Oppenheimer’s struggle with this depiction points to the heart of his study: the provocative idea of girlhood, and childhood in general, as subjects worthy of literary and critical consideration.

Blume, whom Oppenheimer traces from her middle-class Jewish upbringing in the 1940s through three marriages, motherhood and the development of her astonishing literary career – she has sold more than 90 million books – emerges as brilliantly “girlish”. She is thrilled by reinvention and performance, hyperattuned to interpersonal dynamics, ambitious as well as people-pleasing. All qualities that inform her best work.

Drawing on conversations with Blume and her peers, the most vivid sections of this biography concern Blume’s early years. Hers is a personality shaped by the era’s gendered constraints but also an intense, liberated curiosity. Blume was never afraid or ashamed of puberty or sexuality. This openness is integral to classics such as Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, which, Oppenheimer writes, “takes seriously the ... development of an adolescent girl”. It was as radical as it was readable.

In a way that recalls Annie Ernaux’s The Years, the intensity of Blume’s early life fades into the stagnation of marriage and motherhood.

Her writing, initially inspired by Dr Seuss, became a lifeline. It was a slow process. Judy Blume: A Life is a fascinating insight into the business of writing. It also presents the discovery of a literary voice as a psychological rebirth. Oppenheimer deftly unpicks the exchange between Blume’s life and her books: her fiction drew on experience, but her fiction also pushed her towards real-world changes.

Oppenheimer’s style is refreshingly unpretentious: a homage to his subject. It is also tinged with a nostalgia that feels occasionally twee, but also honest. A longing to bridge the gap between subject and author is palpable: testament to the impossible aspirations of biography, and to Oppenheimer’s reality. He and Blume were friends. Over the writing of this biography, that friendship cooled.

This work will fascinate the Blume aficionado and compel the uninitiated to quickly join the ranks.

• Maya Kulukundis is a writer based in Dublin.

A stubborn morning fog hung around to cause a two-hour suspension in play, and a stiff southerly wind blew throughout the day to have players and caddies second-guessing club selections in the difficult conditions. At least the USGA had the sense to merely roll greens rather than mow them in order to keep stimpmeter speeds in the mid-10s while also syringing the putting surfaces with water to ensure playability.

Even so, there were incidents of moving and oscillating balls on greens which only served to underscore the prudent approach in how the course was set-up and especially so given the fog delay that meant a spillover of the first round play into Friday with Shane Lowry among those later starters.

The fog wasn’t the only stubborn entity. McIlroy too demonstrated such a streak, sticking to the task at hand with patience and some fine shot execution until two closing bogeys took a bit of the gloss off the end product.

“It was a day to really just keep yourself in the tournament and not shoot yourself out of it, which is exactly what I did eight years ago here,” said McIlroy, referring to an opening round 80 in missing the cut back in 2018. “I went out with the mindset that pars were going to be good, and if you could pick up a couple of birdies here and there, that’s always a bonus. But really it was about minimising the mistakes. I did that for the most part today.

The high point of his round came on the Par 5 fifth hole, his 14^th, where McIlroy’s response to hitting a pitching wedge approach downwind from 194 yards to 18 feet was to roll up his sleeves, remove his glove and, smiling, accept the putter from caddie Harry Diamond for the eagle putt that awaited.

McIlroy successfully converted the putt for an eagle three which leapfrogged him over Sam Stevens to the top of the leader board until a bogey on his penultimate hole dropped him back into a share and then another bogey – caused by missing the green left and failing to get up and down, his scrambling statistics of two for six showing up that part of his game – on the ninth, his closing hole, saw him ultimately slip one behind the American.

“It’s so tough, so difficult. I didn’t feel like I hit two bad iron shots on the last two holes [but] put myself in pretty difficult spots and wasn’t able to get it up-and-down. Overall, a really good day,” insisted McIlroy.

Still, when the sums were done, the numbers for McIlroy totted up to a 69, far from a disaster and a score that positioned the world number two nicely in contention headed into the next three rounds when conditions are generally expected to be less challenging.

There were tougher times for two other Irish players, as Graeme McDowell – who started birdie-birdie – fell victim to the course thereafter in shooting a 76, while Pádraig Harrington failed to muster a birdie and signed for a 77. “You could get the wrong gusts at the wrong time, for sure, but that’s golf,” said Harrington, at 54, the oldest player in the field.

Scottie Scheffler, the world number one and a US Open win away from completing the career Grand Slam, struggled with some facets of his game – primarily in judging his iron approach shots but also in adjusting to the slower greens – but stuck gamely to the task to ultimately sign for a 72.

However, last year’s champion Spaun struggled in opening his defence with a 77 – failing to find a birdie and finishing with a double-bogey six on 18 – with an uphill fight to survive the cut, while Brooks Koepka, winner in 2018 on its last staging here, signed for a 73.

Stevens, without a top-10 on tour since the Houston Open in April and playing for the first time since a missed cut at the Memorial, returned to form with a display of patience exemplified by what he called a “weird start” in opening with a double-bogey six on the 10^th (his first) to finish with a birdie on the ninth, his closing hole, for a 68.

The 29-year-old American, who has yet to win on the PGA Tour, had hit his tee shot on the 10^th when the fog horn was blown to suspend play with the flagstick on the green invisible to the players at that point. His return after the two hours delay was to hit his wedge 60 yards, into rough, in running up a double-bogey. Thereafter, though, Stevens recovered to navigate his way to the clubhouse lead with that closing birdie.

Did it come as a surprise, given his recent form?

“I wouldn’t say I’m surprised. It’s a long season. I played a lot the first half of the season. It’s easy to get worn down a little bit, and I just haven’t been as on top of keeping a good attitude as I should have been, just maybe having a little too high expectations.

“Then the moment that those expectations aren’t met, being a little more upset than I need to be. I got a week at home last week and just kind of focusing on trying to stay positive and kind of enjoy playing a little more,” said Stevens of resetting that attitude.

The hype around Johan Manzambi will only heighten after his star turn from the substitutes’ bench helped Switzerland out of a hole and get their tournament truly up and running. The 20-year-old managed to excel for Freiburg in their comprehensive Europa League final defeat against Aston Villa last month and, with 73 minutes played here and three minutes after entering as part of a triple substitution, his superb volley put an end to a sterile contest, hooking a right-foot shot into the Bosnia and Herzegovina net.

At that point Switzerland had registered eight shots, three on target, but things unravelled in the final third. It was, of course, a similar story in their opener against Qatar, when they finished with 26 shots but had to settle for a draw. Manzambi scored twice here, his second finish understated but sumptuous, before Ermin Mahmic thumped in an unstoppable volley in stoppage time, the ball clocked at 71mph according to the wraparound LED screen. Switzerland’s captain, Granit Xhaka, capped the scoring from the penalty spot after Amar Memic tripped Djibril Sow.

Manzambi was involved in the build-up to Switzerland’s second goal too, another substitute, Rubén Vargas, reading Breel Embolo’s pass to send a low first-time finish past Nikola Vasilj. The game had been set up for Edin Dzeko, aged 40 and 63 days, to take centre stage after becoming the ninth-oldest player to feature at a World Cup but Bosnia and Herzegovina’s hopes of advancing to the knockout stage of the tournament now hinge on Wednesday’s final Group B game against Qatar.

🇨🇭1-0 🇧🇦 

WHAT A STRIKE TO BREAK THE DEADLOCK!

Watch all 104 games from the #FIFAWorldCup on RTÉ pic.twitter.com/vRWjjWQ0C4

— RTÉ Sport (@RTEsport) June 18, 2026

A grey day in Los Angeles meant no searing temperatures to contend with but nevertheless the first-half hydration break provided Bosnia and Herzegovina with some welcome respite. Other than a couple of early set pieces – Bosnia and Herzegovina’s specialist subject – Switzerland had given Sergej Babarez’s side the runaround. Dan Ndoye blasted against the side netting and found joy inside the left channel. A few minutes later he tried to flick Fabian Rieder’s cross goalwards after Granit Xhaka’s weighted ball into the box. Switzerland schooled their opponents, who were also guilty of giving Murat Yakin’s men a helping hand. Kerim Alajbegovic, the exciting 18-year-old promoted to the starting line-up, played a risky pass that was intercepted by Rieder and Ndoye got a shot away, though fortunately for Vasilj it was lacking conviction.

It felt slightly alarming that with 10 minutes of the first half remaining Nikola Katic wildly celebrated winning a goal kick, punching the air after staving off another Swiss attack, even if the Schalke defender has form for doing so; he celebrated every tackle when he lost a tooth in Plymouth’s shock triumph over Liverpool in the FA Cup last year. A few moments earlier Bosnia and Herzegovina had their first sight of goal after Alajbegovic fed Edin Dzeko inside the box. Dzeko stood up a dainty cross towards the back post but Benjamin Tahirovic recorded a swing and a miss. Approaching the interval, Remo Freuler blocked Dzeko’s first shot after a bright run by Alajbegovic.

After the half-time whistle sounded, presumably Switzerland’s struggles to again apply the finishing touch flowed through their players’ minds as they headed down the tunnel. They had four shots but only one on target. The numbers were not quite as stark as in their opener with Qatar, when they finished with 26 shots to six; Qatar’s stoppage-time equaliser came courtesy of a Miro Muheim own goal.

Ndoye was lively here but Embolo was a little more on the periphery, Xhaka showing his frustration when seemingly on crossed wires at the pivotal moment. None of this should have surprised Switzerland, though, with Bosnia and Herzegovina stubborn opponents; Barbarez’s side had drawn their past six matches, including their penalty shootout victories in playoffs against Wales and Italy to reach this stage.

Switzerland were hardly relentless in the second half but the game continued in a similar theme, promising attacks coming undone in the final action. Manuel Akanji pinged a ball from right to left, Ndoye picked up the baton and sent another tame shot at goal, Vasilj making a comfortable save at his near post. It was Ndoye who produced one of the game’s best moments, reading Xhaka’s flighted pass and launching into the air to send an overhead kick at goal. Ndoye looked to the skies after Vasilj got two hands to his effort. Any joy would have been short-lived with Ndoye flagged offside.

If Switzerland were going to score, Ndoye looked the most likely candidate. Amar Dedic took matters into his own hands to stop Ndoye streaming down the left early in the second half, earning a booking for tugging at the winger’s shirt. Bosnia’s record goalscorer Dzeko was given a yellow card soon afterwards for a late challenge on Akanji and was then withdrawn on 63 minutes. It was an up-and-coming talent in Manzambi who finally rippled the net. – Guardian

As families and supporters packed into stands on either sides, the long parade of waving athletes made their way out on to the pitch to take the seats.

“Let me win. But if I cannot win, let me be brave in the attempt,” the athletes said, making the Special Olympics athlete’s oath.

The largest inclusive sporting event in Ireland this year, the Special Olympics Ireland Summer Games will see 1,277 athletes with intellectual disabilities competing, with some aged as young as seven years old, and some in their 70s.

The athletes will compete over three days across 12 sports, including bowling, equestrian, golf, swimming and table tennis.

For the athletes, the games are usually the result of four years of preparation. However, this event is especially important as the 2022 Summer Games were cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Dara Kiernan (26) will compete in badminton. Representing the Flying Trojans team and the eastern region, this is her second games.

“It is actually amazing to be here,” Kiernan said. “It is an amazing opportunity to see so many athletes from all over Ireland, and to compete with them as well.”

From Ballyfermot, Kiernan is gunning for a medal in badminton – one of 50 people competing in the sport – but in the excitement for the competition, there have been “a few sleepless nights”. That’s “good nervousness”, she said.

Thomas Heaney (23) from Co Armagh will be representing Ulster in golf and he told The Irish Times he was competing to win.

It is Heaney’s first Summer Games, and he said he was “very excited” to be taking part. He will be backed up by countless family members in the stands, who, he said, are “very proud” of him for competing.

“Sitting here, waiting for the athletes to come out, I am quite emotional,” said Mary Hughes, whose son David is one of the athletes competing over the next three days.

She said David was now far more outgoing as a result of competing in the games.

“It is hugely important for the athletes’ development, through socialising and mixing with people they become confident,” she said. “The best thing about the Special Olympics is that the athletes are so lovely and down-to-earth. They love to win, but they are not disappointed if they do not because they root for each other.”

David, from Co Carlow, will challenge for a medal in bowling at age 46. His mother said “age doesn’t matter” in the games, with everyone getting a chance to compete thanks to the “amazing volunteers”.

Karen Coventry, the “incredibly proud” chief executive of Special Olympics Ireland, said she had the “professional and personal privilege” of being involved in the games for 24 years.

Some “15,000 sandwiches and 45,000 bottles of water” will fuel the competition but, for the athletes, as well as their sport, the “big disco” on Saturday night will spark huge excitement, Coventry said.

The President said it was the 40th anniversary of the games in Ireland, with the first competition held in 1986. She said the athletes are in their third year of a four-year cycle, with the ultimate goal being to compete at the World Games next year in Santiago, Chile.

While the athletes are striving for success, Connolly said that was represented as much in the “joy in the face of the athlete” and the smiles seen in the competitions, as it is represented in the medals they may win.

“Anyone involved with Special Olympics Ireland can attest to benefits and changes that go far beyond the court, the pitch, or the pool. It is, ultimately, the building of a community that shows what true inclusion looks like: where everyone has a place, and everyone is supported to develop in their own way.

“I congratulate all athletes on the hard work and commitment you put in to qualify to compete at the Ireland games,” the President said.

Patrick Sharkey, now 83, stood emotionless in the dock as he was put behind bars for a total of 132 charges.

Some victims waved at their attacker as he was led away by prison officers.

Sharkey, originally from the Clonmany area in Donegal and most recently with an address in Belfast, abused his victims in Co Donegal over a period from 1970 to 1995 – during which time he was a teacher at St Joseph’s High School in Coleraine.

Many of the victims were students at the school when Sharkey preyed on them, with one victim just seven years of age when the abuse began.

In sentencing Sharkey at Donegal Circuit Court on Thursday, Judge John Aylmer said the offending, which he described as “very invasive”, represented “a gross breach of trust on all occasions”.

He said that a further aggravating feature was the length, extended period of time and age of his victims, who were between seven and 16 years old.

“The offences can only be described as very calculated, premeditated and predatory in nature,” Aylmer said. “It involved a significant amount of grooming of the victims.”

Sharkey was before the court on signed guilty pleas for all 132 charges, which were a mixture of indecent assault and sexual assault. One of the complainants was the subject of 59 of the charges.

Some offending occurred when children travelled from school to take part in extracurricular activities and stayed in Sharkey’s parents’ house in Clonmany, Co Donegal, while other offences took place when they were on trips to Dublin.

Aylmer said the “sheer number of complainants and large number of offences took it into the upper end for sentencing”.

The signed guilty plea offered significant mitigation, while Aylmer noted Sharkey co-operated with the investigation by travelling to this jurisdiction and making “albeit limited” admissions.

“There is a significant risk that by imposing a prison sentence that you might die in prison,” Aylmer said. He sentenced him to seven years in prison with the last six months suspended.

Det Garda Johnny Gallagher outlined the evidence in the case at a sentencing hearing in May.

One victim, who was the subject of 59 counts, told detectives: “Pretty much every night I was in Clonmany with Patrick Sharkey he sexually abused me”. He said he was “so shocked” and said he “didn’t know what to do”.

“Patrick Sharkey took something out of me that never returned,” a further victim had said.

Another of Sharkey’s victims said he has been trying to block out the incidents for 40 years, while another of his victims told gardaí: “I was just terrified and I pretended to be asleep.”

Sharkey was interviewed on three occasions by detectives and made only “partial admissions”, the court heard. The court heard that Sharkey later told investigators: “Some time in the last six months I’ve come to the conclusion that I shouldn’t have touched those people at all.”

That he was sacked by the BBC in 2015 for thumping his Dublin-born producer was seen as ultimate confirmation that he was, as the British would say, a bad ‘un. How we looked forward to never ever encountering him on television again: goodbye, Jeremy, and don’t let your McLaren gull-wing door hit you on the way out. As one Top Gear fan wrote on social media at the time, “We all knew he was a knob, but behaviour like that is just unacceptable”.

But now, following the final two episodes of series five of the blockbuster Clarkson’s Farm, even hard-core Clarkson-haters are in the uncomfortable place of feeling sorry for and perhaps even quietly admiring him. That is a consequence of this week’s bombshell that he has been diagnosed with an “aggressive” form of prostate cancer.

Ever the showman, he made the reveal on camera during a business meeting with his farm manager, Kaleb Cooper, and land agent, Charlie Ireland. “I’ve got cancer,” he said in a scene filmed last year. “I had a medical, remember, back in May? I disappeared off the other week, and I had a biopsy, and it is cancer, and it’s aggressive.”

Clarkson looked uncharacteristically deflated and every one of his 66 years – the bumptious bonhomie that is his on-screen signature nowhere to be seen. He was initially reluctant to go into detail – “where it is, is of no concern to anybody”- but later elaborated. “The prostate, 10 per cent of it’s dead,” he said. “The 10 per cent where the cancer is.”

You would obviously have to be made out of granite not to empathise with someone with cancer. Add to that the fact that Clarkson’s Farm could well do more to increase awareness about prostate cancer than any number of public information campaigns. Prostate Cancer UK made exactly that point, saying the episode would “raise vital awareness”.

Clarkson has, in fact, spoken about the topic previously, urging men to have their prostate checked. “I’ve had too many friends go down with prostate cancer, and all it takes to get on top of the situation early is a moment or two of being a bit cross-eyed,” he said. “You get the all-clear and the doc goes home happy. What’s not to like?”

The latest series ends with Clarkson’s health having taken a turn for the worse – a sobering conclusion to a season that began with the presenter being diagnosed with a heart condition. Shortly before the end credits, he says his farewells from a hospital bed.

Clarkson’s Farm season five on Prime: A cuddly Jeremy Clarkson? On Diddly Squat farm, pigs truly do fly

“We started season five with me in a hospital bed. Here we are at the end. I’m back in a hospital bed. Some of the treatment has gone awry… If this is all successful, I’ll see you for season six. If it isn’t… I won’t… take care everyone.”

The state of his health is currently unclear, but he has been filming new episodes of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire and has been seen back on Diddly Squat Farm. Whatever the future holds, the real shock is that even those who enthusiastically loathed Clarkson will find themselves in the novel position of wishing him the best. What an odyssey it has been for a presenter who for many years seemed to relish his role as the biggest rotter on the small screen. From Top Gear to top bloke, his redemption is complete.

The big winner of the night was architectural firm Henry J Lyons which won five awards: public building; universal design; urban design, international; and client award.

The remodelling and resurfacing of the face of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) on St Stephen’s Green was awarded the public building award and client award.

After winning the RIAI’s public choice award on Wednesday , the Little Angels School in Letterkenny, Co Donegal, designed by McGarry Ní Éanaigh Architects, won the universal design award on Thursday.

“This year’s winning projects demonstrate how good design can improve people’s lives in meaningful and lasting ways,” RIAI president Fionnuala May said.

“[Irish] Architects are working with the State and communities to deliver innovative public buildings and infrastructure that will support the needs of current and future generations.”

This year’s awards recognised 24 projects across 12 categories.

Full list of jury winners

International

The international award went to Ireland House in Tokyo by Henry J Lyons, which is the realised design of an international architectural competition by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade with the RIAI.

Living home (new build)

The living home (new build) award went to the O-House, designed by Lawrence and Long Architects.

The Rathmines property features a circular courtyard containing a garden and terrace with patio doors that flood the interior in light.

Living home (adapted)

Greenville Terrace by Rachel Carmody Design and Pembroke Cottages by Reir Studio, two renovated brick builds, scooped prizes in the living home (adapted) category .

Adaptation and re-use

Three buildings were awarded in the adaptation and re-use category, including Inis Cealtra visitor centre in Lough Derg, Co Clare. The restored rectory, which dates back to 1905, was completed by McCullough Mulvin Architects.

Number 38 Fenian Road was also awarded after the Georgian building was restored to provide the Royal Irish Academy of Music with student accommodation.

The design by Lawrence and Long Architects includes protruding white cubes that provide extra space for en-suite showers.

Slid in between an existing office building and a manufacturing plant, the new headquarters for Kilsaran was also recognised in this category.

What was once a series of rundown buildings is now a workspace where landscape and industry interweave.

Conservation

Blackrock Park Teahouse, restored by 7L Architects, won one of two conservation awards, the other going to the restoration of the historic Magazine Fort in the Phoenix Park by the Office of Public Works.

Sustainability

Vantage Business Park, Ireland’s first multi-unit mass-timber business park, was designed by Gottstein Architects.

With more than 500 trees and 10,000 saplings, the park was recognised with the sustainability award.

Urban design

Google’s Bolands Mills public realm, designed by Henry J Lyons and Gustafson Porter + Bowman,was awarded both the urban design and universal design awards.

Google itself describes the complex as a “livingroom for the Docklands”.

Universal design

The Little Angels School in Letterkenny, Co Donegal, claimed the universal design award. The school, which has a landscape of sensory gardens, trails and amenity areas, was described as “a masterclass in inclusive design” by the RIAI.

Client award

The jury also presented two client awards to bodies that have shown particular leadership in delivering quality outcomes for their end users: Dwyer Nolan and The Iveagh Trust for Stonemount Park, designed by DSA, and the RCSI for Project Connect, designed by Henry J Lyons.

Public building

The RIAI recognised a group of projects that “positively impact society” in the public building category.

Awards went to the East Meath Civic Centre by Robin Lee Architecture; Project Connect, RCSI by Henry J Lyons; University of Limerick Student Centre by Cotter & Naessens Architects; and Barretstown Medical Centre by McCauley Daye O’Connell Architects.

Workshop and Fit-Out

The workplace and fit-out award recognises workspaces that operate as more than just a place to go to work.

The winners in this category were Earlsfort Terrace by Lawrence and Long Architects and the Leeson Lane Office Building by the OPW.

Living housing award

The winning housing projects were Bóithrín na Saoirse, a collaboration with CENA Culturally Appropriate Homes and Galway County Council by Desiun Architects; Glin Court, an age-friendly redevelopment by Paul Keogh Architects; and the Shanganagh Castle Estate neighbourhood by ABK Architects.

Kelly, who succeeds Kieran Christie, is currently national secretary for health and social care professionals, pharmacy and statutory regulation at Fórsa.

A native of Cork, she is a graduate of University College Cork (UCC), where she studied Speech and Language Therapy, and the Institute of Public Administration.

She was elected equality officer at the Union of Students in Ireland (USI, now AMLE) then a project officer with Ahead, which works to support disabled people in education and employment.

She joined Fórsa in 2012, initially as an organiser in its education department and has risen through the ranks since to co-lead its health division, which has more than 30,000 members.

She has been involved in a number of disputes during her time with the union, including the recent strike action by perfusionists based at the Mater and four other hospitals across the country.

She succeeds Christie, who had previously been a teacher with a long history of activism in the ASTI itself.

The union represents secondary teachers across the country and had 20,212 members at the end of 2024, up from 18, 872 the year before. Two thirds of its membership are women.

Like most of the public unions it has benefited from sustained recruitment in sectors like education, health and administration.

It has annual income of about €6 million and assets of €14 million.

Kelly, who is due to leave Fórsa in the coming weeks, is scheduled to take up the position at the end of September.

Georgijs Poniza (37) was given a 13-year prison sentence and Armen Pogosyan (30) received a similar sentence, but with the final two years suspended, when they appeared before Donegal Circuit Court on Thursday.

It is the first conviction of its kind in the Republic for human trafficking on the basis of labour exploitation. Some of the victims had to scour public bins for food.

The duo, of Assaroe Falls, Ballyshannon, were each before the court on 17 charges, including seven apiece of trafficking. They also pleaded to money laundering and forgery charges.

Judge John Aylmer said it was clear it was a joint enterprise and both men “played a lead role”.

He noted a very high degree of planning and premeditation and said there was a substantial degree of threats and menaces used, with victims subjected to physical violence.

The victims, six men and one woman, lived either in a rural house in Rossnowlagh or in an apartment in Ballyshannon, where conditions were described as “substandard” with a lack of heating and no bedding.

“There was a very significant psychological harm inflicted on the victims,” the judge said. “In some cases, the impact continues.”

“You took advantage of the fact that they were all vulnerable people and they lived in quite impoverished circumstances in Latvia. They were, therefore, all the more amenable to this type of exploitation.”

Last month at a sentencing hearing, Det Garda Paddy Kelly told how the victims were initially recruited by deception in Latvia. They were promised employment with a good salary, good housing and no bills.

Poniza and Pogosyan entered into an arrangement where they would supply workers to two companies in south Donegal. There was no criminality suggested against the companies, who co-operated fully with the investigation.

Bank cards in the name of some of the victims were obtained and used by the accused.

“The victims suffered extreme humiliation,” the judge said. “They felt as if they were treated like ...animals, or worse, like slaves. They were left homeless and some were left scavanging in bins for food.”

The passports of the victims were seized by the men who said they were needed to manage tax affairs. The accused used their victims’ payslips to control what money they would receive. They made deductions while victims would be “fined” if they were found drinking alcohol in the properties.

“I felt that I had no rights,” one victim said, adding that he was regularly assaulted. “I felt humiliated.”

The woman told how she was threatened and bullied and how the pair controlled their victims at all times. At one stage, the accused men made her sign a “debt bond” and she paid €100 a week until a total of €2,100 was paid over.

The judge noted both accused had entered guilty pleas, albeit at a late stage, which spared the victims having to endure a six-week trial.

He noted an “expression of remorse” from Poniza, which was previously issued through defence counsel, while he said that Poniza had a good work record, having trained as a mechanic, before his arrest.

Pogosyan, who hails from Uzbekistan and is of Armenian nationality, penned a series of letters to victims and to Aylmer, detailing his apology, a previous court hearing heard. The judge said his remorse was apparent.

When police arrested the men in 2023, Revenue and fraudulent documents in victims’ names were seized as well as fuel cards and debit cards.

Cambridgeshire police said officers were called to Johnson’s of Old Hurst, in Huntingdonshire, at 1.24pm on Thursday to “reports of an incident involving a three-year-old boy, during which he ended up in the crocodile enclosure”.

“The boy has been taken to Addenbrooke’s Hospital (in Cambridge) with serious injuries and is critical but stable,” a force spokesperson said. “Specially trained officers are at the hospital supporting the boy’s family.

“A 30-year-old man from Norfolk has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder.”

Det Insp Verity McCann said: “At this stage we are speaking to people who were at the zoo at the time of this distressing incident to understand more about the circumstances.

“We do not believe the man arrested and the child are known to each other.

“Officers are supporting the boy’s family at hospital and our thoughts remain with them.”

In a statement on social media, Johnson’s said the zoo’s Tropical House will remain closed until further notice.

The statement said: “Our thoughts and prayers are with the boy and his family following the incident that occurred today.

“Out of respect to the family, our Tropical House will remain closed until further notice. If you have any questions about the incident, please direct enquiries to Cambridgeshire Police Constabulary.”

Ben Obese-Jecty, MP for Huntingdon, said: “I am aware of the incident at Johnson’s of Old Hurst and have been liaising with senior officers at Gold Command who are treating this as a critical incident.

“This is now a live criminal investigation and I would ask people to refrain from speculation online. The police will provide an update with further information in due course.

“My thoughts are with the young victim and his family during a hugely traumatic and difficult time.”

Alastair Torrance, deputy chairman of Old Hurst Parish Council, said: “I do feel enormously for the family of the child. It must’ve been absolutely terrible for the child and the family.”

According to its website, Johnson’s of Old Hurst is a family-run farming business that now features a butcher’s, a farm shop, tea room, steakhouse and zoo.

Keir Starmer signals openness to Burnham cabinet role amid leadership tensions

The zoo is home to more than 100 animals, including lions, tigers, sloth bears, capybaras, meerkats and crocodiles.

A blog post on the zoo’s website says the crocodiles were initially kept to help dispose of waste meat from the butchery, but they went on to be the start of a zoo.

Now the zoo offers experiences, including some aimed at allowing children to help zookeepers look after smaller animals, and others such as spending 30 minutes feeding crocodiles for £80 or lions for £100.

The crocodiles are kept in a converted cattle barn, which has metal-fenced elevated walkways looking down on large pools of water surrounded by tropical vegetation.

A spokesperson for Cambridgeshire County Council said: “Our thoughts are with the victim and their family but as this is a live police investigation, we cannot comment any further.” – PA

“The Ivorian Football Federation (FIF) reports that Elye Wahi’s administrative situation has evolved favorably. The necessary authorisations for his entry into ⁠Canadian territory have now been obtained,” said a statement from the official X account of the ‌Ivorian ‌Football ​Federation.

Canadian immigration officials did not immediately respond to an email query by Reuters. Wahi was linked to an investigation into suspected sports corruption, with French authorities ⁠saying unusual betting patterns were detected around ​a yellow card Wahi received in a Ligue 1 ​match while playing for Nice last month.

Wahi, who was not immediately available to comment, was not named ‌as a suspect. A spokesperson for the ​Marseille prosecutor’s office told Reuters a 23-year-old Ligue 1 player was taken into custody on May ⁠29th as part of an investigation into ⁠suspected organised fraud, organised ​sports corruption, handling stolen goods and money laundering.

The FIF said it had full confidence in Wahi.

“To date, the FIF has not been officially notified of any legal or administrative proceedings concerning him,” the FIF said in a statement.

“During this particularly difficult period, the FIF offers its full support to the player and reaffirms its confidence in him. Elye Wahi remains an important member of the Ivory Coast national team.”

The FIF earlier said Wahi would not be ‌able to join the delegation’s ⁠trip to Canada.

“This is because the administrative authorisations required for him to enter Canadian territory have not yet been obtained. Elye Wahi will therefore remain in the United States ‌until the team returns,” it said. Wahi, who previously represented France at Under-21 level, made his senior international debut for Ivory ​Coast in March. Ivory Coast beat Ecuador 1-0 in their first Group ​E match, while Germany are coming off a 7-1 rout of Curacao.

About 20 staff at the centre, which provides residential, respite and day dementia care, are scheduled to strike on six separate days over the latter part of July after what their union says is a long campaign to have their grades altered to take account of the changed working practices.

Their claim to be regraded to Multi-Task Attendants was recently the subject of talks at the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), but Siptu, which represents the staff, says no progress was made on the issues involved. Staff have since voted in favour of industrial action.

“This has been going on since 2023, when I started in this role,” said Siptu health official Helen Waller. “We have been trying to find a resolution, and we finally got management to attend the WRC, but they didn’t come forward with any new proposals and so we’ve had no alternative but to ballot our members. We are still open to new talks aimed at finding a solution that would avoid the action, though.”

Waller says the role of the staff involved has come to include the provision of some elements of care to patients, but that is not recognised in grades rooted completely in housekeeping work.

The first strike is scheduled to take place on July 15^th with a further five one-day stoppages due to take place over the following two weeks.

St Joseph’s Centre said it was “aware of the notification of industrial action” but that it was inappropriate to comment on the issues in dispute..

“We also consider it premature to speculate on the potential impact of industrial action at this point, given that the proposed date is several weeks away and there remains time for further engagement through the appropriate industrial relations channels,” a statement by the centre said. Contingecy planning is underway, it added.

They can put the matches away, at least for a little while. Before this game the South Africa head coach, Hugo Broos, had responded to fierce criticism for how his side had started the World Cup by revealing that eight months ago, having qualified for the competition, a friend told him they would erect of a statue of him and that he had said: “Make it out of wood; that way it will burn more easily when I lose.”

Defeated 2-0 by Mexico, they were seven minutes away from following that up with a 1-0 loss to the Czech Republic, left with no points, no goals and not much hope either. But then, almost from nowhere, a penalty allowed them to live to fight another day, the bonfire avoided for now.

Teboho Mokoena was the man that scored it and what it meant could be seen not just in the way that he celebrated but in the tears that had rolled down his face during the national anthem. A draw is not a great result and it was not a great game but there was a smile at the end, and hope too. South Africa can still go through: victory over South Korea would virtually guarantee it; a win for the Czechs against co-hosts Mexico would see them through too. Whether they are capable of securing one is a different matter.

