The Irish Times yesterday carried a supplement, which was a special report on Corporate Finance.
There is no caption with the major graphic on the leading page.
Anyone who has been at the Berlin memorial to the Holocaust will immediately be reminded of the memorial maze.
Is such a graphic on the page somewhat insensitive?
Maybe it was the intention.
Uber has warned that EU proposals to designate gig workers as de facto employees will force its ride-hailing service to shut down in hundreds of cities in bloc and raise prices by as much as 40 per cent.
Maybe it should shut down. It is absurd that Uber treats its workers as self employed.
A statue of late German Cardinal Franz Hengsbach has been removed from outside the cathedral in Essen after allegations of sexual abuse against him surfaced
A memorial for victims of sexual abuse will be created to take the place of the statue, which was erected in 2011.
The controversy around the statue began when the German dioceses of Essen and Paderborn announced that they had started investigations into at least three sexual abuse allegations brought against Hengsbach.
Two allegations date back to the 1950s and 1960s. The first case alleges that Hengsbach abused a 16-year-old girl in 1954 while he was still an auxiliary bishop in Paderborn. The second case dates back to 1967 when he allegedly assaulted another woman during his time in Essen when he was already a bishop.
The latest allegations were made by a third victim in October 2022.
Hengsbach founded the Diocese of Essen in 1958, where he was bishop until his death in 1991 at the age 80.
From the late 1970s there were strong objections to Hengsbach and the manner in which he ran his diocese. Many younger German Dominicans spoke out strongly and bravely against the man and accused him of behaving as a tyrant. He imposed an atmosphere of terror and fear among his priests and across the diocese.
Yesterday the bishop of Limburg and chairman of the German Bishops’ Conference, Georg Bätzing stressed that everything must be put of the table and no longer one word of cover up must be tolerated.
This week’s Mediahuis Irish regional newspapers’ column.
Michael Commane
Supervet also known as Bionic Vet, Professor Noel Fitzpatrick has written a new book for children. It’s called ‘Super Pets and Me’. To coincide with the publication of the book he was interviewed on the Brendan O’Connor show.
He began by explaining that he was sitting in his consulting room in Surrey with his two cats on his knee.
It was great radio and I suggest you listen to it. It’s on the RTÉ Radio Player. The interview was aired on Saturday, September 16.
The County Laois vet has become well known in the UK through his popular Bionic Vet on BBC and his Supervet series on Channel 4.
Right through the interview he kept stressing how important it is for us to show empathy towards animals and how we need to give them the same care that we give to other family members.
It set me thinking about the relationship between animals and us humans.
That same day that I was listening to Noel’s interview I saw on a later news programme dogs being used to assist rescue workers searching for people in Derna after the horrific flooding catastrophe in the Libyan city.
Dogs are proving a great help in nursing homes and schools. Horse riding is beneficial for autistic children.
We underestimate animals at our peril but the family pet plays a very special role in our lives. I still remember my father saying that those who are kind to animals are also kind to humans.
It has been scientifically proven that stroking an animal can reduce our stress levels. Petting the family dog or cat can reduce our blood pressure by 10 per cent.
My dog Tess died two years. It means I’m not out walking every day before 7am and she’s not there to greet me in the evenings when I come home from work.
Right now it’s not possible for me to have a dog but as soon as my situation changes I’ll adopt a dog. I’m slow to use the word ‘own’.
Tiger is an elderly cat who lives a few doors down from me but spends some of his time in the house of a friend of mine. It’s through Tiger I have learned something about the world of cats.
He is super intelligent and as cute as a fox. Probably on a daily basis he calls over to my friend’s house. She feeds him and then he heads for his chair where he can spend hours sleeping. He has got to know me and allows me rub and play with him. These days any time I call to the house my first question to ask, is Tiger there. He makes me feel good and I actually enjoy his company.
He knows exactly the people with whom he can play and those he needs to avoid. It takes time to build up a relationship with an animal.
We are all aware of the horror stories from animal shelters where pets have been rescued from appalling cruelty and neglect. I never understand how people can be cruel to animals, then again, how do we mange to treat each other so badly.
Noel Fitzpatrick encourages us all to have empathy for animals and each other. Wise words.
An interesting piece on Vladimir Putin in Finland. He does not seem to be a great table tennis player.
