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

Will look something like this it seems, Pat today announced a 100 day in office plan (modelled on this?). Below are the ten priorities (from labour.ie):

The Irish fear crime with as much passion as they love property: no strange wonder, as both are based on speculation.
When it comes to irrational behaviour why hold back? Once you’ve committed yourself, make the tackle and hang the cost. And across the main political parties, regardless of the font size and headed [...]

Well auction politics or poker politics, it is all academic. He saw the opposition, by equalling commitments on the standard rate (down to 18% - originally Labour), the pension (€300 over the five years of government - originally PDs), lower the higher rate of tax (down to 40% - not as much as the PDs).
And [...]

The Dail is to see two seperate pieces of legislation today, designed to shut off the loophole which Labour pointed to last week. Fine Gael have a private members bill in the Dail specifically making the “grooming” of a child for sex/pornography a criminal offence, while the Justice Minister has tabled emergency legislation designed to [...]

This post is perhaps best seen as a product of the frustration of reading through news accounts of another weekend of mayhem on the roads and footpaths, with a bit of legal ignorance thrown in, but it would be good if the election saw some party step forward with a commitment to legislate to make the following [...]

The Labour Party today levelled the assertion at McDowell in the Dail that, following on from last years CC case and the rapid passing of legislation to close the gap on statutory rape left by the Supreme Court Decision, his legislation repealed vital protections for children.

Tuesday and Wednesday of this week saw members of Dáil Éireann discussing the Labour party’s proposed Civil Unions Bill 2006. (Information also available here.) Those evenings also saw the response from the government and other opposition parties.
- Read the transcript of the debate on Tuesday, 20th February 2007 here.
- Read the transcript of the [...]

In news that they might have been sitting on until government offices were closed, the government is rushing through emergency legislation tonight to close off the “loophole” that would have allowed Sean Quinn’s health insurance group to be treated as a new entrant when it took over BUPA Ireland, therefore avoiding risk equalisation payments for [...]

While not as damning as the actual failure to follow up the tip from Austrian police about two Irish participants in an alleged Internet child abuse ring, it’s telling that the first response of the Garda to the news that they had been tipped off was not to check their records, but to deny that [...]

Daithí (with a hat tip to Lessig) has come up with an excellent idea for this election year, and for our next government:
We know that a lot of interesting IP and IT law and policy issues … will make their way into new Cabinet workplans.
This week, I’m calling on interested parties (interested being those (bloggers [...]

With all eyes resting on random drug testing of school kids, the rest of Kenny’s Young Fine Gael speech seems to have gotten overlooked.
The policy Fine Gael probably hoped everyone would focus on - i.e. the one they put at the top of their press release summary - was that of lowering the blood alcohol [...]

Given the regular migration of UK policy proposals to the Republic, here’s one worth watching: Home Secretary John Reid’s announcement that he’s seriously considereing splitting the Home Office into 2 departments — which might be a tempting idea for an under-siege Minister for Justice to float the next time a scandal hits the department. 

One of the big stories of the last few days is that Eamon O’Cuiv has announced that the state will subsidies public transport for people to go home from Rural pubs. Now there is a lot of up roar about it. About how it is an election stunt, subsidising drinking yadda yadda. But it is [...]

From Fianna Fail: Nationwide youth cafés could stem growing yob culture in urban areas - Ambrose. This, coming from the party who think cafe bars are “a daft idea“. So basically cafes are great at curbing binge-drinking behaviour, but once a person hits 18 suddenly it “wouldn’t gel” and will make binge drinking worse, and [...]

Originally posted at Plain of Pillars
The killing of John Ward has dominated conversation in Mayo for sometime. Yesterday, Padraig Nally, the confessed killer of John “Frog” Murphy walked free from court, having been acquitted of manslaughter.
At first glance, the verdict seems repugnant. Pavee Point has already decided that the verdict reflects the prejudiced nature of [...]

Labour Publishes Civil Unions Bill, Green Ink.