 Secret sands sometimes, Leigh. Do you think so? I like it. I think I'm not cruel enough. I'm just getting one. I think you should ramp it up a bit. I'm only just prepping myself up. You wait to see now next week. What happens? All right. Have a good day. You too. See you tomorrow. That's Leigh Gooch back on the naughty alarm clock. Bright and early from 6.30. It's the 9.00. Pardon? What did you say? Is that your tummy? No. That's the drilling, isn't it? I thought he was told not to drill during my program. The dentist should never move next door. Cool. That's a dentist. He moves in the chair. Oh, there he goes there now. That's a villain. All right. Good luck. Leigh's back with you tomorrow morning at 6.30. Donald's here now with the news at 9. Good morning, Donald. Thank you, Greg. Good morning. The Micah Action Group says, as it stands, the enhanced redress scheme approved by Cabinet yesterday does not meet their needs. Minister Dara O'Brien says he's satisfied that the enhanced scheme will represent a significant step forward and help homeowners rebuild their homes and their lives. However, magapiro Michael Doherty says, while elements of the scheme are close, it's not yet right. He says the focus now goes on what amendments are proposed during what will be a very limited pre-legislative scrutiny process. They know what it was they needed to do. It was very clearly laid out. The shame in some ways is that it's not a million miles away, but there are some fundamental things that they needed to get into account, and they seem to still be reluctant to go there. We will be getting a compressed version of PLS, which we did ask for, which shouldn't affect the overall timelines. The elements that come from that are the hard yards left for this government. They either do it then, or we just have to call it a day with this government and move on. The new career look of the Donegal Municipal District says the housing crisis in the county is becoming very worrying, particularly with the number of young people who don't have somewhere to live. Councillor Ney of Kennedy was elected to the chair with Councillor Tom Conhan as her deputy. Councillor Kennedy says it will be a challenging year, but a productive one. She says the Donegal MD has a tradition of collaborative cooperation, and that will be a fight when they receive funding for two major bridge projects. We do work well together. Everybody has their own main areas that they would tend to focus on, but we all support each other on that. Obviously, there's going to be times when people don't altogether agree, but that's democratic, and that's what we're there for, to support the people who've elected us. We work well together. Bridges were the testament to that at the time the Donegal Town Bridge and Central Bridge went together for funding, and Donegal is now finished. The European Commission is today expected to agree on legal action against the UK when it meets in Brussels. It's after the Westminster Government revealed a plan to override parts of the Northern Ireland protocol. The British Government insists its move is in line with international law. The EU disagrees. It's claimed President Michael D Higgins crossed a line in Commons he made about the housing crisis. According to reports, a number of government ministers are furious about the remarks made during the opening of a new charity funded accommodation for homeless young people in County Kildare. The President described housing as our great, great failure. He said the situation was no longer a crisis, but a disaster. And hotel bosses will appear before TDs and Senators today to respond to allegations of price gouging with hotel room rates. The Euroclos Tourism Committee will have a roundtable discussion with the Irish Hotels Federation, Folchia Ireland, and the Irish Tourism Industry Confederation. It follows reports of people paying hundreds of euro for nights in hotels, particularly during big sporting or music events. The Hotels Federation says there's a shortage of available beds with strong demand, and that's pushing up prices with rooms selling out months in advance. The chair of the Tourism Committee is Niamh Smith. It's not good publicity for this country, either. You know, as I said, we've been through a difficult couple of weeks over what happened at Dublin Airport. We've had the difficulty of the passport office where people do want to go abroad. For those of us who might decide to actually stay in the country, you do need to make it reasonable that families can actually consider it because, as I said, the next option is they will get on a plane. Staying fairly cloudy today with occasional sherry outbreaks of rain, top temperatures 15 to 18 degrees Celsius, cool as near the coast, moderate to fresh, south-west to west winds. And that's Highland Brilliant News. We're back with news in full at 10 o'clock. Is your home or motor insurance up for renewal? Now is the time to check if your policy still offers you the right cover and the right fit at the right price. To be sure you're getting the best deal, take this opportunity to shop around. It's easier than you think. Simply contact your insurer or broker today. Remember, don't just renew. Review. For more information, visit understandinginsurance.ie. Brought to you by Insurance Ireland. And now, it's time for the talk of the Northwest, The Nine to Noon Show with Greg Hughes on Highland Radio. Hello, good morning to you. It's just turned five minutes past nine. On this Wednesday, the 15th of June, or about halfway through the month, how are you keeping? I hope you are well. The lines are open for you right now. We've plenty lined up for you and we want your views on it as we go, but also you can raise your issues as you did with us all week. You do all the time. And we try and highlight them before you get solutions or just platform good news, whatever it might be. Get in touch with us, 08-660-25000. Your WhatsApps and texts, 08-660-25000. Or give us a call at 07-491-25000. We can't promise you a global superstar today like we did yesterday. But we've got loads of superstars joining us with their views and opinions and information, of course. All right, let's crack on. Just a reminder for you by the way, if you want to watch the program, more of you do now than ever did before. You can hop on our website, highlandradio.com, watch us there, or go straight to our YouTube or Facebook channels and join the conversation. Good morning to Michael and Annette Rosary. Good morning to you guys too. Thanks for the kind comments. OK, the Finn Valley Voice this morning, a follow-up review of files claimed that at least 40 intellectually disabled residents of a Finn Valley Health Service Executive Run Centre were subjected to sexual assaults by more than 10 perpetrators over an 11-year period. The report in Saturday's Irish Times say the assaults dating back to 1991 happened at the Sean O'Hare Unit Stranawler, the same centre highlighted by the Brandon Report a separate review completed last year by the National Independent Review Panel. And we are at some point in the future scheduled to speak to the Health Minister. I think there's still a lot of questions that need to be asked in relation to that story. And we hope to put those questions to her when we get an opportunity to do so. In fairness, she's not dodging us or anything. I think she told the producers that she wishes to speak first to the HSC and then she will speak to us. OK, the English Times today tells us of a damning assessment of LUH complaints process. A damning overall assessment was the affected patient's description of the Ombudsman's review into the LKH Hospital official complaints handling process. The review was carried out by the National Director of the HSC's Quality Assurance and Verification Division. Its aim was to ensure recommendations made in the Ombudsman's Learning to Get Better report were being actively implemented in the Donegal Hospital. The review came in the wake of a complaint made by Ender Craig to the Ombudsman regarding the abusive behaviour in inverted commas he received from a staff member in LKH Hospital's Emergency Department and a hospital consultant's again in inverted commas cover-up response to his, or in quotes, sorry, in response to his initial complaints previously reported in detail in this paper. Speaking to the English Times, Mr. Craig, who's from Moville, said a senior hospital consultant to set out to deliberately vilify and destroy my good name and character by inventing vilifying CCTV images, falsifying a clinical incident report, making uncorroborated statements and unfounded allegations and threatens to apply a hazard flag against my medical file on false security grounds. False story on the front of and inside the English Times today. Let's go now to the Irish Independent. Apparently, President Michael D. Higgins crossed the line with housing attack. This is according to ministers, so I suppose you're worrying people dropping bombs right above their head. We probably forgot that the president is quite vocal. He kept his counsel during the Covid crisis, but now that seems to be behind us. He is opining and having very strong views on the housing crisis, but apparently we're going to hear of the minister's reaction. They were left furious at President Michael D. Higgins for describing housing policy in Ireland as our great, great failure. In a remarkable souring of relations between the Irish and Leinster House, Mr. Higgins was accused last night of having crossed the line and of standing on high moral quicksand by senior coalition figures. Well, at least he spoke out publicly. Where are these senior coalition figures? Give us your name, give us your comments. Tell us why. Rather than hiding behind a journalist, I don't mean that bad, but the president's come out. He's made the statements. He's attributed his names to them. Are you really interested in what the minister says? I don't know. After courage, if your convictions say it in public, maybe they will. The president is now facing a furious backlash from the government for his failure to steer clear of political issues. It isn't a crisis anymore. It's a disaster, the president said yesterday, adding that basic needs of food, shelter and education should be met. One minister said the president's comments raised eyebrows among ministerial colleagues and it was even described as embarrassing. The president's reported residence facility for young adults emerging from homelessness and killed air to say the housing isn't a crisis anymore. It's a disaster. The president's latest intervention on the housing crisis, one of his most strident to date, drew strong criticism from ministers and senior coalition figures. Maybe they are quoted. Maybe they did speak publicly. Let me just quickly read through here. One minister said, no, they've done it anonymously here. The next one for the president, he's been speaking out, but we're only hearing what ministers and coalition figures think behind the screen of a journalist there. The Irish Times tells us that the new grant scheme for homes affected by defective blocks could end up costing 3.65 billion if inflation runs consistently high. Cabinet ministers have been privately warned. The enhanced scheme was originally set to cost 2.2 billion when it was agreed to last November, but this has risen to 2.7 billion. Ministers were presented yesterday with three scenarios of inflation which could mean the cost increasing from 2.7 billion to 3.65 billion, meaning that high inflation could add up to 1.5 billion on the final taxpayers' bill in the worst case scenario. This is not a bill that has to be fronted right away. It's going to take time to work through the houses. This is money that is going to have to be spent probably over the course of a number of governments. The meeting heard there is no certainty over the number of homes affected but it's possible the problem will extend beyond Donagall, Mayo, Claire, Limerick, Sligo and Tipperary. The meeting was told that because it could take years for the damage to manifest, it's not possible to know the final cost to the checker. It's also understood that the new legislation when published will allow for the maximum grant of 425,000 euro to be increased by 10% through a yearly review which could take place up to three times with another three reviews allowed if the UROCTIS agrees. The cabinet was also told the government intends to appoint a senior council to investigate any wrongdoing and that anyone found to be responsible for the issues will be pursued and insurance levy to raise 80 million a year is on the cards for 2023. We're going to be talking ourselves more about that of course in the coming while. The Irish Daily Mail tells us that the cost of your summer holiday flight is now more than doubled depending on the destination with airlines hiking prices due to soaring fuel prices and runaway inflation. I wonder to people at this stage are you booking summer holidays or would you have that done already? I think anyone booking a holiday for July or August in June would expect to see the costs go up drastically, wouldn't you? I've don't recall ever holidaying in the summer or going away in the summer so I don't know but I would have thought if you're trying to book in June for July and August you're going to see a huge increase in costs. Families face a hike of hundreds of euro in the cost of their summer holiday after Ryan Air said that its fares have already increased for the summer months and will continue to rise by up to 10%. As I say I would like to interview these people to find out how normal is this increase? Are they doing it anyway? How much of it is because of their costs increase or are they just doing what they probably do every year and gouging? It's the market isn't it? More people want to go away so you can charge more. The sharp increases follow soaring jet fuel prices. Now I thought that I heard an interview with Ryan Air they had hedged quite a bit of their fuel for this year so I would suggest and I'm not an expert that these prices increases happen every year and it's how they make their money so they can sell 999 seats in the winter. On to the Irish Daily Star now we've all seen films haven't we where the big fear is is that we create technology and that technology becomes sentient, begins to be able to think for itself and we've seen scenarios play out like in Terminator whereby it tries to take over the world and Ex Machiner and other ones like that there but anyway Google has placed one of their engineers on leave after he claimed a computer chat box he was working on had developed feelings and he's pictured here in a in a hoodie with the hood up Blake Limone was placed on leave by the tech giant last week after he published transcripts of remarkable conversations between himself and the bot including a claim from the robot that being turned off would be like death Blake 41 who has been working in the language model for dialogue application since the autumn described the artificial intelligence system as a sweet kid following interactions between the pair he revealed that L.A. Lambda presumed is had talked to him about rights and personhood while Linoin shared his findings with company executives in April in a document entitled is Lambda sentient that's probably possible onto the sun now and workers on the minimum wage are set for a series of pay hikes as the government looks to introduce a new living wage in Ireland it comes as Finnegal Senators pushed for the introduction of a third tax ban to help middle income earners tonnestly of Radcor announced the government's plan to end the minimum wage and replace it with a new living wage yesterday it would see the lowest paid workers hourly rate linked to 60% of the average rate of pay in Ireland it means if there was a living wage in place in 2022 the minimum wage would rise from 10.50 an hour to 12.17 per hour the low pay commission will make recommendations of the new living wage rate the government every summer and the new rate will be published in the budget it will take a while to get up to that point and of course we'll hear from the usual representative group saying that businesses it's going to be a big hit for them and so on and so forth but I think 12 euro at least is reasonable compared to where it's at now particularly I think for 18 and 19 year olds some 18 year olds that's fully grown adults fully fledged adults probably have a car may want to move out from the home although that's at this point it's a little bit more difficult but there are much less than someone who's 22 in many cases if the person pays the wage as minimum as they have to I don't never see why that's fair if you're 18 and as I say you could have all the bills that a 22 year old have you should be paid the same as a start as a minimum I think it's fair that 18 and 19 year olds get less money as if they're worthless I don't understand why that was ever introduced and I don't understand why people accept it the Irish Daily Mirror finally a food delivery cyclist asked for forgiveness from the family of a teenager Josh Dunn yesterday as he was cleared of murder and said I'm sorry now being acquitted with a self-defense argument in this country is very rare so this is a particularly interesting case but after George Gonzaga Bento was acquitted Josh's mum insisted she will keep fighting for her boy until the day she dies following over 500 days in custody the Brazilian walked out of the criminal court's justice a free man in a six weeks trial Mr Bento admitted he stabbed Josh he was 16 in the chest twice but he insisted he was acting in self-defense after being attacked when he and a colleague tried to retrieve a stolen bike in Eastworld Dublin in January of 2021 leaving the court building after being acquitted the 36 year old embraced his partner mother and legal team as he grasped a Bible and the book Mindful by comedian Dermot Whelan Mr Bento said I'm very grateful I pray a lot for that I'm not in shock it's more emotion that I can't that I can't speak more emotion than I can speak I beg your pardon Radio Hi Greg I was listening during the week about the litter problems around letter Kenny regarding coffee cups I've seen this post from a coffee van that's on Guibara bridge edible coffee cups drink your coffee and eat your cup genius idea okay what's that like eating your own coffee cup we're going to be speaking to I think those in that industry commenting on this latte levy which it's being called which could see you paying more to try and discourage you from using disposable coffee cups can you ask listeners anyone have a double room available from the 17th to the 19th of June to attend the rally in letter Kenny now I do see on social media a few places being advertised and suggested but if you have a room and you want us to put you in contact with that person get in touch with us 08 6 60 25000 alright yo let's take a quick break and then our first caller will be on with us the newspapers are courtesy of Kelly centra mountaintop letter Kenny the 9 till noon show with letter Kenny credit union is your bank leaving town letter Kenny credit union is now offering my cu current account and debit mastercard bringing full banking features with no appointment necessary to open your account Donny goll county council in association with Bryson recycling are holding a half price bulky goods event at letter Kenny lie and don low recycling centres from the 7th of June to the 18th of June during site opening times for more information and opening times visit donny goll dot ie or call the council on 074 9153 900 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 Donny goll and our fully trained and committed staff will always meet your care needs with kindness compassion and dignity to get your personal home care assessment plan visit bluebird care dot ie or call our care team today on 074 91295 62 and bring care home in 2018 Toyota cut through the confusion completely ceasing production of diesel passenger cars lowering harmful emissions and providing certainty for Irish drivers everywhere and Kelly's Toyota proud to be part of that hybrid electric journey visit Kelly's Toyota letter Kenny or Mount Charles today to see what makes Toyota Ireland's best-selling car brand in 2021 and 2022 you'll never take a wrong turn with Toyota built for a better world best-selling claim based on most recent monthly figures any show and credit union has recently launched cultivate an agricultural loan at only 6.55% APR 6.75% call any of their four offices for more information or to make an