Gerry Adams - a caring society

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 Bereaved mothers who have lost sons to suicide have pleaded with political parties to prioritise mental health.

The women, who have set up the Circle of Hope suicide support group on the northside of Cork City, issued their plea yesterday, as Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams met them and several other groups involved in suicide support programmes.

They told Mr Adams, and his party’s two candidates in Cork North Central, TD Jonathan O’Brien and Thomas Gould, how five young people in one small area of Ballyvolane and Dublin Hill died by suicide within a few months of each other in 2013.

Link for video:

Gerry Adams in Limerick - Irish Examiner

“It was a horrible year — one after the other. Our group came out of that,” said Lynda Haynes.

Her son, Corey O’Callaghan, died by suicide three weeks before his 21st birthday. Fiona Mackey’s son, John, took his own life a few months later. He was 14.

Ms Haynes said the pain never leaves, but having a support group, where people can talk and remember their loved ones, helps them cope.

“Everyone knew Corey. He was just an old soul. It was like he was here before. He gave his heart and time to everyone. He was so happy-go-lucky,” she said.

Corey left a note in which he said he had the best friends. “But he also said he had pain — pain we didn’t see,” said Ms Haynes.

Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams waving to some of the staff and children looking out the window from the Little Learners Educare room as he left following a visit to Togher Family Centre, Cork. Picture: Denis Minihane

“I think he just got tired. He counselled a lot of people. The one person he needed to help was himself.”

Ms Mackey said John left two notes for his family.

“He didn’t do this to cause us pain. It was to get rid of his own pain, but we don’t know what that pain was. Only for this support group. I wouldn’t be here,” she said.

Both women told Mr Adams they want politicians to commit to mental health awareness campaigns.

“Money doesn’t come into it. We fundraise ourselves. We just want them to commit to awareness,” said Ms Haynes.

Mr Adams praised the support groups and called for an all-island approach to tackling suicide, including the introduction of a sustained advertising campaign modelled on road-safety campaigns.

“These groups can take some succour from the fact that even though some of them have lost loved ones, they have saved a lot of other people by the work they are doing,” he said.

“There are people alive today who would otherwise be dead only for the advocacy work and awareness work they are doing.”

Statistics show 459 people — 368 men and 91 women — took their own lives in Ireland last year, but the real suicide figure could be as high as 1,000.

“Despite the fact that 644,000 people — one in seven adults — have experienced mental-health issues in the last year, successive governments have neglected the mental health area,” said Mr Adams. He said if Sinn Féin was in government, it would increase the mental health budget in year one by €35m, complete the rollout of suicide crisis assessment nurses, and reverse cuts to guidance counsellors.
By Irish examiner reporter Eoin English

***

My own experience during the twenty-five years that I have lived in this part of Ireland, is that I have known several people from different walks of life who have taken their own lives and when the financial downturn came that number unfortunately grew.

A FACIST ACTION IN LOUTH

On the day that Ireland defended its actions on the rights of children before UN Committee on the Rights of the Child in Geneva. The barbaric Louth County Council took the opposite point of view and created unnecessary pain and suffering to Traveller Children.

Pavee Point calls on Environment Minister, Alan Kelly TD, to intervene as a matter of urgency to compel Louth County Council to provide alternative accommodation for 17 Traveller families evicted from a halting site in Dundalk today (15th January 2016)

The families were evicted from a Traveller local authority halting site that had been decommissioned by Louth County Council.

Pavee Point condemns these evictions as unnecessary and unwarranted. “This is one of coldest nights of the year and these people have no where to go,” said Martin Collins, Co Director of Pavee Point. “It is clear that Louth County Council has absolutely no concern for the health and safety of these families”

“Louth County Council has totally failed in its duty here. It has a policy of not providing Traveller Specific accommodation such as halting sites or group housing schemes,” said Martin Collins, “They are trying to force Travellers into social or private housing and this is in total breach of the 1998 Traveller Accommodation Act.”

“There is a demand for Traveller specific accommodation in Dundalk and these families are the living proof.

“These families have children at school in the town. Think how these children will be affected by this !

Pavee Point urges the Environment Minister to intervene to find a solution and make good undertakings that there would be no mass evictions of Traveller families as a result of fire safety audits on halting sites in the wake of the Carrickmines fire tragedy.

These evictions are confirming fears that Pavee Point had that local authorities would use the fire audits in a cynical way to evict Travellers.  It is important at this stage that Travellers engaging with the Environment Dept in its safety audit can have trust in this process.

Minister Kelly put a Community Initiative in place at his Department to deal with any issues around fire safety on Traveller halting sites and it is through this Initiative that any fire safety issues on sites should be dealt with.

January 15, 2016 at 7:45 pm

To my blog readers:
Just imagine how you would feel if your local authority were to rescind the planning permission on the house that you had lived in for years. Then arrived at your home, along with the police, on a very cold day in January to evict you.

Can you imagine how these people must feel?

