Ciaran Murphy has a lot to say and while occasionally off key he says it with integrity:

After the coverage of Friday’s bombscares several commentators responded thus:

"Yes that brave Irish freedom fighter who stepped onto that treacherous bus with the dangerous crowd of pensioners truly deserves to walk to the dole office to collect his British pounds with his head held high"

"I must say, the ‘traffic jams for Irish unity’ campaign isn’t doing much for me."

"All these security alerts are basically anti-social behaviour and shows that republican dissidents are much more like their “homie” friends in Brixton than their apologists would have us believe."

However, despite these flippant dismissals - this incident where crown forces came under fire dealing with a bomb claim outside Newry indicates, while the initial claim may not be dangerous, the intent is very much there.

The BBC report that the US House of Representatives is preparing to vote on the President Obama sponsored Healthcare Bill, and Richard Adams notes a last-minute compromise on abortion.

As the vote drew closer, attention focussed on on Bart Stupak, the Democrat congressman who authored the controversial "Stupak amendment" on the original House bill that placed onerous conditions barring abortion provision from health insurance subsidised by federal funds. The last-minute deal was lashed together, involving President Obama, in order to win over Stupak and several of his allies.

Stupak held a late afternoon press conference announcing his dramatic change of heart, and pledged that he and several of his anti-abortion conservative Democrat colleagues would support the bill after seeing President Obama's proposed executive order.

Meanwhile the Obama-supporting Michael Tomasky adds

Under the deal, Obama will sign an executive order affirming that no federal funds can be used for abortions. You can read the order here. It doesn't seem to say much to me beyond the fact of reaffirming that nothing in the act shall be construed to run counter to the so-called existing Hyde language that bars federal funds for abortions.

The mini-instant-conventional wisdom that I'm picking up, subject to alteration, is that Stupak kind of caved. Someone who was at the press conference says that someone read a statement from the US Conference of Catholic Bishops indicating a certain unease with the deal. I don't know this firsthand, and I'll report back as developments merit, and you can Google this on your own of course.

President Sarkozy's centre-right party has suffered a heavy defeat in the French regional elections, early projections of the voting suggest.

Exit polls suggest the Socialist-led opposition alliance took 54% of the vote with Mr Sarkozy's UMP on 36%.

If confirmed the results leave the UMP in control of only one of France's 22 regions, the Alsace region in the east.

As noted, UCUNF have selected 17 out of 18 candidates for the Westminster election. Only the decision on South Antrim is outstanding.

Slugger (me and people I talk to) has been informed, via three separate sources, this is due to concerns from the Conservatives on the alleged homophopbia of current frontrunner Adrian Watson.

In the Sunday Times Liam Clarke identifies some of the hypocrisy of those in glasshouses calling on Cardinal Seán Brady to consider his position.  From the Sunday Times

Think of Liam Adams, the brother of the Sinn Fein president. Liam has not been tried and is entitled to the presumption of innocence in the sex-abuse charges against him, but consider how the allegations were handled. He was moved about the country and for a time lived in America without those he was staying with being told that he was under suspicion. Gerry Adams, who says he believed the allegations when they were first made to him in 1987, did not inform other members of Sinn Fein or the authorities. The result was that McGuinness was photographed opening a Sinn Fein office in Dundalk alongside Liam Adams, who worked on youth projects there and in west Belfast.

Gerry attended Liam’s second wedding and was photographed canvassing with him. To any onlooker, or anyone following Liam’s career through the press, there was no hint of suspicion. What is more, Gerry told a meeting in north Belfast in 1995 that child abuse should not be reported to the police because "the RUC are not acceptable". This was 20 years after Fr Brady, as he then was, and his superiors failed to report child-abuse allegations to the gardai.

As the likelihood of an agreed unionist candidate for both Fermangah South Tyrone and South Belfast recedes so the blame game seems to be beginning. Jim Allister has noted that the TUV can claim to be innocent in this argument. The DUP and CUs, however, are both in the process of getting their retaliation in first. The DUP of course are far from innocent in the past of the charge of being vote splitters. However, this time they do seem to have a bit more legitimacy in their complaints: unless that is of course one takes Trimble's non sectarian claims seriously.

The problem of course is that stating things like: “We have said all along that we will not be joining with any party of a sectarian nature” could be seen to sit a little ill with one who made his political reputation tripping along the Garvaghy Road hand in hand with Dr. Paisley: the then leader of the party he is now describing as sectarian.

There is also another problem in Trimble's comments, he went on to say: “we will be fighting every seat in the UK, and the Province will be no exception." Whilst that is sort of true it is only sort of true as Norman Tebbit has pointed out on the BBC's Politics Show (reproduced here on Conservative Home): "Mr Bercow is not a Conservative candidate. He is an independent candidate. And it's, in my view, not the business of the Conservative Party to support independent candidates. He did cast himself in my mould, indeed. But he has been reworked in recent years. But I don't think he would really be able to describe himself as a Conservative any more, even if he were not the Speaker."

Reg Empey's response was a little less inflammatory: "DUP have nine out of 10 seats and one wonders how many more they want. It was they who gave South Belfast and Fermanagh-South Tyrone to the nationalists and they should return them to us, the new coalition." Again, however, that form of words ignores the reality that seats are not in the specific gift of a political party and further that in both Fermanagh South Tyrone and South Belfast the sitting MP was retiring at the election where the seats fell to nationalists. In addition the DUP heavily out polled the UUP in South Belfast at the election when the seat was lost and it is far from clear which candidate the out going MP would have felt was his natural political heir.

In Fermanagh South Tyrone it is alleged that Norman Baxter was willing to run as a unity candidate but it was the CU's insistence that he take the Tory whip which resulted in him withdrawing from the fray. Going back to Buckingham: it is abundantly clear that the MP the Tories are backing will not be taking their whip.

Somehow, however, honouring an age old tradition of not standing against the speaker and, hence, depriving the Buckingham constituents of the option of voting for a Conservative member of parliament, potential government minister etc. etc. is acceptable. However, having an agreed candidate to stop the election of an MP who refuses to take her seat and is an open supporter of the IRA's campaign of murder, nowhere more brutal, sectarian or indiscriminate than in Fermanagh; is sectarian.

We were fortunate that our time in Washington at the same time the government was trying to get its healthcare bill through Congress. I say ‘government' when in actual fact the government (ie the executive office functions overseen by the White House) when - unlike the strong arm approach of LBJ (or even the Bush administration) - the President had little or nothing to do with the drafting of this bill. Rather his contribution seems to have been cast more in the strategic framing of the bill:

His aim is to establish a long-term political direction—one centered on a more activist government that shapes and polices the market to strengthen the foundation for sustainable, broadly shared growth. Everything else—the legislative tactics, even most individual policies—is negotiable. He wants to chart the course for the supertanker, not to steer it around each wave or decide which crates are loaded into its hull.

To the legislation itself, the Economist gives two reasons to back it: one, decency; and two cost control. The second first:

America’s health-care system is a nightmare of perverse incentives. Because employer-provided health insurance is not considered to be a taxable benefit, people feel insulated from the real cost of their coverage and consequently over-consume. Because hospitals and medical practices in many areas face too little competition, they charge absurdly too much even for simple procedures. Because of the rapacity of America’s lawyers, the fear of lawsuits encourages doctors to practise “defensive” medicine, again driving up costs.

This is the libertarian trap that prefers to let freedom reign which encourage the country to consume resources simply to game the system. Thus the cost of the UK's universal system come in at around 8% of its GDP, whereas the US system which currently excludes 45 million of its population, eats up 16% of its gross domestic product.

Even ‘Obamacare' will leave a significant number of people outside the system. And there will be no ‘public option' (a government-run insurance option). Medicine will remain private, but it will be regulated into ‘exchanges' or government regulated markets in which competition will exert a downward pressure on costs, with a tax being implemented on high-cost insurance plans.

And on the decency thing, for the Economist it is simply about closing an obvious gap between the US and the rest of the developed world. And it is not about covering those currently excluded, but those wage earners whom the insurance companies consider too bad a risk to make money on:

...the much larger number of people who fear falling into that position through losing their jobs; and the larger number again who cannot get affordable insurance because they have an existing medical condition, or because they are too old, or because they have exhausted the “lifetime caps” imposed by insurance companies.

That said, it is still no done thing. House Democrats have - in the words of one Congressman we met last week - ‘lost the narrative' to outlying rumours like Sarah Palin's Death Panel story... And the Republicans are counting on fears that these reforms will play into their hands come the mid term elections in November...

That is still a long way away. Obama's pitch to his party's Congress caucus yesterday was that this was a straight down the middle bill, which balances fairness with an attempt to bring down America's sky high healthcare costs... Turning the US Supertaker will take a lot longer than 7 or 8 months...