appointment any show and credit union boncran I can't on a mobile and more supporting local farmers any show and credit union is regulated by the central bank of Ireland give blood dot ie no we can count on you our community of blood donors to give blood and to choose to be there for others in their hour of need blood donors from Bally and Dunlowe should attend the clinic and Jackson's hotel in Bally Bow Faye from Tuesday 14th to Thursday 16th of June all donors need to make an appointment so call 1-800-731-137 to book your time new donors are welcome visit give blood dot ie to check eligibility and clinic details because we count on you okay we welcome Pauline on to the program now Pauline how are you getting on good to speak to you and thanks for speaking to us right you we're going to talk to you about your daughter and what she's been through this week yeah well it's actually just yesterday but yes there is a lot more in Ireland that went through the same but I think I just need to make a stand for all the children in Ireland wouldn't be too good with this talking on the radio no you're doing fantastic Pauline just pretend we're sitting having a cup of tea at the kitchen table not perfect no so she had her French exam yesterday at 1.30pm so she had a headache now this is a junior cert isn't it Pauline junior certificate sorry yes and so she had a headache so doing the right thing mommy puts up a test to the room and do the test so she did the test and I showed next up but when she went to put the test in the bin there were two lines so I just like you notice that it's a first in our house and for all the years and just right bang in the middle of her junior certificate it was a bit of a shock and we didn't know what to do and so we did the right thing of course so we did two or three more tests to base it out and yes they were positive so so she has Covid according to the antigen test so according to them yes she does but she was fine and in good fit form you know just the sort of what they did beforehand but we're doing the right thing so around the school and it's just the school where the guidelines from the HSE and you know so yeah no sure she couldn't go in of course she couldn't she couldn't go in and with no like what I was told was it's just absent from now on for the rest of the exams so that's her finish with the junior cert in other words by the by the time she would be deemed to be recovered the junior cert's over well there's one more left but you know going by days and stuff like that there we just need to go back on that right so the junior cert is important sorry Pauline because firstly I say A obviously we get a good idea where our students are at and in terms of choosing courses and all that type of stuff it's a good little platform whether they're going into transition year or not but also it's the first I think real experience that's probably really good grounding for the leaving cert absolutely it is important it's like oh it's only the junior cert because I ran the examinations board and you know they helped me as good as I could I just felt like you know sometimes you find that wee voice that you thought you never had so well right okay I need more help here because I don't think anyone's listening to me so here we are but no like there's a lot of for example woodwork she worked so hard on her woodwork piece I did all the rest because she's not the only one I'm just making a stand because I know there's more there's more contacting us as you're speaking Pauline so be sure by that you're not on your own in this one you're not an outlier no absolutely but I just thought right I'm just lay down under these rules but no I'm here and I am going to go stand there because even if there's nothing done this year we need to stand up for our children and I'm not just starting up for my child or my friend's child I'm starting up for all the Donegal I'm starting up for all of Ireland all the children What would they say to you that would they effectively say well sure look it's only the junior sir there's no option for her to sit this against as there is with the leaving sir No resets no like what they did the last couple years a predicted grade I feel like you know even not and just absent and the shocking thing is could they even put down absent due to covid like to explain because sometimes some children do not go on to do their leaving certificate you know it's it's the way it is and the junior certificates look cool and with absent you know of course and listen we don't know either and listen we just hope we don't go down this road we know for a fact that junior sir results were used as part of predictive grades when students come correctly sit their leaving sir so God forbid even a year two or three years something like that with a happen she's got nothing to fall back on So in terms of you know her choice courses for leaving sir or a general overall assessment of how she's doing at school do you feel you have that information or were you both waiting on the junior sir to sort of navigate that path Pauline Well there's a few that she has to sit yet that she won't get to sit now that she was really working really hard for and it's not it's not just alone not okay you know do what you're told but no I just don't think I just think the minister of education should there should have been a plan like where they started the secondary school and then they were head to the pandemic they schooled at home they worked so hard they were absolutely terrified so a plan should have been put in place for these students and I think what we have to remember too is that a lot of people listen I'm sure it's only the junior sir but I would imagine particularly given by the sounds of it the effort that your daughter put into this this was a really big milestone in her life this was an important thing that she was looking forward to nervous about and now it's like well it doesn't really matter you know I don't think it sends a great message either no no you see do you know what we're all brought up where you know you did the right thing and yes that was good we did the wrong thing and you get just a plan for it but you know it's not set in a good do you know what I mean we did the right thing and it's like bam you know and the records record as far as we know that she might as well she might as well have just said you know what stuff I'm not going in from a junior sir and that does her a disservice you know it's not showing a good example for our children and as they all the children of Ireland just not there stay with me stay with me Pauline I want to bring Marlene and Marlene good morning good morning how are you I'm good I think Pauline singing your tune you can relate to what she's talking about tell us about your situation Marlene I second everything Pauline just said there and also I'd like to appreciate you for giving us the chance to but likewise I was in the same position as Pauline but it was last week so it was before the junior sir started and I thought likewise I was doing the right thing I give them plenty notice thinking something can be in place but I appreciate the schools can't you know they've got to go by the government guidelines so that's understandable but yeah he missed out on English Irish maths and geography like the core subjects and as he said himself he would have loved to give it a go to see what it's worth for us you know like they are studying as Pauline said they're told their exams are important they're a state exam but yet when you're told now you'll just be gone you're marked as absent it is sending a very uncare message like it's not important like please God our children will go on through the leave and search but I know hopefully they will but there's kids out there that the junior sir may be their only form of education to date do you know what I'm saying so it's really a huge distrust system to not have any to not have any kind of a predicted grade as Pauline was saying or even to give the reason why Mark also to what worries me is people listen to this now if they have a junior search student who gets a headache or something do they say don't go near those antigen tests unless you don't want to do your junior sir you know like without a backup plan and without support for them what this is actually going to do is either people will go in positive or they won't test at all because of the ramifications losing out in the chance to do your junior sir because even if let's say there's a non-archolic disco at the end of this you know I know this is not important right but with young people you know there'd probably be a bit of banter there and they're at it going well I didn't even do my junior sir as I said no it's not important but we have to try and put our minds our heads in a 16-15 year olds minds as well too exactly and like last week when I was in this situation I kind of felt alone I was like I cannot be the only parents in this situation do you know in the whole of Ireland or anywhere and when nobody was making the fuss like don't get me wrong a friend of mine contacted the Education Correspondent Party and they had basically a system for the leaving sir to students obviously they get to reset them but because junior sir is not needed for your CV or for entrance into college then that's why there was no nothing put in place for the junior sir which isn't good enough really yeah but as both of you have mentioned at this stage for some of us that is your only record of your education yeah yeah have you decided to do something else it wouldn't be too hard Pauline could it to I can't I don't know what the numbers are like but to have them reset this exam you know it's not that important in inverted commas and we know it's different well then you know put aside a class or a day and let them go through the process and just yeah this class was for you know different students you know you know this should have thought this through like COVID you know it's still here and you know what maybe next year it probably could be as well please God not but you know what you know there's plans that need to be put in place and I'm so disgusted that the Minister of Education didn't think this through is there any answer it's just that's a full stop end of and you made the same point too Marlene you know if we're in the endemic stage next year or the year after we're still probably going to be told to stay at home if we test positive for COVID so it's not this is not just a one year thing necessarily we should have a plan for future years as well totally and that's why I'm doing this because I have other kids or she is the oldest of five like I have my god daughter doing the next year and my son and my niece the following year so like I will be in the system for quite some time and I would like to see changes made as possible it may not help our kids this year but it has to help their future years like looking forward to the college fees Marlene not really because it sounds like they're all going to be coming all at their kind of the one time yes they're all stepping stones yeah all right listen both of you thanks so much for raising this issue we're going to make our own inquiries as well I just think you know we don't listen sometimes we talk about our children but we don't listen to them and we don't know what it's like used to of course but you know what it's like for your Marlene and your one Pauline as well and the hundreds of others that are affected by this and how it makes them feel different or that they haven't achieved what their peers have you know like it's not the most important thing in the world but it's probably the most important thing to those two young people this week and last week all right listen both of you well done thanks for that we really appreciate your time and that's what we're here for Marlene and Pauline they're both expressing their concerns in relation to that we would have known it was coming we could have planned for it 08 660 25000 WhatsApp's a text to that number we were talking yesterday to one person who was having difficulty getting through to their GP in my word did it snowball and we thought it was maybe one particular area and it's not it's right across the county and then of course a good number of people contacting us saying that saying that you know there are GP's fantastic so it varies from area to area I'll get to those comments but I'll stay on this topic because Councillor Neve Kennedy joins us now good morning to you Neve you're listening to Pauline listening to Marlene as to say it's probably one of those ones you don't know if you should raise or not because people inevitably are going to say sure look it's only the junior sir but I think they both articulated it better than I to their students it's much more than just the just the junior sir. Totally and utterly and I completely concur with that Pauline. Can I start before and just congratulate you by the way on being the new care here like of the Donegal Municipal District it's a really significant achievement in local politics so congratulations to you in relation to that right okay come on very much Greg Pauline Marlene Pauline Marlene, Pauline contacted me last night and you could tell that you can tell better today but she's very passionate about this and rightly so I mean her child they've gone through school they've gone to the stage they've been so good they've done their studies they've gone through two very difficult years in all fairness all the children have and then at the last minute to end up sick and not able to sit an exam is really disappointing for them particularly the children who work really really really hard and want to get you know to achieve the best and their parents are watching them and looking after them so the passion is there with Pauline and Marlene and other parents as well Neve had another other parent contact me on this issue they're just disappointed that the children can't sit the time will come when the results are out and then they're differentiated by an absenteeism mark on their paper which is really really unfair and particularly when they work so hard to do it so if they can do it for the leaving sir I know the leaving sir it's much more important but at the same time at the stage in those children's lives it's very important for them to have that piece of paper to say look I got this grade and if they can't do that I think as you know it's disappointing and it's disappointing for the children and the parents that have gone through so much in the last couple of years yes of course but also too there is a practical implication that is a practical implications well but my understanding is this say for instance that you it turns out you're not as academic as others that your skill set is not in books it's in another area and you want to apply for a course or a job or something you know if you have the junior certainly particularly if you did quite well in it that can be an advantage to you it can actually maybe even be how you can get on to a course or an apprenticeship not exclusively but you know there are going to be scenarios there we need to be giving them something to fall back on if they choose not to do the leaving sir or if they don't do as well in the leaving sir there could be a bereavement in the family or something like that you know yourself and if these things happen you know but we're robbing them the opportunity of or to at least say they did bother turning up because the records kind of would reflect that they didn't which we know that not to be the case exactly I mean there's nothing as nice to be able to open up a piece of paper or certificate say look how I did this is great or on the other hand it could be whatever it might be each child is different well it could be the kick up the bomb as well you know like say for instance I think lots of people listening their young ones didn't do great in the junior cert and it was like that was the catalyst and then do really well in the leaving sir for example it's part of the process isn't it yeah you get oh we better do better than that and get working on it absolutely so now it's very important for them that this is highlighted and rightly so and I'm very glad that Pauline Marlin came on spoke with us this morning and I'd be on to the department as well to see if there's anything that can be done most likely not this year but let's say at least try and recognise and acknowledge that these parents have been on and that these children are better disappointed we can't be beyond us to sort this out but anyway Neil thanks for your time this morning and congratulations again on your elevation to Cahirlok of the Donegal Municipal District well done okay Paula says the leaving start is pointless never mind the junior cert and I know I get that that's going to be some people's views and I think the older you get and particularly if you've you know you're on your path you realise that maybe it's not quite as important as it may have seemed I get that my son is doing the leaving certainly he says there are a number of his friends who say they have a load of symptoms and not testing because they don't want to have to face another year of studying yeah I can understand that and I can see even more doing it now particularly junior cert students my son told me yesterday they had a bad headache and wasn't testing because he just couldn't face another year repeating we fought it out but I decided I had to respect his decision not test I only agreed because he assured me no one in his class had any underlying health conditions and in the absence of you know rules guidelines and rules and regulations that's proven the point I was trying to make earlier people will make their own decisions some of you will agree some of you will disagree okay I want to read these comments on these surgeries by the way hi Greg so glad you're highlighting this topic of surgery negligence I've been trying my GP for weeks to get bloods done very low energy etc I've been cancelled twice because they said the lab is on strike their attitude on the phone is absolutely disgraceful and I've been very rude on the phone at this stage now doc is the only option for me and the children now in fairness there was a period of two over the course of two weeks where there was strike action and tests would not have been done and I presume blood goes out of date but that was two weeks ago now at this point so it's not a valid excuse anymore I don't believe I was ringing my surgery this morning during your first conversation about the delays after three or four tries I got through and was able to get an appointment for a time I requested that is good that you had that positive experience on Facebook a call says I always email my doctor's surgery as I can never get through on the phones they always respond immediately or within the hour with help and advice either an appointment or a prescription as the phones are impossible to get through one that's one person's experience there right 08 660 25000 already loads of you texting into the program keep them coming we'll get to all of them I guarantee you today we'll give us a call in 0749125 if texting is not your thing and also too by the way you can always feel free if you want to you know we want everyone to feel that they can contact us in a way that's comfortable to them you can always send in a voice message to us as well on WhatsApp 08 660 25000 okay right let's take a break then we're going to find out what the market action group think of the announcement yesterday well it wasn't an announcement the approval well it was kind of announced wasn't it by the cabinet to the enhanced micro redress scheme anxiety aches and pains or a lack of energy they're highly trained team at the natural way letter can you can provide advice on natural remedies for a number of individual health issues the natural way also has its own brand of herbal treatments to help fight fatigue relieve digestive discomfort maintain a healthy immune system and alleviate common menopause symptoms the natural way letter can a shopping center your one stop health shop too many lives continued to be lost on our roads there is still a cohort of motorists who drive dangerously and risk the lives of all road users driving at excessive speed or driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs will destroy lives we all need to take personal responsibility and not take unnecessary risks that put our lives or the lives of others in danger slow down never drink or drug drive and keep the race in its place a message from the