Top Issue 1-2024

11 September 2003 Edition

No smoke without a fine

11 September 2003

HERE WE GO AGAIN. A new law is being introduced and the Irish are falling over themselves to see who can come up with the best doomsday predictions. Seemingly, if the planned 26-County legislation for a smoking ban is allowed to come into effect next year, every pub, restaurant and hotel is going to have to close down. Yes, that's right, the Irish people are so incapable of removing those pesky cancer sticks from their mouths, that there is no way they will be venturing into any buildings other than their own homes, if the law is passed. Free article

Giving everyone a part to play

11 September 2003

MANY REPUBLICANS are aggrieved by the continued failure of the British Government to call elections for the Assembly - with all its attendant implications for North-South institutions. Some may feel that this heralds the end of the Good Friday Agreement as a vehicle to forward the pursuit of national liberation. This may be true, and we might be looking at a renegotiation in the future - however unlikely this might appear at present. Free article

Robert Emmet: enigmatic revolutionary

11 September 2003

Historian RUÁN O'DONNELL assesses the real significance of one of Ireland's most iconic and misunderstood national heroes, the United Irishman Robert Emmet, who was executed 200 years ago in the wake of the failure of the 1803 Rising. Free article

Lost in the post

11 September 2003

THE GOVERNMENT needs your help to solve a mystery. Well, communications minister Dermot Ahern needs your help. Here are the facts as we know them. Ten months ago, John Hynes, the chief executive of An Post, told Ahern in a letter that the company would return to profitability in 2003. Free article

Business as Usual

11 September 2003

The Laffoy resignation is symptomatic of a widespread malaise in the tribunals - that of corruption, arrogance and unresponsiveness - writes PAUL O'CONNOR. Free article

Balla Sharon

11 September 2003

Is deacair a chreidbheáil go bhfuil meas idirnáisiúnta ar bith ag rialtas Iosrael, ach feictear go dtugann rialtas SAM cluas le héisteacht do lucht Sharon i gcónaí. Free article


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