‘Community spirit is alive and well in Granard' – Large crowds descend on north Longford town as agricultural show season kicks into overdrive
Part of that rapidly growing repute was borne out by the presence of Tánaiste Simon Harris who was among the many legions of spectators to file through the gates of Higginstown Showgrounds for what was a two day affair like no other.
A long-held destination of choice for some of the finest pedigree champions in the country, this year's offering certainly didn't disappoint with both its cattle and horse sections attracting particularly noteworthy entries.
One of the chief, overriding highlights came courtesy of the Buddy Kiernan Milling Commercial Heifer Class with its winner's mantle going to Kevin Devine from Carrigallen, Co Leitrim.
Judge Sam Coleman expressed his own 'astonishment' at the calibre of cattle which were on show to the wider public, a feeling that was mirrored by fellow judge Philip Scott in the horse ring.
Chairperson Gerry Tully said that level of positive feedback was one he and his fellow committee members were keen to build on in order to underpin the show's enduring legacy for the next 75 years and beyond.
'The Young Handlers classes were a huge success in all sections,' he told the Irish Independent.
'It is important to keep running these Young Handlers classes to ensure the involvement of the youth attending agri shows.'
A key element behind that drive to inspire the next generation of show enthusiasts was very much evidenced by a local schools competition which was spearheaded by local librarian and committee member Rosemary Gaynor in the event's main indoor exhibition hall.
There was an almost equal level of excitement when Longford based McNally Motors took the wraps off its all new Toyota Landcruiser.
Organisers have already set their sights on holding a major fundraising draw in the hope of selling 1,000 tickets at €100 each with the winning entrant getting their hands on the keys to a brand new landcruiser at its 2026 showcase.
As has been customary fashion with its schedule of events in recent years, a healthy crowd of spectators turned out on Sunday to take in an afternoon of high-class showjumping action.
'We cannot thank all the sponsors, volunteers, gate personnel, judges, spectators and anyone that helped us in any way possible to ensure our 75th anniversary show was the best yet,' added an enthused Mr Tully.
'We are forever indebted to each and every one of them for their continued support and it just shows how community spirit is alive and well in Granard and surrounding areas.'
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The Journal
9 hours ago
- The Journal
Minister defends VAT cut for hospitality as government accused of breaking promises to workers
ENTERPRISE MINISTER PETER Burke has defended plans to cut VAT for the hospitality sector at a cost of €1 billion. Speaking yesterday at Government Buildings, when outlining the government's Summer Economic Statement, Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe outlined that there will be a €9.4 billion Budget 2026 package , of which €1.5 billion is set aside for tax cuts. Donohoe, and other senior members of government, including the Tánaiste and Taoiseach said last month that all government parties have committed to delivering changes to VAT for the hospitality sector. VAT for the tourism and hospitality sectors was reduced to 9% during the Covid-19 pandemic at a cost of €1.2bn to the exchequer. The previous 13.5% rate was reinstated last August, despite the sector's opposition. When asked how much it is estimated to cost for the measure to be re-introduced, Donohoe said yesterday it will cost €1bn for a VAT reduction from 13.5% to 9% for restaurants and cafes, meaning there would not be much left for further tax reductions for others. He told reporters that he has always been clear that if the government greenlights this measure there will need to be 'trade-offs' in terms of other measures that the won't be delivered. Protecting 200,000 workers Speaking on RTÉ Radio One this morning, the enterprise minister defended the VAT reduction, stating that the tourism sector is a very important part of the economy. 'At this point in time, over 200,000 people are employed in it. It's a €9 billion sector. And it's so important to try and keep that sector sustainable,' said Burke. Advertisement Over the last number of years a very significant number of independent small food outlets and coffee shops have come under pressure, he explained, stating that many restaurants are closing their doors. The minister said that the VAT reduction is a 'jobs measure' that will sustain the employment in that sector. 'It is a viability measure, they are under significant pressure. We've had a lot of additionality from government, part of it over the last three years, in terms of regulatory requirements in the trajectory to a living wage and sick pay in so many areas that have put significant pressure on the sector and have reduced their margins. 