And there are a dozen other reasons to kick the government party (not least the stubbornly persistent 10% unemployment rate)... Some of those waverers must now be calculating that it is as better to be hung for stealing the proverbial sheep than a lamb...

The BBC notes the recommendations of a Conservation Study [9Mb pdf file] for the early medieval ecclesiastical site of Monasterboice, County Louth, commissioned by the Irish government's Office of Public Works and Louth County Council.  In particular, proposals to remove and replace with replicas the likely late 9th to 10th centuries, exceptionally significant, Monasterboice high crosses.  From the BBC report

The study notes that there will be opposition to moving the crosses. "Some local residents strongly oppose any option that involves moving the high crosses because of their spiritual connection to the site, and this opinion should be weighed against the potential damage or structural failure of the crosses if they are left in situ without any protection," it said. "If the crosses are to be moved, it is preferable that they are retained as close as practically possible to their current location so that they retain their link to the ecclesiastical enclosure."

From the study's summary [pdf file]

The preservation of crosses

While a number of structures on the site require conservation, and there are a number of pressing issues that need to be addressed, none present as urgent or as important an issue as the protection of the crosses.

Arising from the study, it is clear that on-going weathering and the existing public access will cause the continuing deterioration of the high crosses. A range of options for the preservation of the crosses have been examined. All of these options involve the crosses remaining within the immediate vicinity of the National Monument. The table below illustrates how the issue was assessed and the options that are available, adopting the following criteria:

(A) Protection from the weather and preservation in present condition in perpetuity.
(B) Round-the-clock security from vandalism/wilful damage.
(C) Protection from casual visitor damage.
(D) Protection of visual integrity and character of monument group and visitor experience of monument.

The Options

The evaluation of the options was guided by principles of best practice in conservation (O=objective achieved; X=objective not achieved)

Options

(1) Moving crosses into purpose-built visitor centre nearby and putting exact replicas, indistinguishable from originals, at the original locations A O B O C O D O

(2) Leaving crosses exposed to continued weathering (and deterioration) where they are and placing high quality replicas within visitor centre A X B X C X D O

(3) Erecting protective railings around crosses A X B X C O D O?

(4) Erecting shelter around crosses (roof only with supports) A O? B X C X? D X

(5) Erecting shelter around crosses (glazed walls and roof) A O? B O C O D X

The other objectives

Depending on the decision agreed in relation to the crosses, all other related decisions, including those relating to the extension to the graveyard, traffic management, visitor management and visitor facilities can be further analysed.

Several blogs got here first, but 17 or the 18 joint UUP and Conservative candidates have been announced today.

Mike Nesbitt - Strangford
Daphne Trimble - Lagan Valley
Sandra Overend - Mid Ulster
Fred Cobain - North Belfast
Ross Hussey - West Tyrone
Bill Manwaring - West Belfast
Trevor Ringland - East Belfast
Harry Hamilton - Upper Bann
Danny Kennedy - Newry and Armagh
John McAllister - South Down
Rodney McCune - East Antrim.
Lesley McAuley - East Londonderry.
Paula Bradshaw - South Belfast
David Harding - Foyle
Irwin Armstrong - North Antrim.
Ian Parsley - North Down
Tom Elliott - Fermanagh and South Tyrone

Keith gets in first with a great blog taking the piss out of Ian Parsely’s sudden fondness for being pictured standing in front of stuff.

The facebook series titled “Out and About” sees the former promising Alliance upstart stand, dare I say it, UNCUNFortably, at some of the North Down issue key battlegrounds, including the Bangor fountain “I say NO, NO, NO, to the needless waste of fairy washing up liquid in this fine seaside water feature.”, Donaghadee Harbour and the above pictured temporary carpark. Talk about drawing battle-lines.

Chosing ‘friends’ or becoming a ‘fan’ of something on Facebook doesn’t necessarily indicate you support the views you are connecting with, for example I’m a ‘fan’ of the Orange Order.

However, I do wonder at the wisdom of elected representative like the DUP’s Pam Lewis becoming a fan of a group which sails as close to a hate site as this

WE DENOUNCE KEITH HARBINSON & JIM ALLISTER OF TRADITIONAL UNIONIST VOICE AS COWARDS, TRAITORS, LUNDIES AND BIG GIRLS' BLOUSES FOR THEIR GROVELING "APOLOGY" TO GURU MAGGOTS!

The Irish Times reports that conservation work on the 1,200-year-old "Faddan More Psalter", discovered in 2006 by a workman operating a mechanical digger, is almost complete.  The National Museum of Ireland plans to put the eighth century religious manuscript "of staggering importance" on public display next year.  From the Irish Times report

Yesterday, the museum’s director, Dr Pat Wallace said the psalter was so rare and important it now ranks among the top 10 of the tens of thousands of objects in the national collection. It will form the centrepiece of a permanent exhibition in a room of its own expected to open by "early summer 2011" at the museum’s Kildare Street galleries. Dr Wallace said the discovery was "more important for Ireland than the finding of the Dead Sea Scrolls" had been for biblical scholars and has changed our views about how ancient Irish manuscripts were produced. He added: "We never thought anything like this would ever be found."

Additionally, from the same report

The psalter was found on the afternoon of July 20th, 2006, by Eddie Fogarty, a workman who was operating a mechanical digger.

He spotted the book in the bucket of his digger and contacted the bog’s owners, Kevin and Patrick Leonard, who gathered the fragments and covered them with wet peat before notifying the staff of the National Museum.

A specialist team that arrived at the scene discovered that the psalter had fallen open with lines from Psalm 83 clearly visible.

Hmm...  I'm not convinced it had "fallen open"

And before we have a re-run of the international furore which accompanied the original discovery there's an important clarification which the report omits.  The archived statement from the museum doesn't appear to be available, but the relevant quote is recorded in the comments here.

The Director of the National Museum of Ireland, Dr. Patrick F. Wallace, would like to highlight that the text visible on the manuscript does NOT refer to wiping out Israel but to the ‘vale of tears’.

This is part of verse 7 of Psalm 83 in the old latin translation of the Bible (the Vulgate) which, in turn, was translated from an original Greek text would have been the version used in the medieval period. In the much later King James version the number of the Psalms is different, based on the Hebrew text and the ‘vale of tears’ occurs in Psalm 84. The text about wiping out Israel occurs in the Vulgate as Psalm 82 = Psalm 83 (King James version).

Some are already quoting the wrong Psalm...

Will Crawley provides some background on the "relationship between the Vatican and the international sex abuse crisis."  Meanwhile, Damian Thompson, who thinks Seán Brady should resign, has the text of Benedict's pastoral letter to the Catholic Church in Ireland. [Adds See also Brian's post below]  From the pastoral letter

14. I now wish to propose to you some concrete initiatives to address the situation.

At the conclusion of my meeting with the Irish bishops, I asked that Lent this year be set aside as a time to pray for an outpouring of God’s mercy and the Holy Spirit’s gifts of holiness and strength upon the Church in your country. I now invite all of you to devote your Friday penances, for a period of one year, between now and Easter 2011, to this intention. I ask you to offer up your fasting, your prayer, your reading of Scripture and your works of mercy in order to obtain the grace of healing and renewal for the Church in Ireland. I encourage you to discover anew the sacrament of Reconciliation and to avail yourselves more frequently of the transforming power of its grace.

Continued

Particular attention should also be given to Eucharistic adoration, and in every diocese there should be churches or chapels specifically devoted to this purpose. I ask parishes, seminaries, religious houses and monasteries to organize periods of Eucharistic adoration, so that all have an opportunity to take part. Through intense prayer before the real presence of the Lord, you can make reparation for the sins of abuse that have done so much harm, at the same time imploring the grace of renewed strength and a deeper sense of mission on the part of all bishops, priests, religious and lay faithful.

I am confident that this programme will lead to a rebirth of the Church in Ireland in the fullness of God’s own truth, for it is the truth that sets us free (cf. Jn 8:32).

Furthermore, having consulted and prayed about the matter, I intend to hold an Apostolic Visitation of certain dioceses in Ireland, as well as seminaries and religious congregations. Arrangements for the Visitation, which is intended to assist the local Church on her path of renewal, will be made in cooperation with the competent offices of the Roman Curia and the Irish Episcopal Conference. The details will be announced in due course.

I also propose that a nationwide Mission be held for all bishops, priests and religious. It is my hope that, by drawing on the expertise of experienced preachers and retreat-givers from Ireland and from elsewhere, and by exploring anew the conciliar documents, the liturgical rites of ordination and profession, and recent pontifical teaching, you will come to a more profound appreciation of your respective vocations, so as to rediscover the roots of your faith in Jesus Christ and to drink deeply from the springs of living water that he offers you through his Church.

