Big thaw brings huge hazards

It was anything but a photo finish as show horse Leo romped home but since he became Taoiseach there has been no end of photos.

Mouthing what was clearly a soundbite fed to him by his spinners he claimed what he was offering was the “Republic of Opportunity”.

The reality is a republic of photo opportunities for there is not day goes by where he is not pictured in some situation which is skilfully designed to promote him and his Government.

It has now been proved the Strategic Communications Unit was involved in placing material in national and local papers which gave the impression they were news stories.

The emails show the advertising agency hired to promote Ireland 2040 gave precise instructions the material was to masquerade as news and tailored to each locality.

What makes this scandal worse is the denials which came from the Government and its agents. The Taoiseach must now apologise to the journalist who exposed this dreadful waste of taxpayers’ money.

An inhouse investigation into the SCU is not good enough, it is time to disband this spin unit and redeploy all civil servants involved in generating good publicity to working for the public good. IRELAND’S caring character came to the fore again during the worst snow storm in recent memory.

Even though the Beast from the East has passed we still need to take precautions in the thaw.

The Alone charity has encouraged us to keep in contact with elderly neighbours living alone.

Older people have been urged not to risk a fall now we’ve seen the end of Storm Emma – melting snow and slush can be extremely dangerous and a major slip hazard.

It may have departed but we still need to do our part in looking after each other.