Thurles Information

This open letter hereunder, forwarded to Minister Leo Varadkar should be of particular interest to those presently unemployed & actively seeking work, those offering tourism services, retail & wholesale outlets, in fact everyone currently living in this wonderful county of Tipperary.

Having read the content of the text hereunder, I respectfully ask, regardless of your political views, that you email same (Use the ‘Email This Post,” Tag under this post or Copy & Paste if necessary) to the following three elected government representatives, namely;  Mr Leo Varadkar:  minister@dttas.ie   Mr Noel Coonan:  noel.coonan@oireachtas.ie & Mr Alan Kelly: office@alankelly.ie  thus clarifying your insistence regarding the statement hereunder.

Following the passing of the recent “Budget 2013,” which refuses to take into account each person’s ability to contribute fairly, Co Tipperary must now attempt to generate taxes, using the same “level playing pitch,” as other taxpayers within this island of Ireland.

As the above short video, highlighting General Thomas Francis Meagher’s association with our county demonstrates, Mid Tipperary’s, soon to be forgotten, immense history remains untapped and ignored, mainly due to the risks associated with the provision of visitor attractions. For example, Kerry and Clare are established Tourist destinations which attract vast numbers of visitors each year, while Mid Tipperary is loosing out, due to the fact that it is on the periphery of the Mid-West Region. In fact if anyone examined this area they would quickly realise that our natural region should include Kilkenny & Cashel etc. Thurles Town, in particular, is severely marginalised with a marked bias towards the northern area of the Country, i.e £2m for the National Mining Heritage Centre in the Silvermines – £250,000.00 spent on marketing the Lough Derg Area and £1m spent on Nenagh Castle – not a single mention of Thurles or the Mid Tipperary area in this funding.

My letter, addressed to the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Mr Leo Varadkar reads as follows below & I ask all Tipperary people, at home & abroad, to strongly support this initiative with an Email, to the public representatives above named, in an effort to create employment through tourism.

Historical Tipperary must now be seen as one large ‘shop,’ and the time has come to sell our resources, services & wares on the world’s tourism market. This initiative which Tipperary now requests, will require logical political decision, supported by you, the Tipperary electorate.

Kickham Street,
Thurles,
Co Tipperary.

Dear Minister Varadkar,

I thank you, in anticipation, for taking the time to read this communication.

I speak to you as curator of St Mary’s Famine & War Museum and as a member of Hidden Tipperary, both voluntary organisations which work, without the benefit of any public funding, for the betterment of tourism in Co Tipperary.

Before I get to the main point of my request, I would like to remind you Minister of the following four undeniable & indeed indisputable facts, of which you will be already aware.

(1) The Vikings of the late eight century engaged in ‘hit-and-run raids,’ here in Ireland where they, early on, landed their small numbers of ships, attacked various settlements,  pillaging and burning, before eventually heading back to Scandinavia with their rich booty of stolen gold & silver artefacts.

(2) Agents acting on behalf of the ruling Nazi Party of Germany plundered art and other items via organized looting of European countries, during the time of the Third Reich. The more recent of this particular plundering occurred from 1933 until the end of World War II, undertaken particularly by military units known as the Kunstschutz. In addition to lucre, such as silver and currency, cultural items of great significance were stolen, including paintings, ceramics, books, and religious treasures. Although many of these items were recovered by the Allies immediately following the war, many more still remain missing today.

(3) Local Authorities in Ireland will in three years time be given powers to set their own property tax rates, in order to generate funds to support the provision of services in Tipperary. A public statement made by Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government Mr Phil Hogan states, “Property tax will become more and more the source of income for local authority services to be funded. If they are raising the money locally for service provision, they will have a say in how they spend it. Each local authority can have a different level of property tax in due course. The timing of that is a matter for Government.”

(4) The Minister for Enterprise, Jobs and Innovation, Deputy Tom Hayes, has recently called on the IDA & Government to attract multi-national investment in areas outside of Dublin. Mr Hayes stated that towns in Tipperary like Cashel, Tipperary, Clonmel, Cahir, Carrick on Suir and Thurles are being incorrectly over looked and should now be better considered, when it comes to attracting multi-national investment. He further stated that rural areas (like Thurles) cannot continue to be overlooked, while large urban centres continue to receive massive investment.

These above listed four indubitable facts now bring me to the main point of my communications request, which I make on behalf of Thurles Town, and indeed the whole county of Tipperary.

Continue reading Thurles Tipperary – An Open Letter To Minister Leo Varadkar