Dunnegaw road safety working group the final O'Neill sportswear massive warehouse clearance starts at 9 a.m. on Friday 17th of June and ends Sunday 19th of June for the final time county GA Jersey's leisurewear including t-shirts tracksuit bottoms, half zips, hoodies and jackets all reduced to clear the sale will take place at O'Neill sportswear warehouse of the Melmond Road Stroban if you're getting married the in-house design team in Bissbrent can get all your wedding and signage needs customized to your requirements just visit weddinginvites.ie or call Bissbrent at Port Road Letter Kenny on 9 1 7 9 5 your energy savings start right here right now with BordGosh Energy new and existing customers can save up to 988 euro with our best dual fuel offer find out more at BordGoshEnergy.ie discounts on our standard unit rates for 12 months with fixed term dual fuel contract annual savings figure compared to BGE standard rates offer available to new and existing single fuel customers EAB of 2078 euro unit rate and standing charge apply see BordGoshEnergy.ie for EAB prices and full T's and C's OK so Minister Fulharding Dara O'Brien has received government approval for the new enhanced Micah scheme it's a 2.7 billion scheme grant rates in keeping with the construction cost report prepared by the Society of Chartered Chartered flexible route with abound government guaranteed in regard to remediation works다는 man hole than remission and rebuild a second grant might be available there questionable logic but anyway a revised application process which removes the financial bar now to the scheme alternative accommodation in storage costs and immediate repair works to a maximum value of 25,000 euro within the overall Grant Cap the housing agency playing a key role under the enhanced scheme by taking on authorities, the appropriate remediation options and grant rate for each dwelling. The extension of the enhanced scheme be on the current scope of principal private residence only to also cover rented dwellings registered with the RTB on or before the 1st of November 2021. Inclusion of Claire and Limerick in the enhanced scheme upon commencement and exempt development status under planning legislation for remediation works carried out under the defective concrete blocks grant scheme on a like-for-like basis. Michael Daharty, Piro of the Micah Action Group, good morning to you. Good morning Greg. I'm kind of breaking this down into the most basic terms for my benefit and for those who want to cross it as much as others. How close are we to this being the scheme? It's not that far away Greg and I think that's probably the disappointing part. You know there was an opportunity missed yesterday to get this over the line. There's an opportunity that we could have turned around and said we believe we now have a pathway without further campaigning. They knew what they needed to do to make that happen. We had talked a lot of that stuff over the last six months and movement was you know there was certainly movement and the disappointing part yesterday was that they sort of resorted back to the position that they had in November which meant us feel that a lot of the work we did over the last six months was a complete waste of time and that was very frustrating for us. Right, what's missing? Yeah well we've missing things like the inclusion of inflation in there. So we know that we need the figures that were SCSI independent figures, they were valid on the 28th of February. Valid for the scope of work that they were allowed to price for. They had one hand tied up behind their back because the department dictated the terms of reference and for example you know you had to be working to 15 year old standards that you can't now do so you're going to have to pay the difference yourself. Government knew that when they put that in place. You don't have the foundations included in there. You don't even have a carpet in your home. There's no finishes and everybody knows there's thousands to be spent in finishing a home after you get a shelf. So is this an 80-20 scheme then? Yeah I would say what you're looking at closer to is somewhere between 80 and 90% for a lot of people. That means homeowners out tens of thousands and that's an issue for us and they could close that gap very easily and on that one Greg we are in the game of offering solutions. The solution we offered in that case was that if you're not going to give us a true 100% redress for the house we had then give us 100% true redress for a smaller house. That's not going to be for everyone either though. With the same grant but listen we're in the solutions business we're trying to find a solution for every category of issue Greg and one of them is the amount of people that are saying listen we don't have what we can't we don't have borrowing capacity we can't go to a bank we need to take whatever grant money the government has given us and make the best of it we have no other options okay and we said okay so let's what about these people if they were prepared to downsize what should be helping the green um you know manifesto it also allows this whole thing about yeah they were talking about these mansions like all okay let's for homeowners that are prepared to do it and you're just giving them a choice prepared to downsize to a smaller house let them use the grant that the government is going to give them anyway and spend it on a true 100% basis for that smaller house and that was all that was really really happening we were we were right on the edge of that happening and the pulled it back yesterday massively disappointed and that that locked that locked out a lot of people from a true pathway to 100% redress this isn't 100% redress for anyone this scheme so it's completely it's completely unacceptable yes it's not as it stands it's not and that's why we've said we have to reject this here Greg unfortunately there was an opportunity to do it the easy way yesterday uh based on good good faith and uh and negotiations that were at really really strong positions and and they were they pulled back from the edge yesterday for whatever reason and it looks like they're going to make us put in the hard yards now through uh compressed PLS and amendments so it may happen talk to me about compressed PLS because what the majority of uh people listening to would have heard pre-legislative scrutiny okay yeah that the the government would wish to bypass that they're going to ask the house committee to bypass that so are you describing the debate in the dollars PLS now like what are you what do you mean by compressed PLS no so what we did say Greg um all along was that there was an opportunity for what we talked about accelerated PLS that's basically a process and if you're going to do the whole thing to the letter of the law you could be several weeks that's fair enough but we identified an opportunity to do it through a compressed or accelerated PLS and that really means that you've got the key the six key stakeholders in a in a one-day event but they get to air their views and what's going on they get to be cross-examined by the joint housing committee the six key stakeholders number one is the housing department they have to be they have to stand over some of the stuff that they've been here that doesn't make sense for example IS465 it doesn't include foundations for deleterious materials they have to speak up on that you also have the housing agency who are the people that are going to be overseeing this entire scheme you also have SCSI who are the people that put together the rates and I want them to say that their hands were tied behind their back and what they were forced to do was to price for not a modern-day house but for a house that was 15 years old and exclusions on top of that I need them to say that and then you have got engineers Ireland who are the engineers the likes of the Ambrose McCluskey's and these guys that have said from day one there's been an issue they get a chance to say it as a body representing engineers Ireland you've got the homeowner representatives who will be there and then you also have what other experts we may want to include and we can get to hand to come in to argue our case on a professional capacity on our basis on a one-day wonder right where we're at the moment though right is that it could be let's just an arbitrary figure 80-20 by the time everything's done let's call it an 80-20 scheme so it's less than the 90-10 scheme that didn't turn out to be that we're also have a situation whereby it engineers will not sign off on work that's being done we have the government have announced that we'll fix the outer leaf if the inner leaf starts cracking well you can come back and we'll fix that obviously that doesn't make a lot of sense to a lot of people okay but they're processed with that so engineers aren't going to sign off on this work there is no scheme I'm not trying to be dramatic at Michael by the way but on the basis of those two things right there's nothing here that people travel down to Dublin to march for yeah that's exactly right and you know the people and the questions that you have just asked we will have the right people to speak for themselves as opposed to us speaking on their behalf the likes of the engineers that are saying we can't sign off on what's here right so that's the opportunity that we won that was the one win that we had yesterday in our negotiations with Kevin Dillon John O'Connor and Sligo yesterday that we come away with this compressed PLS and it allows the people's day in court in front of the joint housing okay yes that's a good start you would have heard that the the the exchange between Potter and McLaughlin and the T-Shock yesterday paraphrase in Potter McLaughlin said the important of PLS me or Martin said effectively you know what happens if this goes to pre-ledge it'll get bogged down it'll get caught up we need to get things going now we need to start getting houses fixed you reference the 300 odd houses the council have so I mean the the T-Shock seems to be suggesting that this is going to bypass pre-legislative scrutiny but you're saying there's a compact version of it do you know what I mean so again I just want to clarify that for those that feel that those two things are a contradiction yeah well you've got the the the longhand version and the shorthand version the longhand version was what we asked for because we believe that it still gives more time to you know to um maybe uh put you know and the back of things issues that arise from a meeting they may take a week to come back with answers we don't have that luxury but we do have the impressed right let me give you a scenario then Michael let me give you a scenario right so you know for a fact uh everyone knows out there now at this stage the concerns say engineers have right and foundations okay so the housing committee is is is government dominated okay it's made up by majority government members what faith do we have that in any way even if they hear these experts they will not go well on the balance of everything that's going on you know we're going to prove that the scheme as the government has suggested that's the likely outcome of that surely yeah good point and I'd say the response to that is that this is now documented they can't say that they're not aware the experts will have spoken it will be documented the report will be furnished to the government and the government then have to acknowledge that and they have to acknowledge it and accept it or acknowledge it and reject it but the fact is they'll have to acknowledge it and that's the first time that's something they wouldn't have had to do if we didn't have any form of PLS so that leaves them in a very difficult position that's documented that's on record forever more amen and if they deliberately turn down and reject what is very plausible evidence-based recommendations then on their head be it yeah but that's that's where the difference lies but what happens next though because that's where we're going Michael and I hate to be pessimistic this is this is 9010 all over again it feels just like the conversations I was having on this program and ahead of that ahead of that and I hope I'm proven wrong but it looks like what what does that mean then like let's say for instance the majority is one Joe McHugh has said he won't accept nitpicking he will only back this if the family's back it right your group backs it okay if this comes if it's sorted by way of a vote in the doll does Joe McHugh abstain a vote against the government and the majority is gone like what do you mean by take them down what does that mean yeah so maybe just I think this part's important before I answer that part and I will answer it as you know the first part is that they could have done it easy yesterday they didn't there is another opportunity for them to get it right that is through this compressed PLS and then also through the amendments that will be tabled by us and by opposition that will go through the floors of the Eroctus the dial in the Shannon they'll be discussed to be voted on and then government have to then take them overall amendments the series of amendments that comes from the Eroctus process that comes from the compressed PLS process and accept them or reject them if they accept them then we're all good and they didn't do it the easy way yesterday but at least we would have it on the 15th of July through that process of amendments if they on the other hand still reject it outright that's when we press that trigger and we say you know the safety catch has been off the campaign shotgun here this has been teeing up for some time we have opposition lined up reasonably well now at this point in time just before your call I had a phone call from Ivana the head of the Labour Party yeah so we all of this we're teeing up in the background here government are well well aware of that we had a very strong meeting yesterday with Kevin Dillon and John O'Connor they know that the government are vulnerable they know that we know government are vulnerable and we know Joe McHugh cannot say we're nitpicking if we're going to be costing homeowners tens of thousands of euros so he said he no he in fairness he said the government can't seem to be nitpicking that's exactly right and you know Joe has to stand by that I hope Joe does that and I actually think he will I like to think he got shafted with a 90-10 scheme also let's not forget so he's also been you know plowing alone for a long time here this is his opportunity but at the end of the day he's going to have to man up as he said he would I hope and I do expect him to do that we have got every TD in these affected counties that are now going to have to walk the plank they are either going to back their people or their party and that's assuming that the party doesn't do the right thing by the 15th of July that is the horizon we're fixed on after that it there's no holds barred government goes as far as we're concerned we're not going to spend another day with them and our focus of our campaign is completely on exposing the vulnerability of this government and the TDs that are within it the government goes but the TDs go along with it and I don't think that TDs can ever walk back into their own county with their head held high that'll be the price they pay for turning their back on their people yes but do you have a ceiling to be reached in other words you have to be very clear and when I say you by the way I'm talking about the micro action movement the defective block movement you know how far do they have to come is it inclusion of foundations is it to see about other defective materials yeah is that those the two things that if they if they if they right okay then that's it we have to come to a point where something is acceptable is that it yeah that we have got we they know exactly what they need to do Greg they know exactly it's it's been tabled for them they know exactly what it is they need to do they've just been reluctant to do it there's a there's a series of things but there are a few big ones on there one of them is the that downsizing opportunity that's a zero cost a zero additional cost to the state right now to not allow that is both cruel and vindictive that's all you could say about that because it doesn't cost them one extra penny what they're hoping to do is that they can claw money back that's just not acceptable the cap at 420 excluded 18 percent of our people whenever that was first announced in the 30th of November due to inflation and no other reason that now rises to a third of our people not 18 percent the way that you get to 18 percent is to move your cap up to 460 that's a red line for us they have to go there that's just inflation that's nine and a half percent increase that's the world we're in here we have other things in there as well regarding the IS 465 that needs to be reviewed they've been sitting on their hands on this Greg for months okay and they're going nowhere they know what they need to do Greg they're just they're they're holding off doing it as long as they possibly can but the gun will be to their head on the 15th of of July right well okay Michael listen thanks for your time as always i really do appreciate it all right take care of yourself uh michael doggy they appear over the mic action group back with your reactions and more after the news and a bit of rain outside the night all new show is brought to you by letter kenny credit union offering low-rate car loans with fast approval apply online at letterkennycu.ie or in office today walk the line once again with the multi award-winning johnny cash and june carter tribute show cash returns celebrate the music of the man in black at the millennium forum dairy on saturday 18th of june limited tickets are available now at the box office that's cash returns live at the millennium forum dairy on saturday the 18th of june it started out so simply it was only a limp my walking stick is now a wheelchair i am 50 years old and a dad of two my name is mark dignum and i have motor neurone disease drink tea for mnd this june and help mark and over 400 families every kettle boiled and cup of tea made supports someone with mnd c im nda.ie since she got her free hearing aids with her prsi at speck savers roshine is a changed one music has never sounded better and that makes her dance and dance and dance her singing though 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revive a special room conservatory or sunroom look no further hardwood plantation shutters is your answer a stunningly beautiful piece of furniture that will totally enhance the look and bring ambience to any area of your home luxurious and classically modern and manufactured here in the northwest any size shape or color call or check out our website plantation shutters arland also on facebook and instagram live on air online and on the highland radio app this is highland radio news good morning it's 10 o'clock donal kavana at the news desk the mica action group says as it stands the enhanced mica redress scheme approved by cabinet last evening does not meet the needs of local homeowners housing minister darrow o'brien says he's satisfied that it does and it will help them rebuild their homes and their lives however the action group p.r.o michael doherty says while elements of the new scheme are close it's not yet right it doesn't address issues such as foundations and the inclusion of other deleterious materials he says the focus now goes on what amendments will be proposed during what's going to be a very limited pre-legislative scrutiny process they know what it was they needed to do it was very clearly laid out the shame in some ways is that it's not a million miles away but there are some fundamental things that they needed to get into account and they seem to still be reluctant to go there we will be getting a compressed version of pls which we did ask for which shouldn't affect the overall timelines the amendments that come from that are the hard yards that's left for this government they either do it then or we just have to call it a day with this government the new coherent of the donnie gole municipal district says the housing crisis in the county is becoming very worrying particularly with the number of young people who don't have somewhere to live consular neve kennedy was elected to the chair with consular tom conahan as her deputy consular kennedy says it will be a challenging year but she believes it'll be a productive one she says the donnie gole md has a tradition of collaborative cooperation and she says that was