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By Joseph de Burca 1. Getting away with murder. Sir Patrick Walker was in charge of MI5 when the Belfast solicitor Patrick Finucane was assassinated by MI5 agents. Those agents were handled by the RUC Special Branch on behalf of MI5. They included Tommy Lyttle, Brian Nelson, William Stobie and Ken Barret. The assassination, which […]
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By Joseph de Burca. Prince Andrew is hardly sweating after the publication of the report on Lord Greville Janner by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA). Janner was a paedophile who abused boys and girls. IICSA has confirmed what has been known for decades, namely that witness statements taken by the British […]
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By Colin Wallace. 1. Memories of Brigadier Frank Kitson. David Burke’s fascinating new book on Frank Kitson includes a comprehensive analysis of what has become known around the world as ‘Bloody Sunday’. Reading it has stirred a lot of memories of the time I spent at Army HQ in Northern Ireland during the 1970s. As […]
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By Joseph de Burca. Introduction to Village’s online pamphlet on the Colin Wallace Affair. The Tory Government of Boris Johnson is routinely accused of deceiving the House of Commons. Many British commentators behave as if this is a new low in their democratic history. Yet, there is nothing unusual about the situation. […]
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By David Burke. Andrew Lownie will be known to many Village readers for the depth of his research into the life of Lord Louis Mountbatten and his wife, especially the former’s abuse of boys in the Republic of Ireland. During his research into Mountbatten, Lownie tried, and failed, to gain access to Garda logs […]
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By Deirdre Younge. Introduction. Freddie Scappaticci became an agent for British Army intelligence in 1978. A member of the IRA in Belfast he worked his way up the IRA hierarchy, eventually becoming second in command of the ‘Internal Security Unit”, known as the feared “nutting squad”. He joined the British Army’s newly-formed Force Research […]
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By Ed Moloney. The document reproduced above is the opening five-paragraph extract of a four-page, forty-paragraph Ulster Defence Association (UDA) intelligence report, or ‘memo’ as it is titled, describing the genesis of the corrupt relationship that developed in the late 1970s between the Official IRA and some leading members of the UDA. Since both groups […]
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Philanderer Phil’s will.
Prince Philip’s testament will be locked away for 90 years. What is the British Royal Family hiding? By Joseph de Burca. Prince Philip’s will is to be locked away in a safe controlled by the Family Division of Britain’s High Court. The justification for this is to preserve the ‘dignity’ of Queen Elizabeth. The odds […]
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By David Burke. Marian Brown, a 17-year old teenager, was shot dead in Belfast in June of 1972. For nearly half a century the British Government has denied that she was killed by British soldiers. Her family campaigned for the truth for five decades with the aid of researchers and lawyers. Armed with new information […]
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Come out of there, Katherine Zappone.
Freedom of Expression had a lucky escape. By Vanessa Foran. Katherine Zappone, once upon a time, was packaged as a hero to liberals, a wrapper she was very eager to envelop herself in as she set out to make such a name for herself that she hoovered in a Taoiseach’s pick for the Seanad. There she […]
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Christopher Stanley, Litigation Consultant, KRW LAW LLP, Belfast[1] In 1729, Jonathan Swift published his Juvenalian satirical essay “A Modest Proposal For preventing the Children of Poor People From being a Burthen to Their Parents or Country, and for making them Beneficial to the Publick”. As readers of Village know Swift’s essay suggests that the impoverished […]
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Fianna Failing
Only 25% think the Fianna Fáil Taoiseach, Mr Martin, is the most influential politician in government. By Conor Lenihan. The latest opinion poll, this time from the Irish Mail on Sunday, posits more bad news for Fianna Fáil and its somewhat beleaguered leader Micheál Martin. Fianna Fáil’s opinion-poll rating continues to languish around the 15% level […]
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By David Burke. 1. The counter-insurgency gurus. During the period 1970-72 Brigadier (later General Sir) Frank Kitson served as Brigadier of 39 Brigade in Belfast. It is arguable that he caused more damage to relations between the British government and the Nationalist community than any other individual in the British Army. There are many stories […]
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Taoiseach, Tánaiste, multiple Ministers, civil service, Garda, official inquiries and EU complicit in wrecking the life of one of Ireland’s leading business representatives. How a former CEO of ISME has been shafted by the State because of two key sensitivities in Irish politics: the relationship between the Social Partners (unions and employers) and government, of which […]
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Bridal Shower
A recent protest, perhaps the world’s smallest that was improperly touted by the media as spontaneous, featured more wedding organisers than brides By Jed Lonstein Recently a story appeared in all the major media outlets in Ireland. It was a protest without precedent. There were no marker-scrawled placards or grim-faced anoraks, no barriers or batons. […]
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By David Burke. 1. Where was the ‘EFGH’ Unit of Support Company of 1 Para during the Ballymurphy Massacre? Next week marks the 50th anniversary of the introduction of internment. It began on 9 August 1971. By the 11th, ten people had been murdered by paratroopers in Ballymurphy. Earlier this year, the coroner who oversaw […]
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Tired of Zappone, Varadkar and Martin
As the summer turns to rain it’s time for some fresh faces. By Conor Lenihan. In the light of the botched Zappone Envoy appointment the Covid lockdown guidelines are again under the microscope.When is a Lockdown guideline not really a line of any sort?Clearly when former Taoiseach and current Tánaiste Leo Varadkar is in attendance […]
