Gaetane Cullen

Learning every day...passionate about politics, tech, wellness and culture. Freedom is better than gold.

[Aidan Regan @Aidan_Regan]

Most commentary on the fuel protests/blockade is not worth reading.

This is though 👇

https://t.co/AIO6kNqlvB

[Gaetane Cullen @GaetaneCullen]

This seems like madness. We have great soil, very little sun. Simply put: A terrible idea. Follow the money...?

[AMASS @AMASSMOVEMENT]

"Locals here will carry all of the burden but share in none of the upside."
That one line sums up everything our community has been fighting against.
In case you missed it - this clip is from Kevin Collins' documentary on Ireland's energy crisis, and it features the Bellville Solar project. The picture it paints isn't pretty.
Nearly 1,000 acres. A community ignored. A planning system that works against the people it's supposed to protect.
Full documentary is essential viewing. Please share.
📷 https://t.co/OCTC1dbiY6

[Shanaka Anslem Perera ⚡ @shanaka86]

BREAKING: NATO was built to defend against an attack on a member state. No member was attacked. The United States chose to strike Iran alongside Israel, chose to escalate without consulting its allies, chose to send B-52s from English airfields and A-10s from Suffolk bases and cruise missiles from a British atoll in the Indian Ocean. And when the consequences of that choice closed the Strait of Hormuz and stranded 3,000 ships and sent oil past $107 and started the helium clock that is starving the chips that run the targeting systems that selected the coordinates that started the war, America turned to its allies and said: help us open the strait.

They said no.

Trump told the Daily Telegraph on April 1 that leaving NATO is “beyond reconsideration.” His exact words: “I was never swayed by NATO. I always knew they were a paper tiger, and Putin knows that too, by the way.” Rubio told Al Jazeera it was a “one-way street.” Trump said he had expected automatic support: “It was a test, and we were there for them, including Ukraine. Ukraine wasn’t our problem. They weren’t there for us.” He mocked Britain’s Royal Navy. He dismissed Starmer’s windmills. He treated the 77-year-old alliance as an invoice that came due and was returned unpaid.

The fracture is structural. Article 5, the collective defence clause, was not triggered because no NATO member was attacked. This is a war of choice. NATO’s architecture does not obligate members to join offensive operations they were not consulted about before the first bomb fell. France denied airspace for strike missions. Spain denied airspace. Italy denied airspace. The denials are not betrayals. They are the treaty working as designed. The alliance was built for a Soviet tank column crossing the Fulda Gap, not for a president asking Europe to reopen a strait his own strikes helped close.

But here is the paradox. CMA CGM is French. Fourteen of its vessels are trapped behind the IRGC toll line. Hapag-Lloyd is German. Six of its ships are stranded. The same France that denied American jets its sky is watching French cargo rot in a strait France refused to help reopen. The same Germany that declined to send warships has German containers held in a corridor controlled by a toll system denominated in yuan. The sky denial and the sea entrapment are the same crisis viewed from different altitudes. Europe said no to the war and yes to the consequences.

Starmer announced that Britain will host 35 countries to discuss reopening Hormuz. Foreign Secretary Cooper will convene military planners to “marshal capabilities” after the fighting stops. After. Not during. Not while the seafarers ration water. Not while the helium boils off in 200 cryogenic containers drifting toward irreversibility. Not while the planting season closes across South and Southeast Asia. After. “After” is a word that thermodynamics does not recognise.

The alliance did not break over a threat. It broke over a choice. America chose the war. Europe chose not to follow. And now both sides are discovering that the Strait of Hormuz does not distinguish between the nation that dropped the bombs and the nation that declined to help. The molecule does not care about Article 5. It does not care about Article anything.

The alliance broke. And the clock kept ticking.

https://t.co/dAOBBMsgDS

[Nick Delehanty 🇮🇪 @Nick_Delehanty]

Huge Growth 📈

SEAI has been the single biggest beneficiary of carbon taxes. Its mandate has grown enormously since 2020.

See Table:
Almost every metric is up over 150%.
It has over 20 senior execs earning over €100k.

With carbon taxes set to continue to rise, SEAI will be one of the biggest Quangos in the State.

