IT is good that the debate about families being crushed by unsustainable mortgages is gathering a new urgency.

JUST as Transport Minister Leo Varadkar prevailed in his row with the Dublin Airport Authority over bonuses paid to the DAA chief, Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney has asserted the Government’s authority in a spat with Horse Racing Ireland over bonuses totalling €37,550 paid to chief executive Brian Kavanagh.

JUST last month, as EU leaders met in emergency session to try to stave off the collapse of Italy’s economy, Brian Kavanagh, the chief executive of Horse Racing Ireland (HRI), was paid the balance of bonuses for 2008 and 2009.

THE lethal attacks on the people of Syria by President Bashar al-Assad are outrageous, but al-Assad and his family have repeatedly shown that they care as much for international opinion as they care for the lives of those who oppose them.

EVERY democratically elected government should protect the rights and privileges that give dignity to their state’s citizens and legitimacy to that society’s principles, traditions and values.

PROTESTS and riots greeted Pope Benedict’s arrival in Madrid for a four-day visit yesterday.

SOME 57,500 people received their Leaving Certificate results yesterday. The high failure in mathematics is again a cause for real concern.

RESEARCHERS in 13 focus groups from the Geary Institute at University College Dublin conducted a nationwide survey of the subjective experiences of the unemployed in 2010.

ALMOST 58,000 young people will get their Leaving Certificate results this morning.

AT this time of the year, when so many of us use whatever sunshine summer might surrender to visit the shores around our island, it is very easy to be seduced by the sea.