There have been penalties for those who looked the other way when Epstein was convicted of child sex offences and decided to maintain relationships with the financier — but not for the British ambassador to Washington, reveals SOLOMON HUGHES
The housing crisis that threatens to finally destroy the Irish language
A government disinterested in making serious economic and social interventions for native speakers of the Irish language, coupled with a neoliberal housing policy, is killing off Ireland’s last Gaelic strongholds, writes MORGAN DE MOINBHIOL
Activists with the Banu campaign protest the lack of action for housing in the Gaeltacht, a major factor in erasing the heartlands of native Gaelic-speaking communities. Holiday homes, short-term rentals and Airbnb are now a major threat to the 2,500-year-old language
Labour’s new Treasury unit will ‘challenge unnecessary regulation’ by forcing nominally independent bodies like Ofwat to bend to business demands — exactly what Iain Anderson’s corporate clients wanted, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
DR DYLAN MURPHY looks at a Big Brother Watch report which exposes the government as an enabler of DWP secret spying on benefit claimants
The EU faces a critical choice: will it remain in the shadow of an increasingly unreliable US ally, or will it forge its own path in a multilateral world where co-operation with China is essential, asks MARC VANDEPITTE as leaders meet for the EU-China Summit
A lot of discussion about how the left should currently organise – including debate on whether the Green Party is a useful vehicle for advance – runs the risk of refusing to engage with or learn from the reasons the left was defeated previously, argues KEVIN OVENDEN
For Egypt trade trumps the Israeli genocide of the Palestinians, but how long can the country’s ‘misleaders’ – and others in the region – continue their indifference against the popular will of their own people, asks ROGER McKENZIE
WITH the release of the Irish-language biopic Kneecap, the nomination of Irish-language films at recent Oscars and more and more Irish celebrities using Irish, you’d be forgiven for thinking the Irish language was in an assured and popular place.
However, the material conditions of Ireland’s 20,000 daily speakers inside its designated language districts, the Gaeltacht, starkly contrast with a language in vogue. These sharply defined conditions felt by its native speakers (especially the youth) reaffirm the urgent point laid out in the Kneecap film’s final message: a minority language dies every 40 days on this planet.
After centuries of colonial subjection and 100 years of independence in 26 of its counties, Ireland’s once nationwide majority language is now reduced to scattered regions along its most westerly coasts.
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