“This will be different,” the Czech head coach Miroslav Koubek said after his side’s 2-1 defeat by South Korea. Yet the beginning did not scream improvement. They had only been playing 45 seconds when a long, looped cross from the left found Patrik Schick all alone at the far post, barely six yards out. It was as if South Africa had yet to start playing and as if the striker had not either, like he did not expect it to reach him in the first place. With the ball falling from a height and the contact weak, his attempt on goal, if it could be called that, dribbled apologetically wide.

If the header was not great, Broos’s side were worse in those opening stages. Accused of being too negative against Mexico; here they could have done with a little more negativity, some of what Carlo Ancelotti likes to call pessimistic defending. The Czech Republic were dominating; South Africa were allowing them to and they found themselves a goal down after just five minutes.

The Czech Republic’s second World Cup goal began in the same way as their first: from a throw-in. Up the line it went, Adam Hlozek escaping into a wide space on the left and pulling the ball across an almost empty area. Khuliso Mudau watched it pass and watched two opponents do the same. Wondering whether to stay or go, by the time he had decided it was too late and he was caught in the middle. The defender’s mistimed step towards the ball made up the attacker’s mind. With one neat touch, Alexandr Sojka took Mudau out the game and set up Michal Sadílek to finish.

South Africa appeared out of it, the Czech Republic cutting through them easily and accumulating four shots inside 10 minutes. A deflected effort from Oswin Appollis which hit the side netting was South Africa’s first on 12 minutes, but at least they had turned up. At least now it felt like a game, at least they were playing.

Iqraam Rayners could not get to a Mudau cross inside the six-yard area but there was life at last and a lovely move out from the back saw the full back get in just after the hour. From a neat set-up, Mokoena thumped it over from 25 yards. Just before the break, Matej Kovar dropped the ball at the feet of Thapelo Maseko, but his shot was blocked. South Africa were in this; the Czechs had invited them to be.

But as the second half began they sought to reassert themselves once more, Sadílek getting free to find Vladimir Darida, whose poor touch meant it came to nothing. Schick’s header was then easily stopped by Ronwen Williams and a cross from Sojka was cleared by Mokoena before Jaroslav Zeleny’s clever pass almost set up Sadílek.

All of which might make it sound like a goal was more imminent than it really was and soon the game became a more cautious affair. For South Africa only Appollis offered any real glimpse of invention. Not much happened in the period before, to more boos, referee Tori Penso sent the players to the touchline for more drinks they did not need and a team talk they probably did.

South Africa needed something in the fourth quarter, that was for sure. Even if it was just a reaction, a flash of anger, maybe even fear. What they got was a gift. The Czech Republic had let them play, which did not seem like the worst plan given how little they could create, but from nowhere in particular it came to pass. Coming inside from the right, Thapelo Maseko had a go from outside the area; the ball hit Pavel Sulc on the arm and Penso did not hesitate. From the spot, Mokoena scored. He ran to the corner, thumping at the badge, as team-mates ran after him from the pitch and the bench.

South Africa were alive. They were pushing too, the final 10 minutes or so offering more than the previous 80 had: here was some excitement at the end. Lukas Porovd struck wide at one end and suddenly, in the fifth minute of added time, Evidence Makgopa was in, only to hit straight at the goalkeeper. There was still time for one more Aubrey Modiba effort, who was blocked by David Zima. That really would have been a firestarter. – Guardian

The proposed legislation, tabled by main Opposition party Sinn Féin, passed second stage in the Dáil by 86 votes to 70, in part with the help of a number of Government TDs – notably Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Tánaiste Simon Harris.

The respective leaders of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael both voted in favour of progressing the Bill to committee stage.

Most of their TDs and several Ministers did not.

Some 28 Fianna Fáil TDs rejected the legislation, while 12 supported it.

High-profile Fianna Fáil Ministers who opposed the removal of the three-day waiting period include potential future leadership contenders Jim O’Callaghan and Dara Calleary.

Other Ministers who voted in favour include Darragh O’Brien and Jack Chambers, also seen as possible future leaders of the party.

As for Fine Gael, 23 of its TDs members voted against – including Ministers Peter Burke and Martin Heydon – and 11 backed the proposal.

Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill voted in favour. So too did many of the younger TDs in the two parties – both men and women.

What would scrapping the three-day wait for abortion mean for pregnant women?

There are further stages to go, including amendments to be tabled and Senators having their say, before the proposal to remove the three-day wait might become law. That brings with it the potential for disagreement in the months ahead.

Were it almost any issue other than the sensitive matter of abortion policy, such division within the Coalition parties would set alarm bells ringing in Government Buildings.

However, both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael TDs were allowed a free vote on what has been deemed an issue of conscience. And it is not at all surprising that there are different views within their ranks when the party whip is lifted.

Individual Coalition TDs often must bite their tongue and vote in favour of Government policies they may personally disagree with.

Will there be any long-term damage for either party? It is unlikely.

Famously, 31 Fianna Fáil politicians posed for a photograph to express their support for a ‘No’ vote before the 2018 Referendum to repeal the Eighth Amendment on abortion – at a time when Martin and a smaller number of his party colleagues had expressed support for the ‘Yes’ side.

When it comes to pregnant women in crisis, the aul’ fellas think they know better

In a party that is no stranger to internal rows – look no further than the aftermath of Fianna Fáil’s disastrous presidential election bid – abortion, for all the sensitivity of the subject, has not featured as a cause of any great unrest.

By allowing a free vote, the Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael leadership take the heat out of what has traditionally been one of the most contentious issues in Irish politics – within their own ranks at least.

There were even hints from Harris and O’Callaghan at a press conference on Thursday that there could be a case for loosening the whip system in other instances.

Harris said he felt there was “a strong case for more TDs to be allowed outside of the whip system to give their views on sensitive issues”.

O’Callaghan echoed this, saying other parties should look at the free vote allowed to Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael TDs. “I think there’s a lot of Sinn Féin TDs who’d have preferred to have a free vote last night and they weren’t given that opportunity,” he said.

As to what issues could warrant a free vote, do not expect Coalition TDs to get any latitude when it comes to Government legislation, Budget matters or confidence votes. But it has happened on other issues – for example, the 2024 Dáil vote to accept the final report of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Assisted Dying.

Abortion services Bill has strengthened case for conscience-based voting, Tánaiste says

Should any conclusions be drawn from Fianna Fáil leadership contenders O’Callaghan and Calleary voting against removing the three-day waiting period for abortion services? The pair had been on different sides during the 2018 Repeal referendum, and on Thursday both set out similar reasons for their vote this week.

O’Callaghan said his decision had been a “difficult” one, adding, “I campaigned for Repeal back in 2018,” and at the time, “We brought middle-ground Ireland with us.” He said the people were told in 2018 how the “statutory regime” for abortion services would operate. “I didn’t want to start unpicking that now,” he said.

In a statement to Midwest Radio, Calleary said people voted in the referendum on the basis of assurances like the three-day wait. “I don’t believe they should be removed,” he said.

Some in Fianna Fáil believe their stance on the three-day waiting period will do them no harm among the party’s conservative grassroots at whatever point Martin’s successor is being decided upon.

However, with the timing of any contest an open question, it is unclear how prominent the issue of abortion will be when it comes to Fianna Fáil selecting its next leader.

While it may be a key issue in the background among some within Fianna Fáil when they decide who to back, other matters will likely be to the fore when the hustings begin.

The observation was made by defendant Ming Ting Mancel’s sister, Yen Ting, who gave evidence on Thursday via video link from France.

Ming Ting Mancel is accused of, and denies, murdering her daughter Catherine in collaboration with her deceased husband Emeric Mancel.

The family had travelled to Reykjavik in June last year, supposedly for a final holiday before carrying out a suicide pact together. The bodies of Catherine and Emeric were found a week later at the luxury Reykjavik Edition Hotel on June 14th, 2025.

Ming Ting Mancel admitted at the scene that she had killed her husband and daughter, but later changed her statement and now pleads not guilty, saying her husband carried out the killings.

Yen Ting testified that the last time that she saw Catherine was in the summer of 2018. She described her niece as “quite shy”, and said she did not speak a lot.

She said she did not seem to have any developmental difficulties and was capable of normal conversation.

“But she was a bit fragile,” she acknowledged. When the subject of moving away from home had come up, Catherine had said she was happy living with her parents and did not want to move out.

She also stated that it had been many years since her sister Ming Ting had been in France, saying that she and her sister kept in touch using the WeChat app. She recalled the two most recent occasions when her sister had come to France with her family – the first about 16 years ago and the second in 2018.

She spoke of contact she had had with her sister on Wednesday, June 11th last year, the last time they had exchanged messages.

‘I killed two people’: Dublin-based family murder trial hears evidence from first policeman on scene

Speaking in French, Yen Ting told the court that Ming Ting sent her a WeChat message to say only that she was going to receive a package soon. “That was her last message.”

Yen Ting recalled how she had been worried by the message. It was very short, she said and had not seemed like her sister’s usual messages.

She sent two messages in reply but did not have her mobile number to give her a call.

Yen Ting received this package five days later – two days after her niece and brother-in-law’s bodies were discovered at the Icelandic hotel. In it were souvenirs from Iceland as well as jewellery belonging to Ming Ting Mancel – specifically, a ring.

On June 18th Yen Ting received her niece’s will by post.

Earlier, a medical examiner detailed how Catherine Mancel may have struggled to get free from an attempt to strangle her before she died. Marks on her neck showed she may have tried to break free of the noose, he told Reykjavik district court.

Catherine also had two stab wounds, the second of which wounded her in the heart and eventually killed her, he said. The examiner added that the attempt at strangulation most likely occurred before the second stabbing.

On Friday, Ming Ting Mancel had explained how her daughter Catherine had wanted to die with her parents, but that being stabbed had not been her preferred method. However, her parents had been unable to think of a “more certain” way.

In the district prosecutor’s indictment, Ming Ting Mancel is accused of holding her daughter down along with her husband, and tying a noose around her neck to stop her breathing. They are also charged with stabbing her twice.

Ming Ting Mancel has claimed that she held her daughter’s hand while her husband stabbed her on a chair in the bathroom, and that they later moved her to the bed where he stabbed her again.

The trial is set to continue on Wednesday.

Blackglen Bridge carries traffic over the M50 at Ballinteer near Junction 13 and links residential and commercial areas in Sandyford and the surrounding area.

The 97m-long, two‑span concrete bridge was constructed in 2000.

Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) said “during a principle inspection of Blackglen Bridge, wear was observed in the upper portion of the central pier. Following a more detailed special inspection, it was determined that structural strengthening would be required.”

Structural engineers Roughan and O’Donovan and TII selected a custom-made, high‑strength, stainless‑steel collar, which TII confirmed has now been fitted to the central pillar.

TII spokesman Sean O’Neill said the cost of the work was part of the authority’s overall maintenance programme and cost “in the region of €400,000”.

O’Neill said the work “was to maintain the 120-year lifespan of a bridge structure which has taken significant daily usage over the last few decades”.

But in Lebanon, where ‌more than a million people are displaced by the fighting, Israeli forces launched fresh air strikes early on Thursday, raising doubt about how far Trump will go to force his wartime allies to halt an offensive he has now pledged to end.

The US president signed the “memorandum of understanding” ​to end the war late on Wednesday, as did Iran’s president Masoud Pezeshkian, bringing it into effect two days earlier than previously expected. It calls for the immediate opening of the Strait of Hormuz and lifting of a US blockade of Iran’s ports.

Vance, who will represent the United States at a formal ceremony in Switzerland on Friday to confirm the interim accord, said the US expected Tehran would not have missiles that can “broadly threaten the entire world” as part of the deal agreed with Washington.

He said Thursday marked the start of the 60-day negotiation period to reach a final settlement to the war, which Trump launched ​in February alongside Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu.

🚨 President Donald J. Trump has SIGNED the Iran Memorandum of Understanding at Versailles in France. 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/JQ6qlbvFAF

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) June 17, 2026

But Israel, which launched an invasion of Lebanon in March and has since seized a large swathe of the south in ‌pursuit ‌of ​Hizbullah militants who opened fire across the border in support of Iran, was excluded from the negotiations.

Iran has always said any peace deal must also cover Lebanon. In an apparent major concession to Iran, the memorandum signed by Trump explicitly calls for the “permanent termination” of the war in Lebanon and for its “territorial integrity and sovereignty” to be ensured.

What’s in the US-Iran deal? Reopening shipping, waiving oil sanctions and Lebanon

Trump in recent days has become openly critical of his ally’s operations in Lebanon, accusing Israel of ​unnecessarily destroying entire buildings to hit Hizbullah fighters.

Israel has said it has no intention of withdrawing from Lebanon, whatever Trump negotiates. ​It released a new map on Thursday showing an expanded southern area occupied by its troops, which it describes as a buffer zone.

Vance told reporters one goal of the deal with Iran was to allow the Lebanese authorities to police the south of ‌the country.

“What we want to see is the Lebanese government, the elected representatives of the people ​of Lebanon, who are able to police southern Lebanon, so that Hizbullah has not taken over the country, the Israelis are not threatened, and then consequently the Israelis are not attacking southern Lebanon or Beirut either,” he said.

Two Israeli officials, ⁠including a senior official close to Netanyahu, told Reuters Israel was holding negotiations with the US to ⁠keep Israeli troops in Lebanon.

The senior official described those talks ​with Washington as “stubborn” and said Israel would not back down. The other official said the outcome would depend on whether Trump “decides to force the issue” by threatening repercussions on Israel.

Fighting in Lebanon continued on Thursday morning after Trump’s signature.

Lebanese state news agency NNA said three people were killed in Israeli air strikes on the southern Lebanese towns of Kfartebnit and Zebdine.

Macron’s Versailles charm offensive secures Trump boost for G7

When Trump launched the war, he said his aims were to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme, end ​its ability to strike its neighbours, prevent it from supporting allied militants in the region and make it possible for Iranians to topple their hardline leaders.

Though he initially demanded ​Iran’s “unconditional surrender”, Trump ultimately signed the agreement with none of those objectives met.

US officials say the upcoming negotiations could still yield a strong agreement on Iran’s nuclear programme, but his critics, including some hawks in his own party, say Iran is in a stronger position now than before the war, having withstood a superpower attack, exerted control of the strait and gained valuable waivers to financial sanctions. – Reuters

Any move to curtail trade with Israel due to its actions in the West Bank would need a qualified majority of member states to support it.

However, Ireland and other countries supportive of such a move have so far failed to persuade a sufficient number of other European capitals to offer support.

Speaking as he arrived at the meeting of the European Council in Brussels, Martin said the “failure to take a strong stance” at a European level had undermined the bloc’s credibility.

“There comes a stage when people should be allowed to vote as member states to articulate their position. So in my view, if it was put to a vote at some stage, that might create its own dynamic in respect of Israel’s behaviour in Lebanon, in Gaza and in the West Bank in particular.”

The Taoiseach said he understood not all member states were “on the same page” on the issue, but that “our credibility is damaged by our failure to act”.

The European Commission is expected to bring forward options on restricting trade with illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank in advance of the next meeting of foreign affairs ministers next month.

Martin is attending the European Council meeting in Brussels on Thursday and Friday, the last before Ireland takes up the presidency of the Council of the European Union.

Meanwhile, the Taoiseach ruled out any ban on evictions after a report from the Oireachtas housing committee suggested one should be on the table.

“They do not work, in the short or medium term,” he said, adding that in his view such a step would depress and suppress housing supply.

He said he was “calm” about the number of Government TDs that voted against a Sinn Féin Bill to remove the mandatory three-day waiting period before accessing abortion services.

Several Cabinet Ministers voted against the measure, despite both Martin and Fine Gael leader Simon Harris having indicated they would support the Opposition Bill.

“I’m fairly calm about it and I fully accept the right of every individual to exercise a conscious vote and a free vote in the manner that they did,” he said.

“I think it’s a sign of the maturity of our political system that we can arrive at a situation where we can have a much more measured discussion and deliberation on these issues.”

Martin also insisted the closure of the Silk Road Café in Dublin Castle – the latter will host many events associated with Ireland’s EU presidency – was not solely down to the EU functions taking place.

The owner of the cafe was granted an injunction this week restraining its landlord, The Chester Beatty Library, from closing it for security reasons during the presidency.

“My understanding is it’s not because of the European Union presidency,” he said. “That’s not the issue ... it’s a bit more complex than has been said.”

From the start of next month, the Department of Justice wants to replace the current system where solicitors are paid per appearance with a flat fee of €455 per District Court case.

The consequences of the planned three-day stoppage will take months if not longer to work through a system which already has some of the longest case disposal times in Europe. It currently takes on average 500 days to conclude a case in Ireland which is one and half times the European average, according to the Law Society.

The two issues are not unrelated. Inefficient courts and lengthy proceedings involve multiple appearances by solicitors and thus higher legal-aid bills. In addition, the department believes the current legal-aid system incentivises solicitors to string out cases unnecessarily through seeking or acceding to excessive adjournments, leading to more appearances and fees as a consequence. The department cites its own review – and some striking examples of fees charged in particular cases – as evidence of this.

Thus, although solicitors might not like the proposed changes – about which they say they were not properly consulted – they are in large part a consequence of their own actions, or at least the actions of some of their number, according to the department.

Leaving aside the obvious consequences for their potential income, the solicitors’ representatives have made a number of arguments as to why the changes may not be in the interest of the public, as against the public purse.

They note that criminal cases are often adjourned because the State has been tardy in presenting its case. They also say that the changes will disincentivise solicitors from taking long and complex legal-aid cases, which could disadvantage low income and rural defendants in particular. There is some merit to these arguments, but there is no escaping the fact that the costs of the current system are rising sharply, partly due to numerous hearings of individual cases.

The department’s response would appear to amount to the sins of the few being visited on the many. In the process it may save the taxpayer a significant amount of money, although there will be longer term costs if the solicitors’ warnings hold true. The fact that the department has been presented with this opportunity as a result of its members own actions raises a number of difficult questions for the Law Society and the profession. Perhaps there is scope for negotiation, but change is needed in order to hold costs down, while still ensuring fair and timely legal representation.

Muñoz has signed a “long-term contract” with Liverpool, believed to be for six years, after undergoing a medical on Wednesday in Atlanta, where the 22-year-old is part of the Spain squad at the World Cup.

Liverpool beat Newcastle to Muñoz’s signature having followed his progress for an extensive period and sped up the deal after Iraola’s appointment because the head coach was eager to add his compatriot. Iraola spent most of his playing career at Athletic Bilbao, continues to closely monitor La Liga and Muñoz has impressed him.

Manchester United and Bayer Leverkusen were also interested in the player. Muñoz represented Barcelona and Real Madrid at youth level and those clubs also shortlisted him for a move this summer, but elected to bid for other targets.

Muñoz can play on either wing and as a central striker, versatility Liverpool are eager to have as they begin a new era. One of Muñoz’s key attributes is his speed and a big part of the transfer strategy this summer will be attracting players with pace.

The winger has two international caps, making his debut in March and scoring against Serbia. He was an unused substitute in the draw against Cape Verde.

Muñoz’s arrival will not affect the future of Federico Chiesa. The Italian was a bit-part player under Arne Slot, but he could be a better fit for Iraola’s style. Chiesa, however, is eager to get more playing time and is open to leaving.

Ibrahima Konaté’s move to Real Madrid has been confirmed, the defender joining on a four-year deal when his Liverpool contract expires at the end of this month. Madrid have also signed Marc Cucurella and Bernardo Silva since confirming José Mourinho as their head coach. – Guardian

Volodymyr Zelenskiy described the attack as a response to Russia’s strike on a historic Kyiv monastery complex earlier this week. “We do not want this war and never did,” the Ukrainian president said in a voice message to journalists.

“But if Ukraine is going to burn, your Moscow will burn too ... It is time to end the aggression, time to end this war.”

Russia’s foreign minister in turn announced it would launch huge “group strikes” on Ukraine “on a regular basis” in response to the Moscow raid.

The scale of Ukraine’s long-range attack, apparently designed to shut down operations at the key oil refinery in the Kapotnya area, caught most people by surprise in a city that does not typically warn residents with air raid alarms and prompted panicked messages on social media.

According to reports, many residents in Moscow’s outlying suburbs learned of the attack only when they saw drones flying overhead. “No SMS at all, no sirens. All the information is in local chats – there’s a lot more there than on TV,” a Moscow resident said in a message to the independent, foreign-based Russian news site Meduza.

How significant was Ukraine’s drone attack on Moscow?

Footage posted online showed three plumes of smoke rising from the Kapotnya refinery. The strike was the second in two days on the facility, which local authorities claimed injured at least 17 people, including two children. The refinery, one of Moscow’s most important energy facilities, supplies up to 40 per cent of the capital’s petrol and about 50 per cent of its diesel fuel.

Russia said its ⁠air defence systems ​intercepted and ⁠destroyed 555 Ukrainian drones over ⁠multiple ​regions ‌overnight. The number actually shot down could not be independently confirmed.

Russian president Vladimir Putin is in Kazan, 4700km east of Moscow, hosting leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations as Russia seeks to bolster business and other ties.

Kyiv was hit this week by a major strike of ballistic missiles and drones in a marked escalation of the air war. Putin had warned of impending “systemic strikes” on Ukraine.

The Moscow attack came hours after Zelenskiy said he had held “an important co-ordination call” with the presidents of the US and France and had won vital pledges of further support from this week’s international G7 summit.

European leaders are optimistic about Ukraine’s prospects. In advance of a summit on Thursday evening in Brussels, the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, said the tide was turning: “We see Ukraine is holding the line, even partially regaining territory,” she said, adding that Russia was struggling and imposing “a digital Iron Curtain on their people” – a reference to internet censorship.

Arriving in Brussels for talks with EU leaders, Zelenskiy said it was “really a great moment for Ukraine”, hailing the decision to start formal membership talks with the bloc earlier this week. He said he hoped they could discuss further support for Ukraine to pressure Putin to the negotiating table.

The European Council president, António Costa, was reported by Bloomberg on Wednesday to have contacted the Kremlin in an attempt to engage Putin in discussions about ending the war. A spokesperson for Costa has not commented.

An EU official told the Guardian that in the past few weeks “brief contacts at diplomatic level” had been made “to open communication channels, but nothing was discussed on substance”. The official said that in any future scenario “the EU has specific interests that will need to be defended, therefore it is important to have established diplomatic channels with Russia”.

Zelenskiy was expected to discuss with European leaders the possibility of a system to defend against ballistic missiles. Russia has repeatedly struck Ukraine with those types of missiles, which air defences struggle to counter.

Footage of the Moscow strikes appeared to show the use of Ukrainian Bars hybrid drone-cruise missiles, first used last year. They had been believed to have a range of about 600-800km, designed for precision targeting, but their use against Moscow would suggest a longer range.

Ukraine is rapidly catching up with Russia in its ability to mass-produce long-range strike weapons. Kyiv has stepped up its drone strikes on Russia in recent months, hitting oil refineries that fund Moscow’s war chest, as diplomatic talks on ending the conflict remain stalled.

At least seven drones appear to have beaten Russia’s air defences, including one that appeared to hit a high-rise building in Zhukovsky district. Traffic was halted ​on Moscow’s ring road near ⁠the refinery, the broadcaster RIA ​cited ‌the ​interior ministry ​as saying, while air traffic was disrupted at Vnukovo, Sheremetyevo and Zhukovsky airports.

Footage posted on social media appeared to show a Russian portable air defence system operator attempting to shoot down a Ukrainian strike drone moments before it struck the oil refinery.

A strike on Tuesday was understood to have already halted operations at the Kapotnya refinery, adding to widespread damage to Russian energy facilities and extending a ​fuel crisis deeper into the country.

Russia, the world’s third biggest oil producer and ‌a major oil and fuel exporter, is to import fuel by sea this month as it seeks to manage a shortage after extensive Ukrainian drone attacks on its refineries.

Russian hardliners called for Moscow to retaliate, with some urging the Kremlin to consider using nuclear weapons against Ukraine.

“What else has to happen before we start fighting for real?” wrote the ultraconservative billionaire Konstantin Malofeev on Telegram. “Why aren’t we using the nuclear weapons that our ancestors created and stockpiled through the efforts of the entire country precisely for moments like this?”

Andrey Gurulyov, a retired lieutenant general and state duma deputy, called for Russia to “strike the enemy mercilessly” in response to the attack. “We need to strengthen our air defence system, but most importantly, we need to hit the enemy,” he told RTVI. “Hit the enemy mercilessly, without overthinking it.”

Russia launched more than 200 drones and multiple ballistic missiles at Ukraine between late Wednesday and early Thursday, according to the Ukrainian air force. – The Guardian

Arriving in Ireland in the autumn, the i3 will make its debut with a 50 xDrive First Edition model, which will be priced from €72,855.

However, that First Edition is a ritzy, highly-specified model meant to introduce the car with its best foot forward. A standard i3 50 xDrive will have a price tag of €66,685.

That will get you a four-wheel drive electric sports saloon, with 469hp, the ability to sprint to 100km/h in just 4.7 seconds, and yet which has official energy consumption as low as 13.4kWh/100km, which is how it can squeeze that official 906km from its 108kWh battery.

Real-world experience on Irish roads with the closely related iX3 SUV – taller, bulkier, and heavier than the i3 – suggests the saloon should go for at least 750km before you’ll need to charge it up again.

When you do, it charges quickly with up to 400kW of DC charging power, meaning a 10-80 per cent top-up in less than 20 minutes and up to 423km of range to be added in just 10 minutes (assuming you can find a 400kW charger) while the i3 can also charge briskly from kerbside chargers, as it can cope with up to 22kW of AC power.

The Munich company could do with a big sales success. In its most recent financial results, it warned that profit margins are coming under intense pressure thanks to a slowdown in Chinese sales.

Significantly, the i3 will be hitting the Irish market with a lower price than its main competition, the new Mercedes-Benz C-Class.

The new C-Class – which sports somewhat controversial styling that starts with a massive, retro-themed grille at the front, and ends with a sleek rear featuring brake lights inset with prominent Mercedes three-pointed stars – will have a starting price of €72,990 when it goes on sale in the last quarter of this year, or €78,990 for the popular AMG-Line specification.

Can Merc’s new EV C-Class take on the BMW i3?

For that money you will get the C400 4MATIC which has two motors, four-wheel drive and a 94kWh battery giving it a range of up to 762km on one charge.

Mercedes claims average energy use of 15kWh/100km, and the C-Class gets Merc’s new 800-volt fast-charging system, which in theory allows you to top up the battery to the tune of 325km of fresh range in just 10 minutes’ charging, assuming you can locate a DC fast charger capable of meeting the C-Class’s 330kW charging speed.

Both cars will, in due course, be joined by more affordable single-motor variants. In the BMW’s case that will probably mean a smaller battery and less range; in the Mercedes’ case, the single-motor C-Class will likely keep the same battery pack and offer an 800km+ range thanks to less weight and better efficiency.

Patrick Howlett, Mercedes national sale manager for Ireland said: “Irish customers can expect the refinement, intelligence and driving pleasure that defines the C-Class – now elevated for a fully electric age.”

The C-Class will have quite the cutting-edge interior, with the option of a massive, unbroken touchscreen that measures a full metre across and fills the dashboard from door to door. Will buyers be swayed by such tech? Or will they mourn the loss of a more traditional sort of Mercedes cabin, with its quiet sense of assured luxury?

Both cars may yet be beaten by Volvo’s putative new ES60 saloon, which is still in the early stages of development, but which will share the same SPA3 platform as the new EX60 SUV. We’ve tested, and been hugely impressed, by the EX60 and it claims a range advantage over its competitors too. Will the ES60 be the first of these posh electric saloons to nudge up towards a 1,000km range?

Does that leave Lexus’s new ES350 electric saloon out on a limb, with its claimed 530km range? Not necessarily, but it’s certainly a limitation for the new Lexus. Then again, Lexus’s reputation for robustness, amid continuing buyer concern over battery longevity, may tip some of the balance in its favour.

Beyond those traditional premium brands, new Chinese competitors will also be nudging into this space. The first to arrive will be from BYD’s posh spin-off, Denza, whose Z9 GT offer Porsche-esque styling, masses of cabin space, but does its claimed 601km range seem suddenly paltry in the face of the long-range Germans?

Years ago the “Made in China” tag was synonymous with cheap and flimsy goods: clothes, toys and electronics you mightn’t expect to last you very long.

Things have changed. The Chinese economic behemoth has been busy moving up the value chain and now dominates what Beijing believes will be the industries of the future. It is racing ahead in the mass production of electric vehicles, solar panels and other clean tech. In some cases, it is taking over entire markets and muscling out fledgling European competitors.

European governments have been accused of being too slow to wake up to that reality.

China is also hoovering up a greater share of traditional heavy manufacturing industries that have for decades powered Europe’s economy.

“There is a growing consensus a new China shock is reverberating across global goods markets,” economists Sander Tordoir and Brad Setser wrote in a paper for the Centre for European Reform think tank last month.

“Nowhere is that shock more consequential than in Germany. Its manufacturers in core industries – cars, machinery, chemicals and aircraft – are being simultaneously squeezed out of China and other foreign markets, and at home,” the pair wrote.

The amount of goods China is selling into the European market has increased substantially over the last decade and looks set to continue to do so.

Tordoir has been sounding the alarm for a while, warning of grave consequences if Europe doesn’t readdress this growing economic imbalance.

Simply put, China makes vastly more goods than its own economy can consume, meaning it relies on overseas markets to sell much of what its industries are pumping out. Domestic demand has been dampened by a scarring property market slump.

In trade-speak this is known as overcapacity. The result is a flood of products – from steel to electric vehicles – pushed into the European market, usually on the cheap, which undercut European producers.

At the same time, European businesses are being shoved out of the Chinese market, compounding what was an already uneven trading relationship.

Europe faces risks from both China and the US - but there are solutions

Economists fear the ultimate result will be a hollowing out of European industries, locking Europe into a lopsided dependence on China.

European factories are already starting to close or shed jobs. Businesses are relocating manufacturing operations to China, to gain more access to that market.

The Chinese Communist Party’s economic model gives a big leg up to strategic sectors, while encouraging intense internal competition, further fuelling excess production and pressure to export.

Companies enjoy direct state subsidies and other means of support, such as cheap loans with preferential rates, materials at below-market prices and generous tax exemptions and grants, which EU officials say give Chinese producers an unfair edge in the global market.

Sums done by the OECD estimate Chinese companies receive between three and nine times more state support than manufacturers in other advanced economies.

The EU has taken tentative steps in response. The European Commission, which is the union’s executive arm that leads on trade, has put protectionist tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles and introduced safeguards to block China from dumping steel into the European market.

Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and her top officials want the EU to take a tougher stance to defend the bloc’s economic interests.

The EU’s 27 leaders are in Brussels for a summit where they will discuss China over dinner on Thursday evening. Fearful of provoking retaliation from Beijing, that point in the agenda has been labelled a discussion about “global macroeconomic imbalances”.

“We all know it’s about China ... We have to defend ourselves,” a senior diplomat from one EU state said.

Von der Leyen is believed to be keen that the EU sharpen, or expand, its armoury of defensive trade tools.

Germany has always been reluctant to antagonise Beijing, because China is still a large market for its carmakers and export-dependent economy. Spain’s left-wing prime minister Pedro Sánchez has also cosied up to Xi Jinping.

There are signs German chancellor Friedrich Merz is reconsidering his stance, in the face of a widening trade deficit.

Similarly, Luc Frieden, prime minister of Luxembourg, said the trading relationship “cannot be a one-way street” and the EU needed to get stuck into a proper dialogue with China. “It’s an existential threat for our industries, for our economies, if we do not deal with economic and trade imbalances,” he said on his way into the Brussels summit.

“We definitely need more European co-ordination in our engagement with China to protect the European economy,” Dutch prime minister Rob Jetten told reporters on Thursday evening.

China will retaliate hard against any EU measures. Beijing’s game plan will likely be to threaten its own tariffs or restrict access to raw materials, to heap pressure on European governments and divide the 27 member states.

China has a near-monopoly on rare earth minerals needed to make components in wind turbines, cars, headphones, hospital MRI machines, weapons systems and aeroplanes. It didn’t hesitate to weaponise that dependence during its tariff dispute with Washington.

