Management at Letterkenny General Hospital are to cut the working hours of 100 fixed term workers by an average of 7 hours a week until the end of the year.

Trade Unions have been engaging with the HSE and management at Letterkenny General for months on how best to protect jobs and services.

Members of the HSE West Regional Health Forum were told in Galway yesterday that every health-care facility in the region must operate within its allocated budget for 2010.

Impact spokesperson Richy Carrothers says cutting working hours was the only way to avoid job losses:

Community Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs Minister Pat Carey is considering a proposal that the government cooperate with Northern Ireland and Scotland to fund the replacement of ferries linking offshore islands.

The report of the Small Ferries Project has been published after a two year study of eight routes, including two in Donegal.

Three Irish islands, Árainn Mhór and Toraigh in County Donegal and Rathlin off the north Antrim coast participated in the study, along with five Scottish islands.

With many of the vessels in service on these routes approaching or exceeding their target replacement age of 25 years, report says procuring new vessels and improving harbour infrastructure is key to ensuring that communities have access to lifeline ferry services which are reliable, convenient and affordable.

The Small Ferries plan says thre should be a cross border approach to this process, and proposes the development of a common vessel design.

It says this would ensure considerable cost savings, allow shared expertise in researching new technologies and innovative funding mechanisms and facilitate flexibility in the operation and maintenance of the fleet.

While eight routes were examined during the course of the project, it is anticipated that the project’s findings could potentially have wider reach and benefit for other routes in the three regions.

The Northern Secretary is being urged to ensure that the British Security Services are not interfering in the investigation into the death of Derry-man Kieran Doherty.

Mr Doherty’s family and Foyle MP Mark Durkan met with Owen Patterson this week amid claims of MI5 harassment and surveillance of Mr Doherty prior to his murder by the Real IRA, of which he was a member.

Mark Durkan says the families concern is that rather than helping the police investigation into Mr Doherty’s death, MI5 will attempt to frustrate it.

He says the “Dirty War” of the past is over, and MI5 must cooperate.

Donegal North East Deputy Joe McHugh says he’ll be using an Oireachtas Communications Committee meeting this morning to question the differences between electricity costs North and South.

Deputy McHugh says a new Public Service Obligation levy on all ESB bills will bring the average bill in the republic 15% higher than across the border.

He says while the government says it is committed to competition, the ESB is being prevented by the Energy Regulator from matching the prices set by private entrants into the market.

He says that’s an issue he intends to explore when the regulator appears before the committee this morning:

Donegal Councillor Frank McBrearty has branded yesterdays HSE West Regional Health Forum a waste of taxpayers money.

He says the members of the forum were to be briefed on what measures were being taken, but there were no specific details given, and Donegal members left the meeting no wiser about the extent of cuts at Letterkenny General Hospital yesterday.

Cllr Mc Brearty was to have moved a motion calling for the resignation of Health Minister Mary Harney, but the meeting adjourned before the motion could be debated. He says he’ll move it again next month.

He says the bottom line is once again, the people of Donegal will have to pay for the incompetence of others:

A conference on poverty in Letterkenny has been told that the worst off cannot take further cuts, and alternatives must be found ahead of December’s budget.

The seminar was the first of its kind for the North West, and formed part of a series of seminars to mark the 2010 European Year of Poverty and Social Exclusion.

Organiser Ann Irwin, Coordinator of the Community Worker’s Cooperative says participants discussed poverty in the North West region, and how it can be addressed at local, national and European levels.

She says it’s important that Minister Pat Carey and others take heed of what’s being said at community level………..

The Health Service Executive has announced severe cutbacks in the Western region in order to reign in its budgetary deficit for this year.

It’s accelerating its programme of cuts in a bid to trim 12 million euro a month off its deficit until the end of the year.

It plans to cut 7,000 temporary staff hours a week, and to introduce new controls on absenteeism, sick leave and student nurse numbers.

It also intends to implement changes to rostering.

The HSE says its already managed to get its over-run down to just under 50 million from a projected deficit of 130 million, and is also stressing that no hospitals in the region will close.

However, Galway Surgeon John Mc Cabe says the cuts will affect patients…..

Hundreds of mink have escaped from a farm in the Ardara area.

The mink where being farmed in the Meenavalley area. It’s understood someone cut the wire and opened the gates and let the animals out.

Locals and farmers are asked to be on the lookout for the mink.

Owner of the mink farm, Connie Anderson, said those responsible for letting the animals escape where ‘animal terrorists’:

Meanwhile, the Secretary of the Sliabh League Angling Club, Noel Carr, says that this will unleash a terrible environmental problem on South-West Donegal.

And he says the mink will need food, and salmon will be an easy target:

Donegal County Council is to call on the Minister for Communications to introduce a second phase of the National Broadband scheme as a matter of urgency.

It was suggested yesterday that a survey to identify what areas in the county have no coverage would be the first step .

Many areas in Donegal still have no high speed Internet access while speeds in many other areas are low.

Councillor Charlie McConalogue says that parts of the county receiving no Internet in this day and age is not acceptable

Former US president Bill Clinton is to visit the Northwest tomorrow for an engagement in Derry.

He will then visit Dublin later in the evening.

Former US President Bill Clinton will be accompanied by Declan Kelly, the US economic envoy to Northern Ireland, who is spearheading plans for next month’s US/NI economic conference in Washington, which Hillary Clinton is hosting.

Mr Clinton is due to deliver a lecture at the Magee College campus of the University of Ulster in Derry tomorrow which former SDLP leader and Nobel Laureate John Hume is also scheduled to attend.

It is expected that while in Derry he will also meet the First Minister Peter Robinson and the Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness.

Mr Clinton is expected to refer to the peace process, to the Washington investment conference and to Derry winning the UK City of Culture 2013 award.

Mr Clinton will travel south to Dublin in the evening where he will address the Clinton Institute of American Studies in UCD.