 He knows all too well how important education is in shipping students' futures. Education is the key for everybody, for young people and even for adults. There are 15 post-primary schools that are under the auspices of the ETB. I know that all of those schools provide a wide range of curricular subjects and provide a fantastic education to hundreds and hundreds of students right across the county. Meanwhile, 78% of school leavers in Donegal have gone on to third-level education in 2023. That's according to the latest Irish Times feeder schools report for 2023, which shows around 80% of pupils across the country this year have progressed to college. The paying skills still account for the most pupils progressing to college with 99% of students continuing their education. Meanwhile, the number progressing from just skills in disadvantaged areas has risen to 63%. Carl O'Brien from the Irish Times says there are a number of reasons for that. Education observers say that there's a number of likely factors behind this. One is that we have created more college places, there's more technological universities in the regions which makes college more affordable and also we're far more access initiatives aimed at forging links between death schools and third-level colleges. Weather night today will be mostly cloudy with a fair amount of dry weather with some hatchy rain or drizzle at times, highest temperatures of 7 or 8 degrees. That's all from Highland Radio. News for now will be back with news again at 10 o'clock. Until then, good morning. Talks about her son. He was one of life's givers. When he had a certain brain hemorrhage and sadly died, his organ donation helped two people transform their lives. It's consoled us so often. Amen was a giver in life and to now he's giver of life. Organ donors save lives. Make today the day you decide to be an organ donor and let your family know your wishes. For more, visit hse.ie forward slash organ donation from the HSE. And a very good morning to you. This is the 9-2 noon show on Highland Radio. It is, as myself and Kevin were reflecting, the 12th of December, 13 days to the big day. And we hope you are enjoying the preparations and getting into the spirit of everything. No doubt it'll come up in conversation over the course of the programme and as will lots else as well. If you want to take part in the discussions on the programme, by the way, you can text us or WhatsApp us on 08-6-60-25000. Call us on 07-4-9125. Caroline is taking your calls and producing and Shannon is taking calls and doing all the social media as well. You can text us on comments at highlandradio.com. You can engage with us on social media. We're at Highland Radio on X. We are Highland Hub on Facebook. We are, of course, broadcasting live on our Facebook pages as well and you can interact with the show there. And you can comment. And good morning to Mary who's commenting already on the page. And you can watch the show unfold with all our Zoom conversations as well. Your contributions, as we always say, are absolutely central to this show and we value everything you send in to us and please, please do continue doing so. Let's look at the papers this morning at front of the Tuesday. Donegal Democrat former teacher won't accept verdict. A former secondary school teacher found guilty of indecently assaulting a 13-year-old pupil nearly 40 years ago does not accept the verdict of the jury. A court has heard. Jacinta McSherry O'Connor, 63 of the Mullins in Donegal Town was found guilty on two counts of indecently assaulting a male student in 1985 following a trial in October at the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court. The court heard the abuse occurred while she worked as a student teacher in a Dublin Secondary School. Also in the paper, community rallies to help restore Chuck Tessie. Alan Foley writes that a GoFundMe page has been set up to help with the restoration of Chuck Tessie following a fire at the premises last week. Kostya Verba, her millenia leka are organising a fundraiser in Leo's Tavern in the middle like on the 15th of this month. That's this coming Friday to show their support. Moving on to the Nationals Irish Independent. You have heard the story with Michaela at the Smorning Feeder Schools 2023, which schools send the most pupils to college. That's a pull out on the inside of the paper. In almost 80% of secondary schools in Donegal do send students on to college. The main story on the front of the independent second cut from big energy firm set to kick off Price War. One of the big four energy firms has announced a second price cut in a move that will force its rivals to respond with expectations that a Price War will break out. SSC Electricity is to reduce its prices by 12.8% and its gas tariffs by 11.5%. It follows a 12% cut in electricity prices from the same supplier. That took effect on November 1st. Electric Ireland, Bordash and Energia experts say will be left with no choice but to announce new reductions. Now, we know that inflation has been coming down somewhat over the past couple of months and very often when inflation starts to go up the big companies are very, very quick to impose the price rises blaming inflation. When inflation starts to come down, suddenly they're very, very slow to interact in the other direction and suddenly you get to hear all the things like well, we buy our fuel 12 months in advance so we're actually working off the prices from 12 months ago for the fuel that we have to buy so our operating costs work a year ahead so inflation may be coming down but we're operating a year behind. Even though the day inflation went up you pretty much jacked up your prices on the same day. However, let's leave that to one side. Irish Times this morning, COP28 in crisis over weak plan to phase out fossil fuels. EU threats to pull out of somewhat after text avoids call to end use of energy sources. Ryan confirms wording was unacceptable following meeting of EU delegation and indeed a lot of discussion this morning on COP28. It's taking place, of course, in the UAE and suggestions that perhaps the UAE and its high dependence on oil not going to get the most, shall we say, unbiased view of fossil fuels in the context of energy debate and certainly it's getting very hard to actually come up with an acceptable wording it seems. COP was to have finished by 12 noon today whether or not they will actually have agreed texts and outcomes from COP by 12 noon today would, last we heard, seem doubtful. We see what happens. Rising college entrance from disadvantaged areas is the main story, other main, on the Irish Times free charging schools continue to send the highest proportion of students to third level. That's no surprise, it's always been the case that the fee-paying schools have had the highest level because in many cases essentially what the fee-paying schools are is their students who go in specifically to sixth year specifically to repeat their leaving cert usually because they want to get high points for a high point course. So, yeah, it's almost inevitable that that is going to happen. Also on the front of the Irish Times this morning again, human agency warns of Gaza humanitarian catastrophe. Mark Weiss in Jerusalem writes that Israel has said it will open the Kerem Shalom crossing today for the examination of humanitarian aid entering the Gaza Strip from Egypt. The decision comes after officials from the UN agency, UN RWA responsible for refugees warned the crisis is becoming a humanitarian catastrophe and the situation there, it's beyond serious. It is as an advert for UNICEF on the front page says it is a silent nightmare. That's the rather striking ad from UNICEF on the front of our Irish Times this morning. Situated by coincidence, but appropriately right beside that particular story. Irish Daily Mail this morning, refugees €220 a week welfare to be slashed, newly arrived Ukrainians will only be given state accommodation for 90 days as leaders of coalition change strategy. Welfare payments for Ukrainian refugees will be slashed in their housing entitlements. The political correspondent there on the mail that they won't be ejected from state accommodation if they cannot find somewhere else to live. However, the paper says state-funded accommodation for new arrivals will be limited to 90 days after which they'll be required to source their own place to live. It'll be interesting to see how that works because it's going to be, I cannot see a situation develop where effectively someone is in state provided accommodation for 90 days and after 90 days they're ejected from that building. Can you imagine the ejecting Ukrainian refugees? Sorry about that. Can you imagine the ejecting Ukrainian refugees from, I cannot see that happening I really can't. It would be a political it would be it would be a political shooting yourself in the foot of the highest order so we'll have to see how all that pans out. The Irish Daily Star this morning, kids run for lives as assassin open fire pistol jammed as victim was chased into supermarket a gunman fire opens fire on Noel Boylan as he runs into Lidl in Blakestown in Dublin where he took refugee excuse me, the gunman's weapon jammed as he tried to fire into the packed firing a gun into a packed shop I mean, that is it's beyond comprehension. Other story there, victim of Viefal Garther breaks silence the ex-partner of Twisted Garther Paul Moody has broken her silence to reveal the life of hell that he put her through disgraced Moody was jailed for over three years in 2022 for the coercive control of his terminally ill partner Nicola. That's the front of the Irish Daily Star. Front of the Irish Sun OAPs go to war over flats McGregor versus Paddy and Rita 81. Connor McGregor faces a fight with an OAP couple who are trying to KO one of his massive building projects. Patrick and Rita McGowan, both 81, have put in an application to his apartment block plan in Drimna and Dublin. Also, Connor McGregor actually is featured on the inside of the Democrat this morning. You will recall that there was some discussion late last week about Connor McGregor potentially seeking a run for the Irish presidency and it was made clear that he would have to seek a nomination either from Oroxas members or from councils and the comment at the time from Donnie Gold based Senator Eileen Flynn was that I wouldn't nominate him to do the dishes and he fought back making some rather obnoxious personal comments and there's a story on that and on the inside of your Democrat as well Connor McGregor launches personal attack on Donnie Gold Senator after nomination rebuke and read that story if you so choose On the front of the Irish Daily this morning, Dublin riots fall out. It's a fair cop, fair spelled F-A-R-E taxi box hits brakes on proposals to make Cabbies police street. Taxi chiefs have blasted plans to have cab drivers police the streets following the riots in Dublin last month. City council officials have proposed allowing taxis drive down pedestrian areas to maintain passive surveillance. Taxi industry spokesperson Vinnie Kearns said Cabbies are not trained to do such a job and you'd need Army Ranger Wing training to be able to police some areas he said. Now I strongly suspect Cabbies are a very important eye on the streets anyway. The idea that you would somehow give them dispensation to drive in certain areas with the expectation that they will effectively become community police for want of a better phrase. I'm not sure I am not sure how that would work and I'm not sure that's a reputation that the taxi drivers would particularly want. I have no doubt that many many taxi drivers are sources of help to guard the, in great help to guard the I suspect in many areas particularly what goes on at night because if you want to know what goes on at night in any town, I mean basically ask a cab driver because they're the ones who are driving around, they're the ones who are seeing what's going on but in order to make that almost semi-official I'm not sure that would work to any great extent. It is an interesting an interesting question. Now I am going to take a break. We'll be back in a few moments. We have our McGee's chemist quiz now. I know it was a very busy show yesterday with Greg. He had some very interesting and very powerful interviews and he also had obviously the first of the 1000 year old giveaways to do on the show as well and as a result the McGee's chemist quiz has been rolled forward to today. So we have actually two wonderful prizes from McGee's chemist to give away today. We'll be doing that very very shortly but before we do anything else we're going to take a break back after these. And now it's time for the the 9 to 9 order here at 241 Suzuki with 0% finance from Barry Brown Cars Milford main Suzuki dealer in Dunne Gaul order your 241 Suzuki one of the most reliable and cost-effective brands on the market with 0% finance on selected models so get down to Barry Brown Cars Milford Suzuki sales dealer of the year and secure your 241 today. Hi, it's Texan Downey here bringing our mighty nationwide concert tour with my special guest John Hogan and Owen Mike on Green in Theatre, Letter Kenny Saturday December 30th. Raymond Sweeney here from Ben Sweeney Ironix to let you know we have a great range of Ninja appliances available for Christmas. They include the new Ninja Foodie Max dual zone air fryer which is a large 9.5 liter capacity and six cooking functions so you can cook two different foods two different ways with both ready also the new Ninja Flaxie Drawer with a large 10.4 liter capacity see our great range of Ninja appliances in store at Ben Sweeney Ironix Port Road, Letter Kenny and the shopping center, Dunne Gaul. Send Christmas Smiles from Alcorn's festive flower selection lovingly remember those we miss with a tribute from our Christmas selection all our orders are handmade in store so please order early wishing you your best Christmas from all at Alcorn's that magical time of year once more with minced pies and pudding and treats galore taking pride of place by the twinkling tree all you need to know about the seasons TV a world of entertainment wrapped up inside Christmas begins with the RTE guide stay warm for less this winter with homeland I'll cast energy wood pellets 10 kg by 10 bags yet one free kill and drive softwood logs by two bags for 14 year old nationwide delivery available shop in store or online at homeland.ie Highland Radio time checks with Expressway travel route 32 from Letter Kenny to Dublin when you book online and travel for less Expressway bringing you the time and the time here on Highland Radio is 18 minutes past 9 o'clock and just to make what we were saying at the top of the program I went ahead and pressed the wrong button and who came and rescued me the bowled Kevin sure who else would it be now during the newspaper review we were speaking about the proposals going to cabinet today with regards to changes to the conditions under which Ukrainian refugees come in one of the chief among them being that after 90 days in state accommodation they will then be asked to leave that accommodation and source accommodation for themselves now their payments will also be slashed as well we are told I raised a few questions as to whether that was in any way workable realistically speaking well let's discuss the situation with Donegal Deputy Thomas Pringle independent representative from this county Thomas good morning to you very well in Z thanks Thomas in terms of the proposals by government I mean I will put to you what I said myself during the newspaper review I cannot see a situation develop where after 90 days if a refugee is unable to source their own accommodation that the government is going to somehow get Gar thee to eject them or some forcibly eject them out of the hotel or the state sponsored accommodation in which they are saying I mean realistically is this workable I don't think so Donal we haven't yet seen the full details of what the proposals are but we have seen the bones of it published over the last couple of hours and I don't think that is workable if you look at it then you can consider that at the moment there is something over 5000 asylum seekers who are still resident in direct prevention centres because they can't get out, they can't get accommodation outside of the centre and they have got leave to remain leave to work and they are not asylum seekers anymore but yet they can't find accommodation so how are you going to be able to find accommodation if that's the situation it's a nonsensical idea that the government are coming out to us and I think it's part of the knee-jerk response that we have seen from this government all along as well and it's coming at a time when we are having such discussions about the high cost of rent I mean there are people who are working full time can barely afford to pay rent particularly in Dublin I mean it's bad enough now in Donegol where your rent regularly now goes into four figures for a month I mean in Dublin it's next to the bridge Yeah exactly like it's absolutely crazy in Dublin you'd be looking for maybe for a three bedroom house or apartment you'd be looking for probably two and a half to three thousand euro a month rent for them that's just not possible for anybody to manage other mountains that's a real problem and the reality is that most asylum seekers and Ukrainians and refugees out there would gravitate towards the larger communities that's where the work is available and that's where the maybe the extended communities are as well and so they would be living their lives there and that's just not possible for anybody to live there at the moment and that's a sign and another sign of the government's failure to actually provide accommodation and to like for accommodation for our own citizens as well as refugees and the government complete failure in this has been flagged as an issue and has been a stark issue in the country for almost 10-12 years now and that's not getting any better in terms of the payments the proposal is to reduce payments from 220 euro to 38 euro 80 and I mean again to reduce payments to that extent and then say right off you go and find accommodation somewhere I mean that adds to the questionable nature of the accommodation proposal but also as well as that some suggestions that this may effectively be a way to deter people to come here seeking asylum because you hear the suggestion sometimes coming that you know people will favour coming to Ireland because the rates are so favourable and because the payments are so generous is this effectively the government saying oh we'd better make this place less attractive for refugees to come to yeah the favourite typing of the government says Ireland is such a attractive place for refugees to come to that's why they're coming and you know the refugees are sitting around in Kiev or wherever and the bombs go off around the minister well let's look and see where the best place to go to oh there's Ireland that's a great rate of social welfare will go there and that's not the case and we know that's not the case and Bradger in the last couple of months when he was touting this he actually was asked to provide examples that he couldn't and he couldn't provide the numbers of people who had come to Ireland on that basis and the government is claiming that the Ukrainians are going to all the European countries men here and they try great to this in Ireland and deciding to move on to Ireland as well you know in reality the government could actually deal with that but they actually didn't make it any changes at all where simply people would have to you know when Ukrainian people come to Ireland I'm sure they have to give their ID number or their national insurance number as it was in Ukraine and that would already be registered in Germany or France or in the Netherlands wherever they were and if somebody was already registered we'd have to look after you already registered in Germany you'd have to return to Germany and send them back and that could be done very easily and it could be done without a target and people maybe who are genuinely landing here for the first time and do need our support and our help In terms of these changes would you anticipate a dull debate on them or are these just changes that can be implemented under ministerial order by government that will not actually require a discussion in the the dull chamber I think it will require a change of legislation and that's why it actually can't happen very quickly so I think it probably will be debated in the dull in January and February and the legislation will probably pass towards the end of February which makes a lie again of other government's ideas because of the government that appears something in January into where you're going to go now you want to make sure you're over here before a lot of changes rather than waiting for a lot to come in but you know it will have to