The High Court case taken by businessman Denis O’Brien against TDs will be “absolutely” and vigorously defended, the new chairman of the Dáil Ceann Comhairle Seán Ó Fearghaíl, has said.

Adverserial politics should be replaced by European model of multi-member coalitions and oppositions that contribute to policy, say Muiris MacCarthaigh and Mary C Murphy.

It is an essential public interest that the proceedings of the Oireachtas are reported, writes Gerard Howlin

New sanctions are unlikely to be introduced for unruly TDs after an Oireachtas committee criticised Sinn Féin’s Mary Lou McDonald for abusing Dáil privilege.

The Ceann Comhairle says he intends to complete his term in office.

Lawyers providing expert advice to the Oireachtas banking inquiry have been charging the inquiry a whopping €264 per hour.

Private debt collectors are to be employed on an “ongoing basis” to chase up unpaid Dáil bar tabs running into tens of thousands of euro.

The Oireachtas has been told to overhaul its ethics rules and tighten up the travel expenses regime for politicians following a Supreme Court ruling against a former Fianna Fáil senator.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny has warned there will be no reform of the Seanad if the public votes to keep it.

AS the days count down to a historic vote on changing our Constitution, most voters will be unaware that if senators are let go, so to speak, they are entitled to bumper pay offs.

Fine Gael referendum director Richard Bruton has said he will engage in a television debate with no campaigners on the future of the Seanad after Taoiseach Enda Kenny rejected calls for a head-to-head discussion.

The director of Fine Gael's campaign to abolish the Seanad insists the public will save €20m a year by voting Yes.

It was vicious to watch. Two elderly tramps taunt and attack each other.

Clashes have been sparked by Government claims on how much shutting down the Seanad will save taxpayers.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny said that recent incidents of sexism in Leinster House were totally “unacceptable” and that remarks by senator David Norris were “absolutely disgraceful”.

The Taoiseach is defending the Government’s estimate on possible savings to be achieved by the abolition of the Seanad.

Television coverage of the Houses of the Oireachtas is set to get a facelift with nearly €500,000 being spent this year on efforts to improve broadcasting from the parliament.

The Revenue Commissioners have completed a full audit — the first of its kind — of the Houses of the Oireachtas, including checks on payments for elected members.

Expenses and allowances for TDs, senators, and ministers will be scrutinised next week when the heads of the Oireachtas come before the Dáil’s financial watchdog committee.

Payments for party whips and committee chairs will remain unchanged despite an overhaul in Oireachtas allowances due in autumn.

Tablet PCs are going to be handed out to TDs and Senators later this year, it has emerged.

A number of politicians may be forced to pay back expenses they claimed for campaigning outside of their constituencies, after the Oireachtas said allowances for such work were never envisaged under the rules.

Left-wing politicians funding nationwide travel to fight the €100 Household Charge under special Dáil allowances have been breaking the rules, it has been confirmed.

Oireachtas authorities have still not determined whether Sinn Féin’s Pearse Doherty must pay back €8,000 in travel expenses which he said was being put towards a new car.

Sinn Féin headquarters has refused to divulge whether or not it monitors the bank accounts of its TDs through local finance officers to ensure they only claim the average industrial wage.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny wants a cross-party Oireachtas committee established to monitor RTÉ.

The suggestion by Minister Joe Costello that the approval of the electorate in a referendum would be sufficient to stop the payment of pensions and allowances to those against whom adverse findings have been made by the Mahon Tribunal reports is worthy of serious consideration as an unambiguous component of reform.

A top-level probe into how a Sinn Féin TD managed to leave taxpayers with a €50,000 bill for ink cartridges in two years was demanded last night.

THERE were calls for an inquiry into who abused the Leinster House phone facilities to help the son of a TD win a celebrity television show.

PRESSURE mounted on independent TD Michael Healy-Rae to pay back the costs of thousands of phone calls made from inside Dáil Éireann that helped him win a TV reality show.

The Seanad committee investigating Senator Ivor Callely's expenses claims will meet again today. It will also discuss expenses queries in relation to three other senators.

REPORTS that Senator Ivor Callely has been paid more than €80,000 since 2007 in respect of travel expenses from an address in west Cork to Leinster House is a further example of the greedy behaviour that vexes voters so intensely that it cost Peter Robinson and many other outgoing MPs their parliamentary seats in the recent British general election.

SEVENTEEN TDs have each claimed more than €5,000 in expenses per month since the introduction of a new allowance system.

DETAILS of TDs’ expenses are still not being published despite a commitment by the Oireachtas to do so to ensure greater transparency.

THE RECENT summit of the entire cohort of Irish bishops, the Pope and senior members of the Roman Curia seems to have been little more than a self-serving display of pious political theatre based on a disjointed script played before an increasingly sceptical and despairing Irish public.

AT the moment, in addition to basic pay, TDs are entitled to a staggering array of allowances and expense payments.

FORMER Cork TD Barry Cogan has said the downturn in the economy scuppered any chance five retired politicians had of qualifying for its lucrative pension scheme.

FIVE former politicians experiencing “considerable hardship” have had pleas to allow them claim lucrative pension entitlements rejected by the Department of Finance.

Finance Minister Brian Lenihan has met the Oireachtas Commission to discuss the issue of expenses for TDs, Senators and government ministers.

OUSTED Ceann Comhairle John O’Donoghue resigned from office with a rousing and embittered speech attacking how the media and the Labour Party prompted his downfall.

LABOUR Party leader Eamon Gilmore has defended his push for the resignation of the Ceann Comhairle and rejected accusations the move was a political stunt.

THE trademark ruddiness of John O’Donoghue’s face must have deepened and contrasted ever more starkly with the pale pastel hues decorating the Georgian walls of his Leinster House fiefdom as he pleaded with Eamon Gilmore not to damn him into oblivion on the Dáil floor.