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Former Minister getting plum diplomatic gig inflames leadership issues in two main government parties. By Conor Lenihan. The appointment of Katherine Zappone as an Irish diplomatic envoy has already let loose a lot of free speech – not all of it complimentary. The question is: at a very challenging time for the state do we […]
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By David Burke. Brigadier Frank Kitson, who is still alive, ran 39 Airportable Brigade area, i.e. Belfast, as if he was a mob boss with the city his patch. He let the paratroopers under his command run riot in that domain. Some of the more decent and honourable British army officers were aghast at their […]
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By David Burke. 1. 50-year Concerted Cover-up. The British government’s determination to absolve all British soldiers involved in killings during the Troubles means that there are now precious few opportunities to get to the bottom of what really happened during the Ballymurphy massacre and on Bloody Sunday. The Bloody Sunday cover-up went into high gear […]
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By Deirdre Younge Kingsberry case The High Court in Belfast granted permission in early July for the family of a former member of the UDA, William Kingsberry – shot dead in 1991, to sue Libya for supplying the assault rifle used by the IRA unit that killed him. New approach The Kingsberry case, which is […]
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Nor is Israel based on the rule of law By Sami Abou Shehadeh In an opinion piece published on the 24 June in the Jerusalem Post , a right-wing Israeli newspaper, the Irish ambassador to Israel, Kyle O’Sullivan, claimed that Israel is a country based “on the rule of law, on democracy, and on respect for […]
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By Deirdre Younge. Tom Oliver, a farmer from Riverstown, on the Cooley peninsula, was kidnapped, interrogated and murdered by the IRA in July 1991. They alleged he was a Garda informant. The murder by the IRA’s punishment squad didn’t only cause devastation for his family but split the tight-knit community in which he lived. IRA […]
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By David Burke. 1. “No other perpetrator involved would be given anonymity, for some reason Soldier F is a protected species”. In the last week, Colum Eastwood MP, the Leader of the SDLP, named ‘Soldier F’, in the House of Commons, under privilege. ‘Soldier F’ had faced murder charges for his actions on Bloody Sunday […]
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Detective Sergeant who made protected disclosure about under-regulated phone-tracing and then served time for harassment of DPP official, claims multiple breaches of her human rights and “systemic institutional failure”, in complaint recently rejected by European Court of Human Rights
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By Joseph de Burca. Michael Wolff has published two highly critical books of Donald Trump. Despite this, the former president granted Wolff an interview which has helped inform his latest book ‘Landslide’. In the book, Trump fulminates and groans about perceived slights and betrayals. He is particularly critical of the 1,000 or so lawyers he […]
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By David Burke. Internment – arrest and detention without trial – was introduced by the Stormont Government of Northern Ireland in August 1971. Hundreds of Nationalists were rounded up and detained. Members of the UVF, UDA and Red Hand Commando were not targeted for arrest. The swoops were carried out by British troops including the […]
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The problem isn’t Google and Facebook it’s the fact that 25-year-olds find newspapers boring
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Monitor and improve climate, biodiversity and equality. Leave Government if targets are not reached every quarter
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Conflict of Interest in Meath
Aisling Dempsey voted for dezonings that will increase value of lands owned by the company she works for
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By David Burke. UPDATE: Please also see the following story where Soldier F is named as David James Cleary: Soldier F and Brigadier Kitson’s elite ‘EFGH’ death squad: a murderous dirty-tricks pattern is emerging which links Ballymurphy with Bloody Sunday. A second soldier involved in both events was ‘mentioned in despatches’ at the behest of […]
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By David Burke. Introduction. Soldier F will not now face criminal charges for the murder of innocent civilians in Derry on Bloody Sunday, 30 January 1972. This is because the statements made by soldiers after the Bloody Sunday massacre were taken by the Royal Military Police and are deemed inadmissable as evidence. It would have […]
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Shane Kennedy and his home, a former British naval minesweeper,
‘The Portisham’, prove resistant to legal battles -
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Wellington Poots
Poots aims to save his party, but on
environmental policy he’s agricultural -
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Supply, and Student Housing
By Niamh Alexander. Despite expectations due to the pandemic, the cost of student accommodation in Dublin has remained steady – and costly. Two semesters in the cheapest campus accommodation in UCD will set you back just over €8,000, with the most expensive coming in at almost €14,500, per annum. Sky-high costs can have the effect […]
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How is Conor so wrong? By Michael Smith
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Fourth-division calibre on second-division salaries. By J Vivian Cooke
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The Top Level Appointments Committee (TLAC) long since succumbed to groupthink. By J Vivian Cooke
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By David Burke.
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Editorial. By Michael Smith The most widely supported form of equality is equality of opportunity. Even Margaret Thatcher believed in it. But it has more of the qualities of “freedom” than of “equality”. Village has always tended to support a vision of equality that contemplates equality of outcome/condition – distributing ‘goods’/resources in inverse proportion to […]
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State Interventionism
Leo Varadkar, the Fine Gael Leader, is still touting the 1980s rhetoric of low taxes and impoverished public services. For me, the State is a force for good.
