Fracking and the local development plan

Fermanagh & Omagh District Council tonight agreed to reinsert a 'presumption against' fracking in its draft Local Development Plan. 

This was a position adopted unanimously by councillors previously but had been inexplicably overturned by persons unknown. An internal investigation within the council is to be conducted on how this happened. 

Throughout the process - both before and after being elected - indeed for almost ten years I have argued for an outright ban on fracking. On the committee I was not allowed to bring that position forward as it was adjudged to be contrary to the regional planning guidelines set by Stormont and none of the major parties would support me on it. So we have a 'presumption against' instead.

This does set the bar pretty high and like all the other councillors I voted for it but made clear at the time and subsequently that nothing less than an outright ban would provide real security to the community. In addition I have highlighted that the failure to extend the 'presumption against' to exploratory planning applications (it only applies to what is known as the exploitation phase) leaves the door open to the council being forced to provide planning for the exploratory drilling as almost happened in Belcoo back in 2014. 

Given the legal set up, it is up to the parties in Stormont to ban this poisonous industry. They have the powers and they have the responsibility. 

Tribute to all the fracktivists

I want to pay tribute to all those who have stayed the course in the campaign against fracking. It's nearly ten years since a handful of us publicly challenged Tamboran in the Westville Hotel - when Department officials sat shoulder to shoulder alongside the corporate heads. After that meeting I called the first meeting to form an anti-fracking campaign group in Fermanagh House and it was pretty chaotic. We spent weeks arguing over the name and what our focus would be as a group. Maybe one day someone will write a book about the twists and turns - if told truthfully it will make for a cracking and very amusing story as well as one that confirms the power of people when they stand together.

It's amazing just how many of those who attended that first meeting are still involved and still committed. We've had our ups and downs collectively but the anti-fracking movement is more together today than ever before and I'm sure it will remain together now until we secure that elusive ban on fracking.

It is unnecessary and frankly embarrassing that some politicians now want to pretend that they were the ones to spot the error - it is entirely untrue; indeed everyone involved knows just how untrue it is. They are fooling no-one.

Chaotic scenes as Fermanagh school children left on the side of the road without a bus service as Ulsterbus schools’ contract is not brought forward to cover August reopening

Drivers express concerns that they have been instructed to refuse fare-paying passengers on bus routes from next Tuesday

Stormont Executive must commit to return of suspended bus services and end cuts agenda which is impacting bus provision across Fermanagh and Tyrone

Cross-community Labour councillor Donal O’Cofaigh expressed his disgust at the fact that children in Fermanagh were left without any way to get to school on their first day back.

“Children who were meant to have a first day at school today were left on the side of the road after the bus they were expecting simply didn’t show. I contacted several bus drivers to find out the story and they confirmed that services weren’t operating as the Ulsterbus schools contract only starts at the beginning of September and hadn’t been brought forward. In other areas of Northern Ireland, I understand school children were charged to go to school on operating Ulsterbus services.

“This is a totally shambolic situation – children’s education and safety have been impacted. Let’s call out what happened here – Ministers in the Stormont Executive thought that children being left without any form of transport to school, on a timetable for reopening that they themselves set, was a price worth paying in order to cut public transport budgets.”

NI Executive blasted for failure to put in place adequate infection controls ahead of schools' reopening

Peter Weir, Stormont Education Minister

Education workers have the right, indeed the responsibility, to stand to protect themselves and the wider public health from serious and imminent risk

Donal O'Cofaigh, Cross Community Labour councillor for Enniskillen encouraged workers to stand ready to demand and secure basic infection control regimes should schools reopen next week without adequate protections in place.

"As the recent exams fiasco demonstrates, it is vitally important for our young people that we see the reopening of schools but it is also vital that this occurs safely with adequate infection controls to protect children, their families and the staff working in schools and in public transportation. The total inadequacy of the infection controls put in place to date in schools by the Northern Ireland Executive has been highlighted by a recent statement of all four unions representing education support staff, NIPSA, Unison, GMB and Unite.

"Just like in any other workplace, workers in schools and on the buses at risk of 'serious and imminent' risk have legal protections in withdrawing themselves to a safe distance, raise their concerns with management and return only when the situation has been remedied.

"The responsibility for this looming crisis lies wholly at the feet of the Northern Ireland Executive who have completely failed to put in place basic infection control measures but if next week when pupils begin to return or indeed after that if workers feel that they are putting themselves at serious and imminent risk then it is their legal right, indeed responsibility, to protect themselves and the wider public health. 

"The continued absence of perspex screens from Education Authority vehicles is a cause of grave concern to many drivers, as is the unwillingness to put in place adequate cleansing regimes. Drivers have highlighted the fact to me that the social bubble model being applied within schools is unlikely to survive contact with reality on buses. There are genuine risks to drivers in this rural area - many of whom tend to be older and have higher incidences of underlying conditions risking more serious impacts should they be infected.