Society

Padraigín Clancy on the traditions of Easter in Ireland

For those who seek copies of public documents – an unfashionable and beleaguered breed in boom-time Ireland – there was some good news last week. Monica Muller, an environmentalist campaigning against the on-shore Shell refinery at Rossport, was charged €1 a page by Mayo County Council for A4 photocopies of planning documents. Following a complaint to the Ombudsman, Emily O'Reilly (pictured), this was massively reduced.

The scale of inequality in incomes is vast. Some people earning millions per year, others earning as low as €15,000. The huge divergences are unexplained by differentials in the value of work. These huge disparities result not just in differentials in living standards but also in the healthcare one can afford, the standard of education one can afford for one's children, the degree of influence and clout one can bring to bear on the political system and on society generally. Inequalities in income and wealth cause huge inequalities across all areas of society.

All hostels in which unaccompanied minors seeking asylum reside in will now be subject to the national standards on residential units. This means that hostels accommodating these children will have to meet the same standards as required for all residential units housing children in State care.

Travellers and other minority groups are suffering social injustice and racial violence, according to a report on human rights. By Emma Browne

If at any time in your life you are either wholly or partly unable to take care of your own needs – mental or physical, in whatever way and to whatever degree, then you have experience of what it is to be disabled. Alcoholic? Depressed? Broken leg? Asthmatic? Bad flu? Difficult pregnancy? Diabetic? There is a disability wherever there is impairment to typical functioning, social or practical, temporary or permanent.

A list of the violent deaths in Ireland over the past two years, the victims and circumstances of death. 

Gardaí went to the District Court to have the detention of two men arrested in connection with Donna Cleary's killing extended for 24 hours. John Byrne reports

It is doubtful if anyone will ever be convicted for the murder of Donna Cleary and questions arise about the death in Garda custody of Dwayne Foster. By Vincent Browne

The riots in Dublin were an expression of the anger of the most marginalised of Dublin's urban poor – the first time in living memory that these, the poorest in Irish society, have expressed themselves politically. By Chekov Feeney