I’m reposting this in light of the resignation of Kathleen McMahon as governor of the Dóchas Centre and her highly critical comments about the Irish Prison Service in her letter of resignation. In today’s Irish Times report on her resignation it mentions a chilling aspect, about how the Irish prison service is developing policy based [...]

The recent tragic killing of Toyosi Shittabey behooves us all to critically reflect upon, and engage in national dialogue about, the true scale and nature of racism in Irish society today. The pervasiveness of racism in Irish society is a reality that a number of young people in the Tyrellstown area—where Toyosi was killed—have eloquently [...]

On Monday night The Frontline, RTE’s flagship current affairs show, broadcast a special programme on the state and direction of our health service.
Advertised for a week in advance, the programme promised to tell us if our health system is on the right track or going backwards?
A larger than usual studio audience was given an hour [...]

Despite the expenditure of billions of dollars on development aid and the launch of high-profile initiatives such as the Millennium Development Goals, the blight of hunger has not been defeated. If anything, its grip on hundreds of millions of people is as tight as ever.
In 2000, some 790 million people in the southern hemisphere were [...]

Reproduced by permission of the Irish Examiner.
Ashley Balbirnie of the ISPCC is the latest in a line of people, including Jillian Van Turnhout of the Children’s Rights Alliance (CRA) and Fergus Finlay of Barnardos, who are effectively inverting the facts of the history of abuse in Ireland to secure increased power over our children for [...]

An interview with John Gibbons, formerly of the Irish Times
John Gibbons has covered the issue of climate change for the Irish Times for the past two years. Several weeks ago his weekly column abruptly came to an end. In his final piece Gibbons took the mainstream media to task over their climate coverage:
“Ireland’s most senior [...]

[Migrant Rights Centre Ireland writes:]
Today the Migrant Rights Centre Ireland (MRCI) is launching a pamphlet that critiques Ireland’s political leadership on migration, and its commitment to equality in the current recession.
The political pamphlet, Hidden Messages: Overt Agendas, was written by Niall Crowley, equality expert and former CEO of the Equality Authority. It compares the [...]

To a large extent, the reality of global inequality is ignored or at best downplayed. However, this has not always been the case. Indeed, in the early 1950s, the first UN resolutions on development focused on inequality rather than poverty. Unfortunately, this decline of interest in inequality is not an indication of any improvement in [...]

[An open letter to the Government: Signatories are listed below]
THE GOVERNMENT’S economic strategy is failing. The Irish recession has been deeper and longer than almost any other in the industrialised world.
Consumer spending has collapsed while at the same time unemployment and emigration have soared. Crucially, investment has plummeted off the chart. Not only have Government [...]

“You need to find a way to sell your ideas to people. Make them want to buy into them.”
That was the advice given to me in a little Belfast coffee-shop months ago by a lady whose area of expertise is working with troubled youth. Promoting social justice issues for her is akin to selling brand [...]