there's primary legislation so it will have to be based on the past in the dull but the government that the numbers that the government has from all they'll load and probably take a bit of time for them to do that We could be getting to the point and the general election speculation is going to start growing once we hit the new year obviously but I mean basically any time after March really we're looking at the potential of a general election it could yet be that this might not actually make it into law before the next general election particularly when the director decides to pull the trigger early Yeah exactly well he's decided to pull the trigger early it definitely won't happen but also well what's the local elections coming up he probably won't want to focus on this in terms of running the local elections well particularly looking at finn-gale and to involve one to maximise their votes so that might be a cool factor as well and the decision making process that they make and that's how the government does business is looking to elections all the time and that's why we never see any real change either So the most likely thing to happen then you believe is that these proposals will eventually come before the Dall in January and we may be looking as legislation agreed probably toward the far end of March into April I would think so, I think what the government will do is bring it to January and the agility to make sure there's no debate on it in the Dall and rush it through as quick as possible and to try and have the law implemented and changes made by the end of February so there's early planning time for either a general election or the local elections in June so that it won't have an impact on them and that's probably the way the government will work on this to make sure that it happens If you were the minister how would you do this what proposals would you put on the table to try and ease the situation and to address what is overcrowding and also address what our issues with for instance the provision of tourist accommodation coming into another season where we see many hotels now which are either totally taken up with refugees or 50% taken up with refugees so there are issues that do need to be tackled are there alternatives in your view that could be used that would both address the refugee issues and ensure that they're treated with the respect and with the dignity that they deserve while at the same time ensuring that the tourist product is being provided ensuring that we do have a tourist industry come the next season in Easter in April Yeah the government this has been flagged up as a problem for over two years now it's a stage and the government hasn't put any response in place and what I would be doing if I was there would I be making sure that we would be developing long term accommodation so that they'll remove the need for it to have hotels and provide us health and we see this government constantly do this where you know with them this is a short term measure but they never put anything in place and we can't be operating on basis of an emergency forever and you know they need to be put in the pen so this is in place and we've seen it with everything the government does and we've seen it with something as simple as the access to the contribution that they're giving people after the ESP bills and they said that it was too complicated to actually tailor this to make it the people who really need it but yet whereas I think three budges are now and they're still doing it and they're still doing it and the multimillionaires are getting as much of an electricity subsidy as people who are going on social welfare and so the government basically just don't bother dealing with the issues as don't bother putting in place the long term solutions and that's the problem that we have and that's the problem that we leave in this situation where there's no sign of actually reducing the number of hotel places where I believe that we the government have been working alongside working on the permanent solutions as well as the temporary solutions we would be getting to a point where now you'll be seeing those solutions come in place and the price will be easing off on the hotels and those hotels could then go back to being tourist accommodation which is what it's like to meet as well Deputy Thomas Pringle, thank you very much indeed for speaking to us this morning Thanks so much Thank you indeed, that's Deputy Thomas Pringle there and as we know that issue is being discussed by cabinet this morning and as Deputy Pringle there predicted we can expect proposals and proposal legislation to come to the doll probably in January toward the end of that particular year now let's talk about cents because I used to always say over the years that there were two signs that Christmas was finally here the first was the appearance of the pennies ad remember the one that went pennies got a whole lot of things for Christmas got a lot for your family now that's been replaced in contemporary culture I think by the Coca-Cola lorry which I still haven't seen by the way but it was the pennies ad when I was growing up and the other sign of Christmas was when you hear presenters on the mid-morning show on Highland Radio be their surnames Doherty or Hughes or whatever we're going to be giving away a number of scents and sprays and all sorts of goodies and we have one central hamper worth over 500 euro to be won that's at the end of the week and it contains a number of things to do with Christmas and Christmas and Christmas and Christmas and Christmas and Christmas and Christmas is the end of the week and it contains the Clarence Christmas Hamper a blank canvas with 12 piece gold makeup and brush set there's a large blank canvas purple 3 piece gift set there's a be perfect muted palette there's a Jimmy Shu Lady's fragrance and this is a 20 x 16 gallery wrapped canvas you can have your favourite photo wrapped in canvas and ready to hang on the wall that is coming to us in the end of the week but for each day and we have two to do today because we didn't get one done yesterday. So today we have a 50 milliliters of Carolina Herrera Gold Girl EDP spray. That's EDP, I presume that's odor perfume is it and that's for ladies. So it's a Carolina Herrera Gold, a good girl EDP spray and that's for the ladies and it's a beat the intro question. I am going to play you a piece of music and I simply want you to name the Christmas song and if you can tell us the name of the song and the name of the artist I'm just going to play the piece of music and we want you to either text or WhatsApp us on 086 60 25,000 with your answer and with obviously your name and with the answer to the song. So could we have please the name of this Christmas song, we want the name of the song and if you can give us the artist as well should that would be only great. Take a listen. Right well I incorrectly named it beat the intro it is in fact play the song backwards. So the song is backwards name that Christmas song as we say please text or WhatsApp us on 086 60 25,000 with your name and with the answer to the question. Now we were speaking to W. Thomas Springle there about the Ukrainian accommodation issue and the issue of high rents and the rising cost of rent came up for discussion. We're going to be talking about that topic after these. Watch the show live now on YouTube, Facebook and at HighlandRadio.com. The menu is packed with delicious options for all the family including mouthwatering burgers, delicious chicken and battered fresh fish. Not to mention the famous Charlie's chips, the tastiest in town. All the food is hand cooked to order and there's a great selection of gluten free options also on the menu. Happy Christmas from everyone at Charlie's on Pierce Road at Erkenei. Open every Tuesday to Saturday from 12 to 8. The Department of Social Protection is working to improve disability payments in Ireland. There is currently a consultation on how these payments might work better in the future. We want to hear your views on how the system might be improved. To find out more please visit golf.ie forward slash disability payments reform. A government of Ireland initiative brought to you by the Department of Social Protection. Hi Tommy Bohir get in store to check out my new 15 Kings clothing collection available in premium Gents Outfitters nationwide and at 15kings.com. The Euro Millions Jackpot is a guaranteed 17 million Euro. Play responsibly in store in app or at lottery.ie. The National Lottery. It could be you. Our McCulloch Eulers in Letterkenny are synonymous with fine jewelry, quality watches and giftware with stores at Main Street Letterkenny and the Letterkenny Shopping Centre or online at armaculloch.com. You can choose from their quality product range in a relaxed atmosphere and their sales staff will be happy to help you make the right choice whatever the occasion. Armaculloch Eulers making moments magical for generations. Do you need a UK address? Save hundreds of euros on custom charges shopping online with Spacehub Dairy. We provide a full virtual address mailbox service for all your business and personal use. Save hundreds possibly thousands on custom charges with Spacehub Dairy. Call 04871878077 or online spacehubdairy.com for more details. This is the mental nuncho on Highland Radio just a few of your comments that we were speaking there about the Ukrainian refugee situation. Now Corus says Donald there's a lot taking advantage of our of our welfare to be fair like everything else bolting the door when the horse has bolted what about all the ones crossing from the UK to Northern Ireland who crossed the border into the Republic no checks etc. Now I'm not quite sure if that's totally the case but I take your point caller thank you. The caller says some bully McGregor only picked on Senator Eileen Flynn and none of the rest of the TDs or the Senators on their comments. And why is there not an agreement between the Guardi and the taxi people to hand in any dashcam when they have some when something happens appealing for footage only makes them a target. Well maybe there is an agreement I don't know what the arrangements are between Guardi and taxi drivers that's utterly a matter of themselves. Guardi will come will appeal for dashcam footage and indeed we'll hear appeals for dashcam footage on the program here today during the Community Guard the slot which is coming up after 10 o'clock. When Guardi are appealing for dashcam footage they're appealing for footage from members of the public from anyone. Appealing for footage is not just for taxi drivers it's for everybody and anybody who may be on the road and they'll be appealing for dashcam footage at three o'clock in the afternoon as often as they're appealing for footage at three o'clock in the morning. So that's the situation there. In terms of Guardi basically what we're looking at is a situation whereby Guardi will make appeals for information from members of the public and members of the public including taxi drivers will respond to those. The problem with a formalised arrangement with Guardi per se may well be that it potentially and as our caller said there is it potentially going to turn Guardi into targets? I don't know it's a difficult one and it's up I think it really is up to each individual to see what arrangement that they are going to come to with Guardi and how they are going to respond to whatever appeal is made by the Guardi so we'll keep an eye on on the situation there and see what happens. Now I want to read another comment from a caller it's an interesting one take take a listen to this and see what you think maybe it bring up this issue I was unfortunate enough to have been involved in a road collision a few years ago another driver crashed into me and wrote off my car I subsequently bought a small van to allow me to get around and do my work when I was sufficiently recovered enough to do so I've had a few vans in the past and never once made a claim on either a van or a car in over 25 years of driving no accidents no points no insurance company would sell me a new commercial policy for my van the van's been sitting at the house for the past number of years as you'd expect I spent money and had the van fully serviced and DOE tested by my local mechanic before seeking insurance for myself and I haven't been able to put it on the road the driver that crashed into me eventually admitted liability and I went to try to get a new van commercial policy again for the second time unfortunately for me even with written proof that I wasn't responsible for the accident no insurance broker or insurance company would give me a new policy until the case is settled which it hasn't been yet due to COVID backlog delays I am told potentially 2025 may be the earliest court sitting I'm being victimized by the insurance industry that's have you had any experience like this it's a very very difficult one I can't offer anything in terms of perspective on that one but if you have any experience and if you have any perspective you can offer to our caller there please do morning it's very distressing to see loads of Palestinian boys and men in Israeli trucks blindfolded with hands tied behind their backs the world is watching this and doing nothing Irish people can remember pictures like this during the troubles thank you and we know for instance that you know there is attempts being made in the UN chamber in New York to try and get a resolution passed and it's not being passed because they can't get wording that's going to be accepted to everybody so it is a difficult one indeed now the comments there are many immigrants or foreigners or whatever you want to call them coming into this small country the Irish are rapidly becoming a minority in some parts of the country with and a lot of Irish people are concerned about it and what's wrong with that there is no comparison to the Irish immigrant who went abroad to work and today's migrants who are coming here to languish on social welfare and social housing that's the difference and I wish people would stop saying there is no difference there are people coming in here because they have every right to come in here seeking international protection that is the international law to which Ireland has signed up and it's the international law to which Ireland is obliged under its participation in the United Nations to honour and that I think is what is being done in this instance now we spoke about rent earlier on and I am delighted to say that we can now go to zoom and speak to Ono Brintidi who is the Sinn Fein spokesperson on housing on a very good morning to you good morning to you thanks for having me it is our pleasure and Ono Brintidi you've done this before and you're trying it again to bring a piece of legislation through the doll in your own time that will effectively help stem the tidal rising homelessness and also tackle the issue of rent have you any reason to believe that the legislation you're proposing this time will be any more successful than the last well the legislation where we're actually tabling today is the government's legislation that they introduced last year which we supported which gave effect to a ban on evictions for tenants who have done nothing wrong over the winter period I'm really urging any deputy it doesn't matter whether they're government or opposition independent of party who wants to see a reduction in the number of people particularly children and pensioners an emergency accommodation through December and January to support our legislation we have the highest number of people ever recorded in emergency accommodation with the highest number of children on record and we also have the scandal of rising pension homelessness and while a ban on evictions where the tenant has done nothing wrong is not in and of itself a solution what it does one is give those singles and families breathing space over December January February and March but also that breathing space would allow the government to introduce the kind of emergency measures we've been calling on for some time to help slow the flow of families and single people into emergency accommodation but crucially get people out of emergency accommodation much more quickly so I'm urging everybody and the dollar arithmetic can be very tight as you know urging everybody who wants to see less homelessness over Christmas to support our bill during the debate tonight and the crucial vote tomorrow and then put pressure on government to get this enacted by the end of the week and signed into law by the president next week my I'm going to make a presumption here and that presumption is that the government's argument is going to be that it brought in a ban on evictions under very specific circumstances during COVID as an emergency measure and they extended it because it was seen as the right thing to do at that time but once it came to its end it was ended and what you're trying to do is bring that in as as it were the the norm and their argument is going to be that that is not going to work and that ultimately what it's going to do is it's going to force more landlords out of the system and it's going to get to the point where there'll be less private rental space available for people to go into and that's going to exacerbate rather than solve the problem that I suspect will be one of the government's arguments so so let me go through each of those in turn firstly the legislation we're proposing isn't the COVID-19 ban on evictions it was the emergency ban on no fault evictions introduced by government last October November and the reason why government introduced that and we had called on them to do so is because emergency accommodation and 15 of our local authorities was at that point full and there was literally nowhere for people to go the legislation is very clear and it is word for word the same as the government's previous legislation just with the dates changed it would provide for a period up until March of next year where people who are imminently at risk of losing their homes would have that pause and then there would be a phased series of deadlines from March until through June same as the government's there is no evidence that the last ban on evictions led to an increase in landlords issuing eviction notices in fact if you look at the figures from the residential tenancies board both before during and after that ban at the quarter on quarter number of eviction notices is it in around 5000 it dips above or below that and there are many reasons why landlords are leaving the market some are availing of tax reliefs that were introduced by government in 2011 to 2014 incentivizing them to sell now others if you look at the age profile of landlords are approaching pension age and their intention was always to sell the property to get a pension lump sum at that point and others are selling for other reasons and we have no reason to believe that that number is going to change we've 15,000 eviction notices issued in the first three quarters of this year likely to hit 20,000 by the end of the year but what we do know is every single month since government ended the ban on no fault evictions earlier this year the number of people in emergency accommodation has increased it's almost 20 increase on this time last year and therefore two facts cannot be denied if we don't do something the number of adults and children and pensioners in emergency accommodation will relentlessly continue to increase but also two if we want to put in place the kind of solutions that we're proposing for example the use of emergency planning and procurement powers along with vacant and derrick buildings and new building technologies to deliver an accelerated stream of social housing specifically for those people in emergency accommodation we need a breathing space so these people these families adults and children at risk of of entering into emergency accommodation they need a breathing space but government also needs a breathing space to put in place those measures and let's be very clear landlords who are selling up did not cause this homelessness crisis this homelessness crisis was caused by government year on year not delivering an adequate supply of social housing and in fact since daryl brine became minister not even delivering on the woefully low targets that he has likewise we've seen a significant increase in working people and working families in emergency accommodation a growing number of whom aren't even eligible for social housing and again that's a consequence of government not taking action to supply good quality affordable rental and purchase and also government not acting to tackle runaway rents so the situation has got so critical when finigale took office back in 2012 the number 2011 excuse me the number of children in emergency accommodation was just over 600 the official figure is now over 4 000 like the increase is staggering and if you listen