Election Bill Board's

Thanks to the people who have complimented us on our bill boards. They have been very effective in raising our profiles across both counties. The fact that the person putting up the posters for our ad agency made a mistake and put one of my bill boards up in Carlow and one of Jim's bill boards up in Kilkenny has been fun as well. It is amazing the conspiracy theories that this has caused. I have enjoyed listening to people explain to me that they had it on "good information" that this was a secret Labour Party strategy to show favour for one candidate over another. One of the local newspaper reporters was printing this as fact this week. I now know what the expression savaged by a dead sheep feels like.

If we had known the mistake the guys made was going to cause so much fun, we would have had all the bill broads put up in the wrong places. Just goes to show that the truth should never stand in the way of a good story.

Time for the government to admit their mistake.

Spent Saturday back on the canvas, which was my first day back after the holidays. My fellow Labour Councillor Anne Phelan joined me on the canvas in the village of Goresbridge. Goresbridge is within the local election area which both Anne and I represent. We both take pride in the fact that the Labour Party has the highest number of councillors in this area.

The main issue on the doors steps in Goresbridge was the closure of the local secondary school, St. Brigid's, a few years back. The local parents to their credit ran a very positive campaign to save the school and are now being proven correct in the fact that the school was needed. The schools in the surrounding areas are reaching full capacity and there is a need to cater for the increase numbers over the next few years. I am glad to say that both Anne and I were very strong in support for keeping the school open. However the Department of Education and government TD’s from the area did not listen to the people, invest in the school and keep it open.

Frankly, to this day I cannot see any sense in closing a great school like St. Brigid’s. It is quite clear to me as well as everyone in the local area that a school now needs to be rebuilt in Goresbridge. Needless to say government TD’s will be falling over each other offering to lobby on the matter closer to the election.

It is time for the government and the department to admit they were wrong and start the plans to reopen the school; of course they will in the process waste millions replacing the school they closed in the first place. Not that wasting hard working families tax money matters to this government, wasting money is something they are very good at.

Time to end homelessness

It never ceases to amaze me that we still have people without homes in this Celtic Tiger economy. When the Simon community started in Ireland in the sixties, homeless people, and they were almost all men, were confined to the big cities, and mostly Dublin. I also saw my fair share of Irish people who fell on hard times in London, where I first became a Labour Party member. Indeed I should say congratulations to Emmet Stagg TD who has done so much to highlight the ongoing difficulties these people face in England, despite havcing contributed so much to our economy.

I am glad to support a new campaign on the issue called Make Room, a joint initiative of the Saint Vincent de Paul, Threshold, Simon and Focus Ireland who are demanding an end to homelessness by 2010. This will mean that homeless people in this city and county should be catered for, and that we should provide homes for those who need them. Public housing is always built when Labour are in Government, and ignored when we're not. It needs a Labour Minister in charge of this area again, before the spiralling waiting lsits for housing will finally be cleared, and biulders and developers made to liove up to their responsibilities once and for all.

Log on here to support the campaign.

Sign the Breast Cancer Petition

I see my colleague in Waterford, Cllr. Séamus Ryan, has started a national online petition to seek a proper national screening service to prevent Breast Cancer. As you all know, we have a crazy level of mortality from this cancer which affects a huge number of Irish women. I fully support this online petition, and I encourage you to get everybody possible to sign on to this petition which will go to the Toiseach and the Minister for Health. You can access the petition here, or through Séamus's blog at http://seamusryan.blogspot.com.

Get online now and sign up.

Welcome to the O' Brien Blog

Welcome to my first attempt at blogging. As I said in my profile, I'm entering my 23rd year as an elected councillor. Since that time much has changed about politics, but if you had talked about websites, email and particularly blogging when I was first elected, you'd have been taken off to the local psychiatric hospital, now thankfully almost closed.

I believe that politicians must always find new ways to reach out to voters and to communicate with the voters so I hope that you will follow my news and thoughts on life as your local councillor, election candidate and hopefully the next Labour Party TD for Carlow/Kilkenny. Let me know what you think, for better or worse.

Here goes now for my first pic. Here you see me, my party leader Pat Rabbitte TD, Cllr. Seán Ó hArgáin, the quiet lad from Kerry and now Councillor for Kilkenny city, and Cllr.Phil Prendergast, a Kilkenny native and our candidate for South Tipperary. We're at the recent world ploughing championships in Grange, Co. Carlow. Having been reared as the son of a worker on the now world-famous Mount Juliet estate, I have always been close to the land and rural people. You'll see in my next blog that I am playing an active part in the party's policy on rural Ireland.