Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin has said that Taoiseach Leo Varadkar admitted to him that he wasn’t confident of the vote of some members of Fine Gael.

The Green Party is celebrating its first ever by-election victory in Dublin-Fingal after Joe O'Brien secured the seat vacated by Clare Daly after the eighth count.

Fine Gael's James Reilly has described Verona Murphy's comments about migrants as “very hurtful” and said he rejected them totally.

Mr Varadkar travelled to Wexford yesterday where he spent around 40 minutes meeting locals with the Fine Gael candidate.

The growing pains of this vibrant and bustling constituency are clear for all to see.

A Fianna Fáil councillor has expressed shock at being the subject of a complaint to the Workplace Relations Commission over an alleged incident with an anti-abortion campaigner at a pipe band contest in Dublin last year.

The Taoiseach has spoken to a Fine Gael byelection candidate over a leaflet she sent expressing 'delight' that plans for Traveller accommodation had been scrapped in her area.

The race to fill the seat vacated by Independents4Change TD Clare Daly in Dublin-Fingal on Friday, November 29 is shaping up to be a two-horse race.

Fianna Fáil senator and Fingal by-election candidate Lorraine Clifford-Lee will not be disciplined or demoted for tweets she posted before she entered politics, the party has said.

Concerns that Waterford University Hospital is being left behind within the wider group are widespread, hears Catherine Shanahan.

There is a call for Ireland to ban flavoured vapes - to stop children taking up the habit.

A man has been refused bail after he was charged with “viciously attacking” a 93-year-old pensioner who suffered knife wounds at his Co. Louth home at the weekend.

The case has been adjourned pending a bail hearing later this afternoon.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has signalled to a meeting of his Fine Gael ministers that he would prefer the upcoming by-elections to be held in November, even if his party is unlikely to win any of them.

The head of the new board of the HSE says “the challenge” will be to ensure they deliver the best healthcare for the money available.

The National Maternity Hospital is building a multimillion-euro extension, despite preparations to move it to a new location

A government ministerial driver who served in his post for six years has failed in his claim that a government department breached workplace legislation concerning his role.

THE Department of Health is an out-of-control monster that could “destroy” this Government.

Fianna Fáil leader Micheal Martin has insisted he is not trying to block any of his front-line TDs from running in the European elections amid a flurry of rumours over the future of his most experienced colleagues.

All Fine Gael members selected to run in the next general election will gather today, adding to speculation that Leo Varadkar is preparing to go to the country.

Being handed a diagnosis of lethal cancer together with the promise that it will radically shorten your life rarely provokes — in the person hearing the deadly prognosis — the desire to be funny.

The Government has been accused of “callous inertia” for the slow rate of progress in implementing its health reform programme, Sláintecare, as 707,000 patients remain on hospital waiting lists.

A full trawl of hundreds of thousands of records, rather than a sample exercise, is needed to establish the facts in the illegal adoptions scandal, says Independents4-Change TD Clare Daly.

It is three weeks today since the judgment in the Vicky Phelan case sparked off the CervicalCheck scandal. Sadly, because of the seriousness of the issues, there is scaremongering about the safety of the cervical screening programme.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has claimed the return of the HSE board will ensure a new era of health service accountability — despite opposition warnings that no service “on the planet” could cope with the constant changes to the system.

Those bubbles might once have been sound bites, now they are the foam formed by a minister gulping for air, writes Gerard Howlin

All former health ministers stretching back over the last 15 years could be hauled before a cross-party Oireachtas committee to answer questions on the cervical cancer tests scandal.

A proposal to ban smoking in outdoor areas where food is served will ‘denormalise’ the use of cigarettes, former health minister, James Reilly, has said.

A man sustained fatal head injuries after he was struck on the head by the branch of a falling tree.

Adoption campaigners have queried why the Mother and Baby Homes Commission has taken three years to issue a public call for information relating to the burials of children who died at the Bessborough home.

New hospitals and up to 9,000 beds are needed to reduce overcrowding and waiting lists, according to the Government's bed capacity review.

The cheer that raised the rafters of Triskel Christchurch at 2.26pm yesterday was spontaneous and effortless, unlike the painstaking effort it took to get there in the first place.

A committee to evaluate drugs for rare diseases has yet to be set up three years after a Government report recommended its establishment.

The Taoiseach has confirmed that the Government has abandoned plans to scrap the HSE board and is now drafting legislation to re-establish it.

They must be worried, says Daniel McConnell. The booze companies I mean

Fine Gael senators have warned that the introduction of minimum alcohol pricing will see job losses and floods of shoppers crossing the border if changes are not enacted in the North at the same time.

LATEST: The Seanad is tonight debating amendments to the Public Health Alcohol Bill - which seeks to introduce a minimum price for alcohol.

Schools that receive funds to feed students will be barred from serving meals that are high in sugar, salt, and fat under new rules to be announced today.

Leo Varadkar has received a list of demands from opposition leaders on his first day as Taoiseach with warnings that, if they are not met, there will be calls for a general election.

INTENTIONAL or not, the Fine Gael leadership contest has been a PR masterstroke, writes, Political Reporter Elaine Loughlin.

James Reilly, the former health minister, says a national strategy to support people with autism and their families is “desperately needed”.

As Enda Kenny announces his retirement he says he is 'honoured and privileged' to have served as leader since 2002. Now, Ministers Simon Coveney and Leo Varadkar are set to declare candidacy for the now vacant position of Fine Gael leader and Taoiseach.

Our mixed bag of State and charitable services has been criticised but it is typical, writes Victoria White