If you live in the Castlebar Town Council area, the chances are you’ve had a visit over the past few weeks from Noreen Heston. The first time Fine Gael candidate has for the last six weeks been literally going to every door in the town on the canvass trail. “I started out about six weeks ago on my canvass. I'm actually knocking on every door at the moment. The people are very welcoming of new candidates and female candidates. People say there is an awful lot of anger but there is also an awful lot of hurt.” Out on the canvass trail Heston has heard plenty of good and also sad stories, but it’s meeting the people and hearing their stories that has strengthened her resolve to get elected and do her best for the people.
“First and foremost parents are concerned about their children, will they get jobs when they finish education? Unemployment as well is a major issue. I don't want to say role reversal, because I see both parents taking responsibility for the child but what is happening is the dads who were working in construction are now at home taking care of the children, and the mothers are working. For example a dad said he worked full time, his wife was a part time worker, she would drop the children to school, she would prepare the meal, now he has no job and she's going to work full time and he's dropping the children to school and preparing the meals. But the happy thing is that, what he said to me is that they have 40 per cent of the money they had last year and they’re trying to get by. But not alone are their family happy because they are spending more time together, their marriage is also stronger now.
“One of the sadder stories though is I was finishing my canvass. It was the last house and I was about to put my card through the door and an old lady opened the door. She opened the door and invited me in, she was in darkness. I asked her why she was in darkness, she told me she was scared of further cutbacks and she was trying to save. I thought, ‘Is this the society that we’re living in?’ It stayed with me, but thankfully, I looked into her situation and there was help available to her.”
While Heston wants to see progress in a lot of areas in the town, there is one issue which she feels very strongly about and promises to work hard on if she gets elected. “I would have worked with many residents’ associations, assisting them with issues pertaining to their estates in relation to the completion of estates. Apart from the personal stories on the door, the big thing that I'm hearing is incomplete estates. I've worked for nine years with groups on this. This is a huge issue. All I have to give is myself, but the one promise or commitment I am going to give if I get elected, the only thing I can stand over and the only thing I can keep is that, should I get elected, I will encourage every estate to set up a residents’ association and I will assist them. I also envisage an umbrella group that will incorporate all the residents’ associations together and I do commit to meeting with a representative from every estate once a month so I can relay their issues back to the powers that be.”
While she may be new on the political scene, Noreen Heston has a firm set of goals she wants to achieve and has promised to give her all to the people of the town if she gets elected.
