There were no winners in the Baby Ann appeal in the Supreme Court yesterday, in what has been justly described as a “most difficult and distressing” case.

The murky world of political financing needs to be opened to full public scrutiny.

Two new centres for the morbidly obese are to be opened next year at Mercy University Hospital in Cork and University College Hospital in Galway. While these should, of course, be warmly welcomed, people should at the same time ask why this has taken so long?

There is a hollow ring to the belated promise by Health Minister Mary Harney that new legislation would set up a strict inspection regime for nursing homes so a Leas Cross scandal can never again happen.

The Irish and British Governments intend to remain on course to restore power-sharing in Northern Ireland, as announced in St Andrews last month, despite no definite commitment from either Sinn Féin or the Democratic Unionist Party.

SO-CALLED “tiger kidnapping” is the current buzz-word in news coverage of the activities of violent thugs in Ireland’s flourishing underworld of crime.

SUSPICIONS inevitably arise over the non-inclusion of the Irish road death figures for 2005 among the preliminary figures released by the EU Transport Ministers’ conference.

There is an old saying that paper never refused ink, and politicians never refuse publicity.

Fine Gael Councillor Michael Fitzgerald of South Tipperary County Council has certainly got plenty of publicity for his reckless complaint about targeting people driving after drinking three or four pints.

Ostensibly, the reports of the Garda Síochána Inspectorate and the Management Advisory Group, which recommend radical reform of garda management, should be welcomed, both from a garda and public perspective.