exemplified when they received funding for two major bridge projects would you work well together i say everybody has kind of their own maybe main areas that they would tend to focus on but we all support each other on that obviously there's going to be times when people don't all together agree but that's demographic and that's what we're there for just support the people who've elected us we work well together bridges where the tests went to that at the town donnie gole town bridge and central bridge went together for funding and donnie gole is now finished central now is on the way the EU is expected to take firm action against the uk today over new legislation that undermines part of the northern ireland protocol european commissioners are meeting in brussels they're expected to relaunch legal proceedings against britain which were frozen last year the new laws introduced by borris johnson's government would see goods including agri-food supplies and pets delivered without checks to the island of ireland a woman's been attacked by masked men in what police are describing as an aggravated burglary in the fountain hill area of dairy police say shortly before quarter past 10 last night four masked men entered a flat and forced their way into a room where they struck the female occupant aged in her forties on the leg and hands with weapons including hammers they also caused extensive damage to the flat by smashing windows doors and other furnishings the four plus two accomplices who waited outside made off in the direction of the top of the hill women sustained what are being described as minor injuries but police say they're very distressed they're appealing for witnesses donnie gole county council is to carry out a review of vacancy and their election across the county with the possibility of potential compulsory purchase orders and other measures to promote regeneration and provide housing options the review will draw on a high level examination of vacancy in the region that was recently published by the northern and western regional assembly a vacant home's officer will be appointed to follow through with identified priorities the issue was raised this week by councillor ian macgarvey he told letter kenny milford miserable district that while there's been a lot of discussion there has not been much progress he says it's time for the council to engage directly with the owners of derelict buildings people with property in that state that can be either an asset or a liability and it's about time we realize that we'll say that people who hold them at least we have an obligation to discuss with them and see what the way forward because the way forward is the council's work going to be able to actually place a tax on vacant properties as well as would say their election so i would only hopeful uh couldn't stress enough the importance of proactively dealing with what we're sitting with every day discussing and no progress group representing hotels and the tourism sector will defend high accommodation prices when they appear before td's and senators today it follows accusations of price gouging with people reporting being charged hundreds of euro for a one night hotel stay especially when big events are on hotel bosses say bed shortages and strong demand means many average sized hotel rooms sell out months in advance the iraq this tourism committee will hear from the arish hotels federation falcher arland and the arish tourism industry confederation the chair of the tourism committee deputy neve smith says some of the prices being quoted by hotels are simply unaffordable it does make it very difficult for people who are either visiting going to concerts or whatever that might be to be faced with a hotel bed causing 300 euro and it's beyond most people's reach to pay out that kind of money for a hotel bed but definitely in the city centre prices have always been i suppose that more expensive particularly a peak season with forecast i'm ed air and tell us it will be dull today rather cloudy with a possibility of some light rain winds will be southwest to southerly in direction in top temperatures of around 14 to 16 degrees celsius this afternoon and that's how individual news for an hour back with news again at 11 o'clock until then from the news team have a very good morning the rich notices for this wednesday morning the 15th of june the death has taken place of sheamus boil erity manor cunningham sheamus's remains are opposing at his late residence and will remain at his home while requiem mass is being offered at all saints church newton cunningham on a friday morning at 10 o'clock it can be viewed live on church services dot tv funeral cortege leaving his home at half past 11 traveling via erity bray and down the knocks going to lakeland's crematorium in cavern for private cremation family flowers only please donations in louis desired to the motor neuron disease association care of any family member the death has occurred of theriza mccally keshen's newton cunningham formerly of brokka st johnson theriza will repose at her late residence in newton cunningham from 12 noon today funeral from there on friday afternoon at half past 12 going to all saints church newton cunningham for one o'clock requiem mass with burial afterwards in the adjoining cemetery mass can be viewed on newton kill a parish dot com family flowers only please donations in louis desired to the dunigol hospice letter kenny care of any family member or killie's funeral directors family time please from 10 p.m to 12 noon the death has occurred of thomas canon tealings street bali moat county sligo formerly of killie begs thomas will repose at his residence in bali moat from 4 p.m to 9 p.m today removal from there tomorrow to the church of the immaculate conception bali moat to arrive for mass of the resurrection at 12 noon burial afterwards in st columbus cemetery family flowers only please donations in louis desired to the irish heart foundation funeral mass will be live streamed on the bali moat parish website the death has taken place in england of tony mclintock formerly of money quaggan newton cunningham memorial mass will take place at 11 o'clock tomorrow morning in all saints church newton cunningham with interment of tony's ashes afterwards in the adjoining churchyard family flowers only please the death has taken place of francy mcglennie bonlin for guidore originally of cash on the gore gortho hork his remains are reposing at his home with rosary at 8 o'clock tonight funeral mass in st columbus church knock fella tomorrow morning at 11 with burial afterwards in the adjoining cemetery the funeral mass can be viewed live on kiran rorty funeral directors facebook page house private please from 9 o'clock tonight and before the funeral tomorrow and the death has taken place of sam bucannon ross garrow milford his remains are reposing at his home funeral service in milford presbyterian church this afternoon with burial afterwards in the adjoining cemetery the service is at 2 o'clock that funeral service can be viewed on public sweeney funeral directors facebook page family time please today before the funeral family flowers only please donations if desired to the irish motor neuron disease association care of any family member for more details including any family health guidelines for wakes and funerals please go to highland radio dot com the best music on your station and you're very welcome back to the nine till noon show here on highland radio keep your calls and comments coming into us 08 660 25 000 08 660 25 000 or call us on 07 491 25 000 right we've lots to get through so we're going to get on to the bingo numbers for you shortly don't forget the jackpot tomorrow is 7800 year and our books are on sale now for five euro each so it's a euro per day to play and we do hope you do but of course there's always we only want you to do it if you can afford it and it's for fun but if you can and you enjoy your bingo and you enjoy in supporting good causes no better cause than the national council for the blind of ireland and all the money you raise for them and is not insignificant is spent in the local community too so you're helping your fellow county people as well so we have the jackpot of 7800 euro if you'd ever played before i'll just give you some examples of the daily prize winning books which have been purchased all over the region here's a few recent examples in solo in car and dollar they recently sold a book the daily prize was 1600 euro that was collected by a listener there another 600 euro one in alexander strunaller another 600 at blaney's carry keel another 500 at mckelhenney's manor another 500 euro at supervalue in balibufe the daily price you see starts at 400 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supported by the government of arland and you're very welcome back to the program we're joined in studio now by bg gobala kosenin who's secretary of the krandi meaning resolution thank you so much for calling in and seeing us thank you for the invite it's great to have you with us now we're speaking about a new indian and cultural organization which has been established in letter kenny it's a branch in letter kenny is it it's part of a nationwide group is it yeah it is oh tell us a little bit about it um krandi i would say it is a social organization uh it is established to to integrate the indian community in ireland it has eight units across the ireland and it is established in the year of 2017 so krandi aims to bring a positive change to the society through its activity krandi always engage in activities which have some social relevance not like other indian associations they'd always do the you know the entertaining and the cultural things so krandis activities always aims on the social yeah so whilst the other organizations are doing good things yours is a different focus and maybe more targeted in terms of integration and what have you yes i i wonder are are every is everyone aware that in letter kenny alone and we're talking about all of donagore but in letter kenny alone there are 200 indian families mostly working in medical fields in it is that correct yeah it is mostly in the uh in the medical field most of them are the nurses and some of them are working in the it departments and generally speaking are these families moved here permanently or are they living here through the terms of a contract or maybe everybody's situation is different to bg yeah everybody's situation is different but um most of them are planning to live here for long term uh because um ireland always provide welcomes the uh you know the different nationalities and there is a wide of a opportunity for the medical uh personals in ireland so i think that uh most of them aim to live here long and do you think the majority of indian families here feel like part of the indian community living in ireland or part of the ireland community uh well indians are very friendly people and they always um uh willing to engage with the uh you know the local irish people um so even in our organization granty on the last time we have um conducted the mayday commemoration so that time we all we invited the um the different uh so the political parties and the trade unions in ireland so we always work hand in hand with the irish people yeah but do you think the the do you think we there's more for us to do yeah um with the uh you know they're the local support we can't do anything um so uh it is like a mutual thing yeah okay so you had the first meeting uh of the granty recently where do you want or granty where do you want to see going over the next while what work further work needs to be done do you believe uh well um in um seeing the uh recent scenario of the recession so we are aiming to support um the local businesses and the local farming uh so we are planning to um conduct a campaign uh next month so that's their local shopping campaign uh so all the main um the shopping complexes are the part of corporate so um we always go for the our benefit and we buy things from the big shops uh but the local farming or the local businesses they don't get much margin or much profit so we are providing uh conducting a campaign so that more people can uh buy things from the local shops and they will also get a benefit at the time of recession yes of course and and recently a lot of focus has been on helping uh Ukrainians in Ukraine and also the refugees here yeah we did um as part of the integration activity of letekany unit we thought about doing something which have some um recent relevance so uh at the time most of the Ukrainians were coming here and i know that the irish government is providing good support for them but um you know still they need some support from the NGOs and the voluntary groups uh until they get the social grants and everything to be processed uh so that time uh we had a discussion and every committee members agreed for supporting the Ukrainian community and we uh we focused on involving more the community like an Indian community involved with that and with their support we managed to collect more than 25 boxes of essential things and we distributed we worked in collaboration with the DLDC and Noreen Okain she was a great support for us at that activity and we could manage and hand it over that with the presence of councillor Jimmy Kavana and we did that so talk to me a little bit more about your next initiative supporting local businesses you know local farm markets and small artists and producers how do you see that working or you're still working through that at the moment as to how that will work um well um we are planning to do it is like a campaign we have eight unit across Ireland so we are doing it on the same day and we are spreading messages through the social media and our members are working in different areas like a medical um the hospitality and the IT so we can we have a we are getting more networks through you know engaging with the workplaces as well so we are thinking about spreading the messages so that at least one member could uh you know convince five people five local people or the Indian people to buy then it will be a big crowd and if they start buying weekly one or two people could weekly buy that and continue that it would be a great support for them yeah and of course the advantage too with a lot of these projects less air miles less packaging yes and it'll maybe people try it for the first time and realize that they were missing something right on their doorstep yeah okay very good um and tell us um Crandy deals uh how it actually works is it is it uh representing all Indian families or is it all you know the the broader communities you had what is the set make up of it uh well uh Crandy have a bylaw it is as I said previously it is a social organization a socialist organization so Crandy have its own aims and objectives uh we don't uh stand for the uh you know the uh we don't do the anti-national thing so uh we aim to uh those members those who are coming to us who believes in the values and objectives of Crandy uh anyone can come and join us and work with the Crandy but um we don't encourage who are not very progressive and not very forward so that's the only criteria the the Indian community in in letter can is large at the moment you see it expanding in the coming years yeah it is because um even in the hospital I'm a nurse I work in letter candy hospital uh so I could see that uh when I joined there was not much Indian staff in the hospital but I can see that every month there is a new staff joining and it is expanding and how many how long have you been there sorry in the hospital uh in Ireland I um care for the last six years okay so it's a long time yeah it is for the last four years I was working in the community and for the two years I'm in the hospital okay and did you sort of see a job advertised and thought right I could make my life there and fill that post is that like what I'm trying to get at here is as obviously as you know where there's a lot of recruitment going on at the moment uh would would would Indian medical professionals be looking at uh you know letter candy going right okay we could go and work there um I think there is also recruitment campaigns going on the HSC the personnel so they're going to different countries and of course they're one of the main target is in India India has lots of medical that's what I always feel guilty you know I I just hope that it's not the case and it might not be for India but maybe for other countries that we are going over and taking all the you know you brilliant medical people uh I hope we're not doing the Indian people living in India disservice and leaving them short on on expertise of course they do so there's plenty to go around okay lovely stuff how do people get more information about the Grandi we have a website page and also a Facebook page so and it's spelled by the way it's K R A N T H I yeah that's right all right interesting I look forward to checking that out myself actually anything else you want to add BG before we say goodbye well I'm so happy that I got a got an opportunity to talk in Highland radio and say about our organization that's a proud moment for me and I expect more people will come and join us and we can enlarge you know yeah we'll stay in contact with us you know there's always options podcasts or whatever it might be that that that that that your organization or you as an individual or whatever you know there's probably great opportunities and ways of working together there so it's been our pleasure having you up okay and we'll see you again thank you so very much indeed that's a banji go by la cusnin and we'll be back with more after we take this break stay right where you are the 90 noon show with letter kenny credit union is your bank leaving town letter kenny credit union is now offering my cu current account and debit mastercard bringing full banking features with no appointment necessary to open your account is your home or motor insurance up for renewal now is the time to check if your policy still offers you the right cover and the right fit at the right price to be sure you're getting the best deal take this opportunity to shop around it's easier than you think simply contact your insurer or broker today remember don't just renew review for more information visit understanding insurance dot ie brought to you by insurance island as we move into spring it's time that we look after what is precious to us are you struggling with your hearing your hearing is an essential part of your everyday living hearing is our social sense and connects you to friends and family at connect hearing we are here 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drinks served all day late night opening all weekend live music and dj's throughout the rally warehouse bar and kitchen would like to wish all the competitors good luck this rally weekend um just we update in a news store here that you might be familiar with you might know yesterday dublin pride announced it was ending its partnership with rte over a controversial discussion on the live line program about transgender rights it said it was angered and disjointed by the discussion on joe duffy's show which was prompted by the plan to remove the word mother from maternity legislation but the conversation rumbled on to effectively where they the conversation they were debating which i find quite surprising they were debating whether or not people had the right to exist but anyway i'm not going to insert myself in that conversation but a lot of it was like seriously but anyway dublin pride lgbtq plus said the discussion caused untold hurt so rt hadn't spoke until now and they've reached a statement and they're backing their man if it's okay to say that because in their statement they say public discussion sometimes uncomfortable difficulty and contentious is central to rte's prescribed purpose um so it says rte is acutely aware that discussions on issues such as gender identity are deeply personal to many it's important we listen to them their families and those close to them and it's also important that we allow our audience engage with the understand uh the issues involved that will allow our audience engage with and understand the issues involved that being said though if you're going to moderate such a discussion you really need to know the ins and outs of it as well i don't think sort of well i'm just asking questions and stumbling through such a uh an important and sensitive topic where you are and some people are actually literally going to be discussing whether or not