Letting the status quo carry on doesn’t seem like a credible option. “Leaving the China shock unmitigated and unchallenged would be profoundly irresponsible in a world where China has shown it will use its control over key global supply chains as leverage,” Tordoir and Setser wrote in their recent paper.

However, having spent the last year and a half doing their best to avoid a trade war with the United States, the EU may not have the stomach to rush into one with Beijing.

China forges ahead on digital currency while Europe’s banks look on

They also jointly hold companies and about €1.6 million-worth of other assets in bank accounts and investments.

The three-judge Court of Appeal found the High Court had jurisdiction to make orders in June and July 2025 for the sale of the family home and other properties, but the failure to impose a stay was “a real injustice”.

The matter came before the High Court 42 times after a February 2023 settlement of divorce proceedings initiated by the man, including 24 times concerning his application for sale of the properties, Judge Mary Faherty noted.

It was “difficult to disagree” with the High Court that “every effort” was made by the woman to delay the court finalising matters in circumstances where her husband is “elderly and infirm”.

While dismissing the woman’s appeal over the sale orders, Faherty applied a three-month stay to allow the woman to complete assets reconciliation and other exercises provided for in the 2023 settlement.

Once that is done, Faherty envisaged the woman “will be accommodated” in her desire to retain the family home, subject to whatever was necessary to ensure the man’s half-interest in that is protected.

The parties have adult children, and accumulated substantial personal and corporate assets during their 40-year marriage.

Under the divorce settlement, each was entitled to a 50 per cent interest in the family home, in four other properties, in a number of companies, in all bank accounts, shares and investments jointly or solely held by them, and in specified antique furniture, paintings and ornaments.

Seventy Travellers’ caravans must be removed from the Curragh, court orders

Three of their adult children were represented in negotiations leading to the settlement, two siding with their father and one with their mother.

The man moved to re-enter the divorce proceedings on the basis that deadlines of six to eight weeks had passed without engagement by the woman regarding her obligations under the settlement.

He applied for the sale of the property assets, with proceeds to be divided between them, arguing that would help reduce conflict and assist in resolving difficulties about ascertaining the value of company assets and reconciling those.

The woman “vehemently objected” to the sale, one of the reasons being that she wanted to keep her home of more than 40 years, and alleged unnecessary exposure to capital gains tax. She said the corporate assets were more valuable and she needed more time to get a full picture of them.

When making the property sale orders in June and July 2025, the High Court said both parties were “not entirely blameless” over delays.

Apart from the issue of a stay, the High Court had not erred in making the sale orders, Faherty held. It had properly taken account of matters, including the woman’s non-engagement with her obligations under the settlement.

Occupiers of former Liberties pub remain in situ despite order to leave, court hears

However, as regards the family home, there was “no proper rationale” for not imposing a stay on its sale to allow the woman an opportunity to complete the assets reconciliation exercises.

An order for sale with a stay for a defined period would have been a “proportionate response”, particularly given the woman’s concession in June 2005 that the investment properties could be sold. There being no apparent dispute, the 50:50 assets division could still be achieved even if she retained the family home.

Because €1.6 million in funds was available to the parties in bank accounts and investments, there was “no merit” in the man’s argument the family home had to be sold to put the parties in funds for their litigation, she said.

The High Court also failed to give sufficient weight to the woman’s claims about how the parties’ corporate assets were being dealt with by the man post-divorce, including one of their children being put in charge of a company to her detriment. There was some merit in those claims, the judge said.

The man’s accountants should give requested information to the woman’s accountants to help advance the reconciliation process, Faherty said.

It offered a stark demonstration of Ukraine’s growing ability to strike deep inside Russia with its increasingly sophisticated, largely domestically produced long-range drones.

What was hit?

The main target was the main oil refinery in Moscow’s Kapotnya district on the capital’s southeastern edge.

The refinery supplies up to 40 per cent of the capital’s petrol and about half of its diesel fuel. At least one high-rise residential building, plus an industrial facility and several private homes were also damaged in the attack, with Russian authorities reporting 17 injuries.

How did Ukraine do it?

Ukraine frequently launches drone attacks against Moscow, but the vast majority are intercepted by the capital’s extensive air-defence network, the densest in the country. This time was different.

The sheer scale of the attack appears to have strained Russian air-defence systems. Videos circulating online showed Ukrainian drones flying over the city largely unchallenged, suggesting some were able to penetrate Moscow’s layered defences.

The mix of weapons used may also have played a role. Alongside conventional long-range strike drones typically deployed against targets deep inside Russia, Ukraine appears to have employed jet-powered missile drones during Thursday’s attack. Faster and more difficult to intercept than conventional propeller-driven drones, they pose a growing challenge for Russian air defences.

What are the lasting effects?

By targeting a key oil refinery, Ukraine hopes to bring the consequences of the war closer to ordinary Russians. Previous attacks on energy infrastructure have led to fuel shortages in parts of the country, most notably in Russian-occupied Crimea, where residents have spent hours queuing at petrol stations.

Much will depend on the extent of the damage to the refinery, on Russia’s ability to redirect fuel supplies from elsewhere and on Ukraine’s capacity to sustain further strikes.

But arguably the greater impact will be psychological. For the first time since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, many Muscovites could look out of their apartment windows and see smoke rising over the capital.

How will Putin respond?

Russian president Vladimir Putin, who is attending a summit with several Asian leaders in Kazan, has yet to comment publicly on the strike. The Russian president typically avoids addressing sensitive developments immediately, preferring to leave initial responses to officials and state media.

The most likely response is a renewed wave of large-scale missile and drone strikes on Ukrainian cities. – The Guardian

The Irish pair, Gannon ranked 562 and Barry 283 in doubles, overcame a combined ranking deficit of several hundred places against opponents whose pedigree far exceeded their own. Bollipalli, ranked 104 in doubles with a career high of 65 and Hilderbrand, ranked 97 with a career high of 94, had been installed as tournament favourites, but were undone by a fiery Irish performance that grew keener as the match went on.

The opening set offered little hint of contest, with Bollipalli and Hilderbrand racing to a 6-1 win. But Gannon and Barry didn’t quit, quickly finding their footing to claim a 6-3 win in the second set to level it, which then set up a nerve-testing super tiebreak. In a format where margins are razor thin, the Irish pair edged it 10-9.

The statistics of the match reflect how closely matched the pairs were over the three sets. Both sides converted roughly comparable returns, Barry and Gannon saving enough of the critical moments when they had to. They converted just one of four break points but held firm when it mattered.

Unlike their on-court celebration, Gannon was characteristically candid about the moment the result appeared on the scoreboard. “I think the first [set], we were just both looking to see it [a point] on the board.” he said. “Once we did, we kind of let out a chuckle and the crowd gave us a clap and we both said that’s not really the clap we’re looking for.” The pair regrouped, and as Gannon put it, focused on “good energy, making some more first serves, and staying disciplined.”

Barry, 25 from Limerick, was similarly measured. “Those third set tiebreakers are going to be close,” he said. “The margins are so small on grass court tennis, especially because of the serves, the courts are quicker, more of an advantage of serving. I just kind of have to play every point one by one.” He was, he admitted, “happy when you’re shaking hands with the winner at the end.”

They face Jarno Jans and Niels Visker, ranked 193 and 190 respectively, in Friday’s semi-finals.

In singles, Grigor Dimitrov’s run in Dublin has come to an end, with the Bulgarian losing 6-3, 7-6 to Hugo Jacquet in a match that was far closer than the scoreline suggests.

Dimitrov won 72 per cent of first serve points to Jacquet’s 78 and converted just one of three break points to Jacquet’s three from six. It was those missed opportunities, rather than any collapse in serving, that proved decisive for the former world number three. Jacquet was simply more clinical when the moments arrived.

“Yes!” she said, when I correctly surmised she had roots in Co Monaghan. More specifically, in the northern half of it.

In fact, as I learned, she is one of the small, elite group of tourists who have visited Monaghan deliberately (as opposed to the ones who got lost on the way to somewhere else).

Now on a roll, however, I also anticipated with confidence that the “very Irish” part of Canada she had mentioned being from was Prince Edward Island (PEI). “Yes!” she said again, leaving me two for two and feeling smug.

In fairness, for someone himself from the Oriel County, this did not require any great detective work. I may have exaggerated a little when telling Kate that PEI is “one of our more important overseas colonies”.

But uniquely, whereas Irish twinning arrangements are usually between towns or cities here and abroad, the whole of Monaghan is twinned with the province of PEI. This is because of extraordinary levels of emigration from the former to the latter in the early 19th century.

As for connecting the McKenna surname with north Monaghan, that came naturally.

Yes, the name has spread to many other parts of Ireland in modern times. Even so, the tribal heartland remains where it was in the days when Red Hugh O’Donnell stopped there. Red Hugh was limping back to Donegal after his spectacular jail-break from Dublin Castle in 1592, minus two toes lost to frostbite.

The Truagh Welcome, a bardic-style ballad composed to mark the occasion (and named for the now Border-adjacent parish where the McKenna clan was headquartered), praises the local chieftain’s hospitality to the fugitive via a series of rhetorical questions. The implied answer to all of these questions is “no”.

This passage is a case in point: “Shall the son of O’Donnell be cheerless and cold/While McKenna’s wide hearth hath a faggot to spare?/While O’Donnell is poor shall McKenna have gold/Or be clothed while a limb of O’Donnell is bare?”

More than two centuries later, in 1813, the song was still famous enough to be one of those Irish and Scottish ballads for which Beethoven wrote arrangements.

It was in 1830 that the first McKennas and other emigrants left Monaghan to start new lives in eastern Canada.

The catalyst was a Father Patrick Moynagh, who pioneered an assisted emigration scheme in the decade that followed, paying the costs himself. On one day alone, it’s said 850 people landed on the quays of PEI’s capital, Charlottetown.

The migrants were unusual, therefore, in leaving Ireland before the Famine. And it is perhaps ironic that PEI’s nicknames include “Spud Island”: a tribute to the fame in Canada of its potatoes, both in quantity (25 per cent of the country’s total) and quality.

That too has been the subject of a ballad: the 1969 folk song Bud the Spud, which immortalised the crop and the iron-rich red soil that produces it, via the character of a truck driver delivering the produce to market: “It’s Bud the spud from the bright red mud/Rolling down the highway smiling/The Spuds are big on the back of Bud’s rig/They’re from Prince Edward Island.”

To much of the world, meanwhile, PEI is known mainly for Anne of Green Gables, the 1908 novel by Lucy Montgomery.

This is especially true of Japan, where a 1954 translation of the book caught the public imagination and sent successive generations of Japanese tourists to PEI in the same way Heinrich Boll’s Irish Journal unleashed waves of German tourism here.

The novel’s eponymous orphan girl has red hair and, intriguingly, the surname Shirley, something she shares with one of Monaghan’s historically dominant landlords.

Any suggestions of Irishness seem to begin and end there. But while searching the archives about Montgomery, I accidentally learned something new about the name of a well-known Dublin pub, one of my locals.

In her journals, the writer at one point refers to her birthplace as “the old stand”: a footnote to which explains that this is “Irish slang: [meaning] home again, a common name given to pubs in Ireland and the US.”

Another thing PEI and Ireland have in common is that their capitals both have a Grafton Street. And speaking of pubs, the Charlottetown Grafton Street has several Irish ones in the vicinity.

So I’m going to go out on a limb again here and, attempting three from three, guess the identity of at least one ballad that has been sung there over the years.

Whatever about McKenna’s Welcome to Truagh, the Charlottetown pubs have surely reverberated on occasion to the words of another, later Monaghan bard: “On Grafton Street, in November/We tripped lightly along the ledge/Of a deep ravine, where can be seen/The worth of passion’s pledge.”

The episode also shows how the politics of abortion have evolved. Those who witnessed the bitter debates on the issue in 1983, in 1992, in 2002, in 2014 and – at times – in 2018 would have been surprised at the mostly empathetic tone of the debate this week.

The removal of the party whip by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael has much to do with this; Sinn Féin should follow suit. But the moderation of this week’s debate is also because, as a society, Ireland has developed the ability to talk about such matters without the acrimony of previous years.

There is a long way to go yet with the legislation. It has passed the first hurdle only in the Dáil and the Government has indicated that it may seek to make amendments at committee stage; the Seanad will also have its say. But it is now likely that the three-day wait will be abolished.

Opponents of the measure complain that the referendum to repeal the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution in 2018 was only passed after the government of the day published draft legislation, which included the three day wait, which it promised to enact once the constitutional ban was gone.

They say, correctly, that this was what was in people’s minds as they considered the question of repeal then. Indeed, it was precisely to reassure voters – many of whom had previously been wary about an excessively liberal regime – that the draft legislation was published.

But no parliament can bind the hands of its successors. Legislators may well take this concern into account, but fundamentally their responsibility is to make laws they believe best serve the Ireland of today. Those laws should respect the autonomy of women’s decision-making about their own bodies.

The Irish Government will be expected to help broker an agreement on the size and focus of the union’s common budget when it takes over the EU presidency for the second half of this year.

The 27 member states are under pressure to sort out a budget deal before the end of the year, to leave plenty of time for technical work to get new funding schemes up and running by the start of 2028.

The EU’s current €1.2 trillion budget runs until the end of 2027 and encompasses Common Agricultural Policy farm subsidies, regional development grants and a huge range of other funding schemes.

“Our objective will be to get a deal by the end of the year ... I think a failure to get there would be problematic for the European Union, but obviously it will depend on member states agreeing, and at the moment some believe the budget is too high, some believe it’s too low,” Martin said.

Speaking on his way in to a two-day summit of EU leaders, Martin said there should not be any “limbo” situation, where the existing seven-year budget expires before the new one is ready.

“Something will have to give and this will be a negotiation which will go the full distance, and it will be very, very tough,” he told reporters in Brussels.

Putting together the bloc’s budget is always a politically charged row between a smaller coalition of “frugal” countries who favour fiscal restraint, and a wider group pushing for a larger pot of money.

A draft €1.73 trillion budget on the table has been criticised by both camps for not going far enough in either direction.

The EU budget is mostly funded by contributions from each member state. A natural division is created between countries that are net-contributors into the joint pot and those that are net-recipients of funds.

Ideas for the EU to raise its own revenue, such as through a levy on large companies or excise taxes, have historically “proved problematic,” Martin said. “Invariably it’s been very difficult to get European Union unanimity or indeed consensus on that.”

Pushing along difficult negotiations will consume a lot of the Government’s focus when Ireland holds the rotating Council of the EU presidency during the second half of this year, a crucial period in the budget talks.

“I was there for the last negotiation [and] as you know we spent a couple of days and nights trying to resolve that,” Martin said.

Separately, the Taoiseach said the EU had to be “careful” in any attempts to redress imbalances in its trading relationship with China, and remain “clear-eyed” about the possible consequences of such a move.

The EU leaders were due to discuss whether the bloc needed to adopt a tougher stance towards Beijing, to better protect European businesses and industries against Chinese competitors who were given an unfair leg-up by the Chinese state.

China has promised to retaliate against any new EU trade measures.

The Government had been “advancing the case of Phil Hogan” in the former EU commissioner and Irish minister’s bid to lead the United Nations’ food security agency, Martin said.

Hogan, who was nominated by Ireland, is one of several candidates in the race for the international job, where each of the 193 countries who are members of the UN body cast a vote.

While the Fed held rates steady on Wednesday, nine policymakers projected one rate hike this year.

The pan-European Stoxx 600 index ended the session down 0.3 per cent.

An interim peace agreement between the US and Iran to end the ​war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a key global oil shipping route, has brought a relief for markets in recent ⁠days, with oil prices falling to early-March levels, trading near $78 a barrel.

Dublin

The Iseq All-Share index rose 0.4 per cent to 13,786.23. Ryanair stood out as a strong feature – rising 1.5 per cent to €25.85 – amid a decline in oil prices in recent days.

Banking stocks were mixed, with AIB falling 0.2 per cent to €10.58 and Bank of Ireland rising 0.3 per cent to €18.38, as the sector took pause for breath after strong gains earlier in the week.

Insurer FBD was among the weaker performers, falling 2.9 per cent to €16.70.

London

The FTSE 100 fell 1 per cent after the Bank of England left rates unchanged, with a “hawkish” hold the previous evening by the US Federal Reserve weighing on the market mood.

Persimmon fell 6.2 per cent, Land Securities fell 3.7 per cent and British Land fell 2.6 per cent as they traded ex-dividend.

Oil giants BP and Shell fell 1.6 per cent each, as oil prices touched their lowest since the start of the Iran war.

Intertek gained 1.6 per cent after the testing and certification firm agreed to a takeover by Swedish private equity firm EQT.

Tesco fell 0.9 per cent after it reported sales of £16.8 billion (€19.4 billion) in the 13 weeks ended May 20, with like-for-like (LFL) growth of 1 per cent, supported by growth in the UK stores and strong online demand.

Like-for-like sales in the UK grew 1.8 per cent, below the Visible Alpha consensus of 2.3 per cent, while LFL sales in the Republic of Ireland increased 3.3 per cent, slightly above consensus.

Friday’s global economic calendar has inflation figures in Japan overnight, and retail sales data in the UK and Canada. US financial markets are closed for Juneteenth.

Friday’s local corporate calendar includes full-year results from Cordiant Digital Infrastructure and Record.

Europe

Energy price-sensitive airlines Lufthansa and Air France ‌rose.

Among others, chipmakers Infineon and Aixtron gained ground.

Aircraft ‌manufacturer Airbus rose after Kepler upgraded the stock.

The IMK economic institute said Germany’s economy would grow less than previously ​expected.

BMW is “on the ​right track” with its next-generation models, supervisory board chairman Nicolas Peter said on Thursday, days after a shock profit warning that has hit the German carmaker’s shares. Still, the stock lost another 4 per cent.

New York

US ‌stocks were ahead in early afternoon trading on Wall Street, with semiconductor shares leading gains as optimism about a Middle East peace deal offset worries about a hawkish Federal Reserve under new chair Kevin Warsh.

Intel’s shares jumped after US president Donald Trump said Apple had agreed to work with the company to design and manufacture its chips in the US.

Other chip stocks, including Nvidia, Micron and Marvell Technology, also rose.

All three major US indexes sank in the previous session as investors priced in the likelihood of more Federal Reserve rate hikes, after Warsh underscored the need to curb inflation and other policymakers signalled ⁠higher borrowing costs ahead.

Shares of Accenture tumbled after the company trimmed the top end of its annual revenue forecast. Peers Cognizant Technology Solutions and IBM dropped.

Markets have regained ground from a slump in early June, with a resilient economy, a broadening rally beyond tech ‌shares and optimism surrounding a US-Iran deal ⁠boosting sentiment.

On the data front, Labor Department data showed the number of Americans filing claims for unemployment benefits fell last week as lay-offs remained low. – Additional reporting by Reuters and Press Association

An applicable 10 per cent threshold for the 138 delegates on the general assembly requires at least 14 valid requisitions to oblige the board to convene an EGM, correspondence from the FAI seen by The Irish Times said.

The FAI received 13 letters, representing nine different members. Two letters were received from organisations which are not members of the FAI and only letters from FAI members can be counted “for the purposes of constitutional threshold”.

The requisition received on or around May 29^th, 2026 is “invalid”, according to the FAI, and does not require the board to convene an EGM.

Despite this, the FAI does not rule out the possibility of the board itself convening an EGM of the general assembly.

Last week, the FAI confirmed that Ireland’s home game against Israel on October 4^th will be played at a neutral venue and behind closed doors. They said in a statement that the game would be played out of its responsibility to protect the interests of Irish football.

Failure to play the game, said the FAI, would result in the forfeiture of six points, which could lead to the relegation to League C of the Nations League, and would conversely improve Israel’s chances of promotion and qualifying for Euro 2028, to be co-hosted in Dublin.

A motion from within the FAI membership had called for the organisation to refuse to participate in the scheduled games against Israel “on both legal and moral grounds”.

The motion was proposed by the Professional Footballers’ Association Ireland (PFAI), Irish Football Supporters Partnership (IFSP), CK United, Cork City and Bohemian FC.

The news comes as Palestine’s Football Association have said they have not endorsed the playing of Ireland’s match against Israel.

“The PFA has not issued any statement endorsing, approving, or supporting the decision to proceed with the match,” read a statement from spokeswoman Dima Said.

“Any interpretation suggesting that the PFA has given its blessing to the fixture does not accurately reflect our position.”

Secretary general of the Department of Further and Higher Education Colm O’Reardon said an initial project to upgrade grant application software was established in 2015 was terminated in 2021.

He said a new project was now being initiated, taking on board lessons learned from the previous experience, to develop a grant application system to a modern standard.

He said €3.8 million had been spent on the initial project, of which €1.15 million “had no enduring value”.

He told Cathy Bennett of Sinn Féin that some of the work could be brought into subsequent developments.

O’Reardon said about 115,000 people apply for student grants every year within a fairly condensed period of time, “so it is important that we have the best system”.

Department assistant secretary Keith Moynes said cumulatively about €6.4 million had been spent between the two projects to date.

He said the new IT system for grant applications was scheduled to become operational in 2029.

Fianna Fáil TD Séamus McGrath said it was “staggering” that it would take 14 years to develop an IT system.

Separately, Skillnet Ireland, which receives about €50 million annually from the Department of Further and Higher Education to support training and development of workers in different sectors of the economy, said it had already started investigations into one particular contracting authority before allegations were received in 2023 under a protected disclosure.

Skillnet Ireland chief executive Mark Jordan said he could not discuss the particular organisation or the business network it operated. Committee chairman John Brady of Sinn Féin said his information was that it was “sustainable Skillnet”.

Jordan told the committee the protected disclosure in 2023 was focused on one particular organisation, which was a legal entity that was promoting more than one Skillnet network. He said overall it had received about €2.4 million over several years.

Asked by Brady about issues Skillnet had identified before receiving the protected disclosure, Jordan said: “The issues were twofold; one was in relation to market demand and performance, where we do not see expenditure and therefore the organisation is not expending the funds and therefore not attracting income as well and activity and the key performance indicators are not being delivered. The other issue was around what we would describe as management capability and overall governance. We were concerned with some of the issues we were seeing in our close day-to-day monitoring. In terms of the reporting of transactions and the type of programmes being delivered and initiatives. That was caught within our own governance processes.”

Jordan said Skillnet began identifying problems about April or May in 2023, a couple of months before the protected disclosure was received. He said Skillnet had intensified its engagement with the organisation concerned and had withheld or suspended some grants.

Separately, the committee was told by the Department of Education that about €1.3 billion had been spent on modular buildings for schools between 2021 and 2025.

Labour Party TD Eoghan Kenny said the department was moving away from bricks and mortar and towards long-term modular accommodation.

Some of the caravan dwellers were hostile when security company personnel, accompanied by gardaí and military police, served papers on them notifying them of injunction proceedings brought against them by the Minister for Defence, who owns the land, the court also heard.

The servers “encountered some hostility from some who were refusing to leave and said they would remain there no matter what”, Kelley Smith, counsel for the Minister, told the court.

Thursday’s orders were the latest in a number that have been made since Travellers’ caravans began arriving in the last couple of months on the lands which have a number of uses including related to the racecourse and Defence Forces training.

Caravans parking on the land each summer has been a problem for decades because of the interference with those activities as well as the large amount of waste left behind by the caravan dwellers. Clean-up costs in the past have run into the tens of thousands of euro and more.

The Travellers come from the UK and Ireland and as far afield as France and Belgium. Some seven caravans from Belgium and France were found on the land this week, the court heard.

A major Mass for Travellers is also held around nearby Monasterevin in June and this year two marquee tents were erected on the land, the court has also been told.

Judge Brian Cregan noted on Thursday that none of the named and unnamed defendants had appeared before the court to answer the interim non-trespass orders against them.

He said he was satisfied that that order should be made interlocutory which means it remains in place pending full hearing of the case. It also gives the Minister the option to seek the attachment and committal to prison of anyone who refuses to comply with it.

Interstate Hotel Management Ireland Ltd provides management services for the 150-room X8 Hotel, formerly the Ibis at the Red Cow Roundabout, Monastery Road, Clondalkin. Interstate is an affiliate of Texas-based Aimbridge Hospitality LLC.

The Clondalkin hotel is leased to Propiteer Ibis Red Cow Operations Ltd, now in receivership, and used to accommodate between 270 and 370 international protection applicants, including children.

Receivers Ken Fennell and Andrew O’Leary of Interpath Advisory were appointed over Propiteer by Bank of Ireland in March 2023. Interstate continued to provide management services for the hotel.

On Thursday, Interstate was granted permission for short service of injunction proceedings on the receivers and Propiteer following an ex parte (one side only represented) application by David Whelan, counsel for Interstate.

Relations between Interstate and the receivers functioned “reasonably well” between March 2023 and May of this year, Interstate director Barry Dawson said in an affidavit.

At that point, there was a “sudden change” in the relationship with the receivers making a “host of complaints” about the operation of the hotel, Dawson said.

The complaints were later detailed as including safeguarding and child protection and that several staff were allegedly not Garda-vetted. There were also health and safety complaints, fire safety issues including corroded fire extinguishers and rooms cluttered with bikes, prams and suitcases.

Facilities and maintenance issues were also raised including that there were only three operational washing machines when the requirement for the number of residents involved was 16, Dawson said.

Interstate said while there had been ongoing discussions with the receivers about certain issues, many had not been raised before the receivers wrote on May 25th last that there had been a repudiatory breach of the contract between Interstate and the lessee.

This, the receivers said, entitled them to repudiate the contract and they sought to take immediate control of the hotel to the exclusion of Interstate.

Dawson said it appears the receivers issued a “non-cooperation” instruction with Interstate to all hotel staff, who are employed by Propiteer though managed by Interstate. As a result, he said, Interstate has been unable to properly discharge its functions under the contract.

As a result, Interstate is seeking permanent injunctions restraining the receivers from interfering with its management of the hotel or its relationship with staff. It also seeks damages for breach of contract.

Against Propiteer, it seeks an order to maintain the status quo pending determination of an arbitration process which it says is a requirement of the contract between Interstate and the lessee. It also seeks an order restraining Propiteer from purporting to terminate the contract pending the arbitration.

Judge Brian Cregan said the case could come back next week.

The two sides have met twice since the Cabinet approved engagement on the issue on Tuesday.

In a letter sent on Thursday to the 19 unions that have members in the public sector and are affiliated to the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (Ictu), Kevin Callinan, chair of the Ictu public services committee, said the two sides failed even to agree whether to deal with pay first or last and the meetings ended without any agreement on how to proceed.

“Accordingly, we have to prepare for the likelihood there will be no agreement in place from July 1st (when the current deal runs out) and the possibility that this will be the case for an indefinite period,” he wrote.

He says the committee is “preparing a proposed industrial strategy aimed at protecting and improving living standards” and pursuing individual claims.

He suggests that, based on legal advice, some unions’ rules may have to be amended so that a common approach can be taken in the event a ballot on industrial action is called, and says he will provide a further update next week.

The two sides have said they will remain in contact but it not clear at this point whether the Government will agree to address pay early in any process and include the sort of social partnership-style elements Callinan has said he believes are essential.

In addition to chairing the committee, Callinan is general secretary of the largest public sector union, Fórsa, the second-largest union of any kind in the country after Siptu.

There are some differences between the various unions involved based on the different interests of their members but there is a common desire to see significant pay rises, with leaders suggesting that inflation around core areas such as food, fuel and housing have been running well ahead of wider inflation rates.

It is not uncommon for talks on a new deal to involve a couple of false starts as the two sides set out their stalls but Callinan has repeatedly said the union side is prepared to live without an all-encompassing deal if it believes there is not enough on the table to justify another multiannual pay agreement.

The one about to expire, however, delivered basic pay increases of 9.25 per cent to most public sector and Civil Service staff with an additional one per cent in “local bargaining” (essentially a fund to resolve outstanding local issues).

The lowest-paid staff received increase of more than 17 per cent during the deal’s 2½-year lifespan.

It was a 10^th victory for O’Brien in the historic centrepiece of British racing’s world-renowned extravaganza and a fitting stage for a landmark century that’s more statistical evidence of how he has rewritten racing’s record books.

In the 29 years since Harbour Master delivered a then fresh-faced new Ballydoyle boss a first Royal Ascot victory in the Coventry Stakes, O’Brien has redefined the old game’s parameters of success.

There have been 50 English Classics, 57 in Ireland and another 14 in France. There’s hardly a race worth mentioning in Europe that O’Brien hasn’t won at least once, and plenty other big ones around the racing world from Australia to the US.

But throughout, it is when the racing world focuses on the rarefied action at a very English slice of Berkshire in June that the 56-year-old has mined a consistent seam of big-race success.

He has been leading trainer at Royal Ascot 13 times. It’s a decade since his most successful single week with seven winners that matched the legendary Henry Cecil. He passed out Cecil’s tally of 75 winners that year. In 2023 he passed out Michael Stoute’s total of 83.

The once seemingly unattainable 100 looked on at that point and once again O’Brien delivered.

Ryan Moore has ridden more than half of them and the English jockey timed it to perfection on Scandinavia, forcing the heavily backed 11-8 favourite’s head in front of the defending champion Trawlerman in the final strides of an epic finish.

Considering the Gold Cup was first run in 1807, the sweep of the achievement was lost on no one. That Trawlerman is trained by another of English racing’s greats, John Gosden, and owned by Godolphin, may even have sprinkled a little modern relish on the historic moment.

Sheikh Mohammed’s team have been Coolmore’s great rivals for decades. But even when O’Brien has been at his most dominant, Gosden has always been to the forefront of those taking the fight to him.

While doing so the veteran Englishman has also given fluent glimpses of the competitive nature required to compete at such elite level, bowling a few verbal googlies towards O’Brien who, unusually, has waspishly batted them back.

The man originally from Co Wexford was in more characteristic form after Scandinavia’s victory, typically deflecting praise towards his team at Ballydoyle and in Coolmore, while being firmly centre stage.

“It’s very special, it’s a very special day for myself and everybody in Ballydoyle. There are so many people involved to help a horse get this far. Ryan gave him an absolute class, peach ride.

“That’s just incredible really [100 Royal Ascot winners], it’s something that we wouldn’t dream of thinking about because for that to happen you could not believe. Even this week, it’s literally one race at a time and you don’t even think what it could be or whether it could happen because it’s so competitive, so hard to win races here,” he said.

For once it was Moore who pithily summed up his long-time ally’s likely attitude to hitting three figures. “He won’t care. He’s probably thinking of the next 100. That’s what separates him,” said the jockey

Moore requires only four more winners to reach his own Ascot century and further contributed to a memorable day for O’Brien after he got Joseph O’Brien’s Enceladus up in a fierce King George V Stakes finish. It leaves father and son tied on four winners each going into the final two days.

Already, though, it has proved to be a defining Royal Ascot for its most successful ever participant.

A week that began with a double, but also accusations of team tactics swirling around after Christophe Soumillon’s eight-day ban on an O’Brien second-string in the St James’s Palace Stakes, reached a crescendo with a Gold Cup finish for the ages.

“The crowd was very big and the cheer went up when they turned in, but when he [Scandinavia] went to the front the sound went up and the noise got louder and louder, and that’s what it’s all about,” the man of the moment said.

O’Brien’s fellow Co Tipperary trainer Fozzy Stack had earlier recorded a first ever win at the meeting after Nola Soul landed the Chesham Stakes. Like Scandinavia, Nola Soul is a son of Justify and his trainer believes he has a big future ahead of him.

“We’ll have to be thinking of Group races now and hopefully he can turn up in those good races at the end of the year,” Stack said.

Jockey James Doyle recorded a double, landing an eventful Ribblesdale Stakes on Earth Shot despite the impact of a loose horse on the race. He later scored in the Hampton Court aboard the 18-1 shot Generic who was a length too good for Endorsement.

A week ago, trespassers at the Ardee House on Chamber Street were given three days to leave by Judge Brian Cregan. That period expired on Sunday. The court has heard the premises has been used as a cafe and a social centre since it was broken into around Christmas.

Lyndon MacCann, counsel for property owners Black Sheep Investments Ltd, told the court on Thursday: “Notwithstanding the orders, the activities remained unchecked and continued unabated.”

