Editorial

Editorial: 'Lyra's legacy must be the spoils of peace she sought' 

Bullets have to "stop" somewhere, explained the PSNI's Mark Hamilton, pondering on how a gunman could randomly open fire in a crowded suburban street. The tragedy was that when they "stopped" so too did the rich life of gifted journalist Lyra McKee.

Editorial: 'Assembly impasse an insult to spirit of Good Friday deal' 

Today one of the most powerful women in the world will visit Stormont to honour the Good Friday Agreement.

Editorial: 'We owe forgotten babies the dignity of memory' 

One of the many lessons we have learned historically concerning scandals and the Catholic Church is that the cruellest lies are often told in silence. But what was kept secret or suppressed...

Editorial: 'Notre-Dame reminds us hope can rise from ashes' 

Hearts sank a little as the first images of orange flames licking over the roof of Notre-Dame emerged.

Editorial: 'Delaney was off the ball with lack of explanation' 

In the end it was what he didn't say that did for John Delaney.

Editorial: 'Brexit means early UK vote - but a delayed one here' 

Here's another one from the 'strange but true' Brexit department. The current impasse is likely to lead to a general election in the UK very soon. But in Ireland, the stalemate and uncertainty mean a...

Editorial: 'A Republic for the universal good' 

It is instructive to read the Dail Eireann second stage debates on the Republic of Ireland Bill, 1948, the 70th anniversary of the final passage of which is commemorated in this newspaper today.

Editorial: 'Credit due to Varadkar and Coveney for Brexit strategy' 

comedian Robin Williams liked to poke fun at people in power. He explained the word politics as: "Poli", a Latin word meaning "many", and "tics", meaning "bloodsucking creatures".

Editorial: 'Delay unlikely to help UK escape locked-in syndrome' 

If Brexit was open to product placement, the makers of Botox would be ideal sponsors. Nothing has accelerated the ageing process like it.

Editorial: 'FAI problems won't go away if Delaney avoids questions' 

John Delaney may not have ridden to the Dáil on a donkey with palms at his feet, but he did a fairly good impression of an improbable Messiah coming to save the Football Association of Ireland in its...

Editorial: 'EU has little choice but to grant Theresa May more time' 

Summat about nowt - or something about nothing - is a phrase you might hear in the world's longest-running soap opera, 'Coronation Street'.

Editorial: 'May and Corbyn can't play politics at a time like this' 

It has to be believed that when British Prime Minister Theresa May meets the French and German leaders today on the eve of the emergency European Council summit, she will not be...

Editorial: ''Cuckoo funds' could change our housing market forever' 

Ireland's housing crisis is hit by new problems every day. Today we learn big investors find housing more lucrative than their more usual resort of putting money into commercial or retail property.

Editorial: 'Government must function, not fudge' 

At one level, it is understandable that the tortured and still unresolved Brexit process has seemingly consumed the energy and imagination of the Government but, at another, the almost full...

Editorial: 'Hope now flickers on Brexit but there's still a way to go' 

Even the ceilings are weeping at Westminster as the news of a leak at the Mother of all Parliaments surprises none. Brexit would bring a tear to a glass eye, so whether it is lingering or abrupt, we...

Editorial: 'EU solidarity will be vital to protect hard-won peace' 

Anyone who has ever spent time around the courts will tell you in any marriage of more than a week old, there are grounds for divorce.

Editorial: 'May and Corbyn have final chance to do what is right' 

Finished as Tory leader and prime minister, and with all her other bridges smouldering behind her, Theresa May has "reached out".

Editorial: 'UK now senses disaster but it may be too little, too late' 

There is not a playwright living or dead who could have devised a drama to incite as much fury, exhaustion and resignation as Brexit.

Editorial: 'Westminster is a circus in search of a ringmaster' 

If Theresa May moved significantly in the past three years, it was from no longer being part of the problem to being the problem itself. Some 28 of her ministers are reported to be in open revolt,...

Editorial: 'A thundering disgrace and a minister who cannot stay' 

A thundering disgrace. The infamous language used by Defence Minister Paddy Donegan to describe President Cearbhall Ó Dalaigh certainly springs to mind.

Editorial: 'Climate change in Ireland and beyond' 

Politicians here last week published a cross-party consensus report for action on climate change. That report itself followed a Report of the Citizens' Assembly on climate change. There is any...

Editorial: 'Brexit comedy turns into gallows humour as border risk increases' 

Classic comedy fans are now running out of analogies to draw with Brexit.

Editorial: 'Mr Murphy, housing policy is the opposite of progress' 

At some point, Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy must stop banging his head against a brick wall hoping to turn it into a breakthrough for a door in his failed housing policy.

Editorial: 'Soft Brexit looks best bet as UK struggles to find solution' 

It says much about the downfall of Theresa May that the only real power she now has is to leverage her own resignation as an inducement to vote.

Editorial: 'Housing is a human right - not a financial commodity' 

As far back as the 19th century there has been a campaign to secure rights for tenants on this island. The Land League's rallying cry for the three Fs (fixity of tenure, free sale and fair rent)...

Editorial: 'We must forget about 'hope' and get own house in order' 

Diverted by the din in London, it's time to wake up to the creeping cataclysm of a no-deal Brexit.