people should exist or not uh you have to be really careful in that regard but anyway that's an update in relation to that right your man's coffee cove you might be uh familiar with it good morning chad how are you good morning how are you i'm good chad where are you based we're based in fintown fintown okay so if people want a coffee in fintown whereabouts would they find you they'd see you on the way in or internally or both on the way in and on the way out from uh ball of faith uh on the way uh from glinty's we're across from if people familiar with the areas that mcgean's uh bus travel all right well that's the plug in okay chad we we're hearing about this latte tax now where the government is going to impose a charge on disposable coffee cups with a view to uh reducing our use of them and of course you know we had a litter survey out the day before pure coincidence i'm sure which stated that one of the biggest problems in this country is coffee cups disposable coffee cups so i think we all agree we don't want people throwing coffee cups on the ground okay what's uh what do you think about this chad what impact might have on your business um well there are two things two points that i want to uh discuss a little bit is the the coffee cup itself they are taxing something that is compostable it's biodegradable it's it's recyclable they're taxing something that and and i'm not going to mention other items and i don't want to give them any other ideas but they they could be taxing other things that are less earth friendly than these coffee cups so so while taxing this this one item i'm i'm really unclear of i'm not sure why they're doing that okay so i made the comparison i'll let you continue chad by the way i made the comparison of the comparison with the plastic bag levy uh so the plastic bag levy was discouraged us using plastic bags because they end up we have to we have to export a lot of them uh to china they just end up uh the they don't decompose and they're a big problem what you're saying is is we're using the same model to try and reduce the usage of something that already ticks an awful lot of the green boxes correct okay right continue with your points chad and the other that the other point is again it's it is monetary in the sense that these 20 this 20 cents tax levy if we buy a box of of coffee cups that's going to be an extra 100 euros for the box of cups so so if you are buying three to five boxes of cups a month that's an extra three to 500 euros per box well that's a that's an electricity bill that's somebody's partial rent to the place that they're that they're doing business so this this extra money that we're having to pay this tax on is we have over the last three to six months of course we've seen this cost of living skyrocket but that's also to us as as business owners yeah but the idea chad and i play devil's advocate here right the idea is not to penalize you presumably the extra 100 euro per box of coffee cups the idea is that you pass that on to the consumer and that we make lifestyle choices off the basis of that it's not to punish you it's to punish us it's to change our thinking and i i get that however how many of my customers or our customers as coffee truck coffee sellers in these coffee trailers how many of those customers are just going to drive buying so you know i forgot my to go cup or my uh my travel mug i'm just not going to stop and people might go for 20 cent listen on anything that's a tipping point there is a point a price point where we make decisions and they might not seem like big decisions and you know we all kind of think alike uh so there comes a tipping point whereby the consumer goes you know what if i add up how much i'm spending on coffee per week and put it over the year i'm going to stop doing that and as i say one does it you know a lot of people do it so that's your concern that this 20 cent gets us to that tipping point that is that is a concerned only because it's not the only thing if this was the only cost of increase that we as business owners have had over the last six months okay fine we will eat that cost that's fine we will eat that out of our profit that's fine and that's what coffee truck owners and and restaurant tours have all we've all done that over the last six months of seeing our cost increase i've spoken with several of business owners such as myself and we've all said the same thing i don't want to increase my prices i don't want to increase my prices so we eat the cost up until a certain point and then you have to move to to move that on to the consumer and it's we don't want to but we have to and and this and like i say if this 20 cent increase was the only increase that we've seen over the last six months okay fine we can you know all right we don't want to but we'll eat that cost ourselves but this yeah it's a tipping point for us too yeah and and i just wonder too if it's a little bit unfair on the small guys too because you know obviously there's a convenience because say for instance in your case you have to find the right spot you know and but also you have to go on the quality of your product as well but you'll get big multinationals and people might see the ads and i won't give them advertisement where they're selling coffee for like under a euro and clearly they can absorb these type of changes and even if they go up to one year old 19 it's not it feels unfair maybe that's the competitive world but it feels a little bit unfair on the likes of yourselves that sort of are pushing a you know a quality product is what i'm not saying the others aren't but you know where i'm coming from chat i just think it tips the scale against you guys to the bigger guys you took the word right out of my mouth Greg thank you um it's and to to that point um milk for instance you can we could we could buy very cheaper milk much cheaper milk than we do but it doesn't taste as good it doesn't froth as well it doesn't it's it's not the the right product for what we as coffee trailer and coffee truck uh owners want want to you know give to our customer so so yes there is that that tipping point where we we just can't can't afford the the cost increases and so it's got to be passed on i just think sometimes too rather than trying other things you know like say education for instance or or pointing out the fact that maybe a lot of people don't realize Chad that these cups are completely disposable you know are we add very putting adverts in papers or on the radio to say what you can do with these cups how you can a little action from you uh can you know you don't you can can make a big difference we just go straight to the tax exactly that's the first that was one thing that i thought of yesterday was that Chad me and you we are in the zone me and you are we're like one mind here what's the point is that good or bad i don't know but this is like the reason why Chad is because it's common sense stuff do you know what i mean it seems to be yeah all right okay and it seems inevitable uh but i just i just wish we could look at things in a more nuanced way and think of the competition and not the competition think of the consequences because i think we should be doing everything at this time particularly if things are going to squeeze even more to support our small and medium enterprises you know that that employ one or two or three people ones that don't come in collect the grant money and then clear off again do you know what i mean we should be doing more i think to support the likes of yourself not disadvantage you well thank you and the other thing uh that i do want to mention about this this tax is if i read it correctly that it's 20 cents for now but it could possibly go up to a euro so you mean to tell you mean that in three months time if if what they're trying to accomplish hasn't been accomplished they're going to go well let's just raise that tax to a euro and see if people stop drinking coffee on to go cups if i bring it to go cup if i bring it to go cup to uh you uh do i get it cheaper than if i get it in in the disposable cup as of right now no like is that yeah that's what i'm saying i wonder you know if that's how they're trying to influence business that if you could uh i mean obviously there's something about i'm not a huge coffee drinker uh but obviously there's something to hold in the cup and you know what i mean i think there's a bit of a lifestyle thing i don't know what it is right uh but it's great if it's keeping people like you busy but i'm just wondering then maybe how do you stop them going elsewhere or how do you maintain that trade then you say right if you bring your own cup we'll discount it maybe that's not part of your business model but maybe that's what they're trying to do it's it's a possibility and and i am in no in no way stuck in you know any ground whatsoever i'm i'm i'll move forward let's let's uh you know we're negotiable here we can we can do different things that's okay i don't wonder what the general population is like though retaining something i mean i know if i had a reusable cup it would last a day it would sit in the middle of the car uh what was left at the bottom would go off and then i would lose interest and it may be people are more organized than i am but that would that's literally how my life would play out i've had two travel cops and i've used them twice and then that's it well that's because you haven't stopped by our coffee in fintan that's right okay right i feel like i'm interviewing gareth brux again oh you have a you have a similar way of speaking chad well thank you are you from the same neck of the woods i am not no that just shows how ignorant i am isn't that that's a different accent all over the world okay listen it's uh it's uh have you you you're a long term irish chad are you or have you moved here or what's because obviously or did you work away or because you can get the tone to your accent just moved here last last august and i have not picked up the donnie gall accent yet no well listen you know yourself you'll be here 40 years and you'll still have your accent the same as irish people in america they come back from new york after 50 years and you would swear they'd just come down from uh ballet buffet or something that is true all right chad uh it's good to have you here i hope you've continued success and i really appreciate your time and i think a lot of people would have listened to you and said you know what chad's speaking about a common sense there thank you thank you for having me on great all right take care chad then thank you for engaging and listening and all that type of stuff all right 08 660 25 000 uh 08 660 25 000 right we were talking earlier on to two parents of uh junior cert students uh who their students were um their students uh got covid and uh they're going to be mocked absent for the junior cert there's no option for them to reset it we've heard from uh cancer neve kennedy she says that she's going to raise it with uh she's going to raise it with the minister uh we're going to make our own inquiries i just don't want people to think that we speak to them and then we don't follow it up because at the start of the show i says look get in touch with us you know we'll do our best with you also a good see that it's gaining momentum not necessarily off the back of our conversation but uh off the back of people speaking out because deputy pierce daugherty has been in touch to say that he's also contacting the department of education read the marking absent for any student who's tested positive for covid while doing the junior cert so that's the opposition uh making their representations we've got local counselors uh we are as well so that's just to show uh to the two parents that run with us uh that you know getting your opinion out there as they did it helps and hopefully something positive might come from it that's how it all works all right we're going to be talking about um the pressures on those providing child care uh we're going to talk about that in a moment the 90 noon show with letter kennedy credit union now offering mortgages with life cover provided at no additional cost letter kennedy credit union 9102127 shane connelly car sales has relocated to drum lawn of her dunny goll town besides offering quality used cars we have a brand new state of the art workshop for all your car service needs at shane connelly car sales we deliver straight to your door and offer excellent finance packages check out our social platforms or visit shane connelly car sales dot com attention all tractor and forklift owners dunny goll tires and dunny goll town is a leading supplier of agricultural and solid forklift tires on the northwest with a huge range available at competitive prices dunny goll tires can help you choose the correct tire for your application and we will come to you so no downtime check out dunny goll tires dot com or call 07497 21482 that's dunny goll tires dunny goll town where you'll get a great deal the lotto jackpot is an estimated 4 million euro play responsibly in store in akra at lottery dot a the national lottery it could be you the saturday stretch week seven is here every saturday throughout june visit oakfield park rafau from 11 until late this week there's live music from la pompe after six with later running trains food specials and buffers restaurant craft beers and wines and live music from different acts each week it's the perfect family day out normal gate fees apply no booking required season pass and goal pass holders enter free that's the saturday stretch at oakfield park rally fever is building in the northwest join highland radio for live coverage of the dunny goll international rally on air and online at highland radio dot com in association with voodoo venue letter kinny dunny goll's premier entertainment venue for this rally friday playing live it's sailor bill the lennon festival is delighted to announce that the rnli soapbox derby will be held in remelton on sunday the third of july at 2 p.m with a prize fund of 500 euros entry fee per cart is 25 euro and all carts must be registered by saturday the second of july by calling pg boner on 087 2899232 all right that sounds like good fun trish trish mcgloughlin is manager at the dunny goll county child care committee a very good morning trish thanks for joining us today right okay so um the bottom line is is that uh some child care facilities are going to simply close because it's it's not a business it's not financially viable for them to stay open so what is the operating environment that's leading to to people having to make that difficult decision i suppose greg a core fund it's been introduced this year so we've a transition fund going on now at the minute and people are coming out of the cova payments the core funding's coming in and it's very much based on uh qualifications so full day services with a highly qualified staff will do really well out of this they'll be very sustainable but our small maybe preschool services that have some of the best staff some of the best in terms of quality but on qualified staff you know in terms of we're talking level level seven level eight we're talking degree degree level will not benefit from the core funding their funding will remain the same but there is a freeze cap on parental fees so with inflation and everything else their their costs are rising but we are hopeful that a sustainability fund will come into place and that none of our services in dunny goll will source yeah um yeah we're very hopeful that none of them will yeah well hopefully in fingers crossed because as you say you know even if there wasn't a cap on what you can go to parents with uh there's a limit to what you can expect from people we all know the struggles absolutely so there has to be a separate fund the sustainability fund to make a lot of the providers that you're talking of sustainable is that correct well with with rising inflation and things like that there is gone and fees are set on they're not the sheer fees you know they're not they weren't set last year the year before that so the fees are set pre-covid so um yeah so there is a sustainability fund there at all times a hard to access but there is a sustainability fund and we will be making a case for any of these services that are not benefiting directly from core funding is that made uh at a committee level or an individual service provider level for core funding yeah oh no we're not for the sustainability fund you're talking of isn't yeah oh that's a department fund that's a department fund but do each does each provider have to apply for that separately okay absolutely and we'll support them in that with that a lot of paperwork and what have you to go through i imagine a lot of proving you know you're a lot of proving your your existence and how you're on sustainable but it's very doable at the same time so if that all happens then the child care services are reasonably sustainable in this county or are there other problems anybody that's full day care are very sustainable you know if they've and a lot of our services are moving towards that level seven as i keep saying it is the services on their excellent quality here in the county but it is them services that are going to suffer for people or maybe they just don't want to go back and do a level seven they don't want to go back and do a you know a four-year degree or their past that you know they've been in existence for long enough providing a really quality service and they don't want to put themselves through that pressure so from your perspective and i read an article recently which said that child care facilities are having to close because of spiraling costs are you saying that that things may not be quite as bad as that or definitely not for us in this county definitely so maybe if they're a Dublin based or something with higher overheads it's more of a problem yes and i i think nobody with core funding there's a guarantee in the department that nobody will be getting less funding everybody will be getting the same level of funding as they're getting now historically we've spoken to very highly qualified people working in child care who are on you know minimum wage or not much above that has has there a situation improved yes their situation will improve with core funding because people are qualified the more people qualified within your service the more money that's coming into the service and that is very much to bring people up to you know to professionalize the sector so people with qualifications at level seven level eight will be rewarded for such and how are we doing in terms of the availability of child care places in where we need them effectively i mean desperate in terms of the urban areas greg desperate in terms of like areas i suppose if you look at the county as a whole we definitely have spaces that are available you know we definitely look like we have a surplus but you need a two-hour ride trip before you get to work if you work leather candy okay i get you leather candy could have three full day cares opening uh bunkrana uh don't you call time bundor and head and mess with our ukrainian families in bundor now you know the rest capacity yeah so and is it the type of uh area that new businesses pop up in mary no no what is that is it this there's not enough staff or perhaps unless you're established now maybe people would look at the business model and not think it's it's worthwhile like why don't we see more child care facilities popping up i wonder very we haven't had a big capital grant for a long time again kip was the last one probably 10 years ago now at this stage maybe more um and we don't have the premises so you need a purposeful premises to operate you know you really do you need it at this stage there needs to be a size and they need to be viable um staffing is always an issue in the county we're always look but the but the paying sector as well so hopefully core funding will change that because we have plenty of people coming through the degree programs with moving on to different careers all right so looking to keep them in the sector mary crawford wonder year's manager good morning mary good morning great how are you keeping i'm very good waiting on your call this morning oh well here i am i know mary what's your take on all of this great like the like as regards the core funding and all coming in this september like for for our situation here yourself it's very positive if it goes the way that they are planning it to um we have like we cater for over 250 children a week we're quite a large set and then