to homeless service providers if you talk to simon for example up in the northwest i'm sure you know them well covering dunny gall and mayo and sli go if you listen to frontline service providers anywhere in the country they will tell you they have never seen it as bad and while some of our local authorities have added some additional capacity to take account of the increased demand for emergency places in december and january other areas are absolutely at full capacity and that means people will be forced to sleep rough or sleep in their cars or present to garter stations that's not acceptable and therefore if we want to see homelessness numbers fall in the run up to an after christmas the first step is to support our bill get it enacted but then follow it up with the kind of emergency action that's required to reduce homelessness i i say over and over again on these shows if you look at finland a government in finland over five years ended long from homelessness and the need to sleep rough the fins are no smarter than us they're no richer than us they have no more resources than we have we're at a time of record economic growth near full employment bumper tax revenues and a very large surplus how is it when we have all of those resources we cannot find homes for the 180 pensioners in emergency accommodation we cannot find homes for the 1,700 families with children in emergency accommodation or the six thousand single people we can do what finland did we can end long-term homelessness but right now we need an emergency response and that's why we're proposing the legislation that we're bringing forward in the doll tonight have you had discussions with any of the government we've still got knocked on or anybody else to get a sense of what how the government's going to respond tonight no i i haven't and i expect the government will make their position known later on today there is strong cross-party support on the opposition benches for such a measure when you talk to homeless service providers they will tell you that this is one of a number of measures that could make a real difference but ultimately this is a matter for both the government but also those independent tds who are supporting the government you'll remember when we had the very controversial vote on the revised effective block scheme last summer before last should i say the votes came right down to five um and the government lost charlie mcqueen of you remember well i have to say in the same way as families in donnie gall living with piratite mic and defective block of facing homelessness we have families children pensioners across the country facing homelessness into december and january now is the time to act and i would just urge all tds government in opposition work with us let's make this a a a bipartisan issue and let's reduce homelessness let's introduce the emergency measures and then let's follow what finland did and end long-term homelessness and the need to sleep rough for good do you believe that within 18 months you could be the housing minister who has the chance to actually make that happen ultimately that's a matter for the electorate shin fane has long said that we need a general election as soon as possible far too many families are being failed by this government again i mentioned defective concrete block and i'm talking to my colleagues paard blockland pierce star d and and rose comway walts and others and there are still enormous problems with that scheme as many of your listeners will be reminding you when they come on this show we're seeing hospital waiting lists grow we're seeing house prices rise rents rise in fact in your own county of donnie gall some of the most dramatic rent increases have been recorded in recent residential tenancies board figures no affordable homes been delivered in donnie gall by government and very very few social homes so right across the board we're seeing a government that is failing people they're out of time they're out of ideas i think they're just out of touch with regular working people so the sooner we have that election the better shin fane will set out our stall very clearly on all of the issues whether it's tackling the housing and homelessness crisis tackling the health crisis delivering genuine 100 redress for all those affected by block defects and building defects and then it's up to the electorate and if the electorate wants change then our message is the only way they're going to get change is a government led by shin fane and if they want change in housing and if they want change in defective block then they need a shin fane housing minister implementing shin fane policies because otherwise it'll be more of the status quo and that's not working for people the length and breadth of this country and particularly not for people in county donnie gall deputy ono bren thank you very much indeed for speaking to us this morning thanks for having me deputy ono bren there who is the shin fane housing spokesperson and uh you can send your comments saying if you've any comments to make on that it's a oh eight six sixty twenty five thousand for your text and whatsapp's or you can call 07491 25 000 now let's go back to our quiz because i made a booboo and the booboo i made was i um i have i have a second one to do i'm going to do that in the second hour of the program so if you're sending in your your answers to the first one uh text or whatsapp oh eight six sixty twenty five thousand and we have another one to do uh in the second hour of the program and we will do that a little bit later on and we're going to do that one slightly differently uh and we'll we'll get to that in just a few moments let's take a short break back after these think outside the box with your photos this christmas for canvass prints insta blocks mugs and photo books at megies.ie megies chemist letter kenny sponsors of today's nine till noon show merry old tide one and all at tk max you can spoil all your loved ones with big brand gifts that are always up to 60 less than the rrp i'm going to need a bigger basket fabulous gifts literally everyone will love from kids toys designer jewellery to luxury candles big gifts small prices in store this christmas at tk max the three amigos jimmy buckley robert mezell and patrick feeney are back on tour with their award-winning live show see the three amigos live conry hotel letter kenny tuesday january 23rd tickets priced 35 euro are now on sale at the hotel reception and ticketmaster.ie where extra charges may apply happy christmas from the three amigos the goal mile supported by aib has been helping families around the world for over 40 years this year we are asking you to step up together with your community to continue one of ireland's favorite christmas traditions search aib goal mile to see where you your family and your friends can find your local goal mile event aib for the life you're after could you train the next generation of skilled workers if you're a qualified tradesperson you could become an apprenticeship instructor join an etb team who share your passion and will get you up and running with opportunities nationwide across construction electrical engineering motor industry and more and with flexible work-life balance and a very competitive salary why not apply today at apprenticeship dot ie an initiative of the government around whatever the weather this december letter kenny will bring a warm frontier shopping and great value for your pocket highland weather forecast brought to you by shop lk and let's take a look at what met air and are predicting for us today and when we look at the forecast met air and tell us it'll be mostly cloudy with some sherry rain mainly in coastal areas throughout the day there'll be a good deal of dry weather and a few showers top temperatures today seven or eight degrees celsius light variable breezes north to north westerly later and freshening along the coast so that's not uh terrible i suppose now you'll have heard on the news this morning with mikaela that a business premises in the south of the county put up a social media post seeking information about the theft of three quads the company in question was caron quads based in balentra were joined on the line by caron kathryn caron owner of the company kathryn good morning hi good morning kathryn tell us about this um theft and what what you can tell us about the modus operandi that was used um well we know that they came on the property at about one o'clock on sunday morning uh they had been in the area from about eight o'clock on sunday evening um and they stole they were on our property from about one a.m to four a.m they stole three brand new susie quads and then it looks like they went across the main road to another property and stole a cattle trailer which they then used to transport the quads away from our premises now you you believe that um and we we can't make too many presumptions here but there was a white transit van seen in the area um at around five to six with a cattle trailer behind which you believe may um have have something to do with this and uh anyone with information that should contact gar thee yeah please yeah yeah yeah i decided we're on the the premises for three hours so it's it's um it was a fairly professional operation do you have cctv footage yeah which gar thee are examining we do yeah with a number of cctv images yeah yeah and and presumably the the company across the road that you referenced there um is uh is looking into the situation as well um in terms of the the monetary value i mean you know quads are by no means cheap implements i mean you're talking a fairly substantial monetary value on them you are yeah yeah yeah um yeah i mean there's three of them so um they're probably valued close on 40 000 indeed very very yeah yeah important then that if you can at all that you get information on um on getting those back well we will have our community gather information slot a bit later in the program now i'm not sure if this is going to be referenced it very well maybe referenced on on that as well and no harm to give it another rattle as such but uh catherine important from your point of view that anyone that noticed anything on the roads getting contact with gar thee uh to be the gar thee in bali shannon are presumably leading the investigation it is yeah and um it does seem as i said that there were an area from about 8 p.m on sunday evening so they were they were around the place from 8 until they were on our property at 1 a.m and and there there is a number of cctv footage is often around the roads um in the area uh between five and seven o'clock in the morning um and just as opposed to mentioned the the trailer that was stolen um i'm i'm not sure if you've any information on that but it is a 14 foot tri-axle cattle trailer um and it's the model of it's a blue falcon which apparently is is fairly unusual or a rare trailer right so the blue falcon trailer which you believed was stolen from another premises uh used to transport the quads that were taken from your premises uh a white transit van was used and uh was it you're saying there was uh potentially they were in the area from 8 the previous evening are you suggesting that white transit was spotted in the area uh the previous evening it was yeah it was it was it was spotted on our roads yeah yeah so again gar thee in bali shannon are investigating i don't have bali shannon gar thee's numbered to hand uh but you'll get that fairly easily so if you have any information on that please do contact the gar thee in bali shannon and uh the community gar thee information slot indeed is going to be on with us uh and that will be shortly after the 10 o'clock news and obituary notices so uh there there'll be more from the community gar thee slot uh potentially on this one i'm not sure if this one is included but uh certainly uh there there'll be a quite quite a lot uh on that too in the meantime Catherine listen we wish you all the best of luck in in recovering those stolen quads and uh hopefully you will get some information out there as as a result of this appeal but for now Catherine good morning and we wish you well thanks very much thank you thank you Catherine that's Catherine Cannon there the owner of uh cannon quads and there the the premises who's uh was broken into you you've heard Michaela read the story there on the news this morning already three brand new Suzuki King quads were taken uh two of them 500 non power steering quads uh won a um green 750 with a black bull bar on the front and they believe that theft happened between one and seven with the people responsible on the premises for a number of hours during that period right well as we said already uh we're coming close to the end of the first hour of the program we have the news and obituary notices coming up with Michaela very shortly um but for now what we're going to do is take a very short break as i say the news with Michaela will be coming up after this and then we will have the community guard the information slot in the second hour but for now we'll wish you a very good morning and we'll talk to you soon Chanel flower bomb long con giorgio mani paco robin where else but at mickey's chemist lettery kenny this christmas sponsors of today's nine till noon show this christmas let tfi local link help you get into the festive spirit and bring you where you need to go use a regular rural and door-to-door services to connect with friends and family throughout the christmas season with money routes offering evening and weekend services too for a full list of service arrangements visit transportforireland.ie tfi local link part of the transport for ireland network stay warm for less this winter with homeland five pack wood logs by three for 13 euro hardwood log crit 450 kg only 329 euro nationwide delivery available shop in store or online at homeland.ie maybe you're walking home with a guy you really like after a night in the college bar or maybe you and another fella are heading back to his in a taxi after meeting in a club or perhaps you've gone home with someone after a really great fourth date there are lots of times and places where we need to say what we want and what we don't want whatever the moment have the consent conversation a message from the government of ireland hello i'm david forney medical herbalist are you suffering with stress anxiety insomnia then after ire's botanica peace and calm a traditional herbal remedy ire's botanica peace and calm has a naturally relaxing effect ideal for stress insomnia jet lag and pre-exam anxiety call us the natural way let a kenny shopping center for more information christmas has arrived at paddersons christmas trees and decorations now undisplay christmas gifts from hollywood mirrors to wall art to home fragrances you'll find the perfect gift at paddersons there's a large range of dining tables and chairs sofas mattresses and bedroom furniture in stock and ready for christmas delivery open monday to saturday 9 a.m till 5 30 p.m with free local delivery paddersons the hall livered for everything you need this christmas live on air online and on the highland radio app this is highland radio news good morning i'm akilah clark with the news at 10 o'clock the government is expected to sign off today in a number of changes for new rivals from ukraine under the plans state accommodation would only be provided for 90 days it's also proposed while in state accommodation their welfare rate would be slashed from 220 euro to 38 80 denigal deputy thomas pringle says it's a decision that simply doesn't make sense with the severe shortage of housing at the moment there's something over 5000 asylum seekers who are still resident and direct prevention centers because they can't get out they can't get accommodated outside of the center they have got to leave to remain and leave to work and they're not asylum seekers anymore but they yet they can find accommodation so how are they how are you going to be able to find accommodation if that's that's the situation it's a nonsensical idea that the government are coming out to us and i think it's part of the knee jerk response that we've seen from this government all along as well a corner has found the death of a young girl from county dairy was due to a series of human errors and not systemic failure nine-year-old rachel fergusson from kosh quinn died on june the 10th at 2001 she was one of five children whose hospital treatment was examined in the long-running hyponatremia inquiry donna mary doherty has more rachel fergusson died at the royal belfast hospital after an appendix operation at alton the galvin hospital in dairy as part of the hyponatremia inquiry just as ohara found that the nine-year-old's death was the result of negligent care an inquest into her death was ordered in january 2022 delivering his findings at belfast corner's court corner joe mccriskin said he was satisfied that a series of individual human errors resulted in rachel's death rather than serious systemic structural failures he recorded rachel's death as several edema and hyponatremia the corner added that he is satisfied that following both the inquiry and this inquest lessons have been learned the final negotiations have been trying to get a deal at the cop 28 climate summit in debaille but after optimism of progress some countries are angry that the goal to phase out fossil fuel use by 2050 isn't in the final draft agreement instead nations are being encouraged to help reduce consumption and production cop 28 president sultan al-jabbar says compromise is needed i need all parties to show even more flexibility to get us to the finish line the world is watching let's not rest until we get this done conser donal coil has been elected as the new chair of the denigal education on training board conser coil says the delivery of the new erigal college building in letter kenny will be high on his agenda having previously been a teacher on school principal for many years he knows all too well how important education is in shaping people's futures education is the key for everybody for young people and even for for adults there are 15 post primary schools that are under the auspices of the etb i know that all of those schools provide a wide range of corrective subjects and provide a fantastic education to 100 and 100 students right across the county meanwhile 78 percent of school leavers in denigal have gone on to third level education this year that's according to the latest irish times feeder schools report for 2023 which shows around 80 percent of pupils across the country this year have progressed to college fee paying skills still account for the most pupils progressing to college with 99 percent of students continuing their education meanwhile the number progressing from jess skills in disadvantaged areas has risen to 63 percent carl o brian from the irish time says there are a number of reasons for that education observers say that there's a number of likely factors behind this one is that we have created more college places there's more technological universities in the regions which makes college more affordable and also we're far more access initiatives aimed at forging links between death schools and third level colleges where the night today will be mostly cloudy with a fair amount of dry weather with some patchy rain or drizzle at times highest temperatures of seven or eight degrees that's all from highland radio news for now we'll be back with an update again at 11 o'clock until then you can keep up to date with the latest local news on our website highland radio dot com good morning the obituary notices for this tuesday morning december the 12th the death has occurred of patrick paddy kelly garrison lane dromore crossroads at killie gordon remains reposing at his late residence from 11 o'clock this morning funeral leaving from his late residence on thursday morning at half past 10 for recreation mass in st patrick's church at crossroads killie gordon at 11 o'clock interment afterwards in the adjoining church yard the recreation mass will be streamed live on the parish youtube channel family time from nine o'clock until 11 o'clock and on the morning of the funeral the death has taken place of michael mickey barrett tara court letter kenny and formerly of tirade remelton county dunagall remains reposing at the eternal light chapel of rest mountain top letter kenny this evening from six o'clock until eight o'clock heist private police cremation tomorrow at lake lands at crematorium cavern family flowers only donations in lee if desired the dunagall hospice kerb jim mcglenn funeral directors or any family member the death has taken place of grace car neigh car gordon atran north castle fanard and formerly due literature mac award graces remains are reposing at her late residence removal from there this evening arriving at six o'clock to st mary's church fanavolte to repose overnight recreation mass will be held