SO, it seems the greatly trumpeted and entirely justified Limerick Regeneration Project is to go the way of decentralisation and the ambitious but sidelined national spatial strategy from 2002.

THIS week a Muslim man will ask the High Court to force the State to recognise his polygamous marriage.

YESTERDAY was a good day for this island; it was an especially good day for Northern Ireland.

IT is unlikely that today’s explorers – more tourists than pathfinders really – would include five crates of Scotch and more of brandy among their provisions.

AT lunchtime yesterday, Sinn Féin announced that talks to save the North’s power-sharing Assembly have ended and the basis for a deal now exists.

THE debate about whether Turkey should be admitted to the European Union or not is a hardy annual.

IT IS just possible that Taoiseach Brian Cowen and Finance Minister Brian Lenihan do not recognise the contempt for ordinary people implicit in Tuesday’s decision by Fianna Fáil’s parliamentary party not to revisit the exclusion of more than 640 senior officials from the pay cuts announced in the budget.

THE announcement that 13,300 people joined the dole queues last month is sobering. This brought the overall figure to 436,900. Even more worrying is the proportion of young men – one-in-three of those between 20 and 25 – who are unable to find work.

YESTERDAY’S report, by Carl O’Brien in the Irish Times, that health officials are investigating hundreds of complaints of mistreatment, abuse or lapses in care standards for people with disabilities in residential settings, will cause very many sleepless nights right across the country.

THE recent floods caused immense damage and the prospect of a recurrence is, at the least, disheartening.