'I've been in coffee shops and indeed restaurants where I've seen their margins diminish and some making a very significant loss that they weren't the prior year, considering in many cases their trade and turnover has sustained,' said Burke. Restaurants and cafes are struggling with higher business costs and in some cases reduced demand exacerbated by the increased cost of living, with many in the industry perceiving the reinstated higher VAT rate as a significant pressure on their businesses . Department of Finance says VAT cut is 'unjustified' However, despite the government being determined to bring in the measure, Department of Finance advisory papers published earlier this month in advance of the next Budget, officials said that there are a 'number of reasons' why going back to 9% 'remains unjustified'. It listed the cost to the state, the resilience of the domestic economy, and Ireland's current position as being 'not significantly out of line with other EU countries in relation to the application of VAT in this sector' as among the reasons. 'The cost is very significant,' it said. The news that workers might not feel many benefits in the budget this October has resulted in SIPTU Deputy General Secretary, Greg Ennis stating that private sector workers have been short-changed by government. In a statement this afternoon, he accused the government of 'broken commitments' on pensions, increased sick days and measures to offset the cost of living crisis while announcing tax breaks for business in its summer economic statement. Related Reads Analysis: Delaying details of big projects stinks of distraction ahead of the budget Tax measures and €9.4bn budget package not set in stone until we know US tariff outcome Cutting VAT on hospitality 'unjustified' and too expensive, says Department of Finance He said SIPTU representatives have written to the the enterprise minister seeking an urgent meeting. Ennis said failure to introduce meaningful measures to offset the cost of living crisis is being done at the same time as government promises to provide a VAT reduction to the hospitality sector which will cost the State an estimated €1 billion. 'This morning on national radio, the Taoiseach, Micheál Martin, stated that there was a prior commitment to the hospitality sector on a VAT reduction. However, what about the government's prior commitments to workers with regard to increasing statutory occupational sick pay from five to seven days in 2025, progression towards a living wage in 2026, which has now been shelved until at least 2029, and the abolition of subminimum wages for young workers,' he said. 'Kick in the teeth' for workers 'Without the Government reaffirming and meeting its commitments for improvements for workers in the private sector and a cost-of-living package, the cut in the VAT rate in Budget 2026 will amount to another kick in the teeth to them and their families,' said Ennis. He went on to state that the government has 'gone too far' in placing the interests of business above those of workers. When asked today if customers will see the VAT reduction passed on to customers and if there will be a reduction in prices for those dining out, Burke said: 'So critically it's very difficult to ask everyone to pass it on but we need to ensure that we keep the jobs in the first place and that's the prism I look through when I have a sustainability piece like this.' The government focus now, in the midst of global uncertainty, is to protect jobs, said the minister. Readers like you are keeping these stories free for everyone... 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Irish Times
18 hours ago
- Irish Times
Eager Ministers line up for their spending money as Coalition announces National Development Plan
'Here's your envelope of money now for next year. That's all you're getting. So don't go spending it all on the one developer!' Picture the scene: Government Ministers lined up before the Taoiseach after a final Cabinet meeting to definitively nail down the lack-of-detail in the rebooted National Development Plan (NDP). Micheál Martin sits at a table with Tánaiste Simon Harris beside him. When he greets each nervous-looking Minister by name, Simon rummages through a box, finds a corresponding envelope and hands it to Micheál, who hands it on to a silent Cabinet member. READ MORE 'One for you ... one for you ... one for you ...' Ministers back out the door, scuttle off to quiet corners and, with trembling hands, rip open their envelopes. Anxious advisers hover nearby. Colleagues lean in, all ears. 'Two point two billun,' announces Patrick O'Donovan, the Minister for Culture, Communications and Sport. 'Arragh, 'tis all right, I suppose.' 'I got nine point two billion. Whoop! Whoop!' carols Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, the Minister for Health. 'Twenty-two point three billion. Not bad Patrick, wha? I'm off now to New York to address the UN,' chortles Darragh O'Brien, Minister for Transport. 'Well. Oh. I've got seven hundred and ninety-five million,' says Norma Foley, the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality, voice trailing off. And so on. An ashen-faced James Browne, the Minister for Housing, is last one out. He carefully opens his envelope. 'They've given me thirty-five point nine billion. Oh God.' It's a lot of responsibility. For all of them. Between now and the actual budget in October, the various Ministers have been ordered by their Government masters to come up with the best and most feasible ways to spend their money. 'Each individual Minister has now received an envelope,' the Taoiseach told the Tuesday launch. 