The Mick Clifford Podcast

On 29 May the champions league final between Liverpool and Real Madrid took place in Paris but what unfolded was far more than a football match. Liverpool fans were dangerously penned into tight spaces ahead of the game, access was highly restricted and the folk memory of Hillborough in 1989 was to the front of many minds. After the match, the departing fans were tear gassed by police and attacked...

On Monday, Lisa Smith was found guilty at the Special Criminal Court of membership of Islamic state group, ISIS. The case, which included details of how Ms Smith, who was from Dundalk and served in the Irish army, converted to Islam and ultimately travelled to the Islamic State as it then was. She was detained, and married and then had to flee as Isis was in retreat, ending up in appalling conditi...

Willie McGee joined the fledgling garda fraud squad in the 1970s and over the following thirty years his work brought him to the front line of the kind of frauds that would make some good movies. From the gang that diverted phones from a bank while claiming money on fake bank drafts to the blackmailers who threatened to introduce foot and mouth disease into the country unless a ransom was paid, Wi...

Nearly exactly one hundred years ago, Sir Henry Wilson was gunned down on the streets of London by two IRA men. The assassination was one of the seminal events leading up to the Civil War as the British government claimed that it had been ordered by the anti-treaty forces in Ireland. Irish Times journalist Ronan McGreevy’s new book, Great Hatred, The Assassination of field marshal Sir Henry Wilson...

Recently retired master of the High Court Ed Honahan was often in the headlines because of his interventionist approach to the job. Mr Honahan’s court was the first stop for hundreds of people who found themselves drowning in a sea of debt in the aftermath of the economic collapse in 2008. He gained a reputation as being a thorn in the side of banks who were of the belief they just had to show up...

As the war in Ukraine continues, those who have fled to this country are trying to get on with their lives. Polina Bashkina had what she says was a good life in Kiev but all of that has now been whipped from her and her six year old son and they are currently living in Co Galway, awaiting developments. Polina is a journalist and she has written accounts of both her journey and that of other Ukrain...

The only Irish writer shortlisted for this year’s €100,000 Dublin Literary Award is Cork born Danielle McLoughlin for her debut novel, The Art of Falling. Danielle is a late comer to a writing life, having spent years practicing as a solicitor before taking up the pen seriously in a time of illness. Since then she has won wide acclaim for her short stories in particular and the reaction to her deb...

The North goes to the polls on 5th May in what many are describing as the most significant election in the assembly’s history. Mick Fealty, founder and editor of the current affairs online publication Slugger O’Toole, believes the election is now Sinn Fein’s to lose. However, he also sees change afoot in the north with a growing middle ground and he would like to see far greater emphasis on t...

There is a lot going on in the world at the moment and not a lot of it is good. Irish Examiner Political Editor Danny McConnell is this week’s guest and he takes the temperature in Leinster House and beyond, looking at how this country is addressing the war in Ukraine, dealing with the cost of living crisis and chewing the fat over carbon taxes. And there is also the matter of the new spring in th...

While the focus of the world is on the war and humanitarian crisis in Ukraine, there is an ongoing refugee crisis in southern Europe. Thousands fleeing war and persecution in the developing world are arriving on Europe’s shores but now a new regime is in place which has been compared to Ireland’s Direct Provision system. Detention centres are being built on Greek islands in order to house refugees...

Claire Ryan bought her home in 2006 but within a year she knew that she was living in a dangerous development. Fire safety defects in the building were discovered. What followed was a fifteen year odyssey of stress and worry while no action was taken against the developer and the authorities appeared to turn the other way. Claire’s experience is not unique but it is one of the more shocking exampl...

In the current housing market there are some who will use the crisis to exploit vulnerable people. One phenomenon that has come to light in recent times is the advertisement of rooms for rent at a low cost in exchange for sexual favours. Irish Examiner reporter Ann Murphy has done extensive investigative work in this area which has culminated in the introduction in the Dail of a private member’s m...