Additional Information:-

Today, Eleanor Kelly, solicitor for six of the evicted families said the youngest family member is eight days old.
Four of the families stayed in B&B accommodation this weekend, while two others stayed with their families and friends.
“The youngest is eight days old, there are 17 families in total,”
“The difficulty is that they were given 48 hours to find alternative accommodation.”
She said she had been in contact with Louth County Council about the site at Woodland Park last August, but did not hear back from the council until last week when the families were being delivered 48 hours’ notice to be evicted.


A fire officer visited the site in October and deemed it to be a hazard.
“If there’s work to be done, there’s work to be done.” But she added: “I was in contact with the council last August”
“The ideal situation is to allow them to go to a halting site but there’s no other halting site in Dundalk.”
“These are Dundalk families, they want to be in Dundalk, but I’m aware the halting site in Drogheda is full anyway.”
The council met with Traveller representatives on Saturday to agree on temporary accommodation for the 17 families involved.


FOR LATEST INFORMATION PLEASE READ COMMENT NUMBER 22

Links:http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CRC/Pages/CRCIndex.aspx
http://www.paveepoint.ie
http://www.childrensrights.ie
http://www.louthcoco.ie/en/Louth_County_Council

A HELPING HAND

As many of you are aware I am not a Christian and the path which 
I walk is that of a Druid. In a few days time on the 22nd December (this year) it will be the Winter Solstice, the shortest day and longest night of the year. Daylight will increase on the following day making our days longer but we will still be in winter and temperatures will drop.


I am very aware that these cold days are a burden and make life a lot harder for people who are without the basic necessities of life; shelter, warmth, food and enough clothing. 

Many druids and pagans exchange gifts and send cards at Solstice but rather doing this I donate money to a worthy cause which will help people who are in need.

Today I made my annual donation to Brother Kevin at the Capuchin Day Centre for Homeless People in Dublin. This year the Centre has seen a huge increase in people needing help.
Brother Kevin is well known here in Ireland, always taking time to listen to others in a non judgemental and accepting way.

http://www.capuchindaycentre.ie/Capuchin_Day_Centre_2013/Capuchin_Day_Centre_-_Donations.html

However you celebrate at this time of year may you have warmth, good food and

the companionship of friends.

A Dirty Trick or lack of consultation?

Thursday 3rd Sept.

Hungarian police halted a train packed with refugees bound for the Austrian border and tried to force them to disembark in a town with a detention camp on Thursday, a confrontation that has become a focus of Europe's migration crisis.

After shutting refugees out of the main train station in the capital Budapest for two days, authorities played a dirty trick by giving false hope to the exhausted and confused people to board a westbound train. Hundreds crammed aboard clinging to doors and squeezing their children through open carriage windows.

But instead of proceeding to the Austrian border, the train was stopped just west of Budapest in the town of Bicske, where Hungary has a migration reception centre, and police ordered the passengers off.

Police cleared one carriage, while five more stood at the station in the heat. Fearing detention, some people banged on windows chanting "No camp! No camp!"

One group pushed back dozens of riot police guarding a stairwell to fight their way back on board. One family - a man, his wife and their toddler - made their way along the track next to the train and lay down in protest. It took a dozen riot police wrestling with the man to get them up again. 

"We need water," said a Syrian man who was still on the train and gave his name as Midu.

"Respect the humans in here; no respect for the humans.We want to go to Germany, not here," he said in English.

There then followed a curtailment of news reporting when baton wielding Hungarian Police forced

international journalists out of the station and declared it an operation zone.

The questions that are uppermost: what are Hungarian police afraid of or are their intended actions going to be so terrible and inhumane, that it must be kept secret from the rest of Europe ?

Report by Marton Dunai Reuters +Activist editing)

Friday:

Bob Geldof has said he is prepared to take in four refugee families to do his part in helping to deal with the growing migrant crisis.

Speaking to Dave Fanning on RTÉ Radio One, he said that he looks at the crisis with profound shame.  

He said he understands the economics and the politics, and that the root cause has to be addressed.

However, he said we are in a period of fundamental shift and when people are poor they move.

"It is a monstrous betrayal of who we are and what we wish to be, we are in a moment that will be discussed and impacted upon in 300 years time, a fundamental shift in the way the world has worked for the last, say, 600 years.

"If there's a new economy there needs to be a new politics. There isn't and it's that failure of new politics that has led to this fucking disgrace."

The aid campaigner and singer said he would open the doors to his family home in Kent and his flat in London in a personal response to the shocking scenes.

"I'm prepared - I'm lucky, I've a place in Kent and a flat in London - me and [partner] Jeanne would be prepared to take three families immediately in our place in Kent and a family in our flat in London, immediately, and put them up until such time as they can get going and get a purchase on their future."

Geldof also said that he himself is an economic migrant as Britain accepted him and he said it is the same for thousands of Irish people living in England and Australia and in countries across the world.

Media have misled you!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

© Barry Malone

Imagine waking your children in the morning. Imagine feeding and dressing them. Imagine pulling a little girl’s hair into a ponytail, arguing with a little boy about which pair of shoes he wants to wear. 
  
Now imagine, as you are doing that, you know later today you will strap their vulnerable bodies into enveloping life jackets and take them with you in a rubber dinghy - through waters that have claimed many who have done the same. 
  