at 11 o'clock to more morning with burial afterwards in the adjoining graveyard family flowers only please donations in lee if desired to st mary's church fanavolte care of any family member or market here funeral directors the death has taken place of rose people's neigh doherty 44 castle town court striban and formerly of kula tea lifford remains are opposing at her home funeral leaving her home tomorrow morning at 20 past 10 for recreation mass in st patrick's church murlock lifford at 11 o'clock fall by interment in the adjoining cemetery donations in lee of flowers place to marie curie care of quickly funeral directors family time please from 11 o'clock to 11 o'clock the recreation mass can be viewed at clonley parish dot com the death has taken place of hannah mcgloughlin carrex bar clinley hannah's remains are opposing at her late home funeral from her late home to more morning at half past 10 going to st mary's church boke and cul d'aff for recreation mass at 11 o'clock interment afterwards in the adjoining cemetery family time from 11 o'clock to 11 o'clock and on the morning of the funeral funeral mass can be viewed on cul d'aff parish dot com the death has taken place of neigh devlin temple mall cul d'aff names remains are opposing at the home of his late brother philip devlin at shore road bali lifford family time please from 10 o'clock to 11 o'clock funeral mass will take place tomorrow morning at 11 o'clock in st patrick's church o'clay mallin fall by burial in neigh adjoining graveyard the death has occurred of patrick packy carabin draymark dunagall town remains will repose at gallehurst funeral home station road mine charlotte's this evening from five o'clock until eight o'clock removal from there to more morning going to st mary's church killie marred for 11 o'clock funeral mass fall by cremation no flowers please house private the death has occurred of joe galler seven the cottages burn foot joe's remains are opposing at his home removal to more morning at quarter past 10 to st murris church fawn for requiem mass at 11 o'clock fall by interment in the adjoining graveyard requiem mass can be viewed on church services dot tv family time please from 10 o'clock to 11 o'clock family flowers only please donations in lieu to the oncology unit letter kenny university hospital care of any family member or murphy funeral directors and the death has taken place of daniel canning caradone rath mullen funeral mass this morning at 11 o'clock in st joseph's church rath mullen burial afterwards in rath mullen cemetery funeral mass can be viewed on mcnmediate.tv family time please before the funeral this morning for family information and more details regarding wakes and funerals please go to highlandridio.com your flu and COVID-19 vaccines will give your immune system the top-up it needs to help protect you from serious illness a flu vaccine is recommended for you if you're 65 or over a COVID-19 vaccine is recommended for you if you're 50 or over both vaccines are recommended for health care workers and anyone who is pregnant or has a long-term health condition talk to a participating GP or pharmacist or visit hsc.ie for more from the hsc it's the second hour of the nine to an intro on highland radio just a few notes before we go for the bingo numbers and then our community guard the information slot there's a diesel spill at belnalecki near refold toward letter kenny you can even smell it our quarter says please be careful and also a quarter says i'm at the optimum round about it's a little bit slippy i think there may be some oil spilled please do watch out there's two notices of potential oil spillages one at belnalecki near refold that's quite close to where the the bali holy farm turnoff is i think and also the optimum round about where it's a bit slippy as well i think there may be some oil spilled uh no no sorry but belnalecki is the the crossroads further out um now under the treaty of amsterdam ireland along with denmark have an opt-out from eu immigration obligations only a referendum will give the mandate to create a paradigm shift in our mass immigration policy the caller says ireland is obliged to do a lot of things under international law which they failed to do such as uphold the rights of the disabled and the sick another caller says the new measures for ukrainians are just sound bites to appease voters with an election looming as a person who works in the department of social protection i can categorically state that a photocopy of a passport is acceptable for asylum seekers to obtain a ppsn no checks are done to verify it either with the relevant authority or with interval 80 percent of asylum seekers never enter the employment market sometimes through no fault of their own and irish or e u citizen by comparison must provide valid identification and meet the relevant qualifying criteria in order to avail of social protection services this does not apply to ukrainians until recently ukrainians were allowed to return to ukraine for four weeks on holiday irish citizens are allowed a to be holiday on job seekers added to this the department inspectors nationwide are dealing with a high volume of duplicate claims under multiple ppsn numbers involving a number of people there is the hap discrepancy a family of two adults and three children gets 450 euro a month more money goes to ukrainians irrespective of the size of the family and finally there's the homeless issue 14 000 homeless not a single modular home built for them ukrainians are having modular homes built for them in slago also in dublin and cork perhaps oan might give his view on the fact that no modular housing has been built for irish homeless that's uh from a corner um and now next comment garvey need to stop ignoring footpath parking same cars every day on the busy glen car parts very tricky for those buggies and for those with mobility issues and finally we're delighted uh to be launching the three mary's cd at the mahari community center in don lowe at half past 11 everyone is very welcome there be tea fresh scones and plenty of tasty bites so the three mary's cd is being officially launched today and that's happening at the mahari community center in don lowe and uh that's one that's well worth supporting now it's 13 minutes past 10 if you play highland radio ncbi radio bingo uh please grab your books and grab your pens and we will hand you over to cast the county's number one talk show the nine till noon show on highland radio it's time for ncbi bingo on highland radio it's tuesday the 12th of december you're playing on the brown sheet the reference number is s7 it's game number 50 the numbers are 50 40 35 three two 57 73 63 39 and finally 46 phone your claim to nine one zero four eight double three before eight tonight leaving your name contact number and the name of the shop will you purchase your book and we'll call you back the next working day get all your ncbi bingo information at highland radio dot com the department of social protection is working to improve disability payments in ireland there is currently a consultation on how these payments might work better in the future we want to hear your views on how the system might be improved to find out more please visit gulf dot ie forward slash disability payments reform a government of island initiative brought to you by the department of social protection you go boss victor and roth dior mark jacob's and carlina herrera where else but at mcgee's camis letter kenny where you'll find the biggest names in perfume and aftershave this christmas sponsors of today's nine till noon show find the volswagen in you with a caddy cargo transporter 6.1 crafter and the new amorak with hp finance from 4.9 and service plans from 12 99 per month book your test drive at connelly's volswagen commercial vehicles letter kenny or visit connelly's dot ie terms and conditions apply finance provided by the way of hire purchase agreement from volswagen financial services island and subject to lending criteria volswagen financial services island limited is regulated by the central bank of ireland visit volswagen vans dot ie for more information koonie's christmas shop has gone mad this christmas with massive reductions on trees and lights seven foot colorado was 299 now only 129 seven foot prelet was 289 now only 199 103 bright lights was 79 now only 39 99 need battery lights for your garland were 799 now only 599 hurry though only while stocks last koonie's christmas shop letter kenny retail park letter kenny open seven days and making christmas magical this is the nine till noon show it's 16 minutes past 10 on a tuesday morning and we all know what that means watch the show live now on youtube facebook and at highland radio dot com the nine till noon show is brought to you by megies chemist main street letter kenny with all your perfume and aftershave presents this christmas delivered to your door or order online and collect in store visit mickey's dot ie the commuting order information is brought to you by shared and security systems protecting what you value most call today and get your zero wire alarm system from 299 euro shared and security 91 26025 it's time for the community garthus slot here on the highland radio delighted to welcome garthon nyle maguire into studio nyle you're very welcome thanks donal a lot to get through and such report quite a lot of burglaries and thefts this week yeah don't think i'll get hit very badly this weekend was crying donal um in particular the um any show in area had a lot of burglaries and i heard you earlier caller in relation to kathryn was on about the quads that were stolen and i just i'll reiterate that appeal that uh the information we have in relation to them stolen quads but yeah if we could start off there was also an uh another one in meeting house straight refold between 10 p.m on saturday the ninth uh until sunday the 10th of december entry was gained to a boiler house at the property through an unlocked door and an oil boiler and burner were stolen uh so that quite of uh an expensive item stolen from that premises donal and if anybody's seen anything or can give us any information in relation to a burglary at meeting house straight refold uh on uh 10 p between 10 p.m and saturday the ninth and sunday morning the 10th please contact my colleagues in letter kenny on 0749167100 now the um mobile and green castle area did get badly hit on sunday night monday morning and there was multiple burglaries and i just want to go through them don't know if it could um the first one was at a domestic house in the area of mean letter bail uh legamy hopefully i'm saying that properly mobile between midnight and 3 a.m and it appears that most of these burglaries were around that time donal between midnight and 3 a.m on monday the 11th of december um it's believed entry was gained to this particular house through an unlocked rear door and a sum of cash was stolen uh alongside a dewalt angle grinder and a dewalt drill which were also stolen from the property subsequently greg uh some columbus church was burglarized um uh in balna cray mobile uh at around the same time donal between midnight and 3 25 a.m my colleagues were on route to the previous burglary in the house when they observed that the lights were on in the church and they knew that this was suspicious and they went on to investigate and the uh they when they got closer they seen they heard the alarm was ringing and the front door of the church had been forced open as had the sacristy door the sacristry had been ram sacked and damaging the cause to a tabernacle another couple of rooms within the church building were also ram sacked after entry had been forced nothing is believed to have been stolen at this stage but substantial damage was caused um a very unfortunate um occurrence there donal yeah and then the golf club locally as well yeah next then was the golf club um i'm i'm guessing around the same time but the last time someone was there uh and seen it was secured was Sunday night at 7 p.m and then it was discovered at 8 30 a.m and monday entry was gained by forcing a rear window and a number of doors were forced inside the building also rooms were ram sacked and a sum of cash was stolen from a cash register and also a charity box from within the building was taken uh burglary the end occurred in the green castle area between 2 20 a.m and 5 30 a.m a purse was stolen from an unlocked car um the property had had an unlocked shed and it was entered and a red uh and black mechita fuel pump was stolen from within and then another attempt of theft occurred at the property in the area of carl hugh green castle between 4 a.m and 6 30 a.m two unlocked cars were entered and ram sacked at the property but fortunately there was nothing of value within them so there was nothing reported stolen there so if anybody can help us in relation to this spade of um burl grease and damage if or if they involved and observed anything suspicious any activity or vehicles in the movile green castle area in the early hours of monday morning please contact my colleagues in mochrana on 0 7 4 9 3 2 0 5 4 0 or the guard of confidential line as usual is 1 800 treble 6 treble 1 so anybody that may have dash cam have been in the movile green castle area between midnight and 7 a.m on monday 11th of sember please make that available to my colleagues donal indeed contact any guard of station and we'll pitch in touch with the investigator and detectives it does make the question are any of these linked because i mean in certain cases the the modus operandi is very different but you know they're there i'm sure there must be some sort of suspicion that there at least some of them will be linked that uh the same people could be responsible for more than one oh absolutely greg it's our donal sorry it's um for sure they're linked you know there's because it's it's the same um brittle method of entry and each of these um burglars and it's it's it's common this spade you know any show one um can go without burglars for quite a while and then when they happen together it's generally the one the one person or the one gang that's doing it you know so i mean it could well be that if if two people notice something different at different times you know it could get a link to a same vehicle i mean information could prove absolutely crucial in this case for sure donal yeah and the way that these are typically solved is um somebody noticing something suspicious and tipping the guards off you know because my colleagues are out and about there and you know once they're maybe moving to the report of one burglary you know they're they're not they don't have the blinkers on going to that burglary they're looking out because they realize by the time they get there that these offenders are likely gone so any information in relation to suspicious vehicles you know just a quick phone call if it comes in often comes in often fine but you know um we appreciate the phone call and that is um historically how we solve these burglars and and as we say that information coming from dashcam or just from the the uh the observations of people can prove absolutely crucial let's uh just refresh your memories on that incident in uh bellybug and balantra that we already referred to earlier in the show yeah i heard catherine on earlier and i'm very sorry she's i heard her demeanor and she's very um upset about it rightly so uh it's a terrible thing a terrible loss for that business at this time of year um so this occurred as catherine said between one a.m. and four a.m. and monday 11th of december at bali bulgan bali shannon uh this is the premises that settles um quad bikes the doors to the her lock shed were broken open forced open and three new susuki king quads were stolen from within these aren't like kids quads you know susuki does a lot of kids quads but these were kind of big quads one of them was uh a 750 and two of them were 500s the two 500s are red and colour and are both non-power steering one of these two has oversized kenda bear claw tires on the back the third quad the 750 is green and colour and has a black ball bar fitted to the front uh again anybody that can help us and help kathen relation to this please contact my colleagues in bali shannon on 071 9858530 and the next one we do and kathen alluded to this we do believe the next one is linked because this very well may be the trailer that moved the quads away from from the area this is in in the same area for sure just across the road donal um a uh blue falcon 14 by six foot galvanized cattle trailer was taken from a farm yard in the area of lacklum valentra between the hours of 4 30 a.m and 5 15 a.m on monday the 11th of december two males are believed to vented the farm yard and they weighed the trailer out onto the road to be towed away so in all likelihood this was the trailer that was used to take the three stolen quads away so um obviously my colleagues are following a definite line of inquiry in relation to the link in these two crimes but if anybody can help us or has uh particularly dash cam and in uh the bali shannon valentra area between 4 30 a.m and 5 a.m please maybe make it available to my colleagues in bali shannon who are investigating now moving on to um the area of um advice and we heard a piece there from dona marie based on advice that's been given by gar thee this week and no harm to to repeat it again in terms of protecting your home uh against burglary particularly in the winter months yeah at times it feels like i don't know i suppose there's very little we can do in relation to to some of these burglaries but you know we need to mitigate our risk as much as possible and quite a few of them appeals i mentioned donal there was unlocked vehicles and unlocked doors so the first thing is lock your vehicles and lock your doors um turn on some lights in your house you know um timer switches uh stuff like that led bulbs we all know about that they're they're not expensive to run um a house alarm we highly recommend a house alarm and particularly monitor if possible uh a monitor alarm donal is one that uh when it's triggered uh the the monitoring company are aware of it and they contact the key holder by phone and if they can't get the key holder then they contact us and we will respond and attend that house or business premises that has a verified alarm store your keys away from windows we've had keys that have been fished out of letter boxes before you know with sticks and things um and you know keys for for vehicles uh because most modern vehicles now have immobilizers and they're not that easy to steal you actually need the keys don't keep large amounts of cash or jewelry in the house and if you have to do so for whatever reason have them in a hidden concealed lock safe that's uh secured and you'll get great advice from any of the locksmiths or um safe suppliers in the the the town here in larkinne greg or throughout donnie go and the other one that was mentioned obviously was uh in terms of if you're going away for christmas as many people do don't be proclaiming all over social media that you can't wait for your family holiday for sure we've had instances i'm not sure how common it is but it's certainly been in the past where we've had confirmation that um people have been targeted because they've been broadcasting that yeah we're going away for you know two weeks or whatever and you know it's quite obvious then that the house is going to be empty another one that we come across quite often donal is you know because we're policing the roads network and these criminals have to be on the road to get from a to b from from from each of their victims um they tend not to travel with a lot of the implements with them because um there is no fence there for um having implements to break into your house so what happens in a lot of the time is they actually use the householders own tools to break into their house so have your garden shed locked as well because if you have hammers and ladders and crowbars and things like that you know that's what they're using to break into homes uh don't store cash or any valuables in your car be it locked or unlocked greg um and also always contact gary immediately if you observe any sort of suspicious activity in your area take note of registration numbers if at all possible even partial registration numbers description of the person's wealth and very important is the direction of travel like i said my colleagues once they respond they call it would be nice to have at least the direction of travel when there is somebody maybe has committed a crime or a suspicious look out for your neighbors particularly those who are elderly and vulnerable and all good advice and please do bear that in mind important all year round but particularly important now because there can be an increase with the darker nights and so on there there can definitely be an increase in burglaries and certainly judging by this week