Middle Ireland needs a new government. Independents might provide it
Is there an adult in the room? This is a question that is now being frequently asked among objective observers of the general election campaign which will end with voting in nine days’ time. Some fundamental realities seem to escape the minds of the participants. The first is that we will be governed by a coalition which […]
Courting of Labour is the worst type of cynicism
This general election campaign is in danger of descent into farce. That danger is real. The people of Ireland are not fools. They know that a general election is about deciding which people and which policies will govern us for the next five years and where the balance of power in the next Dáil will […]
America deserved better than this contest, and so did the world
Part of me wishes that I could write this piece the day you read it rather than the day before. The fate of the western world, as I write on Tuesday 5th November, lies in the hands of the American voters as it has often done before. Or to be more precise, the fate of […]
Having a million EVs by 2030 is an illusion
In certain parts of the midlands with which I am very familiar, local inhabitants are regularly in receipt of outages notices from ESB Networks notifying consumers that their power supply will be interrupted for lengthy periods (from, say, 10am to 5.30pm) on a particular day. For owners of holiday homes including me, it means that […]
Sinn Féin’s leaders are more like glove puppets for unseen controllers
In the last few weeks, there has been much publicity concerning internal disputes and disciplinary processes in Sinn Féin. Now that we are in an election run-up, some consider that these controversies are sure to damage the party’s prospects on election day. But the cause of a major decline in SF support is longer and […]
Tackling migration requires political courage from EU member states
Germany’s major opposition party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) has now taken the position that the right to asylum has been too broadly defined by the courts and needs to “stripped back to its original postwar core if countries were to regain control over immigration”, according to an interview granted to the London Times by […]