One of Ireland’s outstanding and prolific writers and intellectuals, Desmond Fennell turned 90 last year. Since the late 1950s, he has published over 30 books and pamphlets dealing with what he himself described as the condition of the human person in Ireland. That has been the basis of philosophy in the western tradition for several […]
The publication of an ESRI report on forecast population growths and consequent housing requirements was published on December 14. The report, Regional Demographics and Structural Housing Demand at County Level was compiled by TCD research professor Adele Bergin and Abian Garcia Rodriguez of the ESRI. As John McGuirk noted yesterday, all the forecasts contained are dependent on arbitrary […]
On Friday, Eirgrid announced that peak electricity demand had been surpassed twice in the previous seven days. It was ironic that this came on the day that the first of two midlands peat stations, Shannonbridge in County Offaly, were officially closed. The remaining peat station at Lough Ree will shut down next Friday. The reasons given by Eirgrid […]
With the Citizenship referendum of 2004 again in the news, as the political “elite” plan ways to overturn that democratic decision, the current statistics available are worth looking at in the context of where the asylum process currently stands. A request under the Freedom of Information Act elicited the following data from the International Protection […]
In the aftermath of a series of IRA military successes, including the killing of the intelligence agents in Dublin on Bloody Sunday and the ambush on the Auxiliaries at Kilmichael on November 28, it was decided to declare martial law in four Munster counties; Cork, Tipperary, Limerick and Kerry which came into effect on December 10. That was […]
In Arthur Koestler’s novel Darkness at Noon, the Stalinist Rubashov’s prison neighbour responds to the news that Rubashov has fallen foul of the regime by tapping out “Bravo. The Wolves devour one another.” Some of us may be forgiven by having the same feelings with regard to the turning of the woke witch hunters on […]
Taxpayer-funded organisations are meant to be transparent and accountable. Proper order, given that so many millions in our taxes are granted each year to entities which often seem to be a favourite of the politically powerful rather than the public. One of the ways in which transparency is achieved is in inviting various parties to […]
Just as the Government rolled over for the far left on the Euthanasia Bill, it seems that they will do the same on Labour’s Private Members Bill which seeks to overturn the decision of the 2004 referendum on citizenship. Yesterday in the Seanad, Minister for Justice Helen McEntee told Senator Ivana Bacik that she supported […]
Following the fitting commemoration of those killed at Croke Park in November 1920, it is apt to recall that the other main stand and the terrace adjacent to Hill 16 are also named in honour of two great Irishmen, Michael Cusack and P.W Nally, who also died in the month of November. Michael Cusack, of an […]
The latest and most serious attempt to overturn the referendum which overwhelmingly approved changes to the criteria governing eligibility for Irish citizenship in 2004 comes before the Seanad on Wednesday. There have been, as we have noted before, several other Private Members Bills tabled by communist TDs, but this one in the name of Labour […]
November 1920 in many ways marked a turning point in the War of Independence. It was a month in which the military conflict reached new levels with around 100 killed on both sides. It also witnessed a marked escalation in the number of officially sanctioned reprisals against the civilian population who by this stage, outside […]
It would appear once again that it is an ill Pandemic that blows no favours. Last month it emerged that one of Ireland’s premier recruitment agencies, CPL Resources, had been given the contract by the Health Services Executive (HSE) to hire contact tracers as well as additional student and graduate nurses. The contract was valued […]