In this Year for Priests, I commend to you most particularly the figure of Saint John Mary Vianney, who had such a rich understanding of the mystery of the priesthood. “The priest”, he wrote, “holds the key to the treasures of heaven: it is he who opens the door: he is the steward of the good Lord; the administrator of his goods.” The Curé d’Ars understood well how greatly blessed a community is when served by a good and holy priest: “A good shepherd, a pastor after God’s heart, is the greatest treasure which the good Lord can grant to a parish, and one of the most precious gifts of divine mercy.” Through the intercession of Saint John Mary Vianney, may the priesthood in Ireland be revitalized, and may the whole Church in Ireland grow in appreciation for the great gift of the priestly ministry.

On a first reading and leaving aside the inevitable and overdue apology, the striking message of the Pope’s pastoral letter is that a clean-up is needed to strengthen the authority of the clergy, not dilute it. At the heart of his response is a basic refusal to grasp the full extent of the problem. Conservative as ever and as unquestioning as ever of the traditions, structures and authority of the Church, the Pope blames the swingin’ sixties for creating a climate of abuse, a turning away from the values of Holy Ireland.  Vatican 2 wasn’t what we thought it was.

From the Pope's letter

The programme of renewal proposed by the Second Vatican Council was sometimes misinterpreted and indeed, in the light of the profound social changes that were taking place, it was far from easy to know how best to implement it. In particular, there was a well-intentioned but misguided tendency to avoid penal approaches to canonically irregular situations. It is in this overall context that we must try to understand the disturbing problem of child sexual abuse, which has contributed in no small measure to the weakening of faith and the loss of respect for the Church and her teachings.

The Pope recognises no systemic problem like celibacy, only the faulty application of procedures – tucked among them, “a misplaced concern for the reputation of the Church”.  But no thought here that the Church’s claim to its own elevated position might be a basic problem. The admission to a sin of clerical pride is welcome though. 

Only by examining carefully the many elements that gave rise to the present crisis can a clear-sighted diagnosis of its causes be undertaken and Certainly, among the contributing factors we can include: inadequate procedures for determining the suitability of candidates for the priesthood and the religious life; insufficient human, moral, intellectual and spiritual formation in seminaries and novitiates; a tendency in society to favour the clergy and other authority figures; and a misplaced concern for the reputation of the Church and the avoidance of scandal, resulting in failure to apply existing canonical penalties and to safeguard the dignity of every person. Urgent action is needed to address these factors, which have had such tragic consequences in the lives of victims and their families, and have obscured the light of the Gospel to a degree that not even centuries of persecution succeeded in doing.

Here, in addressing the Irish bishops he comes closest to admitting cover up but is unspecific about the remedy. The idea of a wholesale reorganisation of the Church introduced after the bishops’ visit to Rome isn’t developed. This will disappoint many. However Cardinal Brady in introducing the Popes’ letter refers to it as “ one small step” and Archbishop Martin call it "a further step." This is unlikely to satisfy many victims.

Serious mistakes were made in responding to allegations. I recognize how difficult it was to grasp the extent and complexity of the problem, to obtain reliable information and to make the right decisions in the light of conflicting expert advice. Nevertheless, it must be admitted that grave errors of judgement were made and failures of leadership occurred. All this has seriously undermined your credibility and effectiveness. I appreciate the efforts you have made to remedy past mistakes and to guarantee that they do not happen again. Besides fully implementing the norms of canon law in addressing cases of child abuse, continue to cooperate with the civil authorities in their area of competence. It is imperative that the child safety norms of the Church in Ireland be continually revised and updated and that they be applied fully and impartially in conformity with canon law.

Further resignations aren't mentioned and as far as the Pope is concerned, we may assume that Cardinal Brady is off the hook. His role in reading out the letter on TV suggests he's staying on. This is probably correct. The whole idea of makng boys swear an oath even if not to undying secrecy was wrong but some confidentiality is needed in such cases before effective action is taken. He was craven for failing to speak out about it earlier but this is not a hanging offence. " Wounded healer" is a good formulation, provided he gets on with real healing and doesn't fool himself into thinking it can be limited to more praying.  Action may come as a result of a review operation to be conducted by the Vatican. A 21st century Inquisition or Star Chamber? But this is specific to Ireland and implies no wholesale reform where it is equally needed – in the opaque and overcentralised systems of the Vatican itself. “Physician, heal thyself.” The unreformed Vatican is the problem not the solution.

Furthermore, having consulted and prayed about the matter, I intend to hold an Apostolic Visitation of certain dioceses in Ireland, as well as seminaries and religious congregations. Arrangements for the Visitation, which is intended to assist the local Church on her path of renewal, will be made in cooperation with the competent offices of the Roman Curia and the Irish Episcopal Conference. The details will be announced in due course.

As usual, the laity are exhorted, but he makes no suggestion of serious democraticisation. They remain in a supporting role.

The lay faithful, too, should be encouraged to play their proper part in the life of the Church. See that they are formed in such a way that they can offer an articulate and convincing account of the Gospel in the midst of modern society (cf. 1 Pet 3:15) and cooperate more fully in the Church’s life and mission. This in turn will help you once again become credible leaders and witnesses to the redeeming truth of Christ.

This letter however unprecedented, is hardly enough unless followed up more radical measures not alluded to here. so now it’s up to the State and the people. They have to ask themsleves if they retain confidence in the authority of the clergy over aspects of education and welfare. Why leave it all up to the old man in the Vatican and his immediate cohorts, however contrite they are?

In responding to the crimes of its clergy, the Vatican has chosen to operate at an almost unimaginable level of triviality.  First of all the Irish bishops fly over to Rome and MEET THE POPE.  Then the Pope announces that is going to WRITE A LETTER.

I'm reminded of a passage from Sir Walter Scott's novel COUNT ROBERT OF PARIS.

"Notwithstanding this derangement of his most sacred time, our imperial
father, who had postponed the ceremony of disrobing, so important were the
necessities of the moment, continued, until deep in the night, to hold a
council of his wisest chiefs, men whose depth of judgment might have saved
a sinking world, and who now consulted what was to be done under the
pressure of the circumstances in which they were now placed. And so great
was the urgency, that all ordinary observances of the household were set
aside, since I have heard from those who witnessed the fact, that the royal
bed was displayed in the very room where the council assembled, and that
the sacred lamp, called the Light of the Council, and which always burns
when the Emperor presides in person over the deliberations of his servants,
was for that night—a thing unknown in our annals—fed with unperfumed oil!!"

The fair speaker here threw her fine form into an attitude which expressed
holy horror, and the hearers intimated their sympathy in the exciting cause
by corresponding signs of interest.....

From the Evening Standard's Londoner's Diary

*LORD Foster’s architectural firm has been dropped from Boris Johnson’s project to design a new Routemaster bus, despite having won the design competition back in 2008. The Mayor’s Transport for London (TfL) has instead awarded an £8 million contract to design and build five of the new buses by 2012 to Northern Ireland-based Wrightbus.
Getting rid of the unloved bendy buses and the reintroduction of a modern version of the hop-on, hop-off Routemaster were among the central planks of Boris’s mayoral campaign in May 2008, some of which he famously conducted from the rear platform of one of the few remaining in service.
His predecessor, Ken Livingstone, was much derided for getting rid of the Routemasters in 2005, having previously said that “only a ghastly, dehumanised moron” would do such a thing. 
In December 2008, the mayor announced Foster + Partners and Aston Martin as joint winners alongside bus-design firm Capoco. Foster’s design featured cream leather seating, wooden floors and a glazed roof. But a TfL spokesman has now told the Architects’ Journal: “Neither the Foster nor the Capoco concepts will be used.”
Wrightbus’s working design, which will be unveiled next month, is understood to have a limited “open” platform to the rear and two staircases. 

As the Washington Post observes, the world will be watching to see if the Pope in his letter to the Irish church tears away the veil of secrecy over the full extent of clerical cover-up and admits some blame of his own. Honesty demands that Joseph Ratzinger himself, the man who for decades has been principally responsible for the worldwide cover-up, at last pronounce his own mea culpa," says Hans Kung, the world’s most famous Catholic theologian, harrassed by JP2 for his liberal thoughts.  It seems to me the Pope is between a rock and a hard place of his own making. Does the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith. the old Holy Office he headed, hold all the details of the thousands of cases? If so, will he promise full disclosure? If he does, he exposes his own cover-up; if he doesn’t, he continues it. If neither as is likely, the pressure for full disclosure will be mightily boosted by anti-climax and his very authority put seriously at risk. The BBC’s Rome correspondent David Willey, no callow secularist and the veteran of six papacies “has never seen a graver crisis affecting the very credibility of the leadership of the world's longest surviving international organisation, the Roman Catholic Church.” Willey believes the Irish letter was held up because of the emergence of the Munich case which points straight to Joseph Ratzinger himself. It’s the old Watergate question: what did he know and when did he know it?. .

