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

Stephen Spillane is a long-time Fine Gael member from Cork. He was recently unemplyed when economic conditions forced his former employer to reduce staffing numbers. He blogs about European and Irish political issues here. – The upcoming elections give the people of Ireland a chance to say enough is enough. Enough of this Government who [...]

Interesting report in this morning’s Irish Independent from Fionnan Sheehan, Senan Moloney and Conor Kane on the on-going will-they won’t-they in Fine Gael regarding coalition with Sinn Féin. The Indo’s team point out that Kenny did not rule out a coalition with any party when speaking to TG4 at the FG Ard Fheis earlier this [...]

It’s that time again with the European election nominations just closed that you might actually be interested in what your MEP has been up to for the last term. Want to check how they voted or how often they were in Brussel ? Thanks to http://votewatch.eu you can.

Update: The legendary personality is Polish activist Lech Walesa Libertas’s conference kicks off soon in Rome, you can watch online. You really should becuase we hear last night; Big name Guest Speaker at Libertas convention Friday May 1st Just a quick note to say that a legendary personality will speak at the Libertas convention in [...]

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 [...]

As BNIFFO-gate rumbles on, it’s easy to forget that the European Union is essentially in crisis today.  People are racking their brains to remember the last time that a government collapsed while holding the EU Council Presidency, but the Czech government has certainly picked a most inconvenient time to do so: half way through its [...]

Do you fancy running for Libertas? That is a question they asked subscribers to their email list (subbed for research purposes) today. They are taking nominations from the floor to run against the Brussles political elite….wonder if we could have an x-factor selection convention for Eurosceptic candidates. Maybe Simon Cowell wants some of that action…. [...]

The German ambassador’s reply to inquiries as to his comments at an event in Tralee on Tuesday. The ambassador was there because of new cultural linkups between Tralee and Frankfurt, his reported comments were incendiary locally – consdiering the high number of ‘no’ voters at the last Lisbon campaign and the re-election of Martin Ferris [...]

The Irish Times reports an arguement in the west. In a weekend speech in Galway announcing his candidacy, Mr Ganley referred to Mr Higgins as “Swimmer Jim” because of the MEP’s support for a €9.2 million plan for a swimming pool at the European Parliament. “I have heard Jim Higgins preaching about the Government wasting [...]

So the Declan Ganley European tour is on stop number 2 today in France. Announcing his French candidates for the EU Parliament Viscount Philippe de Villiers, Frédéric Nihous and Jérôme Rivière.  Out of the three you probably have only heard of De Villiers. He is quiet the controversial guy and supposed creator of the term “Polish Plummer” in [...]

The Sunday Times reports that Fianna Fail are looking for “independently wealthy” -haven’t they hade enough of them? – persons to run as second candidates for Europe. They expect them to spend big on themselves like Royston and raise lots too. In other words they are skint. In Connaught-Ulster the party has set it’s hopes [...]

At the time of the first Lisbon referendum, Declan Ganley marched out on front of the cameras with three tickets for the leaders of the pro-Lisbon parties. We were, Ganley told us, to send these politicians back to Brussels to renegotiate the treaty. Many journalists mistook Ganley’s pro-social behaviour for a political stunt. After all, cheap stunts are to politicians what concrete blocks are to builders, but these commentators failed to remember that Ganley is not a politician.

The office of Czech President Vaclav Klaus has published the transcript of what apparently was a blazing row that erupted in a meeting between him and MEPs Daniel Cohn-Bendit (the ’68 veteran) and Fianna Fail MEP Brian Crowley.  Elements of the row are reported on in the Irish Times today but Klaus has since decided [...]

Enda Kenny and David Cameron met for just under an hour yesterday.  It’s an interesting pairing (photo).  As Enda told the Irish Times, they have the common predicament of being in opposition against a long-standing incumbent party.  The actual common policy areas are tricky.  As Guido Fawkes has emphasized, the un-Labour approach to coping with [...]

Our economic woes may be at an end – Suzy has the scoop. The package will be all about the three T’s – ‘Timely, Targeted and Temporary’. It will include proposals for tax cuts, fast tracking of Structural Funds to stimulate growth, and a percentage of GDP (maybe 1% or maybe not) from member states. [...]

Dan Boyle was selected last night to run for the Green Party in the Euro-South constituency next summer. The senator’s work will be cut out for him getting into one of the three seats. The field is likely to have two sitting MEPs who won in 2004 and a third who was parachuted in for [...]