'They have huge, significant envelopes.' The next step is that they must identify priority projects, cost them and get cracking. In an ideal world, they should have no money left over at the end of the financial year and concrete results to show for their work. No pie-in-the-sky promises to keep constituents sweet and voters in high hopes. No woolly lists of works pending and possible completions. Just real deals, shovel-ready schemes and projects in the pipeline. This is not the same as the last plan, which was launched four years ago by then taoiseach Micheál Martin in Cork and which promised 'a huge pipeline of projects'. It was produced in the aftermath of the Covid crisis and called the 'renewed NDP'. The new model is called the 'revised NDP'. The difference between them? Over €100 billion. Back then, the word being bandied about was 'gigantic' when it came to describing the depth of capital investment in the plan. 'It's on a scale the like of which we've never seen before,' said Michael McGrath, who was minister for public expenditure at the time and has since become Ireland's EU Commissioner. That's peanuts now. At the time, Micheál had to deny claims that the Government merely came up with a 'wish list' of things to do rather than a 'to-do list' of things that would most likely be done. The 2021 version was roundly criticised for having too much detail. The 2025 edition is being roundly criticised for having very little detail. 'It was too long. The last NDP was too big a document, to be quite frank,' shrugged Micheál at the launch of this shrinkflation declaration. It's a very slim volume – nearly a quarter of the size of what went before. If the last one ran to almost 200 pages, the revised NDP runs to 46 pages, 11 of which are devoted to the names of chapters. Jack Chambers of Commerce, the Minister for Public Expenditure, gets a full page for his foreword and the 'three leaders' get another page for their foreword. The 'three leaders', as they were described at the beginning of the briefing, being the Taoiseach, the Tánaiste and Seán Canney, who is a Minister of State and leader of the Coalition Supporters' Club. The CSC is bravely battling for the right not to be known as the Lowry Independents. The rejigged NDP 'is unprecedented in scale and scope', said the Tánaiste. 'But now, our watchword must be delivery.' 'The scale and scope of this review of the National Development Plan is unprecedented,' said Seán, speaking on behalf of 'the Independent Ministers who I represent on the podium here today'. He omitted to say that their watchword is delivery too. Indeed, it was unkindly suggested at the event in Government Buildings press centre that the main reason for such a lack of detail – apart from announcing how many billions are being lashed out on infrastructure and in what quantities and what general areas – was that the Government doesn't want the Opposition to know how much has been allocated for the pet projects championed by members of the Coalition Supporters' Club. Despite repeated questioning, the three leaders were unable to give specific detail of how all this money will be spent, apart from a few 'mega-projects' such as the long-awaited Dublin's MetroLink, which is now on a par with draining the Shannon. [ Ireland's latest investment plan: A sceptic's guide Opens in new window ] It was a pity the Minister for Transport couldn't be present to supply more information, but he was in New York making a statement on behalf of Ireland at the UN High-level Political Forum. Probably the best place for him to be. 'There's more chance of world peace than a Dublin metro,' remarked one veteran of promises past. It was an upbeat performance by Martin, Harris and Canney. With a fair wind and calm economic conditions, this NDP will work wonders, they promised. The framework is in place, the money is allocated and all that needs to be done is for the Ministers to get to work. Or, as Micheál put it: 'The bottom line is that a major infrastructure plan is now agreed ... and Ministers will deal with the sectoral manifestations of that in the next number of weeks.' Simple. Or is it? Next up were the two money men: Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe and Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers. They were not as optimistic about the future, but they tried their best as they talked about the NDP and their just-released Summer Economic Statement (SES). This could turn out to be a Short-lived Economic Statement. It transpired that their figures are based on no tariff increases, whereas Ireland and the EU are waiting on tenterhooks to see if Donald Trump carries through on his threat to impose huge tariffs on goods exported to the US from August. Jack's hope is that, whatever happens, there is 'headroom to deliver additionality'. 'We are going to take a flexible approach,' said Paschal. It's all about 'certainty', they agreed. And what is certain is that they will tweak things depending on what happens in the run-up to the budget. If there is a serious economic deterioration, 'we will revisit it', said Jack. So really, this was more a Provisional Economic Statement (PES) than a summer economic statement. Taking the PES with this SES, is what the Opposition will probably say in the Dáil. Oh, wait. There is no Dáil until September. Brilliant timing.
