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CATHERINE MARTIN’S EXPERTS

Date: November 30, 2023 -

THE CLOSING date for applications to join the expert advisory committee of Culture Ireland (CI) has now passed, although it is unclear just how many people will be given the nod by arts minister Catherine Martin. Culture Ireland is one of the channels used for government-allocated funding in the arts and culture sector and is… Read more »

TAX TREATS

Date: November 30, 2023 -

A PERUSAL of the list of beneficiaries of the Section 481 tax credit in the first nine months of 2023 reveals that 82 productions cashed in, with several recipients receiving the tax break for multiple productions. Larry Bass’s Shinawil was greenlighted for two productions in the €1m-€2 range, Clean Sweep and Maryland, and two in… Read more »

WEXFORD WOES

Date: November 30, 2023 -

A STANDARD Wexford meeting in November wouldn’t seem like a candidate for too much drama but there was plenty on show between the Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board starter Paddy Graffin and the Shark Hanlon-trained Eikonix. The horse was due to contest a low-grade handicap hurdle, having refused to take part on his previous run at… Read more »

ELLIOTT’S ENTRIES

Date: November 30, 2023 -

GORDON ELLIOTT claims he is addicted to training winners and he pulled out all the stops when targeting the €100,000 Troytown Chase at his local Navan Racecourse, fielding 14 of the 20 runners. Elliott’s blunderbuss tactics paid dividends as he trained four of the top six finishers but, not surprisingly, there were sour grapes among… Read more »

LOUISE ENGLISH’S NEW ADDRESS

Date: November 30, 2023 -

WITH A hefty €12m price tag, Louise English and Colm Duggan are offloading their D4 pile and, while they have a substantial mews adjacent to the main house, the high-powered couple now also claim an address in the Algarve. They have both maintained high profiles in the business community with ex-PWC number cruncher English managing… Read more »

MALIN CORP IN NEED OF A MIRACLE CURE

Date: November 30, 2023 -

IT IS hard to understand exactly what is going on inside Malin Corp, the hotchpotch pharmaceutical investment holding company that Kelly Martin set up eight years ago before bailing two years later. What is clear is that Malin is in trouble as the value of its assets has plummeted, with a cash cushion looking like… Read more »

CAIRN HOMES’S MONTROSE BONANZA SECURES SHARE PRICE

Date: November 30, 2023 -

IT IS now over five years since Cairn Homes lashed out a huge €107.5m for RTÉ’s 8.64 acre site in Montrose, south Co Dublin. Paying such a chunky premium for an admittedly well-located site, but without planning permission, was always going to represent a gamble but it looks to have finally paid off and the… Read more »

MICHAEL WOODLOCK’S TAX BILL

Date: November 30, 2023 -

GOLDHAWK’S OLD pal, Michael ‘Flancare’ Woodlock, finds himself in a spot of bother with the dreaded taxman, although this will hardly come as a surprise, given his own description of his relationship with the Revenue Commissioners. Meanwhile, negotiations are ongoing with Woodlock’s bankers. Woodlock’s run-in with the Revenue last month is his second setback this… Read more »

JOHN TEELING’S ENDEAVOUR

Date: November 30, 2023 -

GOLDHAWK spies a notice filed by Companies House in the UK advising that Endeavour Oil & Gas Ltd (EOG) is about to be struck off the register “unless cause is shown to the contrary”. It comes four days after the company filed its 2022 accounts last week. EOG, a subsidiary of John Teeling’s exploration vehicle,… Read more »

STUART MCGOLDRICK MOVES

Date: November 30, 2023 -

FAST-GROWING digital mental health group Spectrum has just filed some unhealthy-looking figures but it looks like boss Stuart McGoldrick moved to raise a bucketload of cash at just the right time. He has also moved from Drumcondra to a spectacular new pile in Co Kildare. Spectrum works with the likes of Laya Healthcare, providing mental… Read more »

FIANNA FÁIL BACKS ISRAEL

Date: November 15, 2023 -

THE HAND-WRINGING about divisions within EU states over the Israeli massacre of civilians in Gaza is one thing. But there has also been a clear division of perspective between the Taoiseach and Tánaiste, as well as between their respective parties, with contrasting statements about Israel’s… Read more »

DERMOT DESMOND’S CELTIC CROSS

Date: November 15, 2023 -

DERMOT DESMOND will be looking forward to the end of this year, as his control of Glasgow Celtic continues to deliver defeats both on and off the pitch. DD has long held sway at Celtic, where he is easily the biggest shareholder, although he prefers to keep as far behind the scenes as possible, hence… Read more »

LUCY IN THE SKY WITH ISRAELIS

Date: November 15, 2023 -

A FAVOURITE tactic of western militarist think tanks, PR firms and lobbyists is to present as centre ground moderates that oppose extremism of the left and right variety. Usually, these are western militarists in disguise whose overwhelming emphasis is on combatting Muslim ‘enemies of the… Read more »

PSNI: A NEW BROOM?