sheets i mean you know there's a lot more burglaries on this week than we might have had say during a week in june or july for sure don't know yeah and it's it's it's it's unfortunate now but it seems like the ones on any show on are certainly linked um i'm not linking the one in in in bounce aside from the trailer and the quads but uh it's you know one person that's determined to commit burglars or a couple of lads are working together they can create a lot of devastation as is quite obvious from this week donal now a couple of questions that came in from last week and the first is what time do pubs close at the weekend yes um pubs the trading hours of license premises uh between monday to thursday are half 10 in the morning to 11 30 p.m people might be familiar with that when they head onto the supermarket and stuff and they can't buy their bottle of wine and stuff before half 10 in the morning uh friday and saturday is generally half 10 to half 12 in the morning but that the certain premise then can apply for exemptions uh to extend that out then to uh up to 230 a.m and then sunday uh is 12 30 p.m to 11 p.m and they are the the legal hours and do you guard these stop walkers cyclists and runners in dark clothing and give them high vis vests uh if we have them donal we do um that you're not a cyclist and a pedestrian they're they're not committing an offence they're not wearing high visibility clothes and they're not you know they're not legally obliged to but obviously it's recommended for their own safety um cyclist are obliged by law to ensure that they are visible using reflectors and lights under the road traffic um uh regulations uh sometimes if we do you have high visibility armbands or or vests we do get them out to pedestrians there is a supply in letter kenny if anybody wants to call in expect particularly this dark time of year uh grogna or one of the guards on the front desk if you ask them nicely i'm sure if they have one they'll they'll give it to you but uh you know i suppose it's not ultimately our responsibility to give people um high vis you know you can buy these online or and in the sports shop donal yeah i know uh sergeant sharding anderson did say last week on the show that they do have whether they'd have a supply in letter kenny at that point whether or not they're still there and i'm sure all the garter stations yeah i think it's the road safety authority that supplies us donal you know yeah it would be yet if there's any groups or anything out there that are looking maybe for more than a couple uh i'd say if you email the road safety authority they'll probably send you a few you know yep well garden line McGuire thank you very much indeed thanks donal all that that's the garter slot it'll be up on our social media and it'll be up on the uh garter facebook page as well a little bit after the show finishes but for now nine McGuire garter thank you very much indeed the community garter information slot is brought to you by sheridan security systems protecting what you value most call today and get your zero wire alarm system from 299 euro sheridan security 91 26025 watch the show live now on youtube facebook and at highland radio dot com the nine till noon show is brought to you by McGee's chemist main street letter kenny with all your perfume and aftershave presents this christmas delivered to your door or order online and collect in store visit mckees.ie merry old tide one and all at tk max you can spoil all your loved ones with big brand gifts that are always up to 60% less than the rrp i'm gonna need a bigger basket fabulous gifts literally everyone will love from kids toys designer jewellery to luxury candles big gifts small prices in store this christmas at tk max the three amigos jimmy buckley robert moselle and patrick feeney are back on tour with their award-winning live show see the three amigos live conry hotel letter kenny tuesday january 23rd tickets priced 35 euro are now on sale at the hotel reception and ticket master dot ie where extra charges may 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just rolls over to the next day and the next and the next so what will happen is on one of the programs on the station this afternoon a call will be made and if you answer within the set time while the phone is ringing you then will be asked a very straightforward question and you will win a thousand euro if you haven't yet got a ticket you can do so now you can do so online at highland radio dot com or indeed the lines are open 07491 25 000 you can call and our team will take the call and you can buy your ticket online as well so 07491 25 000 you can ring and you can get your ticket or you can book it as we say online that call will be made at some stage today and every day until the 22nd and on the 22nd Greg will be calling someone and giving away a new scoda kameek now i want to move on to something completely different we're going to zoom and i remember way back in the midst of time on my mother's birthday one morning many many years ago gay burn read a request on the radio and it was one of those amazing things because when gay burn read your request that was something big and when gay burn read your letter on air that was something really important and it was a key part of very very many households that the gay burn show on radio and we all know gay obviously from the red show but the radio show was a hugely popular show and a hugely important show as well because it was probably the linchpin of national broadcasting on a day-to-day basis gay burn in the morning and i can still hear that tune humming in my head um i'm well old enough to remember listening to that show regularly and my parents being glued to the radio while it was on and a collection of the letters that were sent in to the gay burn show has been uh collated and brought together and published and who better to collate those letters than gay daughter susie burn so i didn't say susie joins us on zoom this morning susie good morning morning thank you so much for having me love you to be to be here and there it's our pleasure susie it must have been of great interest to you to actually sit down and sift through the letters because i mean i don't know how many letters you had to sift through in order to compile the book but i'm sure it must have been well into the thousands if not the tens of thousands it was thousands um very overwhelming and a much bigger group of letters than i thought existed even um within the archives and the archives are filed on a daily basis all of the program files for each day are filed so you're sifting through program files of the actual running order of the day as well as and then finding letters within each day which which gives it which actually although it ended up because of the way things are filed it ends up being a bigger task it also gave a much better understanding of the way the program worked and the way that the the light and shade and the gear change within the program although there were some very very harrowing letters they were also able to switch to lighter stuff as well so during each program it would move from one to the other but there was thousands thousands letters and all handwritten obviously so they had to be deciphered as well as read and and sometimes we forget that it was groundbreaking to an extent that we wouldn't appreciate now in that people were raising issues in letters to the gay burn show on radio that would not be discussed anywhere else and in many ways he was an absolute pioneer in terms of issues that he would have brought to light on radio because i'm sure there are many many issues issues of abuse issues of uh you know very sensitive nature that maybe are discussed an awful lot more openly now but back in the 60s to 70s to 80s that was not the case absolutely not and they i mean the the letters you when you're reading the letters you really feel that that he has that the person who's writing although they're writing to a national radio program they are writing to him specifically and they're trusting him with with as you said stuff that they would never have said before and and i don't know whether they even maybe spoke about it afterwards to their families because a lot of the letters were um although they weren't anonymous they did say please do not read my name out on air for various reasons or for obvious reasons so um and they were they were worrying from the heart and taking huge risks um because i mean they you know they would say often i have five five children i live here in in mayo or i live somewhere and they could kind of be identifiable just by their and they in fairness to the program where there was um specific information that might have identified somebody within their letter that would have been left out so that they really if they if they did not want their name or their person to be known it wasn't um but they but absolutely it was all very um groundbreaking and you felt that people were just in their kitchens and they just sat down there and then having heard something else maybe to write their story and it flowed from that it was usually one letter or one comment which just opened the floodgates and they would come down the letters and in their droves it was incredible and it's noticeable i'm sure that uh very few of the letters i suspect are addressed to mr burn they're all addressed dear gay and and that's telling because they saw him as being a big brother being a father figure but they saw him as a friend he was he had that and it was fairly unique at the time that you know he was very much gay he was ah he's our mate he's our brother he's he's the one we trust and the level of trust gay held was probably if you had done the sort of you see many many transparency so surveys published these days where how much do people trust a b c d and e i suspect if you had done a trust survey in the 1980s uh gay burn would be about ahead with about five times more force than anybody else in terms of a trust competition i mean they trusted implicitly they trusted him and i think they you know you get the feeling from the letters and from listening to a lot of audio that i did that they trusted him because he got to their level and he believed them and um a lot of them are telling stories that were kind of unbelievable at the time and would have been going against the grain and probably had they told their nearest and dearest they would have been told get back into your box now and don't be mentioning that here again so they they opened up their their hearts and they trusted him and i think that he respected that and you know when when i'm looking at the the research and speaking to his producers and stuff you know they would always say that from um and he went on live on at nine o'clock just after nine o'clock news and really from about eight o'clock in the morning nobody went near him in the studio he was just rehearsing rehearsing rehearsing so the letters that he read out were rehearsed letters and he so he kind of got the intonation right he knew that if somebody had had sent a letter to him which was very um raw and honest that he gave the letter itself just by rehearsing it before he went on air he wasn't just reading it off the cuff and i think that's that that's all of the little bits of culminate in the trust that you're talking about and he didn't always necessarily provide answers he didn't always necessarily provide the sage advice that was going to address the question but perhaps the most important thing he did as you've just said was he listened and he believed and maybe the believed is the most important thing of all that when people felt they say a problem shared is a problem halved well i mean you know gay burn shared thousands tens of thousands of problems over the years on that and even even if he didn't have the answers he had that sort of calming presence and that calming sense to the person that you have been heard you are not alone yeah absolutely and a lot of the times you know when you're listening to to back to the radio program and i tried to include a bit of it in the book as far as i could but he would say um to the listeners he would say i want you to stop whatever it is you're doing sit down and listen to this this needs your full attention and at the end of the letter he might just say that that he might say nothing or he might just say um that now that will stay with you for the rest of the day and he i think that in that sense his voice wasn't required he recognized that the people it was all in their words in their letters and later on as things got there was lots of letters about marriage and affairs and all of this stuff that went on and then he brought more in gaffney in to to give advice because he wasn't as you say he wasn't trying to give advice he was reading out peoples but he wasn't in their situation although for a lot of the catholic stuff a lot of the church stuff he was a product of that environment as well he wasn't like he'd been shipped in he he knew the harshness of the catholic church he knew he'd been in a christian brothers school he knew that that the chances were the people were telling the truth because he'd seen it himself and a lot of things and which made it a bit easier yeah and that sense and i'm sure those times when he was reading out letters and maybe he might not necessarily have tallied with his own personal beliefs might necessarily have been what he would choose from his own ethical standpoint or viewpoint but he also had that openness to to appreciate that you know other people may have had different views to him and they were their views and they were entitled to them absolutely and i think i mean he would have always said he was a broadcaster and and it was it wasn't about him it was always about the listener and always about them and you know the the the listenership figures and the the response to all of these various various letters and discussions he knew that that's what people wanted and i think that the in the book the homosexuality chapter is quite telling of that because you have people writing in with all the different perspectives you have gay men predominantly um weirdly although most of the the letters within the archives are actually from women within the homosexuality realm a lot of the letters were from men gay men some men that didn't um that knew they were gay but knew they they were destined to a life of loneliness and solitude because they could never be what they wanted to be then you had people who were venomously against homosexuality and you had mothers writing in to say my son or my daughter came to us a couple of weeks ago with something to tell us and we we thought the word was ending and she just told us that she was a lesbian or he was a gay and this was the best news ever because they had they had thought thought thought the worst and this of these people you can see in their torturous letters that they dreaded the day of telling their parents and and actually for those of them that did the parents were not always to be honest not always but but some parents absolutely threw their arms around them and the relationships flourished from there because there was always something in the background so that chapter for me was a great one in that in that um seeing the different perspectives of different people coming through in letters and how you just let it flow let the let the people talk the book contains many many of the letters but I mean only a tiny tiny proportion of all the letters I'm sure you went through what were your criteria for picking them and how difficult was it to put some letters to one side and not use them because you didn't have the space very difficult sure but what I did was as I said earlier on the program there's thousands letters and so initially I was very very overwhelmed and had to kind of step away for a while and came back to it that okay no what so my criteria my fundamental criteria was except for the Northern Ireland chapter and all of the other chapters this the letters had to be my story so this happened to me or my family because there were so many letters that were opinions or telling stories about something that they'd heard or something or reactions to things so by by just eliminating any letters of that that nature it just became about the everyone's personal whoever wrote that wrote wrote their own personal story and that was the fundamental criteria and then because unfortunately a lot of the letters had the same story the same heartbreak the same cruelty and then it was it was really just a case of taking the different stories themselves and say okay well that that that that letter is kind of the same as the next one so let's just choose one of one of those two so that we could then you know like even in so for example in say the marriage chapter there's different there's people who had affairs or people who had unconsummated marriages there were people who were having an affair and they were the person having an affair with a married man there were some married men wrote in some people who had separated and and regretted so we were just to try and get the balance of all the letters it was it was not easy it I mean it took it took a year longer than I thought it would I was I I thought we would be polishing this book this time last year but I just wasn't ready there was too much in it but you needed to be happy with the final product and you need to be happy that what you were presenting was an accurate reflection of yes I well that's it and I kind of felt that I was only going to do this once and um although there's a little bit of pressure to get it done for last year I really felt that that it would be if we do it once and we do it properly and spend another bit bit more time making sure that when we look back on each chapter that there isn't anything really left out that it's a curated collection of what's in there and it really reflects what's in the archives as much as possibly could the show ran from 1973 to 1998 two hours a day with with upwards of 850 000 people listening every day now when you bear in mind that the population of the country for much of that time was less than four million 850 000 was pretty much I mean 20 plus of the entire population yes incredible and and a higher percentage given that that the percentage of the the listenership was women so it was it was 50 percent of the population was women and even higher percentage of it's probably 30 40 percent of women listening in every day so the influence was was massive and the influence I think the what what's very apparent as you go through the book was that the the the people in the far reaches of the country were listening to each other and realizing that that's actually the the problems that they had or the things that were going on in their lives were going on all over the country and that I think was the strength of those letters that you and the beautiful handwriting and beautiful way people put it around me more than anything was the way the people could write their life and their issues in such a beautiful way and without any emails and any editing without it literally they and full ska pages or those lots of letters and those little ring binder with the wire the notebooks with wires and they just grabbed paper and wrote down from the heart and wrote their story and and posted it off and I I think that that from researching and listening again to audio that that was such a lifeline to people in in the bar corners of the country who thought they were living this life alone and they weren't dear gay a hundred in history of Ireland compiled by Susie Burn Susie it's been an absolute pleasure thanks very much indeed for speaking to us thank you very much happy Christmas to all and happy Christmas ten years as well that's Susie there the the daughter of the wonderful gay burn and the book dear gay a 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euro available from hotel reception ticket master and hot country tv dot com whatever the weather christmas shopping and letter kenny will brighten your december the highland weather forecast brought to you by shop lk see shop lk dot ie or like us on facebook mostly cloudy with some sherry rain this morning particularly in coastal areas a good deal of dry weather though through the day with a few showers interspersed top temperature seven to eight degrees celsius light variable breezes becoming north to northwestern later and freshening along the coast and as we mentioned letter kenny chamber there uh college is asking is there late my shopping in letter kenny tonight i'm sure some of them will be at least if you have anything you can add to that please let us know i want to mention john mclochland the ceo of donnie goll county council is going to join us in studio after 11 if you have any questions about donnie goll county council's budget which was passed last week call us on 0749 125 000 or text us whatsapp