David Willey "From Our Own Correspondent"

The other day a senior Vatican official, Monsignor Charles Scicluna - an amiable priest from Malta who holds the title of Promoter of Justice - actually gave a lengthy official interview about how headquarters in Rome have been reacting to the huge growth in the number of cases of clerical abuse reported to the Pope during the past decade alone.  He also gave numbers: during the past decade the Holy Office received details of 3,000 Catholic priests reported by their Bishops to Rome for sexual misconduct or, even worse, crimes.
Sixty per cent of these cases involved homosexual acts, 30% related to heterosexual behaviour and only 10% - or 300 priests - were, he said, "actual cases of paedophilia." This was, of course, too many, Monsignor Scicluna admitted, but he added: "The phenomenon is not as widespread as has been believed."

So how many cases and how many to come?  3000 reported to Rome says the reverend Promoter, “7000 in the US, 700 new cases” says the (unsourced ) Guardian report which quotes another veteran reporter and prominent lay Catholic Clifford Longley with an even more expansive verdict than Willey's. 

"It is such a big story because everything about it is extreme," says the religious affairs author and journalist Clifford Longley. "It is the worst crisis for the Vatican since the middle ages."Longley says the church survived nazism, fascism and communism and will outlast the EU, the UN, the US. "Bad though this crisis is, it has survived much worse. At the start of the 16th century the Vatican was little better than a shit-hole."

There

is a sharp distinction between his attitude while a cardinal and his activities as pope that could yet leave an indelible stain on the reign of Benedict XVI.  In 2005 he was elected days after declaring that the time had come to sweep "the filth" from his church. By then he had read – and was disgusted by – files on more than 3,000 clerical abuse cases that were channelled to his department by a decree issued four years earlier by John Paul II.
Most of the cases dealt with by the Vatican department in recent years resulted in the accused being removed, if not defrocked. The problem for Benedict is that, as in many other theological respects, he changed his mind. The US Vatican-watcher John Allen this week published in National Catholic Reporter an extract from the transcript of a conference in Spain that showed that, as late as November 2002, Ratzinger dismissed the American abuse scandals as the result of a "planned campaign" in the media.

I can find only one voice in the press joining the valiant band of Slugger commenters defending the Church’s behaviour, Damian Thomson in the Daily Telegraph.

Many Catholics – and I am one of them – believe that the Pope has been stitched up over this Munich case.

Of the seven people originally arrested in Ireland in connection with an international investigation into a conspiracy to murder Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks, only two have been charged - one man with an immigration offence, another with making a menacing phone call to another Muslim man in the US.  RTÉ reports their appearance in court today.

Abdul-Salam Mansour Al-Jehani, who was arrested on 15 March in Waterford, pleaded guilty this morning. Detective Sergeant Donal Donohue told the court he had arrested Al-Jehani, who is originally from Libya, for not having proper identity documents and charged him under the 2004 Immigration Act. The court heard he previously applied for asylum in the Netherlands under his real name but had been refused and when he came to Ireland in 2001, he applied for asylum under a false name. In October 2008, he was granted leave to remain in Ireland until July 2011.

After noting the ways Stoneyford POVFB will go about getting around Parades Commission rulings by taking to the fields, I’ll also note how well behaved their colour party and speeches from the Orange Hall seemed to have been - despite the notable exception of current band leader, Paul Smith;

“the band will walk in the village of Stoneyford at a time and date of our own choosing."

But St Patricks parade in Killrea also suffered from those that seek loopholes as the clearly republican Sons of Ireland Flute Band, and not invited to the parade, applied to march the exact same route, at the exact same time as the return leg of AOH Division 387 Gortrighey's day out. Tacky, guys. No, it was just pure spide.

Gary Donnelly has faced numerous failed charges of assualt on British police officers as a BBC report from September 2009 notes:

Irish News journalist Seamus McKinney gave evidence that Mr Donnelly had been bundled to the ground by police officers as he paused to acknowledge the crowd.

Judge Bates said he had been "impressed" by Mr McKinney's evidence.

Speaking outside the court, Mr Donnelly said it was now the fourth occasion he had been charged with assaulting police and the charges had been dismissed.

In January even a British judge stated:

The District Judge said while there were a number of discrepancies in the evidence given by police officers during the trial, he believed the discrepancies proved that the officers had not colluded before giving their evidence.

"However, it surprises me somewhat that no-one took seriously enough Mr. Donnelly's protestations that his arm was broken", Mr. McElholm said.

Despite being only fined £450 at this stage, after appeal he was gaoled for seven months.

Then after being removed from the republican wing in Magheraberry Donnelly commenced a seven Hunger Strike. This appears to have stopped today with the ending of his segregatation from other republican prisoners.

David Burnside resigned from the Assembly on 1 June 2009, at that point he was switched over to claiming expenses via a Winding Up Allowance

Winding Up Allowance

Winding Up Allowance is paid to a former Member to allow him or her to bring their Assembly business to an orderly close. Office Costs Allowance is not payable from the date on which a former Member ceases to be a Member of the Assembly. Winding Up Allowance (like OCA) can only be claimed for actual receipted expenditure. During 2009-2010 Winding Up Allowance has been paid to one Member

Burnside’s most recent accounts for not being a member of the Assembly show a claim of £15,789.09 from June 09. Francie Brollie has also received £4,929.30 thus far for Winding Up.

Suggestions that Sammy Wilson is receiving this Allowance while still a member of the Assembly seem to be inaccurate. Claims for 14p whoopee cushions may also be fiction.

As a BBC report notes, "Security alerts are continuing in Londonderry after the Real IRA said they left four devices in the city".  Earlier The Guardian described the city's centre as "paralysed".  And there's also a security alert in west Belfast after two masked men reportedly threatened a bus driver and left a suspicious object on board the vehicle.  They're just keeping faith with the republican past...

The administrator of the troubled Presbyterian Mutual Society had applied for a five year extension to his firm's contract.  But following arguments from lawyers representing some of the shareholders in the PMS - that "Some of them may die, some of them may not have the opportunity to enjoy the fruits of their savings" - the application was amended to a period of 12 months. Although whether the property market will have recovered sufficiently by then is another matter...  And the amendment was made "on the understanding that if within that 12-month period there was a need for an extension, and that may arise, we would come back to court and ask for an extension".

I met up with John Arovosis and his America Blog colleague Joe Sudbury whilst here in Washington a few nights ago, and we recorded an interview in the street... It was good fun, though I failed miserably to fulfill John's demands that I briefly explain the history of the whole problem of politics and identity in Northern Ireland... Nonetheless, it was great fun and good to meet up with John on his home beat...

As Brian notes of the church abuse cases, the state has as many questions as the church to answer about the ‘strangeness' of their behaviours towards the church. What's disturbing about the piecemeal way in which the story has been emerging all week is it's implications for what's been going on in Archdioceses outside Dublin. Regardless of where this ends up, the Archbishop of Dublin looks like a moral colossus - not simply for his brave words, but for what he has done on his own patch, even as the Cardinal loses stature day by day... Given the problem of child abuse runs so wide and so deep in Irish society (north as well as south - and as Chris points out perhaps a lot further up than that), this piece meal disclosure of dirty back room deals is the opposite of moral leadership... It requires actions from church leaders to clean out their own stables, and follow Martin's lead. And that's not to mention something more than pious and given the recent past, rather insincere words from our political leaders... See Matt Cooper's column on Martin McGuinness and the throwing of 1970s stones:

McGuinness, who says he’s a Catholic, is entitled to his beliefs and to state them, but if he is judging the cardinal, then perhaps he should consider just how well he and his colleagues, through their actions, lived up to their responsibilities both to the state they profess to love and to their faith.

