McGuinness got €800k EU expenses to use her own office

The story below is from The Irish Times of yesterday. The article is written by Arthur Beesley. On face value this is a shocking story and it’s this behaviour that turns people away from traditional politics and makes them supporters of either the far right or far left.

Then there’s the salary, the pension and all the freebies. And no doubt Ms McGuinness is no exception; all paid for by the tax payer.

If this story is correct, surely Fine Gael could not think of electing Ms McGuinness as their candidate for the upcoming presidential election.

Let them eat cake.

Prospective Fine Gael presidential candidate Mairead McGuinness claimed hundreds of thousands of euro in MEP expenses for office rent and other costs when using family property in Co Meath as her constituency office.

Ms McGuinness’s expenses claims were within European Parliament rules. But they are seen by some in Fine Gael circles as a potential point of discomfort in the autumn presidential election campaign because of the prospect of questions being raised.

In her 16 years as an MEP, she is estimated to have received more than €800,000 in unvouched “general allowance” payments to cover “office rent and management costs” and expenses for phones, computers and other political representation costs.

During most of that period, Ms McGuinness located her constituency office in a building adjacent to her family home at Mentrim near Navan. Land Registry records show she and her husband, Tom Duff, own the office property.

“The Mentrim constituency office enabled her to serve the constituency, and have an easily accessible office for the regular and out of normal office hours’ work she engaged in every week as an MEP,” said a spokesman.

“The office was advertised to the public as her constituency office. Her financial details as an MEP were published on her website and regularly updated, including those in relation to her constituency office.”

Although the presidential election must be held within 60 days of Michael D Higgins leaving office on November 11th, prospective candidates across the political spectrum have been slow to come forward.

However, Ms McGuinness is widely expected to seek Fine Gael’s candidacy when the party opens nominations on Monday. She has long been considered one of the most likely contenders and has never ruled herself out.

A former journalist, she made her mark in European politics as a member of the parliament’s agriculture and rural development committee.

She became first vice-president of the parliament in 2017 but left in 2020 to become Ireland’s EU commissioner in succession to Phil Hogan after the “Golfgate” affair. Her term as commissioner for financial services ended last year.

According to the European Parliament, the general allowance “is not paid automatically”. MEPs must request payment.

“Members are free to request all or part of the amount of the allowance, and/or to reimburse amounts that have not been used,” the parliament’s rules state.

The monthly payment was set at €3,700 when Ms McGuinness was first elected an MEP in 2004 and had risen to €4,950 when she left in October 2020.

Her website is no longer online, but partial records remain on archived web pages. She is estimated to have received €222,000 in the 2004-2009 parliamentary term, €255,762 in the 2009-2014 term, €261,192 in the 2014-2019 and €79,200 in 2019-2020.

There was no comment from Ms McGuinness on these figures after they were put to her.

Comment on recent statements made by Mr Michael Kelly

This blog began in June 2007. Like everything in life it has changed over the years, maybe even grown up and today looks at reality through different lenses that it did back in 2007.

At the side of the blog the following appears:

Readership

This blog is read around the world, on all five continents. 

The blog was launched in June 2007. 

It attempts at getting past staid, predictable comments and opinions, especially on church issues. 

Hopefully it is funny, provocative, skittish, sometimes a little irreverent but never rude or insulting, always watching out for all sorts of humbug, especially of the clerical kind. 

Maybe a counter balance to pious piffle and holy humbug.

__________________

The blog is often critical of organisations and institutions, and makes no apologies for such comment. It remarks on ideas expressed by individuals but it never intends to be snide or make nasty comments about people. Indeed, if it has done that, then it profusely apologises.

In early June, Catholic commentator, Michael Kelly wrote the following on his X account: "A friend just told me there is some fella[sic] who keeps a blog commenting on my social media posts is[sic] a sneery kinda[sic] way. What a curious way to live your life - some people really do need to take up a hobby. Oddly flattering to live rent-free in his head! 😊"

At the time no comment was made, it was felt best to ignore such an impoverished and sad comment. Obviously it was directed at this blog.