In those circumstances, counsel said he had no other option than to seek an order for short service of attachment and committal to prison for contempt against the defendants.

The judge said he was satisfied to grant short service to MacCann and said the case could come back next week.

The court previously heard that Eoghan Lynch and Sean Doyle, who claim to be part of the Revolutionary Housing League, as well as unknown people, were in occupation.

Both men were in court when the order to vacate the premises was made. Doyle claimed their action was a response to the homelessness crisis in which people were “dying on doorsteps” and that they would not comply with the order to leave.

An acutely mentally ill prisoner in his 70s, who has no previous criminal history, has lost an eye in a prison attack after being stabbed with a pen by another prisoner with psychiatric health issues who had been locked up in the same cell.

The attack, which sources described as one of extreme violence even for a prison setting, is likely to put the spotlight back on overcrowding problems across the system. The Irish Prison Service (IPS) is now catering for unprecedented numbers.

The IPS has maintained a policy of accommodating mentally ill prisoners in cells on their own. However, because of the chronic overcrowding, officers have been forced to “double up”, meaning two prisoners to a cell intended for one.

The stabbing incident happened when the two men were in the same cell at Cloverhill Prison, Dublin, on Wednesday night. After the door of the cell on D2 landing – where mentally ill remand prisoners are housed – was locked, prison officers heard a disturbance inside.

Officers rushed to respond but by the time they reached the elderly man, he had been stabbed in the eye and ear by the other prisoner, who is in his 30s.

The injured man was on remand for burglary but has no previous convictions. He was taken to Tallaght University Hospital and later transferred for special treatment, but it is understood he lost his eye.

The cell was sealed off as part of the Garda investigation.

The suspect for the attack remains at Cloverhill Prison which is especially overcrowded with remand prisoners. He is also on remand on a burglary charge.

The IPS declined to comment. Garda Headquarters confirmed, an attack had taken place and that it was under investigation.

“A man, aged in his 70s, is receiving treatment for serious injuries, believed to be non-life threatening at this time.,” gardaí said.

The prison population in Ireland first exceeded 4,000 in 2009 and reached 5,000 in 2024. There are currently more than 5,900 in the prison system, with some prisons at 160 per cent of bed capacity.

About 530 prisoners are sleeping on mattresses on floors while 600 are on open-ended “temporary” release, a mechanism usually employed to free up space for new committals.

Lewis had given members of Diageo’s executive committee cost-reduction targets, rather than a specific number of roles to eliminate, according to two people familiar with the matter. Another person said that “non-revenue-generating” teams would bear the brunt of the lay-offs.

An internal announcement about the scale of the job losses would be made next week, two of the people said, with one adding that there was currently a “funeral home atmosphere” inside Diageo’s London head office.

The owner of Guinness and Johnnie Walker employs close to 30,000 people worldwide.

Since Lewis arrived six months ago, Diageo’s heads of Great Britain, North America and Africa have all left or are in the process of leaving the company, as well as its head of human resources.

Diageo has poached Unilever’s UK chief Marc Woodward, a former colleague of Lewis’s, to lead its domestic business. Unilever said: “We thank Marc for his contribution to Unilever and wish him every future success. His successor will be announced in due course.”

In February, Diageo shared its intention to “redesign our operating framework to drive sustainable returns for shareholders by delivering a more competitive Diageo”.

“We will always prioritise informing our colleagues of any organisational changes first and have committed to update shareholders on our progress at a Capital Markets Day on 6 August.”

Diageo investors have so far only been given hints about how Lewis intends to turn around the FTSE 100 company, which has been badly hit by a dramatic downturn in spirits consumption over the past few years.

Previously, he signalled his intention to cut prices to win back consumers, an approach that could mark a big departure from the group’s long-running focus on high-end brands.

Lewis, nicknamed “drastic Dave” for his record of cost-cutting at Tesco and Unilever, had formulated his restructuring plans at Diageo without the help of consultants, said two of the people.

Diageo’s shares slumped almost 13 per cent in February after Lewis announced a dividend cut and gave his initial assessment of the business, arguing the company needed to invest more in mass-market brands to boost growth.

At a companywide town hall meeting in May, Lewis announced a strategic push into ready-to-drink canned cocktails, in a sign of his plans to balance out Diageo’s portfolio with more affordable options for young drinkers.

The spirits industry has failed to recover from a multiyear sales decline after producers raised prices aggressively during a pandemic-era boom in consumption. A subsequent decline in drinking has fuelled worries that the drop in sales is a structural issue for the industry, as more health-conscious consumers cut back their consumption.

Since peaking at £40 (€46.23) a share in 2022, Diageo’s shares have fallen by more than 60 per cent to £15.

– Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2026

The Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) world rankings compare the performance of the world’s top 1,500 universities across 106 countries.

Trinity College Dublin remains the highest ranking university in Ireland, coming in at 75th for a second year in a row.

For the first time in more than 15 years, University College Dublin (UCD) has entered the top 100, rising 18 places since last year to take the number 100 spot.

University College Cork and the University of Galway rose to 220th and 275th in the world respectively.

University of Limerick (UL) rose to its highest ever ranking at 388th globally and Dublin City University rose to 408th. They came in at fifth and sixth in the Irish ranking respectively.

Maynooth University rose 50 places from last year with a QS ranking of 721-730.

Rankings were based on academic reputation, employer recognition, research impact and student experience, QS said.

In the North, Queen’s University Belfast is the highest ranking third-level institution at 174th in the global ranking. Ulster University is at 595th.

Ireland is the 19th most represented country in Europe in the QS rankings with eight entries.

The United Kingdom leads globally with 93, followed by Germany, which has 60, and Spain with 48.

Ireland is one of 15 national higher education systems globally that have two or more entries within the top 100.

Only 23 higher education systems worldwide have an entry in the top 100. Ireland is one of 10 European systems to feature in the top 100.

Ireland is also second in the world on average in the category of employer reputation among systems with eight or more ranked institutions. Only the Netherlands has a better overall average in this indicator, worth 15 per cent of the overall results.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in the United States, retains its title of the highest-ranked university in the world. It was followed by Imperial College London, which retained its position for a third year in a row, and Stanford University. Both are tied in second place.

Ben Sowter, QS senior vice president, said Ireland last year was “home to the most-improved higher education system in Europe and this year the upward trajectory continues”.

Sowter said the latest rankings “demonstrate how Ireland’s eight ranked universities are going from strength to strength in key areas such as reputation among both academics and employers, sustainability and appealing to international students”.

UCD president Prof Orla Feely said she was “very pleased” with the ranking.

“This represents important recognition of the success of our university in research, where we are one of the top 20 universities in Horizon Europe, in education, where the quality of our graduates is strongly valued by employers,” she said.

UL president Prof Shane Kilcommins said the ranking was a “very significant moment” for the university.

“This achievement reflects the deep culture of merit that defines UL, where excellence in teaching, research and student success is both expected and consistently delivered,” he said.

In all, 31 universities in the UK improved on their previous rankings and 16 ranked in the top 100. The University of Oxford, Cambridge University and University College London joined Imperial in the top 10.

New Accounts show Power City Ltd paid out the €20 million dividends as pretax profit declined by 13 per cent to €4.16 million in the 12 months to the end of September last.

The drop in profit followed revenue dipping marginally by 1.7 per cent from €92.85 million to €91.3 million. The company paid out a dividend of €1 million in 2024

The firm’s accumulated profits stood at €123.28 million at the end of September 2024.

After the dividend payout, offset by a post-tax profit of €3.7 million last year, the firm’s accumulated profits at the end of September 2025 totalled €106.65 million.

On the firm’s 2025 performance, the directors said in a note with the accounts that trading activity during the period had continued satisfactorily.

The note said they were confident the company could continue to trade satisfactorily for the foreseeable future.

The €4.16 million in pretax profit last year followed pretax profit of €4.79 million in the previous year.

The company recorded an operating profit of €3.28 million last year and benefited from other finance income of €879,000.

This was made up of €182,000 in interest received on “deposit account” and €697,000 in net interest income on pension-scheme assets.

The company recorded a post-tax profit of €3.7 million after recording a corporation tax charge of €455,000.

The net cash generated from operating activities last year totalled €11.8 million.

The firm had an outlay of €357,000 on the purchase of tangible fixed assets and this followed an outlay of €869,000 under that heading in fiscal 2024.

The directors, Liam T McKenna, Dermot B McKenna and Sinéad McKenna, shared aggregate pay of €1.16 million last year which was made up of €918,000 in directors’ emoluments and €251,000 in post-employment benefits.

The profit last year takes account of non-cash depreciation costs of €1.7 million.

Numbers employed reduced from 231 to 214 as staff costs increased slightly from €10.56 million to €10.6 million.

Cash funds decreased from €39.54 million to €31 million during the year.

Shareholder funds totalled €107.97 million.

Power City’s 11 stores are located in the eastern part of Ireland with its Dublin stores at Tallaght, Sallynoggin, Blanchardstown, Finglas, Coolock, Fonthill, Carrickmines and Swords, while there are also stores in Bray, Naas and Drogheda.

England stumbled into view before gathering their stride against Croatia in Dallas, winning 4-2 having contrived to throw away their lead twice in the first half. Thomas Tuchel’s half-time speech helped to spark the turnaround, telling his players to throw off their shackles and “show the world who you can be”.

The world saw a second-half performance to suggest that England are true contenders to win this tournament and a first-half effort that screamed the opposite. Tuchel’s assistant coach Anthony Barry described that opening half as “fearful” - an English state of mind with a rich lineage at previous tournaments and one from which they will have to break if they are ever actually going to win this thing again.

Ken Early was in Dallas for us.

The other game in England’s group saw a belated sighting of Carlos Queiroz, who, much like Shakira, uses World Cups to prove he is still on the go. He is in charge of Ghana nowadays, and they opened with a scrappy, hectic 1-0 win over Panama thanks to Caleb Yirenkyi’s 95th-minute tap-in.

In the late game, Uzbekistan felt the great joy of their first-ever World Cup goal before succumbing 3-1 to Colombia. Abbosbek Fayzullaev had the honour for Uzbekistan, equalising on the hour mark before Luis Diaz regained the lead for Colombia five minutes later.

Finally, Roberto Martinez defended his selection decisions after the Democratic Republic of Congo held the Cristiano Republic of Portugal to a 1-1 draw in Houston.

Ronaldo didn’t have a shot on target and yet played all 90 minutes in a moribund performance. He hasn’t scored a non-penalty goal at a tournament since Euro 2020, and yet Portugal remain chained to Ronaldo in the way Prometheus was chained to the rock.

Just don’t expect to things to change. “It makes no sense to get the best goalscorer in world football out in a game that you need goals,” said Martinez.

England are at least aware they have to move on from the past.

Results:

Group K – Portugal 1 (Joao Neves 6) DR Congo 1 (Yoane Wissa 45)

Group L – England 4 (Harry Kane 12, 42, Jude Bellingham 47, Marcus Rashford 85) Croatia 2 (Martin Baturina 36, Petar Musa 45+5)

Group L – Ghana 1 (Caleb Yirenkyi 90+5) Panama 0

Group K – Uzbekistan 1 (Abbosbek Fayzullaev 60) Colombia 3 (Daniel Munoz 40, Luis Diaz 65, Jaminton Campaz 90)

Goal of the day: Abbosbek Fayzullaev

🇺🇿 1-1 🇨🇴

A first ever World Cup goal for Uzbekistan and it is very well worked. Albeit a goalkeeping error gifts the finish to Abbosbek Fayzullaev

Watch all 104 games from the #FIFAWorldCup on RTÉ pic.twitter.com/LEfpXSd435

— RTÉ Sport (@RTEsport) June 18, 2026

Okay, the dodgy goalkeeping costs this some style points, but who can resist a nation’s maiden World Cup goal?

Moment of the day: Happily a small clutch of DR Congo fans turned up to a watch party in Lisbon and weren’t shy in revelling in it.

Spot the DR Congo fans in Lisbon 😅

They LOVED Yoane Wissa's equaliser! ❤️ pic.twitter.com/Kn93PzWPPo

— Match of the Day (@BBCMOTD) June 17, 2026

Picture of the day:

Question of the day: England beat 4-1 Croatia in qualifying for the 2010 World Cup. Which forward scored a hat-trick in Zagreb, but never played a World Cup match, despite being included in a squad? (Answer below)

Coming up today:

Group A – Czech Republic v South Africa (5pm Irish time, RTÉ2 & BBC One); Mexico v South Korea (2am, RTÉ2 & BBC Two)

Group B – Switzerland v Bosnia & Herzegovina (8pm, RTÉ2 & UTV); Canada v Qatar (11pm, RTÉ2 & UTV)

Elsewhere in sport:

The US Open begins today, at the celebrated venue of Shinnecock Hills in New York. Dave Hannigan details the darker parts of the venue’s past and its contentious branding. Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry are joined in the field by Pádraig Harrington and Graeme McDowell, and David Gorman has you covered on all the necessary TV details.

In Gaelic football, Tomás O’Sé tells Gordon Manning why Kerry should not shirk the challenge of Armagh , while our columnist Ciarán Murphy basks in the joy of a Championship day out in Salthill - despite the traffic.

Answer to question: Theo Walcott

So, broadly, three courses are possible: a successful conclusion to these talks, a breakdown and return to conflict or what might be called a muddling-on scenario, where the talks deadline is extended and there are still tensions in the Gulf, if not outright conflict.

The importance of the breakthrough is it makes the worst-case scenario of further conflict and a prolonged disruption of energy supplies less likely.

This would have threatened a further escalation of oil and gas prices, in time possible fuel shortages, an ongoing hit to consumers and higher inflation and interest rates.

Despite this, high energy costs are still going to be a crunch issues for the budget in October.

So what could the better news this week mean?

Petrol and diesel prices

Wholesale oil prices have already come down, with a barrel of Brent Crude trading at about $76 (€66) on Thursday compared to $118 at the peak of the current crisis and prolonged periods above $100. We are starting to see this reflected at the pumps, with petrol and diesel prices easing – diesel, in particular, had already come well off its highs after a supply squeeze.

Trends in the wholesale market should leave prices per litre around 10 cent lower on Friday than they were a week ago in the vast bulk of stations, says Kevin McPartlan, chief executive of Fuels Ireland, the industry representative body.

While there was criticism of the pace at which retailers increased prices after the conflict hit, the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission found no evidence of collusion.

Wholesale kerosene prices are also falling, which will benefit those buying home heating oil. A spike in this market sent prices as high as €900 for a 500-litre fill in spring, compared to around €500 last winter. Prices are now back at about €650.

Energy price shock to squeeze Irish wage growth this year, says Central Bank

As well as wholesale market trends, the big determinant of petrol and diesel prices in the short term will be tax. The Government is due to decide whether cuts in excise duties introduced during the spring, which reduced diesel by 32 cent a litre and petrol by 27 cent, will be renewed after the end of July when they are due to run out.

Ministers have hinted this may happen, though have been careful not to make any commitments. Whether the cuts are renewed in full is likely to depend on the trend in wholesale prices in the meantime. For now, traders speculate that an uncertainty premium in wholesale prices may remain due to concerns about how the negotiations will go.

Also, it will take time for oil supplies to return to pre-war normality, given the interruption in supply. A tanker leaving the Gulf now will take around 50 days to arrive in the European Union. With the likelihood being that the US-Iran talks will still be going on at the end of July, a full or partial renewal of the excise cuts looks likely. At least for a few more months.

Electricity costs

As we learned following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, gas is the key short-term determinant of electricity prices due to Ireland’s reliance on gas-fired generation and the price-setting mechanism in the market.

And, of course, wholesale gas prices feed through directly to domestic gas bills as well. Electric Ireland, the ESB’s retail arm, is increasing electricity prices by 8 per cent from July 1st and gas prices by 7.7 per cent. Prepay Power and Yuno Energy have also announced rises. The Electric Ireland rise followed those by other major players last November.

The bigger players in the market hedge their exposure by buying forward on the market, meaning retail prices are slower to rise in response to wholesale rises, but are then a bit slower to fall as well.

Recent trends in the wholesale gas market have been favourable: having peaked at around 160p per therm, prices are now back at about or just below 100p. It was as low as 70p a therm last December and in the 80p range for much of last year.

Worst of Iran war-related price hikes yet to hit, conference hears

A quick reversal of the rises announced by Electric Ireland recently and other major players late last year looks unlikely. The firms will have bought some gas forward at recent higher prices, while for now prices remain above 2025 levels.

However, consumers can hope that further planned increases are now off the cards if the ceasefire holds. Some smaller players, more reliant on wholesale costs, could reverse some of the recent rises.

The key thing to watch will be the wholesale gas market.

Energy market sources say two issues will be vital.

One is how quickly Gulf energy infrastructure – particularly Qatari LNG facilities damaged during the conflict – comes back on stream.

The Iran deal removes a big economic risk for Ireland – if it holds

Following the Iranian attack there were estimates this could take three years or more. However, this week Bloomberg reported Qatari estimates that 80 per cent of capacity could be back in a couple of months.

The other key determinant on prices in Europe, sources say, will be the impact of the summer move to refill storage across the Continent in advance of winter. This will add significantly to demand. The question is what supply will be there to meet it.

Interest rates

The US-Iran deal gives hope to borrowers that a round of interest rate rises to combat rising inflation could be avoided.

That said, what happens next is being debated. European Central Bank (ECB) council members, including Ireland’s Central Bank governor Gabriel Makhlouf, have warned about “lingering price pressures” and the possibility of a prolonged period before energy prices return to normal. Philip Lane, the ECB’s chief economist, has said it will remain “proactive” in its fight against inflation.

Still, after the recent quarter-point hike, financial markets do not believe the ECB will move again next month and are divided about the prospects on a further quarter-point rise in autumn. Inflation data in the meantime will be vital.

Goodbody chief economist Dermot O’Leary is optimistic. “While concerns remain about the details and longevity of a deal on Iran, risks to energy prices have now moved to the downside, even relative to the milder scenario that was laid out by the ECB last week,” he said. “It is now more likely that the ECB will not require another rate hike to follow last week’s move.”

Energy policy

The crisis has again underlined Ireland’s exposure to price swings in imported fossil fuels and to supply security questions. McPartlan of Fuels for Ireland has been calling on the Government to establish a group to examine the taxation of fuel, including the treatment of renewables, to avoid the need for ongoing “knee-jerk” responses.

‘I am terrified about the winter coming’: One in seven now behind on electricity bills

In relation to wider policy issues affecting consumers and businesses, the Government has established a National Energy Affordability Taskforce, which is due to publish an energy-affordability plan before the budget. It will look at how supports can be directed to those who need them and how the cost of the substantial investment in energy infrastructure should be split between billpayers and taxpayers.

The backdrop is that household costs are now about 50 per cent higher than at the end of 2021, with prices here at the top of the EU league. Higher household arrears have resulted. Even if the impact of the Iran crisis eases, there are big political questions here about how to support households and vulnerable businesses.

Speaking on the latest episode of The Irish Times Women’s Podcast, the writer describes what it was like to dip her toe “into the whole world of Hollywood” and explains her decision to not hire a stylist for the Academy Awards. “I wanted to go as myself ... I wanted to be myself,” she says.

Discussing her delight when Jessie Buckley won the award for best actress, the novelist highlights how “she [Buckley] poured herself – heart and soul and blood and bone – into that role”.

O’Farrell describes the Oscars as a fitting moment to say goodbye to Hamnet: “I wore a mourning veil and a Victorian mourning necklace with my pink dress...it was a celebration but also a saying goodbye”.

The author’s latest book, Land - which is to be adapted for screen by the same team behind Hamnet - is personal and linked to her family history. In this conversation with podcast presenter Róisín Ingle, O’Farrell tells the fascinating story of how a tiny vignette found on a hand painted map in her family home, led her to the novel.

Inspired by her great-great grandfather’s work mapping Ireland in the aftermath of the Famine, O’Farrell ponders what it was like to re-map Ireland following such an “enormous cataclysm”. The question prominent in her mind was “What happened to the people who survived and stayed? What’s their story? How did they recover?”

You can listen back to their conversation in the player above or search The Women’s Podcast wherever you get your podcasts.

In a judgment published this week, High Court president Judge David Barniville made orders against Ronan O’Brien after a disciplinary tribunal made findings of misconduct against the solicitor.

O’Brien, who previously practised at Ronan O’Brien & Co Solicitors, Church Street, Cavan, was previously suspended from practice by the court in 2024.

As well as being struck off the roll of solicitors, O’Brien was ordered to pay the costs of the disciplinary tribunal and the costs of the Law Society in bringing the strike-off application to the High Court, amounting to about €14,000.

The Law Society’s application to strike off O’Brien arose from a complaint by two of his clients.

On various dates last year, allegations against O’Brien were considered at hearings of the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal, an independent body that considers complaints of misconduct against solicitors and barristers.

O’Brien attended the first tribunal hearing and made several admissions. The tribunal ultimately upheld various allegations of misconduct against him.

The tribunal found that O’Brien had misappropriated €239,500 held on behalf of two clients to partly fund his acquisition of a property in Cavan town, and the acquisition – on behalf of a separate client – of another premises in the town.

This misconduct involved fraud and dishonesty, the tribunal found, and brought the profession of solicitors into disrepute.

Other instances of misconduct included the making of unauthorised payments, deficits in client ledgers, and failure to maintain proper books of account.

In his judgment, Barniville noted that the tribunal “pointed out that the findings were not only serious, but that they were at the ‘very upper end of seriousness’”.

O’Brien’s misconduct was “dishonest, calculated, repeated”, the tribunal found, and he benefited financially from his actions at the expense of his clients.

The tribunal considered mitigating factors, including O’Brien’s admissions, his co-operation with the tribunal, and difficult personal circumstances.

The tribunal recommended that O’Brien be struck off the register of solicitors.

The judge said he was satisfied to adopt the sanctions recommended by the tribunal and sought by the Law Society.

But amid the celebrations from Shehbaz Sharif – who has served as mediator for the deal – the release of the memorandum of understanding that gets the ball rolling on the next 60 days of negotiations between Iran and the US, has proven more divisive, eliciting a mixture of outrage, bewilderment and relief.

In France, the leaders of the G7 countries welcomed the deal, calling it a “historic opportunity to prevent Iran from acquiring any nuclear weapon”.

European leaders have largely been sidelined from the negotiations, but expressed relief that the Strait of Hormuz would reopen, allowing the flow of oil to resume. Emmanuel Macron said it would put a stop to a “situation of great instability that had terrible consequences for our economies”.

Trump’s Iran gamble leaves Iran with leverage intact

In Israel, however, the agreement has been greeted with less optimism.

Mark Regev, a former senior adviser to Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, questioned how seriously Iran would approach negotiations over its nuclear programme, now that the US has removed the economic and military “pressure”.

Under the terms of the memorandum , Iran will reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and in return receive waivers for US sanctions on crude oil exports, petroleum products and associated banking services. It will then enter into negotiations over the fate of its nuclear programme and stock of highly enriched uranium.

“The straits are open and the Iranians can start exporting their oil, and therefore they get money coming in, you’ve taken away the economic pressure,” said Regev, adding “maybe Trump will get a great deal ... but at the moment I don’t see that. I see the US having given Iran’s regime a return to life.”

Regev’s views were reflected across Israel.

Yair Lapid, the leader of Israel’s opposition, said on Tuesday: “Netanyahu promised us a historic victory – and we got a crisis with the Americans, Hormuz open to the Iranians, money for the Revolutionary Guards, ballistic missiles aimed at Israel, and Israel waiting in the corridor like a scolded child.”

With Israel set to hold elections before October, Lapid and his coalition partner Naftali Bennett, are seeking to capitalise on the anger brewing in Israel over the agreement between the US and Iran.

Trump, who has previously enjoyed high approval among Israelis, is facing widespread criticism in local media. David Horovitz, the founding editor of the Times of Israel, wrote on Wednesday that the US-Israel war on Iran was lost due to “US presidential weakness”, among other issues.

“It will come back to bite the US. It leaves Israel more vulnerable than before the war began, with a new US-Iran ceasefire agreement that aims to deny Israel the freedom to protect and defend itself,” he wrote.

Trump signs Iran peace plan, claiming deal averts ‘worldwide depression’

Netanyahu’s Likud party, apparently aware of the cooling views on the US president, has reportedly scrapped plans to highlight the prime minister’s close ties with Trump in its upcoming election campaign.

Not all voices were speaking in opposition to the agreement, though; Danny Citrinowicz, a former head of the Iran branch of Israeli military intelligence, said the deal showed reality had “finally returned to US policy on Iran”.

“Before events spiralled completely out of control, the US administration stepped back from maximalist objectives and returned to a more measured and realistic approach,” Citrinowicz wrote on Wednesday.

Those same splits in opinion were reflected in the US.

The Republican senator Lindsey Graham, a key Trump ally, appeared to soften his view of the memorandum of understanding after a “very lengthy and productive” conversation with the US special envoy Steve Witkoff.

“After this discussion, it is my opinion that signing the MOU [memorandum of understanding] will be beneficial to the United States, inasmuch as the strait of Hormuz will begin to open, and the hostilities with Iran will stop,” Graham wrote on social media.

“Whether or not the United States can reach an acceptable, verifiable deal with Iran regarding its nuclear program and other issues is yet to be determined, but I see little downside to trying.”

A handful of other Senate Republicans were more critical in their views. Bill Cassidy, who Trump failed to back in a tightly fought primary last month, said “Iran’s nuclear ambitions were not curbed, and they have learned that threatening the strait of Hormuz works and will undoubtedly leverage it in the future.”

Senator Ted Cruz, who has backed the war, said the president was getting “very poor advice when it comes to this deal”.

Susan Rice, a former official in the Obama and Biden administrations was more blunt in her assessment, calling it “the biggest national security blunder in decades”, while Democratic Senator Adam Schiff said it was “hard to imagine a more thorough capitulation”.

“Iran gets sanctions relief, the release of frozen funds, the ability to export oil, and a $300 billion reconstruction fund. The US gets a reiteration of the vague promise Iran won’t develop a nuke.”

Trump himself hailed the agreement as a “major win” for the United States, while Iran’s chief negotiator, Mohammad Ghalibaf called it “a record of US failure”. Trump signed the agreement on Wednesday and soon after, Iran announced that its president, Masoud Pezeshkian, has also signed it in Tehran.

Trump signed during a dinner with Macron at the palace of Versailles, the site of the 1919 agreement which formally ended the conflict between Germany and allied powers after the first world war. The outcomes of that agreement were short lived, and Europe was again consumed by war just 20 years after it was signed. - The Guardian

The total number of private vehicles driving without insurance reached 187,803 in 2022. This was an increase of 13,626 over the 2021 figure. The data shows that uninsured vehicles accounted for 8.3 per cent of the entire fleet of private vehicles on Irish roads.

MIBI calculates its figures by contrasting the number of private motor vehicle owners paying motor tax with the number of vehicles that have active insurance policies. The figures will obviously not include the far smaller number of vehicles which are neither taxed nor insured.

The number of uninsured vehicles on Irish roads has jumped by more than 32,000 – or 17 per cent – since 2020, says the bureau, a non-profit group which is responsible for compensating victims of collision caused by drivers of uninsured or unidentified vehicles.

Bringing a car into Ireland: What you need to know when it comes to tax

“Clearly not enough is being done to discourage uninsured driving in this country,” said MIBI chief executive David Fitzgerald. “Every single time a person drives a vehicle without insurance they are breaking the law. Yet the number of uninsured vehicles continues to rise.

“Within the last two years, the number of private vehicles being driven illegally without insurance has grown by more than 32,000. That is a really, really significant increase and should be a cause of concern to anyone who is interested the safety of Irish roads.

“Law abiding motorists won’t be happy to see these figures and to look at the growing trend of uninsured driving. If the current trend were to continue then we are likely to pass 200,000 uninsured vehicles in the next 12-18 months unless significant action is taken.”

He said that the “most obvious solution” is for the new Irish Motor Insurance Database system to be “fully adopted”. “This will allow uninsured drivers to be simply and quickly identified without having to even be stopped and pulled over,” he said.

“It enables gardaí to check vehicles on the road without even leaving their cars. They can also use their mobility devices to quickly check the insurance status of vehicles and drivers, thus speeding up the validation process in front line operations.”

Revolut will start offering credit cards to Irish customers from today. The fintech promises a careful roll-out of the cards that it says will not penalise over-limit transactions or returned payments and will offer introductory zero per cent rates as well as cashback on purchases.

Sticking with banking, Fexco Asset Finance has invested €10 million in the sustainable loan initiative being overseen by Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland’s (SBCI), which will see loans of between €10,000 and €150,000 made to businesses looking to cut their energy costs and reduce their carbon emissions.

Figures from the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland show that at least one in 12 cars on Irish roads is now uninsured, with the numbers rising for the third year in a row. Colin Gleeson reports.

Despite assurances from European Medicines Agency chief Emer Cooke that the worst of the winter drug shortage is behind us, figures show a growing number of medicines in short supply in Ireland, with a focus on those relying on plastics, such as nasal sprays, asthma inhalers and eye drops.

In his column, Eoin Burke-Kennedy looks at inflation and whether it will really return swiftly to ECB target levels of around 2 per cent now that it has peaked.

And Pilita Clark writes in praise of bosses’ foibles, if only because it helps to humanise them to their staff.

Stay up to date with all our business news: sign up to our Business Today daily email news digest.

According to new estimates from the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland, just under 188,000 private vehicles were driving without insurance last year, an increase of 13,600 on 2021.

The real number is likely to be even worse as the figures are based on comparing car owners paying motor tax and the number of vehicles with active insurance policies. They do not include those who pay neither car insurance nor motor tax.

The problem, said transport consultant Conor Faughnan, was “as old as the hills” and one which has little to do with the affordability or otherwise of premiums. “It just persists in good times and bad and it’s always around a 6-8 per cent figure.”

By contrast, the figures in the UK are substantially less – with the percentage of uninsured drivers typically around 4 per cent.

Mr Faughnan points to different factors driving the numbers higher from the benign to the malevolent. “It is possible to be an uninsured driver for honest reasons, for example, if you move from one policy to another and forget to add your spouse to the new policy.”

There are also people who take a chance and drive a parent’s car without having the proper insurance. “They feel they can get away with it and they are often proved right. We see that complacency in other ways such as those people who have driven for 30 years on a learner permit.”

He also points to the “outright deception and fraud” and “the guy who already has three driving bans, and no licence”.

The penalties are there to stop it happening and, if caught, the uninsured face an automatic court appearance, five penalty points, substantial fines and the seizing of a vehicle. But how many people are detected?

Last year the Dáil heard about 130 uninsured drivers were caught daily, amounting to about 47,450 drivers each year. In recent years more than 100,000 cars have been seized with over €15 million in fines handed down for driving without insurance, averaging about 9,000 each year.

While 9,000 fines a year sounds impressive, it leaves about 180,000 uninsured drivers facing no penalty whatsoever.

“Clearly not enough is being done to discourage uninsured driving in this country,” said David Fitzgerald, chief executive of the MIBI, a non-profit organisation set up to compensate victims of road traffic accidents caused by uninsured and unidentified vehicles.

The solution seems simple. Allow gardaí identify uninsured drivers using number plate recognition software known as Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR).

The technology – which can read every vehicle registration plate that passes a checkpoint – can identify the insurance company with which a person has their policy and the validity of their tax. It has been in place for more than a decade.

Theoretically the technology can solve the problem but it relies on clean data and the full integration of insurance databases with Garda systems.

“If the Government wanted to take action on this issue, they would be pressing for the full and immediate implementation of that system. However, as the relevant legislation required to completely enable that is still working its way through the Oireachtas, it would seem we still have some distance to travel before the country really clamps down on the problem of uninsured driving,” Mr Fitzgerald said.

“It’s partly bureaucratic inertia,” said Mr Faughnan, and “partly slowness on the part of the insurance companies. But it is also an enormous technical project and not quite as straightforward as most people would intuitively think.”

He said that early usage of the insurance ID system returned a huge number of mistakes. “If the technology is just pinging far too many false positives, it is of no practical use.”

Uninsured motorists added about €40 on to every premium but that in itself was part of a problem, said Mr Faughnan, because “it is the consumer who pays that money ultimately, so the whole system prices it in and charges the punter. You might rhetorically agree that €80 million is being wasted, but the industry is not actually incentivised to fix it.”