Fixtures, all on Saturday:

France v England, 19:45
Ireland v Scotland, 17:00
Wales v Italy, 14:30

Three home wins surely.....
O'Driscoll on the new tackle law interpretation
England an unpalatable mess
Wales need to stop treating players like adults
Gerald Davies on France

The Guardian’s veteran political commentator Michael White takes world weariness to new heights by predicting that the Catholic Church has the stamina to sit out the media firestorm.  These things blow themselves out in time, as all Westminster watchers know. In Britain perhaps, where the abuse crisis hasn’t reached the same level but there’s no sign of a firebreak in Ireland and indeed worldwide, where the storm is gaining second wind and is now engulfing the Vatican.  But balance and fairness are essential and never more so than when the cause is just. I see that the Church’s sclerotic spokemen have taken care to spell out that the latest cases under the microscope were reported to the police. This applies to the Bishop Hegarty case . Not for thre first time, the issue here implicates the State which has to answer why a private civil settlement was deemed appropriate for a rape case.  Responsibility seems clearer in a 2001 rape case in Cardinal Brady’s Armagh archdiocese reported by UTV tonight. This came to trial, resulting in acquittal but also a follow up compensation settlement. According to a lengthy statement issued hastily to the Irish Times, the cardinal was not bound by the confidentiality agreement of the civil action and suspended the priest. However his identity is known only through the rape victim and is being withheld to protect her. This does not appear to worsen the cardinal’s position.  Interestingly the Economist declares that “ removing the Irish primate, who has said he will only go if the pope requests it, could signal that the era of cover-ups is finally over ” a view which I believe fails to rise to the level of events.

Back to Mike White, who links to an interesting court ruling reported in the Daily Mail, market leader in turned-on crossness, which upholds the right of conscience of Catholic adoption agencies not to permit adoptions by gays. I must admit I’ve some sympathy with this view although I wouldn’t have any, if gays didn’t have recourse to other agencies. 

Mr Justice Briggs said because an exemption in the 2007 Sexual Orientation Regulations allowed gay charities to restrict their help to homosexuals, it was right that Catholic Care should also be allowed to discriminate. The judge added that the good work carried out by the charity outweighed the importance of European anti-discrimination legislation…However, he sent the case back to the Charity Commission to reconsider in light of his ruling, which means it could yet find reasons to force the adoption agency to close.

According to a BBC report there's been a slight change of plan in relation to the publication of the "pointless" Saville Inquiry's report.  Rather than the lawyers checking "for issues of national security and right to life" after the report is handed to the UK government, they'll do that before the official hand-over. From the BBC report

The report will now remain with Lord Saville until all the issues surrounding its publication have been resolved, which is expected to take about two weeks. It will then go to the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Shaun Woodward, who will decide when it will be made public. This may be before the general election.

Or it may not...

A spokesperson for the Inquiry said the revised arrangements would "reduce the length of time for which the Secretary of State has to be in possession of the report before publication".

Indeed.

I doubt if Bel Tel’s latest snapshot poll will stimulate much more than ritual pressure for a referendum on Unity. The parties have got enough to do just hanging in there for a long time to come. Naturally people will take what they like out of it. What stands out for David McKittrick is the finding that 69% of all Catholics would still vote for Unity, despite the developments of equality and powersharing. I find that less surprising. These are achievements of direct rule the parties have yet to live up to on their own.  By contrast, the supporter of the Conservative fraction Owen Polley sneers at Gerry Adams for daring to talk up Unity at the Paddyfest, because 85% of Prods and 26% of Taigs would split in favour of the Union. However the overall figure of 55% for remaining in the UK is a far from permanently decisive margin, so hopes of Unity remain very much alive.  On the question of political will to hold a referendum however, there’s a paradox.  Unless public opinion or the demographics shift dramatically, the more strident the politics and the wider the gap, the less likely the two governments are to call a border poll.  Althiugh they are derided by partisans, the wide tolerances in political attitudes consistently recorded in the Life and Times surveys make a referendum scenario even cloudier. 

As the Irish Times report points out, and RTÉ also notes, US President Barack Obama made particular mention of the Shannon airport stop-over provided to the US military, and the odd US politician, when pledging to "continue to co-ordinate in international fora as well as bilaterally to see how we can spur investment and private sector growth on both sides of the Atlantic."  He also received another "lovely" bowl. And the pre-clearance facilities at Shannon Airport are now available for all general aircraft, including private jets.  Irish Eagle identifies the link between those facilities and US tax reforms.

That's the insurance policy against being tagged as a tax haven. Avoiding tax haven designation is one of the keys to economic recovery.

It has to be a good thing that the Northern political parties aren’t tearing into each other over the paedophile crisis in the Catholic church, as Fionnuala says in her Irish Times column in which she identifies a mood of isolation among northern Catholics. Was Paisley right about the Catholic Church all those years ago?  Well of course he was in part, but was he offering instead a better vision of freedom and fulfilment?  A way through the crisis won’t be found in the old traditions of Catholic anti-clericalism and Protestant bigotry, locked in their hoary old quarrel with the institutions of the Church.  In every European country barring Ireland, there have been numerous clashes between Church and State in the past. The paedophile crisis may be gearing up for another, taking on the worldwide character of a new kulturkampf or struggle between States and the Vatican. This time not even the sacrificial resignation of Cardinal Brady, by all accounts a good man who made a bad mistake, would achieve much. Public inquiries are all very well but as the Church has already changed its procedures over child abuse, more radical reform is needed.

In the preceding two centuries, in confrontations between Church and State, the Church came out better than might have been expected, from fascist Italy to communist Poland, because the place of the Church in people’s lives could not be denied. It is no longer so secure today.  In that sense, the crisis for the Church may be worse than anything Stalin or Mussolini could throw at it.  A more open and democratic Rule for Church is surely the way ahead. Slow death from within is more insidious than persecution from without.  The Church's already tenuous position has eroded further in Britain where new equality laws have ended its role in child adoption. The Vatican's arrogance towards the Church of England in the throes of schism badly compromises their common cause. For his forthcoming State visit to Britain, Pope Benedict should be made to realise that he lacks the credentials to complain about the Church’s marginalisation in public life in a speech he’s thought to be planning for the iconic venue of Westminster Hall. This is where Thomas More was sentenced to death for his refusal to recognise State authority over the Church.

While Henry viii is hardly the ideal model, a new relationship is required. The Church – or more specifically its hierarchy – should finally surrender all institutional control over welfare and education, particularly affecting children. This need not mean much of a loss of service. Let the public spirited laity take over full control, reporting to State authority and to bishops and orders no longer.  Individual priests and nuns are always welcome to join in and their institutions they belong to can continue to raise funds. The religious ethos can easily survive where people value it, as in Belfast's Mater hospital. 

The new Rule should extend all the way to the Vatican which should seize the chance to turn itself into the ideal of the United Nations. A literal defence of the apostolic succession and incanting mantras like “ the church thinks in centuries” won’t wear any more.

The expenses saga at Westminster seems to have lead to ridiculous officiousness at Stormont. The most recent returns from MLAs show some strange claims alongside their claims for tens of thousands (I got bored after the Cs but it does continue)

£1.33 Cathal Boylan
£0.56 Allan Bresland
£0.56 Thomas Buchanan
£0.14 Fred Cobain

Wednesday's pictures come from Planck's highest frequency channels and cover about 10% of the sky. They show the great filaments of dust within about 500 light-years of Earth. In the wavelengths it is working, Planck is well tuned to see cold matter. Some of the dust it detects is about minus 261C (12K). "We have the ability to look at very cold emission, essentially dust. We can do unbiased searches over the whole sky for these regions that are very important because they are where stars are forming," Dr Tauber explained.

Nasa chips in here.  And provides the wider view. Image credit: ESA and the HFI Consortium, IRAS.

But it's really ESA's gig.

“What makes these structures have these particular shapes is not well understood,” says Jan Tauber, ESA Project Scientist for Planck. The denser parts are called molecular clouds while the more diffuse parts are ‘cirrus’. They consist of both dust and gas, although the gas does not show up directly in this image.

There are many forces at work in the Galaxy to help shape the molecular clouds and cirrus into these filamentary patterns. For example, on large scales the Galaxy rotates, creating spiral patterns of stars, dust, and gas. Gravity exerts an important influence, pulling on the dust and gas. Radiation and particle jets from stars push the dust and gas around, and magnetic fields also play a role, although to what extent is presently unclear.

Bright spots in the image are dense clumps of matter where star formation may take place. As the clumps shrink, they become denser and better at shielding their interiors from light and other radiation. This allows them to cool more easily and collapse faster.

Saint Patrick n'est pas à l’honneur à Stoneyford

Wow. The village goes French

Margaret Ritchie caused a bit if a stir this morning in Washington when shecomplained that only Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness were to meet President Obama, excluding her and Reg Empey. Her pressure paid off and got some time with him on her own. The reaction ismixed here.

No riot ‘yet' but from the Gown's photos you can see plenty of media types hanging around with hope. Maybe later guys, you are building expectations.

While the BBC spent St Patrick’s Day afternoon covering a children’s rugby match, TG4 provided coverage of West Belfast’s St Gall's bringing the Andy Merrigan Cup to Antrim for the first time and during their centenary year no less.

The match finished St Gall's 0-13 1-5 Kilmurray-Ibrickane.