Date: November 15, 2023 -

A new chief constable for the PSNI has been appointed in double quick time. Jon Boutcher (58), former chief constable of Bedfordshire police 2015-19, was confirmed on November 8 after four weeks as acting chief constable when a calamitous series of mishaps forced the resignation of his predecessor. Boutcher is a vastly experienced police officer… Read more »

FOREIGN AGENTS THREAT TO GARDAÍ

Date: November 15, 2023 -

JUSTICE MINISTER Helen McEntee’s latest problem concerns that most powerful lobby, senior Garda officers worried about huge tax bills for anyone that fills the current vacancy as deputy commissioner. An anomaly in the taxation rules on pensions is the problem and various security correspondents have been mobilised by their ‘senior security sources’ to inform the… Read more »

EOGHAN HARRIS’S LONG WAR

Date: November 15, 2023 -

IRISH TIMES correspondent Ronan McGreevy celebrated the “bravura performance” of Eoghan Harris when the latter concluded last week’s conference on southern Protestants in Dublin’s Buswell’s Hotel. Eoghan Harris complained of Protestant failure to recognise their dire predicament. The former senator and Sunday Independent columnist urged the Prods present to inhabit his historical imagination. It was… Read more »

PIPPA O’CONNOR’S PLUG

Date: November 15, 2023 -

PIPPA O’CONNOR is expanding her empire with a new range of cosmetics and she must have been delighted with the drooling profile in the Sunday Times at the weekend that announced her latest move, Poco Beauty. Her former business partner will no doubt have read the 1,800-word plug. Readers were informed that Pippa was “radiantly… Read more »

JACQUELINE HALL’S CULTURAL CREDENTIALS

Date: November 15, 2023 -

SO IT’S welcome to the Irish Georgian Society (IGS) for Jacqueline Hall, public relations hot shot and daughter of former Fine Gael matriarch Nuala Fennell (who was herself a significant shareholder in the PR company now controlled by Jacqueline). Well known in Blueshirt circles, Hall also appears to be an aspiring culture vulture. The holding… Read more »

SISTERS CASHING IN

Date: November 15, 2023 -

AS USUAL, it was rather late in the day (and following a couple of queries by Goldhawk) when Désirée Finnegan’s Screen Ireland (SI) eventually got around to publishing its funding decisions made for the second quarter of this year. The total funding for the three months topped €14m and plenty of familiar female faces feature…. Read more »

BONOBO BOYS’ APPEALING BEHAVIOUR

Date: November 15, 2023 -

A LARGE apartment scheme proposed for Smithfield by Durkan Residential has been shot down by An Bord Pleanála (ABP), overturning the decision of Dublin City Council (DCC). Among the appellants were the owners of Bonobo, the uber-trendy Smithfield bar, Shane Clifford, Hugh O’Farrell and Declan Murphy, the latter of whom is best known as the… Read more »

COOLMORE’S CASH MACHINE

Date: November 15, 2023 -

AT THIS time of year, all the stallion farms announce their covering fees for the upcoming breeding season, which begins in February, and it is easy to see why developing stallions, while an extremely risky and expensive endeavour, is still the best way to make the really big money, as can be seen with Coolmore’s… Read more »

ANNUAL 2023

Date: November 15, 2023 -

NEALE RICHMOND’S FORUM

Date: November 15, 2023 -

WHILE THERE wouldn’t be oodles of interest in a worthy sounding body such as the Enterprise Digital Advisory Forum (EDAF), the imminent appointment of a new squad of techie types by junior minister Neale Richmond does have some popcorn value. In May last year then junior minister for enterprise, trade and employment Robert Troy (who… Read more »

MARTIN MOVES EARLY

Date: November 15, 2023 -

CONGRATULATIONS ARE in order for arts and culture minister Catherine Martin, who recently advertised for would-be board members for the National Gallery of Ireland (NGI) before the terms of the current directors expire. This is certainly not her usual style. She may also have provided a clue about the next chair. As fans of The… Read more »