Dublin City Council bought the historic Plough Pub, opposite the Abbey Theatre for €850,000 in 2017 and spent €80,000 on rodent infestation and other emergency work before selling it in 2021 to Equitas Properties, owned by Michael and Robert McCarthy for €550.000.
" I love Ryanair and I love the way they sometimes won’t let the facts get in the way of a good story.”
- DAA chief executive Kenny Jacobs, whose previous roles include chief marketing manager at Ryanair.
It’s funny but it is also desperately serious. If Mr Jackobs were today working for Ryanair he would of course say what he was told to say by Ryanair.
Are our lives decided for us by the salaries we earn?
The comment was made by Jacobs after Ryanair announced they were pulling 17 routes from Dublin in a row with the DAA.
The world is in a strange place. What happened outside Dáil Éireann on Wednesday is a microcosm of what’s happening all over the world.
Something too has been happening within the churches for many years.
The link below shows a supporter of US Bishop Joseph Strickland of Tyler in Texas speak about rumours of the Vatican planning to dismiss the bishop.
The tone of the man is worrying.
https://youtu.be/r7u5-J1VeqQ
Was Oscar Wilde looking into the future when he said this?
"By giving us the opinion of the uneducated, journalism keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community."
- Oscar Wilde
This clip makes for interesting viewing.
Piers Morgan interviews former MP, diplomat and walker Rory Stewart.
This week’s Mediahuis Irish regional newspapers’ column.
Micheal Commane
Due to illness I’ve been out of action for some weeks and most likely feeling sorry for myself. It meant I have been watching far too much television. It can’t be good for me.
The escape of Daniel Khalife from London’s Wandsworth prison caught my attention and I became fascinated with the story from the moment it became public knowledge on the Wednesday until he was captured the following Saturday morning.
He was on remand for allegedly placing a hoax bomb and spying for an enemy state. He escaped tying himself underneath a food delivery truck.
All of what I have learned in the media about the escape, the escapee, his alleged crimes and his capture have set me thinking.
Daniel Khalife is 21, still a very young man. He joined the British Army at 16. When I heard that I thought I had misheard, but no. Imagine one can join the British Army as a child. That an army would take recruits at 16 can’t be right. It’s 18 in Russia.
It has been reported that Daniel was the finest athlete in his school, holds the school record for the fastest 100 metres. A former school friend said about him that he was intelligent. I’m asking myself why he left school at such a young age.
I also heard an army colleague say that he loved playing practical jokes on people. He looks an extremely fit person, indeed he looks a charming young man.
With the surname Khalife obviously his family somewhere back along the line is not English. I have seen or read nothing about his family background.
I am well aware to plant a hoax bomb is a crime but he is still an innocent man until found guilty in a court of law, which means he is on remand in prison.
The media have said that the enemy state he was allegedly spying for is Iran. I keep asking myself would the Islamic Republic of Iran employ a 21-year-old, who left school at 16 to spy for them. Maybe they would.
He was captured the following Saturday morning cycling a bicycle along a canal towpath approximately 10 kilometres from Wandsworth prison, from where he had escaped. When I heard that I was greatly surprised. It all sounds mysterious to me.
Politicians and the media have been talking about problems in the prison service in Britain, yes, obviously there are. It sounds strange that a Category
A prisoner was in Wandsworth and that he was working in a ‘plush' kitchen job.
What I find mysterious about it all is that 75 hours after a most daring, ingenious, indeed simple method of letting himself out the main door of the prison he is caught cycling a bicycle.
If he were spying for Iran surely the Iranians would have been able to have got him to a safe house. Would they have left him on a bicycle 75 hours later within 10 kilometres from where he had escaped.
What do I know about the world of spy-craft? Why do I keep thinking there is more to this story than we have been told?
Yesterday’s Sunday Independent carries a three-page extract from Tony Holohan’s memoir We need to Talk, which will be published on Thursday.
Tony Holohan is the former chief medical officer in the State and we all know him for his public persona during the Covid crisis.
If you have thrown the newspaper in the bin and have not read his story, please go back to your bin, take out the paper and read it.
It is a wonderful read about his wife Emer, their two children Clodagh and Ronan and about him too.
It is the story of his wife’s cancer, the misdiagnosis, the long years of suffering and her eventual death.