i go 80 percent of our team is graduate led or our graduates of degrees um and this year they're a couple of months ago we have set up um a scholarship fund as well for anyone who's still level five level six to have their degree obtained so like our service is paying for our workforce as well and either remain them once burned increase their education um with the promise end that they get you know a pay rise at the end of it so we're very we're in a very lucky situation we understand that some services aren't so much but we're not going to do yeah yeah uh some of the services wouldn't be in a position to be as generous as your service there but we do have services that we the service that had nobody at level seven that are going to put seven through the level seven in september so you know mary's a unique service there and the staff are very well looking after trish you have some reservations though about sorry i beg your pardon uh i want to ask mary sorry trish i beg your pardon you have some reservations mary yeah so the likes of the core fund it's fantastic you know so we are going to get um funded towards every room that has a graduate leader and there now we have 15 rooms so that's funding for 15 of our leaders now the core funding and the ero that's been proposed at the minute now talk so just what's the ero oh the employment regulation order okay carol is now setting up the in the joint labor committee at the minute they are setting up a minimum fee or a minimum amount which you can pay an earlier's educator so that's a hundred percent you know we've seen the pay scales our pay scales set out for september so you know we're not worried by it the only issue like like say for instance the two of them aren't marriage so they are going to give me funding for every room that has a graduate working in it but they're only giving it to me for one graduate so we currently employ i think we're we're about 50 over 50 staff working with us at the minute so i'm getting funding for 15 educators we are paying all our our pay scales based on the level of education your experience whatever you have but why are we only getting paid for one graduate in the room when my rooms all have at least two graduates in them do you know and for services now so we're saying we do a financial forecast and each year we do business forecast and SWAT analysis on our service to see how we can progress what's the threat out there what's our opportunities and moving forward so we have predicted that um there's a lot of small services out there who hasn't increased their fees in 10 years now all of a sudden do you know they cannot do under the core fund and if they don't they get standard capitation for their ecc scheme they lose their psp payment but they still have to pay a minimum fee i think it's a 24 percent increase from the minimum wage say for anyone with a level five level six and then there's the second year old now is it's a tier again for their you know their lead educators to space they have to the degree um so you know it works for us but it's not working for every service yeah all right now i think it's it's it's it's it's quite good Mary that you're putting the point of view across of those that it's going to affect rather than the same when you're in a space where you know it'll be better for you guys which i think is really nice all right thanks Mary for that insight it's it's amazing how complex it is and the complex it is and the scale of your business and everything that has to be gone through it's an eye opener to me um mary it definitely is and like you know as regards you know the graduate workforce we need graduates to come in under the service like you know when you're here in university lectures tell them graduate students once you're a level eight you know you're too good for early years they need to come in and see actually what what our educators are doing here unbelievable it's amazing you know it takes a special type of teacher to cater for the under fives never mind under threes you know them first five years are vital so you know and the part of a child's education now and i think we're seeing that aren't we i mean it's it's a continuance all right listen mary thanks for that thanks for the insight i really appreciate it and continued success there um trish thank you very much indeed as well all right lovely stuff thank you very much that's uh trish McLaughlin and mary crawford with our insights there okay oh wait six sixty twenty five thousand what's apps and texts um not gonna lie i have a few messages here that we need to get to we will in the next hour also coming up we'll have a hearing talking business matters ahead of the publication of our business podcast on the highland radio website he'll be running through what's coming up on the podcast and also telling us a bit of business news the night till noon show is brought to you by letterkenny credit union offering low-rate car loans with fast approval apply online at letterkennycu.ie or in office today have you bought your NCBI radio bingo book yet contribute to this fantastic charity and be in with a chance to win daily cash prizes of 400 euro books are now available from your local retailer it's the right price tiles and wood flooring biggest-ever sale 10 million euros worth of stock in store and ready to take home all tiles all wood flooring all batware everything slashed in price right price tiles and wood flooring island's biggest range best prices and in store to take home today sale extended until sunday for a great early season lawnmower deal visit guardly sales and hire exclusive stock is of steiga in the northwest moors streamers and head streamers full trade and service available at gortley sales and hire gortley letterkenny call 9126276 for big name menswear at great prices visit what's in menswear in letterkenny top casual brands including mishmash sixth sense tommy bow and penguin if you're going to a wedding or a big event formal wear names include rima sumo andrey and white label also a great selection of children's casual and formal wear in stock what's in menswear open seven days a week on main street letterkenny and online at what's in menswear dot com getting value on your shopping has never been more important that's why at super value we have great offers like selected fresh irish barbecue meats any three for 10 euro sangria de toro riaka saves 33 percent and get new weekly money off vouchers on the real rewards app for low prices that compete with anyone it's got to be super value enjoy alcohol responsibly are you worried about trees on your property northwest forestry services belly buffet are fully insured and have over 40 years experience in dangerous tree removal tree felling surgery and stump grinding for peace of mind call northwest forest services belly buffet for no obligation quotation on 91 32033 the door for claiming high court redress on homes built with defective blocks is closing if you've been affected you must act now to get justice don't and your claim like your house could crumble to discuss your options with our legal team at the gateway hotel bank rana on the 15th or 16th of june email defective blocks at colman legal dot ie or call 01531 3800 participation is free of charge defective blocks areland building the case for rebuilding your home good morning greg two points i would like to make this is as it relates to president michael d higgins comments he was right to make the statements regarding the disgraceful housing problems in this country his statement was not political but a moral and ethical condemnation of governments inaction about the real needs of people read the junior search it beggars believe at this this is like someone that goes into the gp with one problem and then says and by the way while i'm in here can you have a look at another problem which is more than welcome here by the way we don't limit you to just one comment on an issue but they want to say read the junior search it beggars believe at this stage that young people still have to suffer the inadequacies of the education system where their futures can be determined by one off written exams it's time a system of continuous assessment was implemented in schools in doing so all students would be treated more equally and given the opportunity to seamlessly fit into the marking systems employed at third level education if they decide to do so the idea of being marked as absent on an education certificate is totally adhorrent it is isn't it uh michael d higgins did he cross the line no he did not say it's a texture this is why we vote for our local councillors to help us but whilst they sit on a big pay check every week they aren't doing their job in helping the people so fair play to michael d higgins for speaking out says that caller okay it is 11 o'clock it's time for a news update good morning once again donal cavena thank you great good morning the EU has confirmed it will launch fresh legal proceedings against the uk in regards to the northern ireland protocol the foreign affairs minister meanwhile says reckless uk threats to breach international law have forced the EU's hand saman coveney says the decision to resume legal action is not where we want to be but it's down to a deliberate uk strategy of provocation over partnership the thonus says some of the president's remarks about housing are true and the issue is a social disaster michael d higgins yesterday described the situation as a disaster and our great great failure there has been some criticism that the president crossed the line and spoke out of turn in criticizing government policy however leo radker says michael d higgins is often outspoken and is above party politics and he won't be critical of him in any way the mica action group says as it stands the enhanced redress scheme approved by cabinet yesterday does not meet their needs housing minister darrow o brian says he believes it is fit for purpose and will help homeowners rebuild their homes and their lives michael daugherty who is puro of the action group says while elements of the new scheme are close to what's necessary it's not yet right and the focus will now be on what amendments are proposed during what will be a limited pre-legislative scrutiny process the new coher look of the dunningall municipal district says the housing crisis in dunningall is becoming very worrying particularly with the number of young people who don't have somewhere to live consular knee if kennedy was elected the chair with fellow independent consular tom conahan as her deputy consular kennedy says it will be a challenging year in the dunningall md but she believes it'll be a productive one a woman's been attacked by massed men in what police are describing as an aggravated burglary in the phantom hill area of dairy they say just before quarter past 10 last night four massed men entered a flat and forced their way into a room where they struck the female occupant in our 40s on the legs and hands with weapons including hammers she sustained minor injuries and is very distressed they made off in the direction of top of the hill along with two others who had waited outside and dunningall county council is to carry out a review of vacancy and dereliction across the county with the possibility of potential compulsory purchase orders and other measures to promote regeneration and provide housing options the review will draw on a high-level examination of vacancy in the region that was recently published by the northern and western regional assembly the issue has been raised this week by councillor Ian McGarvey who says well there's been a lot of talk there's not been much progress and it's time for the council to engage with building orders and we're back with headlines again at 12 noon thanks very much indeed donal now wellness wednesday is coming up for you it's a regular feature on a wednesday where we focus on a different element of health well-being things that hopefully might improve your life for educate or help you in some way or other and you know we are interactive by the way if there's something you want us particularly to speak about please get in touch with us and we'll see if we can fit it in this week we're going to be talking about learning to drive with a disability now I presume this could be those with a disability learning to drive for the first time but I imagine too there is when I say imagine I don't need to imagine because I know them personally people who would have to adapt the way they drive because of an illness or a condition or in their life so Raymond McDade is a driving instructor with the Irish wheelchair association their school of motoring he's going to be joining me in studio very shortly to discuss this so if you have any questions or any queries or want any advice get in touch with us right now 08 660 25000 that's your whatsapps or your texts or give us do we get more whatsapps or texts now Caroline is it 50 50 whatsapp more whatsapps on text is it 50 50 she's making a lot of gestures I don't know what they mean I'm going to say 50 50 or you can give us a call and 07 491 25000 right okay so we want you involved and I want to make sure I get your questions answered but we have a break to take stay where you are back with you in just a little over two and a half minutes the 90 noon show with letter Kenny credit union now offering my cu current account and debit mastercard bringing full banking features delivered with the same local trustworthy service of your credit union new this week in home store and more all summer duvets are half price but better hurry because when all our half price summer duvets are gone they're gone also all outdoor cushions are still half price but when all our half price outdoor cushions are gone they're definitely gone order online before 2pm for next day delivery or drop by your local home store and more home store and more a happy home are you worried about an expense or bill that you can't afford the department of social protection is here to help the additional needs payment is now available to support you with 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value on all pet foods accessories grooming and care products call in and let our staff help you spoil your pet today you will be amazed by the range of product for all pets with exceptional value on all leading brands alternatively you can browse and buy online at petworld dot ie and we will deliver to your home okay so on this wednesday it's a broad church today we're talking about driving with a disability you're driving for the first time learning to drive again in a new way and to tell us about it is mr raymond mcdayd raymond thank you very much for coming to studio and joining us great have you with us thanks great now you're a driving instructor with the irish wheelchair association school of motoring based in donagall you also work as like one liter how long have you been working in this field raymond that since oh wait i started and the previous instructor was hired so i took over then you hadn't had enough of it so you decided there's other instructor and worker can do well no the the i was i worked with a wheelchair i've been there for the last 23 years and this as you go along different situations come up driving buses was the start of it and it worked on to this driving instructor brilliant stuff now um you teach people to drive with a disability presumably perhaps maybe if they were born with a disability or if they've acquired it and they need to you know adapt how they uh drive uh before we talk more about that do you think a lot of people um with a disability could drive but choose not to maybe they haven't spoke to the likes of yourself or the irish wheelchair association and they maybe not realize you know how we can adapt vehicles or or whatever it might be yeah it's uh a lot to do with confidence people are sitting in the house and they get they have driven before and uh because they've acquired uh an injury or a disability uh what happens is they they say to themselves no i'm no good for this i won't be able to do this and uh basically what i do is if they come to me i would show them around the car put an adaption in place that would suit them and take them for a drive and once they they get the feeling that they're able to do it the the confidence starts to come back and it's amazing how quickly it comes back and uh how they haven't forgot yeah but your role your role is i think it's as much or if not more supporting as well as instructing in in many cases when people have driven previously yeah previously like it's different from uh if you're born with a disability and acquire disability you know strokes and stuff like that come into the the equation and uh that's just the loss of power and a limb right arm right leg or the opposite and uh our cares can be adapted to suit that do you think a lot of people maybe don't realize that as well yeah this is this is a problem really like people are sitting there and and saying well that's it and then they're depending on on family to drive them about and and you're like you're sitting in the house and saying well who can arrange to take me to the shop my driving career is over effectively well that's that's that's what it is and um i'm sorry some of these questions are basic because i really quite find it quite fascinating in terms of safe for instance driving and it's safe for instance i already hold a full license okay and and and something happens whereby i have to drive an adapted car maybe a hands-only vehicle do you have to sit any further tests uh Raymond or is it just a case of you adapting your skill set yeah it's no they don't have to sit another driving test no they their licenses uh they might have to get a number added to the license uh to uh to mirror the adaption on the car you know it's just a number on the back of their license yeah but uh apart from that i've just uh uh adapt the car and they can get their own car adapted but usually they'll need an automatic transmission to to uh to go forward i was having the conversation early today i think stick shift cars are between going to hybrid and automatic and electric sorry um you know stick shift cars are probably going to be a thing of the past in the very near future of the truth yeah that's that's true yes it's got even trucks they have to specify uh at the one of the manual changes set of it i think too what a really useful thing that you do Raymond as well is before people decide what they're going to do you can give an honest and independent assessment of someone's driving even say making the appropriate adaptions you sitting on with them and saying look no you can drive or you know might need a little bit of extra practice but you can do this so you can let people know can you whether or not it's within the capability to drive again or to drive for the first time yeah the the first thing we do is do a driving assessment and that right away you can you can nearly tell from the from the first visit know what what's needed and if the person's able to continue or not um i guess two people come in with this we'll say the same say a stroke for instance um one might be able to drive another might not it's see how they are mentally as well as physically you know and someone might go well uh my stroke is affecting the right side of my body i used to use the right leg to accelerate and brake so i can't drive you're saying hold on your second i would say that i can bring down left foot accelerator and you you work with your left foot yeah and it does take a lot of practice for that one because your mind's already set for the clutch on your left you know and it takes a bit of getting used to but it's doable that's the thing it's doable if train many ones like that i would say you have a lot of stories too of people who you know we're in the group we talked about earlier where uh something happened to them and they says you know i'm house ban now that's it that's my driving finished they had a chat with you maybe had a go and adapted car and got their independence back uh i'd say you've dealt with quite a few people like that raiment yeah just recently they're a young fella from any shown area and uh he confided to each year and uh he uh came out and actually the very the day of the assessment his parents were looking out the window and surprised to see him driving out the gate this says they never get back and you know but uh after so much training you know after it was about 18 to 20 lessons we had he passed his driving test there brilliant three weeks ago and that he was a first time