Fasten your seat belts and please leave the tables in an upright position

There I was the other night poking around Tesco when a Polish neighbour approached me. She is looking forward to going home to Poland in November and asked me if she should be worried.  She usually travels Ryanair and wonders will the flight be cancelled. Aer Lingus is significantly dearer and she couldn’t afford to fly home as often.  This is the conundrum facing many, mostly low paid workers, who rely on another group of low paid workers in Ryanair to get home.

She pointed out that it’d be too dear to fly in December even with Ryanair so November has become the new Christmas for herself and her daughter as they catch up with family and friends.  I suggested she check Easyjet’s website as they fly from Belfast.

Yesterday I saw a facebook post from a former pupil who works as cabin crew with Ryanair. He was waiting at a bus stop outside a airport terminal when a man approached him and verbally abused him because his wife’s dream holiday had been cancelled once Michael O’Leary pulled flights. It reminded of how counter staff at Anglo Irish Bank were abused by their customers as they closed accounts when the bank collapsed 9 years ago.  People often vent their anger at the wrong person.  It is wrong and sad. The workers in Ryanair are no more responsible for the mess than those who worked the counter at Anglo.

There is a flaw in the Ryanair model. It is predicated on reducing all costs in all circumstances. It maxes the return from the customer base and keeps cost below those of their competitors..  Aircraft, wages, landing fees, fuel, handling charges, agents all reduced to as low as possible. Eventually something has to give.  Michael O’Leary used to thank God for Irish funerals as mourners from Britain flying home had to pay top dollar.

I presume O’Leary is on his knees once more. His pilots are leaving, his aircraft are on the ground. Ryanair jets are flown twice as much as most other competitors. Unless they fly they lose money.  The cancelling of the flights and uncertainty of the customer base mean that the number of passengers will drop. It is not economic to run a plane that costs €98M and fill it with passengers paying just €9.99.  I’m not saying there is a bubble in the budget airline business but if the company needs to keep its pilots it can’t sustain these prices. Pilots can get better pay in Asia or the Middle East and they’re voting with their feet. There’s little that Michael O’Leary and his management team can do about that except pay their staff more.  We all know what that will mean for the price of a ticket.

At the back of it O'Leary reckons that if they increase pay for pilots cabin crew will be next in line. You know those videos you see sometimes of yobs giving stick to cabin crew before they take off? Well it seems the cabin crew are not actually paid to deal with the matter and that they don’t get paid until the plane takes off. Can you imagine a fire fighter at the airport being told, that you don’t get paid unless they’ve to deal with an incident? No. Me neither. Would I work under the conditions that Ryanair staff are expected to work for their pay? Absolutely not. 

So what has all this to do with Wexford? Well quite a lot actually. If Ryanair increase their costs then they must increase their average fare. If they do that they will make cheap travel less affordable. They will also be less competitive and they will become like one of those expensive airlines that Michael O’Leary got so much publicity by criticising. That will mean less flights although it will not necessarily mean that people will not want to travel. People will find other ways to get around, the market will move on.

Unlike Ryanair who sell planes when they get to 10 years old, Irish Rail’s rolling stock last longer, cost less to run and while it won’t  generate as much revenue on an average train journey as a Boeing 737-800 from Dublin to Stansted it is economically more sustainable.  Some of the passengers will revert to boat and train or bus, especially when it comes to travel from Ireland to Britain.  Dublin London is the second busiest air corridor in the world.  If even half a million passengers per year shifted to boat and train or bus from air lines, that’d fill an 8 coach train out of Holyhead or Fishguard every day. Dublin Airport by the way expects over 24 Million passengers in 2017, so these figures are not fanciful.  It will also generate substantial increases of foot passengers into Rosslare. Already 25,000 foot passengers use Fishguard.  The turbulence at Ryanair can have an upside for the shipping companies that operate into Rosslare.

As I’ve said before on this blog, Michael O’Leary must be down on his knees thanking God for Irish Rail management.  If it was raining soup, these guys would be out with a fork!  They are pushing ahead with their plans to terminate train services to Rosslare hoping that by amending the plan to terminate at Wexford rather than Gorey. The €4.4M question as to how much they can save on that proposal will be figured out by the NTA.

In the meantime, is my Polish neighbour going to get home before the end of the year? I wish I knew.   

The long arm of the law reaches up the Mulgannon Road.

In the end it only took about 7 minutes to march from Roches Rd to Mulgannon Rd. Like all good thrillers, there was a twist and turn in this one.  Wexford’s garda station has officially moved ending a controversy that has run for well over a decade. Like all good investigations there was many a false lead. In the end the right decision was made and now our police service can look forward to state of the art facilities from which to deliver services for generations to come.