A Garda spokesman said the force was working with the insurance industry to provide real time data regarding the insurance status of drivers. While waiting for the full implementation of a revamped database, gardaí are continuing to check the insurance status of a driver either via an app or the ANPR.

“When a Garda member gets an ‘no insurance’ alert [they] will always have to check with the driver’s insurance company to verify the data. This check will be in place until the legislation is in place for a direct link between the Garda mobility device and the Irish motor insurance database,” the spokesman said.

He said “significant investment in ANPR technology has been made to date [with] 127 Garda vehicles equipped with such technology”.

The insurance sector says it wants more done. “Uninsured driving is not a victimless crime,” a spokeswoman for Insurance Ireland said, adding that members were “very supportive of the increased use of technology”.

David Fitzgerald, chief executive of the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland (MIBI), the body that covers the financial cost of crashes involving drivers without cover, said it pays out about €70 million in compensation claims every year.

“That means that the law-abiding motorists are subsidising uninsured drivers to the tune of approximately €30 to €35 every time they renew their motor insurance policies,” he told the Oireachtas Transport Committee on Wednesday.

However, only around €500,000 of that is clawed back from those responsible and even that costs the MIBI about €250,000 in legal fees.

Committee members were told that, at 8.3 per cent, Ireland could now have the highest rate of uninsured vehicles in the EU. The MIBI, funded by the insurance sector to compensate victims of accidents caused by uninsured drivers and unidentified vehicles, has paid out over €2 billion since it was established in 1995.

“We look after the innocent party [and] we will then go back after the driver of the vehicle,” explained Tom O’Brien, MIBI technical claims manager.

“We only collect maybe about €400,000 to €500,000 a year in money being recovered from uninsured drivers and the primary reason for that is that most of the uninsured drivers are people that don’t have much means.

“So in comparison to what we’re paying out, maybe €70 million a year, it’s very small what we are actually able to recover from individuals who have actually caused the accident.”

Wednesday’s hearing also heard that people can manipulate the online system to tax their cars without having a valid insurance policy in place, simply by entering a false policy number that cannot be verified.

“That’s not something we’d look to see widely publicised, so at the moment there isn’t that check,” said Mr Fitzgerald, who called for an acceleration of pending legislation that would allow for a wider sharing of insurance details.

“This would be one of the advantages of passing the Road Traffic and Roads Bill because we would have a safe legal basis then to pass that insurance date to the Department of Transport and that would enable [it] to build validation in the way you’re describing, real time validation into their systems,” he said.

The Irish Times view on the rising number of uninsured drivers

The MIBI estimates, based on current trends, that the level of uninsured private vehicles is “likely to pass” the 200,000 mark in the next 12 to 18 months.

Enacting the Bill would help prevent that, according to Mr Fitzgerald, who explained it would free up the sharing of all the insurance data, already available in the Irish Motor Insurance Database (IMID), with gardaí and other agencies.

This would also enable the gardai’s Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) system to check for uninsured vehicles. Responding to questions, Mr Fitzgerald said GoSafe speed vans could similarly be equipped to screen for insurance on passing cars, although this could require separate legislation.

Fianna Fáil Senator Timmy Dooley said he was concerned about a “particularly aged cohort of our population” who have never passed a driving test but remained driving with successive learner permits.

“I know from the work that I do there are people in their mid to late seventies, and some in their eighties, who now don’t insure their cars, can’t insure their cars because they don’t have a driving licence,” he said. “They’re never going to do a test.”

Mr Fitzgerald said UK law would be worth considering where it is an offence to own a vehicle without insurance, whereas in Ireland gardaí must “catch the uninsured driver in the act”.

Throwing out a €60,000 damages claim, Judge James McCourt said said Kamil Losik may not have been one of an inner circle of people involved in staging accidents but knew, or ought to have known, that the crash in which he claimed he was injured was staged.

“There was an outer ring of people known to each other, at least loosely, through their geographical location in north Co Dublin or through their background or through their places of work,” Judge McCourt said in the Circuit Civil Court.

After Mr Losik’s claim was dismissed, three other Polish men who were passengers in his car – Artur Kozlowski, Bartlomiej Wawrzyniak and Tomasz Szczepanski, all with addresses in Swords – withdrew claims for damages totalling €180,000. Their cases were not heard and no findings, apart from noting the withdrawal of their cases, were made against them.

The four men had sued National Retrofit & Construction Services Limited of Laraghcon, Lucan, Co Dublin; one of its then drivers, Damien McEvoy, of Kilmore, Enfield, Co Meath, and the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland. The firm claimed Mr McEvoy, at the time of the accident, was not authorised to drive its van while doing a delivery job for a friend.

Barrister Paul McMorrow, who appeared with David Culleton of Mason Hayes and Curran Solicitors for the company and the bureau, successfully applied for Mr Losik’s passengers to remain outside the court while his case was being dealt with. Judge McCourt directed that they surrender their phones to their solicitors.

Mr McMorrow said Mr McEvoy had not chosen to participate in the case and was not represented. A defence, alleging that the accident had been staged, had been entered on behalf of Zurich Insurance Plc, insurers of the van.

Mr Losik, of Cianlea, Swords, claimed the van rear-ended his car at Applewood Village Green roundabout at Broadmeadow, Swords in February 2017. Dismissing his claim, the judge said his historical recollection had been evasive and any admissions secured were slow in coming.

“I am of the view (the accident) was staged and that Mr Losik knew or ought to have known that it was,” Judge McCourt said as he made an order for costs against Mr Losik. “He is an unreliable witness and I don’t believe him.”

When Mr McMorrow asked for a costs order against Mr McEvoy, Judge McCourt said there was no reality in it.

“You have done a good job for your clients,” the judge said.

In the five-year period up to 2022, incidents involving uninsured or untraced drivers added between €150 and €175 to all motorists’ premiums.

The number of claims relating to uninsured and untraced drivers between 2018 and 2022 handled by the bureau was put at 10,376.

Over the course of the pandemic, the number of claims it handled fell as fewer vehicles, including uninsured vehicles, were on the roads but last year, there was a significant spike with 1,739 claims lodged with the MIBI, representing a 17 per cent increase on the 2021 number.

On a county-by-county basis over the past five years, the highest total number of claims received were in Dublin, where 4,605 claims were lodged, followed by Cork with 819 and Limerick with 617. The most claims per capita were in Dublin, Louth and Limerick.

“The reality is that the cost of these accidents is borne by law abiding motorists, who effectively have to subsidise these claims every time they renew their motor insurance,” said MIBI chief executive, David Fitzgerald. “That means over the last five years, the average motorist has provided an extra €150 to €175 to cover the cost of accidents caused by uninsured and untraced driving.”

Earlier this year, the MIBI published research showing there were almost 188,000 uninsured private vehicles on Irish roads last year and that the Republic may now have the highest level of uninsured vehicles in the EU.

Almost 90% of banned drivers failing to surrender licences

“Unfortunately, as the number of uninsured vehicles grows, the number of claims relating to accidents caused by uninsured drivers also rise. With the level of uninsured vehicles on Irish roads potentially the highest in the EU, we need to do all we can to discourage people driving illegally without insurance.”

It also predicted that the number of uninsured vehicles on Irish roads could pass 200,000 in the next 12 to 18 months if “significant action” isn’t taken, especially the urgent enactment and full implementation of legislation that will give greater powers to Gardaí to identify uninsured vehicles.

Mr Fitzgerald said the legislation was a “potential game changer in the battle against illegal uninsured driving as it will allow the Gardaí to check if the driver is insured just by scanning the licence plate number. It should then become extremely difficult for uninsured drivers to avoid detection.”

The price of motor insurance has continued to fall with premiums costing 5 per cent less in the first half of 2022 compared with 2021 prices, according to a new report from the Central Bank of Ireland. Conor Pope has the details.

Sticking with motor insurance, Conor Pope also reports on how uninsured or untraced drivers are involved in almost 40 incidents each week with more than 10,000 claims lodged with the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland since 2018.

Legal & General Investment Management, one of the world’s biggest asset managers, actively voted against executive pay packets at Irish companies CRH, Greencore and Flutter last year, the group’s latest “active ownership” report states. Eoin Burke-Kennedy has the details.

Is your home underinsured? Many homeowners have been told just that by their insurer recently. Fiona Reddan explains why in our weekly personal finance feature, and suggests some ways to ensure you are not caught out by clauses in your policy.

In our personal finance Q&A, a reader who is joint executor of her late mother’s will wonders if they have to wait until her house is sold before distributing the existing cash assets. And if they have to wait, can they get repayment of expenses so far incurred? Dominic Coyle offers some guidance. If you want more personal finance coverage you can sign up to our On The Money newsletter, published every Friday, here.

The pressure continues to mount on Ires Reit, the country’s largest private landlord, with activist investor Vision Consulting issuing another public letter to fellow shareholders, urging change at the Irish listed company. Will Ires be able to count on its Canadian founder for support? Cantillon offers a view.

Twitter is an extraordinary circus, an accelerated destruction of one man’s wealth and a social media endgame all in one, writes our columnist Laura Slattery.

The cost of agricultural land in Ireland is forecast to rise by a further 8 per cent this year on the back of constrained supply and higher demand from the dairy sector due to new environmental regulations, according to a new report by State farming agency Teagasc and the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland. Eoin Burke-Kennedy has the details.

Deluxe Group, the Co Armagh-based interior fit-out specialist behind the Game of Thrones studio tour, has announced plans to double its workshop capacity with an investment of €1.69 million and open a new facility in Florida amid a boom in global experience economy. Ian Curran reports.

In Me & My Money, Geraldine Magnier, co-founder and director of customer analytics firm Idiro Analytics, tells Tony Clayton-Lea that she likes to support buskers “who add so much culture and beauty to our streets”.

Stay up to date with all our business news: sign up to our Business Today daily email news digest.

We don’t know how many of the 2023 no-shows fell into this category, but we do know that as many as 30,000 people who are on their third or subsequent provisional licence have never sat a test, and some people have been driving around for more than 30 years on a provisional.

Under the letter of the law, you can renew your first provisional licence once by just applying. After that you need to show evidence of having sat and failed a test. In practice, merely a booking for a test is accepted. Given the waiting lists for the driving test, this sort of discretion is understandable. In truth, most people sit the test because they want to obtain a full licence.

But it has created a loophole through which thousands of people, for whatever reason, choose to step through. They would appear to have no real interest in getting a full licence – or just can’t be bothered.

On the face of it, this seems a little hard to understand. Who wants to spend 30 years driving around with a qualified motorist in the passenger seat; one of the stipulations for driving on a provisional licence? Likewise, who wants to drive around with learner plates and have to stay off the motorway?

The answer to this question is of course nobody. A very significant number of people driving around on provisional licences are doing none of the above. Why? Because they can.

The first reason why this makes sense is that penalties for unaccompanied driving are relatively light – certainly for first offenders. It is a fine of €160 and two penalty points on your licence. If you get more than seven penalty points in three years you are automatically disqualified for six months. So, if you pay your fine and take the points, you can afford to be caught driving on your own with a provisional licence once a year. Not bad odds.

Insurance companies are understandably reluctant to say it, but if you are driving unaccompanied on a provisional licence and get into an accident, you are still insured

If you don’t pay the fines, then it gets more serious. The fine fees go up and you can be taken to court. Gardaí have the power to impound your car, but getting it released from being impounded costs €125 plus €35 per day.

Driving without a licence of any sort – your other option if you don’t sit a test – carries a fine of €2,000, so going through the charade of booking tests and renewing your provisional has a certain financial logic from this perspective.

Readers on speed limits and road safety: ‘Changing the law means nothing without adequate enforcement’

But the real incentive for gaming the system by constantly renewing your provisional licence is to obtain insurance. Driving without insurance carries severe penalties; a fine of up to €5,000 and five penalty points, plus the possibility for going to jail for six months.

This is perhaps the biggest loophole of all. Insurance companies are understandably reluctant to say it, but if you are driving unaccompanied on a provisional licence and get into an accident, you are still insured.

This may seem a little counterintuitive, but driving unaccompanied on a provisional licence is, at the end of the day, just another traffic offence, such as speeding or driving under the influence. You are still insured – and for good reason.

The logic of the legal requirement for car insurance is third-party liability – ie, to cover any damage or injury you cause to others through your actions. It makes little sense to exclude reckless or illegal activities such as speeding from the cover.

And even if for some reason your cover was invalidated, the insurance companies, and their policy holders, pay anyway via the Motor Insurers Bureau of Ireland, which operates a fund to compensate people who experience a loss as a result of the actions of uninsured drivers.

The Irish Times view on the rising number of uninsured drivers

The various motor insurance companies all pay into the fund, but ultimately the cost is passed back to policy holders via their premiums. According to the last set of accounts for the MIBI, the fund paid out more than €75 million in 2022.

While all the constituent elements of the process by which learner drivers are regulated and insured might make sense, when you put them together it creates a series of perverse incentives to not bother to get your full licence. And for a significant number of people, these incentives seem to trump the obvious advantages of getting a full licence.

Every complex system has, or is capable of, creating such anomalies, and they are often – as is the case with unaccompanied provisional drivers – baked into the societal costs via insurance. Indeed, the rather lackadaisical approach adopted to unaccompanied learner drivers adopted by the Government seems to indicate a general acceptance of the practice. Conversations about the topic generally involve a bit of eye-rolling and the Father Ted-style equivocation that greets most uncomfortable truths.

The problem behind it all of course is that unaccompanied learner drivers kill and injure people – including themselves.

Uninsured drivers a ‘problem as old as the hills’

Around 8 per cent of vehicles have policies allowing for the transfer of cover from one to another within a specific fleet with such policies typically used by car dealers, taxi firms, haulage and transport companies and retailers.

Since late last year, it has been mandatory for fleet operators to identify the registration numbers for their vehicles and ensure they are added to or removed from the National Fleet Database within a period of 14 days.

It has emerged that just under 233,000 qualifying vehicles had been uploaded to the NFD as of the start of last month.

In response to a parliamentary question from Social Democrats TD Catherine Murphy, the Minister for Transport Eamon Ryan said that it represented 93 per cent of the fleet, which is said to be around 250,000.

Ms Murphy expressed surprise that as many as 18,000 vehicles had yet to have their details uploaded and warned that the owners risked fines and having their vehicles impounded unless they adhered to the legislation.

What really concerns us is that these are not your ordinary vehicles, these are going to be taxis and trucks

Susan Gray - PARC road safety group

“There’s an obligation here and it is really clear,” Ms Murphy said. “There’s insurance implications and there’s a consequence for non-compliance. This is part of a road safety initiative but if we don’t have a complete database it makes a mockery of the system,” she said.

She stressed that the new legislation had been introduced “primarily from a road safety perspective to make sure people are insured it’s not there to add bureaucracy”.

“What really concerns us is that these are not your ordinary vehicles, these are going to be taxis and trucks – vehicles that are on the road continually and we are sharing the roads with them,” said Susan Gray of road safety group PARC.

She expressed disappointment that months after the new legislation came into force there was still no indication of how many – if any – people had been prosecuted for being in breach of the new law.

“What’s the point of these laws if they’re not going to be enforced? There needs to be an advertising campaign so people realise the consequences of not complying and there needs to be prosecutions.”

Under the legislation, the updated NFD details are to be continually checked by the Gardaí with the data used to identify vehicles being driven illegally without insurance.

If the NFD is checked by the Gardaí and a vehicle is not listed in the database, at best the driver will have to provide proof of insurance at a Garda Station within 10 working days; at worst, their vehicle could be impounded and the driver could be facing prosecution for driving without insurance.

According to the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) as many as one in 12 vehicles in the State are not properly insured.

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The cost of such claims added about €35 on to every motor insurance premium, the research from the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) suggests.

According to the annual report, the number of claims relating to crashes caused by uninsured or untraced vehicles grew by 11 per cent in 2023. The MIBI received a total of 1,927 claims, a jump of 187 on the 1,740 that were recorded over the same period in 2022.

The bureau said the increase in the number of claims connected with uninsured or untraced vehicles reaffirmed “the importance of the new law enforcement system to clamp down on uninsured driving”.

Since signing a data sharing agreement last November, the MIBI is now providing the insurance details for 3 million vehicles using Irish roads on a daily basis to the Garda. This means gardaí can now check the insurance status of any vehicle simply by scanning its registration plate.

The MIBI is a not-for-profit organisation that was established to compensate victims of road traffic accidents caused by uninsured and unidentified vehicles, effectively the expense of meeting these claims is borne by law-abiding motorists. Figures from the MIBI suggest that the average motorist will have contributed €30-€35 at their most recent insurance renewal to cover the claims paid out by the body in the past year.

Looking at the breakdown of the claims relating to uninsured driving by county, the largest number came in Dublin where 822 such claims were processed followed by Cork on 141, Limerick with 112 and Kildare on 102.

The number of claims relating to uninsured drivers grew in 14 of the 26 counties across the Republic, with the largest percentage increases occurring in Mayo where there was an 80 per cent increase. Meath recorded a 55 per cent jump while the increase in Kildare was 42 per cent.

A total of nine counties recorded a drop in the number of claims, with the largest percentage decreases in Leitrim, Offaly and Sligo.

As many as 200,000 people drive without insurance in Ireland making it one of the most commonly committed crimes in the State, and despite the cost to car-driving consumers and society at large, the numbers breaking the law has been growing in recent years.

The real number is likely to be even worse as the figures are based on comparing car owners paying motor tax and the number of vehicles with active insurance policies. They do not include those who pay neither car insurance nor motor tax.

In 2022 the Dáil heard about 130 uninsured drivers were being caught daily, amounting to about 47,450 drivers each year. In recent years more than 100,000 cars have been seized with over €15 million in fines handed down for driving without insurance, averaging about 9,000 each year.

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They either assume they are invincible on the road and therefore will never need insurance, or simply could not care for those they may injure, maim or kill or the cost of the repairs that they will burden others with.

New figures out from the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) throws a little light on just how big a problem this is. And the answer is that it is not good.

The number of claims for accidents caused by vehicles that were either uninsured or were never traced jumped 11 per cent last year to just shy of 2,000. Unsurprisingly perhaps, the largest number by far were in Dublin, followed by Cork, Limerick, Kildare and Galway.

Kildare, along with Meath and Mayo, saw the highest increase in such claims last year.

MIBI says the cost of these claims is footed by law-abiding drivers in terms of higher premiums, with the group estimated that every driver is paying between €30 and €35 on their annual premium to help the industry meet the cost.

Frustration on all sides over the rising trend is reflected in a new data sharing agreement which means that, since November last, the MIBI gives the insurance details for three million insured vehicles on Irish roads to An Garda Síochána, allowing gardaí to check the insurance status of any vehicle simply by scanning its registration plate.

Credit where it is due. The figures do also show that claims by uninsured drivers fell in nine counties and were unchanged in a further three. But the trend remains upwards.

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A leading road safety group has expressed concern at the information deficit roadside gardaí are dealing with and warned it will make it harder to detect some of the most dangerous road users until the issue is resolved.

The Irish Motor Insurance Database (IMID) started being rolled out last November and is designed to detect some of the riskiest drivers on Irish roads including those using forged insurance discs and lapsed insurance policies.

It provides details for three million vehicles and five million drivers to the Gardaí daily with the data including names and addresses of policyholders, policy numbers and validity dates, vehicle registration numbers covered by the policy, details of named drivers and other key elements uploaded to the database daily.

It is maintained by the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) and when it was launched last November it was thought fleet vehicle details would be added alongside privately registered cars early in the new year but that has yet to happen.

About 8 per cent of vehicles have policies allowing for the transfer of cover from one to another within a specific fleet with such policies typically used by car dealers, taxi firms, haulage and transport companies and retailers.

At an Oireachtas hearing last week Assistant Garda Commissioner Paula Hillman acknowledged the role of the MIBI in the establishment of the IMID and said gardaí “have live access to at the moment private car owners [and] we will have fleets going forward”.

The details of the fleet vehicles have already been collected and added to a separate database and Susan Gray of the road safety group Parc expressed concern at the apparent delay in merging the two information sets and pointed out that the vehicles excluded from the central database include many using Irish roads on an almost continuous basis including haulage vehicles and taxies

“We were told last November that there would be nowhere for uninsured drivers to hide any more and if you were uninsured Gardaí would know,” she told The Irish Times.

“But this database that needs to be complete is actually still missing 257,000 vehicles and all these owners have uploaded all their details on to the fleet database so it should all be fully accessible to the gardaí by now,” she said

A spokesman for the MIBI said that in order to “ensure there is a strong and robust system in place, the NFD has been subjected to the same stringent IT testing processes that were used for the rest of the IMID data. This allows Gardaí to easily identify all uninsured vehicles on Irish roads. It is expected that the data for all fleet vehicles on the NFD will be part of the daily data transfers to An Garda Síochána before the end of the month.”

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I’m referring to a time when Fiat was a true automotive colossus. Seriously, it was.

Founded in 1899, Fiat is one of the oldest motoring names, and frankly one of the greatest. It pioneered the very idea of a small, affordable car (with the Topolino of 1936) while also making some of the earliest and fastest racing cars (the 290hp 1910 S76 ‘Beast Of Turin’ thrills crowds to this day) and even luxury models (remember the Fiat 130 Coupe? No, you probably don’t, but take my word — it was lovely).

Fiat, for a time, effectively was Italian industry, generating massive dollops of GDP and turning the Agnelli family into titans of industry, not to mention style (Gianni Agnelli is arguably the best-dressed man who ever lived). Fiat, at one time, was rich enough to buy Ferrari purely on the basis that doing so would annoy Henry Ford II.

Today? Sad to say but Fiat is a shadow of its once-colossal self. It’s model range shrank along with its market share, and where once Fiat could be reliably bet upon to produce a European bestseller (Punto, Uno, Tipo, Panda…) it has fallen to producing more or less only the tiny 500 in electric and petrol forms.

This is a company that once held a 30 per cent Irish market share, which had the best-selling car in Ireland in the best-selling year ever for cars in Ireland (the Punto in 2000) and which pioneered the likes of diesel direct injection and more.

The fall from its lofty perch has been painful for Fiat, and it eventually had to surrender both its majority stakeholding in Ferrari (now floated on the stock market) and become a merger partner with PSA Peugeot-Citroen-Opel to form the vast Stellantis Group.

However, eventually a corner must surely be turned and maybe – and it’s a big maybe – this is it, with the introduction of the Fiat 600. With the 600, Fiat is entering two of the most significant sectors of the market, that for hybrids and that for compact crossovers.

While the 600 will be available as a fully-electric 600e model (with a 400km claimed range) it’s likely that for Irish customers the more significant model will be the 600 Hybrid, which uses a compact 48-volt hybrid system which is kind of a half-way house between a mild-hybrid (which are really just beefed-up stop-start systems) and a full hybrid of the sort offered, to great success in this market, by Toyota.

Most crucially of all, this is a very well-priced Fiat. At a basic price of €28,995, it’s significantly more affordable than its Stellantis Group stablemates, the Jeep Avenger and Peugeot 2008, and offers an automatic hybrid model for less than the cost of a basic petrol manual version of either of those cars. It also undercuts the big-selling Toyota Yaris Cross, one of the most popular cars in the country right now. This well-equipped top-spec La Prima model costs €33,995, which is about where most rivals’ ranges are only getting going.

The 600 does so while looking rather good. Okay, so for the most part it’s the same formless blob of SUV-ish shape that everyone is doing right now, but the detailing around the lights – the mascara effect at the edges of the headlights, and the complex lines of the brakes lights – gives it a bit of character, and it makes a better fist of up-sizing the 500’s style into a larger, four-door car than did the unloved old 500X.

Inside, you’ll rapidly spot the kinship between the 600 and the Jeep Avenger. Both cars share a common platform, engines, and electric gubbins, and the cabins are close to identical in places. Really, only the Fiat’s ovoid sweep of the dashboard panel and its little hooded instrument panel (digital instruments come as standard) give it a character separate to that of the Jeep. Still, it would be churlish to complain when overall quality is fine, the seats (leather wrapped and embossed with repeating Fiat logos in this top-spec La Prima test car) are comfy, and space is good.

Well, good-ish. When it comes to practicality, the Fiat lacks the full-width dashboard shelf of its Jeep cousin, and space in the rear seats is really quite limited, especially in terms of legroom. The back of a Fiat 600 is no country for growing teens.

The boot, at 360-litres, isn’t wonderfully large but it’s just about big enough to count as useful. The big 10.25-inch touchscreen looks good but is, as is almost always the case, fiddly to use although thankfully there are proper physical heating and air conditioning controls.

The hybrid system is based around the long-serving 1.2-litre three-cylinder petrol engine originally designed by Peugeot and Citroen as the ‘PureTech’ range. Here, it gets a new six-speed dual-clutch automatic gearbox (for which you pick gears using a slightly fiddly push-button selector) into which a 21kW electric motor is integrated, powered by a compact 1.2kWh battery.

It produces 100hp and 205Nm of torque, neither of which sound very much (especially when ranged against the 1,275kg kerb weight) but actually the 600 feels pleasantly fleet when out and about. The little three-cylinder engine thrums happily when revved, and the 600 will default to electric-only power for short (very short) bursts.

It may not be as economical as it ought to be, though. Admittedly, this is based on a short test drive with minimal urban mileage, but we could only record 5.9-litres per 100km against Fiat’s claimed 4.9-litres per 100km figure. That’s not great, but perhaps the fact that this was an un-broken-in engine with fewer than 1,000km on the clock gives the 600, for now, an escape clause.

There will eventually be a sporting Abarth version of the 600, but this La Prima model doesn’t display much in the way of enthusiasm for corners. That said, the steering – accessed via a neat two-spoke steering wheel – is nicely weighted and feels good, and the 600 flows perfectly well along a tight and twisty back road. Not fun, exactly, but certainly fine. It’s probably best to avoid the 18-inch wheels of this top-spec model, though. They add a bit too much spikiness to the ride quality.

Will Irish buyers flock, in their droves, to this 600 as once they did to the 127, the Uno, and the Punto? Probably – sadly – not, no.

Fiat just doesn’t have the market presence right now to drive that kind of sales success, but at least this new model gives it something with which to fight.

It’s not an exceptional car in any sense, but it’s cute and pleasant to drive, and if the fuel economy works out better for you than it did for us, then it certainly represents sharp value in one of the most hotly-contested segments of the market.

Will it propel Fiat back to its former colossal stature? Ask me again in 50 years…

Lowdown: Fiat 600 1.2 Hybrid La Prima

Power: 1.2-litre three-cylinder petrol engine with 21kW motor and 1.2kWh lithium-ion battery producing 100hp and 205Nm of torque and powering the front wheels via a six-speed automatic transmission

CO2 emissions (annual motor tax): 109g/km (€180)

Fuel consumption: 4.9l/100km (WLTP)

0-100km/h: 9.1secs

Price: €33,995 as tested, 600 starts from €28,995

Our rating: 3/5

Verdict: Distinctive styling and a pleasant driving experience, but Fiat has much work to do convincing Irish buyers that it’s worth a punt(o) again

Pádraig O’Brien-O’Donnell from Newcastlewest, Limerick, died four hours after his birth at the hospital on June 18th, 2022, the High Court heard.

A letter of apology was read to the court as Pádraig’s parents settled their High Court action four years to the day since his death.

Outside court, his mother Leanne O’Brien said the fact of the settlement of the action falling on the anniversary of her son’s passing was not lost on the family.

“It is a difficult day made heavier, and yet it feels right that Pádraig is at the centre of it. Everything we have done over these four years, we have done for him,” she said.

“We did not pursue this case for ourselves. We did it for Pádraig, and we did it so no other mother, no other father, and no other family has to stand where we are standing now. If even one baby is safer because of what we have done, then his short life will have changed things for the better, that is what we hold on to.”

The HSE letter of apology which was read to the court said: “We write to you with profound sorrow and heartfelt regret following the loss of your baby Pádraig. We know that words cannot begin to capture the devastation and grief you are experiencing.”

Signed by the chief executive of HSE Mid West Acute and Older People Services, Ian Carter, it continued: “I wish to acknowledge without reservation that there were failings in the standard of care provided to you and your baby Pádraig. We take full responsibility for these failings and we are truly sorry.”

It added: “We are committed to learning from this incident, and we have reviewed our practices, made changes to our processes and provided additional training to our staff.

“Once again, we extend our deepest condolences and heartfelt apology.”

In the High Court on Thursday, the family’s counsel Eugene Gleeson told the court that the case against the HSE had been settled after mediation.

Two nervous shock actions brought by Pádraig’s parents, Leanne O’Brien and Patrick O’Donnell, of Newcastlewest, had also been settled, the court heard.

In the proceedings, it was claimed that Pádraig had been caused to suffer medical complications ultimately leading to his death at the hospital.

It was further claimed there was a delay to carry out a Caesarean when a decision was made that one was required.

Liability was admitted.

Noting the settlement and the division of the €35,000 statutory mental distress payment, Judge Paul Coffey extended his sympathy to Pádraig’s family on what he called a very sad and tragic case.

Outside court Leanne O’Brien said: “Four years ago on this very weekend our son Pádraig was born, and four years ago on this very weekend we said goodbye to him. He was with us for just a few short hours. But he was and he always will be our son.”

She said he was perfect and they held him and baptised him and their families met him until they had to let him go.

“For four years we have carried that morning with us. The grief has not faded. People say time heals. It doesn’t. You just learn to carry it. We carry Pádraig with us every single day,” she said.

Referring to the apology she said the HSE accepted responsibility for the failings in Pádraig’s care.

“We want to acknowledge that. It will not bring Pádraig back. Nothing ever will. But to hear it said plainly that he was failed and that it should never have happened means a great deal to us. It is something we have waited a long time to hear,” she said.

Circuit Civil Court judge Michael Walsh threw out two claims by Anne Keenan (66), of Church Drive, Clarecastle, Ennis, Co Clare, and her friend Catherine McCarthy (66), of Shelly Drive, Cloughleigh, Ennis, which he described as fraudulent and outrageous.

The judge told barrister Robert Ó Géibheannaigh, counsel for a taxi driver and insurer Allianz, which insisted on challenging the €60,000 claims lodged by the women, it was highly unlikely that the incident they described happened at all.

Mr Ó Géibheannaigh, who appeared with Newmans Solicitors for the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland, taxi driver Stephen Dolan and Allianz, told the court Ms Keenan had failed to declare nine previous incidents in which she picked up €59,000 in out of court settlements. Ms McCarthy, he said, failed to disclose one such case.

Mr Dolan, of Casino Park, Marino, Dublin 3, said what he was accused of never happened after both women swore he crashed into the back of a white van while using his mobile phone as he drove them to Heuston Station in Dublin in June 2016. Both women claimed they had injured their necks and shoulders and Ms McCarthy alleged she also hurt her back.

“Mr Dolan was adamant there was no collision or accident and said his phone was attached to the dash at all times during the journey,” Judge Walsh said. “I am satisfied neither woman was involved in an accident.”

The judge said there was a huge conflict of evidence in both cases and a failure by both women to disclose previous claims.

“I don’t find them to be credible and I am satisfied it was highly unlikely that a collision occurred,” he said.

He said he found both claims to be outrageous and could only conclude they were cases of fraud and gross exaggeration against an innocent taxi driver. “I have no hesitation in dismissing both claims and I will award one set of costs in favour of the defendants,” he told Mr Ó Géibheannaigh.

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Earlier this week, Conor Barrett told the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) that there was a finding in his investigation report where he stated: “A review of the safety manual and the operating manual indicates a strong structure to believe this viewpoint.”

This was in reference to the view of the complainant – pilot Declan McCabe – that the company safety manual left it up to his judgment to file a report after an incident on a flight into Dublin Airport in June 2023, the tribunal was told.

Directing the tribunal to the word “believe” in the passage, Barrett said: “That is a spelling mistake on my part, and it should have said ‘belie’.”

With regard to the first “typographical error”, adjudicator John Harraghy later said: “It’s a fairly significant error, you know… I’m at a loss to understand why this wasn’t highlighted at some stage in the subsequent disciplinary process or the appeal process by someone from the respondent.”

