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  • George Redmond

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    Unravelling Gogarty

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    By Frank Connolly. Planning Tribunal costs as well as findings based on James Gogarty’s evidence are being successfully challenged (Oct 14). IT is bizarre that the very people whose wrongdoing gave birth to the long-running Flood/Mahon tribunal into planning and payments may yet get the Supreme Court to reverse the decision to withhold payment of their costs for obstructing and hindering the inquiry. In 2010, the Supreme Court ruled that Joseph Murphy and his fellow director of JMSE, Frank Reynolds, should be granted their legal costs as the tribunal had no right to withhold costs over their obstruction as this implied criminal behaviour over which the inquiry had no remit. In July, the now 90 year old former assistant city and county manager for Dublin, George Redmond, won his battle for legal costs on the same grounds. Redmond, you may recall, was found to have received large amounts of cash from the likes of JMSE and builders, Brennan and McGowan, and was famously detained by the Criminal Assets Bureau in February 1999 at Dublin Airport with a suitcase containing over €300,000 in cash on his way back from the Isle of Man. Former minister Ray Burke, will probably seek to reverse the tribunal decision to withhold his substantial bill of costs which initially topped €10 million Following in his footsteps, the main focus of the tribunal’s early inquiries, former minister Ray Burke, will probably seek to reverse the tribunal decision to withhold his substantial bill of costs which initially topped €10 million. Burke’s acceptance during the 1989 general election of €30,000 from JMSE sparked the investigation in the first place. It was established following his dramatic resignation as foreign minister just six months after his appointment by Bertie Ahern to the latter’s first ever cabinet, in June 1997. Lawyers for Burke and Redmond should not be breaking out the champagne just yet, however, as the reduction in taxable (ie certifiable) legal fees by some 50% since the tribunal ruling at the height of the boom, and the fact that the Taxing Master assesses costs at current rates, means that they will not enjoy anything like the financial bonanza they might have enjoyed a few years back. The collapse in legal fees is also reflected in the likely final costs of the tribunal which are expected to come in at closer to €160 million rather than the earlier estimate by Judge Alan Mahon of €350 million. This is inclusive of the hit from the Burke and Redmond appeals, and possibly others, which if successful, are unlikely to reach €10 million in total. However, another decision by the Supreme Court has wider repercussions for the tribunal’s third interim report into Redmond, and possibly the earlier report arising from the Burke investigation which was published in September 2002. Following another Supreme Court ruling, the substantive findings of the report may be overturned as questions have arisen over the decision by the tribunal to withhold from witnesses some of the allegations made to it in private by chief witness, James Gogarty, concerning other prominent individuals who were not party to the investigation. The tribunal’s legal team did not think the statements were relevant to their investigation or worthy of public hearings. However, crucially, they have admitted in defence of this decision that they were also seeking to limit “collateral credibility issues” which might arise if some of Gogarty’s private utterings were released. Last July, the tribunal accepted that the Gogarty allegations were improperly withheld. As a result of this concession, Redmond has been given the right to challenge the substantive findings by the tribunal against him. Over the years, the tendency of the High Court to generally uphold tribunal decisions and the propensity of the Supreme Court to reject them has become a phenomenon. Adrian Hardiman, who represented Liam Lawlor in his early dealings with the inquiry and is in general hawkish about the overbearing state, has been the most vocal critic of the tribunal from the Supreme Court bench over the years. He was supported by judges Denham and Murray in the July hearings. It was for this reason that the tribunal withdrew its opposition to Redmond’s appeal, leaving the way clear for a challenge to the substantive findings of corruption against him in the High Court. Now to the dismay of many it seems that much of the early work of the tribunal and the findings of corruption against a number of people could be undone despite the overwhelming evidence, substantiated by other witnesses and extensive financial and other documentation separate to Gogarty’s evidence, of their misbehaviour over many years. There has been no challenge into the findings of Mahon and his colleagues arising from the investigation into the Quarryvale, and related modules including the allegations by Tom Gilmartin which ultimately led to the political downfall of Bertie Ahern; or into other post-Gogarty modules such as Cherrywood. Which is just as well as it might have affected the prospects of former distinguished tribunal member, Mary Faherty, who was appointed to the High Court in recent days. •

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    Visionless post-austerity austerity.

