Opinion

After several decades as a military fort, and a much earlier history of being a monastic settlement, Spike Island was converted into a prison in 1847.

Employment law solicitor Richard Grogan of Richard Grogan & Associates writes on the competence of the Adjudication Officer to determine certain sums. In case ADJ10415, the Adjudication Officer (AO) admitted that it was beyond the legal competence of the AO to determine the amount to be awa

Rachel Penny, employment partner at Carson McDowell, considers the use of non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) to cover up wrongdoing in the workplace. Headlines were made towards the end of last year when the former Northern Ireland secretary Lord Hain used parliamentary privilege to name retail tycoon

Joanne Finn looks at the latest fine imposed on search giant Google and how such decisions are affecting market regulation. Google has been levied with yet another antitrust fine (of €1.49 billion) following a European Commission investigation into its advertising business Google AdSense &ndash

John Dugdale, associate at A&L Goodbody in Belfast, writes on a landmark court ruling Northern Ireland Housing Executive (NIHE) ruling. A judgment of the High Court in Northern Ireland has provided guidance on contractual interpretation and rare judicial discussion of the NEC3 Term Service Short

In January 1992, a 14-year-old girl discovered that she was pregnant. The girl, now known as “X”, had been subjected to sexual abuse at the hands of her friend’s father since the age of 12, and when her parents were on a trip to Lourdes in August 1990, he raped her for the first ti

Lisa Quinn O'Flaherty, solicitor at Fitzsimons Redmond and a Climate Ambassador for Irish environmental charity An Taisce, writes for Irish Legal News on how lawyers can help to solve our climate crisis. I’m a solicitor at Fitzsimons Redmond, with a passion for active citizenship and a deep co

Thom Brooks, Dean and professor of law and government at Durham Law School, writes on the latest development in the Brexit saga. Theresa May’s attempt to secure parliament’s approval for her Brexit deal this month has been dealt an almost certainly fatal blow.

Twenty years ago today, on Monday 15 March 1999, human rights lawyer Rosemary Nelson was murdered by loyalist paramilitaries. A bomb had been attached to the underneath of her car, and detonated when she pressed the brakes as she reached the bottom of the road from her home as she drove to her offic

Cathy Smith, a barrister practising in employment and company law and a committee member of the Irish Women Lawyers Association (IWLA), writes for Irish Legal News on International Women's Day 2019. The theme for IWD 2019 recognises that balance is not a women's issue – it is a business issue.

Having witnessed evictions in 1885 which she described as the “wholesale destruction of the little houses of the people”, Maud Gonne said this “changed the whole course” of her life, transforming her from a “carefree society girl into a woman of set purpose”, dete

Barrister Laura L. Keogh, author of Data Protection Compliance: A Guide to GDPR and Irish Data Protection Law, writes for Irish Legal News on the Public Services Card (PSC) - which contains an individual's name, signature, PPS number, card number and facial image - and its compatibility with the EU

Dr Tom Hickey, assistant professor at DCU School of Law and Government, reflects on the Supreme Court's recent judgment in Kerins v McGuinness & Ors [2019] IESC 11. Angela Kerins was bullied by some members of the Public Accounts Committee in the course of their questioning of her as chief execu

Dr Geraldine O'Hare, director of rehabilitation at the Probation Board for Northern Ireland, writes on the success of the Enhanced Combination Order pilot. For the past four years, the Probation Board for Northern Ireland has been piloting an intensive community sentence called ‘The Enhanced C

On 23 December 1881, 21-year-old Hannah Reynolds was sentenced at the Petty Sessions court to 28 days in Cork gaol for her work with the Ladies Land League. The men in the National Irish Land League were charged under the Coercion Acts, however the women of the Ladies Land League were not to be impr