On Wednesday, Barrett told the tribunal that when he did use the word “belies” elsewhere in the report, he meant something different.

The tribunal was hearing the 11th day of evidence in a whistleblower penalisation case brought by McCabe, who is pursuing complaints under the Protected Disclosures Act 2014, Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005, and the Payment of Wages Act 1991 against Aer Lingus Ltd.

The complainant disputes the company’s view that he was obliged to file a safety report after the Airbus A321XLR he was flying into Dublin Airport on June 8th, 2023, failed to link up with a radio navigation beacon for the new north runway.

The parties dispute the most likely reason for the event, which was ultimately determined to be a “low severity” occurrence. Barrett confirmed in evidence on Wednesday that he was “satisfied” McCabe “failed to submit a safety report” within 72 hours of the flight in question, and that there were “no exceptions” to missing that deadline.

He found further that McCabe “provided inaccurate information” to regulator AirNav Ireland and “failed to submit an air safety report in a timely fashion when requested to do so”.

His investigation report was referred on to a disciplinary hearing later in 2023, and McCabe was demoted from his senior post as an A320 captain with duties as a trainer to a first officer – a junior flying role.

He was also told that while he could return to command responsibility, he would never be allowed to conduct training again. “I do stand over my conclusions,” Barrett told the WRC on Wednesday.

Quoting from Barrett’s report at the hearing, Tom Mallon, counsel for the airline, reached a passage which read: “The contents of this report and the contents of Captain McCabe’s contribution belies Captain Nolan’s position.”

David Byrnes, counsel for the complainant, drew attention to the use of the word “belies” in that passage. He said it meant Barrett had written that his report “undermines” the view of the director of safety and security at the airline, pilot Conor Nolan.

“That’s an error on my part,” Barrett said. “What is the error?” Mallon asked. “It’s an error on my part, and if there’s an error in the report I accept the error in the way it’s written. However, when you read the report in its entirety, the conclusions are clear,” Barrett said.

The case will resume on Tuesday, 23rd June.

Brenda Taylor is seeking damages for alleged personal injuries and distress arising out of the death of her son, Graham Taylor (31), who was a passenger in the BMW 3 Series being driven by Carl Freeman (26).

Dean Maguire was the third man in the vehicle, which burst into flames after crashing into an oncoming truck late on July 7th, 2021. An inquest into Mr Freeman’s death heard the occupants had to be identified using DNA samples taken from relatives.

The truck driver was left with serious, but not life-threatening injuries.

The three deceased men, all with addresses in Tallaght, Dublin, had a litany of previous convictions.

On Monday barrister Fred Gilligan, for the Garda Commissioner and other State parties, said his clients could not file a defence to Ms Taylor’s proceedings for some time due to certain matters beyond their control.

However, there will be a full defence delivered in time.

Mr Justice Anthony Barr said he understood the reasons and adjourned a motion brought by Ms Taylor’s barrister, Brian Carroll, instructed by MacGuill & Company. He gave Mr Carroll permission to seek to re-enter his motion if needed.

Ms Taylor has sued the Garda Commissioner, the Minister for Justice, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Ireland and the Attorney General.

Her case is also against a number of non-State parties, including a solicitor representing the estate of Mr Freeman and a woman alleged to be the owner of the BMW 3 Series.

She has also sued the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland, which is funded out of the insurance policies of every motorist to compensate victims of uninsured or untraced drivers.

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Karl Leonard, whose leg was broken after an e-bike collided with him while he was out jogging in Co Dublin, took a private prosecution after alleging gardaí failed to properly investigate the incident and sent no file to the Director of Public Prosecutions.

Mr Leonard, of Balglass Road, Howth, has complained to Fiosrú, the new Garda complaints body, about that alleged failure. He is separately pursuing a personal injuries damages claim over the collision on August 4th last.

At Dublin District Court on Wednesday, e-bike rider Stephen Dunne, of Russell’s Terrace, Kettles Lanes, Drynam Hall, Swords, was fined €250 after pleading guilty to careless driving contrary to section 52 of the Road Traffic Act 1961, having initially been prosecuted for alleged dangerous driving contrary to section 53.

Dunne, a father of three on Jobseeker’s Allowance, had stayed at the scene of the collision, sought to assist Mr Leonard and was very upset and remorseful, Judge Anthony Halpin was told.

A core issue in the case was whether the e-bike was not only a “vehicle”, which is all that is required for a prosecution for careless or dangerous driving, but also whether it was a mechanically propelled vehicle (MPV).

Section 3.1 of the Act defines an MPV as one, inter alia, intended or adapted for propulsion by mechanical means, including a bicycle equipped with an auxiliary electric motor greater than 0.25 kilowatts.

Mr Leonard claimed the specifications of the e-bike, including having a 750W (0.75 kilowatt) brushless motor and maximum speed of 20-25km per hour, meant it was not only a vehicle, it was also an MPV.

On Wednesday, barrister David Staunton, for Mr Leonard, said it was accepted that Dunne had been driving an MPV.

New roadside Garda checks planned for powerful e-bikes and e-scooters

The significance of the e-bike being an MPV means the user is required to be insured.

The outcome of the private prosecution clears the way for Mr Leonard to proceed with his personal injuries action against Dunne. Mr Leonard also intends to join the Motor Insurers Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) to the case because Mr Dunne was not insured to drive the e-bike.

The MIBI, which is funded by driver motor insurance policies, is generally sued in actions where a defendant driver of an MPV is uninsured or their identity is unknown. The bureau often settles cases but has the option to pursue uninsured drivers for recovery of any monies paid.

A senior legal source said Mr Leonard’s case is significant in two respects.

“It is the first time a litigant took a private prosecution over an e-bike collision in a situation where gardaí did not properly investigate, seemingly because of a widespread misunderstanding of the current legal status of an e-bike for the purpose of the Road Traffic Act,” he said.

Dunne’s admission, as part of his guilty plea, that the e-bike is an MPV is very significant when it comes to liability, the source said. “Users of e-bikes need to understand they can now be held liable for such incidents.”

However, it is a different story when it comes to commercial vehicles, with more than one in six found to be in breach of motor insurance laws last year, according to research from the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland (MIBI).

It recorded 101,881 uninsured private vehicles within the overall 2.4 million private vehicles being driven on Irish roads in 2024. In 2022 the number of uninsured private vehicles stood at 187,803 within an overall private vehicle total of 2.25 million.

The 2024 figure represents about 4.2 per cent of all private vehicles, which points to a fall of close to 50 per cent since the last time the MIBI carried out research in 2022.

Following the development of the IMID, the MIBI has been able to examine the number of uninsured non-private motor vehicles, broadly categorised as “commercial vehicles”, through the availability of enhanced insurance data.

Within the commercial vehicles category, there are generally two different means by which insurance is provided: on an individualised basis with specific vehicles tied to each policy or on fleet or motor trade policies, which allow the cover to be transferred from one vehicle to another within a specific group of vehicles.

Since November 2023, fleet and motor trade policy holders who do not provide the required information to the NFD are committing an offence and are liable to be prosecuted and subjected to fines of up to €500 per vehicle.

The MIBI estimates about 425,000 fleet and motor trade vehicles should be listed on the National Fleet Database. So far, the details for 364,889 have been provided.

The MIBI’s analysis shows that within the combined commercial vehicles category, there are 710,708 vehicles on Irish roads and 108,671 of those vehicles are either uninsured or have not yet been added to the NFD.

This means 15.3 per cent of commercial vehicles or more than one in six are breaking motor insurance laws.

The chief executive of the MIBI, David Fitzgerald, said it was “very encouraging to see the impact that the new detection system is already having on the number of private uninsured vehicles on our roads”.

He said it is “a powerful weapon in the battle against uninsured driving”.

Following the introduction of this system, gardaí were able to seize 18,676 vehicles in 2024 and issue 26,094 summonses and charges.

“This system allows gardaí to see in seconds if a vehicle is uninsured or has not been added to the database, allowing them to act quickly in apprehending any offenders,” Mr Fitzgerald said.

However, he said there is “clearly additional work to do to combat illegal uninsured driving”.

The increase was blamed on the rising cost of vehicle repairs and the fact that injury claims still account for more than half of the overall cost of settling motor insurance claims in Ireland.

The bank’s National Claims Information Database (NCID) full-year report, focusing on the motor insurance and employer and public liability markets, paints a picture of an industry still burdened by high costs.

Despite a drop-off of 1,000 in the number of private motor claims last year, the total cost of settlements rose by €42 million to a record €896 million, up 38 per cent on the pre-Covid average.

The increase was primarily driven by damage claims, reflecting the high cost of vehicle repairs.

The average cost of a damage claim has risen by 116 per cent since 2010, from €1,033 to €2,236, with 78 per cent of the increase coming since 2020.

“The high inflationary environment in recent years has affected the average cost of damage claims across all claim types,” the report said.

Injury claim costs remained stable between 2022 and 2024, the bank said, noting the average cost of an injury claim in 2024 was €39,537. This was 1 per cent up on the 2023 average.

However, the 2023 figure was the lowest since 2019.

The Central Bank noted that while smaller injury claims had reduced in recent years, this has been offset by an increase in the average cost of larger injury claims.

Several commentators noted that the impact of the introduction of personal injury guidelines in 2021, which replaced the book of quantum, can be seen in the reduction in average injury compensation costs. This is particularly the case in relation to minor injury claims.

However, these reductions have been offset by the increase in litigation costs.

“Notwithstanding the increasing cost of vehicle repairs, injury claims account for more than half of the overall cost of settling motor claims, and we urgently need to see more claims settling at the Injuries Resolution Board,” said Ivan Cooper, board member of the Alliance for Insurance Reform.

While the litigation channel accounts for one-third of claims settled, it accounts for more than two-thirds of the cost of settling all claims, Mr Cooper said.

The Central Bank’s report noted that for injury claims settling directly or through the Injuries Resolution Board, “virtually all claims settled under the guidelines in 2024″.

Insurance Ireland said while premiums continue to be impacted by damage-cost inflation, the regulator’s report showed that the current average premium cost of €623 is below the previous high point of €738 in 2017, “demonstrating the impact of the Government’s reform agenda”.

“However, the trend of significantly increased damage claims costs continues, while the use of litigation to settle personal injury claims continues to erode the impact of reforms,” it added.

In total, 38,546 uninsured vehicles have been seized in the first 24 months since the introduction of the Irish motor insurance database (IMID) system in 2024.

The new insurance database allows gardaí to check the insurance status of a vehicle using automatic number plate recognition technology or through their mobile device.

The figures are contained in the IMID annual report for 2025, which shows 4,589,494 valid driver numbers have been added to the database.

Over the past two years, 51,024 charges and summons have been issued to drivers without insurance since the new database was introduced, according to the report, with 25,009 of these issued in 2025.

By the end of last year, a total of 3,646,638 vehicles were included on the IMID database.

David Fitzgerald, chief executive of the MIBI, said the bureau was “very pleased to see the contribution and impact that IMID is making towards law enforcement”.

“Driving without insurance is against the law and it has been a problem in this country for quite a while. That is why IMID was set up – to make it easier for An Garda Síochána to identify those who are breaking the law,” he said.

Noting that IMID allows gardaí to identify uninsured vehicles in “seconds”, Fitzgerald said it has changed the “whole uninsured policing picture completely”.

“Fake insurance certs or suggestions of mistaken identity can no longer be used by drivers to try to get away with breaking the law.

“In fact, the addition of driver numbers to IMID since last March has made it a waste of breath for drivers to even try the mistaken identity angle, with every driver number being tied to one specific individual for life,” he said.

However, Fitzgerald said there was “concern” relating to fleet and motor trade vehicles, with the bureau believing there was still a significant number of individuals “breaking the law”, having not yet added their vehicles to the National Fleet Database section of IMID.

The IMID annual report shows 384,247 vehicles have been added to the National Fleet Database, a subsection for vehicles typically used by businesses and motor traders, which use a single insurance policy for multiple vehicles.

The MIBI estimates there are thousands of fleet vehicles “still missing” from the database.

“We hope to work with An Garda Síochána and other IMID stakeholders this year to target that group and to remind all offenders that if you do not meet your legal motor insurance obligations, you face the real risk of being prosecuted, a process that IMID has made easier than ever for the gardaí,” Fitzgerald said.

They had been set to take part in a one-day work stoppage over concerns about uninsured vehicles being presented for driving tests.

They were also due to engage in an indefinite industrial action by refusing to conduct a driving test unless the presenting candidate could produce a valid certificate of insurance.

In January, it was reported that car driving-test waiting times had dropped from about 16 weeks in mid-2024 towards the RSA’s target of 10 weeks, though higher demand in more populous areas was also having an impact. The planned industrial action was expected to have a detrimental effect on waiting times.

However, following an agreement reached with the Road Safety Authority (RSA) on Tuesday night, the industrial action has been called off.

Driver testers who are members of Fórsa balloted for industrial action last December. Ninety-five per cent voted in favour of industrial action, on a turnout of 83 per cent. Several rounds of conciliation talks at the had been unable to resolve the issue until now.

Under the terms of the agreement reached this week, Fórsa has withdrawn its strike notice and members will report for work as normal on Friday, the union said in a statement.

Nearly 20,000 uninsured vehicles seized by gardaí in 2025, new figures show

The agreement includes interim changes to operating procedures to allow staff to view proof of insurance, a formal assurance that driver testers are fully covered in all aspects of their work, and clearer guidance on procedures following any incident during a driving test.

The agreement also provides for a project plan to give driver testers access to the Irish motor insurance database, with RSA management committing to make the system available within nine months of the necessary regulations being put in place.

Fórsa driver testers will be represented on a working group overseeing the process, alongside the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland and the Department of Transport.

More than 1,000,000 checks on vehicles were carried out by the Garda in the first three months of this year, a road safety seminar will be told on Friday.

The checks, which reveal the vehicle’s insurance, motor tax and roadworthiness, can be carried out by gardaí using hand-held or in-car technology, while not necessarily stopping traffic.

The seminar, organised by Insurance Ireland and the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland, enables representatives from insurance, policing, and the Road Safety Authority examine how they can develop further data-sharing to strengthen enforcement and improve road safety.

Deputy Garda Commissioner Shawna Coxon will tell the seminar that the review of 1,072,349 vehicles represents a 15 per cent increase on the number of inspections in the first three months of 2026.

Coxon is expected to outline how gardaí detected and detained 5,028 vehicles for breaches of insurance legislation in that time period.

In recent years, the force has rolled out active mobility apps across the force, enabling members to have real-time, at-scene access to critical information regardless of their location. The use of apps also allows members to complete road safety checks with access to vehicle and driver information from the Department of Transport, Motor Insurance Bureau and Garda Pulse system.

The discussions will also include the potential introduction of continuous vehicle coverage, a system which requires insurance to be tied to vehicle ownership, as opposed to the current situation where an offence only occurs if an uninsured driver is caught driving a vehicle on Irish roads.

The seminar comes as Susan Gray, founder of road safety campaign group Parc, said she was hopeful a loophole allowing many drivers convicted in court to avoid penalty points could be closed.

Gray, who, along with Fine Gael TD Emer Currie, met officials from the Courts Service and the Department of Justice in recent weeks, said errant drivers were avoiding penalty points simply by not producing their driving licences in court. Without the licence physically produced, officials cannot record the unique driver number required to apply the points to the individual’s record on the National Vehicle and Driver File.

Gray has also called for the abolition of the system where drivers disqualified after accumulating 12 penalty points are asked to post their licences to a post office box in Cork. She said research by Parc found that only 6 per cent of banned drivers comply with that request.

Currie said a quarter of court-ordered driver disqualifications and almost half of all court-issued penalty points go unrecorded.

She said official figures show that in 2024, 25 per cent of court-issued driver disqualifications and almost 50 per cent of court-issued penalty points were not fully captured by the National Vehicle and Driver File.

“This is the database relied upon by An Garda Síochána and motor insurers to verify a driver’s status. These gaps are unacceptable in any enforcement system,” she said.

Alcohol ignition interlocks – which would stop drivers from starting their cars if alcohol is detected – should be mandatory for repeat offenders, Prof Denis Cusack, director of the Medical Bureau of Road Safety, told the Oireachtas transport committee on Wednesday.

He said the introduction of interlock devices currently “has to be voluntary because there’s no legislation to support it”, but he suggested “the next phase” should be to target repeat offenders and those who suffer from alcoholism.

Cusack said the “third phase” in the rollout should be “that all cars in the future be fitted” with the devices.

Last year, he said, those found to be drink-driving were, on average, at more than three times the legal limit.

How alcohol really affects your body, from the first sip to the long haul

“When people are drink-driving, they really are drink-driving,” he said, adding that he feared the rollout of breathalyser interlock devices “is progressing much more slowly than is desirable”.

Internationally, Cusack said, alcohol is a contributing factor in about 30 per cent of crashes.

“If you could stop that overnight with these devices, why not do that?”

Having breathalysers, he said, would make cars safer and would be a “selling point” for manufacturers, rather than a development which car makers would object to.

The leading causes of serious injuries and deaths on the road are speeding, drivers not using safety belts, dangerous and careless driving due to fatigue, and driving under the influence of intoxicants, the committee heard.

Asked what he felt the State needed to do to reduce road deaths, Cusack said more roads policing and Garda visibility would help, though he noted the number of motorists tested last year was at its highest level in two decades.

“You can have as many cameras as you want, but that is only going to pick up speeding, it is not going to pick up drink-driving or drugs,” he added.

He said some “thinking outside the box” was needed to address the issue and suggested the creation of a transport police force, “Garda Iompar na hÉireann”, would help. This could cover public transport and roads policing, with the officers assigned able to “rotate for their own sanity”.

Judge who called cyclists ‘a nightmare’ was fined for failing to provide breath test to garda

Separately, David Fitzgerald, chief executive of the Motor Insurers Bureau of Ireland (Mibi), said one in 15 cars on the State’s roads, some 211,000 in total, were not insured.

“This high level of uninsured driving is bad news for everyone who uses Irish roads,” he said, with uninsured drivers engaging in “more risky behaviour”.

The knock-on for law-abiding drivers, he said, was that uninsured driving “adds to the cost of motor insurance”.

Up to 9.1 million passengers passed through the five main Irish airports in the first quarter of the year, an 11 per cent increase on the same period in 2025. More than 850,000 additional passengers travelled through Irish airports in the first quarter of 2026.

The previous record for passengers to and from Ireland was in 2024, which saw 8.23 million people passing through Irish airports in the first three months of that year.

The number of flights to and from Irish airports also rose by a similar margin of 12 per cent, climbing from 57,940 flights in the first few months of 2025 to 64,656 in 2026.

Most of this footfall was channelled through Dublin Airport, which handled 84 per cent of all flights. They were followed by Cork Airport, which oversaw seven per cent of total flights.

This year is likely to see continued increases in airport passenger numbers, with Minister for Transport Darragh O’Brien noting on Tuesday that he had secured approval to publish and enact the Dublin Airport (Passenger Capacity) Bill as soon as possible.

The new Bill would remove the annual passenger cap on Dublin Airport, which currently limits the airport to 32 million passengers a year.

Law paving the way for scrapping of Dublin Airport passenger cap approved

London-Heathrow was the most popular destination for Irish passengers and was the number-one route for those travelling from Dublin, Cork and Shannon Airport. London was also the route of choice for those travelling from Knock and Kerry airports, which experienced the most traffic for London-Luton.

Amsterdam-Schipol and Manchester were the next most popular routes in Dublin Airport. In Ireland’s smallest main airport, Kerry recorded Dublin as the second most popular route for its passengers, seeing 29, 677 individuals coming to and from the State’s capital.

“In Q1 2026, almost nine out of every 10 passengers – 88 per cent – on international flights in the five main airports were travelling to or from Europe,” said Damien Lenihan, statistician in the transport section of the CSO.

“The two most popular countries of origin/destination were the United Kingdom and Spain. Outside of Europe, the United States was the most popular country of origin/destination in Q1 2026,” he added.

The quantity of luggage on Irish flights also noted an increase – “The amount of air freight handled by the main airports rose by 15 per cent to 50,265 tonnes in the first three months of 2026 when compared with the same period in 2025,” Lenihan said.

The jury of seven men and five women had not reached a verdict after three hours and 10 minutes of deliberations on Thursday, and will return on Friday morning.

In his direction to the jury on Thursday morning, Judge Paul Ramsey had said in regard to several of the incidents in dispute – including the alleged rape of one of the complainants when she was a primary schoolchild – there was a “head-on collision” between the positions of the Donaldsons and the complainants.

It was a matter for the jury, he said, to decide whether they believed the evidence given by the complainants who claimed they were abused by Jeffrey Donaldson, or Donaldson’s evidence that it “did not happen”.

He said if the men and women of the jury believed the complainants, and found their evidence “reliable”, then they must convict, and find Donaldson guilty, but if they were “not sure or not satisfied”, then they must find him not guilty.

Donaldson, wearing a dark grey suit and a pink tie, sat in the dock at the back of the court with his arms folded while the judge delivered his remarks.

The former DUP leader’s trial began at Newry Crown Court four weeks ago.

Donaldson (63), with an address in Dromore, Co Down, faces 18 charges – rape, four counts of gross indecency with or towards a child, and 13 counts of indecent assault on a female on dates between 1985 and 2008.

The charges relate to two women who claim Jeffrey Donaldson abused them when they were children from the ages of about seven or eight to 12 or 13.

His wife Eleanor (60), of the same address, was charged with four counts of aiding and abetting and one count of cruelty to children.

She did not face a criminal trial as she was ruled medically unfit, and the jury must instead decide whether she committed the acts alleged on the basis of trial of the facts.

Jeffrey Donaldson was one of Northern Ireland’s most high-profile and longest-standing politicians at the time of his arrest in March 2024.

Two months before, he had negotiated the DUP back into Stormont after a two-year boycott over Brexit had led to the collapse of the North’s political institutions.

He was suspended from the party and stood down as party leader, and was replaced by the then deputy leader Gavin Robinson.

He did not stand in the UK general election that July and lost his seat as MP for Lagan Valley, which he had held since 1997.

Some students may have been disappointed that there was no question on perspective, said Eóin Ó hAodha, ASTI subject representative and a teacher at Meánscoil Gharman in Enniscorthy.

“If a student was well-practised and banking on a perspective question coming up, they would have been disappointed,” he said.

“Otherwise, the paper was reasonable but technical and hence challenging in places.”

Rob Kiernan, a DCG teacher at the Institute of Education, said that the paper was manageable but that there were challenges to make the students think conceptually.

“Some students might have knee-jerk reactions to diagrams, but if they kept their heads screwed on, they would have found very approachable questions,” Kiernan said.

“Students will have started on a confident note with QA-1. True length and true angle should be in their arsenals since the beginning of fifth year, so this will be a nice familiar entry into the paper.

“It was nice to see a resurgence of Solids in Contact in QA-2, which is an area that really suits those that gravitate towards visualisation tasks or fields like architecture.”

A question on the interaction of the cylinder and sphere was unorthodox and so students might have had a negative initial reaction, Kiernan said.

“But the subject requires students to push their skills and solve problems, so this question reflected that value perfectly.”

In section B of the paper, students were asked for the axonometric projection of a cylindrical hot tub, Ó hAodha said.

“While the question may have seemed initially inviting and straightforward, it was one that students could have got bogged down with and struggled to finish on time.

“Question B2 concerned itself with the angles and projections of a golf chipping set. Although this question required less drawing, it was technical and could only be completed quickly and accurately by those that were well-practised in this area.

“Question B3 was perhaps the most familiar of the 3 core questions, and a spatially aware student who enjoyed working out dihedral angles with the aid of projections would have been happy with it,” said Ó hAodha.

Part C of the exam was more familiar and featured 2 interesting furniture designs within the C2 structural forms and C3 surface geometry questions, he added.

Kiernan said that, overall, the paper examined the real skills of DCG.

“Not just the numbers and lines but the core concepts at the heart of the subjects. “Those who could conceptualise the objects, think through the problem as well as follow the procedures should be very happy with that exam,” he said.

On the ordinary level paper, Ó hAodha said that it seemed fair.

“Perspective made an appearance in section A, question four. The three core questions in Section B dealt with the auxiliary elevation of a bank card machine, the axonometric projections of a greenhouse and the intersecting solids of a skate park,” he said.

– Conor O’Higgins BL

Company that sold glass table was liable for injuries suffered by infant due to its collapse McGarry v McGarry [2015] IEHC 426 (High Court, Barton J, May 6th, 2015) High Court finds that a company was liable for the injuries suffered by an infant when a glass table collapsed, where the company had sold and assembled the table, on the grounds that, on the balance of probabilities, the collapse had been caused by the over-tightening of screws, which resulted in microscopic cracking.

– Conor O’Higgins BL

Essential proof missing for enforcement of UK confiscation order Minister for Justice v Devine [2015] IECA 182 (Court of Appeal, Mahon J, July 31st, 2015) Court of Appeal allows the appeal from High Court, and sets aside a confiscation co-operation order issued against a person convicted in the United Kingdom of fraudulent evasion of value added tax, on the grounds that the request for the enforcement in Ireland of the confiscation order was not accompanied with a statement by or on behalf of the court that made the order as required by legislation.

– James Cross BL

Delay of 16 months between alleged offence and court appearance of juvenile was not sufficient to warrant prohibition of trial O’Connor v DPP [2015] IEHC 556 (High Court, McDermott J, July 24th, 2015) High Court refuses judicial review of ruling by the District Court determining that it did not have jurisdiction to hear a preliminary argument in respect of delay in criminal proceedings involving a minor, on the grounds that: 1) the applicant had a remedy in judicial review regarding his delay point; and 2) the period of 16 months between the date of the alleged offence and the date upon which the applicant was first brought before the court did not disclose a culpable degree of delay sufficient to justify the granting of relief by way of prohibition had such an application been brought.

– Ciarán Joyce BL

Irish turf-cutting criminal offences were necessary for the proper implementation of EU directive O’Connor v DPP [2015]IEHC 558 (High Court, O’Malley J, August 25th, 2015) High Court refuses to restrain criminal trial on charges of cutting turf by machine in a Special Area of Conservation, an indictable offence created for the purpose of giving full effect to the relevant EU directive, finding: 1) the introduction of criminal sanctions, almost 20 years after the habitats directive came into being, could fairly be said to have been necessary for the proper implementation of that directive and 2) the regulations creating the offence were constitutional and the burden of proof to prove otherwise lay on the applicants, if they wished to argue that the regulations were ineffective, disproportionate or not dissuasive.

– Ciarán Joyce BL

Lending institution found to have misled borrower by non -disclosure of commission Untoy v GE Capital Woodchester Finance Ltd [2015]IEHC 557 (High Court, O’Malley J, August 25th, 2015) High Court, by way of case stated from the District Court, finds the District Court judge erred in determining that a lending institution was beyond reproach in not disclosing to a borrower that he was being charged commission on payment protection insurance that he had taken out for three loans, holding that the lending institution was in breach of relevant legislation by not adequately informing the borrower of all of the transaction details.

– Shane Kiely BL

Judge’s charge on provocation in murder trial may have left jury confused DPP v Zhao [2015]IECA 189 (Court of Appeal, Birmingham J, June 26th, 2015) Court of Appeal allows appeal of murder conviction, and orders retrial concerning a Chinese national involved in altercation with man who refused to pay the full amount for a phone call in an internet café, on grounds the trial judge’s charge was not as clear as it might have been and gave rise to a concern a jury might have been confused and might have believed that they had to consider whether the provocation to which the appellant was allegedly subjected prevented him from forming an intention to kill or cause serious injury.

– Ciarán Joyce BL

Civil action for assault of infant to be heard by judge and jury Bookey v The Links Creche Southside Ltd [2015]IEHC 562 (High Court, Hedigan J, August 7th, 2015) High Court refuses application by defendant to set aside notice of trial in civil proceedings alleging assault, battery and mistreatment occasioned to the infant plaintiff while attending the defendant’s creche, and rules that the dominant claim was one of assault and not negligence, thereby preserving the plaintiff’s statutory entitlement to a trial before a judge and jury.

– Ian Fitzharris BL

The full text of each of the above judgments is available on courts.ie. These reports were written and compiled by Stare Decisis Hibernia: StareDecisisHibernia.com

John Logan was one of four children in a car driven by Mary Carberry, an alcoholic who was uninsured and banned from driving, when it crashed into a mud embankment outside Edgeworthstown, Co Longford, in November 2007. He was four years of age at the time.

His nine-year-old sister Michaela and Ms Carberry’s six-year-old daughter Ava died in the crash while John and Ava’s sister Faith suffered injuries.

Ms Carberry, Clonguish Court, Newtownforbes, Co Longford, was later sentenced to six years imprisonment with two years suspended in relation to the crash.

Various other legal actions arose from the crash and the President of the High Court, Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns, yesterday approved a €1.5 million settlement in favour of John against the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI). The judge wished the child well in the future.

Earlier, outlining the case, the boy’s counsel Declan McGovern SC said John was a back seat passenger in the car when it hit a clay embankment on the old Edgworthstown Road on November 26th, 2007. John suffered a head injury and an Erb’s palsy injury to his arm. He still has language and learning difficulties.

John, Chambers Park, Kilcock, Co Kildare, had through his aunt Stephanie Logan, sued Mary Carberry; the MIBI and various others arising from the accident.

Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns was told the settlement was against the MIBI and the case against the other defendants could be struck out subject to assignment of the judgment against Mary Carberry.

Faith Varden Carberry, who was also injured in the crash settled her action for €200,000 against the MIBI last November.

Minister for Finance Michael Noonan made the announcement yesterday in response to a question from Fianna Fáil’s finance spokesman Michael McGrath.

The MIBI is a non-profit organisation established by the Government and companies underwriting motor insurance in Ireland to compensate victims of accidents caused by uninsured and unidentified vehicles.

Setanta collapsed on April 16th, leaving 75,000 motor policyholders in Ireland with no cover. On Wednesday, the Central Bank said it had been advised by the Malta Financial Services Authority that a liquidator has been appointed to Setanta, who will be responsible for the administration of the company’s assets and liabilities.

Mr Noonan said first-party claims on personal insurance policies will be payable from the Insurance Compensation Fund (ICF), once Setanta was formally placed into liquidation.

Claimants would be eligible for 65 per cent of the amount due or €825,000, whichever is the lesser amount. Under legislation, first-party claims by a corporate entity are not covered by the ICF.

The Minister added that neither the ICF nor the MIBI would refund premiums for commercial and personal insurance policies. The Minister said a “portion” of the premium refunds may be available upon completion of the Setanta liquidation.

The Central Bank has engaged with more than 230 brokers who were offering policies from Setanta to consumers to require them to contact policyholders and inform them of the urgency to make alternative insurance arrangements.

In reply to a separate question, Mr Noonan told Mr McGrath that the balance in the ICF was €31.2 million as of April 25th.

The ICF was set up to protect policyholders in the event that their non-life insurer became insolvent. This became a big issue here in the wake of Quinn Insurance being placed into administration by the Central Bank of Ireland.

A levy of up to 2 per cent of gross written premiums is paid into the fund each year by the insurers.

Setanta collapsed on April 16th, leaving 75,000 motor policyholders in Ireland with no cover. The Malta Financial Services Authority has since appointed Paul Mercieca as liquidator to to the company.

Mr Merciera, who is responsible for the administration of Setanta’s assets and liabilities, has confirmed to the Central Bank his intention to cancel all policies issued by Setanta by way of a 7 or 10 day notice. The cancellation notices are to be sent to policyholders over the coming week.

Notices on the cancellation of policies are also to be published in national newspapers.

The Central Bank said it has been in contact with over 200 brokers who were offering policies from Setanta Insurance to ask them to notify customers of the policy cancellations and advise them to make alternative motor insurance arrangements.

Setanta, which had offices in Blanchardstown in west Dublin, had been selling mainly commercial motor insurance through brokers and was known as a low-cost operator.

Minister for Finance Michael Noonan said last week that the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI), a non-profit organisation established by the Government and companies underwriting motor insurance, will accept all third-party claims against policies written by Setanta.

Joan Meenan was unconscious for 26 days and could not attend the funeral of her husband of 42 years as a result of the incident, which occurred as they drove to do their weekly grocery shop, the court also heard.