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    By Michael Taft. Tax cuts and tax increases, spending cuts and spending increases, a little taken off here, a little bit added there:  what is the story of Budget 2015? What is the narrative arc?  Is there one? Like in a pointillist painting, if we concentrate on the particular dots we can’t see the image.  Let’s take a step back in order to get a better view. First, don’t mind the commentary: austerity hasn’t left us; it has morphed into a new shape. Previously, Ministers announced spending cuts and tax increases.  After seven years we know the look of that. Now it has changed form. We still have austerity but it is below the radar. Public spending won’t keep pace with inflation – which means it will be cut in what is called real terms. And these real cuts will be severe enough. Up to 2018, government spending will fall by nearly €4 billion in real terms (ie allowing for the general level of inflation) or 10 percent for each woman, man and child. Public services will be cut by nearly eight percent in real terms per capita. That’s less money on hospital, schools home-helps, SNA, pension supports, and a range of services and income supports. Austerity remains quartered in the house, whatever we call it. Second, the living standard for most is likely to fall next year when we take inflation into account. Social-protection rates have been frozen and inflation is rising, albeit, slowly. The Christmas bonus and increased Child Benefit will do little to ameliorate the thrust of this decline. For those in work there are cuts in the Universal Social Charge and income tax. However, 70 percent of those in work earn too little to benefit from the cut in the top rate of tax or the extension of the standard-rate tax band. And then there are those water charges. The extra charge will in effect wipe out most gains from USC and income-tax cuts. And in a strange quirk, hundreds of thousands of low-paid workers will get neither the €100 social protection top-up nor the water-tax credit because their income is too low. They are stuck in no-support land. The Government ‘spent’ over €600 million in tax giveaways and still managed to reduce people’s living standards. Quite a feat. But there’s a larger issue here. Most believe the Government can only increase living standards by cutting tax. In other European countries they do things differently. Take childcare: in Ireland, households can pay up to €800 or more a month for a childcare place. In continental Europe, households can pay as little as €200 per month and even less if low-paid. That’s because childcare is treated as a public service provided by the local authority. Imagine if your childcare care costs fell by €600 a month by adopting the European public service model. This is far more than any tax cut could ever deliver. We could run through a whole list – free schoolbooks and school transport, lower bus and rail fares, heavily subsidised prescription medicine, free or low-cost GP care, free higher education. Boosting people’s living standards requires investment in public services and income supports.  Ironically, tax cuts can undermine the Government’s ability to gather the revenue to make this investment. Third, investment is the key to driving economic growth.  Imagine how we could improve Irish business performance if a next generation broadband network was connected to every enterprise in the country.  Or a state-of-the-art water and waste system that didn’t leak.  Or the best possible educational facilities from pre-primary to university.  We would be a far wealthier country. Instead, we have an investment crisis with the lowest investment rates in the Eurozone. And the Government intends to cut its own investment over by over 15 percent in real terms up to 2018. Like austerity, this investment crisis will go unseen.  We don’t miss a bridge we don’t have. It will be a drag on long-term, sustainable growth but there will be no current affairs programme dedicated to this subject and little commentary in the Sunday papers. When we step back to take in this budget the image remains blurry. It is hard to know what picture the Government was trying to compose. Whatever the intent, this is not an expansionary budget that boosts living standards or drives productive growth.  What a waste of the universal appetite for change. • Michael Taft is Research Officer with Unite the Union

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    Village, the Irish Examiner, Mark Dearey and the Press Ombudsman

