A NEWSPAPER asserting its human rights is, well, news. 

Senior Celtic Tiger cabinet members, including Bertie Ahern, Brian Cowen, and Mary Harney, are still receiving gold-plated ministerial pensions worth up to €80,000 a year, despite seven years of economic crisis.

The Supreme Court has reduced a €1.87m libel award to communications consultant Monica Leech to €1.25m.

One of the country’s busiest coast guard units will begin the move from a 150-year-old shed to a state-of-the-art €1.9m station today.

A businessman who received a lucrative 25-year contract to house Ireland’s ill-fated e-voting machines from a close relative in charge of deciding who won the tender has been given a €50,000 pay-off to cancel the deal.

JANUARY, from Janus, the Roman double-faced god facing in opposite directions, is here.

Former presidents, ministers, and judicial office holders cost the taxpayer €15.6m in pension and severance payments last year, according to figures released yesterday.

Microsoft is to host a careers event at its campus in Dublin today.

One of the world’s biggest companies is hosting a careers event in Dublin this month that will highlight Ireland’s skills shortages.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny claimed the Government has increased taxes on high earners as TDs blasted his unwillingness to tackle the “runaway, gilt-edged pensions” of former senior politicians.

Brian Cowen was paid more than €310,000 after stepping down as taoiseach last year.

So — after almost ten years and the wastage of over €55m of public monies — a curtain finally draws on the E voting machines fiasco (Irish Examiner, Jun 29).

Every vote counts, especially when they cost taxpayers over €55m.

The electronic voting machines are to be sold on for just over €70,000 and disposed.

Tony Carey beat Tony Dunlea by two bowls in the Munster veteran final at Kilcorney on Monday to set up an All-Ireland final meeting with Oliver Gribben, who retained his Ulster title on the same evening.

The High Court has heard that Public Relations consultant Monica Leech's relationship with her solicitors broke down in the wake of her €1.87m libel pay out from the Evening Herald.

THE Government may struggle to recover any of the €55m wasted on electronic voting machines, admitting they may end up being scrapped rather than sold.

Finance Minister Michael Noonan has said that there may be a market for the obsolete e-voting machines - in Irish theme pubs.

THEY say necessity is the mother of invention.

MORE than 30 former ministers are in receipt of pensions in excess of €100,000 a year.

ROSANNA DAVISON’S opinions are much valued in the media. Frequently, reporters ring the former Miss World seeking the benefit of her wisdom. When Michael Jackson died, she got calls asking her what she thought about it, how keenly she felt the loss.

EVENTS in Cardiff, Croke Park and Cheltenham may be uppermost in most minds this month but Irish sport claimed its most important victory of the year yesterday when it was retained at the cabinet table by the new Government.

GREATEST misnomer of the election was of any outright winner.

THE Labour Party has decided to run two candidates in Waterford for the first time in 42 years, despite the imminent retirement of one of its most experienced TDs.

THE last vestige of credibility evaporated from the Progressive Democrats from the moment Michael McDowell hoist the petard that the PDs were exiting government — only to subsequently change their minds.

THE then German ambassador to Ireland, Christian Pauls, made the mistake of laughing at our folly when addressing a group of German businessmen in Clontarf Castle more than three years ago, almost exactly a year before the banking crisis in the US became world news.

In court, a bruised ego is more valuable than a broken back, writes Dan Buckley

A FORMER mayor of Waterford has declared his intention to become the constituency’s first independent TD at the next election.

FINE GAEL has secured permission from the High Court to bring proceedings aimed at forcing the Government to hold by-elections in Dublin South and Waterford constituencies.

Fine Gael has been granted leave by the High Court to bring a legal challenge to the Government’s delay in calling the Waterford and Dublin by-elections.

Fine Gael is going to the High Court today to put pressure on the Government to call the Waterford and Dublin by-elections.

The Government is tonight facing two more potentially damaging court battles over delayed by-elections.

The long-awaited Donegal South West by-election will be held on Thursday November 25, it was revealed today.

The Government has offended the spirit of the Constitution by failing to hold the long-awaited Donegal South-West by-election, the High Court ruled today.

“THEY gave me nothing and I owe them nothing” was how Jim McDaid summed up his relationship with Fianna Fáil back in 2007, just after he regained his seat on the party’s ticket in Donegal North East.

SINCE Dáil Éireann was established in 1919 there have been 125 by-elections. All but 11 of those were held within six months of the vacancy occurring. But the current Dáil has three vacancies, two of which are already more than six months old and the third well over a year and heading for a record delay.

In the past it was generally assumed that by-elections should be held within six months of a Dáil seat being vacated.

Sinn Féin today accused the Government of running scared of voters and wasting taxpayers' money in a court fight to prevent the Donegal South West by-election.

The Government has indicated that voters in Donegal South-West, Dublin South and Waterford will go to the polls early next year.

THE National Roads Authority (NRA) is to spend €200,000 on signs to direct motorists to services in towns and cities in response to criticism over the lack of service stations and lay-bys on the country’s motorway network.

Former Minister Willie O’Dea has called on the Taoiseach to move the writs for byelections to fill the three vacant Dáil seats.