A specific

identity.

Yeah, and actually, not to go over to the US, but I will go over to the US, Chuck Schumer did an interview with the New York Times in recent days, and obviously he was involved in selecting a lot of the Democratic candidates, both to get through the primaries and then to fight in the midterm elections.

And the point he made was, he wasn't happy with a few of them, like El-Sayed being one of them in Michigan.

He would have preferred less of a progressive candidate.

But once they got through the primaries, the Democratic Party rode in behind them, but also made sure that they were on the same page on three core items.

And that was the three Cs, corruption, cost...

that wears the crown, isn't

I

think this is why the Irish government will be stressing the importance of getting that budget across the line before this term ends at the end of December.

a because they've put a lot of effort into it and as you know Gavin there are a lot of people who have been diverted in the civil servants in especially the Department of Foreign Affairs but in every single government department into working on the EU presidency and from talking to members in government now they're kind of patience is wearing a little bit thin in some instances because the regular day-to-day mundane work of running the country is sometimes playing second fiddle to what's happening at EU level, obviously for very important reasons, but they do feel like the resources now are under pressure when it comes to the national politics.

and national policy and all of that.

So I think it will be important.

What the government has said as well in recent days is it has seen that some countries believe that the budget that the Irish side came up with doesn't go far enough.

Others believe it goes too far.

How much pressure will there be on Ireland to do a little bit more, to put more money in and almost to overcompensate for the fact that we can't give Ukraine weapons?

Taoiseach will buckle to unions in public sector pay, says Michael O'Leary.

Yeah, and this is a story, as you said already, in the headlines that is covered across the newspapers.

But I think the Sunday Business Post, just for the unique way in which they've covered the public sector pay talks and the dispute of this week, I think is the most interesting.

It's an interview with Michael O'Leary.

And look, he's always quite eye-catching in what he says, but I think many of your listeners might actually agree with him this time.

They might not go as far in their language, but he's basically saying that because of the strikes, the fuel protests that we had back in March and April, that unions now anticipate that the government...

If they, you know, do something slightly radical like we had last week, a strike before even pay negotiations were entered into and that the government will, in Michael O'Leary's words, buckle and roll over and that he, Michael O'Leary, expects that the Taoiseach will find the extra money.

on Geoffrey Donaldson's conviction and sentencing is extraordinary.

But would you accept that, the point that Shea is making, that progress is being made, but it's just simply too slow here?

It is too slow.

And this is not a campaign.

While the campaign is relatively new and has gained traction in recent months, this is something that's been going on for years.

And I remember there was a really powerful interview with the former Green Party leader, Eamon Rhinebeck, I think it was in 2024, with Brendan Osborne, O'Connor, where he spoke about his own family situation, his son Tommy, who's now in his mid-twenties, and the fear and anxiety that both Eamon and his wife have around them getting ill, them getting sick, them ageing, because Tommy relies on them and he will rely on them forever.

until they die because there aren't the appropriate state-backed housing and long-term care facilities.

But I think parents in this situation, they have, we've discussed it, they have that real anxiety and fear, but they also have a guilt, a guilt in relation to their other children.

If they're not, I'll come back to that, if they're not happening at that pace, what needs to happen to bring about those reforms on time?

The crucial element in this is, and Shay, that makes complete sense.

It's like if you have an employee, you're a business owner, you have an employee who is not doing their job correctly and you're not happy with them.

But certainly the indication that we've got so far in the last 24 hours is... what you do with that employees you'd wait till the day before pay and you'd say actually i don't like the way you worked for the past month so i'm going to only give you 80 of your salary this month and it comes to as a complete shock to that employee because they've been going along all month thinking they've been doing a great job so you know if you're asking for reforms you have to consult and you like i look at i'm sure there's plenty of fois have gone on in in the past 24 hours by journalists looking to see whether there has been consultation between the minister, the department and RTE in recent months.

And if these concerns were relayed around reforms and being slow, as the minister said yesterday, because if they weren't, I think it's a really unfair thing to do.