Yesterday the comment below, again from Michael Kelly, appeared on his X account: "Sean 'Diddy' Combs, Conor McGregor, D.J. Carey and Bro. Kevin Crowley - four very different men in the news this evening. I know which one we should follow and encourage our young men to emulate."

Surely such a sentiment has little in common with the Christian message. One is reminded of Pope Francis’  words that the church should be like a field hospital.

Again, it must be stressed this is not a personal attack on Mr Kelly but it is an opinion criticising his comments made in the public forum.

If this blog has ever offended or insulted Mr Kelly, it takes this opportunity to apologise to him.

This blog wishes Mr Kelly every good fortune and success in his work.

Channel 4 gives a glimpse of McGregor followers

Channel 4 News last evening carried a special report on Conor McGregor.

One of his supporters said that she had no confidence or trust in politicians. The journalist asked her did she know her local politicians; no, she did not know who they were, know their names or anything about their politics. 

Mr McGregor was not available for comment.

United workers have nothing to lose but their chains

This week’s column in The Kerryman newspaper.

Michael Commane

The Lauren Sanchez Jeff Bezos wedding has been in the news. Neither of them is in the flush of their youth, it happens to all of us. Lauren is 55 and Bezos is 61. It is reported that they spent €48 million on the three-day splash. 

The next time you have an Amazon package delivered to your door you might ask yourself do I really need this or could I have bought it elsewhere, where the profit margin might be less.

What’s going on in the world? Was it always as crass, vulgar and mad as this? Then again if royal families have accumulated such wealth over generations why can’t commoners? It baffles me how we tolerate such inequality to exist.

Is raw capitalism good for society? How can we say yes to that if there are one billion people starving in the world?

Is the dollar bill all about greed and trying to make a fortune? At least in most countries in Europe there is an attempt to control runaway capitalism.

No matter how much we criticise our health service in Ireland, medical treatment is available to all, irrespective of how much money one has.

A cousin of mine was on a cycling holiday with her husband in France in late June and on the last day of their cycling she broke a bone in her leg. With her European Health Insurance Card (EHIC, formerly known as E111) she received all her medical treatment without having to put her hand in her pocket. 

An EU agreement allows all EU citizens free medical treatment in any of the 27 countries they visit. If you are travelling anywhere in the EU in the coming months make sure to apply for your EHIC, which is available online or at any local health office.

Yes, we pay for it in our taxes and that’s the way it should be.

That’s just one example of the many great benefits afforded us by being a member state of the European Union. A couple I know who are planning a trip to Canada and the US have just discovered that he cannot get private travel health insurance as a result of his medical history. 

Not too long ago he had a minor stroke and has one or two other less serious health issues. He lives a normal life for a man in his 70s, plays golf and travels around Ireland with no difficulties whatsoever. Why can’t he obtain travel health insurance? 

The answer is simple; insurance companies consider him too high a risk, in other words insuring him would reduce their profits. It’s as simple and grubby as that. Indeed, why should there be age premiums on health insurance? Is that not ageism? It clearly is. 

Why do we accept such rules?

Whatever about the merits of capitalism, it must be curbed to serve the people. There is no sense to a €48 million wedding splash; it adds nothing to the good of humanity. Looking around a world filled with suffering and pain there is something toxic about the Sánchez Bezos wedding.

I’m not a communist but Karl Marx’s words have always held a special place for me: ‘Workers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains!’ 

Three interesting European dates in the 1990s

Three interesting dates:

On this day, July 1, 1990 The German Democratic Republic accepts the Deutsche Mark as its currency; later that year on October 3, German reunification was completed.

The following year, July 1, 1991 the Warsaw Pact was dissolved at a signing ceremony in the Polish capital. 

Closer to home: on July 1, 1999 the Scottish Parliament was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II.

Trump's bombs aid Iranian dictatorship

One result of the US bombing in Iran is to unite the Iranian people.

