and all the other chaos worldwide, caused mainly by individual political greed and the never ending lust for position and power.

Miss Teresa Treacy - A Lady With Real Backbone

I personally don’t ask You for much as you know, but presently, it’s gettin’ hard to tell what’s wrong from right.

On behalf of Your many confused, but faithful followers, I am hoping that, having read this letter, You might find the time to reply and perhaps offer me some wise council, since it is my belief that You haven’t been calling around this once Island of Saints and Scholars in the last number of years, due to Your heavy work commitments at more deserving locations.

Lord, allow me to explain my confusion.
A 65 year old woman, Miss Teresa Treacy, from Clonmore, Tullamore, Co Offaly, has been imprisoned in the Dochas, Women’s Prison at Mountjoy Jail, in Dublin, for the past 14 days. Her only “crime” has been to challenge ESB and Eirgrid, over the right for them to cut her security locks, trespass on her land, cut down 12,000 of her trees and build pylons on her property, without her consent.

Unlike drug dealers, rapists, thieves, murderers etc. this woman’s prison sentence will not be considered by the authorities, under their “Revolving Prison Door System,” of justice, which presently continues to operates in this country for other truly dangerous offenders.

You understand Lord that in 65 years, this woman’s only crime is that she displays, what our present political leadership lacks, namely, basic backbone, and unless she apologises to our Court system and purges her contempt, which she refuses to entertain, she must remain locked in prison with convicted murderers Catherine Neven and Linda Mulhall.

God, what confuses me is that this event is happening here in Ireland, at the same time as a Sinn Fein leader, who, through his past association with terrorism, without the support of our democratic system and who has wasted more of the Irish taxpayers money than both Fianna Fáil and our present greedy banking system put together, is being supported for the post of President Of Ireland.

Accompanying him in this race also, to get his undeserving hands on a salary worth almost €250.000 plus €317, 434 expenses, is a man who wrote letters, seeking clemency on behalf of a man charged with the statutory rape of a 15-year-old Palestinian boy in 1997. Note also Lord that this is happening in the same year that our government has suddenly realised that pedophilia is not acceptable in present society.

This is happening also in a time when those who have been allowed, by law, to willfully rape and pillage our fair land, still continue to party, using the proceeds from their looting and ill-gotten gain.

What should we be doing Lord, to correct this grave injustice in Irish society? I would appreciate your guidance in this time of silence.

Your faithful servant,
George Willoughby.

P.S. Lord, You do not appear to have an account with Facebook, but if others feel as I do, is it O.K. to send Miss Treacy a message of support by clicking here? We can deal with the “Presidential Hopefuls,” at the ballot box.

Fixed Charge Penalty Notices Not Received

Speed Camera Vans

Judge Mary Devins dismissed two cases taken against motorists over in Castlebar, Co Mayo last week. The accused had been supposedly detected breaking speed limits by Ireland’s new speed camera van system.

The two defendants informed the court that they had never received fixed penalty notices in the post, informing them that they had been detected speeding and therefore did not pay the imposed fine.

Mr Padraic Sammon of Go Safe Ireland, latter which operates these speed camera vans, giving evidence to the court, explained that always at the end of his daily shift, he submits all the information to his headquarters, which in turn forwards this on to the Garda department located in Thurles, Co Tipperary, which then communicates a ‘Fixed Charge Penalty Notice,’ to offenders where applicable.

Judge Devins having heard the defendants excuses, informed the court: “I have no evidence that these fixed charge notices are issued, it’s putting a huge presumption on me that they are. This is a huge issue, I’m not in a position to just rubber stamp that they are.”

Gardaí are understood to have then withdrawn a third prosecution against another accused motorist, because of the judge’s ruling in the two previous cases, thus saving valuable court time.

Buzzard Chicks Poisoned Near Roscrea

Sinister element of Irish rural culture revealed.

The illegal poisoning of wildlife is still a very sinister element of our rural culture, which I regret, shows no sign of disappearing in this country.

My remark is borne out by the deliberate killing of two Buzzard chicks discovered by BirdWatch Ireland volunteers, near Roscrea in Co. Tipperary earlier this month. The bodies of the birds were found close to three poisoned, hand reared and tethered pigeons, used as bait to attract the birds to their untimely death.

BirdWatch Ireland state that this incident was particularly abhorrent, particularly since Buzzards are a farmers friend, only eating rabbits, crows, magpies, fresh road kill, rats and mice and are no threat to farm animals. Buzzards will however, like other meat eating creatures, feast on a larger animal carcase, which it finds already dead.

The Buzzards’ nest near Roscrea was being monitored by two volunteers from BirdWatch Ireland’s Raptor Conservation Project since early spring and the live pigeon bait was found tethered to the ground heavily coated with the banned poisonous insecticide Black Carbofuran. The pigeons had their wings clipped to prevent any chance of escape. A day after the dead buzzards were found another live, poison coated pigeon was discovered tethered close the same area.

The Buzzard species is protected by law and is indigenous to Ireland. The species were absent in Ireland from the late 19th century until 1933, when a pair of birds bred in Co Antrim. The species has spread slowly down from the north and are now established in almost every county in Ireland.
An investigation has now been launched and anyone with information is asked to contact the National Parks and Wildlife Service, Tel: 057 91 37811 or Birr Garda station Tel: 057 91 69710.

Note: This crime is especially irresponsible, as had a local child discovered these stricken pigeons and tried to help them, they could very easily have suffered a similar fate to the unfortunate Buzzards.