us on 08 6 60 25 000 and just a notification there's been an oil spill on the outside lane of the jewel carriageway outside letter kenny now given that we've already reported oil spills at balnalecki near a foe and at the optimum roundabout i wonder could they all be linked it is certainly a possibility so really if you're traveling from refo toward letter kenny uh please do take care because there could be oil on that road now dr mary hainsworth is the um service manager with donnie goll domestic violence and she joins us on the line uh dr mary good good morning morning don't know how you doing well indeed um the donnie goll domestic violence service has is launching its safe at home campaign and we know that sadly christmas time can be a time of hyphened emotions it can be a time when for many it's anything but the season of goodwill it is indeed yeah and we do sometimes do a christmas like like a christmas toy appeal and you know the focus is on christmas and buying presents for children but i think this year we've been hit by the reality that for a lot of children and young people you know one of the best presents you can give them is actually that that kind of freedom from the fear and intimidation that's often got when you know there are either experienced in domestic violence or there's an extreme alcohol use within the house and oftentimes the two combined together can cause quite a stressful time to young people so we're advertising and putting out there a campaign to raise funds for ourselves but it's to support clients to make sure that their homes are have maybe additional safety and security measures so we are trying to encourage families to stay in the home not with an abuser but if they've moved out to either make their new home safe with security cameras maybe they need to panic alarm or if they're staying in the family home i think that things might escalate that we're looking at additional security measures there so it's all about trying to get the message across that maybe the best present we can give children this year particularly those living with domestic abuse is to live in a household that's free of that violence we know the calls to childline will go through the roof over christmas and most of those calls are domestic violence related or addiction issues i heard a comment recently actually i was quite taken by someone said that the essence of christmas is it makes what's good better and it makes what's bad worse it can do yeah and i think you know for a lot of people christmas can be quite a stressful time of the year so what we're trying to do is you know put message it's not about having to buy loads of presents and you know think that that's the the kind of the go-to symbol of a good christmas it is about all the other things you know it's the smaller things that matter and i think you know that message of originally christmas was about peace and goodwill but that emphasis on peace particularly at this time of the year and certainly given what's happening globally i think should be a key message for christmas this year and that's what we're putting at the heart of the campaign you know try and get kids to have some peace this christmas if people want to get in touch with you over the coming weeks how can they do so well we have a helpline number there is 1800 262677 and we do support families to move so you know just because it's the run up to christmas and you think the services will be slowing down or not available we are 24 hours and we will continue to be 24 hours completely over the christmas period so give us a call if you need any support or assistance and that can be about moving it can be about looking for support around child access it can be looking at legal support or court accompaniment any of those services are available and if people want to organise a fundraising event for you which i'm sure will be very much appreciated particularly this time they can make contact with you and arrange that as well they can and they can also use our website done a gold domestic violence services dot ie and there is a button at the top there but there's one to donate but next to that there's one if you want to fundraise and it will actually it helps to set up a page that you can then use to get direct people to send money to so you don't have to handle anything it can all be set up on that page so it's actually really easy to do if anybody wants you know people are back home for christmas maybe want something to do between christmas and new year great opportunity and one of the things you're trying to do as part of the campaign is to provide equipment such as security cameras panic alarms where appropriate also provides supervised access for children where needed over the holiday period so you're trying to to provide what you can to try and make things as as good as possible for some of the people you're dealing with absolutely you know we just want people to be able to have have a good time feel safe you know and feel that you know there are additional supports measures that are available there and you know to contact the service if you want to access any of those um but that is our message let's try and make christmas safe you know let's let's have that as the focus for this year. Dr Murray Hensworth thanks indeed for for speaking to us this morning we wish you and those involved with the service all the best over christmas hopefully you won't be too busy and hopefully it's as good a christmas as it can be for those who use your services. Absolutely thank you don't know on the same to yourself and all the staff at Highlands. Thank you very much indeed and that's Dr Murray Hensworth there and a very very important campaign that's the the Donegal domestic violence safe at home campaign they're doing what they can to to make christmas um as as safe as possible and anything we can do to help i'm sure uh would be much appreciated and very important headlines coming up it's a minute and a half to 11 o'clock we'll take a short break back after these. The 9 till noon show with McGee's Camus Main Street letter Kenny offering a great range of digital cameras and binoculars for christmas. McGee's the photographic experts were the best cost less check out these special offers at simpson supermarket letter Kenny there's quality street tins 10 euro coke zero coke diet cans 12 pack seven euro tato cheese and onion assorted 12 pack three euro 50 there's the slower rain 750 mil two for three euro 50 plus we are now taking orders for your christmas turkey while they're check out Peggy's kitchen cafe only two minutes from letter Kenny hospital for all your christmas needs it has to be simpson supermarket with grid value every day this christmas let tfi local link help you get into the festive spirit and bring you where you need to go use our regular rural and door-to-door services to connect with friends and family throughout the christmas season with money routes offering evening and weekend services too for a full list of service arrangements visit transportforireland.ie tfi local link part of the transportforireland network from the luxurious to the sustainable beautiful irish made products that stand the test of time find something you love forever at madelocal.ie madelocal made to last supported by design and crafts council ireland and me lyra hello there golly gosh it's almost christmas and we want to help you here at harvey's point make it extra special and what better way than with a harvey's point gift card available to order direct from the hotel 074 97 2208 or online at harvey's point.com it's the gift that keeps on giving all year round a harvey's point gift card it's it's time to give your favorite hospitality business the recognition they deserve nominate now for the highland radio hospitality awards at highland radio.com hurry let's celebrate excellence together nominations close on december 13th this is the mention of new show on highland radio it's just gone 11 o'clock time for headlines and we say good morning to be killed o'clock morning a church was ransacked and cash stolen from a number of properties during a spate of burglaries and in is shown in the early hours of yesterday morning a sum of cash was stolen from a house in lecmi while at clumbage church balne cray the sacristy was ransacked ransacked and damage caused to a tabernacle it was later discovered a sum of cash was stolen from a cash register and charty box at green castle golf club when in the same area purse was stolen from an unlocked car and a fuel pump taken from an unlocked shed the health minister says some hospitals are feeling too clear their weekend patients leading to an increase in trolley numbers steven donnelly says he has met with the hse to ensure the right rostering is in place for the next few weekends 747 patients were waiting for a hospital bed yesterday 57 at letter kenny university hospital the government is expected to sign off on a number of changes for new arrivals from ukraine under the plans that state accommodation would only be provided for 90 days donnie god deputy thomas pringle says it's a decision that simply doesn't make sense with the severe shortage of housing a corner has found the death of a young girl from county dairy was due to a series of human errors and not systemic failure nine-year-old rachel ferguson from kosh quinn died on june the 10th 2001 she was one of five children whose hospital treatment was examined in the long-running hyponatremia inquiry it's emerged a cattle trailer used in the theft of almost 40 000 euro worth of quads from a south jenegal business was stolen from a nearby business three brand new suzuki quads were taken from karen quads balentra between one and seven o'clock at yesterday morning cctv footage shows a white transit van believed to be involved close to the premises before traveling to another local business from which the cattle trailer was stolen to transport the quads and it seems a final draft agreement from the cop 28 climate summit is now being hastily rewritten the conference in debaille was supposed to end this morning but discussions are continuing some countries are angry about a decision to not phase out fossil fuel use by 2050 those are the latest headlines we'll be back with an update again at 12 noon millionaire raffle from the national lottery is back with one millionaire guaranteed and over 6.3 million euro in cash prizes to be won it's the biggest ever the draw is on new years eve and tickets are limited to 600 000 the national lottery it could be them gift responsibly the county's number one talk show the nine till noon show on highland radio fill your stocking this christmas from all the great gift ideas at magies camis letter canny sponsors of today's nine till noon show see magies dot i e or like magies on facebook for a chance to win some great prizes at tesco we're helping you become more christmas make a chicotery table and mix and match with three for two and hundreds of meats and cheeses like tesco finest italian anti-pasti our finest board via certified irish angus shadow brand now half price it's a cut above the rest and now for what we've all been dreaming about our board via proved fresh irish turkeys are available in store from december 19 tesco every little helps club pride required subject to availability chief is product free available in most stores prices varying express stores see tesco dot i e are you ready for unmissable magic are you ready for winter in dublin longer evenings when the city comes to life festive fun all through december with christmas lights and dazzling sights before the countdown begins to new year's festival dublin the only place to be when the clock strikes midnight so cap off the year in dublin celebrating like never before make your plans today at visit dublin.com winter in dublin it's magic brought to you by folger arland order your new 241 sozuki with zero percent finance from barry brown cars millford main sozuki dealer in dunny gall order your 241 sozuki one of the most reliable and cost effective brands on the market with zero percent finance on 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you book online and travel for less expressway bringing you the time ass it is six minutes past 11 o'clock i'm delighted to welcome in to studio john mclaughlin who is the chief executive of dunninggore county council john ever good morning to you good morning donal uh i i was present at the budget meeting that was held in lyford last week um the council's revenue budget was agreed with spending of 185,5 million excuse me um agreed and that'll be the effectively the day-to-day money it'll take to run dunninggore county council for for 2024 a capital budget also agreed as well with over 250 million uh in spending there mainly from government grants but but talk to me first john about the the revenue budget i mean effectively that's the money you now have to run dunningall on a day-to-day basis yeah the only honest first well yes the budget day is always a big day for dunninggore county council both in terms of the management and the councillors and indeed the people of the county it sets up the program for the next following 12 months and you write the revenue as we might refer to as operational it does things for example maintenance roads maintenance housing all the maintenance programs then the day-to-day running of the council and in terms of the meeting i mean we all i mean and journalists often have discussions about the legendary budget meetings of the 80s and the 90s and and the 10 some of which i did attend myself where the idea that a budget would be agreed and we'd all be on the road home by five o'clock in the evening there was a time that would have been unheard of budget meetings could as particularly when they were called the estimates rather than the budget but they could go on a long long time and you were at many of those yeah that's correct yeah and i suppose i would start seeing a our budget making pros really starts about june and uh june each year so we've built it up and uh with many meetings and workshops or concerts throughout that period between then and the end of the year so that's what makes it seem to go quicker on the day if all the background works done and generally i suppose an understanding what are the issues what are the key points how they can be facilitated or not as the case might be and a discussion around that now obviously things are different in that there are no longer commercial water charges to be discussed there are no longer domestic water charges or rates to be discussed and in terms of the commercial rate itself the commercial rate has stayed very much the same now for the past number of years so i suppose in terms of the discretionary council charges there there isn't as much shall we say controversial discussion to take place now as there might have been 15 years ago that's correct yeah the key heading is the commercial rates for the the revenue budget now other charges happen at different times during the year however that doesn't stop the entire program because as you know the book covers the entire program for the year so other items can come up even if they aren't directly related to the rates and in terms of the capital budget which was also agreed on the day now a lot of that money obviously is coming from central government but you are also doing some co-funding be a 10 percent or be a 25 percent and there's also some development charges coming through and that's so there is a very small revenue element to the capital budget but mainly that's funding that's really out of the council's control yeah i think what there are controls that actually make the submissions and compete for the capital projects that's where our strongest and we totally count on capital projects for the development of the county you're right a lot of them nowadays require the co-funding something is 25 percent now more recently reduced to 10 percent and our role then is to raise money for that and you might have seen the book about 40 million co-funding raised under loans the revenue budget pays that off each year and in terms of i mean there are so many projects now i mean look we can sit here and say i'm sure there are people going what about this road what about that bridge what about you could you could if it were feasible you could present the government with a billion plus in projects that need to be done in done equal yeah so if you actually put that capital program together in a way that's realistic and achievable is a job in itself because you you have got to pick the projects you believe a can get funding and b can be delivered in a reasonable time and in a way that best benefits the county yeah don't let us suppose that's no different the revenue we build that over in fact capital projects are built up over a number of years but a lot of them span many years multi-annual so they you build that up and prioritise with elected members over the years then you compile them into the annual report it's actually a three-year capital budget would present the first year more certain than the last two that's a belt up and if you look at some of the projects might take 10 years or longer so it's a long long planning process one of the big projects we're looking at now is the 10t project and there's three basic strands to it and the interesting points been made by officials that in terms of the three strands one of the things the council i get i get certainly get the impression from responses given to questions and you you may confirm this that the the council executives view very much with the 10t is that for the moment all three projects must go together and you've basically got manor conningham-lifford you've got letter kenny manor conningham which will incorporate the much talked about bonagie link and then you've got the twin towns bypass by the way based on dollar bypass the council's view at this point is all three need to move together in tandem until we get sort of beyond the planning stage and into the more formal stages of actual operations yeah absolutely don't let's vital we stay together one one big project in fact one big project that you were told is better and when you look at the overall financing of that in the long-term program so we're actually intent on keeping it together until the planning stage is complete then it'll be a matter for the funders then whether they can fund as one big project or they look at phasing it so we're not not one to say we'll break it up now all to go together and that's the best we're doing all the best chance we have we're ahead of a lot of the pack in the country now in terms of where that capital project position as you know it's uh been in the final stage if we're going to cabinet to get the next milestone approval indeed our council is pushing very hard with the allegations both to ti i and the department transfer to make sure it stays on track now we were disappointed over many years it didn't go with the time of the motorways and now we have to go again and some of these projects i mean they've been on i mean i was speaking to councillor part of mcgon over about two years ago and i was reminiscing that i very much remember covering a debate in the council chamber many years ago during a time where i suspect you were probably the head of roads at the time on the council but i remember him standing up and he made a comment about the balba face controller bypass and he made the comment he said if these delays continue we might get this road done until 2010 now i mean and that that's how long i mean the twin towns bypass as far as i can see has been on the agenda for as long as i've been covering dunagal county council meetings and i've been covering dunagal county council meetings for 33 years yeah no donal you're generous there people tell me it's on the on the carriage for about 50 years probably yeah there were two bypasses maintained for one on each side of the town uh now of course it and it's uh we know the background and it simply didn't get funded over the years while we watched all the motorways get built and then when our turn came there was a downturn around 2008 and then we brought back under the uh and it was a good enough thing called the 10 t a european driven title that allowed it to get restarted sooner than the rest so now we're back on again and we were hopeful this time it'll be finally delivered by the way if anyone wants to take part in this conversation and send in any questions you have about the council's budget the council spending and so on this this is your opportunity we're speaking to the chief executive of dunagal county council council uh john mcgloughland um and uh john in terms of the the budget uh a lot of discussion on monday of last on wednesday of last week excuse me when the the meeting took place about how well the council kept into its budget a number of councillors saying that there was a slight overrun on