Many councillors said they now felt a naming and shaming policy was the only way they were going to stamp out the problem which is blighting many towns and villages in the county.

Residents of a new "factory-built" housing estate say they can not believe how quickly their homes were built.

The worst offenders were properties in Limerick City and County Council, Galway County Council and Louth County Council.

The Dundalk-based, 48,000 square metres site is set to become the world’s largest single-use biologics manufacturing facility.

An €8m, 12,000-capacity stadium is to be built close to Dundalk IT.

Revenue officers discovered two separate oil laundering plants in Co Louth after a search on Friday.

Internal correspondence shows confusion over the categorising of people living in emergency accommodation in five areas, and how in some cases incorrect tallies of homeless people were down to miscalculations and omissions.

The Housing Minister has been urged to apologise after being accused of deliberately manipulating the latest homelessness figures.

Louth County Council is leading the way in reusing empty buildings for social housing and other local authorities should follow their example, Fr Peter McVerry has urged.

A former Fine Gael senator and one-time general election candidate has been appointed to an €80,000 a year role as adviser to Taoiseach Leo Varadkar in a move that will put further scrutiny on his government’s PR and adviser spend.

Irish Water has warned that repairs to a burst main that has left thousands of people without water for several days are proving "challenging".

The country’s rental market watchdog has seen a spike in cases of landlords wrongly trying to drive through rent hikes in anticipation of capped rates rolling out in areas under new government measures.

Cross-border fuel laundering is in steep decline, with new figures from Revenue showing a huge drop in incidents, and local authorities reporting a sharp fall in the number of cases of toxic sludge by-product being discovered.

Louth County Council believes it is the first local authority in Ireland to buy up abandoned privately-owned houses that were attracting anti-social behaviour and instead use them for social housing.

Two men have been arrested during evictions from an illegal halting site in Dundalk.

The Ireland Energy Efficiency Fund (IEEF) has landed an €8.5m investment as it moves further towards being fully invested by the end of 2016.

Gardaí were injured when they were confronted by a dangerous dog and a man armed with a knife during a drugs search in Co Louth yesterday.

Just 10% of the funding earmarked to help business transition to renewable energy has been invested in the last 12 months.

The Mayor of Drogheda, who became Fine Gael's first high-profile resignation over the water charges, has said he will still pay his water bill.

The Mayor of Drogheda has announced that he is to resign from Fine Gael in protest at the Government's handling of the water charges controversy.

Four teenage girls remain in hospital for treatment to burns caused when spray from an aerosol can ignited, and caused an explosion on Sunday afternoon.

An early flurry of electoral successes in Dublin prompted talk of green shoots for the Green Party but the countrywide count cautioned that careful cultivation would be required.

Village Magazine and its editor, barrister Michael Smith, have apologised in court to Green Party councillor Mark Dearey for remarks it made about him in a planning “corruption special” last year.

Local authorities along the border are counting the cost of the worst year yet for cleaning up toxic sludge left behind by illegal fuel laundering.

Plans for a cross-border bridge at the site of one of the worst atrocities of the Troubles have been dealt another blow after funding from Europe was pulled.

A number of cattle carcasses have been found near the border in Co. Louth.

Some county councils have lost a third of their staff since the start of the recession, as figures show staffing levels across local authorities have fallen by almost 25% over the past five years.

Cork City Council has emerged as the best resourced local authority on a per capita basis of all 34 county and city councils in the Republic.

Irish planning authorities have given the go-ahead for a new bridge to be built at Narrow Water between Co Louth and Co Down.

Cash-strapped local authorities are facing growing bills to clean up toxic sludge created by illegal fuel laundering.

The amalgamation of Limerick City and County Councils in 2014 is likely to result in staff reductions of about 20% in the first radical overhaul of local authorities in the country.

THE cost to the taxpayer of cleaning up the toxic sludge left by diesel laundering will reach nearly €1 million for 2011 in one county alone.

DOZENS of school building projects needed to help match demand with the recent baby boom could be delivered faster after being handed over to Vocational Education Committees (VECs).

“WE were perfect for each other,” said heartbroken Sean Kennedy last night as he tried to come to terms with the death in a road crash yesterday of his wife Emily Maguire.

A MAJOR illegal fuel laundering plant has been uncovered hidden among bales of straw in a farm shed.

A major illegal fuel laundering plant has been uncovered hidden among bales of straw in a farm shed.

THIRTEEN recently elected members of the Seanad are to share a windfall of almost €440,000.

Cork County Council and Dublin City Council are the big spenders, but the overall cost has been reduced, writes Orla Walsh.

THE developers of Altitude Resort — a €430 million all-weather ski slope and nursery slopes development planned for the north-east — expect to have the first phase open by the end of next year.

Engineers are targeting 2,600 homes still without any water in the North.

More than 60,000 homes face a night without water in the North as engineers temporarily cut off supplies to allow depleted reservoirs to refill.