Sorry to hear that pal.
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My sympathies to yourself and especially your folks. Once upon a time they were youngsters in love and having the craic, scooping without a care in the world at this very time of the year. Growing old blows.
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Sorry to hear that RIP
No good time of the year but this time is particularly tough
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Sorry for your loss pal.May she RIP
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Sorry to read of your loss. May she rest in peace.
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Sorry for your loss @Batigol
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The matching Christmas pyjama family photos on social media can fuck right off.
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Cuntishness on a grand scale.
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A good few lads that should know better
Stooks
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Imstant coffee is absolute swill. Cant believe these people actually drink this stuff.
Christmas is only a few days old and Tesco already have Valentines stuff out ffs. Mops, hoovers and sweeping brushes everywhere on display. Very wrong.
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Dont be doxxing yourself
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On the whole, female commentators. There’s someone on the Leeds game who is talking absolute mundane dross through her nose. Have to turn over to another channel she is so annoying.
Trevor Francis with an more annoying voice.
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This will be the Joey Bartoning of Roy Keane
Don’t get me wrong, some of the men are beyond annoying. It’s like Marty and co, you think there have to be better out there. But ursla* is another example. When they brought a new wave of ladies on board, surely they could do better.
Test match special, you have Isa Gupta who is perceptive, measured, intelligent and a lovely listen, and then some moronic blonde wan presenting who thinks she’s funny and can barely read off a clipboard.
Exactly, look at the darts Emma is beautiful and knows whats shes talking about.
Is Trevor Francis not dead?
224k exit payment
7.5k on his retirement party
39k to attend a business school year before he retired
The former chairman of the Office of Public Works who signed off on the contentious Leinster House bike shed received a €224,000 exit payment when he retired.
An examination of the OPW’s annual accounts shows Maurice Buckley, who stepped down from his role in April 2024, got the payment in addition to €75,513 in salary for the first three months of the year, bringing his total remuneration for the first quarter to €299,686.
Maurice Buckley was at the helm of the OPW when the Leinster House bicycle shelter was approved
ORLA MURRAY/ COALESCE
The Sunday Times has previously revealed that Buckley expensed trips to Paris for an executive training programme less than a year before he left public service, and then had a retirement party that cost €7,455.
John Conlon, current OPW chairman, faced questions on Buckley’s expenses at the public accounts committee. He confirmedthat Buckley’s contract entitled him to the severance sum.
“It was the norm under the contract he was employed under, which were the top-level account committee terms and conditions,” Conlon said. The committee recommends candidates to ministers and government for the most senior positions in the civil service — at assistant secretary level and upwards.
Under its terms, there is an exit payment scheme for secretaries-general on seven-year contracts. It is a recognition of the fact that, after seven years, they may be required to leave. Officials aged over 60 are not eligible for the payment. Only two others in the OPW received severance payments, but at a much smaller scale.
Conlon stressed that he would not be entitled to such a payment when his term was complete. “Unfortunately, I am too old,” he said.
John Conlon, the current OPW chairman, has faced questions about Maurice Buckley’s expenses
BRIAN LAWLESS/PA
John Brady, chairman of the public accounts committee, referred to the payout as “an extraordinary sum”. He also questioned Conlon about the retirement party at Dublin Castle, which was attended by about 150 people.
The OPW originally paid for the event in April 2024. A week after the freedom of information request was lodged in October, seven months after the party, Buckley offered to pay €6,353 of the overall cost.
Conlon said he would have preferred Buckley covered the full total: “In retrospect, maybe he should have.”
Brady challenged the state’s payment of €39,000 for Buckley to attend Insead, the prestigious business school in Paris, in the final year before his retirement.
“What benefits could the OPW accrue from a senior person like him going on a course like this?” he said.
Conlon said there were benefits for senior executives to take these courses who plan on staying within the civil service after their retirement. “That is all I am saying on that,” he added.
Buckley led the OPW when it agreed to spend €336,000 on a bicycle shed at Leinster House, which Simon Harris, the taoiseach at the time, said was “inexcusable and inexplicable”.
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Is that what the government has to pay to get the top private sector performers to impart their knowledge to the public sector ?
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