With reference to the recent article by Victoria White and subsequent editorial comment concerning the Bethany Home, it should be made clear that the Church of Ireland has not ignored the issues raised by former residents.

Property tax is fundamentally unjust and no government has the right to impose it.

The absurd assertion by the Government that it will create 100,000 jobs by 2016 is as anomalous as saying that Kilkenny will win the Sam Maguire Cup or that a donkey will win the Epsom Derby.

It has been reported that Willie Frazer may be visiting Dublin to ask the Taoiseach to lower our national flag.

I’m surprised that the Labour Party has failed to respond to FG minister Brian Hayes’s assertion that “we” are taxed enough and that more cuts, which hit the poorest hardest, rather than proper taxes on the wealthy, are to be imposed in future.

The hype surrounding the drop of €10bn in the overall deficit masks the fact that current, day-to-day expenditure actually increased by €1.5bn (from €48bn to €49.5bn) over 2011.

To give the Irish people a sense of how loyalists feel at the decision of Belfast City Council to restrict the flying of the Union flag on City Hall to 17 designated days a year, loyalist activist Willie Frazer, in a planned protest by a group of about 150 loyalists due to take place outside Leinster House on Saturday next, will be asking for the Tricolour to be taken down.

Prof Geoffrey Roberts’s review (Dec 29) of Bernard Kelly’s new book on the role of Irish volunteers who fought for the Allies in World War II points to the pardon in 2012 for Irish army deserters.

The Irish Medicines Board is now in the business of banning widespread amounts of medicines and herbal remedies off our pharmacy and supermarket shelves that have been sold for decades without any problems.

With much fanfare the Gathering has been launched in 2013.