[Richard Boyd Barrett @RBoydBarrett]

When initially planned, Cherrywood was to have at least 40% under €300k. That plan never happened.
We want every site that is owned by DLR properties and the State to have 100% social and affordable homes.

[Mick Caul @caulmick]

#FFG
Selling Off Hope & Homes

IRELAND'S largest landlord will not pay any stamp duty on a 77-apartment block it has purchased - @TheNewsHughes

IRES-REIT announced this week that it has snapped up the apartments, located in Naas. Co. Kildare.

The company, which currently owns 3,627 rental properties, hit the headlines this week after telling shareholders it expects rental income to rise by 25% as a result of new rental laws due to come into effect on Sunday.

#HowIrelandWorks #GREED #IResReit #HousingCrisis
@irishdailymail

[Richard Boyd Barrett @RBoydBarrett]

Cherrywood's town centre is currently a hole in the ground. Meanwhile there are plans for a Hockey Stadium for the area. The community needs public amenities and services.
As local sports are crying out for pitches and services, a private hockey stadium is a slap in the face.

[Declan Ganley @declanganley]

The French PE firm and absentee SolarLords @OmnesCapital continue their campaign to force their Chinese solar panel blight onto our local parish. Unfortunately for them, the vandalism and intimidation that was inflicted on this community over Christmas only stiffened the resolve of local families to save our community and landscape:
‘Protestors in Galway urge review of solar farm plans after fears area could become ‘Chernobyl of Ireland’ https://t.co/f2wl5qIGWV

[Rob Cross @RobCross247]

This is one of the reasons why the housing system is broken in Ireland. Deutsche Bank's €800 billion investment arm fund has acquired 85% (46 homes) in Belcamp Manor, Dublin 17 for €24.5 million. Originally intended for individual buyers, these properties are now being advertised for rent at €3,175 per month (€38,100 per year) by a London-based real estate investment fund on https://t.co/obpQeAid1n

https://t.co/ILoEPVGacr

It is no surprise that in the past 13 years, rent in Ireland has doubled, and house prices have increased by 55%, making it the fastest growth in any major EU economy. Currently, vulture funds own 1 in 6 mortgages in the Irish housing market, while Cuckoo funds and the State purchase 42% of new homes. This leaves a record number of first-time buyers competing for the lowest supply of housing stock nationwide in over a decade. There are just over 11,000 homes available for purchase nationally, the fewest since 2012 when 60,000 homes were on the market.

The 2022 Census reveals that there are 166,752 vacant homes and 66,135 vacant holiday homes across the country. Out of the vacant homes, almost a third (48,387) have been vacant long-term since 2016 and remain unused. Additionally, the current salary required to buy a new home in Dublin is €127,000, which exceeds even a TD's basic salary of €108,987.

Meanwhile, in December 2023, there were 18,648 entire houses/apartments available on the short-term letting platform Airbnb in Ireland. This includes 4,666 listings in Dublin City whilst there is a record-breaking number of 13,514 people, including 4,105 children, who are currently accessing emergency accommodation.
#Dublin #Ireland #HousingCrisis #DerelictIreland #VacantIreland #homeless #Airbnb

[Dr. Marcus De Brun @indepdubnrth]

Dear Editor & Readership of the Irish Times.

It is somewhat refreshing to read your article of 12/2/26 that refers to me and to my Twitter account, and more specifically to two Twitter posts that were posted on my account several years ago, and are no longer available even to confirm context or content.

Over 5yrs of long form publications published on line in 'Cassandra Voices' and elsewhere by me in respect of Covid Science -and my letters to your paper in respect of Covid policies -were all ignored by your paper throughout the pandemic period.

Your focus on two tweets taken out of context and possibly made under the influence of alcohol; would be thoroughly hilarious were it not for the fact that it is an obvious attempt at a character assassination, and a preamble to the usual form of 'cancel culture' that your paper has applied (and continues to apply), to anyone; physician, scientist, politician, Journalist or otherwise, who might dare to disagree with the sacred doctrines of wokeism or the established Covid dogma, as curried by your paper throughout and to this very day.

