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Derek McGrath

REDUCED FIELD AT THE CURRAGH

Date: July 15, 2016 - Sport of Kings

WITH NEWS that planning permission for the huge Curragh racecourse redevelopment project has being granted. it is a tad disconcerting that 7,000 less people attended the Irish Derby this year than last year. A crowd of little more than 18,000 showed up for the jewel in the crown of Irish flat racing although the event… Read more »

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Simon Cook

Draper Esprit’s potential comes with health warning

Date: July 15, 2016 - Moneybags

BOTH Jim Flavin’s DCC and Shane Reihill’s Trinity Venture Capital (TVC) floated on the Stock Exchange as venture capital vehicles but failed to make a long term impact in this sector. It is noteworthy, therefore, that there is a new entry into this space, Draper Esprit. This company just floated on the Irish Stock Exchange… Read more »

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Kirill Golovanov

Polymetal stake should boost Ovoca

Date: July 15, 2016 - Moneybags

THE BIGGEST challenges for shareholders in Ovoca Gold have been the company’s changing nature and the disjoint between its current dominant Russian shareholders and its management. This, however, changed dramatically last year when the CEO, Kirill Golovanov, bought out Ovoca chairman, Mikhail Mogutov, along with one of the other Russian shareholders in October 2015. This… Read more »

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Mark Little

The Hot Air Brigade

Date: July 15, 2016 - The Hot Air Brigade

“Twitter changed my life. I mean, I loved Twitter before it was even invented. I used to sit around in places like Afghanistan wanting to plug in to the outside world but I couldn’t. Now I get to work on things that actually touch lives.” Mark Little, touching lives in The Sunday Independent “I was… Read more »

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Eamon DeValera

De Valera’s Irish Pressures

Date: July 15, 2016 - The Hot Water Brigade

IRISH Press PLC finally filed its 2014 accounts last month after a long wait, which saw it listed for striking off the Companies Register for the second time in under a year. But there’s bad news for investors in the company – where Eamon de Valera remains in situ as CEO – with accumulated group… Read more »

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Darren Lehane

BAR COUNCIL POLITICS

Date: July 15, 2016 - Wigs on the Green

“INDEPENDENCE, Expertise, Integrity” are the watchwords of the Bar Council which proclaims its members to be readily accessible and bound by an ethical code of conduct for the Bar of Ireland. Members of the Council of the Bar, who have just been elected for the year hence, also find it a most useful network and… Read more »

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kevin-myers

KEVIN MYERS’ WAR

Date: July 15, 2016 - Fit to Print?

“Just to be clear. I thought then and think now, that the moral argument in favour of America intervening in Saddam’s Iraq was overwhelming”, was Sunday Times columnist, Colonel Myers’ response to the Chilcott Inquiry last week. But Myers was anything but clear in the 2002/3 debates about the morality of invading Iraq and switched… Read more »

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Charlie Flanagan

Charlie Flanagan

Date: July 15, 2016 - Pillars of Society

A very bad fortnight for Enda Kenny saw minister for foreign affairs and trade, Charlie Flanagan, also ship collateral damage in the matter of the mooted all-Ireland Brexit forum. But that’s the nature of the political relationship between the two men with Charlie’s fortunes always dependent on his rapport or otherwise with his party leader…. Read more »

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John Hume Jnr

MONSANTO GETS ROUNDUP EXTENSION

Date: July 15, 2016 - Fowl Emissions

AS a ‘good week to bury bad news’, the one following the Brexit vote was hard to beat. As it happened, the timing was probably more fortuitous than devious for the EU Commission as it renewed the licence for the sale of the weed killer glyphosate in the EU on June 28, despite a World… Read more »

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Gary Gannon

Gary Gannon

Date: July 15, 2016 - The Young Bloods

Councillor Gary Gannon (29) has had a meteoric rise in Dublin Central, from the margins of the Tony Gregory Group of independents to a Dublin City Council (DCC) seat in 2014, to a near victory as the Social Democrat candidate in the 2016 general election…. Read more »

Margaret Downes

‘TROPHY’ Dublin properties

Date: July 15, 2016 - High Society

WITH ‘TROPHY’ Dublin properties selling at increasingly inflated prices, the record for this year has been set by former Paddy Power boss Paddy Kennedy’s purchase of 19 Temple Road in Dartry, D6, for a whopping U10m. The happy sellers are barrister Vincent Foley and his wife, Helen, who have a fair few bob to spare… Read more »

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Michael O’Reilly’s Danske woe

Michael O’Reilly’s Danske woe

Date: July 15, 2016 - The Hot Water Brigade

CELBRIDGE-BASED businessman and ex-director of construction giant Pierse Contracting Ltd, Michael O’Reilly had a €247,000 judgment registered against him by Danske Bank in June. The judgment is yet another headache for O’Reilly who last year avoided a restriction order brought against him and the other directors of Pierse by the company’s liquidator in the High… Read more »