There is an excellent history of the Iran Israel conflict in the Weekend section of Saturday edition of The Irish Times.

The piece is written by Dr Vincent Duran, who lectures in Middle East politics in the UCD school of politics and international relations.

How the West has created such chaos and turmoil in the region, and all to do with power, control and money.

The Irish Times does not know who our taoiseach is

Wrong tánaiste and misspelt

This caption appeared in
The Irish Times on Friday.

Might it be that the real tánaiste knows a sub editor in the news desk who’s working on his campaign? 

Note the newspaper’s misspelling of the word tánaiste. This from the paper of record.

It’s also worth noting how poor the newspaper’s digital customer service system is.

And all from the paper of record.

No more wars if women ruled the world? Give me a break

Justine McCarthy in The Irish Times yesterday. The writer of this blog may not agree with all of what she says but it is an interesting piece and well worth a read.

If women ruled the world, there would be no wars. True or false? False, if all the women were Ursula von der Leyen. Because a hawk in sheep’s clothing is still a hawk.

The president of the European Commission was the most petite participant at the G7 summit in Canada last week but she landed with the force of a grenade packed with testosterone. “I spoke to prime minister Netanyahu today,” she announced after Israel had bombed Iran in an unprovoked attack. “I reiterated Europe’s commitment to peace and stability in the Middle East. In this context, Israel has the right to defend itself.”

That same day, Israeli air strikes and gunfire killed dozens of starving Gazans, including at least 17 people seeking food from the grotesquely named Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the honeypot for daily massacres of visibly emaciated civilians by the Israel Defense Forces.

What the f***, in the parlance of the president of the United States of America, is the European Union’s chief executive doing, phoning a fugitive from the International Criminal Court to egg him on with his killing crusades? Who gave her the authority to adopt the G7 statement of “support for the security of Israel”, a statement which, by the way, three permanent members of the UN Security Council also signed up to. “Iran is the principal source of regional instability and terror,” they claimed.

Neutrality policy

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. Ireland, one of the 27 countries that employ von der Leyen, is currently unhitching its neutrality policy from the UN mandate because the Security Council has persistently obstructed peace initiatives. Ireland is also proposing to outlaw trade with illegal Israeli settlements, something the EU has failed to do despite an explicit requirement by the International Court of Justice that UN countries must not support the settlements in the Occupied Territories.

This is not the first time von der Leyen has given the EU’s blessing to Binyamin Netanyahu’s massacring of innocents. The day after Hamas’s murderous incursion into Israel in October 2023 left 1,195 people dead and nearly 250 abducted, she ordered that the Israeli flag be projected on to the commission’s head office in Brussels. Then, as the Israeli government announced it was stopping supplies of food, water and electricity to Gaza, she flew to Tel Aviv to assure Netanyahu he could “count on” the EU’s support in waging war on Gaza. Josep Borrell, the bloc’s high representative for foreign affairs at the time, clarified that she was not entitled to decide EU foreign policy. As a German citizen, von der Leyen may be well motivated by her country’s history to ensure the protection of Jewish people, but it does not justify siding with a genocidal regime.

Spain and Ireland’s request in February 2024 for an urgent review of the EU-Israel trade agreement does not appear to gone anywhere significant.

The woman who was Germany’s minister for defence for six years and was tipped to lead Nato before her appointment as president for a second term seems coated in Teflon-strength immunity. Nothing sticks. Even when the UN Special Rapporteur on Palestine, Francesca Albanese, accused her of complicity in Israel’s war crimes, EU leaders failed to censure her. If they need evidence, here are some facts to start with:

Israel has slaughtered more than 56,000 people in Gaza since October 2023;

Israel has attacked Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Qatar and Iran this year;

Israeli soldiers and settlers killed 938 Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem between October 7th, 2023 and the end of last month;

Israel is the only country in the Middle East with nuclear weapons;

Israel has fired in the direction of Unifil soldiers, including Irish – ergo EU – peacekeepers in Lebanon;

Israel has fired in the direction of EU officials and diplomats in the West Bank.