Ms Meenan, Upper Main Street, Ballyahunis, Co Mayo, yesterday settled her action brought as a result of the collision on the Ballyhaunis to Claremorris Road on August 30th, 2010.

She had sued the owner of the van towing the cherrypicker, David Duggan, Brownhall, Balla, Co Mayo; the van driver, John F Costello, The Demesne, Ballinrobe, Co Mayo; the owners of the cherrypicker Ballyhaunis Plant Hire Ltd, Ballyhaunis, who had hired out the machine; and the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland.

It was claimed the cherrypicker became detached from the van, it crossed on to the incorrect side of the road and then collided with the Meenans’ car.

Liability was admitted by the defendants and the case was before the court for assessment of damages only. After it opened briefly before Mr Justice Kevin Cross yesterday, he was told it had been settled and could be struck out.

Michael Tevlin, the High Court was told, has no memory of the incident in which the car in which he was travelling as a back-seat passenger veered across a road as the driver, with whom Mr Tevlin was drinking earlier, attempted to overtake on the Carrickmacross bypass on December 27th, 2010.

The driver Kevin McArdle, who was later jailed after being convicted of dangerous driving causing death, ploughed into a car driven by Stephen Connolly.

Pregnant wife

Mr Connolly’s pregnant wife, Róisín (39), and two 27-year old men, who were passengers in McArdle’s car, all died in the crash.

Mr Tevlin, Lisankisky, Kingscourt, Co Cavan, has sued McArdle, Longfield, Carrickmacross, Co Monaghan, and the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) over his injuries.

Judgment was yesterday granted against McArdle, who remains in jail, in default of appearance.

Mr Justice Kevin Cross was told by counsel for Mr Tevlin that his client admitted he had had far too much to drink on the day of the crash.

While he had no memory of the crash, Mr Tevlin said he and the driver had a lot to drink.

Patrick Kean SC said his client did not know McArdle’s car was not insured and Mr Tevlin said there was an insurance disc on the vehicle.

The MIBI denies any liability on grounds alleging Mr Tevlin travelled voluntarily in a car with an uninsured driver and when he knew McArdle should not have driven a vehicle following consumption of alcohol.

“Drinking spree”

Edward Walsh SC, for the MIBI, said Mr Tevlin and McArdle had gone on a “drinking spree” and McArdle had consumed nine pints and nine shorts over about nine hours on December 27th, 2010.

Six licensed premises had been visited by Mr Tevlin, McArdle and the two men who died in the incident, he said.

Mr Walsh argued there was gross contributory negligence on behalf of Mr Tevlin and a level of disregard for his own safety and that of members of the public.

That conduct was such that no liability should be imposed on the MIBI.

The case continues.

The Maltese-registered insurer went into liquidation in April leaving 75,000 motor policyholders in Ireland with no cover.

It had been selling mainly commercial motor insurance through brokers and was known as a low-cost operator.

Initially Minister for Finance Michael Noonan signalled the industry-funded Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) would cover all outstanding third-party claims emanating from the collapse.

However, on foot of legal advice, the department has informed the Oireachtas Finance Committee that the MIBI would not now be playing a role in compensating claimants due awards under Setanta policies.

“In all likelihood these claims must now be sent to the Insurance Compensation Fund(ICF), funded by the insurance levy, which itself must queue up and stake its claim under the liquidation process,” Sinn Féin finance spokesman Pearse Doherty said.

“From the outset of the Setanta fiasco Minister Noonan has said that the MIBI will be in a position to cover all third party claims.”

“Today his department has confirmed that this is not the case. In practical terms this seems to mean that the State through the liquidation process will now be seeking a bigger slice of what we know to be a small pie.”

“It seems unfair and irresponsible of the industry to drop this bombshell so late in the day. The Minister should make a clear public statement as to how the third party claimants will be treated,” Mr Doherty said.

In April, the Maltese Financial Services Authority appointed liquidator Paul Mercieca to administer the company’s assets and liabilities.

It is unclear at this stage how much the outstanding third-party claims left in the wake of Setanta’s collapse will amount to as many are still being processed.

The ICF, which is administered by the High Court, can pay out up to 65 per cent of the sum due to the policyholder, or €825,000, whichever is lower.

The €1.65 billion crater left by the collapse of Quinn Insurance in 2010 put such a strain on the fund that a 2 per cent levy was imposed on insurance customers.

Mr Fay, (46) of Lismore Road, Crumlin, Dublin, after telling Judge Jacqueline Linnane in the Circuit Civil Court about the crash, decided following the lunch break not to go ahead with his claim.

Counsel for the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) told the judge that after talks, the case had been settled on the basis that the court would make an order dismissing Mr Fay’s claim with no order as to costs.

He had earlier told the court that on May 5th, 2009, he had been driving his 1998-registered taxi with three passengers towards the junction of Dry Canal and Maryland Road, Dublin, when it had been struck by a since untraced and speeding Honda Accord. The driver had never been identified.

Mr Fay claimed he had suffered injuries to his chest, neck, back, jaw and right elbow and sued the MIBI, which lifts the bill for uninsured or stolen vehicles and unidentified or untraced drivers.

In cross-examination by counsel for the MIBI, he said he could not understand why an MIBI inspector and a garda, both of whom were to be called as witnesses, had recorded him as having stated his taxi as being a 1999 vehicle.

He also told the court he did not know any of the three passengers he had been carrying that day and was not aware that they, too, had begun €38,000 damages claims against the MIBI through the same legal firm as he employed to prosecute his claim.

He did not think it strange to have registered and insured his taxi in his own name on the same day as the crash. He agreed he had also been carrying a television to leave in for repair as his van-like Volkswagen Caravelle vehicle was suitable for carrying such an item in the rear.

Mr Fay denied he had a friend of his son Karl Fay in a car only a day previous to the crash and when the person was named said he did not know him but had heard of him.

He agreed the hit-and-run vehicle “had come out of nowhere in daylight and T-boned his taxi directly in the side.”

Mr Fay told the court his wife’s personal Nissan Almera had been fire-bombed and her claim had been settled by her insurance company. He said he had an outstanding claim for a Volvo car which had bullet-proof windows.

When asked about his son Karl’s association with another person, David Byrne, with whom he had since fallen out, Mr Fay said he had never known Mr Byrne before the incident.

Denying that the crash had been the result of a ruse or conspiracy, Mr Fay said counsel was putting to him matters about which he knew nothing.

Following the lunch adjournment, counsel for the MIBI said the case had been settled on the basis the court would make an order dismissing Mr Fay’s claim with no order as to costs.

Mr Justice John Hedigan, in a reserved judgment, said that following the liquidation of Setanta on April 30th, 2014, about 1,750 claims by and against Setanta policyholders remained in existence.

He said an issue had arisen as to who was liable to cover these claims - the MIBI or the Insurance Compensation Fund - and the Law Society had asked the court to determine the matter.

Mr Justice Hedigan said Setanta was a Maltese registered company and at an extraordinary general meeting in April last year decided to surrender its insurance business licence and be immediately dissolved.

The company was a member of the MIBI, which had been set up by the Minister for Transport to meet claims against uninsured or untraced motorists, and at the time had issued some 75,000 motor insurance policies, all of which had been cancelled from May 29th, 2014.

He said there still remained approximately 1,750 claims in existence by and against Setanta policy holders which had been potentially eligible for payment by the MIBI.

The President of the Law Society had written to the MIBI stating that solicitors had been inundated with queries from concerned Setanta customers as to the consequences of the liquidation.

The MIBI claimed it did not have to satisfy awards against policy holders where the insurer was unable to pay all or part of the award because of insolvency. The Department of Transport shared the MIBI’s view and the Minister for Transport suggested policyholders should pursue claims with the liquidator of Setanta.

Mr Justice Hedigan said it was clear that the background to the MIBI agreements was the obligation to protect the innocent victims of uninsured drivers. This obligation had been placed on insurers in return for the introduction of compulsory insurance in 1932.

He said that from the evidence and legal argument before the court it seemed to him that the wording of the 2009 MIBI Agreement meant that it had a liability to pay out in respect of claims against persons who had been insured by an insurer which had become insolvent.

In his view this liability of the MIBI had been apparent and accepted since at the very least 1964 if not 1955.

Mr Justice Hedigan stated that the MIBI was liable to pay out in respect of claims against persons who were insured with Setanta at the time of its liquidation.

Initially the proceedings had been brought by the Accountant of the Courts of Justice who has statutory responsibility for administering the Insurance Compensation Fund.

The President of the High Court, Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns, had directed that the Law Society of Ireland should act as the claimant while the MIBI should be the respondent. The Accountant of the Courts of Justice had adopted a neutral position in the proceedings.

Brian Murray SC, with barrister Francis Kieran, appeared for the Law Society. Paul Sreenan SC, with barrister Kelly Smyth, represented the MIBI and David Barniville, with barrister Barbara O’Neill appeared for the Accountant of the Courts of Justice.

In a reserved High Court judgement published on Friday morning, Mr Justice John Hedigan said that following the liquidation of Setanta in April 2014 around 1,750 claims by and against Setanta policyholders were still in existence.

An issue had arisen as to who was liable to cover these claims - the MIBI or the Insurance Compensation Fund - and the Law Society had asked the court to determine the matter.

The company was a member of the MIBI, which had been set up by the Minister for Transport to meet claims against uninsured or untraced motorists, and at the time had issued approximately 75,000 motor insurance policies, all of which had been cancelled from May 29th, 2014.

The president of the Law Society had written to the MIBI stating that solicitors had been inundated with queries from concerned Setanta customers as to the consequences of the liquidation.

The MIBI claimed it did not have to satisfy awards against policy holders where the insurer was unable to pay all or part of the award because of insolvency. The Department of Transport shared the MIBI’s view and the Minister for Transport suggested policyholders should pursue claims with the liquidator of Setanta.

Judge Hedigan said it was clear that the background to the MIBI agreements was the obligation to protect the innocent victims of uninsured drivers. This obligation had been placed on insurers in return for the introduction of compulsory insurance in 1932.

He said that from the evidence and legal argument before the court it seemed to him that the wording of the 2009 MIBI Agreement meant that it had a liability to pay out in respect of claims against persons who had been insured by an insurer which had become insolvent.

Insurance Ireland today expressed “serious concerns” about the ruling and said the judgement would have far-reaching implications.

It said the Insurance Compensation Fund, established in 1964, has historically intervened in the event of insurance company insolvencies. The role of the MIBI on the other hand was is to compensate the victims of uninsured or untraced drivers.

“The MIBI is maintained by levies imposed on motor insurers operating in the Irish market,” it said in a statement. “The cost of uninsured driving amounts to approximately €60m annually, which equates to €30 on the average motor premium. This judgment alone adds approx. another €90m to that bill,and this does not include the potential cost of future motor insurer insolvencies.”

It said that following the ruling every motor insurer no matter how prudent would now have to underwrite the least prudent motor insurer in the market and said this “reality will have to be factored into insurers’ solvency and capital considerations”.

It warned that liquidation would now be “a viable option for imprudent insurers who will be able to” dump” their losses on surviving insurers” and said motor insurers in Ireland would “struggle to obtain capital within their groups in order to operate in the Irish market, given that motor insurers in Ireland are now expected to become guarantors for their competitors”.

And it also warned of “upward pressure on premiums and a risk of motor insurers exiting the Irish market”.

The increases will come on the back of similar price hikes this year and will see most motorists paying around €300 per year more for a comprehensive policy in 2016 than they did in 2014.

Kevin Thompson, the chief executive of Insurance Ireland, which represents 95 per cent of the domestic and international based insurance sector in Ireland, denied that mismanagement across the motor insurance sector was to blame for the price spikes.

He accepted that competition had driven premiums below sustainable levels in recent years but insisted factors outside the control of the sector were to blame for premiums increasing.

He said the high cost of awards in court was a key factor driving up the cost of insurance premiums. Other factors include legal costs, fraud and most recently, the High Court’s judgment in relation to Setanta Insurance.

Speaking to The Irish Times, Mr Thompson said the premium increases were inevitable because the motor insurance sector has been losing money for more than five years. He said the net underwriting loss between 2010 and 2014 was €585 million with in motor insurance sector reporting losses of €242 million last year alone.

“From any business model perspective it is just not sustainable,” he said. “We are into a cycle where there is only going to be serious upward pressure on prices. It is not good news for consumers.

Insurance Ireland believes a range of measures are needed to stabilise pricing for consumers, particularly in the area of motor premiums.

“Motor claims costs are rising. The level of awards being made in the courts is at an all-time high. The average High Court award in 2014 was up 34 per cent on 2013 and the average Circuit Court award was up 14 per cent on 2013,” Mr Thompson said. " In litigated cases, legal costs in Ireland account for more than 60 per cent of the compensation awarded."

All told 80 per cent of motor injury claims in the Republic are for whiplash, Mr Thompson said and he described the payouts associated with such claims as being out of step with EU norms. “The figures on whiplash alone are very stark,” he said. “In Ireland the average award for whiplash is €15,000, in the UK, the corresponding figure is €5,000.” In Spain and Italy the average payout for such a claim is around €2,000.

“ The reality is that premiums are dictated by claims costs, and although the Irish market is very competitive, increases in the cost of claims will inevitably lead to increases in premiums,” he said.

Mr Thompson stopped short of criticising the Injuries Board which handles around 20 per cent of the motor insurance claims. It was set up a decade ago to reduce the legal costs associated with claims and speed up the process.

However Mr Thompson pointed out that “the average motor injury award made by the Injuries Board is very high at around €21,000. Also, more than 90 per cent of claimants to the Injuries Board are represented by solicitors even though the Injuries Board was meant to be a lawyer free zone.”

He said around 40 per cent of Injuries Board awards were rejected by claimants “partly because some solicitors adopt a policy of non-cooperation, for example claimants not turning up for medicals or not supplying loss of earnings information so that the Injuries Board cannot make informed awards. The consequence of this is that following the inevitable rejection of the award, the case is subsequently litigated, generating additional legal costs.”

Mr Thompson said insurance fraud added a further €100m per annum to overall motor insurance costs which equates to €50 per annum on the average motor premium.

He also highlighted the recent ruling on Setanta Ireland which found that the industry funded Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland was liable to cover the costs most claims motorists insured by the now insolvent company. “While everyone agrees that those injured by Setanta drivers should be compensated, Insurance Ireland believes the [STATE-FUNDED]Insurance Compensation Fund is the right mechanism to do this,” he said.

He said that by the middle of this year the cost of Setanta claims had reached €90m and was likely to rise. “Imposing the responsibility for this on the rest of the sector through the MIBI will result in higher premiums and potentially a risk of insurers exiting the Irish market.”

While the last week of the 2015 legal year ended with Fine Gael TD John Perry settling his action against the party over the running of its selection convention for Sligo-Leitrim, the first week of the 2016 law term sees former Fine Gael minister turned Independent TD Michael Lowry seeking orders to stop his prosecution on charges of allegedly filing incorrect tax returns in 2003 and 2007. Lowry insists he has no outstanding tax liability and is being treated unfairly when others, including some 145 holders of Ansbacher accounts, are not being prosecuted.

He also maintains that the successful bid by the Director of Public Prosecutions to have his trial transferred to Dublin Circuit Criminal Court amounts to unfair punishment for his popularity with voters in Tipperary. His High Court application opens on January 12th.

Just weeks later, on January 27th, Independent TD Mick Wallace faces an application in the Commercial Court for a €2 million summary judgment from the Promontoria (Aran) Ltd fund, which bought loans of his companies in 2014 from Ulster Bank. The €2 million is alleged to be due under a March 2009 guarantee and indemnity from the Wexford TD as a director of M&J Wallace Ltd.

Back in the High Court, the nine-member Dáil Committee on Procedures and Privileges continues to prepare its defence to the action brought against it by businessman Denis O’Brien for alleged breach of his right to privacy in his banking affairs.

O’Brien alleges that remarks made in the Dáil in summer 2015 by Social Democrat TD Catherine Murphy and Sinn Féin TD Pearse Doherty effectively decided his legal action against RTÉ over the confidentiality of his banking relationship with State-owned Irish Bank Resolution Corporation. The businessman claims the remarks involved “unwarranted interference” by the Oireachtas with the courts. A dispute over discovery issues will be heard in February.

O’Brien’s separate case against Red Flag Consulting over an alleged conspiracy to damage him will also be back before the High Court this term.

Collins in Supreme Court appeal

Another politician, United Left TD Joan Collins, will be in the Supreme Court in February for her appeal against the High Court’s rejection of her challenge to the minister for finance’s decision, in 2010, to issue €31 billion promissory notes in favour of Anglo Irish Bank and the Educational Building Society. The three-judge High Court ruled in 2013 that the notes were validly issued. A core issue in the case is whether the concept of appropriation of public monies should be subject, as Collins argued, to a set limit.

One of the three judges who dismissed Collins’s case was Mr Justice Peter Kelly, who takes the helm as the new president of the High Court this month. Having established an international reputation for the fast-track Commercial Court as a model of efficiency, Mr Justice Kelly is expected to seek to do the same for the High Court.

Among the cases listed for hearing in those courts this term is the personal injuries action by Praveen Halappanavar over the death of his wife, Savita. *

Retired judge judgment

An unusual case expected to get a hearing date this term is by a recently retired High Court judge, 71-year-old Barry White, who wants to resume work as a barrister. He is challenging a Bar Council rule that prevents retired judges resuming private practise in a court equal to or less than the court of which they were a judge.

White, who had an extensive practise at the criminal Bar before being appointed a High Court judge in 2002, claims the rule breaches his constitutional right to earn a living. He had written to the Bar Council saying his wish to resume practise was due to “economic necessity”. The case, against the Bar Council and the State, will be heard by Mr Justice Max Barrett.

Across the yard from the main Four Courts building, the Court of Appeal continues to battle its way through the backlog of hundreds of appeals inherited in 2014 from the Supreme Court, in addition to a mounting number of fresh appeals from the High Court.

An important appeal specially fixed for hearing this term involves a challenge by the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) to a High Court ruling obliging it to assume €90 million in liabilities following the collapse of Setanta Insurance in April 2014. Setanta had been a member of the MIBI, and the High Court ruling has prompted concern that motorists will be hit with higher premiums as insurers pass on the increased cost of funding the MIBI’s work to their clients.

Another significant appeal is by the Department of Social Protection against a High Court decision quashing the refusal of a domiciliary care allowance for the mother of an autistic boy. Mr Justice Barrett upheld the boy’s challenge after finding an alleged “policy” in the department of always accepting its medical assessors’ “desktop” opinions on such applications.

While a Health Service Executive multidisciplinary team assessed the boy as needing considerably more care than is usually provided to children of his age, and advised the parents to apply for a domiciliary care allowance, the department’s medical assessor took the view that the evidence did not indicate a disability so severe as to require this extra care, the judge noted.

* This article was edited on January 11th, 2016

The MIBI is appealing against Mr Justice John Hedigan’s finding that it was liable to pay out in respect of claims against persons who were insured with Setanta at the time of its liquidation.

The case has important implications for motor insurance premiums as well as parties involved in claims concerning Setanta. Following Setanta’s liquidation, some 1,750 claims by and against Setanta policyholders remained in existence.

The High Court was asked to determine whether the MIBI – operated under the terms of an agreement between the Government and companies underwriting motor insurance in Ireland to deal with claims related to uninsured drivers – or the Insurance Compensation Fund, which had been used to cover claims of insolvent insurance companies, were liable for the claims.

Paul Gallagher SC, for the MIBI, said the case raised “a very important issue” concerning the liabilities arising from the insolvency of one of its members.

Significant difficulties

The High Court ruling has created “very significant difficulties” for the MIBI and its members which were now caught up in the insolvency of a fellow member of the MIBI, counsel said.

The effect of the High Court judgment was that members of the MIBI, made up of more than 40 insurance companies operating in the State, were now “co-guarantors” of rival firms but had no entitlements to any information about those prior to the insolvency, he said.

The MIBI agreement did not deal with an issue as fundamental as the issue of insolvency of one of its members, he said. The High Court had decided a phrase in one particular sub-clause in the agreement meant the MIBI had a liability to pay out in respect of claims against persons insured by an insurer that has become insolvent.

This interpretation was “too narrow” in the context of the entire MIBI agreement, the High court’s reliance on this “hidden” sub-clause rendered the judgment incorrect and it should be set aside, he said.

Judgment

Another effect of the High Court’s decision meant the MIBI could potentially seek judgment against any Setanta policy-holders found liable as a result of a claim the MIBI had to pay out on, counsel said.

The appeal is opposed by the Law Society which, following Setanta’s collapse, wrote to the MIBI stating solicitors had been inundated with queries from customers as to the consequences of the liquidation.

Initially the proceedings were brought by the accountant of the Courts of Justice who has statutory responsibility for administering the Insurance Compensation Fund. The High Court subsequently directed the Law Society act as the claimant while the MIBI should be the respondent. The accountant of the Courts of Justice adopted a neutral position in the proceedings.

A liquidator was appointed in April 2014 to Setanta, a Maltese-registered company, and its policies were cancelled by the liquidator on May 29th, 2014. Setanta was a member of the MIBI.

The MIBI, which covers the cost of claims related to uninsured drivers claimed through levies imposed on customers, argued it did not have to satisfy awards against policy-holders where the insurer was unable to pay all or part of the award because of insolvency.

Spaniard Luis Bonell is responsible for Boston-based Liberty’s operations in 16 countries, including Ireland. It has operated here since November 2011 when it acquired the former Quinn Insurance from its administrators.

Liberty’s experience here has been chastening. It came with the best of intentions, promising product innovation, improved levels of customer service and investment and growth for the business.

Instead, it has had its fingers burnt. Between 2011 and 2014, Liberty’s Irish subsidiary accumulated losses of €22 million while staff numbers reduced from about 1,500 to 580 currently. It has also withdrawn from some lines of business, notably quitting the British market.

Some of the blame lies with the company, some is down to the economic situation that prevailed and some is the result of structural issues within the Irish market.

Bonell accepted that Liberty had made mistakes here, trying to run before it could walk and without realising that the terrain was so rough. But it has implemented the necessary changes and is on track to make a “good” profit in 2017.

One reason for its improved financial performance has been an increase in premiums, which rose on average last year by about 25 per cent.

This is not unique to Liberty, of course. Most insurers have pushed through price rises, particularly on motor policies. They cite an increased number of accidents now that the recovery is under way and legal costs and court awards that are out of kilter with other markets.

Part of the blame also lies with the insurers, who chased market share by offering unsustainable prices.

According to Bonell, the average price of a private motor policy in 2003 was €900. “Today is it less than €500.”

Irresponsible behaviour

Along with other players in the industry, Bonell is angry about the

High Court

ruling in September that the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) should be liable for outstanding claims stemming from the collapse in 2014 of Malta-based Setanta Insurance.

The MIBI, which makes payments on claims against uninsured drivers, has been placed on the hook to cover the €90 million in claims rather than the Insurance Compensation Fund, which is designed to facilitate payments when insurers go bust.

“This was not the way the two bodies were designed to work. We come to a scenario where the good companies and the responsible companies will have to pay for the irresponsible behaviour of others. Setanta was an irrational player. Having the [other] insurance companies pick up for the losses of Setanta is not fair. It is a change in the rules of the game in the middle of the game, which we are not happy with,” he said, adding that the cost would have to be passed on to policyholders.

Lack of transparency

Setanta was registered in Malta but operated only in Ireland, offering cut-price products through brokers. Its collapse has highlighted gaps in regulation but should also act as a warning to consumers that they need to be more careful when choosing an insurer.

“In the end, customers have a certain level of responsibility about the type of companies they decide to buy from,” Bonell said. “There is a level of risk that in general people should be aware of.”

It’s a fair point.

Bonell cited another problem with the insurance market here: a lack of transparency. Compared with other countries, the market data is lacking and generally published well after the event.

“As a result, it’s much more difficult for companies to assess trends and to understand where the market is. So the market operates a little blindly because of a lack of information,” he said.

“In many other markets, we get monthly information, we get quarterly information. In Ireland, it comes annually and with months of delay. In other markets, companies share claims cost, frequency, and price increases, and there is more transparency. This is public information. This is something that the industry [in Ireland] should be working for.”

Hear, hear!

Twitter: @CiaranHancock1

Dublin blue, that is, not the shade associated with his native Tipperary. Coincidentally, it mirrors the corporate colours of AIG, which has used its sponsorship of Dublin GAA to heavily promote its brand to consumers over the past two years as it launched products directly to the market.

The walls outside O’Rourke’s modest office are lined with large photographs of the Dubs parading Sam around Croker, and various bits and pieces associated with the county’s teams adorn his office.

The five-year sponsorship began in November 2013 and has transformed the American insurance company from a relative unknown in the consumer market into a highly recognisable brand.

O’Rourke, who hails from Thurles and has a strong GAA background, was the driving force behind the deal.

“I wouldn’t say I was a fan of Dublin before we sponsored them but I’m certainly a fan now,” he says. “We wanted to raise the profile for AIG in Ireland. There aren’t many suitable opportunities for that but Dublin GAA was the one for us. It has a large population of consumers and we do most of our business in Dublin. So it made perfect sense.”

Ironically, O’Rourke is a committee member with the Tipperary supporters’ club but sponsoring his home county never came into the equation. “No. It wasn’t available at the time.”

He won’t talk numbers but the sponsorship is thought to be worth €800,000 a year to Dublin, with AIG spending another €400,000 annually leveraging it via marketing and advertising.

O’Rourke might also be feeling blue about the company’s losses last year in motor insurance, where it has a 6 per cent market share and about 200,000 policyholders.

“We lost a considerable amount of money on motor insurance [last year],” he says. “It’s difficult to give you an exact number because if you look at the statutory basis, we probably ran at close to a 100 per cent loss ratio before we paid any of our marketing expenses, distribution costs or employee expenses. It was a particularly bad year for motor insurance.”

In other words, for every euro AIG took in customer premiums, it either paid out a euro or reserved a euro for claims. And it then had to pay all of its usual business expenses.

“We lost between €10 million and €20 million just on motor,” he says.

AIG isn’t the only motor insurer in Ireland to have hit a bump in the road. Insurance Ireland, the industry lobby group, estimates that losses across the sector amounted to €585 million between 2010 and 2014. It’s a staggering figure and helps to explain the large double-digit increases in premiums that customers have experienced in the past couple of years.

O’Rourke says the other parts of AIG’s business have performed well and overall the out-turn for the year “was around break even”.

“Our traditional commercial business and specialist business offset the losses we made in motor,” he says.

AIG celebrates its 40th birthday in Ireland this year, and is the State’s biggest insurer of commercial lines.

Client confidentiality does not permit him to name names but he can say it insures Croke Park and the “chances are that we insure most of the financial institutions’ bank branches . . . most of the sports clubs . . . most of the shops and offices in towns”.

“Of the top 20 companies in Ireland, we probably insure 19 of them,” he adds.

Given that it last made a profit from motor insurance three years ago, why is AIG bothered operating in the volatile consumer space when it has such a strong foothold in the commercial market here?

“We’re hoping there will be reforms,” he says, ever the optimist. “If you look at motor insurance costs in places like France and Germany, they are all in the €400 to €450 a year mark. In the UK, it might be closer to £500 but in Ireland, if you try to renew your insurance as new business it will be €700 on average.

“And that’s increasing dramatically. A lot of people have seen a 50 per cent increase in the past year. We’re again back in the situation where we are one of the most expensive places in Europe for car insurance.”

On its website, AIG.ie, the company claims to offer motor insurance for as low as €310 but it comes with a load of conditions.

You need to be a 49-year-old accountant, living in Dublin 6 west, with a 10-year licence, six years’ no claims bonus, six years claims-free, driving a 2010 Volkswagen Golf 1.4-litre petrol car worth €11,500. It must be used for “social domestic and pleasure”.

O’Rourke thinks you might also have to take its telematics option, which monitors your driving behaviour.

AIG is writing about 1,000 policies a month with telematics. “In particular, good drivers are looking for value and they’re not afraid of it,” he explains.

In terms of reform, O’Rourke would like to see Ireland follow the UK in considering a ban on whiplash claims to save the industry £1 billion in fraudulent claims. Whiplash awards by judges here have begun to spike in recent years and it’s become a hot topic within the industry.

“In France and Germany, the normal award for whiplash is between €2,000 and €3,000 and the legal fees are in the hundreds,” he says.

“In Ireland, the average award for whiplash is €15,000. So we have the most expensive necks in Europe. Ironically, in the UK, the average payout for whiplash is £5,000 and they dub themselves as the whiplash capital of Europe.”

O’Rourke is hoping revisions being undertaken on the book of quantum, which is supposed to act as an aid in the assessment of compensation claims, will help improve the situation. “We’re hoping that will bring more realistic awards. I would be hoping to get it this year.”

He says insurance companies have no problem paying for loss of earnings or for medical care but want to deter ambulance chasers. “The judiciary make the awards. So we need an updated book of quantum and we need to have reasonable awards that compare with Europe. Or else we need to go down the route of the UK and ban awards for whiplash.”

He would also like to see more specialisation among judges, who preside over these cases.

“We don’t have specialisation in Ireland. Personal injuries can be heard by a judge with a conveyancing background or a family law background. That’s a difficult situation. Awards went up 34 per cent from 2013 to 2014.”

He cites a case recently that AIG valued at €75,000 and which went for €350,000. “When you have those level of awards there’s a fear factor [among the insurers] of going to courts,” he says.

An obvious tool to improve AIG’s financial performance on motor policies is hikes in premiums. AIG put through increases of more than 50 per cent last year for new business and about half that level for renewals.

“We still won quite a bit of new business,” he says, adding that the increases this year will be lower but still double-digit.

“Over a long period of time we’d expect to make money and we did make money when Mary Harney [the former Progressive Democrats minister] brought in the Personal Injuries Assessment Board, various road-safety measures and cut down on the drink driving. We’re hoping [that with] government reform in the next year, coupled with rate increases that we’ve applied, we’ll make money again.”

If nothing changes, O’Rourke fears that average motor rates could get as high as €1,000 here. “That’s not what we want but that’s ultimately what could happen.”

Setanta Insurance

Another bugbear relates to the collapse of Malta-registered Setanta Insurance two years ago. In September, the High Court ruled the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) should be liable for outstanding claims stemming from the collapse of Setanta, which operated in Ireland only.

The MIBI, which makes payments on claims against uninsured drivers, has been placed on the hook to cover the €90 million in claims rather than the Insurance Compensation Fund, which is designed to facilitate payments when insurers go bust.

The matter has been appealed by the MIBI and a verdict is awaited from the Court of Appeal.

“Hopefully the industry will win the appeal,” O’Rourke says. “This is an issue for the compensation fund not the MIBI. Ultimately, policyholders will pay for it but it’s the size of the cheque. If you put the loss on the insurance companies they then have to reserve for the potential of this happening again and it brings more uncertainty.”

“Setanta was based in Malta and used the EU rules to set up fly-by-night insurance company here. It was Irish-managed only selling into Ireland from offshore areas. The opening of the EU was supposed to provide regulation around that but they went bust and it’s come back to the Irish consumer. It’s going to come back to the balance sheets of the insurers [here].

“This is the only jurisdiction that this could happen in. The industry was shocked by the decision of the High Court. It had to be appealed. The decision basically means that every insurance company is underwriting their competitors, who are based in Malta with none of the risk management you need to attract a financial strength rating. It’s an insane situation.”

AIG added another string to its bow last year with the acquisition of Laya Healthcare, which made an after-tax profit of €12 million on turnover of €51 million in 2014. “It’s been a very good buy for us.”

Stable government

O’Rourke says the general election campaign and the uncertain result being indicated by the polls is not resonating yet at its headquarters in New York.

“[AIG global chief executive] Peter Hancock when he was here said it was an economy that he wanted to invest in. Shortly after that he supported the acquisition of Laya. He put more treasury jobs in here and I think over time we’ll see more jobs come here. There’s certainly a good relationship with the IDA.

“We want a stable government, a business-friendly government, and I’ve no doubt that’s the type of government that our head office would like to see when they’re investing in the country. There’s always lots of opportunities in a company like AIG for further investment. Hopefully, we can have a period of stability after the election for a term at least.