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Eoghan Goal
In the end Harris destroyed himself
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By Joseph de Burca. 1. A faction within the British Army tries to expose a child abuse network. During the summer of 1973 Captain Colin Wallace, a PSYOPS [psychological operations] officer with the British Army, tried to expose the existence of a child abuse network in Northern Ireland. He had the support of a string […]
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UPDATE: Sir Jeffrey Donaldson is the new leader of the DUP. One of his mentors was James Molyneaux MP. Donaldson succeeded him as MP for Lagan Valley after Molyneaux retired in 1997. On 19 December 2019 Village exposed Molyneaux’s involvement with the Anglo-Irish Vice Ring. On his website Donaldson has stated that: “My involvement […]
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By Deirdre Younge. In April 2000 Jeffrey Donaldson, the new leader of the DUP, stood up in the House of Commons and made the heinous allegation on live television that former Special Branch sergeant in Dundalk Garda Station, Owen Corrigan, had colluded in the murders of Chief Superintendent Harry Breen, Commander H Division, and Superintendent […]
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The late Enoch Powell was a racist and a violent paedophile with deranged views about the intelligence of women. He was also a mentor to Sir Jeffrey Donaldson who is about to become the leader of the DUP. Donaldson acted as his election agent, 1982-84. Another of Donaldson’s mentors was the paedophile James Molyneaux. (See […]
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By Dónal Lavery Sir Jeffrey Donaldson MP is now the new, or rather “old”, ‘shining light’ of Ulster Unionism, as part of what seems a “coronation” after an “abdication” by Edwin Poots MLA. Both are socially conservative and oppose some LGBTQ issues, both are staunch Orangemen, but both do differ in ways that can be […]
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Bog Standards
Invis Energy and An Bord Pleanála caused a bogslide in Donegal
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Even when it appointed a proper environment correspondent, George Lee, it diverted him to Covid-duties
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A menace in the District Court
Village names a retired judge who pursued a woman who appeared before him in family law proceedings
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Bad policies lead to bad results
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The Blueshirt who has inherited the most distinguished legal pedigree but lies about his background, worked for Big Tobacco and as a Commercial Lawyer, and broke electoral law
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Irish Times reviews of RTE Radio 1 are as dull as the reviewees
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Judges appointing Judges
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By Sean Brennan. I have just read the article in the Sunday Independent [20 June] concerning whether RTE contacted Des O’Malley first while the station was producing the GunPlot series. It is the second article which the Sunday Independent has produced about the issue. The earlier one – written by Des O’Malley – appeared on […]
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The Irish Times promoted the Official IRA’s version of the Arms Crisis
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By Christopher Stanley, Litigation Consultant, KRW LAW LLP, Belfast* [i] In the last six months victims of violent abuse in Ireland have been ‘granted’ apologies. First, the Irish Taoiseach apologized to the victims and survivors of the Mother and Baby Homes. Writing in The Independent on 14 January 2021 Emer O’Toole noted: “On Wednesday, the […]
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Vilification Once More
Des O’Malley, the Minister for Justice in 1970, continues to ignore the hard questions about the Arms Crisis. Instead, he persists in smearing anyone who dares to disagree with him. Some of his latest slurs question the integrity of those in RTÉ responsible for the ‘GunPlot’ series. It is now time to stop throwing the […]
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Conservation Politics
Reviewing the history and likely future of the National Parks and Wildlife Service as Minister of State for Heritage Malcolm Noonan announces a major review
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Paddy Power without Responsibility
Lockdown boom for Online Gambling poses dangers of invitations to lodge ever more money and sneakily changed stakes
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By Dónal Lavery. I have been working on a book-in-progress about the issue of the Kincora Boys Home scandal involving undisclosed sexual abuse and exploitation. Part of that exploitation included victims being sent to live in the US at the behest of powerful abusers with salient influence. A Northern Protestant, Richard Kerr, was taken into […]
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Come again
THE STONE WAS MOVED AND DOMINIC CRAWLED OUT By Christopher Stanley So, we have this sort of completely insane situation in which part of the building was saying, ‘are we going to bomb Iraq?’, part of the building was arguing about whether or not we’re going to do quarantine or not do quarantine, the prime […]
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“Trust me, I’m a Doctor”
A closer look at the ‘Celebrity Psychiatrist’ closely linked to Kincora Boys Home and British Intelligence
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By Andrew Lownie. In 2015 I started researching my biography ‘The Mountbattens: Their Lives and Loves’. Little did I know then that six years later it would have locked me into a marathon legal battle with the Government and Southampton University. My quest was to find out what had happened to the personal diaries of […]
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A review of ‘The Irish Diaspora – Tales of Emigration, Exile and Imperialism’ by Turtle Bunbury
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The British Government purchased Mountbatten’s archive for the benefit of historians (allegedly) but has locked it away. It may include details about his links to paedophile networks including the Anglo-Irish Vice Ring.
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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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The Past: as real as the Present.
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 […]
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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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Marxism and the Poet
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 […]
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The tide swells for Nationalists
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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 […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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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, […]
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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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Dance more, drink less
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 […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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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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Estates of Fear
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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Dystopia here, now
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 […]
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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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Carers under government bus
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 […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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By Joseph de Burca Buckingham Palace has been sitting on a time-bomb since 2015: the ABC sex-abuse cover-up scandal. The Palace is currently engaged in a most undignified war of words with the Duchess of Sussex (Meghan Markle). The ABC scandal could erupt merely if Markle decides to draw attention to it. The ABC scandal […]
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By David Burke. The madness and mayhem in Washington earlier this year was fuelled by thousands of so-called ‘patriots’ who believe the world is ruled by ‘swamp’ puppets of a reptilian race from outer space who murder and sexually abuse children. They see the various anti-Covid vaccines as integral parts of a plot against humanity. […]
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Inequality is rising in Ireland.
