RITA CHILDERS, the wife of former president Erskine Childers, who herself came close to being Ireland’s first female president, has died peacefully at the age of 95.

FORMER government minister Ivor Callely got a “parachute payment” of €31,754 after stepping down from his job for accepting a free perk, it was revealed yesterday.

HAVING written full-length biographies of both Charlie Haughey and Jack Lynch, I was particularly interested in Frank Dunlop’s book, Yes, Taoiseach.

RETIRED judges, including controversial former Supreme Court judge Hugh O’Flaherty, received pensions worth £2.7m last year.