Student Politics: where careerism meets "deeply uncool"

In advance of the annual USI Congress, Red Wedge previewed proceedings with an article "What is to be done with the Union of Students in Ireland?" In this article, he offers an eyewitness an account of the event and some thoughts on the future of the student movement.

It’s the first night of the congress. There is a hustings debate taking place between the two candidates for the presidency of the organisation. UCCs Richard Maurice Roe and the Eastern Area Officer of the organisation John McGuirk are going head to head.

Related Links: SIPTU taking unfair dismissal case against USI | Thread On Conference on UCDSU.net | FUCC Thread On USI Elections | FUCC Congress "Blog" | Transparency and Accountability in UCDSU and The Failure of USI | USI Accuses Education Minister of Political Cowardice over Grants | Union of Students in Ireland back Coke Boycott At 2005 Congress |

On Monday in Dublin, a local history group organised a commemoration of the brave women who fought alongside the men in the fight against British rule and the establishment of the Free State.

The march was led by a colour party of women wearing the uniforms of Cumann na mBán and the Irish Citizens Army and photographs of many of the women were carried on the march. After being erased from the historical record for many years (literally in the case of Elizabeth O'Farrell) the women of the 1916 to 1923 period of Irish history are starting to be recognised once again for the important role they played in the struggle for Irish freedom.

The five area-based Community Development Projects in Limerick City have called for all-party support for John Fitzgerald’s recommendations for improving life for people in the city’s disadvantaged communities.

Volunteers and workers from the five Community Development Projects also want the Government – before the Dail dissolves in three weeks or so – to set up the proposed Regeneration Boards on a statutory basis. They held a press conference in Limerick city centre today to press home their message.

Ballumun tower block

"Hotel Ballymun" is "a unique short stay hotel" which is open to the public between 31st of March to the 27th of April 2007. It is located on the top floor of the Clarke Tower, one of the last remaining tower blocks in Ballymun, an impoverished suburb in North Dublin which has been extensively "regenerated" over the last few years.

The project was commissioned by Breaking Ground, the Ballymun Regeneration per cent for art scheme and it intends to "re-consider the utopian architecture of 1960’s Ballymun and encourage the practice of salvaging and re-imagining objects, spaces and resources from the past, which can be re-used inventively to meet contemporary needs."

However, the project is not without its critics. One indymedia contributor has launched a brutally frank attack on the project and similar artistic endeavours in the suburb, likening them to "showing an episode of "MTV Cribs" in deepest sub-saharan Africa - as if to say, here is what we have in our part of the world, you have none of this, we bet you'd like it but you're poor so fuck you."

New: an alternative view in photo story from hotel ballymun

Related Links: Hotel Ballymun Website | Affordable Housing in Ballymun: affordable for whom? | Out of site, Out of mind -Travellers in Ballymun | Open Forum meeting about Traveller accommodation in Ballymun | Ballymun Locals Take Action Against Privatisation | VIDEO: "mmm skyscraper i love you..." McDermott Tower comes crashing down in Ballymun | Residents protest in Ballymun | From Ballymun to Los Angeles - public housing residents meet at the Project Arts Theatre

Everything Must Go!

Concerns about the safety of Shell’s pipeline in Rossport are well known. But that’s not all that’s at stake. Not by 400 billion euro. The oil companies exploiting Ireland’s west coast have got some of the sweetest deals in the world and that doesn’t happen by accident.

This article looks at how the Irish state has been busy rolling over for the last thirty years so the multinationals can grab the riches that should belong to us all.

Related Links: ICTU head calls ponders nuclear power | Eirigi Natural Resources | SP on climate change | Rossport: a community resisting the multinationals | Peak oil and Energy Resources |