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    Village has taken the Irish Examiner to the Press Ombudsman over its misreport of the Mark Dearey case against Village which Dearey dropped in April after the parties agreed non-financial terms including a reiteration of an apology. Village had already given for a mistake but no concession of the alleged defamation for which Dearey had taken the case.  Reporter Ray Managh, fresh from making seven inept mistakes in a previous report in the Irish Times at an earlier stage of the case, blew it again.  In July Managh professed himself “stunned” by the allegations in Village’s complaint and asked the Ombudsman to halt the investigation pending his production of a copy of the transcript of the case – and went to the Circuit Court to obtain it. Although the Ombudsman is not treating Managh as a party to its investigation, it granted the postponement he sought. On 4 December Tim Vaughan, the Examiner’s editor wrote to the Ombudsman pronouncing that “I am not in a position to furnish you with my response to the complaint but hope to be able to do so very shortly. I regret this delay, which unfortunately is unavoidable”. Nobody can tell Village what has happened to Ray Managh and his court application.

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    Likudation: The ascendant Israeli political party is committed by ideology to oppressing the Palestinians.

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      By Frank Armstrong. There are two possible solutions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: one realistic the other miraculous. The realistic solution conjures divine intervention; the miraculous, a voluntary agreement between the parties. The latest round of conflict is, mercifully, largely over. On August 26th, both Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) accepted a ceasefire agreement after a 50-day Israeli assault on Gaza had left 2,100 Palestinians dead and devastating destruction in its wake; 71 Israelis were killed, all but 5 soldiers. The agreement calls for an end to military action by both Israel and Hamas, as well as an easing of the ongoing Israeli siege of Gaza. Essentially, nothing has changed. To explain the conduct of the Israeli authorities it is important to understand the ideology behind the Likud party, the dominant political force in Israel since its foundation in 1977 under the leadership of Menachem Begin. Although Ariel Sharon split with the party and formed Kadima in 2006, relegating Likud to fourth place in the ensuing elections, it has since returned to power under the immanent figure of Benjamin Netanyahu. The Arab-Israeli wars which began with the foundation of Israel in 1948 have mostly resulted in comprehensive Israeli victories, notably in the 1967 Six-Day War. This ascendancy has been consolidated by the demise of the Soviet Union and the emergence of the US, Israel’s Cold War patron, as lone Superpower. The Palestinian geopolitical position was further weakened by PLO support for Iraq in the first Gulf War. But, despite accords with Egypt and Jordan, Israel faces perpetual conflict with neighbouring countries, as most Arabs nurse a fixed view of Israel as a colonising, oppressive presence in the region. It is only continued autocratic rule in Egypt and Jordan that keeps these sentiments in check. The Israeli electorate has consistently favoured leaders unwilling to countenance concessions, and the expansion of settlements has become a fixed policy. The withdrawal from Gaza in 2006 was a simple realisation that it was untenable to maintain 10,000 settlers inside a grossly over-populated strip of land containing over a million and a half Palestinians. There were bigger fish to fry in the West Bank and Jerusalem. To explain the intransigence it is necessary to understand the ideology underpinning the Likud Party. Likud ideology can be traced to three principal sources: first, the writings of the Revionist Zionist Ze’ev Jabotinsky; second, the experience of the Holocaust; and third, the emergence of religious Zionism after 1967. Ze’ev (Vladimir) Jabotinsky (1880-1940), a Russian-born Jew, is generally viewed as the spiritual founder of the Israeli Right. In 1923 he wrote a still influential article entitled ‘On the Iron Wall (We and the Arabs)’. In it he asserted that a “voluntary agreement between us and the Arabs of Palestine is inconceivable now or in the foreseeable future”, since: “Every indigenous people… will resist alien settlers as long as they see any hope of ridding themselves of the dangers of foreign settlement”. In response to resistance Jabotinsky advocated “an iron wall” of military might which “they [the Palestinians] will be powerless to break down”. With military ascendancy achieved Palestinians would be ready to yield and only then “will they have given up all hope of getting rid of the alien settlers. Only then will extremist groups with their slogan “No, never” lose their influence, and only then will their influence be transferred to more moderate groups”. At that point limited political rights could be granted. Such a vision ordains that negotiations can begin only when the Palestinians produce a malleable leadership willing to accept their permanent exclusion. Jabotinsky’s metaphorical ‘iron wall’ was given a literal interpretation by Sharon’s construction of the ‘security fence’ that runs through the West Bank. Mahmoud Abbas was perhaps viewed by Sharon as a leader who would acquiesce to Israeli demands, but Hamas most certainly was not. But Jabotinsky’s analysis was flawed as it ignored how the policy of the ‘iron wall’ could generate fatalistic extremism in the form of suicide bombing and the use of civilian shields for rocket attacks. He also failed to foresee the internationalisation of the Palestinian cause. The second major influence on Likud, and Israeli society in general, is the trauma of the Holocaust experience. The collective memory of Jewish passivity in the face of genocide mandates a policy of fierce reprisal in response to the taking of Jewish life. Restraint is characterised as appeasement. The leadership of the Israeli Right manipulates this latent fear of destruction, appealing to an international as well as a domestic audience. In his book ‘A Place Among the Nations’ Benjamin Netanyahu dwelt on the lessons of appeasement of Nazi Germany and the betrayal of Czechoslovakia by the Western powers for the contemporary Middle East. Arabs are likened to Nazi Germany, Palestinians to the Sudeten Germans, and Israel to the small democracy of Czechoslovakia, the victim of Chamberlain’s 1938 deal with Hitler. For Netanyahu the lesson is clear, to grant concessions to Palestinians is to endanger the survival of the state of Israel. This Holocaust motif was also employed by opponents of Yitzhak Rabin after he signed up to the Oslo Accords. Inside the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, two Likud deputies proceeded to open black umbrellas comparing Rabin’s peace deal to Chamberlain’s capitulation, while effigies of Rabin dressed in SS uniform were set alight at right wing demonstrations.. Suicide bombing and rocket attacks cunningly target this traumatic inheritance, perpetuating a cycle of violence that is difficult to contain, and generated support for the extremists on the Palestinian side. The loss of Israeli life calls for harsh reprisal, which in turn radicalises the Palestinian population. Acting out of the core Likud dogma, Netanyahu must respond to an attack even if this completely discredits moderate Palestinian leaders. The ferocity of Israel’s response to terrorism works against the moderate Palestinian leadership that Jabotinsky’s model requires. Likud policy exceeds the idea of the ‘iron wall’. The last major influence on Likud is the rise of religious Zionism, especially generated by the