And for the first time in a long time I find myself 100% agreeing with a Sinn Féin press release from Gerry Adams

Speculation is rife about exactly if/when ownership of Independent News and Media UK finally passes to Russian oligarch Alexander Lebedev. Robert Peston believes the deal is imminent later today or tomorrow. But not a word about the implications for stablemate the Belfast Telegraph, which has been the nearest thing the Indy had to a cash cow for years. Media guru Roy Greenslade covers the history of the tortuous negotiations but has no fresh information to add.  The whole business is about as transparent as Belfast sleech and a far cry from the cross border, cross channel idealism of the old tycoon Tony O’Reilly. Meanwhile the rest of the Belfast media stays silent. Cowed perhaps by the freemasonry of their own nervous owners? 

Lebedev picked up the ailing London Evening Standard for £2 and adopted the bold strategy of turning it into a single edition, late evening freesheet. That may work for the captive Tube readership and may even be on the cards for the Indy at least in London and other big metro centres. The name of the game seems to be to abandon nationwide circulation, in favour restricting it to big city concentration with lower costs. As for the Bel Tel, it seems to be part of the goody bag for Lebedev’s son Evgeny. I’m sure they’ll appreciate that in Larne. For the Lebedevs you can see the fun in the Standard gamble but the appeal of the Bel Tel may elude them. In the medium term it all seems terribly precarious, even though when I last heard, the paper was still making money despite its gently falling circulation. I wouldn’t be surprised of Lebedev’s ownership of the Belfast Telegraph was a short term fix with an sale-on to another buyer. But to whom?

According to an Irish Times report, the Irish Minister for Justice, Dermot Ahern, "will propose to the Cabinet a constitutional amendment deleting the constitutional prohibition on blasphemy when the children’s rights amendment comes up".  Game over, then? [Hopefully... - Ed] Although there's still the other jurisdiction to worry about...  ANYhoo... Atheist Ireland welcomes the commitment and notes an earlier Sunday Times report.

Ahern, who was criticised for increasing the fine for blasphemy to €25,000 last year, said he never regarded the provision in the new Defamation Bill as anything more than a short-term solution. "There was a lot of nonsense about that blasphemy issue and people making me out to be a complete right-winger at the time," he said. "There was an incredibly sophisticated campaign [against me], mainly on the internet. I was only doing my duty in relation to it, because clearly it is in the constitution. The attorney general said ‘there is this absolute, mandatory thing… it is an offence, punishable by law." A final decision on a blasphemy referendum rests with the cabinet, but if Ahern remains justice minister after this month’s reshuffle, he is likely to propose that it be added to the autumn list. The government is already committed to referendums on children’s rights and establishing a permanent court of civil appeal.

Once more then, just for fun. [We'll never shift those beards now... - Ed]

One thing is obvious this St Patrick's Day: very few people in Washington are thinking about Ireland, north or south. Obama's healthcare bill is the only thing people are talking about. The general perception (ie from both left and right is that Obama has been strangely passive. Past Presidents have be active in writing law and then offering it to Congress to rip up, or disagree with. In this case, President Obama has delegated much of the initial drafting to Congress. The bill before them now has striped out a lot of the more controversial provisions, like the possibility of state funded abortions. But it has annoyed some Democrats that their leadership in Congress has agreed to abandon a public option (meaning all government will flow into the expensive private system) or an expansion of Medicare. Jane Hamsher:

The Senate bill isn’t a “starter home,” it’s a sink hole.  It needs to die so something else can take its place. It doesn’t matter whether people are on the right or the left — once they understand the con job that’s about to be foist upon them, they agree.

That might be the sensible thing to do. Except, that US politics seems to be even more locked down than our own little regional affair in Stormont.

If and when Congress clears healthcare out of its inbox, the mid term elections will dominate the minds of the mainstream press and the US's vast army of voluble bloggers. Yep, just over a year after the Obama ‘audacity of change' election, the Democrats in the House (along with a third of the Senate, and a collection of Mayoral and gubernatorial contests now face a ‘throw the bums out' election (in a poll released by NBC last night, 50% of US voters said they would vote out their congressman) in November.

Back in 1993, when Bill (and Hillary) Clinton tried and failed to get medicare reform through Congress had a trust rating of 70%. Now, according to the NBC poll (PDF copy), it is down to 17%.

The vicious culture wars that has slowly asserted its grip on US politics (and which once Obama promised he would bring to an end) seems to have trashed the bipartisanship that once allowed the US federal government to actually pass some law. Although getting a majority in the House works, it is not good enough to pass a bill in the Senate. When the Democrats lost Ted Kennedy's old Massachusetts seat to Scott Brown, they definitively lost their filibuster-proofing.

In Washington, it seems, it is the game that counts, not the policy. A few weeks back (before he declared himself a candidate in the Democratic primary in California, Mickey Kaus argued that:

For months, both GOP and Fox hosts have been talking about socialized medicine and death panels and vicious Medicare cuts and the government coming between you and your doctor, etc. If Democrats pass the bill and none of this happens, Republican opponents will be more than defeated. They'll be discredited.

But as PoliticsDaily notes:

Where the quandary comes in for Democrats is that the [NBC] survey found 67 percent of Republican respondents said they were very interested in the November elections compared to 46 percent of Democrats.

Moral appears low amongst Democrats on Capitol Hill. Some suggest that's a lot to do with the Obama White House's aloofness from their team in Congress. They cite poor engagement both with Congress and their external support base. The conventional wisdom, from bloggers to mainstream media insiders, at this moment is that it is the Dems are going to get caned in November. The degree to which they lose seats will depend on whether they can bed in their change and begin selling it.

The buzz now is that despite huge pressure being applied by a very targeted ad campaign at wavering Democrat congressmen, the party is confident of passing the bill. Confident even though the word goes the bill may only pass by one vote. Why? Because although they can pass it with more than one vote, they won't because voting yes to health care for these guys is almost instant death in November's mid term elections. 

So one will get to take the poison chalice, whilst the other four (it's rumoured) get to run with the opposition herd.

We should get a result by midnight Eastern Time on Saturday night.

Details have been announced of Emperor Constantine Pope Benedict XVI's official state visit to the UK Scotland and England. Apparently, it's got something to do with the way his Empire is administrated...  According to the BBC report - "The theme of the visit will be relations between the Christian Churches and the major faiths."  But, obviously, not those who "cannot, according to Catholic doctrine, be called ‘Churches’ in the proper sense." And, according to Scottish Secretary of State, Jim Murphy, MP, "It is the first ever official Papal visit to our country combining state-to-state discussions and related engagements as well as pastoral events being organised by the Catholic bishops' conferences of England, Wales and Scotland".

St. Gall’s of Belfast will once again do battle at Croke Park today in a bid to become the All-Ireland club champions for gaelic football (coverage live on RTE.) The Milltown team’s ascent to the status of one of the premier club teams in Ulster and Ireland in recent years was the first visible sign that the footballing fortunes of the Saffron county were finally taking a turn for the better after generations of mediocrity- including going almost two decades without a single victory in the Ulster Senior football Championship.
Today is also the special date for school finals in soccer, rugby and gaelic football, with St. Malachy’s taking on La Salle in the soccer final, BRA facing Ballymena Academy in the rugby decider and St Colman’s (Newry) taking on Omagh CBS in the gaelic football encounter. Good luck to all involved.

2009 was a memorable year for Antrim as the county finally made its way out of the basement division in the National League. More significantly, of course, the team went on to contest the Ulster Final for the first time since 1970, though the occasion would provide sobering evidence that the gap between Antrim and the top tier counties- in this case, Tyrone- remained extremely wide.
All of which has meant that the undefeated start to the Division 3 campaign to date has been somewhat surprising, and perhaps indicative of a new found resolve and self belief absent from Antrim teams for a generation. The manner of the Antrim victories to date- including trouncing fellow northern counties, Cavan and Fermanagh- are all the more impressive when it is considered that the numerous Antrim panellists from the St Gall’s club have yet to feature for the county in the National League campaign due to their club commitments (and this includes the troubled but talented CJ McGourty, who has made amends with the Bainisteoir and will be expected to feature once again in the Antrim panel.)
Victories over at least two of the three remaining league opponents from Leinster counties should be enough to see Antrim promoted to Division Two for 2011, where much stiffer opposition awaits. But before then, there’s the small matter of a June appointment with the Red Hand county, which will provide the clearest yardstick yet of the real progress achieved by the Saffrons.

In the meantime, good luck to the Gallsmen today!

Your browser does not support iframes.

[Crossposted to thestory.ie]

Readers may recall a blog post I wrote back in December detailing my dealings with the Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism (DAST). After gleaning information from the footers of Ken Foxe's FOIs concerning John O'Donoghue, I established that the Department was using Oracle iExpense software to store expenses information.