Mark Twain described an uneasy conscience as “a hair in the mouth”. In her acceptance speech when she was conferred with an honorary doctorate by Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in 2022, von der Leyen said the Holocaust was “an indelible stain” on her country’s conscience and it must never be forgotten. No rational person would argue otherwise. The Nazis’ systematic extermination of Jews in Europe spread its stain beyond Germany’s borders and the world must be forever vigilant in countering anti-Semitism, but not at the price of Islamophobia. The hair in the mouth turns the heart to stone when a guilty conscience can condone thousands upon thousands of children being strafed with gunfire, blown apart by air strikes, starved to death and dying of thirst.

Human rights conditions

A new EU report has stated there is evidence that Israel has violated human rights conditions agreed in its trade deal with Europe. News so stale it is an affront to the people of Gaza. About 26,000 more have been killed there in the 16 months since von der Leyen dismissed the request from Dublin and Madrid. This week, the EU’s foreign ministers decided to postpone any decision about the trade deal until they next meet on July 15th, by which time – judging by the current daily death toll – hundreds more people will have perished. Surely Fianna Fáil MEPs who voted against von der Leyen’s reappointment as president last year are kicking up a stink with their Fine Gael government partners who are in the same EU alliance as her and who backed her nomination. It is noteworthy that more than 90 per cent of the alliance’s party leaders are men.

The creation of an EU army is central to von der Leyen’s vision for Europe. Heaven forbid that it should happen on her watch. For she is living proof of the foolishness of the hypothesis that there would be no wars if women ruled the world. See also Margaret Thatcher, darling of the Tory fraternity, who sentenced 320 people to death on board the Belgrano. 

As long as the patriarchy keeps choosing the women, the world will not be in safer hands. The question that will always need to be asked is which women?

Where Biden failed Mamdani might succeed

It’s a year ago today since that car crash debate between President Joe Biden and Donald Trump, where Biden had his senior moment. Shame on him and the Democrat Party for attempting to hold on to power, whatever the cost.

On Wednesday the Democrats chose Zohran Mamdani as their candidate for the upcoming mayoral race in New York. He’s a charismatic candidate of the left. The Trump team are already attacking him.

Hope springs eternal.

Trump is proving that might is right

Watching Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte joking with US President Donald Trump over his use of bad language was stomach-turning. 

Is this really where we are?

Every day Trump is proving to the world that might is right. And people are doffing their hats to this man.

To think that the US president is supported by many Catholic bishops is difficult to grasp.

If a pupil/student used the f-word in school it would be rightly be considered an disciplinary issue, the US president uses it and the Nato secretary general makes a joke of his using it; pathetic behaviour by a sycophant. So much for Nato.

It’s jungle warfare commuting in Dublin’s rush-hour

This week’s column in The Kerryman newspaper.

Michael Commane

It’s my third week in a new job in Dublin. From door to door it’s a nine-kilometre journey across the city.

In good weather I cycle, when it’s raining public transport. I’m accustomed to cycling in urban and rural terrain but it is a number of years now since I have commuted through Dublin rush-hour traffic. 

It’s a fabulous sensation to be back out there with the travelling public heading to and from work, indeed, there’s a sense of camaraderie about it. I often find myself knocking at the cab window of a bus and chatting with the driver; I tell them I’m a bit of a bus nerd, so regularly we talk about the new electric or hybrid buses. 

I’m told that since Dublin Bus installed cameras on its fleet the number of insurance claims has plummeted.

Cycling through Dublin early on a Sunday morning has been a mind-blowing experience; the amount of litter on the streets is beyond belief; the filth and dirt strewn across the streets and footpaths is honestly astonishing. And all this has been done by people out ‘enjoying’ themselves the previous night.  

Every Sunday morning council workers are on the streets cleaning it all up. I make it my business to say hello and thank them for the job of work they are doing. Sometimes we get chatting; on Sunday on Camden Street, which was in a filthy state, the council workman said: ‘I can assure you it’s just as bad over on Leeson Street, the posh side of the city’. I thanked him for his job of work as I pedalled off; he gave me a big smile and was appreciative of my gesture.

