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

Following in Young Fine Gael’s footsteps, the Labour party have announced a competition with a €1,000 prize for a 1 minute video extolling the virtues of the Lisbon Treaty. Unfortunately for the likes of me, while it appears to be open to raving right wingers, it is confined to those in second and third level [...]

The papers are still covering the Kathleen Lynch scandal the Indo has
Meanwhile, Ms Lynch repeated that she deeply regretted any hurt caused by her letter, but stressed that she would not be resigning and hoped to draw a line under the matter.
Of course you want to draw a line under it. Because you seriously messed [...]

From the Irish TImes.

“Having heard an interview with one of the victims in the case, who was clearly distressed by my letter and having considered the matter and discussed it with colleagues, I now accept that it was inappropriate for a TD to have become involved in any way in a case of such seriousness.

So [...]

I noted this from Labour Press Releases of late.
The Labour Party President and Foreign Affairs Spokesperson, Michael D Higgins TD, is in Norway, returning on Friday 11 April as part of a broad-based community delegation including members of Kilcommon parish in Erris
All very nice and everything but this bit caught my eye.
“The Corrib gas conflict [...]

The following is a synopsis of an article that appears on Irish Left Review.
When Eamon Gilmore, TD launched his leadership bid back in August he laid out his primary objective:
‘Labour should break free of, and reject, the “half party” limit which others impose on us - and which, sometimes, we inflict on ourselves.’
Full [...]

Economic growth to slump to the lowest levels since the recessionary 1980s. Unemployment to rise. Inflation heading back up. Tax revenue slumping. Exchequer deficit out of control. Export growth sluggish. No direction, no respite, no hope and . . . no ideas. Yep, it looks like Fianna Fail is odds on to win the next [...]

Not that it should come as a surprise but one really does have to laugh sometimes - it beats crying.

It strikes one as serendipity - for the opposition at least - that the Dail debates a motion on the three reports from last week into Port Laoise, the one that gave rise to the Naughton letter and entered ’systems-failure’ in the political lexicon by failing patients in a grotesque multiplicity of manners while the [...]

This post actually started a while back, the last time Bertie mentioned we would be tightening our belts this year, I decided to finish it because he mentioned it again yesterday.
We know that the US is as good as in a recession, their central bank doesnt seem to have much capacity to stall the bad [...]

Tánaiste accuses FG of witch-hunt

While the Indymedia commenters go on about the Fianna Fail-Green Party coalition openly colluding with these US torturers and murderers, in their protest that involved putting Liam Mellows in a orange boiler suit, Niall O’Brolchain is in one of the pictures next to Michael D. What struck me about this is Labour are having problems [...]

Bertie-hooray, Enda & Eamon-boo. Below is the Fianna Fail response to the gains it has seen in the Irish Times and Sunday Business Post over the week. As you can see, it is thrilled with its performance but it strikes me that this is also a boot that they have been waiting to apply for [...]

The trend since the election has been the return of the 2+ party system and this poll does little to dispel that impression. Following closely on the Irish Times poll midweek, there is good news for both of the big parties in today’s Sunday Business Post poll. Fianna Fail are up four to 36% while [...]

There are two small but interesting pieces in the Irish Times today concerning Labour and the PDs. The PDs are meeting in Galway today in a meeting organised by Noel Grealish to discuss future direction. Though the meeting is due to be “councillor-driven” and Mary Harney won’t be present it is interesting and symptomatic of [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]