The Unite trade union will ballot crane operators over the coming days to extend industrial action, which started yesterday, to additional sites.

The Construction Industry Federation reacted angrily to yesterday’s crane strike that halted two major construction sites in Dublin.

PBC 11 Glenstal Abbey 3: Not even the torrential rain and the strong, cold and swirling wind at Thomond Park yesterday could dampen the delight of Presentation Brothers Cork as they defeated Glenstal Abbey by 11-3 to capture the Clayton Hotels Munster Schools Senior Cup for the 29th time.

Gardaí have taken the unusual step of visiting homes in the Irishtown area of South Mayo to reassure shocked locals that no third party was involved in the horrific deaths of an elderly couple and the serious assault on their son last week.

Gardaí investigating the deaths of an elderly couple in Mayo have said they are keeping an “open mind” as to what happened.

Investigations are continuing into the deaths of an elderly couple in County Mayo.

FAI chief John Delaney and Ireland team manager Martin O’Neill were among the mourners yesterday at the funeral Mass for Milo Corcoran, a former FAI president who leaves “many, many legacies”.

Tom Fitzgerald (Irish Examiner, Letters ) says if one believes in God one must believe in the Devil, an evil entity that causes human suffering.

Trade union Unite has today welcomed the decision by two of its members to descend from a tower crane they had been occupying at the JJ Rhatigan site at Kishoge Community College in Lucan, Co Dublin.

During his interview with Elber Twomey on 8/9/14 (Irish Examiner Sept 9), RTÉ’s Seán O’Rourke asked Elber “How could a loving God allow such a terrible thing to happen?” referring to the death of her husband and children due to a car crash. 

Two men staging a sit-in in a tower crane at the site of a Dublin community college in have said they are prepared to remain there and go on hunger strike until they are paid the money they claim is owed to them.

Two workers at a building site in Lucan Co Dublin have occupied a tower crane overnight, in protest at pay and conditions.

Four major school building projects have been examined this year for the Department of Education or by other state agencies over complaints about employment irregularities.

The Department of Education has been asked to beef up its monitoring of compliance with employment law and wage agreements as another school building project faces industrial action.

Final tallies from Killarney are in and the quota is likely to be 2,000.

A brother of former Fianna Fáil minister and ceann comhairle John O’Donoghue yesterday confirmed he will not be seeking re-election to Kerry County Council.

A brother of former Fianna Fáil cabinet minister John O’Donoghue is expected to step aside from the forthcoming local elections to make way for the return of the former minister to politics.

Recently, the Tánaiste was interviewed on The Week In Politics.

Bord na Móna has been accused of locking out workers, amid claims it has tried to impose unilateral changes to work practices at a base in the Midlands.

The Central Bank of Ireland has launched two collector coins to mark the 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s visit to Ireland.

It is now widely accepted that US president John F Kennedy would never have visited Limerick in 1963 were it not for the persistence of Mayor Frances Condell.

White House planners did not include Cork in the first draft itinerary they prepared for President Kennedy’s visit to Ireland.

Former Senator Tom Fitzgerald has passed away at the age of 74.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny won the hearts of the nation with his recent emotional apology to the survivors of the Magdalene laundries.

With respect to golfer Rory McIlroy’s predicament of having to decide whether to play for Ireland or Team Great Britain in the 2016 Olympic Games, there is a very simple solution to his problem.

With respect to the recent penalty points scandal, if there was any conscience or decency left anywhere in high office there is a way for the powers that be to save face and right the wrong that has been done to nobodys (ie people who know nobody in high places or aren’t famous).

Why should the proposed National Children’s Hospital be built in Dublin?

During the week beginning Jul 30, RTÉ’s Liveline highlighted the issue of attacks on the elderly and the fear in which our old people live of being robbed and assaulted in their homes by people looking for soft money for drug habits, etc.

During the Pat Kenny radio show on Jul 6, Minister for Agriculture Simon Coveney made an impressive case for farmers to be compensated for the impact that the wet summer is having on their livelihoods’ by bringing forward their EU payments.

WHY is our national broadcaster screening violence on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, the holiest and most peaceful days in the year?

ONE of the most thought-provoking items recently printed in an Irish newspaper was that of Sean McCarthaigh, in the Irish Examiner on October 11, 2011.

One rule today, I say to myself again. No judgments. My first coursing meeting will be all about the occasion. Rights and wrongs for another day.

A tradesman is to lead a protest from Co Limerick to the Green Party headquarters in Dublin this Monday over a controversial new vehicle tax.

TOM FITZGERALD is a man with a van who feels he is being driven to break the law.

AS a sole-trading, single-man operation struggling to survive the recession, the issue of not being able to use my commercially taxed vehicle for private purposes is the straw that will break this particular donkey’s back.

IRISH Vintners’ Federation CEO Pádraig Cribben (Letters, September 1) did not address my point that the people who dispense alcohol in Ireland are not suitably qualified to do so because they do not hold a recognised pharmaceutical qualification (Letters, August 27) .

IN response to Tom Fitzgerald’s letter (August 27), headlined ‘Alcohol – a drug served by amateurs’, I wish, on behalf of the 4,500 publicans represented by the Vintners’ Federation of Ireland (VFI), to answer certain questions posed.

IF alcohol is a drug, why is it being dispensed by people who have no qualifications to dispense drugs? Is any member of the Vintners Federation of Ireland, staff at off-licences or in supermarkets suitably qualified to do so?

I WOULD like to see Dr Chris Luke of Cork University Hospital run for the Dáil. During the head shops controversy, he was outspoken in his efforts to inform people of the deadly effects of the products being peddled to our youth.

WITH regard to the opening of pubs on Good Friday, many people seem to think it’s time church and state practices should be separated.

BRITAIN, it seems, is drowning in a vale of tears. One after another, in the run-up to their general election, British politicians are lining up to emote in public. Never before have so many cried so easily, so openly and so often.

BEFORE any property is bailed out under NAMA every single politician – national and local – top bank officials, developers and their ilk should disclose their personal interest and financial involvement with land banks, property or any other holdings that have the potential to be refinanced by public money.