It could have been very different. Michael McDowell and Fianna Fail wanted the new garda station somewhere out the Rosslare Road. They were not too interested in engaging with the local councillors or gardaí themselves as to where they might be based.  The thinking at the time was that brownfield sites like the former Nunns Granary would be apartment blocks in the Celtic Tiger era.

Then along came the collapse in building, the change in government and the realisation that the building industry could only survive if the state invested in social infrastructure.  Today we’re seeing the benefit in Wexford of the logic that dominated the early part of this decade. A year ago there were 3 cranes dominating the skyline in Wexford where the schools, the new court house and the garda station were under construction. But what Wexford got was not a new garda station but a new divisional head quarters.  There’s a difference I’ll come back to later.

So it is both a time to reflect on the past services that the Gardaí delivered in the past but it’s also a time to look forward to how policing into this century will be carried out.  The demands of society are very different to the day when the art deco drawings of the old station at Roches Road were on the architect’s desk.  There’s over 7 acres of land at Mulgannon Garda station. Much of it may at a later stage see further building.  The facilities are of the order that past members of the force could only dream of.

So it leads me to think that as society continues to change is it the future that policing will be delivered from major stations like the new divisional Head Quarters.  A divisional HQ will deliver much more than just a garda station.  There is a massive shed at the back of the garda station. You can drive a huge artic in there, shut the doors and strip it down. There is a high spec ventilation system to draw away engine fumes. The view from the conference room at the top of the building looks out over the town towards the harbour. Above that is the locker room while each sergeant and inspector will have their own office elsewhere in the block. 

Prisoners have an exercise yard and an en suite toilet in their cells.  Prison or court escorts will no longer be through the main door but from a secure holding area to the rear. So the working conditions are far superior to what went before.

Let’s be honest about this. If you were a garda in a rural station in Wexford District and you saw your colleagues getting a brand new station, you’d be keen to work there too. Which makes me wonder is the day of the rural garda station gone?

Up north the PSNI which is regarded as the model police force aim to provide services from just 40 police stations.  I know Fermanagh very well. Its population is just half of Wexford’s. They have just 2 police stations open 24 hours. If you want to meet a police officer you have to make an appointment. Policing is about delivering a service to the people it serves.  The idea that you can have stations in every small village is not compatible with these aspirations and the demands on the service nowadays.

So what happens in the future if more rural garda stations are proposed for closure in Wexford? That question may take more than 7 minutes to resolve.

Fit to help?

 You never know when you might need it. That was the piece of wisdom I took away a few years ago from work on a winter’s evening one Friday. To cut a long story short, I ended up one afternoon with a few colleagues taking part in a defibrillation course. Sure it was another box ticked, wasn’t it? Doing first aid and dealing with minor causalities should be food and drink to a biology teacher?  As we left the room and made our way home, the instructor’s final words stuck in there.

When you work with over 600 boys and nobody older than 65 all healthy, the scope for assisting with an emergency is quite slim. But ar eagla na h-eagla, if there is an emergency, I’d rather have the practical experience than the theoretical knowledge how to cope with an emergency.

So there I was a few days ago, walking home from work on a bright afternoon. To the rear of Tesco there is a steps that leads out onto Mulgannon Road. Around the corner I came as I climbed the stairs. When I saw a man kneeling over another man, the first thing that crossed my mind was that I’d come across either a fight or a mugging. The man who was lying on the ground seemed unresponsive and his leg was shaking. It was clear that he was having an epileptic episode and that the man kneeling over him was trying to revive him.

I stopped and asked what had actually happened before I arrived. The victim had lost consciousness and fallen backward hitting his skull off the concrete as he fell to the lower landing on the stair case.  His leg shook uncontrollably as his eyes rolled. I had arrived within 2 minutes of this episode kicking off. So I rang the emergency services on 999.

I was put straight through to the operator who asked me my location and whether I could talk to the man and establish if my suspicion of epilepsy was correct. The nearest ambulance was in Enniscorthy and I was told it’d be here as soon as possible. I rested his head on my laptop while I checked his pulse was fine. Could I check the man’s breathing? To be fair to his companion he rang the man’s partner who was with us in 5 minutes and could confirm much of his medical history.

All the time that I was dealing with the situation, we were passed on at least 2 occasions by couples who were coming from the supermarket carrying shopping as they stepped quietly over us. Perhaps it was the case that they felt there was nothing they could do, maybe they felt threatened by what they came across.