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    Democratic Féin.

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    By Anton McCabe. The North’s Executive and Assembly are under threat of collapse. As of  mid-October the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) was refusing to attend talks aimed at resolving the impasse – objecting to the “media circus” and even, apparently, the very involvement of the Irish government. The UK government is requiring the Assembly to impose the same cuts in social welfare as are hitting the rest of the UK. The DUP is willing to go along with the cuts, but Sinn Féin (SF) is not. However, while the crisis seems terminal, there are contradictory factors. None of the contending parties has a ‘Plan B’ in the event of the collapse. Another election would return the current line up to the Assembly, with at most only a handful of seats changing hands. None of the parties, nor the British government, has an appetite for a return to Direct Rule. There is also a deep fear ingrained in society of a return to widespread political violence. The DUP labours under an unavoidable burden. It was built round the charismatic figure of the late Ian Paisley. Inevitably there have been difficulties of transition to conventional leadership styles. Within the DUP, Peter Robinson’s position as leaderhas been weakened. Who his successor will be is now widely discussed. Last month, he removed two ministers linked to the DUP’s traditionalist wing. Social Development Minister Nelson McCausland had been mired in controversy regarding contact with construction companies. Health Minister Edwin Poots had also become bogged down in constant controversy. McCausland, who believes among other  things that  Ulster Protestants are descended from the lost tribes of Israel, has been enmired in controversy after incorrectly ‘naming and shaming’ four firms in the Assembly which he falsely claimed had received overpayments amounting to £18m. The Social Development Committee also concluded McCausland deliberately misled MLAs over a meeting with a double-glazing firm which had made donations to the party. Poots was criticised for refusing to lift a ban on gay men giving blood and reprimanded by Northern Ireland’s Lord Chief Justice who said it was detrimental to the rule of law for him to claim he might not  receive a fair ‘trial’ in his appeal of a court decision that the ban was irrational. While Robinson was never going to act in response to squeamish media coverage, he showed unexpected indecisiveness in dealing with McCausland. The DUP has also begun, for the first time, to show public division. After his removal as minister, Poots told the BBC: “I already knew that it wasn’t really the intention for Peter (Robinson) to stay on for that period of time (as First Minister) in any event”. Unleashing an uncharacteristically colourful image, Robinson duly rounded on (unnamed) internal critics as “people with the strategic vision of a lemming”. The other major party, Sinn Féin, is increasingly focused on the Republic since in the best of prognoses it only has a realistic chance of taking three extra seats in the North while even doubling its current 14 seats in the Republic would be something of a disappointment. Of course in the North, Sinn Féin is a permanent and responsible party of government because of the power-sharing arrangement. It must govern within the financial constraints imposed by the Conservative-dominated coalition in Westminster. In the Republic, it is a party of populist opposition, filling the space vacated by the Labour Party. Its hammering of social-welfare cuts in the North exemplifies its trans-border ambition, for it covers its electoral back in manoeuvres in the Twenty-Six Counties. An additional difficulty is that both the Irish and UK governments are focused on upcoming elections. So Enda Kenny reacted aggressively to Sinn Féin’s ascent to equality – on 24% – with it in the opinion polls, and he derided its vaunted alternative budget which  would “close down the country” and “result in a 73 per cent cumulative tax rate on workers”, while fulminating “your  promises are completely unachievable”. Meanwhile Cameron has postulated removing the rights of MPs from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland to vote on English-related questions so undermining the cherished power of the DUP to prop up Conservative- (or even Labour-) led governments. Sources in the DUP told Village their relationships with SF has improved. They point out that Robinson and McGuinness are still doing business. They also feel that many in Sinn Féin are in fact committed to the Assembly project. They have hopes for talks between the parties and the governments. “If the welfare issue is brought into wider talks, then, if there are changes, it is easier to get away with a u-turn in the smoke”, one source said. Sinn Féin sources are more pessimistic, and believe the Assembly is on a countdown to collapse. They believe the  level of cuts proposed is not viable. However, they “never rule anything out” of the upcoming talks. Collapse of the Assembly would leave both parties damaged as their rejectionist critics would claim vindication – gold currency in the North. But both parties have achieved a pre-eminence through the  Assembly and furthermore have material stakes in it funding of Members’ salaries and of voracious party workers and advice centres. Ultimately the logic of devolution is compelling for  both. •

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    Ireland’s Chimerical competitiveness.

