In a recent lecture to the Ditchley Foundation, former UK prime minister John Major calls for political reforms, especially the use of more experts in government and the role of politicians as a mediator between experts and the public. The details of his proposals are a bit unclear, but are discussed in a blog by…
By Michael Breen (17 May, 2011) An interesting piece of information that was not previously in the public domain surfaced in Morgan Kelly’s now infamous Irish Times article. He stated that: ‘The deal was torpedoed from an unexpected direction. At a conference call with the G7 finance ministers, the haircut was vetoed by US treasury…
By Eoin O’Malley (10 May 2011) How many times in making an argument do we rely on the eminence of a person holding a position to back up our own point of view? You’ll regularly read in the pages of the Irish Times that a ‘Nobel-prize winning economist says X’ and we are expected to…
By Iain McMenamin (30 March, 2011) The Moriarty Tribunal’s report details an exchange between a politician and businessman, the like of which cannot easily be targeted by political reforms. Politicians have a demand for cash and can supply lucrative private goods to business, such as a mobile phone licence. The political demand for cash in…
Eoin O’Malley (10 March, 2011) For much of the election campaign parties promised that there would be a change to the way politics was done. This continued to the first day of the 31st Dáil. But will it? One way to judge the government is by the programme for government, and another by its actions.
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Eoin O’Malley (5 March, 2011) Yesterday some of us wrote in the Irish Times about what might need to be done in the government’s first week to show it is serious about political reform. One of the suggestions was for using the Seanad route to appoint a minister with relevant experience to what will be…
Eoin O’Malley (28 February, 2011) Although the election was a seismic event in the redevelopment of the Irish party system, the decisions made in the next week as to the structure of the government will have a greater long term impact. The decision Labour has to take as to whether to go into government or…
Eoin O’Malley (20 February, 2011) The three most recent polls by Red-C, Millward Brown and Ipsos-mrbi in today’s Sunday Business Post and Sunday Independent and tomorrow’s Irish Times are broadly consistent and are also consistent with recent trends. Fine Gael’s position is solidifying (not surging) and Labour is slipping slightly (not falling). The Greens look unlikely to return…
Irish Politics Forum 