TENS OF THOUSANDS OF DISTRESSED BORROWERS ARE CURRENTLY AFFECTED WITH A FURTHER 100,000-PLUS COMING DOWN THE TRACKS, NOW BEING DESCRIBED BY THE CENTRAL BANK AS NPE’S (NON-PERFORMING EXPOSURES)

Mining is a threat to the health and well being of the natural environment and that of the local community. Mining is a process that is hugely destructive to land, water and air and to all who require these for their continued healthy existence. In this era of Climate Emergency and rapid species loss the granting of licenses to prospect is very much a step in the wrong direction. It is at odds with the responsibilities of this government at this crucial time for the planet and all that live in it.

When construction of the new harbour at Greystones, Co Wicklow, began, all harbour users, including the traditional fishermen and their boats, had their moorings and other facilities removed while the project was being built. When the harbour was complete, the other users such as leisure clubs were provided with full facilities including new clubhouses, boat yards, storage and so forth. But the fishermen and their boats were excluded. This was despite the promises and guarantees we were given before we left in 2008 and on many occasions since, and in spite of the fact that provision of facilities to commercial fishers was included in the planning approval granted by Bord Pleanala. In 2014, Wicklow County Council issued harbour by-laws which effectively excluded the fishing fleet. The by-laws give a nod to mooring rights but, by imposing other conditions that are impossible to meet, effectively barred the fishing fleet from Greystones Harbour and transformed this traditional community harbour into a purely leisure boating facility. We, the fishing families of Greystones, do not accept this expulsion and have launched our new campaign to ensure that we can return from ten years of exile to our home port, with full rights to moor, land our catch, store bait and other equipment, and generally carry on our trade as we and our predecessors have traditionally done in Greystones for hundreds of years.

 For more than ten years now, we have had to moor at Dun Laoghaire, with huge disruption to our family and social lives. We have to drive to Dun Laoghaire each morning, drive our boats back to our traditional fishing grounds near our home port, then land our catch at Dun Laoghaire before we ready our boats for the next day and FINALLY drive home to Greystones, usually well after eight in the evening after a pre-dawn start. Family life and time with our children have both suffered as a result. And being exiled to Dun Laoghaire adds €150 each week in fuel costs alone. Please sign this petition, which will be presented to the Minister for the Environment, the Minister for the Marine, and to the chief executive of Wicklow County Council. Your support can help ensure that we can come home at last, and that our skippers and crew can resume a normal existence. We now must negotiate with Wicklow County Council, and every person stepping forward to support our cause will influence how they deal with us and bring a positive outcome closer. Bring the boats home!

For over 150 years Greystones harbour and marina have been used by local fishermen. Their livelihoods are now under threat as Wicklow County Council are attempting to get rid of the local fishing workers. The local fishermen have been there a long time and are a part of traditional Greystones. We should be trying to protect these traditions rather than exile them.

BACKGROUND https://youtu.be/L5JQAb9w-fo Article: “Everything You Need to Know About the Sudan Revolution” by Ola Diab http://500wordsmag.com/sudan-news/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-sudan-revolution/ =============================================================== Dear Taoiseach, We the enclosed signatories submit this petition on behalf of and in accordance with the people of Sudan participating in an active popular uprising that began on December 2018. Our goal is to accomplish the removal of the authoritarian government and deep state bureaucracy presided by Omar H. Al-Bashir and to resume democratic rule of law thru a civilian-led government of Sudan. We support the Declaration of Freedom & Change force (DFCF) in its commitment to secure freedom, peace, and justice in Sudan. We the undersigned request the following be provided with your leadership and discretion: 1. Ireland must call on the military junta led by general Burhan to pledge a commitment to Freedom & Change in its fulfilment of a popular mandate to form majority representation in the interim civilian authority until internationally monitored elections are organised after an agreed upon period of time. 2. Ireland must call for an end to the systematic murder, torture, violation, and abuse of peaceful citizens by the National Intelligence Security Service and Rapid Force Support (aka. Janjaweed Militia). The Militia must withdraw its presence from all cities, towns and villages. 3. Ireland must call for the formation of an independent investigation panel to probe the criminal attacks on protesters near army headquarters in Khartoum, as well as other sites across the country, since April 11 and especially between May 29 and June 3. This panel shall collect evidence, interview witnesses, and publish a report. The report’s findings shall help bring culpable perpetrators and complicit military officers to justice. 4. Ireland must call for the restoration of a free press and public freedoms, including the right to free expression and association and the right to peaceful assembly. 5. Ireland must call for the release of all political detainees and prisoners of war, and call for an end to the arbitrary arrest of citizens. Ireland must call for the immediate release from detention of civil society and politically active prisoners of conscience. 6. Ireland must call for an immediate end to a disruption of internet and telecommunications services imposed by the military junta. This disruption prevents peaceful civilians from tending to their personal safety and prevents individuals from collecting, documenting, sharing, and reporting crimes and cruel punishments.