spending for 2023 but you then pointed out yeah there was a slight overrun on spending but there was also a slight surplus in revenue so i mean the council is pretty much balancing its books yeah absolutely yeah yeah that that point was made it's the the out turn was a lot higher in the budget this time last year but the out turn was higher because we got several more grants during the year several million that's a good thing we never turn away extra grants and that's well no one and uh and we just spent it uh what we did turn out for the last number of years in the last almost 10 years is a slight surplus each year and that we've held that with the council the large deficit for many years of a few hundred thousand each year we up to six seven hundred thousand to write off that old debt so i always try to command just marginally underneath the the plan every year and our auditors looking that's pretty tightly that's a good that's good to do that it keeps everything under control it also allows it in the year ahead yeah to go further with the plans and allow the proper prioritization of the elected members when the money's available as it should be and it also gives you some a bit of wiggle room in terms of if the government comes forward and says yeah we can give uh you know there there's bridges need to be done for instance in every one of the municipal districts and there's various roads or or it may be flood repair or whatever that if the government comes to you and says look we can provide x amount of money for that bridge or for that project you can go yeah we can provide 10 percent because we have that money in reserve that we can just dip into so that the council always tries to have something that it can say yeah if if it comes through we we can provide a bit of money to do the yes yeah we always try to provide we've nothing reserve we actually have as deficit at the moment that we're writing off them several years ago so but we have uh it means moving things around and reprioritizing in order to create that margin or getting loans and you pay for those for 20 years so we're there's the no mistake but we're very very tight for money but we've been well managed and run tightly we count mainly on government supports and Donegal apart from the local money we raise here and uh that's probably true for most most counties outside of the Dublin region let's talk a bit about commercial rates because the commercial rates are substantially if i recall off the top of my head in around about the 40 million mark it will be the is the projected uh income from rates in 2024 it's about 40 maybe 41 42 there there are about yeah 40 about 40 million yes yeah and that's when you look at the revenue budget that's almost a quarter of the 185 million so the big component for us yeah I raised locally I would say that we have about uh 6,000 rate paying properties I would mention that just to put it in perspective about 80% of those pay 5,000 or less there's four customers that you pay uh over one million each so the upper end uh there's a lot of very big big ones maybe state utilities and the multinationals and then a lot with many smaller ones and of course we we know truly it's hard to stay in business yeah but even the perspective in terms of we count on those then to provide the services now we know that there was a revaluation process took place now which is which is the council is involved in it but it's ordered from on high the that comes from Dublin it's it's a decision of government it isn't a decision of Donegal County Council and it's it's probably fair to say it is still being implemented and it's going to take probably another year just to get the full impact of that revaluation clear both to yourselves and to businesses but how is that process going yeah and I suppose the principle of revaluation for a county in Donegal is one of the later ones is there's no net change overall so within the overall rate uh amount some some go down and others have to go up to balance it off that's the theory behind it and that's been done so we'd find uh and that's truly the way the turn is here that the some have gone down and then the flip side is some actually go up we're working through that and I suppose people have the right to appeal it and then there's a separate process the council not involved in that apart from uh you're right we were we we understand what's going on but we're not the decision makers now the council hasn't uh increased the commercial rate now I think since about 2050 2018 that's 17-18 now you did mention this year that there may well be a rate increase uh next year for the 2025 budget and maybe conversations on that will start in the coming months uh in in the council chamber uh that's going to be a hard discussion yeah it's thank goodness it's it's a discussion we're willing to have with our elected members in terms of uh whoever heading over the next uh those five years or whatever and the ambition we have for the council in terms of uh raising its own money to act with the co-funding of major projects or where Texas the spending power of the uh as we all know the year now has slipped back and when we have fixed it it means effectively we can do less with the same money that we had from five years ago so there's no need of an honest conversation that and what does that mean who does it affect in terms of the rate paying uh uh property owners and what it all means in terms of the five-year plan for example a suggestion from one councillor that a value for money um exercised by the council could create savings across various council departments and that might be enough to negate an increase in rates uh is it your belief that that might be the case or do you think the value for money assessments are tight enough as they are well and i think we've we've we've several several people always scrutinizes around the the value for money and audit headings in the council we're probably one of the most audited public bodies in the state uh we're never we're never afraid of value for money exercises always welcome them i would say if you look at uh simply if you look at just simply our staffing from uh from uh 2008 2010 went about 1500 now we're between 1100 and 1200 so substantially less staff and we're now far far more uh a range of business now the caller says and and this is a comment that we hear often and i'll put it to you the council's been slow to keep infrastructure up with the expansion of the town over 30 years the monarchy link was necessary 20 years ago now and i suppose it does raise the question to what extent is it the council that controls how that goes and to what extent is it external bodies be it the department be it the government be it whoever you know in the monarchy link and there's several the caller clearly refers letter kenny we have several roads planned for letter kenny totally probably maybe two to three hundred millions worth all of which we count and coming from the state the monarchy links part of the 10 t we would benefit that over 20 years ago and picked a route a rough route for it but there's never any money for it and that's the problem it needs the funding needs the approvals to go for the consents and the planning in the cpo that isn't it was never forthcoming for the monarchy link already the other 10 days i'd say the same is true for the northern relief road and what we're referred to as the southern or the lake road there was another 100 million projects with plans there for 20 years but council on its own money will never pay for those that need state intervention i'd say also uh people talk about some of those been developer led we'd look around letter kenny now the developer led project would never fund that scale of work and means it becomes stagnant so we need we need fresh thinking there and we need an injection of money and letter kenny particularly i would say with the the work we're doing with the northwestern region and for letter kenny to become the the objective become a small city and what we need to support that and that requires a intervention the other thing that crops up in a lot of discussions is the fact that for instance we talk about the the fore lane which which has been much discussed over the past number of years but the fore lane is the n-15 it is a national road likewise letter kenny manor conningham is a national road um so there it's not that dunagall county council actually has controlled over those roads in many cases they are state roads uh run by transport infrastructure ireland and they're the ones that make the calls on the n-15 not necessarily dunagall county council yeah no though you're right those are national roads uh fully funded 100 funded by the the state through transport infrastructure ireland what the county can do is i suppose representation is lobbying and helping to prioritize and we would have done that for several years as you as you know the the letter kenny and on through the fore lane on the books for many many years the issue of defective blocks obviously is is a huge issue in dunagall and has been now for some time um a caller is asking is there any way to find out what the current status on a person's application under the scheme is they're saying the staff on the hotline in the council are fantastic however they're not able to give timelines a real time update it's having a detrimental effect on people and adding to the already high levels of anxiety and stress experience i know i appreciate staff are busy but this does nothing to alleviate the stress and suffering i have all my documentation up to date finance builders everything lined up but i can't move until i get my letter of conversation of grant amount my life is on hold and in limbo until i can get this moved on any help would be appreciated and i'm sure this is one caller but i'm sure there are many many people out there in exactly that position and they're looking towards only go county council and they're asking where where is this and at what point am i is there anything that can be done to give them clarification or to give them some light yeah don't always say fortunately for huge um understanding and empathy where people are going through uh for many years now on the defective blocks uh we did synth and hand scheme we have almost double our staff in the office administering it and we're now administering us a lot a lot smaller part of the overall scheme so uh what all it could do there is i've got the details the the staff would get back to anyone i know there's many many calls coming in many ways to contact us i can't give an answer here but certainly would come out to get them back to people as soon as we can and certainly they need to know where they're at in the scheme but in in terms of of decisions as to whether or not a letter can be released is it done equal county council makes that decision is it the department makes that decision are the council just administering this on behalf of the department and the department are making decisions or does don't equal county council have some autonomy in terms of how this is administered yeah well yeah and that's there's a there's a variety of answers required there don't it is department scheme we're administering it however we have the autonomy to issue certain letters and it's important over the summer is coming on to the old scheme and getting that converted or they're applying fresh onto the hand scheme after the old scheme we're closing those out so our team will issue the letters and everything under the new scheme we do part one which is eligible it and so on then it goes off to the housing agency but they write back so we're the ones issuing the correspondence every time to the homeowner even the housing agent involved so you're you're you it very well could be the case that you're actually waiting on the housing agency to give you the go ahead to make the next move even though what people will see is i contacted the council and the council gave me a letter but in between is a process where you have to liaise with a third party you could be a although from what you read out there at quite possibly that person might be on the older scheme where it would be then under the council's control one final question john before we leave and call us as i'm in a council house 24 years any work that has to be done to the house i've had to do it myself the council isn't doing enough on the upkeep of houses surely this will only cause greater problems down the road um in terms of the upkeep now i know there is there is money in the budget for the upkeep of of your own housing stock um does that caught up a point yeah and probably need more detail to know the specifics but uh yeah the council covers a certain range of topics under housing maintenance and then certain things fall to the tenant we have uh we spend a lot of money in housing although we do hear that we would need to be spending more all the time but there's a limited budget available in terms of making it all work and work on a prioritized basis but in that case uh and i would compliment tenants who do a lot of work themselves and they they've uh great pride in their own homes and they do things perhaps over and above but the council does have a maintenance budget there and it's done on a prioritized basis john mclaughlin the chief executive of donnie god country council thank you very much indeed john it's been a pleasure thank you thank you watch the show live now on youtube facebook and at highland radio dot com think outside the box with your photos this christmas for countless prints insta blocks mugs and photo books at megies dot i e megies chemist letter kenny sponsors of today's nine till noon show do you need a little extra help staying in your home at bluebird care we offer a wide variety of q mark approved personalised home care services across donnie gall and our fully trained and committed staff will always meet your 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cards because they are accepted everywhere online and in store using apple pay or google pay contactlessly first 1000 euro tax free order online now from clever cards dot com clever cards master cards are issued pursuant to clever cards interbank agreement with master card e-money's access with clever cards master cards are safeguarded and regulated by the central bank under e-u payment service regulations clever card is certified by apple pay and google pay terms and conditions apply at centra we've got amazing christmas offers this week like cabaret milk tray 530 gram now 10 euro inspired by centra chocolate you'll log 600 gram now 8 euro and san terita selected range 8 euro each perfect for stocking up for christmas shop smart feel festive at centra enjoy alcohol sensibly everyone loves going to the cinema that's why an eclipse cinema's gift voucher is the perfect christmas present they aren't just for kids but all the family even little miss her to buy for we all have one of them and when you buy an eclipse cinema's gift voucher you now get 10 extra free available on our bond or and leverage to ban cinemas or at eclipse cinemas dot com vouchers don't expire and can even be used for dainan screen options and vip cinema experiences this is an until noon show on the island video an important note to read out carers are urgently needed to cover shifts from 10 a.m to 5 p.m and 5 p.m to 9 p.m daily and also at weekends experience with dementia or Alzheimer's is essential for more information please call us here at island on 0749125 thousand so carers urgently needed to cover shifts from 10 to 5 and then from 5 to 9 in the evenings experience and with dementia and Alzheimer's is essential as we say and it's 0749125 if you would like to know more and have a conversation and just let you know on this week's ars to protect which comes up in just around about an hour's time don't worry we'll speak to the clean coasts officer for donnie gall and in a conical and also william kill the secretary of the friends of ross nala clean coasts group they won an award recently for their campaign lifted a bit it's all things beaches and pooches so if sand and dogs are your thing don't miss ours to protect today in fact don't miss ours to protect any day because it's always really well worth listening to and it's on at half past 12 during the around the northwest program now we are going to welcome another guest into studio emir hohe is with us emir good morning how are you very well indeed thanks for having me you're the daughter of of barney gibbons who many people will know and and barney had an illness which sadly early around this year resulted in an amputation yes that's right um january past he had an amputation and unfortunately he's um looking at having a second one um in the coming months and this is because of serious diabetes yeah um how is this health at the moment um it's not great to be honest he's in and out of hospital a lot he's home at the minute but he's just after doing almost a two-week stent it back in yeah we're hoping we can keep him home for christmas and at the moment your mom's his primary carer and she's not a young woman either no they're both in their 70s and mom's actually going for an operation herself now in the 20th of december she's going for a knee replacement yeah so it's it's it's hard enough at home and no doubt i mean you know and any support you can get would be greatly appreciated and with that in mind some some good friends of the family uh the browns are organizing a tractor and our robert brown and andry brogan um are organizing a tractor on that's going to take place next weekend they are um robert and dad has been great friends for for years they both um drove lorries together dad was a lorry driver for 40 years so robert seen the difficulties that everybody was having trying to care for dad now that he's off his feet completely and they organize the northwest truck fest every year in need of different charities so this is why they've come together and organized this tractor on for him so it takes place on sunday next which is the 17th yeah uh tell us about the route and the arrangements so it's registration is at migating and traveling dromore out beside the nct center uh at 12 o'clock and it's 20 euro tractor it's heading towards the mountaintop and to kill mccrennan back into remelton um to the linen lodge uh we had to change the route slightly um so in the linen lodge then we will have um music with um palma cahill johnny hohey um mark mclean and a few guest singers um evlyn gal her and bitty and um jennifer matthewson coming in for a few songs as well and it starts the run itself starts at 2 but registration as you say mega can travel in dromore from from 12 noon and the run starts at 2 so presumably you'll go from dromore to the poll star and then up past the mandirrigal and then up the business park road mountaintop then kill mccrennan yeah that's it yeah yeah um yeah just to avoid the main town traffic supposed was sunday before christmas it's going to be very mad at my suspect all right so it's important to as you say i mean your dad drove a lorry for for for many years a lot of people will know him most people i suspect in the transport business will know him i mean you know the name of barney gibbons as well known across the area and it's times like this you always find that people just come out of the woodwork and say and you'll get a lot of oh i remember driving with your dad 20 years ago i remember your dad this i remember your dad that and you're going to find people knowing your dad that you never knew knew you're that's it they're a great community um he's met a lot of men along the way down through the years to different companies that he worked for and we'd like to encourage as many to come along to the tractor run and to the linen lodge as well for an evening of how many tractors are you hoping to get well as many as possible you would you know i'd heard of um a tractor on there just been ran last weekend i think they had upwards nearly a hundred tractors going so the more the merrier absolutely everybody's welcome and and in terms of as you say he's at home at the moment as is your your mum but your dad needs physio and it's hard it's expensive and yeah you'd be hoping to i mean in terms of keeping him at home as long as possible as long as possible we're hoping um if we can get a new mode of transport for transportation for him because he's completely off his um you know his good leg now um he used to be able to transfer himself from the bed to the chair and into the car and things the gap but we can't do that now so he's confined to the wheelchair the whole time um unless the use of a hoist you know so um even getting him to the tractor on sunday's proven to be difficult never mind all the appointments that he has to attend and i'm sure he's looking forward to that too because that's going to give him and and something he's going to need i mean he's going to need