As we approach Christmas and the celebrations to mark it, it is worth giving some consideration to what is done to ensure that people without a home are given the supports and services they deserve.

Michael Clifford has surely done for us all now (Opinion, Dec 15).

On a weekend of Heineken hell, all four Irish provinces were defeated in the Heineken Cup.

I must congratulate the Labour Party, especially Eamon Gilmore and Kathleen Lynch, in the Dáil: they have put many more people in poverty and on the breadline.

Why is there not a stop put to all overseas aid and the money diverted for use in alleviating poverty in Ireland?

We heard recently that one million people watched the final violent episode of a violent series on TV.

As we approach the end of 2012, I doubt too many people will shed a tear — as mass unemployment leads to our villages, towns and countryside losing our youth in their thousands to far away shores.

Despite acknowledging that the digging out of foxes and the use of terriers to attack them is “unacceptable“, Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney has so far refused to outlaw these most abhorrent acts.

Was there anything honest, decent or uplifting in Budget 2013?

There is no doubt that we in Ireland had, and continue to have, troubles of our own that we have to focus on and set to right, but right now we cannot but feel for the trouble that our friends in the US have to contend with inside their own borders, i.e being held hostage to the dubious and anachronistic notion arising from the 2nd Amendment to their constitution — the right of the populace to bear arms.