Publications such as yours (at home and abroad) have consistently denied contrary opinions to established views in respect of the medicine of covid and the politics
of Ireland. The former is usually described as a 'conspiracy theorist' or 'anti-vaxer', and the latter -irrespective of history or credential credential - is generally dismissed as a 'right wing' extremist.

Your article fills me with sadness; not in respect of the hurt it attempts to deliver to myself and my family, that was accomplished several years ago and is merely being reinforced today.

Instead, your article hurts because it is yet another dictate, applied purely to deprive Covid policies of any revision. It is an attempt to deprive the victims of lockdowns or vaccines, of any voice, or any imperfect advocate.

You have deprived 'US' whomever we might be, of a place at the table, where public discourse might serve as the antidote to public division.

It is your selection of those allowed to the table that has paralysed political evolution and divided our society into the arbitrary camps of Left and Right. When in truth, we are all united in the pursuit of faith, hope, and kindness.

Thank you for your recent publication. If the capacity to 'look deeper' or to 'think independently' still persists within our divided society - then perhaps as they say : 'there is no such thing as bad publicity.'

Yours etc

Dr Marcus de Brun.

[Irish Farmers' Association @IFAmedia]

Further Significant Double Standards by Bord Bia Chair

Larry Murrin’s company, Dawn Farm Foods, is not a member of the relevant Bord Bia Quality Assurance Scheme, the Food Processor Standard.

When appearing as a witness in front of the JOC for Agriculture as chairman designate in April 2024, Larry Murrin said that "all stakeholders have to be on the bus and we need the maximum number of people engaged" when speaking of Bord Bia Quality Assurance schemes.

55,000 farmers and over 500 food and agribusinesses are on this bus.

But Dawn Farm Foods either did not apply to be part of the standard, does not meet the criteria or did not pass the Audit.

Whatever the reason it is a total contradiction of what Bord Bia stands for.

Larry Murrin must step down and all trust in Bord Bia from farmers be restored, and new chair put in place.

#DoubleStandards #RestoreConfidence

[Ridge & Frost @RidgeandFrost]

🗣️ "This is essentially a life sentence, a death sentence."

Jimmy Lai's son Sebastien Lai reacts to his father's 20-year jail sentence in Hong Kong for national security offences and tells @WilfredFrost he hasn't spoken to his father in more than five years.

[Nick Delehanty 🇮🇪 @Nick_Delehanty]

I predicted this.

The Bray to Greystones Cliff Walk will not be reopened for at least three years.

This tells us everything we need to know about this Govt's ability to get things done.

EVERYONE wants to cliff-walk back open.
Local businesses are losing money.

Last year Simon Harris (former Taoiseach, current Tánaiste, current Minister for Finance and future Taoiseach) decided to personally intervene. He chaired a re-opening task force and publicly targeted March 2026 for reopening.

Now we’re told it can’t be done. This paragraph explains exactly why:

"Committee chairwoman Green Party councillor Erika Doyle said while the timeline given for the proposed full remediation project is “disappointing and not what any of us wanted to hear,” it acknowledged that statutory processes such as planning applications, environmental assessments and procurement, “stem from national and European legislation and cannot be bypassed”.

...and there it is.

Committees.
Processes.
Assessments.
Procurement.
No urgency = No delivery.

Simon Harris had a clear mandate: move heaven and earth for his local community and reopen a nationally important public amenity.

A leader delivers. Instead, we have rule by committee.

Today in the Dáil, @Toibin1 asked Harris if he was not "embarrassed by the length of time its taking to deliver infrastructure in his area".

thats what this is....
Embarrassing.

[Declan Ganley @declanganley]

It is long past time that the kind of fantasy-led, Eamon Ryan style student politics that drives these schemes was put out to pasture. We need energy policy that produces abundant cheap reliable energy, protects communities, protects water, protects food production and respects people’s right to live in peace in the places their families have cared for over generations.

What is happening in Cooloo is not a consultation. It is a shakedown dressed up as planning.

