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

Ian Kehoe in this morning’s Sunday Business Post on the An Bord Snip report (not online yet):
The Bord Snip report will be given to minister fo finance Brian Lenihan this week. He plans to bring it to Cabinet the following week. Lenihan’s preference is to publish the report despite growing tension between his department and [...]

The return of Morgan Kelly to the pages of the Irish Times is most definitely noteworthy, Kelly spent much of the period from 2006-2008 being pilloried as a wonk in an ivory tower who went wrong on the maths somewhere. In 2007 he wrote in a head to head with Austin Hughes (behind paywall, email [...]

An Bord Snip reports tomorrow, with cuts to social welfare and services likely to top its list of recommendations (if our Sunday’s are to be believed). In the meantime though, Brian Cowen has announced an Innovation taskforce whose aim will be something about getting Ireland toward the Smart Economy. The members will be people who [...]

From last night’s debate on a private members motion (FG) on Crumlin cutbacks.
During the debate in the Dail, Ms Harney said: “I find it strange that when we ask hospitals to make efficiency savings, some hospitals decide that the most sensitive area is the area that should be cut first.”
Those nasty hospitals….taking spin to a [...]

Apropos only 19 of 145 judges taking a pay cut, Niall Collins TD for Fianna Fail in Limerick wants a referendum:
“This group of elite untouchables should be subjected to the regular procedures administering the pay of higher civil servants. In the modern day being protected by the Constitution is simply not good enough given that [...]

Posted this on my own blog yesterday, so apologies for the cross posting. Should have put it here first!
Apart from the speculation on who will be Fianna Failure’s nominees for the two Seanad by-elections (caused by the death of Senator Tony Kett [FF] and election to the European Parliament of Senator Alan Kelly [LAB]), a [...]

With a week to digest the election results, the Green Party might be credited with an emerging strategy to take into their negotiations for a renewed programme for government and, in theory at least, the second part of the process of government for however long it lasts. It was assessed here and elsewhere that the [...]

Today at 12.00 from the Garden of Remembrance. Sign the petition and bring a white ribbon if you are attending.
Today’s order of business in the Dail is the worst political failure I have seen:
10.30 a.m.
* Leaders Questions
* Motion re Confidence in Government (to conclude at 5.30 p.m.)

Today the motion of no confidence tabled by Fine Gael seems certain to fall, meaning they will not be able to table another such motion for six months – early December. With the Government’s Dáil majority looking shaky, I’m going to assume Fianna Fáil will push to have the Donegal South-West bye-election to replace Pat [...]

The Fianna Fáil second tier are dripping into the count centre as we speak. Sean Haughey was first – arriving about an hour ago. Pat Carey popped in a half-hour later. Mary Hanafin is the latest, she sauntered in quietly under the radar and hugged Maurice Ahern while most cameras wern’t switched on – mine [...]

Early predictions from most of the mainstream media outlets have McDonald as the favourite. There is nothing is solid from the exit polls however – while they are perceived to be more trustworthy in Dublin than elsewhere – they are far from concrete. They say it’ll come down to who goes out first between the [...]

Enda and George will be looking to nail the Greens into the coffin on Tuesday. Both men know that the motion of no confidence will not succeed. Both know that if they were to move into government that in the eyes of the international community they’d be committed to supplying €4bn of taxpayers money to [...]

Alexia via her Qik is over at the RDS while we sit in blogger HQ at the D4 Court. Here is her interview with Maureen O Sullivan, victorious candidate in the Dublin Central by-election.

Thanks to Mark Coughlan

The cheeky chappies in Fine Gael have been stealing Irish Election’s thunder by doing some moratorium busting of their own. I travel through Dublin city every day, from west to east and north to south and didn’t spot one of the posters below until today. However Adam Maguire informed me via Twitter that they have [...]

This is the last in a series of posts from party members. The equivalent posts from Fine Gael, the Green Party and the Labour Party can be found here.
Conor Reidy is a postgraduate law student at University College Cork, former chairman of Donogh O’Malley Cumann at U.C.C. and Munster representative on executive of Ógra Fianna [...]