“I can’t see any government that doesn’t involve Fine Gael. They’ve some very capable ministers.”

O’Rourke has spent 23 years with AIG. Raised in Thurles, his father was a garda and his mother a nurse. He was encouraged into accountancy by a schoolteacher who told him it could be a passport to see the world.

He worked initially with Coopers & Lybrand (now PricewaterhouseCoopeers) in Dublin before joining AIG in 1993 in its internal audit and operational review department. Since then, he has since travelled extensively with the company, working in New York, Turkey, Poland, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Bermuda, Argentina, Ecuador, Brazil.

His favourite place? “I loved Argentina. We had a game of hurling when I was down there. The Irish in Argentina against the Irish Argentines and they beat us. It was a great occasion and we had a barbecue afterwards on St Patrick’s day. It was great fun and it meant a lot to them. The GAA donated the hurleys.”

He also “really liked” Oman and thought Lebanon was “fascinating”, choosing to stay in the hotel room occupied by Briton Terry Waite before he was kidnapped in 1987.

“It [Beirut] was totally bombed out at the time, the centre was just rubble. But the people were so friendly.”

O’Rourke left New York to return to Ireland a week before the 9/11 terrorist attacks. He was initially appointed as financial controller here before becoming financial lines manager in 2004 and commercial lines director four years later. He took on his current role in 2012.

Does he see himself as an AIG lifer?

“Yeah, I do. When I look around the market, I think we have a lot of advantages than other companies don’t have and that this is the place to be. My predecessor was here for 22 years.”

Before leaving, I ask who he thinks will win this year’s All-Ireland hurling and football championships. “In hurling, I’d love to see Tipperary and Dublin in the final, with Tipperary winning. In football, I’d like to see Dublin beat Mayo in the final.”

Blue is definitely his colour.

CV Name: Declan O’Rourke Job: General manager, AIG Ireland

Age: 45

Lives: Badger Hill, Kilteel, Co Kildare. “The house is actually in Dublin but the entrance is in Kildare.” Family: Married with five children. Hobbies: “I play squash every week and the occasional round of golf. Love all sport, really.”

Something we might expect: “All of my insurance products are with AIG.”

Something that might surprise: O’Rourke worked in Lebanon for a period and stayed in the hotel room Terry Waite used before his kidnapping in 1987. “I requested it. I just thought it was a fairly famous room.”

The Court of Appeal has decided that the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland rather than the Insurance Compensation Fund should meet the cost of claims resulting from Setanta’s insolvency. Either way, it seems, the motorist will pay ever higher premiums for car insurance – up by 30 per cent in the year to January. The cost of home insurance, partly reflecting the impact of flooding, has increased by seven per cent in the same period. Minister for Finance Michael Noonan recently promised an overall review of insurance costs in consultation with the Central Bank and other departments; a challenge that now awaits the formation of a new government.

The European Commission has told Fine Gael MEP Deirdre Clune that it is not responsible for the supervision of European insurance companies that trade in other member states. However, it does suggest that a new EU regulatory framework, introduced in January, should enable more effective regulation of their activities. Supervisors have been given greater powers to monitor the solvency of insurance companies. They can intervene more quickly if required. And where cross-border activities are involved – as in Setanta’s case – they can share information with the relevant authorities.

But would these new regulatory powers – if introduced much sooner and applied rigorously – have saved Setanta from insolvency and spared motorists the cost of having to pay for that company’s mistakes?

Speaking to The Irish Times from Malta, Paul Mercieca said this move would delay the payouts to claimants and increase the cost of the liquidation process.

“Everything is more or less in limbo,” Mr Mercieca said. “We will incur more costs in keeping a small staff without any resolution in sight. The claims we have naturally continue to develop and deteriorate. It’s very frustrating.”

Mr Mercieca, a retired former head of accounting firm Deloitte in Malta, said he would seek to ascertain how long the Supreme Court process would take, adding that he was not a party to this action but an “interested observer” as liquidator to the company.

Setanta was registered in Malta but sold insurance policies exclusively in Ireland before it collapsed in 2014. Mr Mercieca has determined that the cost of claims could run to about €90 million with the number of claimants estimated at 1,750.

Both the High Court and the Court of Appeal have found that MIBI, which has 40 insurers as members, should meet the cost of these claims. However, MIBI argues that the Insurance Compensation Fund should pick up the bill, as it did previously in the cases of PMPA and Quinn Insurance.

Mr Mercieca said four full-time staff and a part-time employee are managing claims from Dublin. In addition, he has to pay fees for legal, accountancy and IT services. “There are costs,” he said.

Mr Mercieca said he has managed to establish the identities of the beneficial owners of Setanta but declined to reveal their names.

On whether he might pursue legal action against the former owners, he said: “I’m still considering that.”

Mr Mercieca said he would provide an update on the liquidation process to creditors of Setanta at a meeting in Malta, probably in June.

The team of advisers involved with Setanta Insurance Company Ltd in liquidation are Deloitte in both Ireland and Malta, Irish law firm Arthur Cox and Ganado Advocates in Malta.

According to Maltese law, no payments to claimants can be made until the total liabilities of the company have been established.

His death comes just over a week after the publication of a report on the response by State agencies to his abuse of a boy in Waterford in the 1980s.

The former sports coach was 10 years into an 18½-year sentence for the sexual assault of 15 teenagers in Waterford in the 1970s and 1980s and had been suffering ill health in recent weeks.

Kenneally, who had been seriously ill for some time, died on in the Midlands Prison in Portlaoise around 3.30am on Thursday morning. He had spent much of the last year in the Midlands Regional Hospital in Portlaoise as he suffered very poor health including blood pressure issues and diabetes.

Earlier this year, in February, he underwent surgery to have one of his legs amputated below the knee due to health complications from his diabetes and he had remained in hospital. But late last week he was transferred back to the prison where he received palliative care on the G1 landing.

A commission of investigation into complaints against Kenneally found a serious dereliction of duty by senior Garda officers when they learned he sexually abused a boy in 1987.

Judge Michael White, who chaired the South East Commission of Investigation , examined the response by the Garda and the South Eastern Health Board to a report in 1987 that Kenneally – a member of a prominent Fianna Fáil political family in Waterford – was abusing pubescent boys.

White also criticised the health board for failing to follow through on complaints that could have led to Kenneally being caught much sooner.

In his report, White noted: “There is no evidence of widespread collusion that would indicate any finding by the commission of State collusion and/or conspiracy, which is not to underestimate in any way the seriousness of the dereliction of duty in the original investigation in 1987/1988.”

Who was Bill Kenneally? The basketball coach whose crimes had ‘lifelong impact on victims’

An accountant, Kenneally, who lived at Laragh, Summerville Avenue in Waterford city, was a serial abuse of pubescent boys whom he befriended through basketball, casual games of soccer, a local tennis club in Waterford in the 1970s and 1980s.

White described him as a risk to young boys in Waterford in the 1970s and 1980s.

“Bill Kenneally was a predatory sexual abuser operating in Waterford city and its environs. He had an intense sexual attraction to pubescent boys in early adolescence described as hebephilia rather than paedophilia,” observed White of Kenneally, who testified before the commission in March 2024.

Kenneally was jailed for 14 years and two months at Waterford Circuit Criminal Court on February 19th, 2016 for the indecent assault of 10 boys. He was jailed for a further four years and six months on May 22nd, 2023, at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court for the indecent assault of five other boys.

White said Kenneally’s crimes had “a lifelong impact on the victims and their families”.

Noting that Kenneally was not brought to justice until a formal complaint was made by one of his victims, Jason Clancy, in December 2012, White said “his crimes were cruel and exploitative. He was intelligent and manipulative and an expert at grooming children by developing trust and affection.”

But White noted Kenneally also used fear to exploit his victims. “He photographed many of the boys with a Polaroid camera which could instantly develop photos of them in compromising positions. He retained possession of these photos ... [in an] effective blackmail of the boys to preserve silence.

State apology to be offered to Bill Kenneally victims after report detailing ‘abhorrent crimes’

“He regularly used restraints including handcuffs and builder’s twine. He used alcohol, money and gifts in grooming and in the commission of offences. Many of these boys had never consumed alcohol before being introduced to it by Bill Kenneally.”

The commission heard evidence from the senior investigative officer on the case between 2012 and 2018, Chief Supt Anthony Pettit, that gardaí had taken statements from 23 men, alleging that they had been sexually abused as minors by Kenneally.

Pettit said two other men made statements alleging activity that could be described as grooming while gardaí identified another 13 men who had socialised with Kenneally as minors. All 13 declined to make statements, but gardaí believed there was prima facie evidence he had abused four others.

White noted that from an analysis of complaints made to gardaí from 2012 onwards, Kenneally’s targeting of boys for abuse was intense during the period from 1978 to 1987, with some of the activity clearly observable.

This included Kenneally behaving inappropriately in changing rooms and showers when boys he was coaching in basketball were showering and changing, while he also used to take young boys to fast-food restaurants and for spins in his car.

He regularly provided alcohol for youths to drink and he kept alcohol in the boot of his car while he regularly invited boys to his own home when his parents were aware and played pornographic tapes for them and gave them alcohol.

Kenneally was a member of the influential Kenneally political dynasty in Waterford - his grandfather William Kenneally was a Fianna Fáil TD for Waterford from 1952 until 1957 while his son, Billy Kenneally snr, Kenneally’s uncle, was a TD from 1965 until 1981.

Billy Kenneally’s son Brendan, the abuser’s cousin, was a TD in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s, and was criticised by White in his report for not notifying the authorities of his cousin’s abuse after he confirmed to the investigation that his father told him in 2001 of his cousin’s abuse in 1987 and 1988.

Brendan Kenneally could have reported the matter to Child protection services of the South Eastern Health Board and asked them to carry out a risk assessment on his cousin when he learned of the abuse in 2001, said White of the now retired TD.

“He should have spoken to Bill Kenneally and advised him to resign from Waterford Viking basketball club and he should have never allowed him to continue to canvass and act as a tallyman for him or the Fianna Fáil party.”

Although Kenneally pleaded guilty to the indecent assault of each of the 15 boys he was accused of abusing, he never testified at either of the trials.

He appeared to show little remorse when he finally spoke about his abuse at the commission in March 2024.

Kenneally began his testimony by expressing his concerns about the commission and its failure to provide him with copies of legislation he had requested and its refusal to allow him to be present when testimony from his victims was given in private session.

He was combative when he was questioned by barristers for the commission and the victims.

When barrister Barra McGrory, representing seven of his victims, put it to Kenneally that he had continued to abuse after 1987, he replied ‘Did I? Did I?’”

He went on to claim that his second trial, where he pleaded guilty to sample counts covering up until 1990, was not fair.

He insisted he didn’t do “anything criminal” after December 1987, and when McGrory put it to him that he continued “doing the sort of thing” he did, Kenneally replied: “I believe not with any boy below the age of consent.”

When asked if he supplied to alcohol to teenagers aged 13 and 14, Kenneally replied: “Is that a criminal offence?” When it was put to him that he had given them alcohol to get them to co-operate with what he wanted them to do, he said “co-operation insinuates consensual”.

At one stage, when he was asked by his own counsel, John Peart about his sexual “predilections”, Kenneally described himself as an “ephebophile” - which is defined as an older adult who is sexually attracted to adolescent - and he chuckled.

The Government is expected to offer a State apology to the victims.

The Irish Prison Service has confirmed there was a death of a person in custody at Midlands Prison.

It said all deaths in custody “are investigated by the Irish Prison Service, the Inspector of Prisons and An Garda Síochána, where circumstances warrant”.

The cause of death will be determined by the Coroner’s Office, and next of kin have been informed.

When renewal time came last month, he was quoted €620 for the same level of cover. Horrified by an 82 per cent price hike, he decided to make a few calls. He was quoted €590 by AIG – a saving for sure, but not a big one. He persisted and “eventually I got an online quote of €290 with Aviva”, he says. “I checked it and rechecked it and it was the same level of cover.”

His story of a huge price increase is not uncommon, although the subsequent savings are a lot less common.

Over the past two years, the big players in the Republic’s car insurance market have talked up price increases while consumers picked up the tab. They were hit with premium hikes of about 25 per cent last year and face even bigger increases this year. Many will pay more than €400 more for a comprehensive policy in 2016 than they did two years earlier.

It was a different story between 2010 and 2014 when motorists saw premiums tumble as the Republic went from being one of the most expensive places in Europe for car insurance to one of the cheapest. Many assumed premiums were falling because of a decline in serious and fatal accidents due to better roads and safer cars.

They were wrong. Increased competition saw stalwarts such as Royal Sun Alliance and upstarts like Setanta Ireland fight hard for market share. It turns out they were fighting too hard, and in 2014 it became clear the numbers didn’t add up. Companies were taking in less in premiums than they were paying out in claims.

Setanta went to the wall in April 2014 and two years on, the motor insurance industry is still picking up the pieces. Last week the Court of Appeal rejected an appeal by the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) against a High Court decision that it must pay out on 1,750 outstanding claims left in the wake of Setanta’s demise.

“Today’s judgment immediately adds a further €90 million in costs to the entire insurance sector,” the MIBI said. “This adds to the current volatility in the insurance market generally, which is already under significant pressure from the increased cost of claims.”

Insurance companies “are being made pay for the mistakes of a competitor,” says Jonathan Hehir, managing director of online brokers coverinaclick.ie. “And not only was Setanta a competitor... it was a competitor that won business by quoting unrealistic pricing and that was essentially a rogue trader in the Irish market.”

He is both right and wrong. Setanta did win business by quoting unrealistic prices, but it won’t be the insurance companies who pay. Their customers will. Industry sources suggest the ruling will add €50 to an average premium until the €90 million in liabilities has been met.

But the real difficulty is not the ruling but the precedent. Setanta wasn’t a big player in the market and companies will cope with a €90 million loss. It would be unimaginably worse if a bigger player suffered a similar fate.

“The indirect implication of the Court’s decision is that all motor insurance providers in the Irish market will now be held responsible for any potential insolvencies of their competitors operating in Ireland, and that burden will place further pressure on premiums,” says Ciaran Phelan of the Irish Brokers Association.

Kevin Thompson, chief executive of Insurance Ireland, the umbrella group for the sector, said it could not “support the concept of the sector being guarantors for less prudent operators” and said the judgment underlined the need for “urgent legislative change” to ensure it could not happen again.

But Setanta is only a part of a very complex picture. And it alone is not responsible for the price increases Irish consumers face.

Financial mismanagement on the industry’s part has seen it lose almost €500 million over the past three years alone. Clearly that is not sustainable.

Then there is insurance fraud. It adds €50 to the cost of every motor policy in Ireland.

The courts, the legal profession and the Government are also implicated in the price spike.

One case of whiplash can get someone €25,000, while the next one might get €15,000. This encourages some motorists – and their legal representatives – to spin the legal wheel rather than settle cases.

Whiplash payouts account for up to 80 per cent of motor insurance claims in the Republic, compared with just 3 per cent in some other countries. Last week AIG, the world’s biggest insurer, said Ireland should consider banning such claims to avoid the average cost of premiums hitting €1,000.

Both the number and value of claims is climbing sharply. According to the Central Bank, the average cost per claim between 2012 and 2014 increased by about 8 per cent while claims frequency went up by an average of 8.3 per cent. Legal awards are at an all-time high.

The insurance industry wrings its hands over price increases, but insiders say it doesn’t really care that much because it knows consumers have to pay the price, no matter what it is.

For its part, the legal profession benefits when cases go to court as 60 per cent of the value of compensation goes to pay legal costs.

There are also issues surrounding the “discount rate”, the assumed rate of investment return resulting from a big payout. If someone faces a lifetime of challenges following a crash, then money is put aside. Until recently, courts in the Republic assumed a lump sum would grow at a rate of 3 per cent per year.

But in an era of historically low interest rates and sluggish markets, such assumptions might be considered generous. A 2014 court judgment set the rate of growth at 1 per cent. If this rate is lower, payouts might have to climb and companies charge policy holders more. A minister for justice could end the uncertainty by setting the discount rate.

All that is missing is a willingness to act.

Case Studies:

Donal Hunt

Donal Hunt is a 35-year-old married man from Drimnagh. He drives a Volkswagen Passat and has a full no-claims bonus and no penalty points. “When I bought the car four years ago, I paid between €400 and €450 for my comprehensive cover,” he says. “It was the same again in 2013 and in 2014 and then for 2015 the cost of the cover actually fell under €400.”

In December he went to renew. “All the quotes I was getting were coming in at over €800. I kept being told that premiums were going up because of Setanta. But surely that should not have added more than 100 per cent to my policy?

Eventually he found a policy with the AA at just under €800 and his cover has been slightly enhanced.

Martha Kearns

Martha Kearns recently got a quote from her broker for third party fire and theft insurance. It was €644.74, substantially more than the €452.57 she paid last year.

“I have had no claims, accidents or changes to the policy since,” she says.

“The broker said it was because last year and the year before there was a record number of claims and this was being passed on to all clients’ premiums. This, she said, was ‘the best price in the market’.”

Kearns wasn’t convinced. She asked the broker to recheck the market.

“She came back with the same price from her existing company. The other prices she quoted from other companies ranged from €650 to €943.”

Tim Redfern

Last year Tim Redfern’s insurance was with Royal Sun Alliance. He paid €38 a month or €456 a year. He is 47 years old and has 15 years of claim-free driving behind him.

“In August, my broker told me the premium was increasing to €600 because cars over 10 years old can’t be easily insured.

“I shopped around and was quoted up to €956, but eventually got it down to €404.21 a year.

“Of all the goods or services I have ever come across, the amounts charged by car insurance companies seem totally arbitrary.

“It is obvious to me that anyone who doesn’t shop around is being systematically ripped off.”

The case arises out of a High Court judgement which found that the Mibi was liable for some €90 million in claims against the Maltese registered Setanta following its liquidation.

The bureau believes the liabilities should pass to the State’s insurance compensation fund, which happened following the failure of PMPA and Quinn Insurance

It has warned that Irish motorists are likely to face an average once-off insurance premium hike of €50 if the ruling is not overturned.

Earlier this month the Supreme Court agreed to hear the appeal, describing the issue involved as “a very serious one”. The Mibi yesterday lodged its formal intention of notice to proceed with the court.

“As the implications of this case will have a significant impact on motor insurance policyholders, the motor insurance market as well as the ongoing operations of the Mibi, it deserves the judgement of the highest court in the land,” chief executive Patrick O’Brien said

“Not only is this case adjudicating on a significant specific liability - it is also establishing a precedent which could have ongoing implications for the entire motor insurance sector in Ireland,” he said.

The big players in the Irish market have pushed up their prices dramatically over the past two years, with premiums rising by some 25 per cent last year and further again this year.

As many as 80 per cent of all claims lodged with the Injuries Board are settled outside of the process.

However, Insurance Ireland, the lobby group for the industry, denied a lack of transparency was pushing prices up.

In a statement, it said it had been lobbying for the past 18 months for actions to be taken to address the spiralling cost of claims and the consequent increase in premiums.

“We’re supportive of the role played by the Injuries Board . . . but the claims environment has changed and it needs new powers,” said chief executive Kevin Thompson.

“These include simple things like compelling claimants to provide loss of income information and to attend medicals,”

Mr Thompson called for awards to be benchmarked against international standards and pointed out that eight out of every 10 motor injury claims in Ireland were for whiplash.

In Ireland, the average whiplash settlement is €15,000 compared with €5,000 in the UK, he said.

Mr Thompson also highlighted the role of the collapse of Setanta Insurance more than two years ago.

Earlier this year, the Court of Appeal rejected an appeal by the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland against a High Court decision that it must pay out on 1,750 outstanding claims left in the wake of Setanta’s demise.

“As things stand, insurers are being asked to price a product to factor in the cost of a competitor failing. We can’t think of any other sector where this happens,” Mr Thompson said.

Insurance Ireland also called for improved road traffic enforcement.

The common link is that Setanta and Enterprise were selling into Ireland from other, smaller European countries. Setanta was regulated in Malta and Enterprise in Gibraltar.

Setanta

With Enterprise Insurance insolvent, the Central Bank advises that consumers will have to look elsewhere for cover. And the question now is whether there will be another hole to fill, if outstanding claims cannot be met by the company’s liquidator. And if so who will meet it? Because it appears that many other countries do not have compensation mechanisms, meaning pressure comes on the industry here – and in the long-term their policyholders – to foot the bill, even though the Irish regulator had no part in overseeing what was going on.

When Setanta went under, it left behind €90 million in claims from 1,700 policyholders. The High Court ruled that the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) should meet the bill and this was upheld by the Court of Appeal. MIBI is to appeal to the Supreme Court, meaning the policyholders will have to wait a long time before their claims are paid. Its case is that it is an industry fund designed to pay up when there are claims against uninsured drivers, as opposed to meeting the bill when competitors go bust.

On the hook

Coincidentally, the Department of Finance published proposals on Friday that in future the Insurance Compensation Fund should foot the bill in liquidations. This is a special fund loaned money from the exchequer. The industry repays it over time, or rather customers do via insurance costs and a 2 per cent levy on non-life policies. The industry is concerned that the latest proposal – which will require legislation – is that this fund is being exposed to meet all the costs of insolvent companies, rather than a capped amount.

As of now the MIBI appears to be on the hook if any shortfall emerges in Irish claims on Enterprise Insurance, after the High Court decision. Meanwhile there is confusion and uncertainty for the 14,000 customers of Enterprise, the brokers who sold them these policies and anyone with a claim against the company. And yet more pressure is likely on the incredible upward march of motor insurance costs, up an extraordinary 38.8 per cent in the year to June.

The British territory is the regulatory base of 11 out of 24 foreign companies registered with the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland (MIBI) to sell insurance through local agents under rules allowing EU firms to “passport” services to other member states.

Enterprise Insurance, which informed Gibraltar authorities last week that it was insolvent, has 255 Irish claims on its books as of last month with an estimated cost of €6.2 million, the firm’s provisional liquidator told The Irish Times yesterday. Gibraltar does not have an insurance compensation fund.

“That average claims cost is high, which would indicate that they were mainly personal injury claims,” said the liquidator Frederick White, managing director with Grant Thornton in Gibraltar.

Hopelessly insolvent

Gibraltar’s supreme court was told on Monday that Enterprise, which stopped writing Irish business late last year and also had customers in France, Greece, Italy, Norway and Britain, was “hopelessly insolvent” with an asset shortfall of at least £18 million (€21.3m).

Mr White said he hopes to complete his independent assessment by early September.

While he has been in contact with the MIBI as well as compensation schemes in other countries, Irish bodies are not in a position to deal with any cases ahead of a key Supreme Court appeal, expected to be heard in October.

The MIBI, an industry-funded body that deals with claims against uninsured drivers, is appealing rulings by the High Court and Court of Appeals that have landed it with the bill from the collapse of Malta-based Setanta Insurance in 2014.

It was initially expected that the State-run Insurance Compensation Fund would cover up to 65 per cent of Setanta’s €90 million of outstanding claims, up to a limit of €825,000.

“Unfortunately, given the company’s current situation and the absence of a sustainable framework to address eligible claims in Ireland, claimants here will face uncertainty until the matter is resolved,” a spokesman for industry group Insurance Ireland said.

New cover

While Enterprise Insurer’s regulator, the Gibraltar Financial Services Commission, had insisted the failed insurer’s customers remained covered, a spokeswoman has now advised policyholders to “take out new insurance cover”.

Wrightway Insurance, a Wexford-based underwriting agency that wrote business in Ireland through brokers on Enterprise’s behalf, said it estimates over 60 per cent of Irish policyholders have moved their cover.

“Based on broker feedback, we would expect that number to rise significantly next week,” said a spokesman for the firm, a unit of Swiss giant Zurich Insurance.

Wrightway said last weekend that it would cover outstanding Irish premiums as an “ex gratia payment to its brokers to pass on to policyholders.”

Based on figures provided by Mr White to The Irish Times, it appears that the amount Wrightway will pay will be in the region of €2 million.

Mr White said that Enterprise had €16 million of gross Irish premiums, of which €2 million were “unearned premiums” relating to the time period remaining on insurance policies.

The industry has been quick to play the “consumer” card, worrying that the cost to Irish insurers of covering claims by unprotected foreign companies means higher premiums. But the problems of the insurance sector run far deeper than the question of who should foot the bill for unprotected claims. And with motor premiums rising at almost 39 per cent in the year to June and accelerating, according to the Central Statistics Office, consumers are seeking answers.

Insurers complain about the cost of fraud, the rising number of claims and the size of awards, and increasing legal costs. Insurance Ireland says legal costs now amount to more than 60 per cent of compensation in litigated cases. But more than two-thirds of claims are settled by insurers among themselves and there is no transparency on the terms of such payments.

More fundamentally, as former Central Bank governor Patrick Honohan noted, Irish insurers adopted an overly optimistic view on the future economic outlook and followed what he called an “imprudent pricing and underwriting approach”. Companies have also overestimated likely investment returns – both the return they can expect on their own funds and the investment performance of sums awarded for long-term care in cases of catastrophic injury. The courts last year said carers should not have to take “unnecessary” investment risk and cut the assumed interest rate to one per cent from three per cent previously, sharply increasing claim costs.

And while increased regulatory costs under the EU Solvency II Directive are also cited, this has been coming down the tracks since 2007. Insurers made little advance provision for the increase in financial reserves required.

The kernel of the Setanta case still proceeding through the courts is who should pick up the tab – the Insurance Compensation Fund or the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland. The bottom line, of course, is that in either case, it is ultimately the consumer who pays. The distinction is even less relevant following recommendations of the ongoing review of the insurance sector which proposes the abolition of a ceiling on third party claims.

There is a case to be made that any EU state licensing non-life insurers that can sell across national boundaries should be obliged to have a local compensation scheme in place in the event of company failure.

However Ireland’s motor insurers have shown little ability or inclination to address risk. And that is precisely what they are supposed to do.

Revolut said it had 3.4 million customers in Ireland, which is up from 3.3 million at the end of last year. The figures indicate steady growth for the fintech, with the 2025 figure up 10 per cent on the year before. It has more than 75 million customers globally.

It said Ireland remains one of its strongest markets for “deepening daily customer engagement”. It offers financial products ranging from savings and investments to credit cards and loans in Ireland.

It reported year-on-year increases in Irish customer savings and investment balances, with about one in 10 Irish users now actively investing with Revolut every month.

Combined, Revolut customers have either invested or saved more than €3 billion with the platform in Ireland.

The figures show it has 348,000 monthly active investing customers, which is an increase of 22 per cent on last year.

Total investment balances are up 40 per cent to €1.1 billion. The average investing balance per customer in Ireland was €3,330 in May, while the average age of investors was 37.

US equities (39 per cent), money market funds (37 per cent), and exchange-traded funds (16.5 per cent) were the most popular asset classes in Irish customers’ portfolios.

It said it had more than €2 billion in total savings balances in Ireland, which was up by more than two-thirds in the past 12 months.

Joe Heneghan, chief executive of Revolut Europe, said the figures show Ireland is “ready to invest”, but that households are having to do so “with one hand tied behind their backs”.

ECB moved to rein in Revolut in Europe

“The ‘exchange-traded funds deemed disposal rule’, a high capital gains tax rate, and deposit accounts offering little to no returns are all relics of a previous era,” he said.

“Ireland lags behind when it comes to retail investment – we can see that clearly versus the rest of Europe – but our data shows that there is a strong appetite for investing among a broad demographic of consumers, which could be grown further with a simple, clear tax incentive.”

Ireland’s official Savings and Investment Account (SIA) has been a talking point in media and political circles for months now. Tánaiste and Minister for Finance Simon Harris first raised the idea in February. Irish savers could soon be ploughing billions of euro into a tax-efficient, State-backed vehicle that would better the paltry deposit rates offered by the main banks, he said.

Heneghan said Revolut “remains committed” to working with the Department of Finance to ensure the SIAs can be rolled out across its digital platform.

“The Minister is right to push for change,” he said. “If we look at investment ratios across Europe, it’s very clear that countries with tax-advantaged investment accounts are significantly outperforming their peers.

“To move the needle for Irish households, we would welcome the introduction of personal investment accounts and are actively engaging with the Department of Finance in its work to make this a reality.

“If well implemented, this would really make a difference to a broad range of people trying to build their investing habits – whether you’re starting out by investing €10 a week, €100 a month, or you’re ready to move some of your savings out of a low-yield bank deposit account.”

Neither Gibraltar nor Malta offer an insurance compensation scheme for policyholders caught short by the collapse of a firm in either jurisdiction.

And while UK customers of Enterprise are automatically covered by the country’s Financial Services Compensation Scheme, the issue over who initially carries the can in Ireland is still up in the air.

It will be October before the Supreme Court hears an appeal by the Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland, an industry-funded body that deals with claims against uninsured drivers, against rulings by lower courts that it pick up the bill as €90 million of Setanta claims remain in limbo.

Meanwhile, the Government’s pledge last week to act on recommendations of a report that motor claims arising from the liquidation of an insurer should be met by the Insurance Compensation Fund, with the MIBI contributing 35 per cent, remains just that – a promise. It will still need to be legislated for.

Claims

Typically a compensation scheme steps in immediately to deal with claims. It, in turn, seeks to recover as much as it can from a defunct insurer’s liquidator. The clients of Enterprise and Setanta have no such luxury.

When Central Bank governor Philip Lane addressed a room full of European insurance executives on a junket to Dublin in May, saying that Europe needs more co-ordination on protection schemes for customers in the event of a firm failing, nobody knew that we would have a “mini-Setanta” within two months. But here we are.

Yet in a market where a company can set up in a 2.6 square mile jurisdiction at the top of Europe and “passport” insurance services unimpeded all over the EU, it’s high time that regulators got together to make sure that customers across the union also enjoyed similar protections.

Zenith Insurance, which is understood to have built up to a 5 per cent stake in the Irish motor insurance market, moved two months ago to stop writing motor insurance through one of four Irish underwriting agencies through which it had been carrying out business.

Industry sources said on Tuesday that Zenith, thought to have developed an Irish business with up to €50 million in premiums by offering among the most competitive rates in a troubled market, has decided to withdraw more capacity in this country.

Gary Humphreys, group underwriting director for the UK-based Markerstudy Group, which owns Zenith, said: “We continually monitor performance and rates in all areas of our business and respond accordingly. We are not completely withdrawing from the Irish market.”

Underwriting agencies operate between brokers and insurance companies, which ultimately take the risk for policies. Markerstudy declined to comment further.

Difficulty in Irish market

The development, say sources, comes after the

Central Bank

in Dublin pressed home the difficulties in the Irish market earlier this year to regulators in

Gibraltar

, home to 11 out of 24 foreign insurers operating in the Irish motor market. Injury claims have surged in recent years, forcing Irish-regulated companies to bolster their reserves by tens of millions of euros, while motor rates are up by 70 per cent since July 2013.

Less than five weeks ago, another Gibraltar-based company, Enterprise Insurance, collapsed and declared itself “hopelessly insolvent”, sparking uncertainty about how 255 Irish claims on its books, with an estimated cost of €6.2 million, will be met.

The latest move by Zenith, owned by a strong parent in Markerstudy, is a proactive and strategic one in light of the state of the Irish market and the company will continue to carry out some business here, say sources. All existing Zenith policies will be honoured.

The problem for Irish customers of Enterprise Insurance following its collapse is that Gibraltar does not have an insurance compensation fund and Ireland’s regime is in a legal quagmire. The Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland, an industry body that deals with claims against uninsured drivers, is appealing High Court and Court of Appeals rulings that it foot the €90 million bill from the collapse of Malta-based Setanta Insurance in 2014.

It was initially expected that the State-run Insurance Compensation Fund would cover up to 65 per cent of Setanta’s outstanding claims, up to a limit of €825,000 per case.

Zenith stopped writing business in June through ARB Underwriting, an insurance underwriting agency in Dublin. ARB said at the time that Zenith cited Ireland’s difficult market, courts system and unhappiness with how the industry had been left with the cost of Setanta’s collapse as the main reasons.

Executives from the other three Irish agencies that Zenith uses to arrange and administer insurance business for it – Footprint Underwriting, Bump Insurance and Prestige Underwriting Services – did not respond to attempts to contact them on Tuesday.