The Journal
a day ago
- The Journal
Analysis: Delaying details of big projects stinks of distraction ahead of the budget
LAST TIME OUT – back in 2021 – the government's National Development Plan ran to 189 pages. Today's document setting out the list of infrastructure projects the current coalition hopes to deliver over the next decade comes in at just under 50 pages and is rather scant on detail. The NDP is the government's long-term plan for what large-scale infrastructure projects will be needed in Ireland over the next five to ten years. Numbers in the billions were bandied about by the Taoiseach, Tánaiste and Minister of State Sean Canney as they announced the plan at Government Buildings , but details on the top projects, the timescale and how they will delivered, were thin on the ground. There was no mention of road projects, new hospitals, or specific schools that were going to be built. They only real specific mention was that the MetroLink was getting fully funded, but the government still doesn't know how much it will cost. Instead of providing a list of projects, Taoiseach Micheál Martin said each line minister had a body of work to do over the next couple of weeks. Announcements to be made closer to October's budget Those various ministers will come back and outline their priorities and what they can do with the money allocated to them 'closer to the budget', which has been confirmed for October. Interesting timing. The Journal asked if pushing out the departmental announcements is an attempt to distract the public with shiny capital spending announcements ahead of what is expected to be a lacklustre budget, particularly for workers. The Taoiseach's response? He said the previous NDP in previous years was 'too big a document, if I'm frank'. He outlined how each minister will now have to prioritise the projects they want to get over the line. Advertisement 'They have work to do within the department in terms of prioritising the allocation of that funding and prioritisation is going to be key.' He denied there was any attempt to distract the public. 'I mean, this is concrete substance in terms of investment in projects, be it roads, in active travel, be it in third level education, be it in research projects, the people receiving that funding won't see it as a distraction. They'll see it as very real.' Martin said today's slimmed down document with little detail was the 'right approach', in his view. 'Doing things differently' Similarly, the Tánaiste said in the past, there has been a 'big rush' to publish the NDP, which included a 'long list of projects'. 'We've tried to do things differently here. We've tried to provide ministers and their senior officials with certainty as to the envelope of money that they have for the next five years. And now we're telling them to go back and look through and tell us what can be delivered and the pace in which it can be delivered. 'We have to be agile in relation to this. You know, when it comes to capital projects, you might have two projects. One gets planning quicker than the other. We have to provide people, I think, with the flexibility here on what can be delivered quickly and ensure that value for money,' said Harris. Public Expenditure Minister Jack Chambers also defended the document today, stating that he never intended to publish a long list of detailed projects. While the Taoiseach denied that departmental announcements in the run up to the budget were a form of distraction to keep the focus off budget measures, such a tactic would not be a surprise move. Why? There was a stark warning from government ministers today that October's budget projections could be built on sand. After the NDP was launched today, the government also published its Summer Economic Statement (SES), which outlines the parameters for the upcoming Budget. While in previous years there has been talk of 'bumper budgets' and once-off measures, there was no such talk today. Instead, the budget spending pot was revealed under a cloud of uncertainty. Related Reads Houses, water, health and Metrolink: The key points from the National Development Plan Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers and Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe, speaking to the media at a press conference. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo While this could in fact be a very large budget, in terms of increased spending on last year, the Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe cautioned that a 'deterioration in the tariff landscape' would result in a 'recalibration' of its €9.4 billion Budget 2026 package announced today. The paper also stated there will be a €1.5 billion taxation package, essentially tax cut measures. However, this could be gobbled up if the hospitality VAT rate is reduced from 13.5% to 9% at a cost of €1 billion. The finance minister confirmed that there will be 'trade-offs' where other tax cuts might not get the green light due to the hospitality VAT cut. Fantasy economics Donohoe also confirmed that the SES published today is based on the workings that there will be 0% tariffs between the EU and the US. Yes, you read that right. Zero per cent. This is despite Tánaiste Simon Harris and other senior ministers stating that a 10% tariff is 'baked in' to government projections… just not for the budget package projection published today it would seem. Essentially, the SES published today is not worth the paper it is written on as no-one in government is working to the optimistic view that Trump will roll over on tariffs. If anything, the predictions are the landing zone could be above the 10%. Hocus pocus projections and fantasy figures are how the SES projections published today could be described. Even amid the economic uncertainty that comes with the ongoing standoff over tariffs, capital spending will be protected, the Taoiseach said, stating that 'current spending would be under pressure'. 'Our budget day decisions could change,' if the global uncertainty does come to pass, Donohoe said today. Chambers said the government will 'absolutely have to revisit' the €9.3bn budget allocation 'if there is a deterioration'. All this points to a strategy of delaying 'good news' infrastructure announcements until the autumn – by which point, presumably, we'll have a better idea of how grim the economic situation is looking. Readers like you are keeping these stories free for everyone... A mix of advertising and supporting contributions helps keep paywalls away from valuable information like this article. Over 5,000 readers like you have already stepped up and support us with a monthly payment or a once-off donation. Learn More Support The Journal