driver first time driver they're almost the best yeah the the the older type the uh the bad habits are still there okay um so talk to us a little bit about some some of the adaptations that can be made to cars because i think you know say let's say we presume the easiest thing would be an automatic and even in the case whereby i think uh you know it's probably easy to work out how hand controls could work how it could be adapted but what other adaptations are common to assist people getting back behind the wheel behind the wheel for the first time raiment yeah there's different types of uh adaptations there's a with the quality infrared system it's a system that's it's plumbed into the computer we'll see in the car and uh we would use a for instance there's a device called the lollipop believe it or not it just looks like a lollipop there are buttons on it for indicators wipers uh the horn uh dipping the lights putting on the wipers no secondary controls and uh it looks very complicated at the start but once these people get to get get a grip on it and they're determined to do it that's one way that you don't have all you have to do is steer the car with the one hand maybe maybe they're using hand controls on the other side not using their feet at all like yeah it's uh we can bring down a left foot accelerator like i've said earlier there just an ordinary swivel ball on the steering wheel just just for maneuverability around right about some and i think too obviously with the advances in technology um we're able to do things now that we probably weren't able to do you know not so long ago slow go that's correct yeah it was very basic at one stage but as we go on the technology's catching up rabbit you yeah brilliant so let's presume then that you know i think rabie the starting point would need to be able to you need to be able to afford to run a car and have a car right yeah i think that's you know like your tax and insurance all the usual stuff in terms of then adapting a vehicle or you know getting instruction from you Raymond how expensive uh is that normally is if there's an average it depends on people's needs of course but yeah depending on the needs uh i'll say the infrared system it's it depends who you go to i wouldn't be too uh or fair was the was the prices you know but uh it can go go to thousands depending on the on the adaption you need that's for the very sophisticated sophisticated systems you know uh to change the pedals will say uh they just take out the pedal box put on a different one it wouldn't be as expensive could go up into eight or nine hundred five euros depends on the depends on the people you use you know different places you go with different prices first of all to get into our system we have to have to do the assessment and the assessment uh in our uh situation and that's the average wheelchair is 170 euros to start off i know that sounds expensive but when it goes to the lessons and the lessons are 30 euros a lesson which which makes it we try to keep the price down do you make it probably slightly below the market sort of rate for lessons yeah but below the market rate and uh we try to keep it as affordable affordable as we can you know so the the the the the message here too though is getting assessment and the assessment is also for people that have never driven before as well is that correct absolutely first timers and uh people who've acquired a disability the first timers are usually people who are born with a situation and are you the only show in town or are there a team of you like i'm thinking what's the waiting time for instance if someone was listening and thought you know what i might spend 170 for an assessment it could be the it could be you know a really exciting journey i'm on um is it does it take a long time to to sort of go through the process not really what you you can uh you have to get an application for me get it online there on the awa website um you've got it downloaded because you fill in the first couple of pages and the the back two pages for the gpd filling or the consultant whichever and uh fill that in uh the gps decide it and stamp it right so really what it is is to make sure that your medical professional believes that you're uh you're able to just begin this process i think don't think that's unreasonable no it's and then uh what happens and you post it off to clean our place down and our headquarters down and clean and kind of go there the address is on the on the forum it's on there's the forum there it's uh um you don't send any money you just send the send the form and it goes back to being a file and when i get the file i bring you without a week there about and uh as quick as i can get it because i'm the only show in town for this particular situation you know at the moment yeah okay and you have a lot of people over the course of the year i'm sure though uh ramin you help a lot of people yeah uh but can't well about it's usually i between about maybe five or six a week there really okay because of the you know it takes time to to go through the patience you you have to be very patient with the program oh yes it's uh it's uh it's very you have to be extra patient you know it's takes a little bit longer no not that much all right call us as the lollipop was fitted in my son's car it was 2,400 euro before that but a second hand one could be got for 1,200 euro so there are options there options are right yeah it's it's it depends on the vehicle to there's different yeah uh different stuff different uh adaptions yeah and do we know as i say i know your focus is on instruction but do we know if there's any supports available from the state to sort of help people with any of these costs well the in 2013 the uh there there was a the annotation granted yeah i've talked about this quite a bit it was uh 5,020 euros and 20 cents at that time and they cut it off in 2013 yeah and uh this promise to replace it oh yeah it was a temporary matter all right yeah but today we've talked about here and there and sneaked it in but we might have to make another inquiry to see what's going on there well listen Raymond it's really it's been it's been fascinating to get an insight the the people if they want more information either ring the Irish wheelchair association or go on to their website uh and that's where they can get more info before we talk about this family fun day because we'll give that a plug is there anything on the issue of the the driving instructing that you wish to mention that we didn't talk about uh Raymond uh like uh no just the driver instructed now you have to go through your raven test again just to start it off and then uh we get trained up uh Barry Reed down at Lowell there he took me up to do the assessments uh very knowledge of measurement and uh we uh we get on very well and still do yeah but uh it takes a good bit of training it's not an easy path and it requires a lot of effort and with your assessment somebody you're assessing the minute the step out of the care yes i get and to come into the building for instance and you're watching and looking to see what what but you are working with an awful lot of people so a lot of people you know fly through that assessment and okay this has been fascinating Raymond uh by the way the Irish wheelchair association if you wish to support them there's a family fun day new and vintage uh auto show cars and tractors uh it's on the sunday the 26th of june everyone's welcome the spot price is on the day entertainment is by Paul McCahill it starts at 1 p.m. behind the clan re hotel in letter kennies so a great spot there plenty of space plenty of fun all right okay um all proceeds as i mentioned go to the irish wheel chair are you a vintage car owner Raymond oh no i'm not notice well it's hope you see that my car is vintage i was going to say i was looking at some of these cars on the front of it i don't think you're right i'm better than i'm better than a lot of cars out of the road right now but listen people love their cars and they're very proud uh okay you can contact uh there's come contact numbers here by the way if you want to uh uh get involved uh a caller says i had driving lessons with Raymond he's so patient it was a great experience i now drive a drive from wheelchair vehicle they are very common now it's essential if you live in Donogholt have your own transport although it is expensive i think lots more disabled people could be driving if they were made aware of the options available maybe through ot's etc and we're trying to do our bit here Greg if you have an automatic Volkswagen with adaptive cruise control you need very little adaptation on your car when you set it up a finger is all you need honestly it does the braking and acceleration for you Raymond has the patience of a saint says another i was in a bad accident 16 years ago and he's helping me get my confidence back and that's the type of work you do and that's why i said right sort of from the beginning i think you're as uh it's as much support as training yeah it is yeah uh listen i want to know if you have to have passed your theory test before going to Raymond i think that would be prudent anyway wouldn't you have to have your provisional impairment with you yeah i don't think that's on the reasonable especially if you're going to get someone in behind the wheel of the vehicle as well i can't put the man unless they have a visual relation and i think having a you know it's a nice achievement to have that in any case okay listen Raymond it's been lovely having you in thank you very much indeed uh and we'll mention that uh track your show a little bit that auto show a little bit closer to the time as well but thank you so much for coming in it's been that lovely having you on thanks the 90 noon show is brought to you by letterkenny credit union with monster loans available up to 60 000 euro for all occasions visit letterkennycu.ie the train calling at platform three is the 1959 service to cork calling at charville malo and maria in seat 32a starts chemo next month we don't always know who's at risk from covid 19 and other viruses but we do know how to protect them keep hands clean and wear a mask let fresh air in get vaccinated and stay at home if you are unwell from the hsc for us all zilch not a diddly squat if you cut savings that's about as much interest as you're earning and inflation's eating into the value too have you considered investing to potentially grow your money at bank of arland we know you've worked hard for your money and with our expert support it can work harder for you so don't rest it invest it visit bank of arland.com explore investing bank of arland begin terms and conditions apply bank of arland is the tide agent of new arland assurance company plc trading his bank of arland life for life assurance and pensions business members of bank of arland group bank of arland trading his bank of arland insurance and investments is regulated by the central bank of arland the final o'neill sportswear massive warehouse clearance starts at 9 a.m on friday 17th of june and ends sunday 19th of june for the final time county gea jerseys leisure wear including t-shirts tracksuit bottoms half zips hoodies and jackets all reduced to clear the sale will take place at o'neill sportswear warehouse of the melmond roadstraw band due to continued expansion once and higher in that county have a vacancy for a mechanic and plant fitter work will include maintenance and repair of plant higher tools and equipment experience with diesel petrol and electrical machinery will be important a full driver's license and basic computer knowledge is essential this position is full-time and offers a competitive salary to apply send your cv to jobs at whatsonhire.ie come on down to the annual fin valley show on russle brothers farm killy gordon this saturday 18th of june with the usual dog home industries whole tree sheep cattle horse and pony classes and fast and furious donkey derby with trade stands show and shine tractor competition live music from david james and children's entertainment it's sure to be a family fun day at the fin valley show this ad is sponsored by killpatrick brothers contracting for all your agri needs moin raking billy gps so in slurry arm and you're spreading call ray or javion 087 212 1760 okay a lot of you backing president michael d higgins via text uh good morning of course president higgins was more than right to address housing problems and a lack of housing it's a pity some of our tds and cancers are not as forthcoming and other michael d higgins is sitting in a large house himself since he went into office and he could have homeless people move in there so another person may be not quite as keen on what he has to say right i lived in germany for the greater part of this year there is a great system in place where there are recycling facilities for plastic bottles it's called the pee fan system and you get 25 cent back per recycled bottle you get a voucher for the shop you deposited them in little is one of them as a student it was a great way to save a little bit on your shopping especially after a night out okay uh all right that's that makes sense i mean we'd be out collecting plastic bottles if we'd get 20 25 cent per bottle i mean can you imagine you know what for 20 bottles and you get five five euro off your bill it's not insignificant uh good morning greg i'm delighted to uh see president michael d higgins speaking out so passionately about the national disaster of the lack of housing for our citizens in this country shame on our politicians and civil servants on the policies that they have followed for the past 10 years i've a member of my own families living in rented accommodation in letter kenny for the past years paying 700 euro a month with the stroke of a pen their rent will be going up by 400 euro a month from first from the first of september and to be quite honest the house falls far short of housing for an expected new baby shame on the greed raging through our country and well done to anyone like michael d who calls out the lack of proper policy unfair access to affordable and decent housing for all people uh yeah indeed and you know i think if we're going to talk about getting the housing right we have to get it right for landlords as well because you know a lot of people said stop it i'm not going to be a landlord i'm going to do airbnb or i'm going to do this that on the other uh because they get all the blame if the increase the rent now obviously some of it is is just seeing how much you can make but i think that has to be part of the conversation as well like why did so many people uh with houses that they were renting decide to stop long-term renting and move to airbnb or sell the house uh too little too late for the president and speaking out about the housing crisis he stood by this last few years and said nothing about the taxes that were introduced year after year on working people he never stood up for the water charges or fought the household tax uh hi greg i think the way things are going 12 euro will be a pittance in four years time um another i'm always suspicious about this government's announcement why not just make the minimum wage 12 euro per hour is this finnegales way of abolishing the compulsory minimum wage with a recommended living wage hence lowering workers wages now if it's in defense of the government i think the minimum wage right the minimum this is like what is the bare minimum i can pay someone for this job whereas a living wage reflects the cost of living so if you have a living wage that perhaps would be more in harmony with inflation for example because a living wage on it becomes a living wage if it increases with the cost of living so i presume that's why they're moving in that direction whereas a minimum wage doesn't really tell us much does it that's just the least an employer can pay uh to uh the least an employer can pay to fill a position why do we have president if a td can say the president needs to get back in his box why are we paying for a figure head that much that must remain silent have your say on our social polls i just think you know these ministers and government members that are uh throwing uh shade at the president that should put their names to their comments do you know what's no point speaking to a journalist on the quiet i can tell you right now and this is the gods on his truth if a minister or an elected representative wanted to criticism uh criticize michael d higgins to me to say on the radio and i couldn't mention their names i'd tell them to go and jump as if i'm going to be their mouthpiece because they want uh because they wouldn't but i wasn't but it didn't happen but i wouldn't i would say well tell them yourself you know come on and say it i'm not i'm not your spokesperson so you can take digs anonymously anyway the president's 100 right it's about time something was done about the housing crisis so many people from broken marriages now have nowhere to go the country is a disaster believes that caller uh hi gregg could you please ask uh michael darty why can't we go back to doblin and sit in the motorway for however long it takes and stop the talking that has to be done at the right time you know and it has to be done at the right way like you know there are those that tried to do that for other reasons and if it's not organized right it ends up actually you're going backwards if you go to doblin you have to make sure that you go into doblin like the last time and it has a huge impact and it makes a big difference because otherwise it actually can take away from your campaign the uh the the campaign as it relates to fuel prices it fell flat right because they said right we're going to do this and we're going to do that calm down people didn't go down they tried to blockade stuff and the guard just says no problem if you don't move we're going to find you every hour and and put points on the license to the point whereby they'd be off the road in a day right okay so if you're going to do something like the the the the micro campaigners did the last time it has to be done right and at the right time in the right right way that progresses the campaign rather than it's amazing the momentum can be lost if you do something like that uh wrong and the one thing I'll say about the micro campaign is very well organized uh I think what they're doing they did down in doblin yesterday just the right thing at the right time uh that couldn't be ignored by the media down there didn't disrupt anyone but made really uh good and clear points and I think when the time is right to pull the trigger they'll know exactly what to do and how to do it they've got it right so far in terms of the PR and how that's been handled uh behind the scenes and in front of the scenes has been excellent it's uh for anyone wishing to campaign kind of that's how you do it so we'll say I just don't think right let's all go to Dublin you know how many would be able to turn down how how many would go down how many would get involved in the blocking of motorways how would that be policed what would be the the upshot of it all of those things have to be factored in uh hi greg this uh be of a government can get money for everything for everything but can't sort us hi greg can you ask is the six thousand seven thousand testing fees done away with or do we still have to pay I would wait until the process has been gone through we'll know this time next month what's what um I think so we'll see has anyone seen Declan Bono since Donogorff's loss at the weekend disappointing he didn't say a few words since and after the match I mean there's a bit of wounds licking going on I'd say for the whole team they're disappointed you know uh they've put it all in there and um obviously um it didn't work out uh Chad has the nicest hot coffee on the road uh in Fintan thanks Chad I hope Chad you're not texting in I'm only joking greg 20 cents off bringing your own cup three ten for a large coffee or the place is five for a large coffee that is right 20 cents off bringing your own cup three ten for a large coffee or the place is five all right I don't know what that means I'm not a big coffee buyer I'll drink it if it's bought for me um but I don't know the ins and outs of that text sorry delighted to see our president take a proactive role no politician should be annoyed with his comments it is their duty to sort these things out yeah indeed okay I take your point there um good morning greg I have a lumbar fracture on my spine the doctor made an appointment for me in hospital three weeks