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Receivers swarm on Redhill

Receivers swarm on Redhill

Date: July 15, 2016 - The Hot Water Brigade

A COMPANY called Redhill Properties Ltd last month had its fifth receiver appointed to it in three years on foot of a tranche of mortgage charges created by Anglo Irish Bank back in 2004 and 2005. The principals here are Carlow-based Stephen Murphy – an engineer and developer whose companies have incurred some spicy losses… Read more »

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John McCormack

John McCormack’s huge losses

Date: July 15, 2016 - The Hot Water Brigade

IT’S been a summer to forget for former Sligo Businessman of the Year John McCormack, with Bank of Ireland (BoI) appointing a receiver to his fuel and garage empire. Some 208 jobs were lost in Sligo and Leitrim – where jobs are thin on the ground – when the receivers closed 15 of McCormack’s businesses… Read more »

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Bad news for the Butler boys

Bad news for the Butler boys

Date: July 15, 2016 - The Hot Water Brigade

GOLDHAWK recently spotted an interesting set of accounts filed in June by a company called Entertainment Enterprises Restaurants Holdings Ltd (EERH), one of the entities in Colum and Ciaran Butler’s Entertainment Enterprises (EE) group. The Butler brothers are listed as directors of the company, which is in turn controlled by another of the boys’ outfits,… Read more »

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Laurence Shields

Worrying Numbers for Michael Peirce

Date: July 15, 2016 - The Hot Water Brigade

SPARE a thought for Oransay Developments Ltd (ODL), which had a receiver appointed to it last month on foot of a mortgage charge created by Bank of Scotland (BoS) back in 2008. The Dublin company is a subsidiary of Amiba Ltd, which trades as MDS Amiba and MDS Gateways, two large-scale suppliers of communications systems… Read more »

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Irish outposts for Blackstone’s schemes

Date: July 15, 2016 - The Hot Water Brigade

INTERESTING to see that Saudi Arabia has agreed to invest $20bn in private equity giant Blackstone’s new US infrastructure fund. The fund is designed to funnel investment towards Donald Trump’s planned public works projects but one particular pie that Blackstone already has a finger in is Irish third-level education. Blackstone’s CEO is ostentatious republican Stephen… Read more »

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veronica-guerin

THE ASSASSINATION OF A JOURNALIST

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the Nation

Sunday Independent editorial executive Willie Kealy opened his tribute to Veronica Guerin last Sunday with a polemic against those who felt that she had not been well served by the newspaper before and after her death. Kealy is at least consistent, unlike half a dozen other INM personalities, all of them household names, who told… Read more »

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des-crofton

DES CROFTON’S SHOOT OUT

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the Nation

THERE WAS an interesting report last month concerning the hefty €75,000 awarded to Des Crofton, national director of the National Association of Regional Game Councils (NARGC), the body that represents shooters in Ireland, over comments made about him on Facebook. However, it turns out this was just the first blast in what is an ongoing… Read more »

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MORGAN O’SULLIVAN

MORGAN O’SULLIVAN’S GERMAN DRAMA

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the Nation

THE DRAGGING of James Flynn and Morgan O’Sullivan of Octagon Films into the Four Goldmines by German producer W2 Filmproduktion creates the prospect of a revealing spat about how players in the opaque Irish film and TV sector conduct their business. In an attempt to have the claim for a whopping €25m in lost revenue… Read more »

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Fintan-Drury

FINTAN DRURY REINVENTS HIMSELF

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the Nation

WHAT on earth has come over Fintan Drury, the PR guru and dynamic businessman with all the right connections? He has come over all wet and liberal with journalistic outpourings on the world’s evils and has even criticised the corporate world he once belonged to for being hand in glove with the government in Britain…. Read more »

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DERMOT DESMOND’S PANAMA PROBLEM

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the Nation

IT looks like Der Kaiser is getting ready to do go to war with The Irish Times over the paper’s report of his links to the Panama Papers. Dermot Desmond is not a happy man with IT’s recent coverage of the Mossack Fonseca leak and a resulting article that linked him to a company that… Read more »

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david-hall

DAVID HALL’S LUCRATIVE LIFELINE

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the Nation

MORTGAGE CAMPAIGNER and self-promoter extraordinaire David Hall was back in the news last week when he was appointed by the board of Console, the suicide prevention charity, to review the issues raised in the recent HSE audit and RTÉ investigation. This is just one of the many items he is currently dealing with apart from… Read more »

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Mary-Mitchell-OConner

TEACHERS FAIL IN SOUTH DUBLIN SCHOOL

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the Nation

THE PARENTS at the Harold School in Glasthule, south County Dublin – formerly headed up by current Minister for Jobs and Enterprise, Mary Mitchell O’Connor – have scored a victory over the teachers, with An Bord Pleanála (ABP) ruling that the use of a playground area as a car park is illegal. This sets the… Read more »

