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Gerard Howlin

Gerard Howlin

Irish Examiner

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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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