Important research from Unite shows Irish Times wrong on most important social issue of our time. By Suzie Mélange. In a report entitled, ‘Hungry bellies are not equal to full bellies’, to be launched on Monday 1 March, Unite Trade Union in the Republic of Ireland will provide lengthy research-based evidence of the growing inequality […]
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Out of Time
How the newspaper of reference dealt with correspondence challenging an important article it published about equality Brendan Ogle Of Unite submitted the following article to the Irish Times on 15 December 2020 Unite House Unite the Union 55/56 Middle Abbey Street Dublin 1 D01 X002 Republic of Ireland Republic of Ireland Head Office 15th December 2020 On 14 […]
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State’s bad bank fails to take responsibility for another inept hit to the public purse as it improperly sells to someone connected to the original debtor, blaming IT systems. By Frank Connolly (November edition, Village) NAMA Chief Executive, Brendan McDonagh, appearing before the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee (PAC), failed to deliver a credible explanation as […]
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Documents released to Village under FoI reveal false pretences behind €25,000 paid by Meath County Council to former employees of plant-hire company owed the money. By Frank Connolly Official documents obtained by Village have revealed in considerable detail the manner in which a County Meath businessman was defrauded by a former employee in 2008 and […]
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Dag Hammarskjold
The youngest and best UN Secretary General, 60 years after his assassination. By Chay Bowes Dag Hammarskjold was the second ever, and some say the greatest, Secretary General of the UN. When he died sixty years ago this year, President John F Kennedy suggested that Hammarskjold had been “the greatest statesman of our century”. At […]
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In the US, UK and Ireland Trump, Johnson – and throttled SMEs – threaten a revolution By Gary McCarthy Ireland’s consumption collapsed by 20% in the first half of 2020 – the worst in Europe except Spain and the UK. The economy is on its knees and SMEs have only drawn on €180 million of […]
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As Covid takes everything from the Young, Society and the Media single them out for even rare breaches of the rules. By Zoë Jackson McGrath Youth is about the only thing worth having, and that is about the only thing youth has. Unfortunately a global pandemic has challenged even this iron law of cynicism and […]
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A recent EPA Report has highlighted how policy problems are interconnected, and need a whole-of-government response By Tadhg O’Mahony Transport and the environment are in the air. Recent weeks have brought debates on CETA and the evolving Climate Bill, and on radical moves by local authorities to facilitate pedestrians and cyclists. Far deeper EU targets […]
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By Christopher Stanley. [i] “Ireland was a cold harsh environment for many, probably the majority, of its residents during the earlier half of the period under remit. It was especially cold and harsh for women”. (page 1) The Irish government may have hoped in vain that the publication of The Report of the Mother and […]
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By Christopher Stanley Litigation Consultant KRW LAW LLP Belfast. Last year I wrote piece for Village called The Accused and the Accusers: If Not Now, When? There,I offered an analysis of the proceedings of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse Inquiry (IICSA) in relation to its investigation into the allegations of child sexual abuse […]
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As Covid-19 and other diseases spawn resistance to over-used antibiotics, phages – viruses that naturally infect and kill bacteria – may be a long-term replacement By Shane Raymond Doctors Globally worry daily about fighting Covid-19. However, some doctors and medical experts now worry not just about the damage the virus can cause, but about the […]
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By Joseph de Burca. This week marks the 32nd anniversary of the assassination of the Belfast solicitor Patrick Finucane. In 1989 he was shot dead by UDA killers controlled by MI5 in front of his young family at his home. The British government continues to resist a judicial inquiry into the murder despite castigation from […]
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By Margaret Urwin. In ‘The Intelligence War against the IRA’, Thomas Leahy, Senior Lecturer in Politics in Cardiff University, challenges the growing dominant narrative that the IRA was brought to the negotiating table in the 1990s because they had been ‘brought to their knees’ by British intelligence. Since the outing of State agents, Stakeknife and […]
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AstraZeneca
A poem in the pandemic, by Kevin Higgins after Brian Patten Now all the old gods have died or are on life support in the prison infirmary psychiatric wing we have a new name for the absolute: AstraZeneca. Even those who get emotional at dinner parties about the state of the planet know there’s no […]
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Kildare Councillors flouted the public interest and perhaps the law in approving the sale of Council land without including its additional actual value to the purchaser as a “ransom strip” – following a valuation by a former Fine Gael Councillor.. By Fiona McLoughlin Healy. The role of Councillors in disposing of assets is an important […]
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By Kevin Higgins Inspired by the apologies of British Labour Party leader Leader Keir Starmer for his party’s “anti-Semitism” and his recent appointment of a former Israeli intelligence officer as Labour’s head of social media. To any white South Africans hurt by the anti-Apartheid movement. To any tobacco plantation owner’s son barred by Emancipation from […]
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So help me God
Drafters of the US Constitution foresaw violent demagogues, and Presidential Inaugurations have mostly befitted the momentous transfers of power By John Vivian Cooke. Exactly on the stroke of noon on 20 January, Donald Trump will be out of office. There will be no more lies, frauds, outrages, or broken laws from President Trump. His presidency […]
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The Treaty
Having failed to crush, flatten, or close our borders against it, as Winter begins to put its uncouth fingernails all over us there is talk of negotiations. King Virus comes to the table wearing a crown of spikes that fans out to fill the whole room and can’t be removed except on the day of […]
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UNambitious
Ireland will again exercise its place on the Security Council to promote consensus rather than vision and values. By John-Vivian Cooke Ireland took a seat on the UN Security Council for the term 2021/22 on 1 January. This is the fulfilment of a key strategic goal of Irish foreign policy. However, having secured that seat […]
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London extradition hearing was the last stand of either Wikileaks founder or Western Intelligence Imperialism, and awaits January decision By Caroline Hurley Queensland-born Julian Assange (49) founded Wikileaks in 2006. Four years later it published several huge and devastating leaks provided by US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning, including: the Afghanistan war logs, the Iraq […]
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Stalwart Hopes, Stunted Growth.
