Mayo Citizens' Information Centres - 25 years of service to community
By Tom Gillespie
THE importance of maintaining face-to-face contact with those seeking assistance at the country's Citizens Information Service (CIS) has been highlighted by Tomás Lally, development manager of Mayo CIS.
He explained: "The future, I believe, will be face-to-face - that is the key thing. But all the projections we have say 90 per cent of public services will be online by 2030. They will be available online but will everyone be able to use them. They won’t.
“There is a big mis-match at the present between the way services are progressing and the capacity of people on the ground. The system is demanding more and more, that they know more, understand more, or it's assuming.
“There will always be people who will need face-to-face. It suits us all maybe to apply for a driving licence online. It is very comfortable, it's quick, you can do it in your own time. You don’t have to be driving into town. But there is an essential part of social interaction as well. It's about coming in and having the interaction with people. It's called connecting.”
Mr. Lally, a native of Partry, said this year markes the golden anniversary of the establishment of CIS in Mayo.
He recalled: “Kitty Howley was the first chair of the Mayo Citizens Information Centre in 2000, but before that the service started with volunteers coming together, no one was getting paid. Volunteers came together in local areas to help out, based initially in the Social Services Centre in Castlebar.
“All they had was a phone and the office space. They could phone the health board if there was a medical card question.
“I remember in 1993 I came back from the UK and I went down to see Kitty Howley.
“I was familiar with the Citizens Advice Bureau in the UK. That’s where a lot of this came from in the first place. The model of Citizens Advice started in the UK.
“As time went on it was set up on a more secure footing. Initially the volunteers got a telephone allowance. There was an office in Castlebar, Westport, Claremorris, Ballina and Belmullet.
“My first job in 2000 was to bring all the independent republics together under Mayo. The key people were Kitty Howley, Jackie Gleason, Kay Dolan, Máire Ruane, Sr. Juliet Walsh, Tony Cawley and others who were responsible for the establishment of the service in the county."
Tomás continued: “We still have volunteers coming in even though there is money now and it's on a more professional footing, with lots of training.
“We still try to keep linked in to the community and not become detached in terms of becoming a public service. A lot of the time we are quite critical of public services and the way they have gone online.
“We get volunteers in and we train them up. We also get people from the Community Employment Schemes to give them an opportunity to progress. It is a challenging mix. We have five offices but in terms of the amount of staff we are quite reduced. It is stretching what you can.”
During Covid the CIS service was classed as an essential service.
“We had no one coming in,” he said, “but we dealt with queries on the phone. Before Covid about 75 per cent of our clients were drop-ins through the doors. Everything went on the phones during Covid. Now we are back to about 65 per cent drop-ins. Fifty per cent of our queries are social welfare related issues - pensions, job seekers', income supports, disability payments.
“We do a lot of social welfare appeals - disability allowance - people who are turned down for disability allowance first time around comes to us. About 90 per cent of our cases are successful.
“A lot of the time people don’t put in an appeal or go to the doctor to provide proper evidence. Really these people do not know how to make an appeal or have a half-hearted approach and someone at a desk in Dublin looks at it and that’s it gone.
“You have to have the evidence. We support people in that, in which we would have a very good track record.
“We deal with employment issues. We used to do unfair dismissals but they are too involved, which is a job for a solicitor.”
Tomás continued: “We have a lot of issues with people trying to access stuff online. So one of the benefits is people can come here and look at the possibilities. They can look at options before making a choice.
“We have no role in terms of reporting.
“We are independent while, ironically, we are funded by Social Welfare. So we have one side of the house saying no you are not entitled to a payment while the other side of the house is saying you should be entitled to it.”
Tomás has been with CIS since 2000, prior to which the was in local government in the UK for about 10 years.
Service offices are located at: Dillon Terrace, Ballina, F26 W218, where the drop-in service is available Monday to Friday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. and on Tuesday from 2 p.m. to 4.30 p.m. and can be contacted on 0818-075990;
Cavendish House, Hopkins Road, Castlebar, F23 PX44, where the drop-in service is available Monday to Friday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., and on Monday from 2 p.m. to 4.30 p.m. and can be contacted on 0818-076040;
Main Street, Belmullet, F26 N8C3, and the drop in service is available on Wednesday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. and can be contacted on 0818-076030;
Curam Centre, Dalton Street, Claremorris, F12 F6C5, and the drop-in service is available Monday to Wednesday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. and can be contacted on 0818-076080;
The Courtyard, James Street, Westport, F28 XO52, and the drop-in service is available on Wednesday from 10 a.m. to 12.30 p.m., and 2 p.m. to 4.30 p.m. and on Friday from 10 a.m. to 12.30 p.m. and can be contacted on 0818-076100.
Do you have a story to tell about your business? If so, Tom Gillespie would be delighted to hear from you. Get in touch at (087) 9680780 or gillespietom49@gmail.com.