Posted by David Farrell Organised by St Patrick’s Cathedral, there will be a symposium on the economics contribution of Jonathan Swift on October 16th: more details here. The Annual Service in commemoration of Swift is on Sunday 17th October at 15.15, at which Dr. Don Thornhill (Chairman of the Competitiveness Council etc) will give an…
By Michael Gallagher It’s hard to find anyone who does not expect FF to be in opposition after the next election. And things could hardly be otherwise: when the economy is in the dire straits it is, and the major party of government has held office for 21 of the previous 23 years, it would…
Fine Gael TD Lucinda Creighton has posted the following on her blog, essenatially arguing for a Tallaght II strategy. Posted by Jane Suiter Some may say it is naive of Opposition politicians to suggest that now is a time when we must put aside the old fashioned confrontational, adversarial politics of old and replace it,…
The Annual Political Studies Association of Ireland [PSAI] conference will be held this weekend in DIT. Details of programme below and further information here. Of particular note is the roundtable on political reform on Friday: Chair: Professor David Farrell, UCD Speakers: Joan Burton TD, Finance Spokesperson, Labour Party; Dan O’Brien, Economics Editor, Irish Times; Eddie…
Adrian Kavanagh, 29 September 2010 Irish Times Ipsos-MRBI opinion poll September 30: FF 24 (+3). FG 24 (-3), Lab 33 (+4), Greens 2 (-2), SF 8 (-2), Others 9 (nc) Core vote (before undecided voters are excluded): Fianna Fáil 19 (+3); Fine Gael 20 (-1); Labour 27 (+5); Sinn Féin 6 (-2); Green Party 2 (-1);…
By Eoin O’Malley (29 September, 2010) The news that Geir Haarde, the former prime minister of Iceland is to be charged with criminal negligence for his role in the Icelandic banking collapse will, no doubt, be greeted with popular acclaim. Haarde faces a fine and up to two years in prison if the charges are…
By Michael Gallagher This rather provocative title is intended to raise the issue of just what end it’s hoped will be served by political reform. Possible ends could be classed as process-oriented or outcome-oriented. Regarding the former, having a political system that is more transparent and participatory is worth trying to achieve in its own…
Leo Varadkar’s audit of his time Would a different electoral system change anything or would the expectations by the electorate stay the same? Meetings (22%) Correspondence (16%) Media (10%) Paperwork (10%) Dail Chamber and Committee (8%) Travelling (7%) Conferences (7%) Events (7.5%) Phone Calls (5.5%) Canvass (3%) Office (2.5%) Miscellaneous (2%) Clinics and Funerals (0…
By Matthew Wall In this post, I would like to open a discussion around the idea of imposing term limits on our TDs. This is not an idea that has heretofore received much attention in Ireland. As such, the post is primarily concerned with ‘crowd-sourcing’ peoples’ opinions on how term limits would play out in…
Adrian Kavanagh, 25 September 2010 The poll figures to be published in tomorrow’s Sunday Business Post are radically different to those in Thursday’s Lansdowne Millward TV3 poll and, as such, produce very different estimates of Dail seats for parties using the method of producing constituency estimates as in previous such analyses. On these poll figures,…
Irish Politics Forum 