latest Taoiseach says details on controversial cement levy still ‘to be worked out’ as Sinn Féin tables motion to scrap it

The Taoiseach has defended the new concrete levy, amid claims it would add around €3,000 to €4,000 to the costs of an average three-bed semi-detached home.

Mica scandal: TDs fear they’ll be hit hard by 10pc concrete levy amid Sinn Féin poll rise

Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael TDs remain opposed to the Budget’s 10pc levy on concrete to fund mica compensation amid ongoing concern that the €11bn giveaway Budget has not boosted either party’s popular support.

Premium

Liz Truss move to attend European summit feeds Brexit speculation as Micheál Martin says he believes PM wants solution

The Taoiseach says he believes embattled UK prime minister Liz Truss does want to resolve the impasse over the Northern Ireland Brexit Protocol.

United Ireland: Partition debate ‘must not be reduced to sectarian headcount’, says Heather Humphreys

Religious belief no longer defines attitudes towards partition on this island, Social Protection Minister Heather Humphreys has insisted.

EU energy tax will help fund fuel subsidies, says Taoiseach Micheál Martin

Taoiseach Micheál Martin said an EU deal on windfall energy company tax can raise “a couple of billion” for Ireland that would be an “additional help” for fuel subsidies.

Premium

John Downing Opinion Eyes of Europe fixed on Germany in the hope €200bn support package eases inflation across the bloc

There is no way to sugarcoat this one. Inflation is on the rise and increasing prices are bolstering calls for the European Central Bank (ECB) to raise interest rates more swiftly and steeply when its governing council meets at the end of the month.

Premium

John Downing Opinion ‘Prudent Paschal’ has finally learned how to grease a voter’s palm, but history shows voter gratitude is elusive

I know and really like Joe Duffy, but if I listened for a while to his afternoon RTÉ radio phone-in show, I’m not entirely sure I’d ever get out of the bed at all .

Premium

John Downing Opinion It’s hard to quibble with this giveaway Budget but its effects will take months to register

I would be embarrassed to tell you how long I have been watching Budgets. But I have to say I never saw the beat of this one for sheer largesse and munificence.

Premium

John Downing Opinion Lavish budget is hard to criticise but ultimately the weather will decide its success

Mild winter anyone?

Premium

John Downing Opinion Why ‘little things’ like free schoolbooks and the price of a car could be key to end of partition

Back in what now seems like another lifetime, we had these almost mythical cousins living in Armagh city whom we very rarely saw. My father’s first cousin, “Tom Fitz’’, had hurled for Limerick and later Armagh.

Premium

John Downing Opinion Sterling slide: UK prime minister Liz Truss’s slash-and-burn gamble risks bringing her fledgling leadership to a halt

Liz Truss took the mantle three weeks ago to the very day and it has been a very ill-starred start.

John Downing Opinion Italian voters look ready to back hard-right and install first female PM

Giorgia Meloni is a name you will very probably hear a lot more of as she could be elected as Italy’s first woman prime minister.

John Downing Opinion Tommie Gorman writes about prospects for a united Ireland and horrors of the Troubles in new memoir

Tommie Gorman takes the ending of systematic violence in the North very seriously and very personally.

Leo Varadkar rejects proposal to provide unlimited public transport for €9 per month

Tánaiste Leo Varadkar has rejected a proposal to give everyone unlimited access to public transport for €9 per month.

Premium

John Downing Opinion Forget a united Ireland by teatime. The North now has three identities

A century after its creation as “a protestant state for a protestant people” the six counties of Northern Ireland now have a majority from what was always the smaller catholic community.

Premium

John Downing Opinion Alarm bells ring over EU states’ €500bn spending on energy subsidies to citizens

The EU’s ambitious draft plans to co-ordinate energy policy are gradually being dialled down, leaving Ireland pretty much on its own for the Budget in five days’ time.

Premium

John Downing Opinion Pension reforms are dicey territory – but grand plan by minister Heather Humphreys just might win through

Pension system changes all across the western world have a great propensity to infuriate those most feared by politicians: the grey brigade. And when the oldies take to the streets, they usually play for keeps.

History made as Irish judge, Síofra O’Leary, to become first woman to lead European Court of Human Rights

The election of an Irish judge as the first female president of the European Court of Human Rights has been hailed as “historic” and “a source of pride” for Ireland.

Premium

John Downing Opinion A quarter century after his death, much of Jim Kemmy’s vision for Ireland is now a reality

Four times a day for 15 years, I walked past “the dead, the mad and the bad” in Limerick city on a school route that went past the municipal cemetery, the psychiatric hospital and the prison.

Premium

British spies struggled for a decade to block Charles Haughey’s return, writer of new book claims

British secret services conducted a 10-year campaign to vilify and block Charles Haughey’s return from political exile after the Arms Crisis of 1970.

Premium

John Downing Opinion As hard-right parties gain ground, EU’s centrists will need a rethink

The electoral breakthrough by the hard-right Sweden Democrats this week reminds us that far-right parties across Europe are here to stay.

Premium

Unlikely wartime leader Ursula von der Leyen vows to fight Putin in energy markets

Ursula von der Leyen is an unlikely frontline European leader in a time of war. The former German defence minister, a qualified medical doctor, was an unknown figure three years ago before she took charge of the EU policy-guiding Commission.

€1,000 boost for families in Budget as tax and USC cuts on cards

The average worker could get tax cuts of almost €1,000 a year in the Budget if the Government introduces a suite of measures outlined this week.

Irish mum whose child was seized by French police in dispute with dad needs help, Dáil told

A young Irish mother whose child was seized by armed French police and sent to his father’s custody in Malta needs help from the Government, the Dáil has been told.

Tánaiste Leo Varadkar says putting price caps on energy bills has ‘echoes of the bank guarantee’

TÁNAISTE Leo Varadkar has said bringing in price caps on energy bills has “echoes of the bank guarantee”.

TDs observe one minute’s silence for British Queen Elizabeth as Dáil returns

Deputies from all parties stood for a minute’s silence in honour of the late British Queen Elizabeth 11 as the Dáil summer recess ended,

Premium

How Government might rejig Finance to keep Paschal Donohoe in EU job

When the UK sought access to EU single currency members’ meetings, French finance minister Dominique Strauss-Kahn rebuffed them with a message: “In a marriage, you don’t admit strangers to the bedroom.”

Political parties ‘not doing half enough’ to attract women and gay people into politics, says Ceann Comhairle

Political parties “are not doing half enough” to attract more women, gay people and those from diverse backgrounds into politics, Dáil chairman, Seán Ó Fearghaíl, has said.

John Downing Opinion A century on, remembering one brave fighter felled in the ‘War Between Friends’

There is another bundle of centenary joy facing us tomorrow when we consider one more in the series of inglorious Civil War atrocities back when our own people turned upon each other.

Government will be allowed skim off energy firms’ profits to help households under new EU plans

The Government will be empowered to skim off energy firms’ windfall profits to subsidise bills for households and business under plans agreed by EU ministers in Brussels yesterday.