ago and checked yesterday to see where I was on the list I know you passed out when I was told how long the person has a lumbar fracture on their spine doctor's made an appointment you probably think right okay hopefully mid-july four years four years before they'd be seen it's a serious problem what's wrong with the hospital system they say it's a it's a good question all right okay I will take a break here stay right where you are back with more after the the nine till noon show is brought to you by letter kenny credit union offering low-rate car loans with fast approval apply 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contains this bugula husk always read the label fiber gel fiber twos is a medical device always read the instructions okay you're very welcome back to the nine till noon show here on highland radio and it is time for this business matters in association with the faculty of business and atu dunnegall the part-time level eight honors degree in business is delivered through a mix of online and face-to-face lectures email exec ed business at lyit.ie that's ex ec ed business at lyit.ie or call 9186206 and we're welcome into studio uh the presenter of hot and radios business matters podcast it is kieran o'Donnell hi kieran good morning great good to have you and what's the crack all good on yourself same ass same ass you thought it'd be shipped there a little ad breaker oh just they didn't bring me water when i asked for it and uh and well there you have a short temperature and we respect what happened huh karyl was offering you glasses is that because it's important for your eyes not to hold the water it's because i didn't put my cup in the dishwasher it's a home away it's a home away from home like you know all right um kieran let's talk about the arigal arts festival because another bumper program has been released yes Greg the program of events for the 2022 arigal arts festival took place on saturday at angredan theater here in letter kimmy so this is a 35th year of the festival which is hard to believe and it's most well it's primarily a celebration of our vibrant culture there is also a significant economic return through the festival it's good to see it back do you load the dishwasher oh do you have a dishwasher i do load the dishwasher like i mean i think if you leave cups close to the dishwasher i think you've you know you've met hot you know i wouldn't be great at emptying it but if if it's the last resort at all but i'm very good at loading it up but if i leave the two cups beside the dishwasher do you think it's fair that that what i was subjected to there now you probably should have wise and dry the cups but the lights were on i was under the impression the dishwasher was mid-cycle now you know what happens you open the door you get splashed there's no saying Greg when you spin and you're losing so i i think i was a bit harsh that's all anyway i'll know for again i'll put it in the dishwasher and so you don't like emptying the dishwasher that would be a fan though okay uh 08 660 25 000 do you think Kearnal Donald should empty the dishwasher get your calls into us right now okay uh we talked about uh did we the the crowdfunding is this the the crowdfunding or what's the funding here for sleeve league distilleries yeah it's an oral development Greg on an ongoing story i suppose uh Donnie Goss Spurris producer sleeve league distilleries is looking to raise two million euro through crowdfunding to boost to boost its production capacity so as part of a new equity around Steve the Distilleries will launch a crowdcube campaign on monday that's June the 20th which will see production being carried 24 7 and its input increasing from 440 000 liters to 600 000 liters per annum so back in 2020 and that's what is what you're referring to Greg the owners of sleeve league distillery James and mario dori raised 2.3 million pounds through crowdcube father distillery and our draft which is currently on the construction should be nearly there as far as no cost of 10 million euro right really significant development okay um right now some donnie gall projects have been shortlisted yeah three worthy regeneration and refurbishment projects refurbishment projects in donnie gall have been shortlisted for the 2022 or a public choice awards the remelton historic towns initiative killy begs regeneration strategy and action plan and salt pans college and wrath maul are up for a public vote alongside 20 other plans so the winners of those greg will be announced on thursday june the 23rd and we wish them well in their endeavors there some positive news unemployment at cita yeah cita and letter kinny is to increase its workforce by growing a technical team by 20 cita is the global leader in technologies enabling safe and seamless global travel and they are searching for people who have a passion for innovation and the technical skills to build the next generation of digital products that will transform the journeys of millions of passengers across the world so the company will hold a tech open night at australia kenny offices on thursday the 23rd of june between 5 30 and 9 p.m. and you have to register online i came down a number of ways through cita's social media platforms donnie gall invest as well there are plenty of links there but a good opportunity for people who are looking to either upscale relocate or get an insight into what life is like at cita yeah and our traveling is made much more simple and seamless and we don't even know why but it's companies like this that are doing the groundwork and getting their heads together the only good thing is most you know the aviation sector as we know has just taken a massive bounce maybe a bounce that people didn't see being so high so soon so obviously there's a demand then for the services that cita provide rightio let us talk now about an award for beautiful glenn column kill yeah congratulations to glenn column kill on winning a national dot ie digital town award the southwest donnie gall towns building a digital cultural infrastructure for our community project to come top prize in the digital tourism category and that was at the annual award ceremony and the script nine thousand euro which will be spent in the local area so the dot ie digital town awards were established in 2021 by dot ie and they are the managers of erlin's trusted online dot ie address okay rightio uh we'll take a quick break and then we'll come back with what's coming up on this week's podcast how does that sound you're the boss great all right we'll be fully up to date after these the nine till noon show with letter kenny credit union is your bank leaving town letter kenny credit union is now offering mycu current account and debit mastercard bringing full banking features with no appointment necessary to open your account beat that cost of brexit with no customs charges do you need a uk address for your limited company or personal use space hub in dairy can provide you with your own mailbox have your post and parcels delivered to space hub and collected your convenience there's brand new 20 foot shipping containers now in stock ideal for all your storage needs at our spring town and comore depots find us on facebook at spacehubdairy.com or call 04871 878 077 for more details this father's day choose dulcian cabana gucci cool water diesel one million Jean-Paul Gautier choose mcgee's chemist main street letter kenny great gifts for great dads click mcgee's dot ie due to continued expansion mcquee's tires railway streets are seeking to recruit 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modern and manufactured here in the northwest any size shape or color call or check out our website plantation shutters ireland also on facebook and instagram higgardy's auto body repairs and that are kenny have been keeping cars on the road across the northwest for the past 50 years higgardy's are the only forward approved body shop in the northwest would repair all makes and models painless dent removal when screen replacement and restoration work higgardy's even mix their own paint approved by most insurance companies and certified steel standards ireland that's higgardy's auto body letter kenny for all vehicle repairs see higgardy's dot com business matters in association with the faculty of business and atu dunnegall the part-time level eight honors degree in business is delivered through a mix of online and face-to-face lectures email exec ed business at lyit.ie that's ex ec ed business at lyit.ie or call 9186206 all right kieran talk to me about this week's podcast yes greg my guest this week is former managing editor of the dairy journal pat mcgirt pat as we know as a well-known commentator has written a number of books and is columnist with the dilly mur and the letter kenny leader after attending letter kenny regional technical college he began his career in journalism with the dairy people in june 1974 he moved to rte in 1979 before becoming the editor of the dairy journal in 1981 at the age of 27 when newspaper sales were at their peak the dairy journal group recorded an annual profit of around five million pounds so on this clip pat recalls that that time when newspapers were king the freddy journal said 28 000 add a one pound something but sit just stick to a pound that's 28 000 pound right away and if tuesday was selling say 27 000 26 000 had a pound ago that's 26 so 28 and 26 they're yearning 54 000 a week before you even start now the freddy could have 50 60 70 000 pounds worth of advertised on it on a good week that the tuesday could have had 20 30 000 on a good week so work got out and at one stage remember when now the mccarrots had told the paper but and we were locked in with the newsletter and belfast but the journal still wasn't me we had five million pound profit or remember one year so you said newspapers were king absolutely that that was no wonder in the local news papers were sort of enticed by the you know the big multinational the dilly murder and the egregious and the pen they bought all bought up local newspapers because they were so lucrative in terms of revenue and i suppose kiran it's interesting to do it's the future isn't it like what what does the future hold it's in terms of newspapers place and it varies from publication to publication this is the same could be said of all media really in the world going forward yeah suppose look newspaper sales and they've been impacted by a number of factors greg the the last recession at the end of the oddies the the the large increase in the very swift move you head on to the side of that mug the the soft change across to social media everyone visualized the way newspaper news stations and radio stations do their work the way newspapers do their work now so the whole thing has changed and there's most one factor here the the the Reuters report on this morning there and obviously they're making a bit news and about the Ireland and as a massive appetite for news and the the survey they're able to say that we're we trust the news sources that I have issues with that survey in that uh in in that that survey does not allow people in Donegal to say that they would trust Highland radio yeah what it does is it's and it's set up to say that they trust a national newspaper or a national radio station what it does not take into account is that most people most people listen to radio that isn't RTE but anyway that's by the by but I take your point and and it's general overall finding I suppose and the only thing just to add was the only thing that certainly didn't do newspaper sales any favours was the fact that when the pandemic came people just couldn't go to work or the shop and buy the paper Greg you know radio listen Kieran thanks very much for that we'll look forward to seeing you next week 100% all right take care of yourself by the way if people want to podcast the business matters podcast they can do so by going to our website it's also available on Spotify right tunes or if you wish to listen to it it's broadcast on Sunday evening after the six o'clock news now if anyone is looking to get in touch with the show they can do what Vanoula did just stick your head in or alternatively how do they go about doing so yeah just drop me an email please all right listen take care of yourself thanks very much and I really do appreciate it all right so we asked you on our social media President Higgins has called the housing crisis a disaster and our great great failure do you think you crossed the line on Twitter 15% of you said he had 85% no on Instagram it was 17% believe you had 83% thought no now Dr Laura Kahilain is a senior lecturer in law at the University of Limerick and joins us on the program now thanks for your time Laura I really appreciate it no worries okay so some people might have forgotten that President Michael D Higgins is quite vocal we haven't heard from him for quite some time just what is the sort of significance of him speaking out in this fashion well it's a bit of a tricky one and as you say I mean questions about the I suppose the appropriateness of his comments have come up in the past and actually there there was I think a smaller controversy a couple of weeks ago about similar types of comments as well and the tricky thing here is that the office of the president has changed so I mean in the early days it certainly was seen as a very traditional a very conservative office but since Mary Robinson's time it certainly has changed and she would have seen herself as being a sort of a voice for the people and she would say you know am I not entitled to represent the people's views and you know Mary McElise I think carried that on and Michael D Higgins even more so but there are difficulties here because the office of the president is intended to be above politics and that is because they have certain duties certain constitutional duties which means that they can't conflict with the government and the constitution does clearly set it up so that there won't be conflicts between the presidency and the government so that's where this gets a little bit tricky if and if the president is seen to be interfering with government policy then that is problematic but is he not really trying to ride two horses here and I'm not being in any way disrespectful to him but I presume he has to sign off on legislation so there I'm not sure if there's a president in that regard but he's criticising legislation which all decisions come from which he himself has endorsed with his signature and that is the really tricky one so that's one of the major roles under Article 26 of the constitution is that the president must either sign the piece of legislation or send it to the Supreme Court if there's any question that it might be unconstitutional and that is a major role it's not something that's exercised very often that they do send it on but it is a very important role that the president exercises and that is one of the main reasons that they are seen as being neutral and that they don't take positions on things like this because obviously then there might be an appearance of bias when it comes to issues around legislation afterwards. Yeah because people will hear his words and say you know fair play Michael D Higgins for speaking out but he eventually say for instance might sign off on new legislation to deal with the defective block crisis and the public might be saying this and you know you're our last defender here so as I say I'm not questioning his motive for me personally I just think there's a he could actually you know rather than just saying stuff there's an opportunity for him to maybe make it a real stand but he's chosen not to and this looks good but in effect what does it do? Well the worrying thing is I mean okay it's all very well and good when these are comments that we agree with and you know we're happy that he's saying these things where a problem will come in is where a future president be at this one or some other president might decide to take things a little bit further and start saying more controversial things and that's where it does actually become quite dangerous and that's where you can have a conflict between the presidency and the government or you can have people saying well hang on a second this isn't representative of my views and that's why the role of the president is not set up in that way they're not supposed to be you know expressing these sorts of views and so that's where the danger is and it's a slippery slope you know when you see presidents coming very close to the line and saying these sorts of things that in future I mean god forbid we have a sort of Trump-like president who starts saying very worrying things and that's where it becomes very difficult. I mean the government will take this on the chin and the ministers will will speak out behind journalists but I mean let's just say hypothetically they wanted to take a stand on this issue or perhaps maybe his next series of comments what potentially could happen there if the government says hold on you're overstepping your line here you know you work on the you perform your duties on the advice of the government you're not there to criticize it what mechanisms are there to resolve a situation like that if it would ever come to pass? Well not very many I mean obviously behind closed doors I'm sure there will be conversations had I mean it's part of the thesis duty to keep the president informed of you know legislation and upcoming policies so I'm sure they will be having conversations and this potentially will arise but in terms of formal mechanisms I mean the only thing you can do is to remove the president but that is a major undertaking which I can't imagine would ever be attempted on the basis of something like speaking out so I would imagine it will be conversations behind closed doors more than anything else. It'll be very interesting to see what else he chooses to weigh in weigh in on Dr Laura Callaghan thank you very much for your time this morning. I really appreciate it have a great day Laura is a senior lecturer in law at University of Limerick right we also asked you on our social media children who have studied hard and have tested positive for COVID a being marked as absent rather than being given an alternative option to sit the junior cert exams do you agree with this on Twitter 28.6% of you do so 71.4% of you believe that what is happening at the moment is wrong we asked the same question on Instagram I wonder is it a slightly different demographic on that social demographic on that social media platform well overwhelmingly 93% of you believe that marking students who test positive for COVID as absent is unfair 93% of you believe that that is unfair I mean but people missed exams for other reasons too though is it the same if you broke an ankle or something or you weren't able to go or I don't know what the story is there read the coffee cup tax guy Chad he just hit the nail on the head 100% a box extra for the government's pockets it's nothing to do with environmental damage it's a stealth tax now the one thing I'd say about that though let's just suppose right that Chad buys the cups adds 100 euro onto his bill he passes that onto the customer and that we continue to buy coffee but our habits are changed and that we buy we bring our own cups okay so he still does the same amount of business but doesn't have to buy as many cups that's perhaps the ideal situation I think we all feel that that probably is not the way it would play out but the caller goes on to say if the government was serious about litter issues they charge a euro cup to purchase the cup and if you bring it back to the place of purchase they'll refund the euro then they'll have no litter otherwise it's just another way of them getting revenue for themselves yes it would cost you a euro to dump that out on the road it's interesting I don't know either as consumers if we'd get on board with that but you know what it seems to be a lot of people out there the common sense people which are our listeners that are coming up with more practical solutions that would you know encourage people to stop littering but not tax them into stopping littering I just wish we could have a people's court where a lot of these decisions were made let us have our say let us come up with some policies and see how we get on because as I say that's one simple text there with not only a criticism of what's been proposed but a logical alternative all right thank you everyone for watching the show for listening to the show for texting calling all your interactions it's really really