The Finance Minister, Brian Lenihan, has spelt out plans to make a further €3 billion in cuts at the next Budget. €500 million of these cuts are to come from public sector "reform" and if the unions don’t agree, he will impose further pay cuts.

Taxi Regulator must put a halt to issuing new taxi licenses and implement an independent review of the Taxi industry.

"The obscene notion of people being forced to work, particularly in physically or mentally stressful jobs, until the age of 68 before they can retire is an obscenity. Mary Hanafin complains that we are living too long. Well there is no better way to shorten the lives of building workers, teachers and so on than prolonging their working lives" – Joe Higgins MEP.

It seems that open season has been declared in the Green Party, open season to grab and lust for office and privilege.

Following on from John Recto joining his striking Green Isle colleagues Jim Wyse and John Guinan on hunger strike a settlement was reached between the strikers and the company overnight.

A demonstration of 700 family, friends and trade union officials and activists took place in Naas on 27 February in support of the 13 striking TEEU members at Green Isle foods in Naas Co. Kildare.

The government and the employers are intensifying their assault on wages and working conditions. Following the same blueprint that they used to attack public sector pay last year, of vilifying anyone with a semblance of job security, the already measly minimum wage is now in their line of fire.

The Assembly Executive is to carry out cuts amounting to £113 million from the health service this year. This decision, collectively agreed by the parties in the Executive, as part of the Draft Expenditure Plans 2010/11, is a direct attack on health services which will have a major impact on thousands of patients.

I was always told that if I got a degree, I’d have no trouble finding a well-paid full-time job. I finished college in May, and haven’t been able to find a job, though I have been working part-time in the same pub I’ve been working in since I was sixteen.

Ann Orr writes about the increasing problem of mortgage defaults : In December 26,271 mortgage holders were behind in their mortgage re-payments due to the dramatic increase in unemployment. And Michael Murphy writes about the government's plans for another bank bailout.