John Holmes

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Pat Dawson of Cork-based Dawson Travel was one of the first to get involved in the business after being asked to source tickets for Old Trafford by a bank’s social club. File photograph: Clive Mason/Getty Images
Football fan survey: Irish champions of attending Premier League matches

Irish players may find it harder to get a look-in at the wealthiest English clubs these days, but supporters from this country still top the Premier L(...)

Police surround Drumcree Church as hundreds of Protestant Orange Order members fill the hillside on July 10th, 1996. The Orange Order were protesting over the refusal of police to allow the order to march through a predominantly Catholic area. Photograph: Crispin Rodwell/ Reuters
British state papers: Orange march to Drumcree ‘a disaster’

The disastrous effect of a decision to permit an Orange march through the nationalist Garvaghy Road to Drumcree Parish Church in Portadown in July 199(...)

Former British prime minister Tony Blair and former taoiseach Bertie Ahern signing the Belfast Agreement. Photograph: Reuters
The inside story of how the Belfast Agreement was struck

When British prime minister Tony Blair left Downing Street in early April 1998 and headed for Belfast to take charge of the Northern Ireland peace tal(...)

Ulster Unionist Party leader David Trimble and Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams pass within touching distance of each other outside Castle Buildings, Stormont during a break in the negotiations before the signing of the Belfast Agreement on April 10th, 1998. File photograph: PA
Twists and turns of vexed Belfast Agreement Talks revealed

How rarely we get a chance to “feel the hand of history upon our shoulder” in the life of a country. In a confidential memo authored by John Holmes,(...)

Posters in Dublin during the 2002 abortion referendum campaign. File photograph: David Sleator
Breda O’Brien: Referendum Commission reform is vital to democracy

It is very odd that the Citizens’ Assembly discussion of referendums has been moved to this weekend, given that it will allegedly have no impact on th(...)