Irish Election - Coverage of Irish Politics, News and Current Affairs

Noel Grealish, the rather lonely figure who comprises the PD back bench these days, has spoken out against the Mahon Tribunal in a bid to make himself some new friends. Mr. Grealish has been previously reported to have held discussions about joining Fianna Fail, and is regarded as being a good fit- part of the FF “gene pool”, [...]

There is a major ruck going on in the Republic over the rather convoluted and, frankly, highly dodgy account the Taoiseach has given the Mahon Tribunal concerning his tax affairs. Cian has the Enda Kenny statement that the Irish Times re-published in full in yesterday’s paper. Mr Ahern responded by calling the opposition leader a [...]

Last night, unexpectedly, I was called by Newstalk’s Breakfast Show and asked how I thought the electorate were reacting to the personal attacks between Enda Kenny and Bertie Ahern.
Firstly, I pointed out that my record of reading the mind of the electorate is similar to my success at becoming heavyweight champion of the world. Then [...]

TV3 Nightly News with Vincent Browne Starts Tonight
It was all reading quite well, not quite Newsnight but a bit different and worth the watch. Until I saw that usual heads Halligan et. al. will be involved.

Update: Finian has been found! On Morning Ireland of all places - god forbid he would put himself at the mercy of Liveline listeners! The promise for the unit for CF patients is contained in Section 5 of the deal document. A new unit is 2/3 years away until completion. Finian is seeking a short [...]

Briefly, Enda releases a statment calling on Cowen to act on Bertie if he refuses to step aside and they reply against his ‘increasingly personal’ attacks. Both statements below the fold.

The only surprise with the public sector pay benchmarking report is that the unions sound surprised. The findings have had an air of inevitability going back to the time that the implications of the previous benchmarking round sunk in: a nearly 10% jump in public sector pay, on top of what was agreed in [...]

Update: Below is a press release from Solus, the light bulb crowd about their meeting with Minister Gormley yesterday. They are not complimentary;
It was revealed today during a meeting with the Minister that his department had not put any proposals together on what lamps would be included in the ban and how he proposes to implement [...]

We got 308 responses to this months survey. And the results can be seen in the Graphs below. When looking at the percentage changes it must be noted that last months survey had less responses. I have only done a very quick calcullation of the error and I would say it [...]

Reading Cian’s post on Irish Election I was in complete agreement with him as regards the overall analysis. For some Independents the deal with FF, so far, has reaped considerable dividends. They have essentially cemented themselves within a process whereby they can continue to draw down actual political achievements that resonate on the ground, with [...]

John Waters on blogs
John Waters watch serves up another fine morsel from the clown prince of Irish column-ism. Nice and balanced views of the internet from our John.

Libertas Leaflet campaign from ‘No to Lisbon’ group
Looks like Libertas are going to throw a great deal of money at the ‘NO’ campaign to reject the EU treaty. The leaflet campaign is another big move and they look to have cornered the no campaign from an early point in their life. Whether they succeed or [...]

We had this up yesterday about the Fine Gael proposals on Schools and the piece about cheap laptop provision to all students. Hanafin has laughed off the possibility of supplying laptops to all 344,000 secondary pupils for a total of €23m – or just under €67 each. The main reason is the requirement for software suites [...]

RTE News: ‘Slab’ Murphy sent for trial
Slab is on his way to court and if this move progresses consider it the beginning of the unwinding of the empire. Slab offers a way for CAB to enter into the wider organisation’s finances and begin to take down a network of funding built up over years.

Eamon Ryan was on RTE this morning and said that it is time for a full debate on the merits of nuclear power in Ireland. In light of the decision which seems to be coming today in the UK to begin upgrading their nuclear power generators. A debate which has been called for a while [...]

Forensic Science is one of if not the most popular science subject in UK universities. Thousands apply to do it. In my Uni it is not unusual to see a group of students out on the grass dressed up in the full gear marking of a section of grass. So what are the job prospects [...]