THEY say that the best fish and chips are wrapped in a quality newspaper. Last week’s Budget was like a particularly greasy cod and chips wrapped in a glossy magazine (with a large emphasis on the cod).

YOU know the way we become immune to things — even tragedies fail to move us when they are piled up over time. We become hardened and desensitised.

THE Taoiseach has summoned the Disability Legislation Consultative Group (DLCG) to a meeting in his office late next Friday afternoon.

SHOULD probably begin with a small apology to diligent readers. If you followed my instructions of last week, you’d have found the horsey money in the book of estimates, exactly where I said it was.

‘THE next logical step was to put horse-racing’s finances on a permanent footing. If that is not done, racing will be at the whim of the Government of the day and, when the pressure comes for expenditure on things like health and education, racing will go down the political priorities list.”

HAVE you been following the Rugby World Cup? It’s a peculiar competition. For the first couple of weeks, a whole series of matches that make you wonder about the cynicism of the organisers, totally one-sided affairs involving rugby nations giving tutorials to countries where rugby is still in its infancy.

“THE land of Ireland is for the people of Ireland — all the people of Ireland.” That’s what our beloved Taoiseach said, in his less than stirring speech to the Árd Fheis on Saturday night.

THE following scenario is unimaginable, isn’t it? A religious brother, now in his 70s, is arrested and charged with a series of horrible crimes.