How did this man do what he did during the pandemic and at the same time care for his wife and two young children?
This book is up there with Henry Marsh’s Do No Harm.
It’s a touching account, so honest, so readable. Thank you Tony Holohan.
Is it my imagination or what but I get the distinct impression the quality at Independent Newspapers has greatly improved under the stewardship of Mediahuis, who are now the owners of the group.
This makes for interesting viewing. Would you call Scott Galloway an alternative thinker?
Kenmare native Bernard Looney resigned as CEO of BP earlier this week. Below is the Guardian story. He spent his working life with BP, joining the company as a young engineer.
His earnings last year from BP were approximately €10 million.
He was a new style CEO, was also a much sought after motivational speaker.
On one occasion he told his listeners something his mother told him when he was a child.
He said he has never forgotten it. She told him that we were given two ears and one mouth and we should use them proportionally.
Good advice.
Irish packaging company Smurfit Kappa has merged with US WestRock. They are two of the world’s largest packaging companies.
The new global giant is worth approximately $20bn.
Smurfit Kappa CEO is Tony Smurfit. His grandfather came to Ireland from the UK and opened his first factory in Observatory Lane, Rathmines in 1938. The company made cardboard boxes.
In 1952 Smurfit moved the factory and its 150 workers to Clonskeagh on the Dodder.
Smurfit Paper Mills in Clonskeagh closed in February 2005 and it was the last paper mills in the country.
At the time the company said the decision was made as the mill had become "uncompetitive due to a number of key factors, including reduced market pricing, increased energy costs, higher environmental charges and changing market requirements for packaging paper grades”.
Some 56 per cent of people living in the United States of America are unable to cover an unexpected $1,000 bill with savings, according to a telephone survey of more than 1,000 adults.
In 2022 the United States spent $766 billion on national defence.
There are approximately 22 million millionaires in the the US.
BBC 2's flagship news programme, Newsnight discussed on Monday evening how whistleblowers are treated at some NHS Trust hospitals.
Two nurses, who reported wrongdoing and misbehaviour, were interviewed on the programme. It was spectacular television, as the two women gave a brilliant account of how they have been treated by their hospital bosses because of what they did. Both women pointed out that managers at all costs make it their business to protect the name of the organisation and the organisation itself. They also said that it appears to them that hospital general managers are answerable to no-one, whereas all other members of staff have line managers.
The nurses have no doubt that whistleblowing is rampant, not just in the medical profession but across society, with no exceptions.
Below is a link that makes for interesting reading. As this blog is written in Ireland it is not possible to download the link to last evening’s BBC programme. If you are reading this in the UK, it is highly recommended viewing last evening’s programme.
This week’s Mediahuis/INM Irish regional newspapers’ column.
Michael Commane
I’ve mentioned it many times in this column that I am a hospital chaplain, indeed, I’m in the job seven years. It’s been a life-changing experience. Every day I learn something new and I certainly hope that I do some good in the job.
But something happened a few weeks ago that has given me a whole new understanding or perspective about the job. It must be six or seven weeks ago now, indeed, further back that I began to get sick, had a pain in my back, felt nausea and was generally under the weather.
I had been on a quick weekend visit to Kerry to swim in the Atlantic and on the way home on the train, a journey that I usually enjoy, I felt sick. I just wanted to get home and go to bed.
I thought it would pass but it didn’t and eventually some weeks later I found myself in hospital, where I spent five days. I had a kidney infection. I’m due to have surgery the beginning of October and in the meantime I’m left walking about with a catheter inserted. Not pleasant. But, there’s nothing seriously wrong with me and all will be well.
Come late October, early November I hope to be back cycling, swimming and walking in the hills. But looking back now on the last few weeks, especially the time in hospital and the days following I have no problem mentioning I had moments of difficulty.
My imagination ran riot with me. I knew there was nothing sinister or malign with my illness but I felt uneasy and disorientated. I had been taken out of my daily routine. Life was uncomfortable. I simply wanted to bury my head in the pillow. I’m a worrier and panic very easily. My illness gave me the perfect opportunity to panic and worry all at the same time.
Without exception the staff who cared for me while in hospital were all wonderful people. But there was one young nurse and she really stood out and she was such fun as well. It turns out that she’s an accomplished violinist. But so humble and nothing was a problem for her.