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Red ink at King’s Inns

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the Nation

AMONG THE names that have popped up on the Lobbying Register is that of the Honorable Society of King’s Inns, which is shown to have lobbied Department of Justice mandarins on the sensitive issue of the Legal Services Regulation Bill. Given the manner in which assorted provisions of that bill were watered down, it looks… Read more »

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Miriam O’Callaghan

The Hot Air Brigade

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the NationThe Hot Air Brigade

While we may have no way of knowing how Claire’s renunciation of the political life might go down with party chiefs, we may perhaps hazard a guess that it will cause another blonde and equally talented broadcaster with suspected designs on the Presidency to breathe a very genuine sigh of relief. Mary Carr in Mail… Read more »

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Martin-McGuinness

SINN FÉIN CHAOS OVER BREXIT

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the NationBird's Eye View

LAST Friday there was a notice sellotaped to the door of the post office in Bridge Street in the centre of Belfast. It read: ‘Due to increased demand for Irish passport forms we have run out.’ It hoped to have more by Tuesday. There was a similar surge in Britain, where it’s estimated six million… Read more »

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Micheal-Martin

MICHEÁL MARTIN’S INNER CIRCLE

Date: July 2, 2016 - Last Refuge

THAT little-commented-on poll in The Sunday Times last weekend shows Fine Gael ahead of Fianna Fáil, which fell 2%. This is a reversal of the last poll in May, which showed FF one point ahead. It also shows that Brendan Howlin’s ascent to the Labour leadership has boosted the party (static at 5% since May… Read more »

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Pat-the-cope-gallagher

THE ‘COPING’ POLITICAL CLASS

Date: July 2, 2016 - Last Refuge

PAT ‘The Cope’ Gallagher must be happy that discussion about his determined bid to take the Leas-Cheann Comhairle’s job has not focused on the extraordinary number of pensions, totalling €114,000 circa, that he receives from his many years as a TD, junior minister and MEP. MEPs are entitled to an old-age pension from the age… Read more »

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kate-oconnell

Kate’s U-turn

Date: July 2, 2016 - Last Refuge

IT looks as though the penny has dropped with newly elected Fine Gael TD Kate O’Connell, who has resiled from her strident position on removing the 8th amendment, sharpish, like. In her broadside against party leader Enda Kenny for not appointing enough women as junior ministers (ie, herself – see The Phoenix 17/06/16), Kate also… Read more »

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Fintan Warfield

WOLFE TONE IS ALIVE AND GAY

Date: July 2, 2016 - Affairs of the NationLast Refuge

SMASHING a lot of stereotypical images is Sinn Féin’s young senator, Fintan Warfield (24), whose gay, arty profile will come as something of a culture shock to traditional Republicans and SF opponents alike. Joining SF at 16, Warfield became a councillor for Templeogue-Terenure in 2014 and Mayor of South Dublin the same year aged just… Read more »

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JUSTICE Frank Clarke

GSOC Vs INDO

Date: July 2, 2016 - Fit to Print?

JUSTICE Frank Clarke’s inquiry into the conduct of the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission (GSOC) in an investigation that saw Sergeant Michael Galvin take his life last year had some interesting things to say about the Irish Independent’s coverage of the matter. Sgt Galvin had actually been exonerated by GSOC of any wrongdoing (he was investigated… Read more »

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Dearbhail McDonald

Dumb Dearbhail

Date: July 2, 2016 - Fit to Print?

Goldhawk wrote last February that Dearbhail McDonald was agonising about taking the group business editor’s post at INM because of the delicacy of commenting on boss Denis O’Brien’s business affairs (see The Phoenix 15/1/16). Dearbhail eventually took the job in late April but she could hardly have expected that she would have to grapple with… Read more »

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article default

Loveable loyalists

Date: July 2, 2016 - Fit to Print?

The impeccable behaviour of the Irish soccer fans has provoked a cross community response from some quarters that argues the Norn Iron fans are just as loveable, if a bit cheekier. Determinedly PC in its coverage of Norn fans in Europe, The Irish Times reported approvingly this week on its banner in the Parc des… Read more »

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Brendan O’Connor

Brendan O’Connor

Date: July 2, 2016 - Pillars of Society

Brendan O’Connor should be an editorial has-been by now, a casualty of Denis O’Brien’s new regime at Independent News & Media (INM), which ousted the O’Reilly family and their loyal supporters at the Sunday Independent four years ago. O’Connor was perhaps the most belligerent attack dog in the fight waged against O’Brien by his former… Read more »

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Kevin-Toland

DUBLIN AIRPORT CLIMATE PICKLE

Date: July 2, 2016 - Fowl Emissions

FALLOUT from the Brexit vote may prove something of a gift for the Dublin Airport Authority’s (DAA) ambitious plan to have a second runway built and ready for business by 2020. The huge cloud of economic uncertainty now parked over Britain may put the kibosh on its own 2015 Airport Commission recommendation for a third… Read more »

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