[Masih Alinejad 🏳️ @AlinejadMasih]

I’m not afraid. I’ve been dead for 47 years this is the voice of a woman in Iran who is fed up with the Islamic republic.
47 years ago, the Islamic Republic took our rights and turned a nation into hostages.
Today people have nothing left to lose, they rise.
Iran is rising.

[Nick Delehanty 🇮🇪 @Nick_Delehanty]

The latest figures show how DCC's remit is changing rapidly .. its a homelessness contractor.

In 2024, the council awarded €1.73 billion worth of contracts over €10m.

42% for homeless emergency accommodation.
Housing construction, roads, parks etc made up 58%.

[Francie Gorman @gormanifa]

After travelling more than 1,000 kilometres by land, sea and John Deere, Tom and I arrived in Brussels for the @COPACOGECA protest outside the European Parliament.
@IFAmedia

[Nick Delehanty 🇮🇪 @Nick_Delehanty]

Dublin City Council has spent €455,000,000 in the first 9 months of 2025.

37% or €168,000,000 goes to private hotels/landlords for emergency accommodation. Thats almost 4 in every 10 euros.

Here are the top 10 paid companies.....🧵

[Gaetane Cullen @GaetaneCullen]

Happy Friday 💘, here's a tune to wake you up! Allez-y! https://t.co/6sfmmEhxAm

[Ciaran Mullooly MEP @ciaranmullooly]

THE NEXT 10 DAYS …. will see absolutely critical developments for farmers and consumers in Ireland - with decisions that will undoubtedly impact both the economy of this country, its premier rural industry and the health of its citizens for years to come.

On MONDAY DECEMBER 8:

The INTA trade committee of the European Parliament will meet and vote on whether or not to approve or amend so-called safeguards to the mercosur trade deal . If they vote them through (despite my amendments to try and remove the dangerous use of antibiotics in beef exports to Europe ) - the way will be clear for the same safe guards to go before the European Parliament plenary meeting of all 700 MEPs in Strasbourg on December 16. If they vote them down or seek agreement on even 1 amendment - the process will be delayed indefinitely .

On TUESDAY DECEMBER 9th:

the European Commission panel of scientific experts from all Eu states will
meet and decide on a proposal from the EU Commisdioner Jessika Roswall to extend the existing nitrates derogation for Irish farmers - with a specific set of new conditions and environmental measures to be decided on that will dictate if it is indeed practical or possible for landowners to farm in some areas of the country in the next 3 years and beyond. These decisions have huge financial implications for farmers in derogation with outstanding financial commitments.

On WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 10:

A group of 150 MEPs - including myself and 4 more Irish MEPs will learn if our 2nd attempt to have a vote at the plenary session of the European Parliament on a move to refer the Mercosur trade deal to the European Court of Justice is successful or not. If the President of the Parliament continues to prevaricate on the issue the eventual court scrutiny will be further delayed.

FISHERIES QUOTA D DAYs:

EU fisheries ministers will attend the next Fisheries Council meeting on 11 and 12 December, where 2026 fishing quotas will be agreed. Irish Seafood sector reps have pushed the Irish Minister Timmy Dooley for Hague Preferences at the EU level to adjust historically low quotas for Ireland.The focus is on these December Council meetings where final quotas are set, with hopes for political intervention to secure fairer outcomes. Anything less would be catastrophic for our fisheries industry . I have been working hard in the European parliament to support this sector over last 15 months .

On TUESDAY DECEMBER 16:

On the day when the full 700 members of the European parliament may face a vote on whether or not to approve so-called safe guards to the rotten Mercosur agreement in Strasbourg , farmers from all over Europe will meet and protest in Brussels over plans by the European council of trade ministers to meet and push through the actual trade deal in a vote that will finally reveal which way the Irish Government may actually vote on the deal . There is NO place for Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael to hide in this vote - which is now scheduled for Tuesday Dec 16 or Wednesday Dec 17

On THURSDAY DECEMBER 18

150 MEPs who sought a referral of the Mercosur trade deal to the European Court of Justice will have their last voting opportunity of 2025 to express their democratic right.

On SATURDAY DECEMBER 20

European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen wants to fly to Brazil for a signing ceremony with her Mercosur counterparts. I will do everything in my human power to try and stop that happening

@independent_ire