Gonzaga College 41

Cistercian College, Roscrea will face Gonzaga College in the quarter-finals of the Leinster Schools’ Senior Cup, following their narrow victories over CBC Monkstown and Castleknock College yesterday.

Politicians of all hues paid their respects to Albert the peacemaker as thousands gathered to say their final goodbye to the former taoiseach.

Tomorrow is the 30th anniversary of Charlie McCreevy’s sensational motion to oust the then taoiseach Charles Haughey. Ryle Dwyer examines the traumatic events

HOUSE prices attracted headlines in 1980 but the concern at that time was the scarcity rather than glut of available properties.

FIANNA FÁIL rank and file complained to then taoiseach Charles Haughey about rogue developers — who were known party backers — abandoning unfinished housing estates.

ALBERT Reynolds has accused Bertie Ahern of shafting him in the 1997 presidential race.

The story about Albert Reynolds believing that Bertie Ahern shafted him in relation to the Fianna Fáil nominations for the presidency has long been doing the rounds in political circles, but Mr Reynolds has now confirmed it in his memoirs.

THE controversy over military flights in Irish airspace, which became a major issue in efforts to oust Jack Lynch as taoiseach in 1979, were raised in a number of state files.

HE HAD a tight grip on all aspects of his nation’s life but Romanian diplomats were anxious that their president Nicolae Ceausescu would not be outdone by rival communist leader Marshall Tito during a 90-minute stopover in Shannon during April, 1978.

AGAINST the backdrop of the forthcoming inauguration of Barrack Obama as the first African-American president of the US, the controversy over South Africa’s participation in the World Cup of Golf at Waterville in July 1978 is a reminder of how much things have changed in 30 years.

THE Refugee Appeals Tribunal is to maintain its policy of secrecy around the way it handles cases despite internal disagreement over the way it has operated.

SENATOR George S McGovern is probably best remembered as the Democrat Party’s nominee defeated by Richard Nixon in the US presidential election of 1972, but the tactics used, especially in the Watergate building, led to Nixon’s resignation less than two years later.

BERTIE AHERN has not yet named the ‘temporary’ senators who will replace the four Taoiseach’s nominees in the outgoing Seanad who have been elected to the Dáil.

I WAS very privileged to be invited to attend the first official commemoration ceremony for all Irishmen who died in the Battle of the Somme and throughout World War I.

THOUSANDS of children in foster care cannot be legally adopted and are denied a chance of enjoying a “second family” because they have no specific rights of their own, it emerged yesterday.

The Minister for Social and Family Affairs Seamus Brennan has called for support services and family law courts to be more sensitive towards the rights of fathers, it emerged today.

RETIRED Fianna Fáil Minister Michael O’Kennedy yesterday became the first former Government minister to receive an honour from the English monarchy, for his work forging links between Irish and British parliaments.

FORMER Fianna Fáil Ministers Michael O’Kennedy and David Andrews have been paid €101,000 and €74,000 respectively to decide upon asylum seekers’ appeals for refugee status.

THE funeral Mass of Archbishop Michael Courtney, the murdered papal nuncio to the central African state of Burundi, takes place in his home town of Nenagh, Co Tipperary, today.

SUPPORTING and strengthening the family in the face of mounting pressures, such as divorce, is one of the Government's key objectives, Minister for Social and Family Affairs Mary Coughlan said yesterday.

Labour Leader, Ruairi Quinn, says a restructuring of the health boards may be necessary.

The Labour Party leader Ruairi Quinn is visiting constituencies in Tipperary, Kilkenny and Carlow today to bolster support for his local colleagues.

Many of the three-seater constituencies are expected to provide fierce battles in the upcoming election and many pundits will be closely watching developments in Tipperary north.

British plans to commission the mixed oxide (MOX) facility at the Sellafield nuclear waste reprocessing facility in Cumbria were today claimed to have the potential for souring Anglo-Irish relations.