January, 2018

How much does the state care about the vulnerable?

“You can judge a society by how it treats its weakest members.” That was Mahatma Ghandi’s view and it’s hard to think of a better measuring-rod. So how are we doing? Let’s do it with housing. In late November 2017, 8,857 people were judged to be homeless in the south of Ireland, with a rise […]

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Statues and buckets of faeces: what do you think?

One of the most interesting debates over the past year has been about the place of the past in public representations. I remember interviewing Professor John A Murphy about a statue of Queen Victoria in Cork, which he believed should have been kept in its original place of display, Famine Queen or no Famine Queen. […]

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Another year

Human beings are relentlessly optimistic. Every year at this time we go out and go a bit mad with   Love for all and a determination that this coming year will be the best ever: this despite the fact that a  vulgar oaf is in the White House, that a shell of a politician occupies […]

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