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Mary Lou McDonald is managing to stick clearly to a well-thought-out line on Covid and the economic support necessary.

ANNUAL 2020: SINN FÉIN ON THE BRINK

Date: November 19, 2020 - Last Refuge

IF 2019 was an annus horribilis for Sinn Féin, 2020 has been the year of resurrection, of Aiséirí. From the depths of a major setback, the party’s prospect of government power is realistically on the agenda more and more. Political rivals and the media could hardly conceal their glee in 2019 when Sinn Féin suffered… Read more »

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The geographic spread of the Social Democrats, which was co-founded by Catherine Murphy, is even more Dublin-centric than Labour’s. Solidarity/People Before Profit TDs, such as Richard Boyd Barrett (below), are all lively and effective political operators.

ANNUAL 2020: FRINGE PARTIES TRAPPED

Date: November 19, 2020 - Last Refuge

As they considered who to vote for to lead our government in February, the electorate faced the choice of TweedleFF or TweedleFG. Perennial predictions of a wipe-out of Independents were unfulfilled and, while there are none in government, they remain poised to strike a deal should a sudden election arise. As the two centre-right parties… Read more »

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Rory Cleary

STICKING IT AT DUNDALK

Date: November 19, 2020 - Sport of Kings

FLAT STAYERS aren’t particularly well catered for at Dundalk and, after some lobbying from Michael Grassick’s Irish Racehorse Trainers’ Association, Horse Racing Ireland agreed to add a low-level handicap over two miles to the recent fixture list. It was a humble affair and was won by the Rory Cleary-trained Nightly Wailing, ridden by the trainer’s… Read more »

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Ali Ryan

ALI RYAN’S GOSSIES

Date: November 19, 2020 - Briefcases

ALI RYAN, the boss of online gossip outlet Goss, announced last week that her much-talked-about annual awards show, the Gossies 2021, will indeed be going ahead come January, albeit not in the physical sense. Goldhawk, meanwhile, is waiting for the new accounts to see if there something else to celebrate. Ryan was in a teasing… Read more »

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FRANK CLARKE’S APPOINTMENT

Date: November 18, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

ANOTHER aspect of Séamus Woulfe’s term as attorney general that has recently been seized on is the secretive manner of his appointment to the Supreme Court and the fact that few in the cabinet knew there were other applicants for the job. But what of the similar manner of the appointment as chief justice of… Read more »

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leo Varadkar

VARADKAR’S VBFS

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

HOW PIQUANT that Leo Varadkar should have made cronyism such a strong part of his political profile when he began his bid for leadership of party and country a decade ago. Vlad gave more than just a confidential document to an interested party (Dr Maitiú Ó Tuathail) and others have also received preferment of a… Read more »

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Gemma O'Doherty

GEMMA’S BRITISH COMRADES

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

GEMMA O’DOHERTY is positioned distinctly to the right on the political spectrum, but her rallies and those of other anti-immigrant ‘Irish patriots’, like the National Party, increasingly see followers waving dozens of Irish flags. These patriotic groups usually march around Dublin city centre before stopping and playing republican records, such as A Nation Once Again… Read more »

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Peter Vandermeersch

PROFILE: PETER VANDERMEERSCH

Date: November 5, 2020 - Pillars of Society

BUYING A large newspaper group – Independent News & Media (INM) – just as print media looks to be in the final stage of terminal decline indicates a positive mental attitude; either that or a wildly optimistic view of transitioning profitably from print to digital media. Pile on the Covid plague, which struck less than a… Read more »

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Emer McLysaght and Sarah Breen

YOUNG BLOOD: EMER MCLYSAGHT AND SARAH BREEN

Date: November 5, 2020 - The Young Bloods

THEY’VE PUBLISHED three bestselling books, are working on the screenplay for their character’s film debut and won the 2019 Popular Fiction award at the Irish Book Awards. Stellar stuff, but some might say that the most impressive thing Emer McLysaght and Sarah Breen have achieved is managing to parlay a single observational comedy idea into… Read more »

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Ken Murphy

LAW SOCIETY ‘EXTRAVAGANCE’

Date: November 5, 2020 - Briefcases

WITH THE long-time director of the Law Society preparing to step down in March next year after 26 years in situ in Blackhall Place, there is bound to be quite a queue of applicants for the post given the size of the remuneration package. Before he exits, however, it looks like Murphy’s stupendous salary is… Read more »

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Rebecca O'Byrne

DANIELLE RYAN’S STYLISH COUSIN

Date: November 5, 2020 - High Society

NEXT MONTH will see the release in the US of the film Wild Mountain Thyme. It should coincide with the release of the latest figures for Roads Luxury group, owned by one of the movie’s stars, Danielle Ryan. She also has a new charity on the go, where a recent arrival on the board is… Read more »

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MARGARET SWEENEY’S €1M PA

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

FORMER DUBLIN Airport Authority boss Margaret Sweeney landed herself a 42% pay hike at the listed property giant I-Res Reit, where her total remuneration topped a cool €1m last year. This is an impressive salary given that an awful lot of the work is carried out by a separate Canadian-controlled entity with its own boss… Read more »