Think of the story you’d have to tell to reassure them. Think of trying to make it fun. Consider the emotional strength needed to smile at them and conceal your fear.

There is no "migrant crisis" in the Mediterranean.

What would it feel like if that experience – your frantic flight from war – was then diminished by a media that crudely labelled you and your family "migrants"?

And imagine having little voice to counter a description so commonly used by governments and journalists.

The umbrella term migrant is no longer fit for purpose when it comes to describing the horror unfolding in the Mediterranean. It has evolved from its dictionary definitions into a tool that dehumanises and distances, a blunt pejorative.

It is not hundreds of people who drown when a boat goes down in the Mediterranean, nor even hundreds of refugees. It is hundreds of migrants. It is not a person – like you, filled with thoughts and history and hopes – who is on the tracks delaying a train. It is a migrant. A nuisance.

It already feels like we are putting a value on the word. Migrant deaths are not worth as much to the media as the deaths of others - which means that their lives are not. Drowning disasters drop further and further down news bulletins. We rarely talk about the dead as individuals anymore. They are numbers.

When we in the media do this, when we apply reductive terminology to people, we help to create an environment in which a British foreign minister can refer to "marauding migrants," and in which hate speech and thinly veiled racism can fester.

We become the enablers of governments who have political reasons for not calling those drowning in the Mediterranean what the majority of them are: refugees.

We give weight to those who want only to see economic migrants.

The argument that most of those risking everything to land on Europe’s shores are doing it for money is not supported by the facts.

No Fixed Abode

My new blog post may well have been about two new hats one in felt and the other in hide, or it may have been about a new camera, perhaps even Mrs H’s new shoes however, I think that you will agree they are rather mundane sort of kitchen sink type posts. Which I know a lot of you are fond reading and I am fond of writing them from time to time; but
I found this though and it is to my mind much more important for it is has a human angle.

Charley

A woman whose 6-year-old son is in the final stages of liver disease has issued a plea to Offaly County Council to find them a permanent home to ensure he qualifies for a waiting list for life-saving surgery.
Helen Lynch (25), who has been homeless in Tullamore for much of the last year, says she needs a permanent address in order for her son to go on the transplant list at King’s College Hospital in London.
Her son, Charlie, was diagnosed with liver disease when he was only a month old and is now in urgent need of proof of permanent accomodation before the pair travel to England for an appointment at the hospital next week.
“The liver transplant must be carried out at King’s College Hospital and the doctors have informed me that I need to be in a house where I can control Charlie’s health,” she said.
Currently staying with family in Tullamore, Ms Lynch is moving between her mother and brothers’ houses but she needs accommodation where she can ensure a sterile environment after the transplant takes place
“It’s very hard. Dragging the kids from one house to the next. They don’t know where their home is for the last year. My mother has an awful lot of medical illnesses herself. She has a wheelchair and walkers and the house she’s in is very small,” she said.
“Charlie’s going to need constant care after his transplant.”.
Ms Lynch said that without proof of permanent accommodation, Charlie could miss out on an opportunity to expedite his treatment at next week’s assessment.
“We’re due to go over for his initial assessment to be placed on the liver transplant list. Now, the problem is we could go for the assessment but if they think Charlie should go on the active list there and then - which they probably will because he’s in the final stages of liver disease - he won’t be placed on that list without (having) permanent accommodation.”
Having survived with the disease since an early age, she says a transplant is now the only treatment option open to Charlie.
“We’re on a timeline here and I feel as if my child’s life is on a countdown timer,” Ms Lynch said.
“It’s a nightmare for any parent to have to go through. It’s hard enough dealing with the transplant on its own but to be told that he might not have the chance to get the transplant because of a house is worse. To think that four walls is all that it would take to save my child’s life and that I can’t get it.”
Ms Lynch says she has exhausted every avenue in her attempts to get a house and social worker Sandra McDonagh, of Offaly Traveller Movement, has been advocating on her behalf.
“I’ve met with a few politicians and they’ve been on to the council for me. But, it’s basically the council that needs to buck up and do something. I’ve tried private landlords, I’ve tried talking to landlords. It’s no good - there’s nothing available in Tullamore. The housing crisis in Tullamore is ridiculous.”
“To be honest with you, I’ve lost hope. I don’t know what else I can do. I’ve done everything I can possibly think of. I’ve begged them, I’ve gone up there crying my eyes out to them, begging them to help me.”
She was told of houses due to come on-stream next year but Ms Lynch says she doesn’t have the time to spare.
“They said they got 29 houses off Nama to be given out next year but I don’t have until next year. I haven’t got until next year to wait. I have a matter of days and if you leave out the weekend I have just two working days before I’m due to fly out”
“If I haven’t got an address to hand them if they want to put him on the list, he won’t be put on the list.”
She said it was now up to the council.
“I’m not calling on them, I am begging the council to hurry up and do not let my child to die over a house. He’s worth a lot more than that to me and surely their kids are worth a lot more than that to them.”

© Irish Times Fri, Nov 28, 2014,