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‘NAZI SHOW TRIALS’

Date: January 26, 2023 -

IRELAND’S BIODIVERSITY crisis is so severe it now requires a “societal response”, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar told the Citizens’ Assembly (CA) at the weekend. “This will benefit not just the people of Ireland but the entire ecosystem that we all depend on,” he said. The Citizens’ Assembly, the first in the world of its kind to… Read more »

BOYD-BARETT AND THE NIMBYS

Date: January 26, 2023 -

WILL THE 2020s become the decade that Ireland finally takes its place as a major player in renewable energy? Not if the nimbys have anything to do with it. Plans are well under way to develop our first offshore wind farm in over 20 years, to be located on the Kish and Bray sandbanks, over… Read more »

BRENDAN McDOWELL’S £2M DIVIDEND

Date: January 26, 2023 -

NO DOUBT cosmetics czar Brendan McDowell is glued to the latest series of Love Island, given his company’s marketing links to some of the stars of the series. Most recently, the BPerfect founder teamed up with the show’s 2022 winner, Ekin-Su Cülcüloğlu, to launch a new collection of slap on the market, BPerfect x Ekin-Su,… Read more »

JOHN O’CONOR’S SUCCESSOR

Date: January 26, 2023 -

WHILE PIANIST John O’Conor is currently delivering his residency at the Glen Gould School of Toronto’s Royal Conservatory, the hunt is on back home to find a new artistic director at the Dublin International Piano Competition (DIPC). Given that founder JOC had been in situ for decades as artistic director and chair of the international… Read more »

SIOBHAN’S BANSHEE WEBINAR

Date: January 26, 2023 -

MAYBE IT’S because Sunday Times editor Nóirín Hegarty previously worked for Lonely Planet but readers will have noticed a tendency of stories in the ‘news’ section of the paper to breathlessly puff up tourism and Irish travel agents in particular. This month saw headlines such as “Americans pay top dollar as tourism gets a reel… Read more »

PAUL BYRNE’S HORSE TRADING

Date: January 26, 2023 -

RACEHORSE OWNERSHIP is a well-known way to burn through money but one man who is proving most adept at making a decent living out of owning nags is Paul Byrne. Through his association with the Mullins clan, most notably his pal Emmett, Byrne has pulled off some impressive deals in recent years, selling his Cheltenham… Read more »

PAUL HENSEY’S POLITICAL CHALLENGE

Date: January 26, 2023 -

CLEARLY THE lure back to Ireland was too strong to resist for Paul Hensey, with the news that he is to take over from the retiring Paddy Walsh as head of the Association of Irish Racecourses (AIR). Hensey has been on an interesting journey since he ended his long association with the Curragh back in… Read more »

DERRICK SMITH’S STRATEGY

Date: January 26, 2023 -

WHEN THE former Aidan O’Brien-trained and Coolmore-owned High Definition was sold to bloodstock agent Mark McStay at Tattersalls last October for £350,000, it was reported that the high-class colt would be going to Joseph O’Brien to embark on a career over hurdles. That lead to the natural assumption that High Definition would be carrying the… Read more »

DÉSIRÉE FINNEGAN’S DIVIDEND

Date: January 26, 2023 -

ON JANUARY 20 Désirée Finnegan’s Screen Ireland (SI) finally published its 108-page report on the Section 481 film tax credit, entitled: The Cultural Dividend Generated by Ireland’s Section 481 Film and Television Incentive. Those waiting for a rundown on the dividend in question will be sorely disappointed. What readers of the report may define as… Read more »

KERLIN’S SMILING DIRECTORS

Date: January 26, 2023 -

ART-LOVING moneybags Paddy McKillen has been busy fighting legal actions in recent times courtesy of his increasingly fraught relationship with the Qatari royal Al Thani family. Separately, the Irishman has never been shy about spending big bucks on art projects, as evidenced by his 540-acre Chateau La Coste cultural/tourist project in France. Another of Paddy’s… Read more »

THE ONLY WAY IS UP FOR GREENCORE

Date: January 26, 2023 -

HAVING DISAPPOINTED the unfortunate Greencore shareholders over his 13-year reign, Paddy Coveney parachuted out of Greencore and left behind a company that is a shadow of what it once was. If investors were looking for some relief under a new regime, it is unlikely that… Read more »

CATHAL FRIEL DELIVERS AGAIN AT AMRYT

Date: January 26, 2023 -

CATHAL FRIEL has plenty of followers who are impressed by his entrepreneurship and optimism. His Raglan Capital supported John Craven’s Cove Energy, which was taken out by the Thai state-owned PPT for $1.25bn. That deal delivered a fantastic return to all Cove shareholders, including Mike Nolan and Tommy O’Gorman, but was seen by many market… Read more »