When it comes to road and footpath safety it is honestly jungle warfare. It is almost impossible to describe how bad things have got since the last time I was cycling in rush-hour traffic in Dublin. Cyclists, pedestrians, motorists, all have their fair share of clowns on the roads. Where are the traffic police who are meant to be policing our roads? 

I cannot understand how there are not more serious accidents on our roads every day. It is mind-boggling the number of cyclists who break traffic lights. 

I’ve heard and seen jay-walking but every day now I am observing the phenomenon of jay-cycling. Pedestrians crossing the road engrossed on their phones and if you say a word to them you get a stream of foul language thrown at you.

I’ve learned how dangerous it is to say a word to misbehaving motorist. I’ve seen road rage first hand.

Top of the list of road abusers have to be Deliveroo, Uber, Just Eat and all the others fast food deliverers. Their behaviour must be stopped. The companies for whom they work need to be held to account for what’s happening on our streets.

And then the electric bicycles that travel at speeds well in excess of the legal 25km/h; why are the gardaí allowing all this to happen? And please, don’t mention the electric scooters. 

Do we have to wait for some cataclysmic disaster and a multi- million euro inquiry before something is done. We deserve better than this.

Full marks to our bus drivers for the extraordinary work they do.

Merz promises to make Bundeswehr strongest in Europe

 Below is a link to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz's address to the German Parliament this afternoon.

It is a powerful speech in which he promises to make the Bundeswehr (German Army) the strongest conventional army in Europe. He has strong words to say on Russian President Vladimir Putin, stressing that the only language he understands is one of brutal force.

The link is in German, it’s possible to turn on the subtitles and no doubt, someway or other it’s possible to hear the speech in translation.

https://www.youtube.com/live/ohAOsD6J34A?feature=shared

Moscow is still in the news

On this day 80 years ago, June  24, 1945 the Soviet Union celebrated its victory over Germany with a victory parade in Moscow.

Yesterday the Iranian foreign minister visited Moscow to discuss the US bombing in Iran. Vladimir Putin has promised to offer assistance to Iran.

Why can’t world leaders listen to their people and to history?

No faraway conflict when human dignity is at stake

From the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops:

Hours after the United States bombed the sites of three nuclear-enrichment facilities in Iran, Pope Leo XIV called the situation in the Middle East "alarming" and said diplomacy was the only responsible way forward.

"Every member of the international community has a moral responsibility: Stop the tragedy of war before it becomes an irreparable abyss," the pope said June 22 after reciting the Angelus prayer with thousands of people in St. Peter's Square.

In Washington late June 21, President Donald Trump announced that "the U.S. military carried out massive precision strikes on the three key nuclear facilities in the Iranian regime: Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan."

"Our objective," Trump said, "was the destruction of Iran's nuclear enrichment capacity and a stop to the nuclear threat posed by the world's number one state sponsor of terror."

"Tonight I can report to the world that the strikes were a spectacular military success," Trump said, adding that the facilities had been "completely and totally obliterated." The U.S. president also threatened that if Iran did not "make peace" then "future attacks would be far greater and a lot easier."

The U.S. bombings came 10 days after Israel began carrying out attacks on Iran's nuclear facilities and its military infrastructure, leading Iran to retaliate by firing missiles at Israel. Officials have reported that the strikes have killed at least 400 people in Iran and 24 people in Israel. 

Addressing the crowds in St. Peter's Square, Pope Leo said people all over the world were praying and crying for peace.

"It is a cry that calls for responsibility and reason and must not be drowned out by the din of weapons," Pope Leo said. "There is no faraway conflict when human dignity is at stake."

In addition, the pope said, with the "dramatic scenario" of the bombing of Iran, "the daily suffering of people, especially in Gaza and other territories, risks falling into oblivion" as the attention of the world turns elsewhere.