And we've heard from Susan Kirby there about those small industries, those companies that rely on RTE.

And I think a lot of the general public, when they see RT or hear RT, they think it's this multi-million euro monolith that just sucks up public funds.

This minister has form in this regard.

The public sector and the private sector might be there together.

I think this will be an interesting, for all the political nerds like myself listening in, it'll be an interesting side show next Wednesday in Leinster House because there was a meeting of the Business Committee today which sets the schedule for the following week and they were unable to set that schedule because you had members of the opposition saying, like members of our panel, saying that they will not turn up at the Dáil, they will not be crossing the picket line.

And the chief whip, Mary Butler, was adamant that the Dáil would sit next week.

So you had this stalemate.

I think there was advice sought on whether a derogation could be got from the unions for workers in Leinster House to allow the Dáil even sit.

Because my understanding back in 2009 when this last happened is They actually got members of the army in to man the doors and entrances.

Can you

uniform, army uniform.

If they're not, I'll come back to that, if they're not happening at that pace, what needs to happen to bring about those reforms on time?

The crucial element in this is, and Shay, that makes complete sense.

It's like if you have an employee, you're a business owner, you have an employee who is not doing their job correctly and you're not happy with them.

But certainly the indication that we've got so far in the last 24 hours is... what you do with that employees you'd wait till the day before pay and you'd say actually i don't like the way you worked for the past month so i'm going to only give you 80 of your salary this month and it comes to as a complete shock to that employee because they've been going along all month thinking they've been doing a great job so you know if you're asking for reforms you have to consult and you like i look at i'm sure there's plenty of fois have gone on in in the past 24 hours by journalists looking to see whether there has been consultation between the minister, the department and RTE in recent months.

And if these concerns were relayed around reforms and being slow, as the minister said yesterday, because if they weren't, I think it's a really unfair thing to do.

And we've heard from Susan Kirby there about those small industries, those companies that rely on RTE.

And I think a lot of the general public, when they see RT or hear RT, they think it's this multi-million euro monolith that just sucks up public funds.

This minister has form in this regard.

And Elaine, this addiction, as it appears to be, I mean, experts in this area, they're flagging concerns around the seriousness of it and the nature of this online bidding.

Yes, I spoke to Professor Colin McGarra, who's obviously an expert in gambling and has been dealing with the issue of problem gambling for many, many years now, over two decades.

And he did say that this system of bidding does mimic that gambling product that is so addictive for people that it taps into the kind of cognitive effects of gambling.

And it ratchets up, I suppose, the pressure on people, like we've said before.

And that creates a scenario that people find themselves bidding and spending more than they ordinarily would.

He also says that it's not just this product, but he said that gambling and the traits of gambling can be seen everywhere.

across sectors now and that companies are using that to lure people in, especially the kind of the phenomenon of, you know, you almost get the big purchase similar to a slot machine.

Just tell us about that.

How did the coalition arrive at that figure?

Yes, well, this begins, obviously, with the summer economic statement back at the start of the summer and has been developed over the summer to give the parameters for this budget.

Now, one thing I think to be cognizant of, or perhaps keep an eye out for, In previous years, as the budget drew nearer, previous finance ministers were able to find a bit more money down the back of the sofa, to use that term, through extra revenue from the likes of corporation taxes.

And we do know that both corporation taxes, VAT and income tax is running ahead of what was forecast.

So whether or not ministers Simon Harris and Jack Chambers decide to extend the budget envelope or the budget parameters in the final few days remains to be seen.

But it still will be very, very tight this year.

We know that ministers have been warned that they have to first find cost savings within their department's before they'll be entertained when it comes to expanding the path they're given or being provided money for new measures.

How will that fit into, let's say, social protection? An increase in the main weekly rates is mooted, but how much do we know?

Elaine, I suppose, first of all, just on a technical issue, why is it necessary to recall the Dáil in order to delay these hikes?

Yeah, well, there was a resolution passed by the Dáil earlier this summer to row back on these cuts that were made.