Natalya Summar has been living in Cork for twenty years but since 24th February she has been focused on doing what she can for her native Ukraine. She is now embarking on a journey to rescue her niece who has made it to Poland from her home in Kyiv. Natalya talks on the podcast about how her family are coping, and the guilt she feels being so removed from them and her friends.  We also t...

Housing is the defining issue of Irish politics at the moment but what do we talk about when we talk about housing? Lorcan Sirr has assembled a collection of experts to give their views on how housing impacts on all aspects of life, from attitudes to land to whether planning takes account of gender, health, aging and the environment. The book, Housing In Ireland – Beyond The Markets may well be a...

Exactly one hundred years ago this month meetings took place in the Gresham Hotel to shape a new police force. Michael Collins chaired the first meeting and what emerged from the discussions was a new force that still had some hurdles to mount before settling down to be guardians of the peace. In the force’s centenary year, Conor Brady, former chair of the Garda Ombudsman and former editor of the...

In this decade of centenaries, some of those who made their mark a century ago have had their lives and contributions critically examined. However, there has also been an acceptance that a number of women who lived through those times had not heretofore been recognised for their contributions. Marie Comerford is one such woman and her recently published memoir is probably the last first person acc...

The government is examining how to cut down on protracted objections to planned projects and some people are up in arms about it. Peter Sweetman is, by his own admission, a serial litigator against planning decisions. He has a record of being successful in the actions he has taken – in some instances all the way to the European Court of Justice. This week, he spoke on the podcast about why the pro...

Just over sixty years ago the morning sickness drug Thalidomide was withdrawn from the market when it was discovered that it was causing major foetal damage in the expectant mothers to whom it had been prescribed. Tens of thousands of mothers across Europe miscarried and at least another 5,000 babies were born without limbs, with limbs foreshortened and other serious medical issues. In Ireland the...

Sunday January 30 marks the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, the day that thirteen innocent people were shot dead in Derry by members of the parachute regiment of the British army. Another man later died from his wounds. Irish Examiner political correspondent Aoife Moore, a native of the city, is also a niece of one of those murdered on that day, Patrick Doherty. She talks about how the eve...

As always, the major political stories for the coming year are likely to emerge from nowhere that is currently on the horizon. However, we do know that there will be two major events in 2022. An assembly election in the North may well see Sinn Fein take over as the largest party and be rewarded with the office of First Minister. And in December – if the government gets that far – there will be a c...

Charlie Haughey bestrode public life in Ireland for four decades and was then hauled back into the spotlight in retirement when it was discovered that he had been in receipt of millions from wealthy individuals when he had been a senior politician. Professor Gary Murphy of DCU has written a compelling account of Haughey’s life that examines the good, the bad and the ugly of probably the most talen...

In 2019, Romi Ramtohil was living on the streets and in bad health. After thirteen years in this country he saw no way out of the rut into which he had fallen. He wanted to return to his native Mauritius. But how could he get there. He had no way home, no means, no passport, not even a mobile phone. Into the breach stepped a whole array of people to help Romi, including the Alice Leahy Trust, two...

How much damage is your poor old Christmas jumper doing to the environment? The cost of fast fashion in not just abuses of working and human rights, but also damage to the environment is now being acknowledged. Recent images from the Atacama Desert in Chile where hundreds of thousands of tonnes of unwanted clothes are left to rot slowly have presented the reality of what happens when we buy cheap...

Last week the cabinet recommended a presidential pardon for John Twiss, a 34-year-old man who was hanged for a murder he didn’t commit in 1895. Twiss, a native of Castleisland in Co Kerry, was convicted on flimsy and manufactured evidence of the murder in Newmarket, Co Cork of a man who was an agent for landlords. Even before he was executed his case was recognised as a grave injustice. A petition...

Exactly a century ago on 6 December, the Anglo Irish Treaty was signed in London. The document for the first time recognised Ireland’s right to independence, albeit under particular conditions. The occasion was marked by initial euphoria which quickly gave way to some confusion and anger, in turn leading all the way to the outbreak of civil war within six months. By August 1922, the two leading Ir...