By calling on the Government to target attitudes towards alcohol and sex in this country, the Rape Crisis Network effectively seizes the moral high ground today — International Human Rights Day — by highlighting a specific issue where action is urgently needed.

As a group of something just over 200 people, a group that would have been far larger if others were not at home minding a loved one dependent on their care, protested at Leinster House yesterday over the budget decision to cut the €1,700 annual grant for respite care by €325, the Health Service Executive was advertising for 35 “leadership coaches” to help managers with the “personal transition” promotion might impose on them.

US secretary of state Hillary Clinton spoke for the great majority of people on this island yesterday when she told an audience in Stormont that there is no place for violence in Northern Ireland.

In the aftermath of Budget 2013, there are genuine grounds for fearing that provisions intended to stimulate the economy will be nullified by the severity of cuts that will take around €1,000 from the average family income, money that would otherwise go into the tills of high-street shops.

People can be forgiven for not knowing Ireland held the chairmanship of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

Yesterday’s budget, the sixth austerity package in five years, continued the process of trying to restore some sanity to our public finances without introducing any measures so radical that it might threaten the Coalition’s immediate future.

Some societies and communities seem unable to suppress the instincts, the atavistic gene, that will, if not checked, lead to their own destruction.

Marie Fleming went to the High Court yesterday because she is terminally ill and wants to avoid a “horrible death” and die with dignity.

Shannon Airport has made losses since 2008 and passenger numbers have fallen by 60% over the past five years.

Last summer’s London Olympics showed what a magnificent platform sport can be to celebrate the very best in humanity.