We got 27 cent on petrol, 32 cent on diesel.

The government had hoped that all of the turmoil that's happening across the world, mainly, I suppose, in the Straits of Hormuz and Iran, would be done and dusted over the summer.

Trump would have gone back to dealing with whatever he deals with in the White House and that the fuel prices would have increased.

gone back down to a reasonable level.

That obviously hasn't happened.

Yet when something like this comes along between the vested interests and the general attitude towards making sure they look after the heart of the electorate, suddenly the money can be magic there and we're told it doesn't even affect the budget.

Good morning.

Yeah, and I think school times and school hours, you can have one opinion on it if you're a teacher and a very different opinion on it if you're perhaps a parent that's, as you said, dropping off and collecting children at different times.

But yeah, the Department of Education, it hasn't quite begun this review yet.

It is going to begin a review of a circular that... basically stipulates the hours that schools must operate throughout the year and then the school day itself the likes of breaks and as you said already that hour early that the junior and classes get out um ahead of the rest of the school so all of that will be looked at it's based on a circular at the moment that was issued to schools in 1995 and so it's a good while it's 31 years ago.

Yeah, since we've looked at basically everything, as I said, how schools operate, five hours, 40 minutes, that's primary schools have to operate at the moment.

And the amount of days, it's 183 days the primary schools are required to remain open.

And another thing it deals with, and you didn't mention it there, is the level of holidays.

there.

Am I right that at the beginning of this government, Micheál Martin de Tiszaig made a point saying that one focus he wanted to have was on child poverty? And by any stretch, this is central, I'd suggest, to child poverty.

Yeah, and the Child Poverty Unit wants to significantly reduce child poverty.

Now, there are a number of ways of doing that.

Obviously, housing is just one aspect.

You have education, you have supports, you have the measures I think the government would point to, like the free schools meals.

They all do help to reduce and alleviate poverty.

sustained poverty amongst families.

To an extent that there's definitely a conflict of interest there, to put it that way, that's largely down to the development of the economic model we have.

And to a certain extent,

you know, put the onus on parents to stop, if we continue on with that, to stop the under-16s getting their hand on the poutine, which the under-16s will always do if they really want to.

And it does seem to be that the tech companies are the ones that are just led away with it.

We're asking kids to give up their smartphones and we're asking parents to make sure that they give up their smartphones and there's no onus on the actual media companies who are producing this.

And Gav, I know you mentioned there that, you know, what about the 45-year-olds who are taken in by whatever ideology it is? That's opinion making and opinion shifting.

I think there's a vast difference in... kids being exposed to violence, to pornography and to all other dangerous content at a very young age.

We have to really, while both are bad, you can say there is a very, there's a big difference between what kids can be exposed to at too young of an age

But does he think, Elaine, therefore, that he's going to be able to manage to wrangle Ireland back into America's orbit by kind of speaking unkindly and by being a diplomat who says unkind things in a series of national newspapers?

But all that taken into account, it was a pretty bad showing under her leadership, this by-election to do with him.

It certainly was, and she was asked, you know, in the days both before the count and immediately after the count, about her future as leader, and she was adamant that she is not for moving, that, uh, you know, party members voted her in at the most recent Ard Fheis, that she has a mandate from members to remain on as the head of the party, Uachtarán Sinn Féin, and she will be doing that.

But you're right, you know, for the leader of the, the main opposition party not to be able to win either a by-election is significant, and I suppose, ultimately, y- you'd imagine people are raising questions within that party.

There doesn't seem to be any squabbling at the moment, but sometimes it can be hard to get into the inner workings and the inner mind of, uh, Sinn Féin members.

They're perhaps not as talkative as, uh, particularly Fianna Fáil.

Uh, they don't air their grievances [laughs] as much with the media as perhaps, uh, Micheál Martin's party.

So, it can be hard to, to discern how significant, uh, an issue might be within the party.

I suppose we're all used to talking about it, Elaine, but just in terms of some listeners who may not be completely across it, what exactly is it, and why is there going to be such hassle over it?