I wrote an FOI request in October asking for a ‘datadump', of the entire database since inception (in other words, a copy of the database). The Department refused both the original request and the appeal for internal review (conducted by a more senior official in the Department).

In January I appealed the decision to the Office of the Information Commissioner. The request, internal review and appeal have cost a combined EUR240 (kindly made available by you, the public).

The Appeal letter to the Information Commissioner

Today I am pleased to say that I have reached a settlement with the Department, brokered by the Office of the Information Commissioner. The Department have agreed to release almost the entire database, with some elements removed. This is not a formal decision of the Commissioner, but is instead a settling of the issue. This just means that a formal OIC Decision was not required as the two parties reached an agreement.

The settlement is this: the entire expenses database of the Department, to include the follow expenses data headings:

Description, Grade, Full Name, Claim, Date, Purpose, Status, Total Claimed, Distribution Line Number, Start Date, Expense Type, Euro Line Amount, Currency Code, Currency Rate, Amount Quantity Unit, Rate Net Total, (EUR) Payment Date, Withholding Amount Invoice, Amount, Amount Paid.

Cost Centre numbers, employee cost centre numbers, named approvers and justification fields have been removed. There are also some removals from other fields which is either considered personal information or information obtained in confidence. These removals do not mean the information is redacted per se, it just means that in order to get the data, I agreed to remove certain columns in order to expedite the process. It does not preclude me from seeking the justification field, for example, in the future.

The data contains EUR774,882.29 of expense claims by named civil servants over a five year period (2005 to 2009 inclusive). The amount involved might appear relatively small, but it is the quality of the data that is more significant.

I cannot overstate the importance of the release of this data, and there are a number of reasons why this is the case.

Firstly, it sets an important precedent in terms of what information can be obtained from public bodies. In their refusals to release this data, the Department cited three sections of the Act which they felt exempted them from releasing it. The OIC felt differently. While not a formal decision of the OIC, a settlement was justified in this case as the Department were amenable to releasing the majority of the data sought. Decisions can take far longer to get (up to two years), so I felt that on balance the offered information in the settlement was acceptable.

Second, are the broader implications.

Following this settlement with DAST, I have started the process of requesting similar expenses data from the Department of Agriculture and Food, the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, the Department of Community Rural & Gaeltacht Affairs, the Department of Defence, the Department of Education and Science, the Department of the Taoiseach, the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission, the Department of Justice Equality and Law Reform, the Courts Service, the Industrial Development Authority, the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, the Department of the Environment Heritage and Local Government, the Department of Finance, the Department of Foreign Affairs, the Department of Health and Children, the Department of Social and Family Affairs, the Department of Transport, the Health Service Executive, the Revenue Commissioners, FÁS and Enterprise Ireland.

I believe the combined expenses data for these (and other) bodies will run to tens, if not hundreds of millions of euro.

But perhaps most critical is this: I sought the data not as a journalist looking for a scoop, not as a member of the public with an axe to grind, but as a transparency advocate only interested in the public interest. By publishing this, and coming data, I believe the public is served by a more open and accountable State – where data related to how some public monies are spent is no longer hidden, but is in full view. Transparency keeps the system honest.

I should also make clear that publishing this data is not an attempt to embarrass any one person, nor does it form the basis of any claim that somehow there was something unjustified about any expense claimed by civil servants. It is simply an exercise in transparency, and no more.

And I will leave readers with one question.

If I am getting this data and intend publishing it in its entirety online for the public to see, what is stopping the Government from doing the same, proactively, without question, and as a matter of course?

In the end, sunlight benefits us all.

The dataset, presented as is (and containing some macros):

Department of Arts, Sport & Tourism expenses database

Our esteemed Senators have been at it again. Hold onto your hats. Senator Donie Cassidy kicked it off:

Donie Cassidy (Fianna Fail): Senators Fitzgerald, Coghlan, Quinn and Norris congratulated the Jekyll and Hyde foundation for the wonderful work it is doing. Senator Fitzgerald outlined the huge difference between the cost of the services being provided by the foundation and those provided by the HSE. It is something we must examine—–

Frances Fitzgerald (Fine Gael): It is the Jack and Jill Children's Foundation.

Dominic Hannigan (Labour): Jekyll and Hyde is something different.

Donie Cassidy (Fianna Fail): My apologies. It is the Jack and Jill Children's Foundation....

Your tax euros hard at work there.

You would have to wonder whether you could call the proposal for a bank inquiry an ‘inquiry' at all. It certainly does not appear to have much in the way of grilling the people who caused the mess, or of dealing with the decisions post September 2008, all of which were the critical ones.

I made the point earlier to Senator Dan Boyle (who is said to have offered his resignation over the inquiry). I tweeted to him: "...forgive my cynicism then. Will I see TV pictures of our leaders for the past 12 years being held to account for their decisions?"

To which he replied:

Brian Cowen, at least, is a start. But Bertie Ahern, being the Taoiseach who oversaw the entire period would be another must see. And Messrs McCreevy (Finance), Cullen, Dempsey, Roche and Gormley (Environment) would be others. As I said to Mr Boyle, accountability behind closed doors is not accountability. Accountability must be seen to be done, a bit like justice. Getting a report at the end of a process is not enough.

But then accountability seems to be a rather novel concept to most of our politicians.

[cross posted to thestory.ie]

I have received copies of all financial support given by Enterprise Ireland for 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008. It details tens of millions of euro worth of grants to companies throughout the country. The supports are broken down by county.

For now I have not ‘cleaned' the data, ie I have not removed spaces and extra sentences that are not needed for the purposes of better presentation. The document is ‘as
is' and is based on PDFs which have been imported into Google spreadsheets.

Enterprise Ireland grants 2005 – 2008

You can view each year of data by clicking the respective year at the bottom of the spreadsheet.

[cross posted to thestory.ie]

[Cross posted to thestory.ie]

Last month I put an FOI request in with the Department of the Taoiseach for the following:

(1) All transcripts of public sittings of the Moriarty Tribunal from its inception to the date on which this request is received.
(2) The contract for transcription services and a breakdown of fees charged for transcription services.
(3) The breakdown of fees for the maintenance and building of the Moriarty Tribunal website, and the contract for this.

Today I received the reply. I had to read it twice to let it sink in.

Moriarty reply

I can, in some way, live with the fact that the taxpayer spent the bones of EUR1 million on transcription fees since the inception of the Tribunal in 1998. But I cannot fathom how a) the transcripts are not available online and b) that I have to pay (again) to see the transcripts of the Tribunal and c) that Doyle Court Reports retains copyright on transcripts of public sittings of a Tribunal of Inquiry setup by the Department and paid for by the Irish people.

I called Doyle Court Reporters this morning and they were very courteous and helpful. I asked for a quote as to how much I would have to pay for digital (.doc) copies of all 370 days of public sittings of the Moriarty Tribunal. They called me back a short time later, stating that for all days the cost would be EUR16,600 @ EUR45 per day. But if I was bulk buying they would be prepared to offer a discount of 25%.

I did suggest to DCR that since the public had already paid nearly EUR1 million for the transcripts, it seems a little odd that I would, as a citizen, have to fork out another EUR16,600 to get copies of the transcripts. DCR were again courteous and helpful, and suggested I speak with the Moriarty Tribunal.

I then called the Moriarty Tribunal, where I spoke with the registrar, Siobhan Hayes. First I asked if the Tribunal had copies of all transcripts, to which the answer was yes. Are these subject to FOI I then asked... to which she eventually replied no, and that copyright was with DCR. I then asked why other Tribunals, such as Mahon and Morris, had published transcripts on their websites, and Moriarty ones were unavailable. I was told that the original agreement was that copyright would stay with DCR, and that was the way it was. I then asked for a copy of the contract or agreement between the Tribunal and DCR in relation to stenography services. Siobhan said she would get back to me on this issue.

Of course a couple of questions arise. First is whether the Department of the Taoiseach does hold the transcripts, but simply pointed me in the direction of Doyle Court Reporters for copies of them. Second is how, exactly, copyright on transcripts of a public sitting of a Tribunal applies.

Third, and most importantly, is why the transcripts are unavailable for public consumption as a matter of public record. These are historically important transcripts containing the sworn evidence of former Taoisigh including Charles Haughey and Bertie Ahern, as well as other former senior ministers, civil servants and businessmen, all in relation to extremely serious issues of public concern. Indeed when a Tribunal is established it is invariably included in the Terms of Reference that it concerns "definite matters of urgent public importance".

Yet in relation to a matter of urgent public importance, for a Tribunal that is shortly to issue its second and final report, I can't see who said what in relation to anything on any given day, whatsoever.

