Who has the right to comment on the Croke Park Public Service Agreement?
Labour leader Eamon Gilmore says that political parties should not ‘interfere’ in what is a matter for public sector workers. They should be left in peace, he says, to consider the strengths and weaknesses of the agreement and make their decision accordingly.
I don’t [...]

It’s interesting reading the article by Harry McGee in the Irish Times about Sinn Féin and its current troubles. That topic, though, is for another day, albeit I find it hard to disagree with him when he argues that
“There are some who believe Sinn Féin is in terminal decline, like other republican parties that preceded [...]

Let’s think happy thoughts for a brief while because much else is… well, less than happy. So, here’s something that cheered me up at least a bit and it’s a point that is rarely touched on by commentators more concerned with the jockeying for position of the larger centre right political parties. Reading The Lost [...]

There’s a certain notion in the air that an election is near inevitable now. And, in one sense hasn’t that always been the case. But, it is correct that the chances of an election this year are better now than they have been. So, with that in mind what are the rumours swirling about out [...]

I’ve read a couple of different pieces about the prospects for government amongst various potential parties and combined they allow for some useful insights into how the Irish political landscape may be developing.
Yesterday Fintan O’Toole had an impassioned column on his thoughts as to why Labour should wait… in other words to eschew entering coalition [...]

The three opposition parties, Sinn Fein, Fine Gael and now Labour have each published their proposals for economic recovery. In each case the emphasis has been on job creation, some form of stimulus and an attempt to restructure the economy to replace the previous over reliance on construction and property development.
Over on the progressive economy@tasc [...]

Labour is quickly approaching a crossroads. It is seemingly torn in two directions: a new stimulus strategy that prioritises rising unemployment and declining economic activity; or an accommodation with the orthodoxy, compromising within parameters laid down by the deflationists (or just as worse, paralysed at the crossroads unable to choose). The Labour Party conference provided [...]

One of the major problems of political life in this age where everything is available almost at an instant is the sense of familiarity, even dullness, of policy proposals. Take, for example, the idea of a third tax rate for high earners as mooted at the Labour Party National Conference yesterday by Eamon Gilmore. It’s [...]

Recently on South Belfast Diary I leaked the draft Section 8 of Labour’s 21st Century Commission, dealing with Party organisation in Northern Ireland. Since 2002, the Irish Labour Party has allowed membership in the North. We have actively participated in conferences and have had an NEC co-opted member, Mark Langhammer. More to the [...]

During the unkind years of the neo-liberal consensus, which were dominated by the free-market/small-government/low-tax/eat-what-you-kill/greed-is-good mentality that pretty well everyone now recognises to have been a failure, it was exceptionally difficult for the Labour party in Ireland to promote itself as anything more than ever-so-slightly left-of-centre without fear of electoral annihilation.  Though it battled away manfully, [...]