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      By Constantin Gurdgiev (November 2014). Of the 196 appointments to state boards made by the current Coalition, only 35 resulted from open public competition. Pay increments for civil servants – for length of service not performance – remain in place. Only .75% of civil servants received less than  three out of five in the October performance reviews which ground entitlements to the automatic pay increments. Meanwhile the country is on the march over Irish water and its bonus-for-nothing culture. The Regulator has set it a target of only 8% in cost reductions over the next few years.  The percentage is paltry because it is obliged to maintain double the necessary  workforce inherited from local authority staffs until 2025 – following a deal with the unions. John FitzGerald of the ESRI has said the extra wages and other costs for the  2000 extra staff amount to around €150m a year, or an extraordinary €90 per household. In recent weeks, the Government promised to deliver comprehensive reforms of the public sector. As before, there are vague targets for transforming the sector underpinning much less vague giveaways to insiders. In exchange for reversing pay cuts imposed in the two previous agreements with the unions, the State is promising some easing in the absurdly ineffective procedures for removing incompetent employees. The former is a tangible, enforceable and easily monitored commitment: either new pay flows or it does not. The latter is completely non-transparent and unenforceable. No-one, beyond senior civil servants, will ever have any real proof as to whether or not the new regime is working. No-one in the public service has any incentive to make sure it does. As pay, promotion and performance awards remain detached from actual productivity, no fine-tuning can ever deliver measurable gains in performance. And of course Public Sector Reform Minister Brendan Howlin failed to implement the €75m reduction in civil-servant allowances he promised some years ago, out of the total of €1.5bn in such perks.  In the end the only allowance abolished was a €218-a-night payment for civil servants who represent Ireland at meetings abroad. Of course even straightshooter Leo Varadkar  suggested it was worth retaining the allowances so as not to damage the Croke Park deal. “We have to weigh up the consequences of any action”, he said at the time. “It has been determined that allowances and increments, like core pay, are protected by the Croke Park Agreement and for €75m it wasn’t worth throwing the agreement in the bin”. Some public-sector workers still get paid 30 minutes a week “banking time” to cash cheques, even though salaries have been paid electronically for a generation. Others are entitled to two ‘privilege’ leave days which were originally introduced back in the 1940s to allow them to make their ways back to Dublin from the country after a bank holiday weekend when the trip might have taken a day. And some civil servants benefit from a paid half-day’s leave for Christmas shopping. Employees of the Marine Institute get an allowance for going to sea, soldiers get an allowance for handling explosives. Inland Fisheries get an Eating on Site allowance and Advisory Counsel Grade II in the Attorney General’s Office get an ‘Acting Up’ allowance for doing the work of an Advisory Counsel Grade I. Furthermore there is to be no reform of unsustainable public-sector pensions. There are no changes to the imbalances   between public and private sectors’ employees, which are a multiple of even the imbalances in PAY between the sectors. There will be no reform of the performance-rating and monitoring systems. There is a growing public recognition in Ireland that the current Government offers little real reform of our political culture and the system of governance. This all contradicts recent surveys of global institutional and structural competitiveness that have generated a lot of ‘feelgood’ publicity for Ireland’s political leaders. Last month, the World Bank released its Doing Business 2015 survey results. Ireland’s overall rankings improved by four places  from 17th in 2014  to 13th, the best reading since 2012. The good news prompted a flurry of excited press releases and a chorus of minstrelling Ministers. Even our reserved Minister for Finance, Michael Noonan has lauded Ireland’s improved position. “I welcome the continued strong performance by Ireland in the Doing Business report, which is reflective of the ongoing reforms being implemented in Ireland’s business and regulatory environment as we continue to improve our competitiveness”, he drawled. The praise, however, came with a kicker. The sub-components of the survey reveal that Ireland’s gains came almost entirely from a massive jump in our rankings within ONE category. In the (hardly determinant) ‘Getting Electricity’ rankings we moved from 139th position in the 2014 survey to 67th this year. There has been a marked decline in the length of time required for business to obtain an electricity connection. Which is great. And the cost of compliance fell, as a share of income per capita. But it happened because our income per capita rose, not because the heavily-regulated energy sector became more efficient. The World Bank survey largely fails to reflect the bleak reality of Irish energy. According to the Irish Academy of Engineering, since 2007 our energy-price inflation outpaced the OECD average by 45 percent. Household electricity prices in Ireland are up almost 30 percent in the last three years. Our ranking in the ‘Starting a Business’ category placed us 19th worldwide in 2015 compared to 21st in 2014 – a fine if small improvement. The  gains here were driven by a significant drop in the number of days required for new-business registration. But the number of procedures and registration costs remained unchanged. We gained two places from 52nd place to 50th in the ‘Registering Property’ category rankings, going. The time taken to register a property has reduced but the cost of complying stayed the same. In other sub-categories, things were much less positive. When it comes to dealing with construction permits, Ireland ranks slipped due to recent Government reforms.

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    The Irish Times and abortion.

