Things are bad enough when the taxman takes money from a person’s wage packet but when workers are paid less because they cannot read, it is a damning comment on the Irish education system.

WHETHER Health Minister James Reilly accepts it or not, perception is everything in politics, a timeless and universally accurate yardstick whereby politicians are measured by the man and woman in the street.

NO matter who brings Sam Maguire home after tomorrow’s All-Ireland football final between Donegal and Mayo, the game marks the dawning of a new era for the GAA.

The East-West Interconnector was officially opened yesterday at Batterstown, Co Meath, where the Irish national electricity grid joins the interconnector.

The latest figures released by the Central Statistics Office provide an intriguing insight into the changing face of Ireland.

It must be assumed, unfortunately, that Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Brendan Howlin is in the debilitating grip of an advanced case of political Stockholm Syndrome.

The Government yesterday published the wording of the children’s rights amendment to the Constitution and even if it has been nearly two decades in the making it is very welcome.

Communications Minister Pat Rabbitte has said he finds it hard “to get worked up” about the publication of the semi-nude photographs of Kate Middleton.

The new Dáil session is likely to be dominated by the forthcoming budget, which Taoiseach Enda Kenny has described as the most challenging of the Government’s period in office.

Once upon a time, when far more people went to pubs than do now, there was a pretty common character disliked and avoided because he invariably and knowingly left when it was his turn to buy a round of drinks.