IF YOU accept that we need a sound banking system you will have to acknowledge that the banks have an extraordinarily strong hand when negotiating with the Government no matter how dire the circumstances.

BRIAN LENIHAN may be planning to cancel Christmas when he dons his Scrooge suit next week, but the country that brought us the credit crunch is still insisting we at least fantasise about bulging stockings.

CHILDREN have only started back at school, but Christmas, it seems, is just around the corner.

MICHAEL McDowell will be sniggering into his memoirs.

THE Government’s timetable for reopening the Cork-Midleton railway line was called into question again last night when a TD claimed the start-up date would be later than previously announced.

Two big Irish films are set for action in the coming months.