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

So rumours has it that there is going to be a recruitment freeze in the public sector in the budget to save money. So that begs the question what happens the Public Appointment Service.  Do we need one? On their site there is listed a little over 40 employees and the budget for the commitee that [...]

So we have a budget to save the nation coming up. What policies would you bring in? Nationalise the banks? Raise Tax, Drop Tax, hire Ninja’s to take over Sweden? A new SSIA? Borrow more?

Interesting aside at the web briefing from micandidate.eu tonight (more of which when my brain has digested it, thanks to Alexia for Qikking it though, many more insights on twitter). They plan to allow candidates to solicit donations via their website, which I think has issues with regard to Standards in Public Office over and [...]

Got a response from NUIM giving a little more detail on Bertie Ahern‘s job description as Honorary Adjunct Professor of Mediation and Conflict Intervention. In response to your query I can confirm that the position of Honorary Adjunct Professor of Mediation and Conflict Intervention is an honorary one for which no remuneration is involved.

Bloomberg is reporting that the negative ratings outlook of Standard and Poors for Irish government debt in January has been confirmed with a downgrade from AAA to AA+ (no link yet).  Apparently Spain already has that rating so it’s hardly the dunce’s cap.  Perhaps the timing was on a fixed schedule but it’s a little [...]

Three very interesting articles in the wake of the Labour Party conference from Saturday (as well as the liveblog of the day). None of them are the pre-written tripe based on a script and some well chosen comments (e.g. “it was a well receieved speech”), Simon McGarr was down there and his takes makes for [...]

Interesting Release from Labour Broughan calls for State to lead relaunched SR Technics Now it runs to 1130 words in length and only We are also the only Party who have resolutely stood by the SR Technics workers at Dublin Airport and we are determined to do everything possible to protect the nearly 1200 SR jobs at [...]

From Twitter Sunday Business Post poll.  FG 31 (+1); FF 28 (+5); Lab 17 (-5); SF 7 (-4); Green 7 (+1); Others 10 (+2)

Pat Kenny is going to stop doing the Late Late and take over the Q&A slot. Personnally I think this is a good move Pat Kenny is at home with politics not so much with Light Entertainment.

WE saw last night the very interesting announcement of Susan O’Keeffe for Labour’s euro candidate in North-West as Labour kicked off its conference. The whole thing has a really nice sub-site on Labour.ie and as you would expect from them full streaming on ustream, lots of pics and blog posts as well as a substantial [...]

The honors cannot stop falling upon the head of our dear Taoiseach. Not alone is he honoured in Latin America, part of a worldwide bureau of speakers and an in demand figure for global events, Bertie Ahern is to take up a post at NUI Maynooth as Honorary Adjunct Professor of Mediation and Conflict Intervention [...]

The Labour Party start their conference weekend off with the announcement that they will be running a candidate in the North-West constituency for the forthcoming European Parliament Elections. Susan O’Keefe is a journalist who broke the story on a World in Action programme on the Irish Beef Industry which led to the formation of a [...]

Who will you vote for in the next Election ( online polls)

Property tax is not a panacea for solving Ireland’s fiscal crisis An excellent piece on the theory behind property taxation.

Nothing more to add really. Except, possibly, well done that man.

They are running a petition on their French site against Turkish membership of the EU