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Dermot Lacey

DERMOT LACEY’S STRANGE APPOINTMENT

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

EYEBROWS WERE raised recently when education minister Norma Foley quietly made her three appointments to the governing authority of UCD. One of the faces did not quite fit, as Dublin Lord Mayor Hazel Chu would have been well aware. The members of the current governing authority in Belfield will serve until 2024 and the chair… Read more »

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Susan Bergin Marlowe Mullingar Film Studio RTÉ Self-Employment

PAT MOLLOY’S SUCCESSOR

Date: November 5, 2020 - Behind the Scenes

STILL NO sign of the 2018 accounts at Dublin’s Hugh Lane, where there is finally to be a change at the top, with ex-banker Pat Molloy preparing to step down after 22 years. The constitution allows the chairman to serve “indefinitely” and Molloy has almost achieved that feat, having been on the board since his… Read more »

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Una Mullally

ALAN KELLY REINVENTS HIMSELF

Date: November 5, 2020 - Last Refuge

LABOUR LEADER Alan Kelly and his handlers have been busy with a relentless campaign to replace AK-47’s image with a brand new persona since he took the party leadership. Gone is the scary megalomaniac, drunk with the faintest hint of power – a personality trait that women in particular found unpalatable. Now a new man… Read more »

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Vol. 38 No. 22

Date: November 5, 2020 -

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SIMONE ROCHA’S PEARLS

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

FASHION DESIGNER Simone Rocha recently launched her Spring 2021 ready-to-wear collection ‘in the flesh’, eschewing the online Zoom-type events that are increasingly familiar. Under pandemic protocols, the designer’s 10 models stood at least two metres apart within the large Hauser & Wirth gallery on Savile Row and fashion hacks had their temperature checked on the… Read more »

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Paddy Cosgrave

DOCTORS DIFFER

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

THE LIST of characters in Leo Varadkar’s ‘confidential’ leak story includes the tánaiste himself, web summit guru Paddy Cosgrave, GP union head Dr Maitiú Ó Tuathail and medical professional Chay Bowes. But the unconscious instigator of the controversy that threatened to destabilise the government is the former chief executive of the National Association of General… Read more »

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Leo Varadkar

DR VARADKAR’S DILEMMA

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

TÁNAISTE DR Leo Varadkar’s medical interactions have seen him don scrubs and present as Joseph Lister in the first phase of Covid-19 last April and, more recently, as a Machiavellian meddler in medical politics. Varadkar also claimed in an Irish Times article in 2018 to have had the benefit of experience as a “hospital doctor,… Read more »

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Nichola Mallon

SDLP FRACKING DILEMMA

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

NORTHERN CONTROVERSIES only attract media attention if they concern Sinn Féin, which might help to explain why the SDLP’s Nichola Mallon, Northern Ireland’s infrastructure minister, has escaped mainstream media criticism over a fracking issue. Fracking is a process regarded as so dangerous to human health and the environment that it is banned in several countries,… Read more »

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Declan Kelly

DECLAN KELLY’S PREDICTIONS

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

NO DOUBT corporate strategist extraordinaire Declan Kelly was keeping a close eye on the US election results this week given his company’s strong links to the Democrats. Closer to home, the Irish subsidiary of Teneo has hit some unexpected turbulence. Meanwhile a company acquired at the start of this year is being wound up. In… Read more »

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Siún Ní Raghallaigh

OOPS! THEY’VE DONE IT AGAIN

Date: November 5, 2020 - Affairs of the Nation

AN IRISH animated film topped the UK box office charts last month, offering another potential big pay day for Siún Ní Raghallaigh and Moe Honan’s Galway-based animation company, Moetion Films. Unfortunately, there is nothing in this for the Irish taxpayer, who may be feeling a little shortchanged. The Guardian review of Two By Two: Overboard (a sequel… Read more »

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Pat Finucane

‘BEATING’ THE IRA

Date: November 5, 2020 - Hush Hush

Successive governments in the Irish republic bear the brunt of responsibility for the IRA’s ‘insurgency’. That’s one of the core accusations from former Special Branch (SB) officer William Matchett, whose book on SB’s war against the IRA has been trumpeted recently as the best unionist… Read more »

HushHush-def

JON BOUTCHER’S BLUSHES

Date: November 5, 2020 - Hush Hush

The ‘Stakeknife’ spy charade was exposed to further ridicule last week when state prosecutors ruled there is no hard evidence that Fred Scappaticci is in fact “the agent called Stakeknife”. Former IRA man Scappaticci did have links with the security forces in the ’80s and ’90s, but he was not Stakeknife. Operation Kenova’s Jon Boutcher… Read more »

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Rachel Allen

THE HOT AIR BRIGADE

Date: November 5, 2020 - The Hot Air Brigade

If you have any leftover zabaglione, try folding into it chunks of broken meringue and crushed berries for an Italian take on the classic Eton Mess. Rachel Allen, Sunday Independent’s Living, submitted by reader Clothes are not essential. Minister of State for Employment Affairs and Retail Business, Damien English on RTÉ’s Prime Time I have… Read more »