Cloughjordan Ecovillage Two Decades On. By Caroline Hurley. Cloughjordan So Far In September 1999, at the Central Hotel Dublin, Gavin Harte and Gregg Allen launched Sustainable Projects Ireland Ltd. (SPI) trading as The Village, whose aim was to create Ireland’s first eco-village, with a stress on sustainability, community, and promoting mainstreaming environmentally-friendly ideas. Rising property […]
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Celebs get it in the neck
Twitter rejects lockdown relatability ‘We all hate you’ By Sam White Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, Placido Domingo, Idris Elba, Harvey Weinstein, Donna Air, 1960s songstress Marianne Faithful, Kodaline guitarist Mark Prendergast, Prince Charles, Boris Johnson and Dominic Cummings, Prince Albert of Monaco, John Taylor from Duran Duran, Ireland’s Ryan Tubridy and Mary Lou McDonald, and ‘Bond […]
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A note from the editor: This article is about the late Paudge Brennan, the Fianna Fáil Minister who resigned a little over 50 years ago after the eruption of the Arms Crisis. It is written by his son, Sean. Not surprisingly, it is partisan. It does, nevertheless, yield an insight into a perspective on Irish […]
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By David Burke. A memo has just been released from Britain’s National Archives. It concerns discussions at the apex of the British government about salacious rumours relating to John Hume’s private life. It was sent to Sir Robin Butler, Cabinet Secretary to John Major’s government, and also to Major’s private secretary, Sir Alex Allan. Allan […]
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By David Burke. George Blake has just died aged 98 at his dacha outside Moscow where Putin’s overseas intelligence service, the SVR, was protecting him from Covid-19. Blake was held in high esteem by the Russians. Putin has said that the “memory of this legendary person will be preserved forever in our hearts”. Putin awarded […]
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By Andrew Lownie. A few weeks ago the Irish Times ran an article on the death of Mountbatten linked to the new series of The Crown in which the murder features in the opening episode. As the author of the most recent biography ‘The Mountbattens: Their Lives and Loves’, I was interviewed for the piece on […]
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Please help me.
Transgender people are not getting appropriate psychological or medical treatment and, in breach of WHO guidelines, are being treated as if they have mental health problems By Rachel Rathbone. I always knew I was female, from an early age. Never more so than when I went to primary school, an all-boys school with me, a […]
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A Banquet of Ringforts
Michael Smith reviews ‘The Men who eat Ringforts’ by Sinéad Mercier and Michael Holly, featuring Eddie Lenihan The title of the delightful ‘The Men Who Eat Ringforts’ gratifyingly, replicates the headline for a typically incisive article by Tony Lowes published in this magazine in 2010. It complained that there was no legal protection for ringforts. […]
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Style with some substance By Mehar Luthra I used to pride myself on being the most politically unaware human on the planet. I revelled in my political illiteracy. Politics was a snooze-fest. Until, that is, the advent of Obama and Trump. Obama came along, made politics cool and accessible and inclusive and he actually talked sense. […]
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Tory PM Edward Heath concealed the identity of a paramilitary organisation which perpetrated a massacre in Belfast in 1971. He did so in the hope of acquiring the votes he needed to win a majority in the House of Commons to enable the UK to join the EEC, the forerunner of the EU. What he […]
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John le Carré spent most of his career exploring the British psyche through the lens of its secret service. You’d think he might have mentioned Ireland once or twice.