I’m back at work this week and it has dawned on me, no matter how understanding or kind I am to a patient I really have little idea how they must be feeling, how they must be worried and nervous about their health.
What must it be like for people who discover they have serous or terminal illness? I’m forever mesmerised with the resilience of people. I’ve seldom if ever encountered a patient who is angry or hopeless about their condition.
With my own short spat with discomfiture I think I’ve had a tiny glimpse of what ill-health might be like. I know Irish Rail and Aer Lingus have simulators for training their drivers and pilots.
What better training or preparation could there be for a hospital chaplain than some sort of simulator. AI might be able to come up with a solution? There’s an idea now for those training hospital chaplains, indeed for all those involved in the health profession.
I’ve had a whole new insight how to approach my job. I hope it’ll make me a better chaplain. We can never have enough empathy for the other person.
There has been much talk in the last weeks about speeding on Irish roads. It is planned to change speed limits and to take other actions to reduce road accidents.
But there has been no mention on changing the penalty points system. At present you get three penalty points if you are breaking the speed limit irrespective of what speed you are travelling. Why not introduce a gradation system.
A driver travelling at 200 km/h on a 120 km/h road receives the same penalty points as a driver travelling at 130 km/h in a 120 km/h zone. That surely can’t make sense. And it would be so easy to change. Why is that not considered?
An interesting clip on Harold Wilson talking about the then Common Market. It is from 1975.
The Thinking Anew column in The Irish Times today.
Michael Commane
There is much discussion at present about the age of leaders. Joe Biden is 80, Mitch McConnell is 81. Donald Trump is 77, Vladimir Putin will be 71 next month, Pope Francis is 86 and our president is 82.
Isn’t it often said that wisdom comes with age? Don’t we all have to pause sometimes at the understanding shown to us by our parents, the patience they had to summon up to deal with our younger selves and our hare-brained ideas and actions? I wince when I recall some of things I said and did to my parents. A day never passes when I don’t think of their love and wisdom.
The playwright George Bernard Shaw gives us a little insight into the whole mystery of age, young and old, when he says that youth is wasted on the young.
Certainly the older I get, the more I realise that every single person is different, and it is well-nigh impossible to understand fully another person. One thing is sure, we can never get inside the head of another person, no matter how close we are to them.
And there is an extraordinary mystery about that. It is beyond fascinating. There is a temptation in all of us to think that we can second-guess another person.
Every individual is unique. So often we expect other people to think as we do. Life is far more nuanced and complicated than that.
In tomorrow’s Gospel (Matthew 18: 15 - 20) Jesus tells that lovely story about the importance of forgiveness. But in order for it to work we have to talk with our opponent, listen to what is said and then if that does not work get the community involved and try to work it out among ourselves. Listening is at the heart of it. So too is trying to understand the other person.
For such a process to work there can be no agendas, no predispositions. Jesus goes on to say: “Where two or three meet in my name, I shall be there with them.” And yes, that’s what one might call a leap of faith.
As Christians we believe there is a power, a spirit beyond us, an all-knowing God, who knows the inner thoughts of the other person.
We might like to deny it but isn’t so much about our world based on stereotype? We talk about individual thinking, personal freedom.
That’s all fine but only if it’s within our neat parameters. On the one hand we seem to extol individual freedom yet on the other hand there is that constant drive to get us all thinking in a similar vein. In many ways, isn’t that what fashion is about?
Someone who thinks outside the box is considered a maverick. Usually the person who disagrees with us is “wrong” or seen as difficult.
The Christian will say God, whose being, beauty, goodness, truth and love, set the standard to which we aspire . But even then, it’s far too easy to utter words about God that fail to match the reality we imperfectly understand.
When we get glimpses of love and truth, goodness and beauty, somehow, we are on the path to God, and to a better understanding of our fellow human beings. At times forgiveness appears a near impossible task.
In the second reading in tomorrow’s liturgy (Romans 13: 8 - 10) St Paul tells us love is the one thing that cannot hurt our neighbour.
Growing old is a process and so too is wisdom and belief in God. Neither youth nor age is the problem. Listening to each other helps to smooth the way.
Ageing is no guarantee of wisdom but we all know people of great age who communicate an extraordinary sense of wisdom and love. Think of the wisdom and love grandparents show their grandchildren.
The Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke (1875 - 1926) writes: “The kings of the world are old and feeble./They bring forth no heirs./Their sons are dying before they are men,/and their pale daughters/abandon themselves to the brokers of violence.”
Love transcends youth and age and my prayer is that I believe in God, an all-knowing God, an all-loving and merciful God, with whom I can have a real and living relationship.
According to British intelligence, Russian privates fighting in Ukraine are earning $2,091 a month. This works out at 2.7 times the average monthly salary in the Russian Federation.
Retired firearms police officer with the UK’s West Midlands Police, Rebecca Callum gave a sensational interview on Channel 4’s evening news yesterday.
Callum, a woman of colour, told a horrendous story of racism and misogyny. And how she has been treated as a whistleblower.
Later in the programme Tony Burnett, a retired officer with the force said he would be hesitant to dial 999 for assistance. He pointed out how the police investigate themselves and asked how can the police protect the public when they can’t protect their own staff. He also said that the police as an organisation is far too insular, something that Ms Callum also stressed.
She claims she felt ‘belittled' and ‘devalued' when working as a ballistics officer, where she was one of only seven women in a unit with 235 men.
Rebecca Callum is a brave woman and gives great hope to whistleblowers. She is currently suing the West Midlands Police.
British Education Secretary Gillian Keegan yesterday used an expletive and a vulgar word at the end of an interview when she thought she was off air but the microphone had been left switched on.
The clip was later aired minus the expletive. She subsequently apologised.
Such an apology is meaningless and indeed it helps make words meaningless. Had her mic been turned off would she have apologised? Not at all.
What’s even more annoying is to watch these Tory posh politicians with their fine accents for public use but in private using the language of the gutter.
What do they believe, for what do they stand? Everything and nothing.
This week’s Mediahuis/INM Irish regional newspapers’ column
When Paudie and David Clifford ran out on the park for the Munster final against Clare in the TUS Gaelic Grounds in Limerick at the beginning of May I was surprised. Their mother, who had just turned 60, had died the previous day.
Actually I’m ashamed of myself for thinking such thoughts. In The Irish Times of Saturday, August 26 David Clifford gave a heartrending interview to Malachy Clerkin where he spoke about his mother and how she was ‘football mad’.
He said that he, Paudie and his Dad had a chat and decided to play in the Munster final. He said: ‘And the main reason that we went and played was we knew Mom would have hated to think that she was the reason that we missed the game.’ He went on to speak in the most loving terms about his mother and the wonderful selfless woman she was. Beautiful words from a loving son. Ellen Clifford had been sick for some time.
I know little or nothing about football but I do know what it is to be a son. My mother died in 1988. She was 78, four years older than I am now. In her late 60s she was diagnosed with cancer of the throat. She underwent a laryngectomy and lived another 10 years.
In that time she was unable to talk, which was a terrible affliction for her as she was by nature a gifted talker, argumentative too. But she bore her disability heroically.
Maybe it’s black humour but there was a funny side to it. I learned more or less to lip read my mother but unfortunately Dad never managed and that greatly frustrated my mother. I still find scraps of papers in books with her hand written notes to my father. The pages of her old Oxford dictionary are filled with them. And they’ll be staying there.
Reading how David Clifford spoke about his mother set me thinking about my mother and the wonderful person she was. It might sound a corny cliche but aren’t our mothers extraordinary people. Of course there are exceptions but in the overwhelming majority of cases mothers are simply amazing.
My mother is dead 35 years and I can categorically say there is never day when I don’t think of her and indeed my father.
She always defended me. I must have been five or six, something happened in school and she was there defending me.
Again when I was 10 a teacher blackguarded me, slapping me far too many times. My mother was having none of it and she and my father took action.
But it was my mother, who was the driving force in making sure that something was done. And that was 1959.
I was lucky to have had my mother for 39 years and yet it was far too short. In so many ways our mothers are the guiding lights of our lives.
I still recall at parent teacher meetings how mothers would speak in such glowing terms of their children no matter what sort of classroom scoundrels they might have been. We need to bow our heads to nature every day of our lives.
Jimmy O’Grady, who died in March 2014 spent his working life on the railway. He was a gracious and wise man. Jimmy drove the last train out ...
