Around Ireland: LITTLE SCHOOL OF HORRORS

By Stephen McKinley

A Castleisland school principal has called on the taoiseach to visit her school to see for himself the horrific conditions endured by the pupils and staff.

Crumbling walls, mold on ceilings, poor water quality and outbreaks of head lice make the school almost uninhabitable, principal Margaret Walsh told the Kerryman newspaper.

“There are so many problems, but the lack of space is certainly one of the biggest,” she said. “We were only built as a two-teacher school, but we now have three full-time teaching staff, as well as some part-time staff.

Unfortunately, the lack of space often means that they have to take their classes in what is basically a storage room.”

Worst of all, Walsh said, was the quality of the drinking water.

“We had to send around a circular warning the children not to drink it. Pupils and staff have no available drinking water; we can’t keep boiling it every time one of the children wants a drink,” she said.

GRIM FIND

Cork pupils were at the center of another grim discovery — an outbreak of tuberculosis, reports the Corkman newspaper.

Pupils in Kanturk were tested recently, but school principal Tony Lee said that the TB strain was “highly uninfectious and hasn’t been airborne, which is the major way in which this disease is spread.”

Asked the reaction of students to the news, Lee said: “I felt their parents would be more taken aback because to us tuberculosis would have a big significance.”

TAKE IT OR . . .

The Papal nuncio, Archbishop Giuseppe Lazzarotto, has told protesting priests from the Killala diocese that the appointment of their new bishop is a matter for the pope and emphasized “the importance of accepting with faith and joy whomsoever the Holy Father chooses to send” to them, the Irish Times has reported.

Last June, the priests met with the nuncio to express their disappointment at a lack of consultation with them about who should be their new bishop.

It is expected the nuncio will shortly announce who is to succeed Dr. Thomas Finnegan as bishop of Killala. The Killala priests nominated Fr. Kevin Loftus, parish priest at Easkey, as their sole choice for bishop, though they were entitled to put forward three names. Lazzarotto criticized the move, saying that it must have place a “terrible burden” on Loftus. He said such a man, if selected, would be beholden to those who supported him and could lose his freedom as bishop.

It was felt he was referring in part to priests in Killala who have made no secret of their unhappiness with the conduct of church affairs. It was understood the Nuncio was referring to Fr. Kevin Hegarty and Fr. Brendan Hoban, editor and associate editor of CTide magazine. Described as “a review from the margins” the magazine has been unequivocal in its criticisms of Catholic Church leadership in recent years. Both priests support Father Loftus’s nomination.

FARMERS’ POT SWEETENED

More than 8,000 farmers and landowners holding out against the compulsory purchase of their land for the stalled national roads plan have been offered an extra _200 million compensation.

The offer includes _4,000 an acre, worth an estimated _80 million, on top of improved compensation for lost land. The Irish Farmers Association has said the offer brings the cost of buying the land to build highways from _400 million to _600 million.

The IFA has said 25,000 acres may be involved, with 8,000 farmers each handing over an average of just over three acres and getting _75,000, an increase of _8,000 an acre on the previous offer.

The National Roads Authority had previously calculated total compensation for land acquisition would be _400 million over the 2000-2006 lifetime of the plan.

GOLDEN DREAMS

A gold necklace, one of two similar artifacts discovered two weeks ago on a beach in County Mayo, is being examined by the National Museum.

The Irish Times reported that a Cork businessman was walking on a beach during low tide when he found two gold torcs, each approximately 3 1/2 inches in diameter, possibly more than 3,000 years old.

The businessman returned to Cork with one of the torcs and left the other one in Mayo.

The businessman has asked for his identity to be kept secret. Details of the location of the find are being withheld by the National Museum.

Under the 1994 National Monuments Act, such finds automatically become the property of the State. The measure makes provision for a reward to be paid both to the finder of a valuable object and to the landowner on whose land it is discovered. After the discovery of the Derrynaflan hoard in County Tipperary in 1990, the finder and the landowner received just _25,000 each, although the objects recovered included a silver chalice and paten with gold and amber inlay, a bronze ladle and bronze basin.

DRINK FREE

Cookstown in Tyrone will extend its successful alcohol-free zone beyond the town limits to outlying villages, according to the Tyrone Courier.

The villages of Stewartstown and Moneymore are next on the town council’s list.

Mark Kelso, the Council’s Chief Environmental Health Officer, said the by-laws were currently being revised and adopted and said he hoped they would be in operation in the two villages within weeks.

“At present the bylaws prohibit the consumption of alcohol in Cookstown’s public places. However, the council and police have noticed two hotspots, in Moneymore and Stewartstown, and after much consultation, it has been agreed to extend the bylaws to cover these villages,” Kelso said.

Inspector Paul Douglas of the Cookstown Police Service of Northern Ireland agreed.

“It can create a problem at weekends with people leaving public houses with alcohol and we continually try to encourage pub owners to ensure that alcohol is taken off customers before they exit their premises,” Douglas said. He added that once persons were allowed on to the streets with alcohol, it tended to result in attacks, assaults and even criminal damage.

COURTING DISASTER

Peter Roohan was back in court in Enniskillen last week, this time for a traffic offense — Roohan has been learning to drive at the age of 67.

But Judge Brian McElholm was exasperated with Roohan’s refusal — or inability — to take the court proceedings seriously.

When his case was called, Roohan came forward and said: “I suppose you’ll wipe that out. It was only a wee simple thing. It will not happen again.”

The judge told him, “Don’t play the old soldier with me, Roohan,” as Roohan continued to mutter inaudibly to himself. When a police officer was called to take the pensioner to the cells for contempt, there were no officers to be found, adding to McElholm’s ire.

When a policeman was located, Roohan was escorted out and returned later, when he pretended to be deaf.

“You are really trying my patience. I know you’re not deaf. You can hear when you want to hear,” the judge told him. “I’m going to enter a plea of ‘not guilty’ on the basis that he is refusing to cooperate.”

The judge released him on _200 bail and advised the pensioner to get a solicitor if “you can find one brave enough.”