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Lord Bew

CENTENARY HALF CELEBRATION

Date: November 5, 2020 - Northwind

The budget for celebrating the north’s centenary is due to be revealed at the end of the month. Northern Ireland Office (NIO) sources suggest several million pounds will be earmarked for local groups and councils to organise events across the north. The NIO suggests it’s part of the ‘Shared History Fund’ mentioned in January’s ‘New… Read more »

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Ursula von der Leyen

CAP SELL-OUT

Date: November 5, 2020 - Fowl Emissions

“Today the European Parliament will vote on how we produce our food for the next seven years,” tweeted Luke ‘Ming’ Flanagan. “The decisions MEPs make will intrinsically impact on our very future on this planet. Yet still it will receive less attention from our media than the third round FA Cup draw.” And so it… Read more »

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Climate Disinformation Coillte Climate Action EU Livestock NDC Claude Etchelamendy Ed Brophy Richard Boyd-Barrett Kish Dale Crammond Frank Mitloehner Shell Greenwashing Meta Data Centres Ireland

VEGGIE DISTRACTION

Date: November 5, 2020 - Fowl Emissions

Veggie discs for dinner, anyone? Vegan tubes for lunch? These are the names we almost got for meat-free burgers and sausages, in an anti-vegetarian proposal cooked up by Europe’s meat industry. The ploy failed when MEPs voted to reject the proposed ban on using the words ‘burger’ and ‘sausage’ for plant-based products. They did not… Read more »

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Elisha McCallion

GOVERNMENT SEANAD PACT

Date: November 5, 2020 - Last Refuge

SINN FÉIN senator Elisha McCallion’s resignation from the Seanad has done both Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil a big favour, producing a political scenario beyond irony for all political parties concerned, even the Greens. Following Michael D’Arcy’s recent resignation from the Seanad, Taoiseach Micheál Martin – he who has made such generous gestures to unionists… Read more »

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Eamon Ryan

RYAN’S VICTORY

Date: November 5, 2020 - Last Refuge

THE SURPRISING thing about the recent exodus of some of the more forceful radicals in the Green Party is that leader Eamon Ryan came within a few dozen votes of losing the leadership to the party’s left-of-centre challenger, Catherine Martin, in July. At the same time, five of the 12 Green TDs can be described… Read more »

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Jennifer Carroll MacNeill

BLUESHIRT ORDER

Date: November 5, 2020 - Last Refuge

FINE GAEL’S Dún Laoghaire constituency chairman, Edward Kennedy, may have delivered the last of his portentous letters to members, depending on the imminent result of the tight election for chair between him and membership secretary Annette Kent. Not all Kingstown Blueshirts appreciate Kennedy’s style and a resentful few privately mock his efforts to maintain standards… Read more »

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Bog-Cuttings-Defaul

BOG CUTTINGS

Date: November 5, 2020 - Bog Cuttings

‘WANKERS!’ A man who was abusive towards gardaí has been given the chance to have his case struck out if he makes a donation to the Garda Benevolent Fund. Terry Trindler (29) of St Benan’s Villas, Laytown, was observed by gardaí in Stockwell Lane, in the early hours of the morning, shouting at members of… Read more »

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John Burns

NEW EDITOR FOR ‘ST’

Date: November 5, 2020 - Fit to Print?

Frank Fitzgibbon’s resignation as editor of the Aawrish edition of the Sunday Times leaves the gate open for John Burns, the man who has been aching to succeed Fitzgibbon for many years, having joined at its inception 27 years ago along with just one other journalist, the late Alan Ruddock. Burns is associate editor and… Read more »

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Micheál Martin

MARTIN’S ‘SHARED’ HISTORY

Date: November 5, 2020 - Fit to Print?

AN TAOISEACH Micheál Martin developed his shared-island theme with the Guardian last week in an exercise in historic revisionism that will have fazed even Eoghan Harris and Charlie BlackandTanagain. With commendable reserve, today’s modern Irish leader praised the generosity of the Duke of Devonshire – Peregrine Andrew Morny Cavendish, to give him his full moniker… Read more »

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Lily-Rose Depp

FUNDING LILY-ROSE DEPP

Date: November 5, 2020 - Behind the Scenes

THERE’S LITTLE doubt Irish film and television producers are having a bad year, but at least they (and their international cast members) continue to draw succour from the public purse. The section 481 tax credit is the biggest source of taxpayer cash for Irish film and TV luvvies and, so far this year, 77 productions… Read more »

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In Bed with the Blueshirts

IN BED WITH THE BLUESHIRTS SHANE ROSS (ATLANTIC BOOKS)

Date: November 5, 2020 - BooksReviews

POLITICAL REMINISCENCES in Ireland are invariably boring, free of interesting information and full of self-justification presented with no context (or purpose). But this book is different. It actually tells you what happened – from Shane Ross’s point of view of course. The mouthy former minister helpfully admits at the start that he has a monstrous… Read more »

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