"War does not solve problems, but rather it amplifies them and produces deep wounds in the history of people that take generations to heal," he said. "No armed victory can compensate for the pain of mothers, the fear of children, the stolen future."

"Let diplomacy silence the weapons," Pope Leo said. "Let nations chart their future with works of peace, not with violence and bloody conflicts!"
 

Donald Trump does not understand how money works

 “Despite being obsessed with money, Donald Trump doesn’t really understand it”

-David McWilliams in The Irish Times yesterday.

The same old story over and over again

The same old story over and over again. What was it in 2003? Remember Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and  what a clever name the US and Britain gave them; they’d frighten any sensible person. But of course there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, oddly enough they happen to be in the hands of others, including the US and UK.

But for the illegal and immoral behaviour of the British and the United States in the 1950s it is most likely that Iran would now have a stable democratic government. The UK and US made sure that the oil would not be nationalised by an incoming democratic government.

And now the US and the UK try to convince the world they are the guardians of moral propriety.

Liar liar on the wall

Canadian academic Yoshua Bengio, one of the godfathers of artificial intelligence, has attacked the multi-billion race to develop the technology, saying the latest models are displaying dangerous characteristics, such as lying to others.

Former German head spy new ambassador to the Holy See

 It’s often said that the Holy See/Vatican has the best secret service in the world; it has a network of priests who span the world.

Yesterday the German government appointed Bruno Kohl, the current head of the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) the German Federal Intelligence Service, as its next ambassador to the Holy See.

Kahl is a lawyer by trade; he also studied journalism at the Catholic Journalism school in Munich.

Difficult not to spot the irony in the appointment.

Make sure to check carefully all your service bills

This week’s column in The Kerryman newspaper.

Michael Commane

Regular readers of this column may remember I wrote some weeks back about my travails with Lidl; the issue is now solved. I received a gift card for €30, which means they gave me an extra €10 on top of the price of the new hiking boots. Originally when I exchanged them I was told my bank account would be credited. That did not happen. 

But really it is a case of one step forward, two steps back.

More trouble and annoyance; this time with my AA membership and with The Irish Times. Again, I found myself wasting valuable time and getting annoyed and frustrated. I find it hilarious when a recorded voice assures you that one of their agents will be with you shortly when you know there are only two or three agents at the call centre. 

And then we are being told that modern technology is making everything work so seamlessly, humbug. 

Some time back I spotted my AA monthly sub had jumped from €26.97 to €40.09. I phoned and what a wait I had before I was ‘privileged’ to speak with a human voice. 

I explained that I was shocked to see how my sub had jumped by 33 per cent. I told the agent I was closing my membership account. She asked me had I read the email they had sent me. No I hadn’t, as they bombard me with emails. She asked me to hold while she’d make some enquiries; more waiting time on the phone. She returns to tell me that they would bring my monthly sub back to the old price of €26.97. 

Imagine, had I not been vigilant in checking my bank statement I would have been left paying the higher price. And to think by one phone call the AA was willing to reduce my monthly sub by 33 per cent; that is outlandish. It means an annual saving for me of €157.44.

Talking to a friend on Saturday she told me her monthly bill with Virgin Media is €140. That’s for her television, landline and broadband.  The woman is not great for checking details on her accounts. Obviously she is paying for services of which she is not availing.

The following day I discovered my access to the online version of The Irish Times had been closed. 

The Saturday newspaper was delivered to my door but it seems the digital edition is not available to me; that means more phone calls, more waiting to speak to a human voice.

There is urgent need for an up-to-speed, smart regulatory agency that ensures people are being properly and clearly informed how much they are paying for the services they require. 

My friend with Virgin Media may well have an extra tv socket somewhere in the house, for which she is paying, but is not even aware that it is there.

With the disappearance of paper bills it is so tempting not to log on and check for what exactly we are paying. Are companies aware of this phenomenon and take advantage of it?

Far too many people are intimidated by the antics of multi nationals and large companies.

Just think what’s in store for us when AI is up and running.