Morning Focus – Friday 07/09/18

The last Morning Focus of the week opened with yet more discussion of Trump’s impending visit to Clare this November.

We heard on this show previously about how many are planning to protest the visit but the latest news on that front is that the large ‘Trump baby blimp’ that saw action in UK protests could make its way to Clare. Former Labour TD for Clare, Michael McNamara went into more detail with Gavin this morning.

From one ongoing bone of contention in Clare to another we had more of the closures of rural post offices. John Howard, a member of a committee in Kilfenora trying to retain the post offices gave us details of an upcoming meeting. Kilfenora already held a meeting on this subject which saw a number of politicians make an appearance, however this meeting tonight (September 7th) is exclusively for the ‘people’.

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Ending out the hour was the possibility of never going back one. While clocks are scheduled to go back an hour come October 28th the European Commission is now recommending that daylight saving times by axed. This comes after an online poll organised by the commission showed 80% of people were against adjusting the clocks. Deirdre Clune, a Fine Gael MEP for Ireland South had more details for us.

The second hour opened with 16 year old Aoife O’Gorman. Aoife found herself flying to Belgium this summer to visit an Irish World War I veteran’s grave. This was because Aoife was one of four chosen to represent Clare as part of the ‘My Adopted Soldier’ archive which aims to build an archive of all the Irish men who fought in WWI. Aoife, a student from Coláiste Muire researched the life of Michael Cooney.

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Then we discussed a different type of research with Professor Louise Allcock of the Ryan Institute at NUI Galway. She’s heading up research into sponges and corals, found on the edge of Ireland’s Continental Shelf, as a means of curing diseases such as Huntington’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, epilepsy and others.

Then we had our weekly arts round-up with Clare County Arts Officer Siobhán Mulcahy.

The hour ended with Noel Coote owner of one of two Clare dogs still in the running for the Irish Greyhound Derby. The dog, Newhall Missile has something of an underdog story as it was a 150/1 outsider before round one. The dog has also touched the lives of many as it was trained by John Browne, also from Clare and its second owner Colin Barry has spina bifida and this is the first he’s been involved in greyhound racing.

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The final hour saw Morning Focus’ Friday Panel make an appearance. This week’s panel included Bernadette Kenny -psychologist, counsellor and CEO of Bluebox Charity, Orla Vaughan -business person, Vaughan’s Barn, Kilfenora, and William Cahir – partner with Cahir And Company Solicitors, Ennis. Topics included Trump’s visit to Doonbeg, History’s removal as a core subject in the Junior Cert, Millenials being worse off than generations before them and lastly, kids programming.

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Finally the show ended with a look at the Presidential Election. We asked Ennis once more about its opinion of the candidates and who it’ll support in a bid for the Áras.