Affairs of the Nation

Denis O'Brien

Affairs of the Nation

DINNY AND DERMO AND INM

THE MOST recent coverage of ODCE boss Ian Drennan’s affidavit on the alleged carry-on in Independent News and Media (INM) has seen mention of a strange deal involving the sale... Read more »

Affairs of the Nation

Heavey Exit

FANS OF Goldhawk will not have been too surprised by news this week that one Dorothy Thompson CBE has been appointed chair of the quoted exploration company Tullow Oil –... Read more »
Simon Coveney

Affairs of the Nation

IRISH FOREIGN POLICY COLLAPSE

IN JUST three weeks the disintegration of Ireland’s once honorable non-aligned foreign policy has been laid bare by the pace of events in the Middle East and the EU. This... Read more »

Affairs of the Nation

Ian Bailey

Affairs of the Nation

IAN BAILEY: CHAPTER 84

IAN BAILEY’S hearing in the Court of Appeal this week was the first of several staging posts along the way as he continues to fight off those who would see... Read more »
Paddy Jackson

Affairs of the Nation

IRFU KEEPS ITS EYE ON THE BALL

THE TERMINATION of the contracts of shamed rugby players Paddy Jackson and Stuart Olding was never in doubt from the time the trial ended and the all-important commercial considerations kicked... Read more »
Emily Logan

Affairs of the Nation

EMILY LOGAN KEEPS MUM ON EGYPT

HUMAN RIGHTS campaigning can be a tricky business as the head of the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission (IHREC), Emily Logan, found recently. Logan recently apologised to the other... Read more »
Ian Hyland

Affairs of the Nation

HYLAND’S SUITE GUYS

THERE has been rather less hype about Dublin Tech Week – Ian Hyland and Paul Connolly’s attempt to replace Paddy Cosgrave’s web summit – than they would have expected. Perhaps... Read more »

Pillars of Society

Catherine Heaney

Pillars of Society

Catherine Heaney

LAST WEEK, the Culture Minister Josepha Madigan, flanked by Leo Varadkar and Paschal Donohoe, announced a huge U1.2bn infrastructure funding package for the arts.... Read more »

The Young Bloods

Síona Cahill

The Young Bloods

Síona Cahill

INCOMING Union of Students in Ireland (USI) president Síona Cahill (25) is taking charge of the national union at a very interesting time. In... Read more »

Fit to Print?

Anne Harris

Fit to Print?

ANNE HARRIS’S ‘WAR’ CASUALTIES

WRITING in the Sunday Business Post recently, former Sunday Independent editor Anne Harris described her “personal testimony of my experience at INM” as “the equivalent of war” and how “democracy... Read more »

Fit to Print?

Brendan and Denis

AN INM editorial executive who has thrived despite offering Denis O’Brien perhaps the greatest single provocation is Sindo journalist Brendan O’Connor. In the heat of battle before the fall of... Read more »
Gavin O’Reilly

Fit to Print?

GAVIN’S DISGUST

“It is time for answers at INM, GAVIN O’REILLY EXCLUSIVE”, was emblazoned across the front page of the Sunday Business Post following the ODCE allegations against ex-INM chairman Leslie Buckley... Read more »

Last Refuge

Mary Newman

Last Refuge

FINE GAEL SIRENS’ SEANAD BID

THE Newman blue blouse coven – TD Kate O’Connell, her sister and parliamentary aide, Theresa Newman, and third sister, would-be senator Mary Newman – are incensed at Leo Varadkar’s disregard... Read more »
Micheál Martin

Last Refuge

MICHEÁL MARTIN’S REPEAL THE 8th RISK

IS the political media corps so invested in a Yes to repeal the 8th referendum that none of them wants to consider the fall-out from a No vote? Nobody is... Read more »
Vincent Browne

Last Refuge

Haughey’s money

THE progress of Vincent Browne’s long awaited biog of Charles Haughey has seen the veteran hack appeal recently for information from the public on the former Taoiseach. Goldhawk’s contribution to... Read more »
Micheal Mac Donnacha

