Micheal Martin is giving out about the Shinners suing for libel. It's "chilling", he says.
What ever must he think of this shower...
First up, FF TD and serial driving offender Barry Cowen who threatened the Sunday Times if it published details of his driving offences. They went ahead and published anyway. Baz has never sued them.
Next up, and related, we have Thomas Byrne who told local radio in Louth he was "consulting with my solicitors" about claims made by party activist Ken McFadden, about leaking Barry Cowen's transgressions. Thomas never sued on this occasion. But he has previously sued Google.
And we had a near decade long libel battle by FF presidential candidate Sean Gallagher against RTE after RTE's election debate where false claims were read out. It's believed Sean got around €130,000 from RTE in the end.
And Frank Fahey, a junior FF minister who is believed to have received around €150,000 from the Mail, and an undisclosed amount from the Independent.
And we can only delight in the hubris of FF TD Beverley Flynn who was hit with a €1.25m legal bill when she failed in her libel action against RTE. She was still paying it off a decade later!
And isn't it only a couple of months ago that FF junior minister Robert Troy issued a legal threat demanding resolution within 24 hrs. Seems at this remove that Robert was trying to conceal his shady property dealings.
And not sure what happened this case, but ex-FF TD Frank O'Rourke blamed posts on Twitter and Facebook for his loss of his seat in #ge2020. The case appears to have petered out.
And while ex-FF minister Pat Carey is suing the publisher of the Independent about stories of child abuse, he is suing for privacy and breach of confidentiality and not specifically, defamation.
And although a FF councillor these days, Colm Keaveney was a FF TD in 2015/16 when he issued several defamation claims against the publisher of the Independent. Is one of these cases still ongoing?
And when RTE Investigates conducted an undercover sting which exposed sleaze, if not downright corruption, by local councillors in planning matters, it was FF's Joe Queenan who threated to sue RTE for libel. He never did.
Thanks to @saoirse161616 below for reminding us of FF minister [until 2010] Martin Cullen who sued RTE Liveline and the publishers of the Sindo and publishers of The S*n for false allegations of adultery. The RTE case was settled in 2009. No word on damages though.
Martin Cullen didn't sue the Indo about this altogether separate shaggy dog story, but there's a fair chance he received compo anyways. It's an hilarious apology though.
The most senior FF politician to sue for defamation was Albert Reynolds who was awarded 1 shiny new penny in compo, and he had to foot around €500,000 for his own legal costs in an action against the Sunday Times.
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Still trying to get my jaw back off the ground from reading the Sunday Times report on Escort-Ireland, the hugely profitable illegal prostitution website operated by the McCormick family of convicted pimps.
Where to start?
Sunday Times claims “Escort-Ireland had been until recently operating in Spain, where the sale of sex is legal” No, it’s still operated by Periodic Table SL whose accounts for 2022 were filed in April 2024 and reported here.
Also, while the sale of prostituted sex is legal in Spain, the advertisement of prostitution was outlawed a year ago, which means the future looks bleak for the McCormicks keeping their operation there.
Contrary to what was suggested last Oct, there has been no examination of transactions in the barter account in the period 2012-2016, and we know that at least some of these are juicey, like these
Former commercial director Geraldine O'Leary seems to shoulder a large amount of blame for the scandal. Reading between the lines, she concealed the barter account from RTE internal audit, and craftily, she didn't repatriate the cash to RTE where its spending could be monitored.
Every month, the Irish Prison Service publishes statistics on inmates, including the top 5 non-Irish numbers. You’ll find the monthly reports here. irishprisons.ie/information-ce…
In Census 2022, people were asked for their nationality, you’ll find the responses at the CSO data table F5065 here data.cso.ie
Govt will be pleased with commencement notices for 3699 housing units in the month of February 2024, bringing the annual rolling 12-month total to 35752, the highest since records began (2012) and likely highest since 2007.
The problem is, the "housing deficit" was 250,000 units in 2018, see Leo Varadkar below, and we have 400,000 additional population since then.
And the thicko eejits in Leinster House, on all sides, are squabbling over whether the annual target should be 30,000 or 50,000
🤦
You have to laugh at FF and their "we have delivered 100,000 homes in the past four years". Sorta true, but we needed 200,000 homes just for new population, replace obsolete stock and accommodate diminishing household size.
Yet the Main Media will lap it up and Oppo are silent!
10 tell-tale signs that RTE ia pulling the wool over our eyes about #reform and #lessonslearned since the scandals last summer...
1. Costs, Oliver Callan, €150,000 for 200 1-hr weekday light entertainment radio shows, moving to Cork’s most expensive offices, scandalised at €60k/yr #FairCity photographer but okay with €50k?
2 Revenues, allowed 12-month sponsorship of Brendan O’Connor to run out before seeking new sponsor, every lost week now costs RTE ~€4k, no sponsor for Operation Transformation, for first time ever?
An alternative [to Paul Reynolds] review of Garda performance in 2023...
January - Garda Sgt Cathal Middleton (42) given 5-month prison sentence for sexual assault
February - Luke Rochford (35), who is no longer a member of the Garda, is charged with stealing sniper rifle parts from the Defence Forces ordnance stores in the Curragh Camp in Kildare