Ireland's political and cultural magazine
By David Burke. Brigadier (later General) Frank Edward Kitson is alive and well and living in Devon. He is the individual responsible for the Ballymurphy massacre. He was the Brigadier of 39 Brigade – that is to say he was the officer in charge of all British soldiers in Belfast during the Ballymurphy massacre. His […]
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Ballymurphy, the UK government’s proposals to deal with legacy issues, and the dogs on the streets. By Christopher Stanley, litigation consultant. Statute of Limitations In London today (11 May 2021), the British government set out its legislative agenda by way of the Queen’s Speech to the House of Lords. Unexpectedly, the British government remains intent […]
By David Burke. The denial of justice for political gain. Next week will see the release of the long-awaited inquest report into the Ballymurphy massacre during which British soldiers killed and wounded a large number of unarmed civilians in Belfast. The atrocity took place after the introduction of internment in August of 1971. Adding insult […]
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How I grew to see that without broad Marxism the arts and its unserious, networked and commodified lit-libs are for sale. An extract from the essay ‘Being a Marxist Poet in the Twenty-First Century’ by Kevin Higgins. More than a quarter of a century ago a man-child called Kevin retired from politics as he turned […]
By Sean Brennan. The documentary titled ‘Gun Plot’ which was shown on RTE 1 last night was fascinating television. The RTE production team should be commended for this brilliant documentary on a very important and significant political and legal event which occurred 50 years ago but has not been properly addressed by the media up […]
By Joseph de Burca. 1. Moloney and Kinchin-White When the Kincora Boys’ Home child abuse scandal first broke, Ed Moloney was one of a number of journalists who reported details about it in the press. Now, Moloney and James Kinchin-White have teamed up to shine a light on the role of the RUC in the […]
By Professor Barry McMullin, Dr Andrew Jackson and Professor John Sweeney The Climate Action and Low Carbon Development (Amendment) Bill 2021 published by the Government in March 2021 is a very considerable improvement over the preliminary draft released in October 2020. The revised Bill benefited greatly from the pre-legislative scrutiny process of the Joint Oireachtas […]
How failure to regulate for ethics created a climate where a PR man could deride transparency. By Vanessa Foran. I want to take you back a few months to a mad little incident that keeps coming back to me. “You are almost too transparent and informative”. This is what PR man and registered lobbyist, Conor Dempsey, […]
By Sean Brennan The purpose of this article is to examine Des O’ Malley’s Role in the events which are commonly known as The Arms Crisis and The Arms Trials 1970. The Arms Crisis erupted during the early hours of 6 May 1970, when a press release issued by the Government Information Service announced that […]
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Let’s not conflate our pent-up fantasies of dancing until dawn, with more alcohol sales. By Eunan McKinney. The ‘2020 Programme for Government – Our Shared Future’, committed to the urgent establishment of a taskforce that would promote vibrant and sustainable night-time culture and economy. This 2019 initiative began its formal work in July 2020 under […]
By Joseph de Burca. Christine Keeler was the woman at the centre of the Profumo scandal. As a teenager, she slept with Captain Eugene Ivanov, a Russian naval attaché at the Soviet Embassy in London, while also having a relationship with the much older John Profumo, the high-flying Conservative MP who was Secretary of State […]
By Joseph de Burca. Richard Kerr, a survivor of child sex abuse at Williamson House and Kincora Boys’ Home in Belfast, is hoping that his legal action against those responsible for failing to safeguard him as a child, will be listed for hearing later this year. He has faced innumerable delays and obstacles in getting […]
Reconsider criteria for what constitute frontline healthcare workers. By Izzy Fox. News of “leftover” vaccines from the Beacon Hospital in south Dublin being given to teachers in St Gerard’s in Bray, the private school where the children of the CEO of the Beacon attend, and to the head of the VHI, has understandably provoked public […]
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Inept decision-makers ignore the wishes and interests of local authority tenants. By Mannix Flynn. Ireland’s Attitude to Social Housing Let’s be clear, thou gh the middle classes could not care less, tenants in our local authority estates have rights. A few years a o it was reported that localauthorities had received 10,000 complaints about anti-social behaviour in […]
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Village magazine editorial – February-March In the 1970s boys comics imagined dystopian futures of out-of-control robots and rollerblade axe-fighting. They were a counterpoint to the humdrum reality for the warless Persil generation. 2021 has opened with dysfunctionality every bit as overwhelming as the most vivid imaginations of 50 years ago feared. We have brought a global […]
Leo Varadkar has somehow convinced media that he’s not bound by that Act but he is – and faces an even more serious case under the Corruption Act. By Conor Lenihan. The latest twist in the Leo Varadkar leak controversy evokes yet more confusion and doubt. The fact that the Garda have now confirmed that […]
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We can’t trust our health minister to prioritise vaccination for family carers By David Nolan As a family carer, I have implored the government to classify informal carers on the vaccine rollout list. Informal carers need vaccination for continuity of care. Why should unpaid family carers providing extraordinary levels of care in the home be treated […]
And there was a lie in the Dáil. By Michael Smith. Factual Background to Alleged Crimes WhatsApp correspondence headlined ‘Leo Always Delivers’ first published in the Village Magazine of November 2020 showed then-Taoiseach Leo Varadkar transferred a confidential draft contract being negotiated between government and the Irish Medical Organisation to a friend of his, the […]
By Michael Smith. History The Irish Times title was revived in 1859 by a 22-year-old English army officer, Major Lawrence Knox, and run as a Protestant, Nationalist newspaper, reflecting Knox’s Home Rule politics. He stood unsuccessfully for Isaac Butt’s Home Government Association. By 1873 in the ownership of the department store Arnotts it was a […]
Educate and empower Councillors to exercise effective governance and compliance over the €5bn administered by local authorities annually; and to be public not private representatives. By Fiona McLoughlin Healy. The Report on the Role and Remuneration of Local Authority Elected Members written by Senior Counsel Sara Moorhead issued to Minister John Paul Phelan last year and recommended an increase […]
