Category Archives: News

news as it is happening-ish

Guess we know who that “unnamed Irish official” official is now.

CENTRAL BANK governor Patrick Honohan is expected to raise the possibility of delaying a cash payment of €3.1 billion to the former Anglo Irish Bank on March 31st and suggest alternatives at the meeting of European Central Bank decision-makers today.

Options being considered to delay the cash payment include a payment-in-kind by way of a Government bond or another promissory note until a long-term restructuring of the notes is concluded.

Notes for notes. Totes not notes for votes.

We’ll get our cotes.

State to seek delay on €3.1bn cash payment due over Anglo (Simon Carswell and Stephen Collins, Irish Times)

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No, not like that.

DUBLIN’S PRINCIPAL shopping street, Grafton Street, is to be repaved in grey and pink granite by Dublin City Council at a cost of approximately €2.5 million.
The work, which will see the surface of the entire street dug up and the existing red-brick paving removed, is expected to take about a year to complete. It is due to get under way next January.

The council says the Eurobrick paving, which was laid on the pedestrianised street in the mid- 1980s, has deteriorated badly to the point where it requires repair on an almost daily basis.

Grafton St repaving in pink and grey to cost €2.5m (Irish Times)

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On Friday, the IMF hinted at a possible debt reduction for Ireland. The Minister For Social Protection took the ball and ran with it.

Another sporting analogy, anyone?

JOAN BURTON’S linking of better terms for Ireland’s bank debt with the fiscal treaty referendum is causing problems for the Government’s campaign, her Labour colleagues have claimed.

Labour Ministers are angry over remarks Ms Burton made in recent days. The Minister for Social Protection has twice linked a reduction in Ireland’s bank debt burden to support for the Yes side.

However, Government sources yesterday told The Irish Times while they are confident a deal reducing the debt will be reached, it is unlikely to be finalised before the vote.
“Joan has deliberately created unnecessary difficulties for the Government and you would have to wonder what game she is playing,” said one senior Labour Party figure.

That’ll do nicely.

Previously: Ireland’s Shoulder Angels

Burton intervention on treaty provokes Labour fury (Irish Times)

(Photocall Ireland)

THE GOVERNMENT has moved to quash suggestions from within Cabinet that Europe should cut the cost of Ireland’s bank debt burden to boost support for the fiscal treaty referendum.

The Taoiseach, Tánaiste and Minister for Finance moved swiftly yesterday to declare that there should be no link between the referendum and the Government’s drive to ease the terms of the Anglo bailout.

They were responding to remarks by Minister for Social Protection Joan Burton in which she said a move to restructure the expensive IOUs used to recapitalise Anglo would aid the referendum campaign.

“These are entirely separate matters, in other words, the Irish people are not going to be bribed by anybody,” Mr Kenny told reporters in Brussels.

Yes, quite right.

Wait. What? No! Tell us more about the bribes!

Coalition rejects seeking Anglo concession to secure Yes vote (Irish Times)


God bless ’em.

ALMOST A quarter of pupils attending Protestant primary schools are from Roman Catholic backgrounds, a survey has found.

The research showed that pupils attending Protestant schools are from a wide variety of religious backgrounds, with just over a third (38 per cent) from the main Protestant groupings.

Parents of “no religion” made up 7.4 per cent of those surveyed, 20 per cent came from unspecified Christian backgrounds, while 5.6 per cent came from other Protestant groups such as Pentecostalists.

Almost 25% of Pupils Attending Protestant Schools Are Catholic (Irish Times)

Screengrab: Oxford Dictionary Online

On foot of the Food Safety Authority’s See Something, Say Something campaign, launched last year, this just in:

In total, there were 966 complaints about unfit food, 497 complaints about suspected food poisoning, 446 about hygiene standards, 137 about incorrect information on food labels, 37 about incorrect advertising and 332 other complaints.

