The Greens ascended onto Planet Bertie — a location that Gormley had said they would never inhabit — and breathed deeply of the noxious air. The Greens were brought in as lobby fodder... and to provide cover for the dirty work of introducing enforced recycling, carbon taxes and water metering

More men than women have lost their jobs during the downturn, particularly in the construction sector – and please let no one pretend that working on the sites in all weathers is somehow easier than cleaning the Dáil, especially when men are more likely to lose their lives at work and have lower life expectancy

IT seems Craig Barrett might be the man to give us a state of the nation address.

The car is going to be the next battleground, and with good reason. The car is an enclosed space, even with the windows open, and the dangers (as well as unpleasantness) posed by second-hand smoke are obvious to most... it is still not uncommon to see adults smoking while children (or others) are in their company

Should we follow the American model of requiring the president to sit regular medical tests and of releasing the results? The BBC’s Jeremy Paxman was vilified in 2002 for asking Charles Kennedy on Newsnight what were pertinent questions about his drinking

The predictions are subjective and, it could be said, designed to suit whatever side of the argument people were paid to be on. Some of those making them had been correct before and others wrong, but as the ads say, past performance is no indicator of future performance

This talk that the institution of marriage would be somehow devalued by making it available to gay people is ridiculous. Surely the value of a heterosexual couple’s marriage is defined by the effort and commitment that they put into it rather than by the mere fact of their being married?

This is going to be a big problem for customers, both personal and business, of many of the other foreign-owned banks, especially if they abandoned AIB and Bank of Ireland for seemingly better deals and now have to go back to their original bankers, tails between their legs. Will they be entertained?

U2 TAKE to the stage in Croke Park tonight basking in some good publicity arising from Monday’s announcement of its provision of €5 million towards the musical education of some of the nation’s children.

The ability of the system to cope with a large-scale outbreak of swine flu must be in serious doubt given the problems it has in coping with demand for normal health services. Doctors and nurses will be put under severe stress to cope and will have to protect themselves from contracting the illness as well, not just for their own sake but so they don’t spread it further.