The other mainstream media organs in Ireland, print and broadcast, are enjoying the discomfort currently endured by the country’s national broadcaster, RTE, which they ruthlessly resent for the advantage it enjoys as a commercial competitor from the substantial public funding it receives through the television license fee. This schadenfreude has…

Summer holidays leave one with time on one’s hands. The work the devil made for my idle hands this summer included encouraging me to explore the furthest flung fringes of internet political commentary about events in Ireland. The website Gript.ie describes itself as an independent source of news, a site…

On Friday, 13 May 2022, Sarah Mead was the teacher in charge of a Year 6 class at Meridien Angel Primary School in Edmonton, Enfield. Ms. Mead had been employed at the school since 2015 initially as an Assistant Head Teacher. …

On 1 July, in his regular weekly column for the newspaper, Pat Leahy of The Irish Times reflected on what he called RTE’s “agonies” arising from the revelation that actual payments in recent years to Ryan Tubridy were substantially higher than had been advised to the public. …the entire culture…

At the end of June, for the first time in the life of the current Dáil, the bookmaker Paddy Power’s estimate of the odds of the major parties’ chances of winning the most seats at the next election remained unchanged compared to six months previously. It offers odds of 1/5…

In the winter of 1561, Lucrezia, Duchess of Ferrara, is taken on an unexpected visit to a country villa by her husband, Alfonso. …

On 23 May, Roderick O’Gorman, Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth announced the appointment of Daniel McSweeney to oversee the excavation and recovery of children’s remains at the site of the former Mother and Baby institution in Tuam. Mr. McSweeney will head up an independent office established under…

To my mind, the key measure of a person’s standing is the appetite of those within their sphere of influence to take or return their calls. Especially during his two decades as RTE’s Northern Ireland correspondent but also during a dozen years as its correspondent in Brussels, Tommie Gorman was…

On 22 May, Ireland’s Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly, signed into law what the official government press release called “the world’s first comprehensive health labelling of alcohol products”. To allow businesses time to prepare for the change, the new arrangements will apply only from 22 May 2026. Thereafter, the labels…