Nature fully supports not just human life, but all life on the mother being planet that we call earth. It is now that we must show solidarity & support her, before it’s too late. Now is the moment to take action. Now is the moment to recognize nature in our constitution, just as we recognize our brothers & sisters. We welcome this reestablishment with our direct environment, as it is beyond crucial to life on earth.

Decriminalisation of Sex Workers should be of high priority.

Our local libraries are an amazing resource. Weekends are a great time to go to study, take your children, and browse around as there is lots to do there. When a bank holiday weekend comes around the local library shuts that preceding Saturday. I have gone to my local library on lots of Saturdays during the year planning to have some quiet study space only to realise as its a bank holiday they are shut! I imagine there are many people out there who have had this experience. This wonderful resource should be open particularly at a bank holiday weekend allowing people access to the wonderful facilities.

The summer football works. The current set up is not without its issues but with a bit of fine tuning, eg make the break shorter in summer, it will work no question. Give it a chance. With the current proposal to revert back to winter football without giving calendar football a chance it’s sending a strong message to the kids, if something is hard,quit!! regardless of who it affects.

Under the Loco Parentis rule, parents of disabled children are restricted from leaving their own home while a respite nurse is in the home to provide in-home respite. An adult must remain in the home. This is not respite. Parents who are caring 24/7 for their medically fragile children must be able to recharge, run errands, go to medical appointments, spend time away with their other children, and much more. The siblings of the disabled children must also be able to have the most normal social life outside of the home as possible. For this to happen, parents must be able to leave the home with these siblings during in-home nursing respite hours. This rule is particularly discriminatory against lone parent carers who don't have a partner to be the adult to remain in the home as the Loco Parentis. Of all carers, lone parent carers are typically under the most amount of stress - physically and emotionally - and as such, being able to leave the home, even just once a week for 5 hours, is desperately needed. Ultimately, the best care possible for the disabled child is what is at risk if the parent carer is unable to maintain their own physical and emotional well-being. The other children in the family, and family unit as a whole, are also at risk of harmful, irreparable dysfunction if essentially trapped in their home due to such an inhumane, unjust, policy as is Loco Parentis. This rule, implemented by the HSE, is clearly a violation of human rights and the rights of children.

Every home and business in Ireland needs access to quality broadband. It is as important as electricity and water. But the roll out of Broadband has gone from 500 million euros to 3 billion euros. The whole process has been marred by controversy and lack of transparency. We need to learn the lessons from the National Children's Hospital. Public money is our money and needs to be spend correctly, transparency and with proper governance.

Ireland has changed, we are a more inclusive, equal and progressive society and sex education in Irish schools must reflect this. Young people we work with have said that sex education is not fit for purpose, does not reflect the variety of identities and sexual orientation of people today, putting the health and safety of young people at risk. Recommendations by the Oireachtas Committee on Relationships and Sexual Health, and the NCCA Review of the RSE, echo what our young people say.