Last Refuge

SINN FÉIN BLOCKS DUBLIN MAYOR FROM DÁIL

DUBLIN’S Sinn Féin mayor Mícheál Mac Donncha raised his already high profile stint as mayor with pimpernel activities in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories last week. But if Mac... Read more »

Hush Hush

Robert Nairac

Hush Hush

ROBERT NAIRAC’S PADRE COLLEAGUE

RTE’s Prime Time has begun rebroadcasting on its website an apologia for Dirty War operative Robert Nairac despite public demands for the film’s removal from its website by Stephen Travers,... Read more »

Hush Hush

Olga’s cases

GOLDHAWK’S favourite Russian lawyer, Olga Shajaku, popped up in the news last weekend when her client found himself accused of owing a fellow Russkie €1m. Olga knows a thing or... Read more »

Student Life

Boni Odomene

Student Life

USI SIGNS UP TO Israel boycott

USI (Union of Students in Ireland) held its national congress earlier this month in Ballinasloe, where Longford native Síona Cahill was appointed president (see Young Blood, pg 17). The most... Read more »

Bog Cuttings

Bog Cuttings

Bog Cuttings

Bog Cuttings

‘Fuck off, you’re a sausage’ GARDAÍ received phone calls from residents about youths causing disturbances in the Glanmire area over several months last year. In one incident a youth told... Read more »

Fowl Emissions

Michael Creed

Fowl Emissions

POOR CHILLY SODDEN FARMERS

CRISIS, what crisis? It seems like only yesterday when our media was awash with heart-rending stories of starving cattle and desperate farmers as the fodder crisis swept the land. Agriculture... Read more »

Fowl Emissions

Agri-bucks

WITH the average family farm income in 2016 at a dismal €24,000, and with two in three beef farmers only solvent thanks to CAP transfers from the EU taxpayer, you... Read more »

Bird's Eye View

Down Loyalists Dee Stitt and Arlene Foster

Bird's Eye View

LOYALIST GANGS AT WORK IN PLAIN SIGHT

AT NOON last Friday, 200 PSNI officers with members of the British National Crime Agency and Customs and Excise raided 12 premises in greater Belfast including the towns of Crumlin... Read more »

The Hot Air Brigade

Colm Tóibín

The Hot Air Brigade

THE HOT AIR BRIGADE

My Sunday ritual is to go to Alice Tully Hall at the Lincoln Center to hear a chamber orchestra… It’s important not to shuffle or cough. When I went to... Read more »

High Society

High Society

Michael Noble Jnr

High Society

WHERE THERE’S MUCK THERE’S BRASS

A HUGE spread in Delgany, Co Wicklow, featured in the Sunday Times earlier this month, with the price tag for Castlefield House coming in... Read more »

High Society

High Society

Opera Company’s new cast member

ANOTHER NEW name has been added to the cast of the recently incorporated Irish National Opera company (INO), formed by the merger of Opera... Read more »

High Society

George and Wendy Magan

High Society

GEORGE MAGAN’S MILLIONS

THIS YEAR has been rather less controversial than last for George Magan – aka Baron Magan of Castletown – with the news that the splendid Castletown Cox estate, outside Carrick-on-Suir... Read more »

Behind the Scenes

Sharon Horgan

Behind the Scenes

DRAMATIC HAND-OUTS FROM THE BAI

THE LATEST round of the Sound & Vision fund run by Michael O’Keefe’s Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) had €6m of TV licence fee dosh to hand out to the... Read more »
Emer Martin

Behind the Scenes

EMER MARTIN Vs EDNA O’BRIEN

CONGRATULATIONS are due to writer-cum-filmaker Emer Martin, who gave Dame Edna O’Brien both barrels in a full-blooded comment piece last weekend in The Irish Times. Her timing was perfect. O’Brien... Read more »

Sport of Kings

Mark Flood

Sport of Kings

MARK FLOOD’S FITZWILLIAM FANS

FITZWILLIAM RACING was a name that cropped up a few times in the winner’s enclosure last year and the investment syndicate, set up by venture capitalist Mark Flood, has made... Read more »
Philip Fenton

Sport of Kings

PHILIP FENTON’S RETURN?