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Trump’s Your Fault
Trump and Biden are culturally Irish By Stephen Corbett Donald Trump could repatriate Apple and Google, rip up the Good Friday Agreement, and next March 17th spend the day on the greens at Mar Al Lago. Expect anything from the United States nowadays. That’s why I’m sounding the alarm from Scranton, Pennsylvania, birthplace of Democratic […]
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Judicial review sought to overturn planning board decision By Frank Connolly. The residents of a housing estate in Ashbourne, County Meath, are fighting to retain the only open space available to their children after a decision by An Bord Pleanála (ABP) to grant permission for three apartment blocks on the land. The Millbourne Residents Association […]
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Compromising RTÉ’s ‘Countrywide’
Damien O’Reilly pushes an agenda against “some” unspecified “thug” environmentalists, in the Farmers’ Journal. By John Gibbons The announcement in October that RTÉ’s radio programme ‘Countrywide’ had entered into a 12-month sponsorship deal with the Irish Farmers Journal (IFJ) represents an unusual, arguably unprecedented departure. The IFJ is bound at the hip with Ireland’s most powerful agricultural […]
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Shane Ross tells nearly everything
If only the Independent Alliance had performed as well as the rip-roaring book Part 1 Review Michael Smith reviews ‘In bed with the Blueshirts’ (Atlantic Books, €12.99) and speaks to its suspiciously unselfrighteous author Shane Ross can write, analyse and judge. We saw it when he wrote for the Sindo and in his juicy books about the […]
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A valuable contribution to preserving the memory of the Conflict and to the continued out-workings of the fragile peace (in) process in this Northern Ireland, this Narrow Ground. In addition to the most recent edition of De Smith’s ‘Principles of Judicial Review’, the other two most used book on my desk are Coroners’ ‘Law and […]
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Lands purchased for €500,000 in 2016 are put up for sale for €4.2 million in 2020 after planning obtained on behalf of sons of Councillor who discussed their rezoning By Frank Connolly A Meath County Councillor is under investigation as his two children stand to reap over €4.2 million from the sale of lands re-zoned […]
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The print edition of Village magazine posed a number of questions to Des O’Malley about the Arms Crisis but he ignored them. They arose out of an article he had published in the Sunday Independent in September. He also used that article as a platform to attack recent research on the crisis without addressing any […]
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Margaret Urwin is known for her work with Justice for the Forgotten/the Pat Finucane Centre. Her published works include the pamphlet Counter-gangs (2012) which describes the activities of undercover British special force units in Ireland in the 1970s. In 2016 she published the highly- regarded ‘A State in Denial: British Collaboration with Loyalist Paramilitaries‘. She […]
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These four questions need now to be asked in the Dáil, as Leo Varadkar has not replied to Village‘s attempt to get answers. By Michael Smith. Since we live in a democracy lying to the Dáil is a resigning offence. Village has made the case that the Tánaiste Leo Varadkar has run to cover over his leak […]
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On Thursday Village‘s editor, Michael Smith, wrote to Leo Varadkar: “Dear Tánaiste, You referred in the Dáil on 10 November to the impossibility of yourhaving had ten encounters in 2019 with Dr Matt Ó Tuathail. You saidmany of the encounters referred to athttps://villagemagazine.ie/at-least-10-times-not-2-or-3/ wereimpossible. Can you please say how many, and which of them, youconsider […]
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We live in a democracy and a free press is supposed to be important. So why have the mainstream media been silent when Village, a small, serious, independent magazine and its whistleblower, Chay Bowes, have been threatened and bullied by perhaps the most powerful political party in the State, Fine Gael, and perhaps the most powerful […]
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At least 10 times not 2 or 3
Statement from Village, 9 November 2020 The cardinal political sin is lying to Parliament. It is a resigning matter for a Minister to lie to the Dáil. Village submits evidence below that suggests the Dáil has been lied to on what is currently an important and topical issue. In his Statement and replies to questions in the Dáil […]
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Leo Varadkar Must Go
Cheating politicians cheat us all. By Paul Murphy TD. Leo Varadkar is either a liar or a very unlucky man. According to what he told the Dáil on Tuesday, the only time he ever leaked a confidential document was the time it ended up in Village magazine. After throwing Maitiú Ó’Tuathail under the metaphorical bus and repeatedly […]
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On Tuesday, Village magazine shared communications with RTÉ, The Irish Times and the TDs who were leading Dáil questions of Tánaiste Leo Varadkar yesterday. We here link to a PDF of what we shared. Beneath are the most important of these. Readers will make their minds up as to whether the material was effectively deployed […]
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: Ruadhán Mac Aodháin, Solicitor, Prospect Law Re: Whether the Official Secrets Act applies to Ministers and TDs? Client: Ormond Quay Publishing Limited Date: 3rd November 2020 From: Diarmuid Rossa Phelan SC Thank you for your instructions of last night raising the above question to be answered by noon today. The short answer is that there is no exclusion in the […]
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In advance of the Dáil debate on Tánaiste Leo Varadkar’s now-admitted leak of a confidential document last year, Village wants to express a hope that the debate will be forensic, not the usual populist, adjective-heavy grandstanding, that may let a culprit off a lazily-cast hook. To this end we suggest that TDs framing the debate about wrongdoing not […]
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By Joseph de Burca. It is no exaggeration to say that Robert Fisk, who has passed away, was one of the finest journalists of the last half-century. He reported on the Troubles during the 1970s for The Times of London before it was taken over by Rupert Murdoch, produced a book on the 1974 Ulster […]
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Biden is unexciting and past his best but not mad ‘Vote Joe’ For Village’s agenda of equality of outcome, sustainability and accountability, Bernie Sanders was the best champion. By comparison, his conservative Democrat vanquisher Joe Biden is ideologically vague, compromised, wedded to mid-twentieth-century agendas and lacking timely radicalism. Biden’s persona is attractively folksy grandfatherly – and Irish-American […]
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Mr Varadkar’s statement provokes dramatically more questions than it answers. The Tánaiste’s statement says “the ambit of the [Official Secrets} Act is limited to persons holding a public office”. It is a grotesque and unbecoming misconstruction for the Tánaiste to so cynically and brazenly – presumably following days of legal advice – misinterpret the Official […]
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Fine Gael leader Leo Varadkar has come to be known as a leaker. The hashtag #leotheleak has trended on Twitter on several occasions after Varadkar was accused of publishing things he shouldn’t. That Leo leaks however hasn’t yet been proven—or become a political liability for the tánaiste. That may change with evidence from a healthcare whistleblower that Varadkar, while taoiseach, leaked a confidential document to a personal associate.
