Represent!

Brolly

Jabby wrote: »

And as for all the great things she does for you up there. My God, What is she there for? It's expected that she and the Cope should attend AGM's. That's their job, it's politics and they are well paid for it...like the rest of them.

I wasn't praising the fact that she and Pat attends AGMs etc, I am saying that if someone has an issue, then they should attend a meeting and tell them. I know its their job to do these things and yes they are paid well to do it.

On the great things that she has done for us - yes, again thats what a T.D. should be doing - I am just pointing out that she is working hard for the people of Donegal and there should be no reason why she wouldn't continue to do so in the future. So thats why I said the "no" was childish - to me its offensive in that it just disregards all that Mary does do for the people of Donegal. But, thats your opinion and your entitled to it.

Right, enough discussions for me. I must go back to the studying!:D

Vinegar Hill

Congratulations to Mary! I have listened to her speak on a few occassions and found her to be very intelligent and concerned for the people of Donegal. I had to ask for her assistance on a personal matter and she was staright forward, honest, and eager to assist me.

I think she will do whatever good she can for the people of Donegal.

ednwireland

blue shimmering wrote: »

Then there are four 'Centres of Excellence' proposed for Dublin - how can that make any sense?

unfortunately its a 1.2 million plus people in dublin plus surrounding areas

county sligo 60000 people donegal 147000

although that does mean we should get one center of excellence if dublin gets 4

http://www.cso.ie/statistics/popofeachprovcountycity2006.htm

blue shimmering

ednwireland wrote: »

unfortunately its a 1.2 million plus people in dublin plus surrounding areas

county sligo 60000 people donegal 147000

although that does mean we should get one center of excellence if dublin gets 4

http://www.cso.ie/statistics/popofeachprovcountycity2006.htm

I can see your point but what is the point in putting these 'Centres of Excellence' in already overcrowded hospitals - it they want centres of excellence should they not be building them from scratch instead of herding all of us into hospitals that are already over stretched? What I mean about Dublin having four centres proposed and then north of Galway none doesn't make sense to me!

As far as I can see they don't really care about us at all, petrol, diesel is just esculating at a frightening pace and we are expected to foot this bill ourselves! What is happening is that anyone who is living outside the main cities are being taxed to the hilt, whereas if you live in the cities you can just hope on the bus and choose between four different centres, get your treatment and hop on the bus again to go home. I do think the whole thing is a disgrace - no one should have to travel more than 40 - 50 miles to get treatment, I would have thought sense would have prevailed but obviously not!

Don't worry I will be following up with Mary herself next weekend! Wish me luck because I think we will all need it - thank God none of my family are currently affected with cancer but who knows a year or two down the road....

Jabby

blue shimmering wrote: »

Don't worry I will be following up with Mary herself next weekend! Wish me luck because I think we will all need it - ...

I hope you get a positive response from Mary Coughlan, but what are the odds? Remote I'd say. She, along with the rest of the FF deputies from the region will vote against the retention. It should not be treated as a political issue. As long as it is, there is absolutely nothing us 'mugs' can do about it.
We got the government we voted for. That's not to say that a FG government would be one bit better. All they seem to be doing is making as much political capital out of this predicament as they can. Don't know who's the bigger joke.
Good luck with it anyway
Jabby.

Mint Sauce

has anyone seen, or have any pics from last weeks home coming

blue shimmering

Jabby wrote: »

I hope you get a positive response from Mary Coughlan, but what are the odds? Remote I'd say. She, along with the rest of the FF deputies from the region will vote against the retention. It should not be treated as a political issue. As long as it is, there is absolutely nothing us 'mugs' can do about it.
We got the government we voted for. That's not to say that a FG government would be one bit better. All they seem to be doing is making as much political capital out of this predicament as they can. Don't know who's the bigger joke.
Good luck with it anyway
Jabby.

I was out at the Solis Castle Hotel in Donegal Town on Friday night 23 May at 7pm to gather for our awards that were to be presented by Minister Mary Coughlan - we were waiting over an hour with her arriving after 8pm but I do suppose it is difficult to get through the traffic all over the country (who's fault is that?)!

She arrived eventually and there were a number of speeches - a jibe at her about being careful while beside live mikes and so on....Then it was mentioned that she had put four through her hands (Cowen, Ahern, Haughey & Reynolds I think) to which she replied 'not literally'. It was quite funny actually and light hearted - we all then went up to collect our awards - around 200 of us from Letterkenny, Ballyshannon, Letterkenny and Dungloe (I think)! After that photos of each group were taken - this all took a long time, I was finished with the photos about 10pm and went over for something to eat! It was a fabulous place and the food was lovely, the drink was reasonable too - I would recommend anyone to go for an evening to relax in it, a really breathtaking hotel!

Anyway to get back to Mary, I looked around after getting something to eat and she was gone, couldn't believe it - she must have left as soon as the photos were taken, so I didn't get a chance to question her on the whole health care issue! She was asked about funding for Adult Education and also education in general and she said 'is that a plug' to which a reply of 'yes' was made! I was disappointed myself because I also wanted to bring up the whole issue of the cost of fuel, which is having a serious impact on everyone in Donegal because we have a terrible public transport system - it is either once or twice a day or even not at all! Trevor Sargent told everyone to change to alternative fuels - how do you do this when you have a petrol car, can not afford to purchase another one with morgages going through the roof? Is he mad or something, it would be ok if we could just leave our cars at home and hop on a bus to where ever we have to go but that is not possible in Donegal!