COULD Philip Fenton be planning a return to the training ranks? The former champion amateur jockey and multiple Grade 1 winning trainer was handed a three-year ban from training by... Read more »
Bryan Cooper

Sport of Kings

BREEZE UPS AND DOWNS

BRYAN COOPER’S new venture as a seller of breeze up horses has gotten off to a stuttering start. Cooper – in partnership with his friend Cormac O’Flynn – bought six... Read more »
John Magnier

Sport of Kings

JOHN MAGNIER’S KENTUCKY CHANCES

DESPITE HIS glut of accolades and achievements on the turf, Saturday, May 5 in Churchill Downs could see Aidan O’Brien and John Magnier raise the bar further when they saddle... Read more »

Reviews

Dafhyd Flynn

Movies

MICHAEL INSIDE – DIRECTED BY FRANK BERRY

PUT MARK Hamill on a familiar rock in the Atlantic, add a few CGI bells and whistles and we’ll readily believe he’s an ascetic Jedi knight marooned on a far-flung... Read more »
FROM A LOW AND QUIET SEA - DONAL RYAN

Books

FROM A LOW AND QUIET SEA – DONAL RYAN (DOUBLEDAY)

DONAL RYAN’S novels have focused to date on damaged and distracted characters experiencing lives of quiet misery. Ryan’s latest book echoes both The Spinning Heart and The Thing About December... Read more »
Alison Spittle

Reviews

ALISON SPITTLE’S CULCHIE CLUB – RTÉ2

ALISON SPITTLE’S one-off documentary tried to discover the meaning of being a modern-day culchie. Over a very long hour, we learned little enough. London-born Spittle grew up in Co Westmeath... Read more »

Moneybags

Moneybags

David Ehrlich

Moneybags

Fat fees at slow growing I-Res Reit

THE ARRIVAL in Ireland of the 50,000-apartment Canadian landlord, Capreit, has fundamentally changed the rental investment market. Its Irish offshoot, Irish Residential Property Reit... Read more »

Moneybags

Tony O'Reilly Jnr

Moneybags

Providence shareholders holding out for a bonanza

AFTER 37 years of failures at Atlantic/Providence Resources, the company has signed a farm-out and financing deal with the Chinese group, Apex – a... Read more »

Brief Cases

Liam and Siobhan Sugrue

Brief Cases

Liam Sugrue’s bad timing

SPARE a thought for Kerry builder Liam Sugrue whose construction outfit has gone to the wall. Three of Sugrue’s companies collapsed earlier this month and a quick glance at the... Read more »
Niall Wiseman

Brief Cases

Niall Wiseman’s faulty Towers

A LOUTH development company called Towerpoint Properties Ltd faces a winding up petition in the High Court next week courtesy of the dreaded taxman. The outfit turns out to be... Read more »
Hot Water Brigade default

Brief Cases

Cantec’s troubled history

MORE on Click.ie, the Dublin tech retailer that collapsed in early April leaving customers empty handed. The company behind Click.ie is Cantec Office Solutions Ltd (COS), one of two related... Read more »
Hot Water Brigade default

Brief Cases

Derek Madden’s late filing

GOLDHAWK spotted an interesting little bioenergy company called Prime Energy Power Ltd, where the liquidator has just been called in after it ran out of moolah. The directors here are... Read more »
Pat Crean and Greg Kavanagh

Brief Cases

Greg Kavanagh and Pat Crean’s agreement

THE honeymoon is well and truly over for Greg Kavanagh and Pat Crean, the duo behind New Generation Homes. After cashing out of New Generation at the end of 2016... Read more »
Lisa Lynch

Brief Cases

Taxing matters

A COUPLE of familiar names popped up recently with tax judgments registered against them. Earlier this month, the Revenue slapped Wicklow businessman Stan O’Reilly Jr – best known as the... Read more »
Hot Water Brigade default

Brief Cases

Dom Carney’s court dates

SPARE a thought for brother and sister duo Dom and Niamh Carney who had a tough day in the Supreme Court recently. The Cork entrepreneurs were denied leave to appeal... Read more »