This conference is likely to be our last before the general election. I believe this election and the preparations for it will correctly emphasise the squandered opportunity of creating a humane, just and caring society in Ireland.
I've been sick over the last two weeks. Not an earth-shattering experience for the nation, but one that gave me the opportunity to reflect acerbically at a distance about the perpetual double-standards of our political system and the cynicism about politics that is produced thereby.
He studied to be a priest, was kicked out of the Labour party for being too left-wing, and spent a month in Mountjoy jail. Ruairí McCann and Colin Murphy profile Socialist Party TD Joe Higgins
Hailstones, thundershowers and ferocious winds assailed the capital city earlier this week. A bolt of lighting even struck a flowerpot on the Merrion Square side of Leinster House, setting it ablaze.
On RTÉ's Questions and Answers programme on Monday (23 May), Pat Rabbitte was almost pallid. Not once did he score a "hit" on fellow panelist, Brian Cowen, the Minister for Finance. There was a now familiar "inhalation of statesmanship", conveying pomposity by someone who used to be entertaining and daring.
The Government's failures to meet its own commitments on road safety and to respond to repeated calls for safer school buses enrages the nation. By Hilary Curley, Colin Murphy and Vincent Browne
Batt O'Keeffe is the subject of a complaint made to the Taoiseach's Department over his role in the siege at the Slí Eile centre in Charleville. By Felim McMahon and Vincent Browne
Fifty-nine changes were made to the report by the Arts Council after it had been agreed by a Special Committee on the Traditional Arts on 13 July, 2004, according to the traditional music organisation, Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann. The most substantial of these changes related to funding recommendations which could result in a loss of approximately €1 million to the traditional arts. Other changes made to the report concern education and traditional arts and the role of community arts in local authorities were also made and key appendices were left out.
Bertie Ahern's reputation for being cunning and devious sometimes makes people see cunning and deviousness in everything he says.
Posturing aside, the rainbow parties' policies are surprisingly similar. Hilary Curley investigates the policy proposals of Fine Gael, Labour and the Green Party