Will the last TD to leave the Dail please switch off the light at the end of the tunnel

The country has reached the verge of national bankruptcy, primarily because of policies pursued by politicians here in the last decade. Vast borrowings have been undertaken, largely to finance current expenditure and hardly at all for wealth-creating investments. We now owe in total foreign debt a sum the equivalent of £6,000 for every income tax payer in the country.

POOR CHARLES HAUGHEY. There is now not a single writer on politics who is sympathetic to him. The estabblished political correspondents were at all times antagonistic to him but there were a few other writers on politics who were friendly. Bit by bit he has lost these allies until now the only perrson he has going for him is Prioncais MacAonghasa who writes the Gulliver column in The Sunday Press, but not under his own name. This anonymity allowed Prioncais to write a whole load of bilge recently on a media connspiracy to undermine Fianna Fail, masterminded by subversives.

THE RTE Authority was finally given an opportunity on Thursday, December 10 to meet the Minister for Transport and Communications, Pattrick Cooney, to press its case for a massive hike in the licence fee increase which the Authority claims is urgently necessary to save RTE from financial collapse. It was most unfortunate therefore that the Chairman of the

The heightened crisis in Northern Ireland demands a re analysis of the situation there and an attempt to describe the basis of a solution which, ultimately, will end violence. By Vincent Browne

Oxford Street will be in chaos at least once each day between now and Christmas", said a leading member of the Provisional IRA in reference to the resumed English bombing campaign. This was stated in the course of an interview with Magill at the beginning of November.

The party of James Connolly and Jim Larkin is facing its most serious crisis in its almost 70 years history.By Vincent Browne

Only seven of the 15 seats which Labour currently holds can be deemed safe; These are Dublin Central (Michael O'leary), Dun Laoghaire (Barry Desmond), Meath (Jimmy Tully), Kildare (Joe Bermingham), Tipperary South (Sean Treacy), Cork North Central (Toddy O'Sullivan) and Cork South Central (Eileen Desmond) .

THE Government's tough attitude on the Dunne kidnapping, based on the line that Governments never concede to or negotiate with kidnappers, was a load of old codswallop. Which brings us back to Wigmore's old and trusted friend, Patrick "Ghengis" Cooney. At the time of the Herrerna kidnapping in 1975 the Government not alone entered into negotiation with the kiddnappers but actually agreed to a deal in writing. The aeal was discussed in detail at cabinet meetings and agreed to. It was communicated to the kiddnappers via a senior Garda officer at the scene of the seige in Monasterevin, Co.

It was in the early 'sixties that Professor Paddy Lynch and the late George O'Brien first started to talk about Garret FitzGerald being Taoiseach some day - he hadn't even entered politics then. For almost twenty years many people have regarded it as an inevitability that Garret would one day. lead-this country and it was a prospect that was much desired by his many friends who admired his intellect, his integrity, his energy, his dedication .and his innate "goodness" . By Vincent Browne

By Vincent Browne