Mad, isn't it?

Related post:
Morris transcript FOI

Another year down... a happy new year to everyone!

I can't really add much to Mr Kelly's excellent analysis. What it says to me is that the next 12 to 18 months are going to be among the most difficult, if not the most difficult, time this country has faced. I encourage everyone to read the entire document.

I will emphasise his conclusion:

Despite having pushed the Irish state close to, and quite possibly beyond, the limits ofits fiscal capacity with the NAMA scheme, the Irish banks remain as zombies whose only priority is to reduce their debt, and who face complete destruction from mortgage losses. The issue therefore is not whether the Irish bank bailout will restore the Irish banks sothat they can function as independent commercial entities: it cannot. Rather it is whether the Irish government's commitments to bank bond holders when added to its existing spend-ing commitments, will overwhelm the fiscal capacity of the Irish state, forcing outside entities such as the IMF and EU to intervene and impose a resolution on the Irish banking system.

The Irish Credit Bubble (UCD)

[cross posted to thestory.ie]

I don't want this post to seem like an "I told you so" post. But it might appear that way. I started irishcorruption.com/publicinquiry.eu back in 2005. One of the biggest issues myself and my uncle Anthony covered, and still cover on that blog, is the lack of regulation of the banks. And when the country was in a credit boom, and nobody, or at least very few, were asking questions about regulation of the banks, myself, and to a much deeper degree Anthony where highlighting this issue ad nauseum. Almost all of these posts were also copied to the office of the Financial Regulator.

August 22, 2005 Toothless IFSRA
August 25, 2005 Allied Irish Banks investigates itself
September 28, 2005 Banana Republic
October 10, 2005 Irish/Italian accountability
November 15, 2005 The sheriff is not for the good guys
December 13, 2005 Irish (Banks) Mafia
December 23, 2005 Legal actions, dodgy dealings and resignations
January 9, 2006 The (Irish financial) Wild West Show
March 24, 2006 Still waiting for law enforcement
March 26, 2006 Former AIB executives settle with Revenue for EUR323,313
June 7, 2006 Ireland - The Wild West of European finance

August 1, 2006 Irish Financial Regulator - Bizarre and toothless
August 2, 2006 Rampant corruption - rampant profits
September 28, 2006 A corrupt state
October 13, 2006 Bank robbers and bank robbers
December 12, 2006 Failing to make connections
December 14, 2006 Maintaining the illusion
January 23, 2007 State contempt for consumers
March 20, 2007 Irish Financial Regulator - Betraying the consumer
April 4, 2007 The Financial Regulator, banks and credit unions
April 25, 2007 Insider watchdog
May 3, 2007 It's all in the mind
June 17, 2007 AIB: Still ripping off customers with impunity
June 13, 2007 Man of steel turns to straw
August 23, 2007 A corrupt and secretive financial market
August 21, 2007 Dublin - A conduit for dodgy deals?
August 27, 2007 Dublin operation - A sloppily-run pig sty

And that's just the first two years of blog posts. Never let anyone tell you that no one could have seen what was coming.

Two good articles by IT journalists over the weekend.

First up, Simon Carswell, via FoI:

THE INTERNATIONAL Monetary Fund (IMF) told the Government that the definition of "long-term economic value" on bank loans in the draft Nama Bill was "masterful" as it was "sufficiently specific" and "sufficiently vague" to allow "appropriate flexibility".

Steven Seelig, an adviser at the IMF, made the comments in an e-mailed response to a request by the Department of Finance for his opinion on the draft National Asset Management Agency Bill published last August.

"It is both sufficiently specific and sufficiently vague to allow appropriate flexibility. I hope you can retain this language," said Mr Seelig, an expert on "bad banks", in a private e-mail to department officials sent on August 25th.

The e-mail was among records released to The Irish Times under the Freedom of Information Act relating to representations made to the department on Nama.

And Laura Slattery, also via FoI:

THE NATIONAL Asset Management Agency (Nama) should be required to register with the Land Registry or the Registry of Deeds, Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan has been advised.

In correspondence released to The Irish Times under the Freedom of Information Act, the Law Society of Ireland and the Property Registration Authority both expressed concern about the exemption for Nama assets to register in the Land Registry or the Registry of Deeds.

The society wrote to Mr Lenihan in September to say "normal conveyancing practice" should not be disrupted by Nama and that the agency should be required to register its interest in a land bank or property title.

The Property Registration Authority said the exemption for Nama assets to register "would appear to run counter to public policy and the necessity of transparency and reliability in land registers".

Registration on a State register "provides clarity and certainty", John Coleman, chairman of the Property Registration Authority, wrote to the Department of Finance. Other letters written to Mr Lenihan expressing concerns about the workings of Nama included a note from Bernard Allen TD, chairman of the Committee of Public Accounts.

I will be seeking copies of these FoI in my own future FoIs.

[Crossposted to thestory.ie]

I will post the document first and tell the story below, it's worth a look. The information contained in this FOI, is I believe, valuable.

Cost-benefit analyses, impact reports or preparatory reports for NAMA

Why is this information valuable? It contains a timeline of what companies were involved in consulting the Government on the formation of NAMA, and gives us insight into the process. It also contains previously unknown titles, such as HSBC's "Project Neo". This is likely relates to the rumoured formation of a "New Anglo Irish Bank" in 2010. And it gives us an idea as to the level of involvement of Merrill, Arthur Cox, Rotschilds, PwC and HSBC.

The background:

A little bit of a saga ended today, finally. It is worth noting the dates involved in this request.

On August 17 I sought the following information from the Department of Finance:

1) A list of all cost-benefit analyses, impact reports or preparatory reports that have been carried out by the Department in relation to the proposed National Asset Management Agency (NAMA). Please can you list the title of the document, its date, and by whom it was written.

2) A list of all cost-benefit analyses, impact reports, or preparatory reports that have been carried out by people or companies working on behalf of, or at the request of the Department, in relation to the proposed National Asset Management Agency (NAMA). Please can you list the title of the document, its date, and by whom it was written.

I received my acknowledgment as standard, which was followed up with an email. The email said it was unlikely my request would be successful but if I wanted, I could be given information outside of my request. I went along with this and it resulted in this blog post on September 30. That's in and around the 20 day limit under the Act.

But I didn't feel the information provided was sufficient, and I always wanted information should my request be refused. So I said I still wanted to proceed with my original request. The Department then took the date of my re-request as the initial date, thus giving them another 20 working days. This brought the result of the request into early November, despite an initial request in August.

Numerous emails were sent, and replied to. The civil servants involved were "busy" with NAMA and it was taking longer than normal to reply to my request. Last week I had enough, and wrote an email seeking an internal review as my request was now a deemed refusal since the 20 day limit had expired. Today, December 8, nearly four months later, I got the reply.

I didn't get all of them, but here are most of the questions she asked:

Why is drumcondra so important to you?
Con Ahern, he's a fascinating character..?
What is a flying column?
How did he keep order in his house?
He would give you the odd thump?
Were you afraid of him?
You liked him?
Who do you think you were most like, your mum or your dad?
She died in the middle of the good friday negotiations?
In the meantime you did slip into the hospital...?
What impact did it have?
How would the other boys have seen you? they called you a culchie?
So you were a fighter? Were you in alot of scrapes? Would you use your fists?
Did anyone ever get the better of you?
Do you need as a leader to be ruthless to succeed?

There's a great piece in your book were you say you could be tough if you had to be...
What did you mean by that? Every trick in the book?
Was Haughey ruthless?
You liked him?
DId you see him doing anything that was wrong?
Why did you take it from him?
Was Albert tough?
You were disappointed at how Lenihan supported you in the end?
What were they saying?
What did they say to you?

There's a loyalty in Miriam, I didnt deserve it?
You did find love again with Celia Larkin?
What was so special about Celia? Describe her, in your words.
What breaks your heart now about the absence of Celia in your life?
Why did it break up Bertie?
You ruled out getting married?
The Mahon tribunal... are you worried about that?
Would you be upset if they did come out with a finding like that?
You have a clean conscience on it...
You believe someone out there was trying to bury you...?
Who is the real Bertie Ahern?
Are you very self disciplined?
Was it worth it all?

Bertie + Dubai = economic implosion

I don't think I can add anything to that.

For those interested on what goes on at some State bodies that do not fall under FOI legislation, Mark has distilled the details of the Baker Tilly report in CIE (the Irish operator of railways), and posted the report itself. It details widespread fraud at the body, and is the first time the report has been made publicly available. As is policy now, I OCRd the document making it searchable and indexable.

I am back from Barcelona... and so many projects will hopefully come to fruition as a result of attending PDF Europe.