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Gerard Howlin

Gerard Howlin

Irish Examiner

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Verona Murphy getting the Ceann Comhairle job was a sign of Michael Lowry’s political savvy

20.12.2024 9

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

It’s a measure of the importance of Independents that a lot hinges on Verona Murphy’s next move

The general election distilled significant power into the hands of a few Independent TDs. There are about seven at the time of writing likely to take...

06.12.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

The false election promises being made to Ireland’s under-40s

Backloading liability on to people under 40 is the theme of this election. Unhoused, under-pensioned, and liable for more dependents as demographics...

22.11.2024 30

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

With 2024 set to be the hottest year ever, why have plans for climate spending been put on hold?

With impeccable timing, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil timed out the Green Party last Monday night. The party leaders would not agree to allow Minister...

08.11.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Sinn Féin is on the back foot but that does not mean the Government parties are over the line

Foregone conclusions about the general election are premature. Sinn Féin may be in the doghouse politically, but the election will end up being about...

25.10.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Simon Harris is making Micheál Martin look like the status quo. This is a problem for Fianna Fáil

Simon Harris is not running for tánaiste. That should not be news, but it hasn’t sunk in with Fianna Fáil. Success would be Fianna Fáil and Fine...

11.10.2024 20

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Whatever happens in the election the outcome will be the same: a coalition of imprudence

The next election offers little choice between the three larger parties and several smaller ones. Sinn Féin’s alternative budget is distinctive,...

27.09.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Ireland is doing the equivalent of using its credit card to pay for groceries

The hubris of the noughties is back with a bang. We have lost the run of ourselves and forgotten what a paltry sum the €13 billion coming from Apple...

13.09.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Taoiseach plans all-powerful Department of Infrastructure. What could go wrong?

The question now is whether we should establish a new Department of Infrastructure. The Taoiseach says it will be a Fine Gael manifesto pledge. It is...

30.08.2024 40

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Big problems cannot be magicked away by the Taoiseach’s emphatic statements

Simon Harris is the first populist leader of Fine Gael, and the Taoiseach who has ended analogue politics. As a politician he has an astonishing...

16.08.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

The Sinn Féin surge is over and its fightback has hardly begun

If the Government is planning a general election in autumn, it is now in its last 100 days. We’ve been here before. Enda Kenny was ready to go to...

02.08.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Gerard Howlin: If Sinn Féin recovers, it could yet claim higher ground on housing

If the Government is planning a general election in autumn, it is now in its last 100 days. We’ve been here before. Enda Kenny was ready to go to...

02.08.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Inheritance tax is a modest payback for a massive benefit

Sewing pockets into shrouds is one part of the campaign to cut inheritance tax. Another is to establish squatter’s rights over the promise of tax...

19.07.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Who is Jack Chambers? Nobody knows but we’re about to find out

Who is Jack Chambers? The answer is nobody knows. That’s a political analysis, not a personal comment. His CV is known but not much of what he...

05.07.2024 20

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

The question is not whether we decarbonise - it’s whether we do it quickly or get left behind

Brexit, Covid and the Green Party are the forces that shaped this Government. Two were reactive responses to outside events, but were well done. In a...

21.06.2024 30

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

We are distracted by personalities, but what’s really at stake in this year of elections is policy

Today’s elections are the starting line for change. The results, whatever they are, will reset politics here, and a new European Parliament triggers...

07.06.2024 9

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Ask Ukraine about the value of Irish ‘solidarity’: it is €38.80 per week

Amid unspeakable tragedy, first in Israel on October 7th and subsequently in Gaza, a humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding. At home, on university...

24.05.2024 40

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Limerick’s mayoral election will either be an embarrassing novelty or a brave new world

Ireland is now a state of disbelief, assaulted by algorithms sent from dark places. Thirty four per cent of us believe “a small, secret group of...

10.05.2024 40

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

We now know which hospitals are overspending and which are delivering. Let’s fund them accordingly

If only I knew then what I know now. On St Brigid’s Day 2023, I spent 24 hours in the Emergency Department of Wexford General Hospital with an...

26.04.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Next election will herald an age of Independents

Fine Gael reshuffled this week under a new leader, and the Fianna Fáil ardfheis begins on Friday night. The political centre is still above water but...

12.04.2024 30

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

The idea this Government has another year is constitutionally correct but politically preposterous

There was a national tizzy nine days ago when Leo Varadkar resigned as leader of Fine Gael. Four days later Simon Harris succeeded him. On April 9th...

29.03.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

What counts now for flailing Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil is which wins the race for the disgruntled centre

The lasting effects of the lost referendums are limited. There may be squalls at parliamentary party meetings next week, but the people have moved on....

15.03.2024 5

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

The world is burning, but Sinn Féin is focusing on the local elections

It beats Banagher, but the passing of the Nature Restoration Law by the European Parliament on Tuesday was overshadowed by the RTÉ soap opera. In a...

01.03.2024 20

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

The children’s hospital project has been both meticulously planned and overly rushed

The paradox at the heart of the delayed and increasingly expensive national children’s hospital is that it was a rushed job with a sloppy start. It...

16.02.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

It’s official: The national mood is lightening. The black clouds are turning grey

The certainty of misery is over. The feel-bad factor that dominated since the advent of Covid is receding and has been for some time. Covid built on...

02.02.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

The concerns and prejudice boiling over in small towns mark the end of an era for Ireland

We are in a different world in 2024. The political context has changed, but the bigger issue is that so has our culture. The riot in Dublin on...

19.01.2024 30

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

The young are caught in a grotesquely unfair trap

We are embarking on the most radical change in the provision of pensions and welfare since David Lloyd George introduced old age pensions at age 70 in...

05.01.2024 10

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

There is a grim Irish tradition of arson, from burning big houses to burning refugee centres

There is a lazy pessimism taking over the public conversation. It believes that a political fracture over migration is inevitable. Something has...

22.12.2023 30

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

Many attracted to Sinn Féin’s paramilitary past now veering far-right

Two opinion polls in a row had Sinn Féin down three points. It is too soon to say if that is a deeper trend and too soon to encompass fallout from...

08.12.2023 20

The Irish Times

Gerard Howlin

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