Turf deal ‘better than giving €9m a year to Europe’

Arts, Heritage, and the Gaeltacht is sometimes dismissed as an irrelevance, the least significant of the government departments.

Try telling that to Jimmy Deenihan, who as minister with the portfolio has responsibility for one of the more divisive issues facing the Coalition: The ban on turf-cutting on some of the country’s bogs.

For the last three weeks, turf-cutters have staged protests outside Mr Deenihan’s constituency office in Listowel, Co Kerry.