NAZI REGALIA

Date: November 15, 2023 -

SHOCKED AND perplexed observers of National Party leader Justin Barrett turning up to an anti-immigrant protest last week dressed in an SS overcoat may be interested to learn the reasons for his apparel. In October Barrett appeared on a live X ‘spaces’ discussion, where the ongoing saga of the conflict within his party was raked… Read more »

THE COUNTER-RESTORATION

Date: November 15, 2023 -

DESPITE THE very best efforts of the European agri-industrial lobby and its allies on the political right, the EU’s Nature Restoration Law (NRL) remains on track to come into legal effect after intensive negotiations involving the EU Parliament, Commission and Council of Ministers. While heavily watered down versus its science-based original targets, the NRL still… Read more »

FACIAL ‘APARTHEID’?

Date: November 15, 2023 -

In June justice minister Helen McEntee backed off a confrontation with her Green Party colleagues in Government when she agreed to remove aspects related to facial recognition technology (FRT) from the Garda Síochána (Recording Devices) Bill 2022. What she was effectively doing, though, was kicking the proverbial can down the road. The whole area of… Read more »

THE HOT WATER BRIGADE

Date: November 15, 2023 -

Maybe it’s something to do with the turn of the millennium, or the Great Crash, but at some powerful level, it is simply wrong to state that it is 50 years since 1973. Declan Lynch, Sunday Independent Life Magazine By demanding Israel’s diplomatic ostracisation from Ireland, [Martin] McGuinness’s Sinn Féin heirs have abandoned the former… Read more »

CORMAC LUCEY’S HOT AIR

Date: November 15, 2023 -

Climate denial comes in all guises but Goldhawk was surprised to see it appear on the website of the august Chartered Accountants Ireland. There, accountant, TCD lecturer and Sunday Times columnist Cormac Lucey dismissed the “public hysteria” etc around the climate emergency. To support his, ahem, arguments, he cited notorious climate sceptic and game theory… Read more »

BOOKS EDITOR’S ‘CLASSIC’ BOOK

Date: November 15, 2023 -

A NEW literary genius would appear to have been discovered and is working away, almost unknown and unrecognised, in the Irish media, judging by an especially favourable review in the Irish Times last month of Dirty Linen: the Troubles in My Home Place. Headlined “An important, humane book that will prove to be a classic”,… Read more »

REVIEWING PAUL MURRAY

Date: November 15, 2023 -

ON NOVEMBER 26 assorted scribblers will find out if they have landed the literary sales steroid that is the Booker Prize. Two Irish novelists are in the mix – Paul Murray (The Bee Sting) and Paul Lynch (Prophet Song). While the latter is listed as 5/2 favourite, Murray’s effort has attracted a few bob to… Read more »

BRIPPA’S PROPERTY

Date: November 15, 2023 -

ELSEWHERE (see p16) Goldhawk takes a look at the latest business move by Pippa O’Connor, who launched her Poco Beauty range this month. This seems to be completely separate from the rest of the business group controlled by O’Connor and hubby Brian Ormond. The couple have incorporated a new company, Ronnocob Ltd, for the move… Read more »

DAVID BARNIVILLE’S LIST

Date: November 15, 2023 -

WITH THE deadline having now passed for applications for the €230,000-a-year job as chair of An Bord Pleanála (ABP), minister Darragh O’Brien will be anxious to get a permanent player installed. Certainly, the incoming head honcho – who will replace current interim chair, legal eagle Peter Mullan – will have plenty on his or her… Read more »

EXPENSIVE TRIP FOR HARRINGTON

Date: November 15, 2023 -

THERE WAS plenty of Irish interest at the Breeders’ Cup in Santa Anita, California, and while most of it centred around Aidan O’Brien and the impressive win of Auguste Rodin in the $4m Breeders’ Cup Turf race, there was also plenty of chat about a few horses that didn’t even make it to the starting… Read more »

STREWTH!

Date: November 15, 2023 -

THERE WERE some long faces in the parade ring from team Mullins after Vauban trailed home in 14th place in the Melbourne Cup under Ryan Moore. Confidence was high before the race that the horse would give Willie Mullins a first victory in the €5m race and everything seemed to go to plan in the… Read more »

COLIN KEANE’S EDGE

Date: November 15, 2023 -

THERE WEREN’T too many surprises among the names at the top of the tables in the leading flat categories as the season wound to a close in November. Colin Keane added a fifth champion jockey title to his CV and, given he has yet to turn 30, he could yet match or exceed Mick Kinane’s… Read more »