These are the pictures of Terence Wheelock, who we are told left Store Street garda station without any physical injuries, except some bruising on his left arm and a ligature wound to his neck.
The photos speak for themselves and it is not hard to understand why his family believe he was the victim of an [...]
“Some media reports refer to extensive bruising on Terence’s body,” read the garda statement.
“The gardai see no reason for this nor were they noticed by the gardai or Dublin Fire Brigade personnel who attended the scene.”
When Terence Wheelock was taken into custody, gardai made a note of his injuries and any other distinguishing marks.
The garda [...]
A WATCHDOG on political expenses – who resigned from his position in frustration at the slow rate of expense reform last year – has said there is an “entitlements culture” in the Irish public sector.
In a hard-hitting article for Accountancy Ireland magazine, Tom O’Higgins, who chaired a number of high-profile government audit [...]
And so, at last my book has come out, you can buy it here:
www.poolbeg.com
Or read a bit more about it on the blog. I’ll post up some chapters from it after the weekend.
THE Department of Finance climbed down on major pay cuts for 650 senior civil servants and other highly-paid public workers, primarily because they feared a costly legal action.
Legal advice had been sought by the Association of Assistant Secretaries and Higher Grades, which found that performance-related
awards were in fact part of a “core remuneration package”.
The Minister [...]
While Bertie Ahern was fortunate enough to be deemed eligible for the artist’s exemption for his memoirs, others have not fared quite so well.
Figures from the Revenue Commissioners show that seventeen people have been refused the tax break in the past four years.
All of them appear to have taken their cases to the Revenue Appeals [...]
Stung by criticism from the Sunday Times about the lack of activity on this site, I’ve determined to post at least one update a week for the foreseeable future
John Burns makes a number of good points in that article about the many false starts there have been in Irish blogging, and there is [...]
One of the issues I’ve consistently tried to drive home over recent months is the enormous difficulty involved in getting the full picture of overseas travel expenditure for any government Minister.
Last week after another two months of waiting, I got back details from the Department of Enterprise on Ministerial travel for a specific year.
They charged [...]
By far the most expensive aspect of Ministerial travel in recent years has been the use of the various government jets.
Technically, there are two, a Gulfstream IV for longer journeys and a Learjet, which is generally used for short hops around Europe.
Aside from that, the government also makes frequent use of the Beechcraft and a [...]
For the best part of three months, I (and a couple of other newspaper reporters, it now seems) have been trying to get details of all overseas travel expenses involving Mary Harney, the former Tanaiste and current Minister for Health.
A few weeks ago, we got our hands on the general details of her costs for [...]