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By Deirdre Younge. The Smithwick Tribunal concealed its relationship with Freddie Scappaticci whom it treated as a credible source of information while the Kenova Inquiry is investigating him for multiple murders. The Smithwick Tribunal found Garda collusion in murder of RUC officers, but couldn’t name the colluder. This was partly because it allowed a motley band […]
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By David Burke. I was fortunate to have a book published recently. I won’t personally be much affected by who sells it it but it did spark me thinking about the beleaguered publishing industry in Ireland. It does sterling work promoting diverse, minority and high-quality works. Writing is an Irish speciality. Reflecting this, thankfully Ireland […]
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By David Burke. The letter from the Garda officer who had served in C3. In 1973 a former Garda intelligence officer, Patrick Crinnion, wrote a letter which he addressed to three politicians: Garret FitzGerald, Conor Cruise O’Brien and Richie Ryan. All three were prominent government ministers at the time. Crinnion had served with the overarching […]
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By David Burke. Deputy Sean Haughey has repeated his request for the release of certain Garda files from the Department of Justice. There is a lot more to his question than readily meets the eye. In the late 1960s and 1970s C3 was the most secretive and sensitive department within an Garda Síochána. It provided […]
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The legacy of Chris Ryder, the former Sunday Times (ST) journalist who passed away last Friday, is not one to be proud of: he was one of a number of journalists who helped MI5 and the RUC’s Special Branch cover up the rape of children who had fallen into the grip of a paedophile gang […]
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UPDATE: Des O’Malley is going to reveal what he knowns about the new allegation that Seán MacStíofáin was a Garda informer in The Sunday Independent tomorrow. Hopefully, O’Malley will answer the 10 questions Village raised in the original version of this article In the event that O’Malley does not address these questions in The Sunday […]
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By David Burke. The family phone of Captain James Kelly and his wife Sheila, in Terenure, Dublin, was tapped by the gardai in 1970. Captain Kelly was one of the Arms Trial defendants who went on trial 50 years ago this week. He was acquitted. It is inconceivable that Mícheál Ó Móráin, who served as […]
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By Michael Smith. Justice Minister Helen McEntee has confirmed the existence of secret and “sensitive’” Garda files relating to the Arms Crisis. She did not rule out releasing them in “appropriate” circumstances. Her comments were made on Tuesday evening in response to Seán Haughey TD of Fianna Fáil who was asking her to confirm that […]
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Conor Lenihan reviews ‘Deception and Lies – the Hidden History of the Arms Crisis 1970’ by David Burke: the arms crisis was a legitimate operation of state which history has falsely judged as a nefarious adventure by Haughey who went on trial 50 years ago this week for alleged illegal gunrunning. The year 1970 was […]
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VILLAGE IS about nothing if it isn’t giving space to whistleblowers. Reflecting this, the magazine has several times illustrated articles with a cartoon whistleblower, cheeks inflated to bursting, typically to no political avail. It’s a good image for the magazine in general, Village’s frustrated sympathy is nearly always with those prepared to blow and it […]
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The Green Party should be – and appear to be – this century’s equivalent to the trade union movement. By Councillor Oliver Moran. Protests against environmental taxes in Europe, farmers’ blockades in the Netherlands, urban unrest in France, and the water-charges movement here in Ireland should cast a long shadow for the Green Party in […]
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“Paramilitarism: Mass Violence in the Shadow of the State” by Uĝur Ümit Üngör (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020). Reviewed by Chris Stanley. The genesis for this book was an analysis of Assad of Syria’s unleashing of militias to repress an uprising against his regime in 2011. Upon reflection the author realised that that violent episode deserved […]
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by Michael Smith It’s 2020. We’re transitioning to a civilisation with a wiser sensibility. We’re defenestrating monuments that subvert our values. What’s the first erection we should remove? On its twentieth anniversary, it’s Dublin’s spike, the ‘Spire of Dublin’, a tiger in metal. Dublin lost the run of itself in a boom that started in […]
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Incitement to hatred of the speckled.
