News

PUBLIC health services in Clare and the Mid-West have been plagued by a plethora of problems due to chronic under-funding and staffing embargoes.

ONCE upon a time there was a Fine Gael backbench TD with whom I had a very friendly relationship. I hasten to add that I have been friendly with many Fine Gael TDs over my years covering politics for various newspapers.

“Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear.” – Mark Twain (1835 – 1910)Watching the Frontline debate on RTE earlier this week was a lesson in the danger of mistaking politics as a form of practical art for politics as a real thing with implications for the future.

For many years, the people of Ireland have lived with the reality of the Catholic Church putting the institution before the rights and lives of the people who make it up. Priests have been shielded, moved and protected to the detriment of children who were abused and their families.

With just two weeks to go before the referendum on the fiscal treaty, it now looks, at the time of writing, that the treaty will be passed. But a word of warning – that could all change over the course of the next 14 days. I am one of those who still have to make up my mind. I still don’t know whether the treaty is good or bad for us.

THE proposed development of an €11.7 million Lynxs cargo facility at Shannon  Airport, which could potentially lead to the creation of thousands of jobs in the region, has been dismissed by Michael O’Leary.

THE appointment of mental health liaison officers in GAA clubs would help stem the rising incidence of self-harm and suicide in the country, according to Clare hurling captain, Patrick Donnellan.