00119978Eamon Gilmore TD with Fionnuala Sheehan, Chief Executive of drinkaware.ie

norrisp

Senator David Norris raised the appointment of Fionnaula Sheehan, Chief Executive of drinkaware.ie and chairperson of MEAS to the board of RTÉ.

According to the latest issue of The Phoenix, the Oireachtas Communications committee met in secret in July to propose and endorse nominees to the RTÉ Board. A working group was set up to process expressions of interest for the RTÉ board and it too met in secret. The Phoenix reveals the Oireachtas members in the working group.

With The Phoenix in hand, the Senator called for Minister Alex White to reject her nomination.

We’ll drink to that.

Previously: No Black Stuff Need Apply

File pic: Sasko Lazarov/Photocall Ireland

Defiant tricolour!

Anyone?

Thanks AuroraBorealice

90093094siteserv

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9Zhs_e8ts8

“Minister, there would be some unease about the fact that Denis O’Brien’s close political links may have been instrumental in his bid to buy Siteserv, the company that won the State contract to install water meters for Irish Water.

“I think the idea that powerful businessmen with close ties to the establishment still end up profiteering from decisions made by governments or semi-State bodies must be a worry for this Government as you promised that things would be different.”

“The very nature by which this gentleman ended up in possession of Siteserv is very questionable. He did a deal with IBRC where €100m of debt that Siteserv owed to IBRC, which was really the taxpayer, was wiped off….”

“…two higher bids for the company that would have earned the State more money were rejected and a former Fine Gael minister [Alan Dukes] was chairman of IBRC at the time the deal was approved”.

Independent TD Mick Wallace in the Dáil under privilege (*blows raspberry*) today.

“I think that is a very worrying set of assertions as opposed to a question…That politicisation of the public procurement system would be quite improper and unlawful … Bluntly, considering the deputy’s position, I am surprised at some of the assertions he has made.”

Minister Brendan Howlin responding.

Wallace says O’Brien’s Siteserv bid ‘questionable’ (RTÉ)

Previously: Denis O’Brien and That Siteserv Deal

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Irish Water’s Elizabeth Arnett

“All of the costs in terms of staff costs in Irish Water are included in the costs that have been approved by the Regulator. The structure whereby you would be holding back some of that salary and some of that wage and performance-linking, linking that to performance is the structure that we’re in and as I said that is government approved but I can certainly understand why people would get upset if they thought this was, you know, back to the bonus culture and I can assure it’s not…. I’m not telling porkies, I’m telling it as it is.”

Elizabeth Arnett, spokesperson for irish Water on RTÉ’s Today with Sean O’Rourke on Tuesday.

I”m Not Telling Porky Pies (Broadsheet, October 7)

Meanwhile, today…

“in a statement the Commission for Energy Regulation (CER) said no staff bonus amounts were reviewed or approved by it.The CER said whether or not Irish Water paid bonuses was a matter for the utility company, rather than the regulator. It clarified that it reviews and sets the total level of costs that can be recovered by Irish Water across all its key activities.”

Regulator: We had no role in setting Irish Water ‘bonuses’ (Independent.ie)

Oh.

thomasdavis

Finally.

A new stamp to celebrate the bicentenary of Thomas Davis, a founder of the Young Ireland Movement (and according to wikipedia a “professional juggler’ by the age of 13)

An Post writes:

“The 68c stamp, designed by Irish design agency Conor & David [Conor Nolan and David Wall], features an engraving of Thomas Davis taken from the book Memoirs of an Irish Patriot by Charles Gavan Duffy (in the National Library of Ireland).”

FIGHT!

Available here

Update:

cat

Professor De Selby writes:

“Along with this commemorative stamp, and in keeping with their attempts to appeal to the youth of today the Philatetic Advisory Committe have decided, based in no small way on the wild success of their ‘Cats of the Internet’ series, to run a sister stamp which features an engraving of Thomas Davis’ feline companion: Cát Davis, who is credited with inspiring the lyrics to Davis’ famous poem ‘A Nation Once Again’ whilst passing an abnormally large hairball”

1010_knotenpunkt_3 Bleicher_1010_Knotenpunkt 1010-knotepunkt-1 1010-knotenpunkt-14-01-1
A 3D-effect trompe l’oeil on the wall of a Hamburg apartment block by German artist 1010 that appears composed of coloured layers excised into the building.

It may also resemble another thing.

streetartnews

Broadsheet.ie