An Outsider’s view of always present, now boiling, racism in Ireland By David Langwallner Hugo Hamilton wrote a book called ‘The Speckled People’ (2003) which to some extent mirrored my experience in growing up with a Germanic mother and a Gaeilgeoir Irish father who refused to allow him to speak English. “Speckled, ‘half and half…Irish on […]
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By David Burke. Introduction. The Arms Trial opened fifty years ago later this month, 22 September. It has since become clear that the prosecution was one of the most tainted episodes in modern Irish legal history and that, more than anyone else, the former Taoiseach Jack Lynch was responsible for the sham. The prosecution which […]
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by Mannix Flynn The root cause of the homelessness crisis in Ireland is the broken housing system. Ireland does not have a public housing system to meet the needs of the society. The biggest mistake was the decision by Labour’s Joan Burton to cut social housing spending by 72% between 2008 and 2012 (€1.38bn to […]
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By Joseph de Burca. Introduction. The documentary on the liar and fraud Carl Beech raises the most serious questions about the competence of the BBC which broadcasted it on 24 August. For years Beech masqueraded as the survivor of a VIP sex-abuse ring that allegedly engaged in the rape, torture and murder of children. During […]
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Philibuster
The wily Trade Commissioner’s future rests on a report into his implausible explanations from the circumspect but stringent EU Commission President. By Jonathan Baxter. National morale had already been starting to crack before more than 80 attendees sat down for dinner at the Clifden Station House Hotel. As a result, this was never going to […]
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By Joseph de Burca. The BBC has a lamentable record insofar as VIP sex abuse is concerned. It allowed Jimmy Savile prey on children for decades while countless officials knew what he was like. Johnny Lydon (aka ‘Johnny Rotten’ of the Sex Pistols) was shut down when he tried to expose Savile. If Lydon – […]
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The presence of gardaí at evictions may lead tenants to believe that they have no choice but to vacate their home. By Conor Doyle. Video footage emerged last Thursday of the latest iteration of what’s become a familiar scene. Men, dressed head to toe in black, with dark glasses and face coverings (although on this […]
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The current political administration in Britain attacks the Civil Service (by cull) and the Judiciary (by murmuring) while tightening the grip of the Executive, particularly through unelected advisers and ‘specialists’. By Christopher Stanley For readers of Village the names of Gina Miller and Shamina Begum may not immediately be recognised. They are two women with British citizenship. […]
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The Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement – implemented in an EU/Canada trade deal – introduces a bilateral Investment Court System and will transform it into a Multilateral Investment Tribunal. By Anna Jermak Introduction Given that foreign investments significantly contribute to a country’s economic prosperity, States have been trying to attract foreign investors by offering them […]
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The UK will probably apply lower environmental and social standards, and in exchange will have EU tariffs applied to its goods and restrictions on freedom of movement to the EU. By Michael Smith Britain formally left the EU on 31 January, and is now in a transition perioduntil the end of the year. Boris Johnson’s […]
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An emigrée contrasts Poland’s reversion to hatred of LGBT+ with Ireland’s recent liberalisation. By Sara Chudzik. I was twelve when I first moved to Ireland in 2007. Ever since then with every passing year I would count how many years it is that I’ve lived in Poland and how many in Ireland. Now the Irish […]
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We need to move beyond tokenism to ensure genuine equality of access to training and jobs for teachers from minority backgrounds. By Sorcha Grisewood. In her memoir, ‘No You Shut Up: Speaking Truth to Power and Reclaiming America’, political activist Symone Sanders recalls her experience of school in America: “In Omaha, my sister and I went […]
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A reply to Adam McGibbon and Michael Rafferty of the Just Transition Greens. By John Vivian Cooke. Quo Virides (Whither the Green Party)? In their recent articles in Village Magazine, Adam McGibbon (Just Transiti ON) and Michael Rafferty, (Just Transition are Left insurgents in the Green Party aiming higher than ¨internal opposition¨), debated the future of the […]
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A reply to Adam McGibbon’s recent article in Village. By Michael Rafferty. Adam McGibbon’s summary in Village of the birth of the ‘Just Transition Greens’ (JTGs) recalls the relatively modest experience of the Green Party’s eco-socialists in mitigating some of the worst facets of their involvement in a previous coalition government. But these counted for little when […]
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The Green Party needs Just Transition Greens to make it possible to negotiate a more ambitious programme for government. By Adam McGibbon. As the Green Party leadership election drew to a close last month, a new green-left affiliate organisation – the ‘Just Transition Greens’ – was born. The foundation of the Just Transition Greens, announced in a […]
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By David Burke. UPDATE: See also Just declassified UK memo on John Hume reveals interest of PM John Major’s top civil servants in “possible press stories regarding John Hume’s private life”. John Hume was the victim of a campaign of character assassination in the early 1970s perpetrated by British spies. It was spearheaded by an […]
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Malicious and unfair assaults on the credibility of Richard Kerr, the Kincora whistleblower, are nothing new. The most concerted effort to undermine him so far was one perpetrated by sinister individuals posing as journalists who attempted to get him to join forces with the now notorious conman Carl Beech. This occurred when Beech was featuring […]
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A report from the Intelligence and Security Committee (ICI) about Russian interference with British democracy has just been released. ‘In brief’, it declares: “Russian influence in the UK is ‘the new normal’, and there are a lot of Russians with very close links to Putin who are well integrated into the UK business and social […]
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By Joseph de Burca. Prince William, the Duchess of Cambridge and other senior Royals continue to retain a sinister cabal of deeply corrupt officials in their employment at Buckingham Palace. These officials bartered access to William and Kate as a bribe to ABC TV in the US in return for the concealment of a child […]
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Media failed in its duty on Covid
Government should focus on the elderly, as it should have done in March; Varadkar and Martin both outrageously breached the lockdown. By Michael Smith Perspective The Covid-19 infection rate of Irish healthcare workers at 32% of total infections is the highest in the world. Nursing homes account for nearly two-thirds of deaths, while the international […]
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Coronavirus shows that our self-destructive civilisation is fragile. But the earth may be on our side. by Vita Golden. This article argues that self-destructiveness including neo-liberalism facilitates twin scourges: plagues and environmental catastrophe (“ecocide”). In reacting, as you would expect, against ecocide Gaia, the force that regulates the earth’s environment, also attacks plagues and those […]
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