I think we are being penalised for not living in Dublin or some of the other cities and think it is not fair - the government squandered all the money in the years that they were rolling it in and they can't blame anyone else for this because they were the one's with the power!

These were some of the points I was going to bring up with Mary and don't worry my chance will come and I hope she can answer them for me - fair enough, get us to chose alternatives if those alternatives are available to us and THEY ARE NOT!

She did seem to be positive on the front of Trade and Enterprise and do think she will be working to bring something up North in Donegal but our major draw back is that our transport system is so bad!

When I get up to her I will bring these and other points I can think of to her attention and hope she will do something about it - its a disgrace we don't have a rail system, sometimes I think we are going backwards rather than forward!

donegalman1

Interesting she announced Forward emphasis jobs. They were getting subsidised office space a few years ago in Letterkennys BDC Building and later pulled out axing jobs. Is this maybe the jobs just being moved around again and getting grants. I do not expect them to be long term in Gweedore

LoanShark

To Blue Shimmering..

Your post is very long winded, So I'll not bother quoting any of it..
But You Do relaise That Mary was Probably in Meetings from 7a.m. all day on Friday In Dublin, and Then had to come to Lough Eske, and Was almost certainly on the Phone the Whole way down and possibly had to attend a FF meeting or meet with a constituant Somewhere along the way and then go to you to hand out awards, and even then at ten o clock would have gone to her office in town to check her messages and possibly have had to ring Brian Cowen.. Prepare herself for her day on Staurday and then maybe have a little bit of time with her husband... Beffore Goin to bed and having to get up on saturday and do it all again.. I know for a fact that she only takes sunday off NO MATTER WHAT for family only..

And You wanted to talk to her about Health and Fuel Prices at 10 o clock on a friday night... I know mary for a long time,and if you started to quiz her like that,She would polietly tell you to P.F.O...

You make some very good points about the transportation I'll give you that.. But believe me That was not the time or the place to be bringing up such a debate..

blue shimmering

LoanShark wrote: »

To Blue Shimmering..

Your post is very long winded, So I'll not bother quoting any of it..
But You Do relaise That Mary was Probably in Meetings from 7a.m. all day on Friday In Dublin, and Then had to come to Lough Eske, and Was almost certainly on the Phone the Whole way down and possibly had to attend a FF meeting or meet with a constituant Somewhere along the way and then go to you to hand out awards, and even then at ten o clock would have gone to her office in town to check her messages and possibly have had to ring Brian Cowen.. Prepare herself for her day on Staurday and then maybe have a little bit of time with her husband... Beffore Goin to bed and having to get up on saturday and do it all again.. I know for a fact that she only takes sunday off NO MATTER WHAT for family only..

And You wanted to talk to her about Health and Fuel Prices at 10 o clock on a friday night... I know mary for a long time,and if you started to quiz her like that,She would polietly tell you to P.F.O...

You make some very good points about the transportation I'll give you that.. But believe me That was not the time or the place to be bringing up such a debate..

I was not going to go into a lot of detail - only mention the key points which is easier when talking than writing it down and I do know Mary quite well - she has never used bad language to me, ever! I would be highly offended and think it only lets a person down more so than gets a point across! I will not be long winded as you said I was last time - I was just giving a taste of the atmosphere!

Mary did know what she was signing up to when she joined politics and definitely knows what is involved now that the is second in command - one thing that can be said about Mary is that she is not naive! I would love to know what the politicians did before mobile phones, laptops as so on were invented, the country seemed to run just as well.... I will finish on that!

muffler

blue shimmering wrote: »

Trevor Sargent told everyone to change to alternative fuels

And how did he arrive - by bicycle?

Maybe someone should have offered thew donkey - sorry I man offered him a donkey and cart for his return journey.

blue shimmering

muffler wrote: »

And how did he arrive - by bicycle?

Maybe someone should have offered thew donkey - sorry I man offered him a donkey and cart for his return journey.

I know what he would be arriving in if I got the chance to get to him first, they only represent such a small amount of the public but seem to think they can force feed us their way of thinking! Don't get me wrong - if I had alternatives to spending a fortune on Petrol or Diesel I definitely would but just can't afford to change and as was pointed out earlier today it would take 21 years to get the money spent back - what kind of vehicle would you have by then?

All these alternatives are not thought out very well, just look at the shortages of wheat, barley and other crops that are not being planted - the alternative fuels are being grown instead! How can this be good for the world or economies, all these people having nothing to eat and starving to death? Another thing was paying farmers set aside - which was paying them NOT to put in a crop, at least this has been reversed and they can grow whatever they want! It is a very big worry for all of us and to be honest I do not think OUR government or the European Union has done us any favours by having a lot of the red tape, and so on...I can see us definitely going back to the donkey and cart with the price of fuel - what is the carbon footprint for a donkey?

Maybe we could get the Dáil to cycle while there and produce enough electricity to run part of Dublin - they don't seem to do much else and might as well do something useful! Actually why can the Ministers not share cars instead of everyone of them going up to the Dáil separately costing us and also the environment - why can't the Green's introduce something like this?

LoanShark

blue shimmering wrote: »

Actually why can the Ministers not share cars instead of everyone of them going up to the Dáil separately costing us and also the environment - why can't the Green's introduce something like this?

Because that is just Silly..