ARNE VIGELAND’S IRISH ANGLE

Date: January 26, 2023 -

NEXT WEEK will see a creditors’ meeting held for a company called SJI Equities Ltd, which is owned by a Norwegian investor named Arne Vigeland. This company had starred as the plaintiff in a multimillion-euro Norwegian legal action – initiated against the directors of the listed RenoNorden ASA – in which allegations of insider information… Read more »

KITE MEDICAL’S CRASH LANDING

Date: January 26, 2023 -

WHAT AT one stage looked like one of Ireland’s more promising medtech start-ups, Kite Medical Ltd, is now to be wound up after failing to secure long-term financing to complete the development of its patented technology. It attracted plenty of praise but not enough moolah. The company, which spun out of Galway University’s BioInnovate programme,… Read more »

PAT O’FLYNN’S SUPPLEMENT BOOST

Date: January 26, 2023 -

PAT O’FLYNN’S iron-absorption supplements company Solvotrin Therapeutics continues to attract the big bucks, with a business expansion scheme (BES) fund the latest to come on board here to join the stellar line up of existing investors. In total, €4m has been raised in this latest round at €250 a share, with €2.1m chucked in by… Read more »

BOWLER HATS’ BARGAIN AT THE CURRAGH

Date: January 26, 2023 -

WHILE THE state-backed Curragh racecourse has been haemorrhaging money – the 2021 accounts filed before Christmas show that Curragh Racecourse Ltd dropped €4m that year and accumulated losses hit €22.3m – of more interest to some is the ownership structure. Of particular interest is the large stake acquired by the Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board (IHRB),… Read more »

DONOHOE’S SIPO COMPLAINT

Date: January 12, 2023 -

EUROPEAN POSTER-BOY boy Paschal Donohoe, now public expenditure minister and recently re-elected as president of the Eurogroup, may have his glistening image tarnished if a complaint to the Standards in Public Office Commission (Sipo) under the Electoral Act proceeds to a formal stage and an eventual adverse ruling. With some rather more serious allegations circulating… Read more »

PROFILE: JENNIFER CARROLL MACNEILL

Date: January 12, 2023 -

While the media-hyped ministerial reshuffle turned out to be the damp squib that cynics had predicted, it was still interesting that Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, got the nod for a junior minister position ahead of the much-touted Neale Richmond. The 42-year-old barrister has makes no secret of her ambition to be a future leader of Fine… Read more »

YOUNG BLOOD: SHARON KEEGAN

Date: January 12, 2023 -

SURELY THE biggest asset Sharon Keegan has is her ability to talk up her athleisure brand Peachylean? This year business watchers who have followed the company’s trajectory since it launched five years ago will get to see if it can deliver on its founder’s confidence. Keegan could never be accused of lacking ambition – or… Read more »

HEAVING GOING FOR TRAINERS

Date: January 12, 2023 -

A DEVASTATING ruling by the Court of Appeal has meant a very bad start to 2023 for the new regime at the Irish Racehorse Trainers Association (IRTA). There has to now be a question mark over whether the body can avoid a trip to the knacker’s yard. The IRTA went through a recent leadership change… Read more »

MARTIN’S DIPLOMACY

Date: January 12, 2023 -

IT’S BEEN a rough year for Russian diplomats on Dublin’s Orwell Road since Russia invaded Ukraine, when the Russian embassy became a focus for protests by Ukrainian exiles and their Irish supporters. Probably the most dramatic of the protests in the early months was when Desmond Wisely, the owner of an ecclesiastical supplies company, drove… Read more »

BRUSSELS BAGGAGE

Date: January 12, 2023 -

THERE HAS, not surprisingly, been acres of space devoted to the scandal over cash-fuelled lobbying by the Qatari government of European Parliament members, with a number of players arrested to date, most notably parliament vice president Eva Kaili. Goldhawk has previously reported on how other counties in the Gulf region, the United Arab Emirates (UAE)… Read more »

MICHAEL HEFFERNAN’S NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS

Date: January 12, 2023 -

THERE HAVE been some changes in the business portfolio of Michael Heffernan, son of Dunnes Stores boss Margaret, with the businessman having checked out of his hotel group. Meanwhile, his fashion interests remain very much on trend. The annual return filed just before Christmas for H&H Hotels Collection covers the year to April 17, 2022,… Read more »