Editorial: 'Brexit emergency demands leadership from Taoiseach' 

It has been both a tedious and fraught three years since UK voters narrowly opted to leave the EU. Now the only semblance of good news is that some kind of termination is in sight.

Editorial: 'McDonald has explaining to do' 

The decision by the Sinn Fein president Mary Lou McDonald to pose with a banner reading ''England get out of Ireland'' at the St Patrick's Day parade has been widely and rightly condemned as...

Editorial: 'End may be in sight, but we still have no clue what it is' 

Blinded by her illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable, Theresa May gets to stagger on for a bit longer. The EU had no choice but to cry "enough".

Editorial: 'Cross-party approach is now crucial to stop Brexit chaos' 

Like one of those deluded Japanese soldiers lost in the mists of time still fighting, Theresa May refuses to concede the war is over concerning her Brexit deal. She took the fight once more to Brussels...

Editorial: 'No-deal anxiety is growing as May flounders yet again' 

Who could have foretold that 1,001 days after the vote was taken, Brexit would remain a puzzle unresolved? Even by the standards set by the travelling clown rodeo it has become, this is...

Editorial: 'May must compromise if she is to finally sort Brexit mess' 

Fumbling about in the dark can be fun, but it gets risky if it goes on too long and there is a possibility of people being hurt.

Editorial: 'May must now reach out as Brexit shambles intensifies' 

The voices of the reasonable and rational have been stilled by the frantic and fanatical who have steered the Brexit bus, front wheels spinning, over the edge.

Editorial: 'St Patrick's day mission had more significance this year' 

It is a time of year when the doors of the great and powerful across the world are at least half-open to Ireland and the Irish. It makes perfect sense to push in those doors, enter and tell our...

Editorial: 'The livestream of ethnic nationalism' 

The murder of 49 people in Christchurch has been called the most shocking livestream in history. That it is, but the lesson from this outrage has become more urgent than to pearl clutch over the...

Editorial: 'We must always remember that terror will never win' 

Sometimes an event comes along of sufficient evil to cast a shadow over the whole world.

Editorial: 'Too little, too late but let us protect peace we have' 

With disappointment, relief but mostly dignity, families of victims of the 1972 Bloody Sunday killings reacted to the news that only one former British soldier would be charged.

Editorial: 'May's tariff plan places our farmers in Brexit crosshairs' 

It may not have had quite the impact of the Royal Navy's Helga sailing up the Liffey, all guns blazing at Liberty Hall and the GPO, but the announcement of the new UK tariff regime has been explosive,...

Any delay to shambles of Brexit must be meaningful 

If blundering on regardless constituted strategy, Theresa May would have got her way months ago. The art of victory is said to be learned in defeat. If this is so, Mrs May is surely the exception to the...

Editorial: 'Stakes are high but realism from UK side is now overdue' 

Words are supposed to have power, wise ones survive after those who have spoken them have moved on.

Editorial: 'First help Lisa Smith return home - then ask questions' 

Lisa Smith must be allowed to return to Ireland. The former Defence Forces soldier detained in Syria, as that country's fierce conflict draws to a close, is an Irish citizen in difficulty in a foreign...

Editorial: 'Greater focus on gender inequality' 

The ratification, albeit belated, of the Istanbul Convention by Ireland is an important and welcome development in preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence, but...

Editorial: 'The EU can't be expected to Solve May's crisis for her' 

Just one more push, pleaded Theresa May of the EU, as if she were the midwife instead of the mother delivering the Brexit problem child. The blank refusal to own responsibility, after a two-...

Editorial: 'Women have made gains but more battles must be won' 

'Dress suitably in short skirts and sitting boots, leave your jewels and gold wands in the bank, and buy a revolver." Such was the characteristically practical advice given by Countess Markievicz to...

Editorial: 'No progress, no discussion and still no clue to future' 

Podiums had been polished and sound-checks completed, but once again the preparations for a planned read-out on progress on Brexit had to be cancelled in Brussels. No progress, no discussion.

Housing crisis will come Back to bite government 

Many of the great social changes occur without our noticing. By the time they are identified as trends by either sociologists, or economists, someone has either won or lost, and the rest is academic.

Editorial: 'Wise words needed to avoid 'reopening gaping wound'' 

The Taoiseach is right to insist that Ireland has been "very flexible and reasonable" in helping the UK to deal with problems "largely of their own creation" on Brexit.

Editorial: 'Succession law and homicidal heirs' 

Nobody, as ancient legal maxim proclaims, may profit from his or her wrongful conduct. The justice of this principle is self-evident. It applies in many different circumstances. In relation to...

Editorial: 'Brexit still in limbo, but the mood music is a bit sweeter' 

If you have ever wondered what language they speak in Limbo, it is probably some dialect of Brexitese. Phrases like "unless and until", "fluid borders", "hard borders", "backstops" and...

Editorial: 'Our homeless deserve better than jaded 'no quick fix' line' 

If happiness is not the absence of problems but the ability to deal with them, Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy may not be in the best of form just now.

Editorial: 'Scouts' survival depends on winning back parents' trust' 

Childhood memories, both good and bad, tend to be for life. The vast majority of those who went on scouting trips will remember the untrammelled freedom of being away from home, over-night...