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    By Ruth Cullen The Irish Times was once seen as the paper of record. But its coverage in some social areas like abortion shows it to be more engaged in agendism than journalism, less a paper of record than a paper of advocacy. Cynics, of course, would say with AJ Liebling, “freedom of the press belongs only to those who own one” but they can’t have it both ways – a prominent message from the editor on the Irish Times’ website declares the centrality of its ethos of accuracy. Village has documented elsewhere the systemic failures of the Irish Times even to correct errors once they are pointed out to it. The great Guardian editor CP Scott noted that “opinion is free, facts are sacred”. Drawing this distinction, and only applying opinions once the facts that drive them are definitively proved, is the great tradition for serious newspapers. The problem for the fragile Irish Times in the information era is that being treated seriously requires consistent presentation of both sides fairly. Any failure to do this leaves a track record of taking sides and opting not to present fairly the side with which it disagrees. The newspaper’s bias can be measured in two ways; on the one hand, by what it covers and the way it covers it, and, on the other hand, by what it covers up. Take the coverage of the tragic death of Savita Halappanavar. The Irish Times unabashedly led a rush to judgment in which Savita’s death was conscripted as dramatic proof that the Government must bring in abortion legislation at once. It was a rush to judgement because the facts of the case were not known at that time, but it opted not to let the absence of facts stand in the way of using the tragedy to push for abortion. In making this choice it accepted as collateral damage the significant long-lasting harm which its emotive, later to be discredited, charges would inflict on Ireland’s international reputation as a recognised world-leader in safeguarding the lives of pregnant women, and indeed in treating them properly and with dignity. Nor did the emergence of the facts prompt a correction of the record by what used to claim to be the paper of record. Even when the details in the HSE Report, the evidence given at the Inquest, and the 13 missed opportunities identified in the HIQA Report, established beyond doubt that Savita’s death was due to lapses in the management of sepsis, the Irish Times opted not to correct its misleading slant but continued to use her death to push its ‘right-on’ abortion narrative. In his editorial review of 2013, Irish Times Editor Kevin O’Sullivan puffed up Kitty Holland’s role in breaking and driving the ‘story’ but omitted any mention of the contradiction between the Irish Times’ ‘take’ and the evidence of flawed sepsis mismanagement. Holland even won the accolade of journalist of the year for her efforts, perhaps betraying systemic dysfunctionality in the newspaper industry. On Friday, 23rd August 2013, with the legislation safely in the bag, the Irish Times’ front page lead story headline ran, “First abortion carried out under new legislation”. The triumphalist subtext was – now that we have legalised abortion, look, already a woman’s life has been saved! The following day, however, it had to start a crawl-back as it emerged the story was incorrect. Mind you, it made the retraction a bit less embarrassing by sliding the admission of the cock-up down to the fifth paragraph, but in the end it had to publish the following correction: “The hospital has pointed out that the case described in the article did not happen”. There was a bottom of the barrel quality to the obstinate clinging of the Irish Times to its pro-abortion spin on Savita’s death in the face of the mounting evidence that the real cause of her death was deficient sepsis management. The same desperation to show that it had been right all along produced this rush to claim that a woman’s life had been saved by an abortion under the new law it had campaigned so hard to bring in. Kitty Holland has again taken a lead role in covering and interpreting the recent case of Ms Y. The Irish Times had no difficulty publishing an interview with the vulnerable woman at the centre of this case but showed a strange reluctance to follow the progress of the second human being involved, the baby, who thankfully survived. The coverage was premised on the view that abortion is a medical treatment for suicidal feelings, implying that had the case been dealt with earlier the abortion would somehow have been appropriate. The narrative was that many opportunities were missed to provide the woman with best medical care, but what they mean by best medical care is abortion. However, the psychiatrists’ evidence at the Oireachtas hearings on abortion showed that there is no medical basis for this view. The list of curious incidents in which the Irish media did not bark on medical problems arising from abortions stretches back decades. Take the C Case involving a minor in State care brought to the UK for an abortion. The Irish Times inflicted on its readers several weeks of one-sided coverage pushing the case for her abortion. But, some time later when she went public to speak of the harm and hurt she had suffered from the abortion, and her profound regret at having undergone it, the fearless voice of the Irish Times was surprisingly silent. Or the tragic case of  a woman from Ireland who died in 2012 in a London taxi immediately after an abortion in a Marie Stopes clinic. Here was a story about the life and health of a woman in pregnancy where the poor woman actually lost her life because of an abortion. Why did this merit only a fleeting mention in the Irish Times? Why was there no hue and cry, no outrage, no Irish Times

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