The authority said contamination with foreign objects was “frequently” reported by consumers last year.
“In 2011, these reports included food contaminated with live and dead insects; a tooth; a false nail; pieces of metal; plastic rubber tubing; and a plaster,” the authority said.

Specific incidents included a report of a small dead rodent in a bag of bananas, and a bolt “complete with nut and washer” in meatballs.

Consumers also reported concerns about food being sold past its ‘best-before’ date, where no information was displayed at the point of sale.

Food Complaints Include ‘Dead Rodent’ (Irish Times)

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Seán Quinn appeared at the Commercial Court yesterday seeking permission to defend claims that he has some liability for €2.34 billion loaned to various Quinn companies by Anglo:

When the judge said the bank disputed whether he could appear, Mr Quinn said: “I don’t know, judge, the way I see it, Anglo joined me, I filed a defence and I want to stand over it.”

The judge said an interesting legal issue arose whether Mr Quinn could do so. The judge fixed Mr Quinn’s application for hearing on March 15th and directed the relevant legal documents be served at his address in Co Cavan. When Mr Quinn said he was “not big into emails”, the judge directed the documents could be served by ordinary post.

When the judge asked Mr Quinn how long he required to prepare for the hearing on his entitlement to defend, the latter said a week to 10 days would be adequate. “I’m a simple farmer’s son,” he said, to which the judge said: “I’m a simple man myself”.

In the distance, a chicken coughed.

Quinn seeks to stand over his defence (Irish Times)

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MORE THAN 100,000 domestic customers of Electric Ireland have begun receiving higher electricity bills – because they are not using enough electricity.

A new “low user standing charge” was introduced by the ESB-controlled supplier with effect from February 1st, targeting customers who “use an average of 2 units (2 kWhs) or less per day in any billing period”.

Households not using enough electricity are seeing their bills increase by 15.5 cent a day, or €9.45 per two-monthly bill, or €56.70 per year.

Domestic customers have been informed of the increase in bill inserts, in some cases by letter, in the past fortnight.

Terms and conditions apply. Don’t they just, though?

Over 100,000 Face Higher Bills For Not Using Enough Electricity (Irish Times)

RISING unemployment in Europe has driven an influx of Irish and British skilled migrants to labour-strapped pockets of the Australian economy in recent months, government figures show.

But skilled migration from Greece, where unemployment topped 20 per cent in November, remains low as Australian recruiters target already strong labour streams from the British Isles.

The Perth offices of one of the largest global recruiters has noted a surge in Irish and British citizens on temporary visas seeking employer sponsorship. The company’s counterparts on the east coast have reported only a small rise.

”Unfortunately for Victoria we do not have the luxury of mines, we don’t have a resources boom,” said Hays Victoria senior regional director Tim James.’

Helped by campaigns to attract Irish and UK workers, the Hays Perth reception desk felt as if it had ”half of Dublin in it on a Friday afternoon”, said WA senior regional director Simon Winfield.

Irish and British head for Australian jobs, but where are the Greeks? (The Age)

Coming soon: Galway Alberta and Cork, British Columbia.

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(Hat Tip: Mark Geary)

Speaking at the launch of the new Pathways To Work initiative yesterday:

Mr Kenny said the plan was about ensuring that when economic recovery came, those who lost their jobs in the recession were not left behind.

The aim is to get 75,000 long-term unemployed people back into the workforce by the end of 2015. Listing areas in which there are job opportunities, including IT, the meat industry and fishing, the Taoiseach warned: “In the 1990s we had a culture where there was an assumption that particular kinds of employment were off limits to Irish people, but that shouldn’t be so in the future.”

He cited the example of a nursing-home owner who told him she interviewed 24 Irish women for four jobs but none would accept the work at a rate of €10.50 an hour. As a result, the employer said she would be hiring four Polish women.

Polish women.

Can’t be having that.

Taoiseach says jobless must be ready to take up any work (Irish Times)

(Photocall Ireland)