The patient was at this stage gaining consciousness as he came out of his fit.  Within another 5 minutes we heard the sirens as the ambulance arrived.  2 paramedics stood at the top of the steps and came down to take over from me.

Boy was I glad to see them as by that stage. We manoeuvred the causality to sit up  and low and behold he could walk to the ambulance. We shook hands and I wished him well in hospital, he was going to an emergency ward that was brand new and high tech.

When I was returning home today from work, I used the same steps. Believe it or not I met the same 2 guys walking down. We shook hands again and chatted. He looked healthier although still pale.

I never reckoned that I’d have to use the skills I learnt during the course. I also thought that in one ear and out the other, but no. So if there is the opportunity the learn first aid. Please take it. You don’t know when you might need it.

A view from the bridge

Frank Sinnott has died? Surely not? 

The suggestion that someone larger than life can actually have died is a hard one to figure out. But it’s true. 
Many’s the morning Frank would ring me at 7.30 AM to ask me if I’d consider taking an ad in the Co Wexford Free Press.

“Frank” I once said, “It’s very early, I’m only just up”. 

“Joooe” he drawled “I thought I’d get you before I went to bed as I knew you’d be at work”.

“Okay,” says I “What’ll it cost?”

“Not as much as it should” was the response I’d get.

And if you missed Frank and rang him back he was hard to get hold of but his hilarious message before you entered his voice mail invites you to leave your car keys for him!

And so it was.  Frank was a creature of habit. Coffee outside Cappucinos, pints in Mary’s Bar and laying a few bets at a bookies on South Main Street. He lived on Johns Gate St.  Frank was a prolific writer whose books would bring a smirk to your face and a smile as wide as the moustache on Frank’s broad face. Frank lived a hundred different lives within sight of Rowe Street church. Writer, Concert Promoter, Musician, Poet, Philosopher and Advertising Executive and man about town. Frank was an outrageously funny person. 

On one occasion he discovered that his book had sold 2 copies in one bookshop while the erotic novel “Shades of Grey” had sold just one. The next week he was proudly boasting that he’d outsold Jamie Dornan by 2 to 1 in Wexford!

Frank Sinnott was the eternal optimist. On the morning after I lost the local council election, Frank rang me at 7.30 AM.

“Joooe, I heard you lost. Don’t worry you’ll be back” says he,

“Thanks, I appreciate that” I responded.  “

What you need to do” continued Frank “is to put an ad in the next edition of the Free Press thanking your voters, they’ll remember that”.  “

How much will that cost me?” says I.

“Not as much as it should” says he!

Frank was a naturally gifted comedian, great writer but also had an incisive knowledge of local politics. Long before the local elections he told me I wouldn’t win. He was right. He could read the political tealeaves before the kettle even boiled.

His column in the Free Press was hilarious. It was called “A view from the bridge” Fr Aodhán Markem was at one time, according to Frank , the first priest to do the four minute mass.  Many’s the councillor had their slightest trait affectionately dissected. Frank gave us Philomena Begley, Whacker and of course Ted Howlin who was always impeccably turned out and dressed for every occasion. There was never harm intended. That was Frank’s skill. We all could laugh at ourselves. Humour makes us human, we are the stronger when we appreciate it. Frank was never nasty or dismissive. He would have been a fish out of water on social media.

Every town produces its own characters. These characters reflect the life, spirit and sense of humour of the town. They’re part of the culture, gossip and eventually folklore. Dublin recently honoured a character from the 60’s called Bang Bang. Part of what we are has been lost today. But mark my words. In years to come when people like me are forgotten, Frank Sinnott will be remembered with a smile.

Early this year saw Frank endure the grief of losing his brother and mother within days of one another. I bumped into him in February and asked him how he was. It was the first time since his mother’s funeral that we’d had a real chat. Frank asked me to mention his late mother in my own column in the County Wexford Reporter. I promised that I’d do it at the end of the year when I usually reflect back key events of the previous 12 months. “That’d be lovely, I’ll look forward to that” Frank replied. “But how much will this promise cost me?” says I. The twinkle in Frank’s eye shone as bright as ever.  I know I’ll keep that promise.

I’m certain that already today, Frank has told his beloved mother that he’s going off to the Bookies to put a few quid on Shergar and that when he comes back he’ll give Elvis a ring to book him to play in the County Hotel next week. Afterwards he’ll phone Slipper O’Mahoney and ask him to run an ad in the next edition of the Free Press. And poor old Colman Doyle will once again be asked about his jumper.

Heaven has just got a bit more blissfully funny in the last 24 hours and we are much poorer since Frank got a view of heaven from the bridge.

Thanks for the good times, Frank, Rest in Peace