JACKY TEHAN’S PROMOTION

Date: January 12, 2023 -

THERE HAVE been some changes at the Roche family’s investment company, where Jacky Flavin Tehan has moved into the hot seat. Flavin Tehan is the daughter of Mary and DCC founder Jim Flavin and indeed her hubby, Paddy Tehan, is a senior suit in the DCC group. Jacky’s own background is in accountancy, having worked… Read more »

JOHN MAGNIER’S MASTERPIECE

Date: January 12, 2023 -

IN JUST eight weeks an export ban will expire on the famous Sir Joshua Reynolds masterpiece, Portrait of Omai, which has been the subject of intense debate across the Irish Sea as the National Portrait Gallery (NPG) has sought to keep it in the country. John Magnier, the squire of Coolmore, famously picked up the… Read more »

VOL 41 NO 01

Date: January 12, 2023 -

STILL STANDING AND SHOUTING

Date: January 12, 2023 -

NEARLY 40 years ago to the day – January 7, 1983 – The Phoenix rose from the ashes of a previous media venture and it is still standing. Buffeted by legal threats from the rich and the crooked and opprobrium from the ‘responsible’ media; squeezed by mega media platforms and ongoing hostility from most (if… Read more »

O’LEARY PULLS NO PUNCHES

Date: January 12, 2023 -

PAUL KIMMAGE began 2023 by reminding his Sindo readers on New Year’s Day that he hasn’t given up when it comes to exposing a doping culture in the Irish racing industry. This is despite having failed to land a killer blow courtesy of his series of incendiary articles last year. After dishing out a hefty… Read more »

BLUESHIRT PLAYBOOK

Date: January 12, 2023 -

SOME AGEING Fine Gael members have been muttering about Irish Times anti-American liberals who blame the antics of Brazilian ex-president Jair Bolsonaro’s fascist fans on the precedent created by Donald Trump’s rabble storming Capitol Hill. The FG Good Ol’ Boys are quite put out as they claim their antecedents in the Blueshirts should receive the… Read more »

GARDAÍ’S GOOD TIMING

Date: January 12, 2023 -

JUST BEFORE Christmas there was a high-profile conference, called ‘Breaking the Silence’, held in Dublin focusing on issues to do with the sex trade, trafficking and sexual violence. It was presumably entirely coincidental that, in the run-up to the event, the boys in blue got busy raiding the apartments of sex workers. No doubt the… Read more »

HARRY’S GAME OF CHESS

Date: January 12, 2023 -

RICHARD KEMP, a former commander of British armed forces in Afghanistan and ex-chair of the Cobra Intelligence Group – co-ordinating MI5 and MI6 and answerable only to the British cabinet – was wheeled out to attack Buck House traitor Prince Harry last week. Kemp used the occasion to advertise his own security credentials and spoke… Read more »

TURN AROUND FOR LEGAL EAGLE

Date: January 12, 2023 -

LIMERICK SOLICITOR Gerard O’Neill will have been pleased at the fight back he successfully mounted against press statements issued by the Irish Small and Medium Enterprises Association (Isme) following a High Court case presided over by Judge Michael Twomey in 2019. At that time, Judge Twomey threw out the personal injury actions of O’Neill’s two… Read more »

IRISH ARMS TO ISRAEL

Date: January 12, 2023 -

THE CONTROL of Exports Act was passed in 2008 to ensure that Ireland would finally be in compliance with the provisions of the European Union’s Council Common Position, which was agreed in June 2003. This provided for controls around the export of goods and technology to certain military end users. The act requires that each… Read more »

THE HOT AIR BRIGADE

Date: January 12, 2023 -

In these places, character must be erased lest it tell a story. A sense of place must be rinsed until what emerges from the white walls is what Kyle Chayka labelled “AirSpace” – “a profusion of symbols of comfort and quality” – the triumph of the generic, the homogenous. Una Mullally on new-build studio apartment… Read more »

DONALDSON’S BIG CALL

Date: January 12, 2023 -

DUP LEADER Jeffrey Donaldson has a big call to make in a couple of months as the EU and UK move inexorably towards a deal on the Northern Ireland Protocol. Since early 2021 Donaldson – egged on by loyalist bloggers and wary of the electoral threat of Jim Allister’s extremist TUV party – has adopted… Read more »

A TAOISEACH ONCE AGAIN

Date: January 12, 2023 -

ONE PRESUMES that former taoiseach, now Tánaiste, Micheál Martin, was not entirely gulled by the remarks of Leo Varadkar, then his second-in-command, to the Fine Gael ard fheis in November when he praised Martin to the rafters. In fact, Martin may have felt a shudder down his spine at Vlad describing him as a “good”… Read more »