that mental boost i suspect as well and hopefully that will give him a good shot in the arm as well in terms of you know his own well being because you're going to have to keep it obviously on on on how he's doing inside as well as outside well that's it uh he has coped extremely well considering what he's been through for dad being such a social outgoing person if he wasn't on the road he was out socialising with friends and now to be stuck at home all the time it's been quite difficult for him so the tractor run takes place on uh the the 17th of november which is this coming sunday it's a tractor run for barney 20 euro per tractor and then there'll be a session afterwards in the the linen lodge um it could be a hell of a good day for a lot of people yeah fingers crossed there's some great prizes some company sponsored really um good prizes we have an overnight stay in the shandan hotel um with afternoon tea and um megidigan travel kindly sponsored a 250 euro lk voucher we have vouchers for tokyo boutique avante hair and counts tractors they sponsored a really big tool toolkit as well so there's some things been auctioned we've actually got livestock for auction as well believe it or not i presume they won't be there on the day though hopefully that would be interesting a whole life major um i don't think it would um look too good in the linen lodge live sheep running around yeah probably not i think there's there's going to be enough may him know that the animals into it as well um i hope you have a really really good day and listen all the best with it and we wish barney well we wish your mum well as well with the the operation coming up there too and and hopefully 2024 can can see you know the the equipment i mean i'm sure that there's equipment you could do within the house as well as you say maybe the use of a hoist maybe the use of various things and the more you can do in in terms of of providing that equipment at home the more you can do to make a home stay as as as safe and and as practical as possible that's hopefully that that will happen email we wish you all the best thank you so much thank you email that's a email hi there and that tractor on a tractor run for barney is taking place as we said leaving bonnigee at two o'clock on next sunday um afternoon registration was started 12 noon and it'll go from dromore it'll go down the four lane as far as the poll start it'll go out past the monterey gill out as far as the um business park road up past the old unify site and then up to the unify roundabout and then it'll not unify the um optimum roundabout sorry then up past here at the mountaintop and then out to kill me friend um you're thank you thanks very much right this is my new show on highland video just a comment we were speaking to to john mclaughlin there and john made the uh the point that you know letter kennies ultimate aim is to become a small city quarter says we need to be able to get out of letter kennie before we can become a real city that is a bit of a joke uh so says that corner now um as john mclaughlin said sadly um the the reality of it is that they're very much dependent on the the government and transport infrastructure earned for prioritization and for money and and that is the situation that they are in it's the mindsill new show it's highland radio it's at 23 minutes to 12 noon going to take a short break uh don't forget by the way uh and and we will have our um our quiz in in just a few moments time we'll have that very shortly uh adan murphy is coming up after this program uh around the northwest uh standing in for john and as well as that just reminds you that the draw continues the uh the highland radio grand a day draw grand a day up to uh the 22nd and then a car and the 22nd so uh you can still buy tickets for that they're available on our website highland radio dot com and you can also uh ring the station 07491 25 000 and you can buy your tickets via the station as well and there will be a call made at some point this afternoon uh can't say what show it's going to be on but it will be made at some stage this afternoon and there will be a person winning 1000 euro and obviously the tickets also enter you into that uh draw on the 22nd for the scoda kameek as well just want to say uh good morning to the people who have been listening to us uh on our social media uh marie and elaine charlie mary kevin uh and and to anthony and and to all those who are listening to us this morning it's great to have you uh if you have any comments to make oh it's 6 60 25 000 you can call us on 07491 25 000 the 08 6 60 25 000 number go for both texts and whatsapps take a short break back after these chanel flour bomb long con georgio marie paco robin where else but at mickey's chemist letry kenny this christmas sponsors of today's nine till noon show at nissan buy anny two for one nissan e power x trail or cashkai and receive a brand new nissan e power into 2025 choose the nissan leaf with zero percent finance alternatively you can choose a 2000 euro trading booster or 3.9 percent finance options visit i motors dot ie or call into our showroom in drum keen or malin today gives the gift of red castle hotel and spa to your loved ones this christmas choose from a range of memorable experiences to suit all visit our website to view and purchase our gift fighter offers and experiences including our winter getaway offer from only 125 euro per couple for more information see red castle hotel donnie gall dot com celebrate the 12 days of m and s exclusively with sparks and be in with a chance to win 5000 euro when you open a door every day m and s are giving away thousands of free gifts and daily festive offers from the first to the 12th of december don't miss out sign up today with the m and s app terms and conditions apply make your next menswear choice at once in menswear letter kenny from suits to casual where there's big names to choose from like andre tom pen remezumo super dry penguin and tommy bow if you're going to a special occasion or big event get fitted in style at once in menswear open seven days a week on main street letter kenny online at once in menswear dot com or follow on social media for details of offers and new arrivals the christmas club is also now open and a small deposit will secure any item give joy at boots with hundreds of amazing gifts available on three for two we have a huge range of brands like number seven ted baker and so from glory and with home delivery and click and collect it's never been easier to tick everyone off your christmas list boots give joy selected stores and boots dot ie subject to availability cheapest free offer ends 24th december delivery charges may apply and now the highland forecast brought to you by shop lk widespread christmas shopping this december in letter kenny see shop lk dot ie or like us on facebook and looking at the weather forecast from met erin and they tell us to expect mostly cloudy weather some sherry rain particularly in coastal areas but a good deal of dry weather right across the region as well top temperatures this afternoon seven or eight degrees celsius with light variable breezes they'll become north northwest really later and they will freshen along the coast so that's the way it's looking at not too bad not too bad hopefully it'll stay dry in your area wherever you are now let's go and do our mcgee's chemist quiz and we have as i say two quarters to do today because um it didn't happen yesterday uh for for various reasons a very very very very busy show yesterday so we're going to do two today as i say and our first caller is joining us on the line and i'm delighted to say good morning to russian blackened in harmony hillan letter kenny russian good morning to you morning hurry very well indeed russian i'm going to play you um a snippet of a christmas song and i am going to ask you to identify the song now um it's a song that's very well known um at christmas time so have have a listen and can you identify this christmas song we're just going to play as i say a very short snippet any thoughts is it do they know it's christmas by bandaid it most certainly is congratulations that is to do the most christmas by bandaid so congratulations now russian you have won yourself a carolina herrera good girl odia perfume spray courtesy of mcgee's chemist and perhaps more importantly you're entered into the draw for the hamper at the end which contains a hamper of clarin's goodies also a blank canvas 12 piece gold makeup brush set a large blank canvas purple three piece gift set a b perfect muted palette jimmy shoo ladies fragrance and also a 20 by 16 wrapped canvas so you can wrap your favorite photo in canvas and have it hanging right of place on your wall congratulations uh russian that's that's you thank you very much uh with a do the most christmas and have a listen out on friday you could be the big winner there as well thank you indeed for playing oh great fine thank you that that's russian right let's see if we can make this two by two uh because we are now joined on the line by mary duffy who joins us from iris in plan mani mary good morning hello how are you doing uh very well indeed uh mary hopefully we can help make your christmas um the prize on offer uh this time it's a 50 milliliter pakora ban in victus or the toilet spray for men uh and uh that'll be a nice handy present for somebody i'm sure and as as we said already with with russian if you get this you will also be in the draw for the hamper at the end of the week on friday now we did give a sneak preview of this earlier on in the show so take a listen to this it's a very well known christmas song it's played backwards and see if you can identify this piece of music please right um say it again derrick ryan it is derrick ryan indeed well done uh that is derrick ryan and uh congratulations to you mary you have won as i said you have won that pakora ban in victus or the toilet spray and also you are in the draw for the hamper prize on friday so uh congratulations and thank you very much indeed for taking part thank you very much okay doke it's our absolute pleasure that's mary duffy there in iris plan mani and earlier we had russian blacken in harmley hill in letter kenny both of those winners and it's good to have uh the the prize won at the first go it's always good to hear and uh there'll be another one as we say another one tomorrow and there'll be one on the program on um wednesday thursday and friday as well so don't forget we will have a daily prize and we will also have the hamper and just repeat what's in that hamper again because it is a very very nice hamper indeed uh it's got that clarence christmas goodies it's got the blank canvas 12 piece gold makeup brush set uh purple three-piece gift set a B perfect muted palette jimmy shoe ladies fragrance and that wrapped canvas uh photo frame as well wonderful wonderful stuff indeed now we are going to go back to uh the telephone because we are going to speak to uh faith who is a friend of valerie a practicing nurse in letter kenny and uh there has been sadness and faith a very good morning to you good morning faith um you are a very good friend as as we say you're a very good friend of valeries um and tell the story um so yes go ahead yeah um what what happened because we know that um mavis um clinic uh man younger came from zimbabwe to celebrate christmas uh in in letter kenny but sadly there there has been been tragedy yes so valerie invited here mom mavis clinic man younger to come to island to spend christmas and holiday with her so she picked valerie she picked the mom from the airport doubling airport on saturday the second of december and took her to letter kenny to a house here so in the early morning of sunday the third of december the mom just called for help and she was down in the stairs and valerie just rushed down to here she found mom sitting on the floor she was still responding and uh called the paramedics the paramedics arrived and then after some minutes she had a cardiac arrest in the house she was resuscitated in the house and taken to the hospital in the hospital she received the treatment in the intensive care unit and sadly passed away on the 6th of december so this was the first time that uh valerie had invited her mom to come in so she was looking forward to spending the christmas with her but unfortunately things didn't go as planned and now the challenge is that valerie is going to bring wants to bring her mom back to zimbabwe for a proper burial and that is is where it's going to cost a lot of money yes so that's where the challenge is the cost of repatriating mom's body beg to zimbabwe that cost is substantial we're talking in excess of 10 000 euro yes we are talking about cost that we got from our funeral director that is going to amount to 10 500 euro the challenge now is is to raise that money valerie does not have that money to hand she's a practicing nurse in letter kenny um presumably that that amount of money is not available to her so you're you're hoping to raise some money uh i take it to uh to get that that money together so that valerie can bring her mom home yes yes that is the appeal valerie doesn't have that kind of money at the moment she had planned the christmas and the holiday to be with the amount here so what she had planned was christmas she had booked some holidays and she had decorated the house for christmas she had penned the fridge with food but she didn't plan that anything would go wrong at this time now a go fund me appeal has been launched online that people can use to help a go fund me it has already raised 2800 euros as we speak people from all over the world uh the world they are helping and mainly people from letter kenny yeah and special thanks from people from letter kenny and around donica now and and valerie has siblings in zimbabwe as well as well as and her dad is there her siblings are there and and obviously they want to bring their mom home to her home for burial and and it's very important to the family that that this is done yes it is really important valerie is the only family in island she has three siblings back home and the father is back in zimbabwe so it will be really important for the burial to happen in zimbabwe so that the people there back home can have closure also obviously it's it's it's important that this money is raised quickly is there a timetable in in as much as is there a time that the the the remains of valerie's mom have got to be taken from the hospital and put on a plane or or how are how are things in terms of just the arrangements so we were hoping since we are coming into the holidays there are so many papers that needs to be paperwork to be done back in zimbabwe in the embassy and in the foreign affairs so we were hoping if we get the funds quickly and we pay the funeral directors they might be able to speed up the process so that at least by this Friday we have everything in order would the hope be to actually bring her mom's body back to zimbabwe before Christmas yes yes that that's what we are really so that if we raise the funds quickly she might be going back home before Christmas yeah and obviously Valerie will want to go back with her mom to zimbabwe and be with her family for some time over Christmas so that they can grieve her mom's loss and and it's going to be very important for the family that that can be done yes exactly yeah faith i i really really hope that that people can help with this because i mean to be on your own in a foreign country and have this terrible thing happen to you and and just if anyone is coming in we're speaking about faith is a friend of Valerie who is a practicing nurse in letter Kenny and Valerie's mom traveled over from zimbabwe to celebrate Christmas with her daughter and her daughter's family in letter Kenny sadly within 24 hours of arriving Mavis Valerie's mom had a heart attack cardiac arrest went to the hospital and sadly passed away in intensive care at letter Kenny University Hospital and this go fund me appeal is to help raise an excessive 10 000 euro so Valerie can bring her mom back home to zimbabwe back home to her father and her siblings who are in zimbabwe themselves and that they can give her mom a burial and hopefully do so before Christmas it's important faith to you it's important to Valerie and it's important obviously to the family that this does happen it is really important it will really really make a difference and it will really make this Christmas a difference yeah um faith thanks thanks indeed for speaking to us today and look we we hope that this can bring some sucker and some solace to to to Valerie and and if that money is raised at least it'll give Valerie the the comfort of knowing that that she can be with her family and I've no doubt Valerie wants to be with her family at this time as well because I mean you know I can think of nothing worse than the mourning the loss of a parent on your own with no family around you knowing that they're on a different continent knowing that they're so far away so it'll be very important to Valerie as well to be with her family so for her comfort and for her happiness and for the happiness of everybody else it's very important I think that this is is is achieved faith listen we wish you and Valerie all the best at this time and hopefully this target can be can be achieved but but for now thank you very much indeed thank you so much thank you for calling thank you for your help and I would like to thank in advance the help that is going to come through from the people from letter Kenny from Johnny Gao and from all over the world we really appreciate this and thank you so much yeah it's an faith we wish you all the best and if you want to contribute there is a link to the GoFundMe page yet which we can put up on our own social media and it's I won't read it out because it's one of these things which just got loads and loads of numbers it just doesn't work out audibly but it is yeah it is as I said it is on our car and it's just confirmed to be it is on our website it is on our social media it's gofund.me and you can get the link there and you can assist in in in this really really important thing we're coming to the end of the show actually and we have done all the yep that's that's done that's done yeah we have pretty much done a lot of people expressing an interest actually in the Dear Gay book I'll just put it up on camera here if you just look this is this is the book Dear Gay compiled by Susie Bourne we spoke to Susie earlier in the program a lot of people expressing an interest in the in in the book yeah a lot of people expressing an interest in it some really interesting letters in here and you know it's it's it's called a a handwritten history of Ireland and it's really really it is exactly that now a lot of people have been suggesting to us by the way just listening to to what Faith had to say a lot of people have been suggesting the Kevin Bell trust now the Kevin Bell trust in this instance do not have a role to play because the Kevin Bell repatriation trust which is a hugely important trust the Kevin Bell repatriation trust does not repatriate people out of Ireland it brings people home to Ireland but it does not have a role repatriating people out of this country to other areas so a lot of people suggesting the Kevin Bell trust might be able to help and we have confirmed it that they only repatriate into and not out of the country and they do they do fantastic work in in their own right but that's in this instance sadly the Kevin Bell repatriation trust is not an option um hope you've enjoyed the 9 till noon show today just to remind you that Aidan Murphy is coming up around the northwest that'll be following this program Aidan's here and will have past two at half past two it's David James and then after the news at five o'clock from 5 30 until seven it's Ivan Borland and just to remind you that at some point this afternoon uh it may be with Aidan it may be with David we we don't well I certainly don't know um it'll be on a different show each day but a call will be made at some point over the coming hours to one ticket buyer from the the draw and a thousand euro will be given away today if you're that caller and if you get the call and you answer the phone a thousand euro will be yours once you answer the question so that could happen so keep an ear out for your phone and obviously keep listening to Highland as well and see how that pans out uh that's it for me Greg's back on the 9 till noon show this tomorrow morning as I said it will be Aidan around the northwest later on uh I want to say a very special thank you to all of those who took part in the program today thanks to you for your comments thanks to all our guests uh thanks to Caroline who produced and also to Sharon for her help on the program as well and thanks to all the contributors this is the 9 till noon show it's uh Donald Kavana saying goodbye and have a very good day