The City Council, led by Fine Gael, Fianna Fail and the Greens intend to adopt a City budget that hikes rents for Council, HAP, RAS and Approved Housing Body tenants.  The rent hikes will hit in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis, with families already struggling to meet basic costs. At the same time, Ireland is set to have a budget surplus of over €9 billion. Why is that while tech companies and billionaires are being given a light load by the government, we are being told that these rent hikes are necessary?  They passed the rent hikes in Dublin by one vote. Thats how close these fights are. Its only through organising as tenants and putting pressure on our elected representatives that these hikes can be resisted. 

Charlemont Street has wide footpaths but not a single tree along this stretch: just brick, paving and traffic. Street trees would give shade on hot days, soak up rainwater, cut noise and make the street a calmer, greener place to live, work and walk. Dublin City Council has already planted trees in the North East Inner City and the Liberties, so we know it can be done here. The more of us who sign, the harder it is for the council to ignore. Add your name and help green Charlemont Street.

This change is urgently required because the complete lack of statutory regulation in the Irish roofing sector leaves homeowners entirely unprotected against severe financial ruin and unsafe housing conditions. Currently, unlike electrical or gas works, anyone in Ireland can legally market themselves as a professional roofer without providing proof of qualifications or public liability insurance. When substandard or uninsured roofing work causes catastrophic structural damage or water ingress, homeowners are left with zero consumer recourse. Rogue operators simply vanish or liquidate, while insurance companies refuse to cover the damage because the work was substandard. This regulatory loophole damages the reputation of legitimate Irish tradespeople, strains the courts and allows rogue contractors to exploit vulnerable consumers. Introducing mandatory registration and insurance will guarantee consumer safety, enforce structural building standards, and bring the roofing sector into line with other strictly regulated trades in Ireland.

The 84X’s replacement has been a significant downgrade for the people of Newcastle, Kilcoole, Greystones and South Bray. Journey times have worsened and services removed. Passenger numbers have fallen almost 15%, in contrast to overall growth across Dublin Bus services in 2025. The X2’s Cherrywood world tour has added 10-15min to the journey time in each direction, negating the entire point of an express service. This has led to passengers avoiding them in favour of the X1 which are then full before leaving the city centre, leaving people stranded. We are calling for this detour to be removed. The N11 Cherrywood bus stop is only a 10min walk to the luas. An entire busload should not be discommoded for the convenience of a small few. Meanwhile, the last morning and first evening X2 need to depart earlier and later respectively to accommodate UCD students. The 84x arrived in time for 10am lectures, which the X2 fails to do.  Many students finish for the day at 15:50. The bus used to arrive around 16:10 and was regularly standing room only. It now comes at 15:55 which is impossible to make. It is now often less than half full - some ‘improvement’ alright. For a student in class from 10-4, a round trip has gone from 9:15/17:00 to 8:15/17:40. UCD is one of the biggest trip generators on the route and services must accommodate this. These are cost-free improvements that could be implemented overnight if the will was there. We hope this petition will compel the NTA to act. Additional departures, removal stops where alternatives are available (Foxrock, Stillorgan etc.) and bus lanes along the M11 would greatly enhance the service, but we’ll leave them for another time. So please sign this to help remove the Cherrywood detour from the X2, and to tweak the departure times of some services.

Due to the popularity of the beach all year round, access to public toilets year round is essential for all of our visitors and especially for families and older people. 

We hope to get as much support as possible as this will affect everyone even in the future for other generations. The town will struggle more as it does not have the larger amount  of service's needed and these should be implemented before any housing comes in We hope to achieve as many as signatures as possible.  Open to individual residents to sign (Meaning: more than 1 person living in a household can sign as it affects all of us individually) 

Having lost friends and having experienced both drug use and drugs policing, it is clear the current approach to drug use is criminalisation of a symptom caused by a combination of various social factors. Criminalising drug use itself causes unacceptable collateral policy harm. So I believe we need to show public and popular support for this position, even if some people feel it does not go far enough.

Animals are sentient beings who deserve protection, dignity and proper care. Tradition must never take precedence over their welfare. According to reports concerning the 2026 Ballinasloe Horse Fair, the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (NSPCA) responded to 61 logged animal welfare concerns during three days of inspections. The NSPCA reported that 26 animals were taken into its care following 17 separate seizures. A further 20 issues were addressed through on-site advice, and 12 formal warnings were issued. The NSPCA also stated that the majority of horses on display were in good condition. However, the reported interventions raise important questions about the welfare challenges associated with animal trading at large public fairs.

While the government cosies up to big tech billionaires, ordinary people are paying the price.   This endless growth of data centres is: • Driving up our energy bills - households in Ireland paid €715 million more in electricity bills between 2015 and 2023 to subsidise the huge growth in data centres. Data centres also pay less for electricity than households.  • Draining our water supply - while people are forced to conserve water, data centres are allowed to use millions of litres a day. Over the summer of 2026, data centres doubled their water use in Ireland.  • Straining our energy grid - data centres now use 23% of all electricity in Ireland, and this is projected to grow to 31% by 2035. Instead of households being able to access clean, cheap energy, this is being sucked up by data centres.  • Affecting local communities - with air and noise pollution, and pressure on local infrastructure and services.  • Driving demand for more dirty gas - and encouraging the government to support new infrastructure to import more dirty, expensive gas to Ireland.     • Powering dangerous war and surveillance - investigations show that data centres in Ireland are providing cloud storage services to Israel’s military intelligence agency.  There have been limits placed on data centres in Ireland before, but we desperately need more. The government must reinstate a moratorium now, to address the huge harms that data centres are having on our communities.   We are planning to hand over this petition together with Friends of the Earth Ireland.

Online petition

We want everyone in Ireland to have access to high quality, locally produced food. We also want farmers to earn a fair living from providing that food into their communities. What are we asking for? 1. Formal recognition of Local Food Farmers in Irish agricultural policy 2. A Basic Income of €350 a week for Local Food Farmers who meet the criteria, at a net cost of about €8.3m, roughly 0.4% of the Department of Agriculture's current annual expenditure. What does our current food system look like? Ireland has a highly productive agricultural sector, but our current food system is heavily shaped by export markets: • We import as much as 83% of our fruit and vegetables • We produce around 7x more beef than we consume yet, import over 40,000t of beef each year • 90% of Irish dairy production is exported • >50% of the average diet in Ireland is ultra-processed Our current model disconnects what we produce from what we eat, and shifts value away from farmers and local economies. Why invest in Local Food Farms? Local Food Farms generate multiple social, economic and environmental benefits. Increasing domestic food production reduces reliance on imports, strengthens resilience to supply-chain disruption and keeps more value circulating locally. There is significant potential to grow this sector while reconnecting land, people and communities. Why a Basic Income? If we want thriving local food systems, we need to guarantee a fair income for Local Food Farmers, but many Local Food Farms are overlooked by the current subsidy system. As voiced by farmers in our research, a Basic Income for Local Food Farmers would: • Provide income stability • Enable long-term planning and investment • Increase production and market reach • Drive on-farm innovation • Facilitate agroecological land stewardship • Improve farmers’ overall wellbeing • Support essential caregiving responsibilities • Create opportunities for on-farm educational programmes & community engagement What is a Local Food Farm? Talamh Beo have developed robust criteria to assess the eligibility of candidates for this Basic Income proposal. A summary is as follows: 1. Primary food production - the farm is actively engaged in the rearing or growing of primary food products 2. Local market oriented - at least 70% of food produced is sold via Short Food Supply Chains 3. Agroecological production - prioritising biodiversity and the long-term health of soils and ecosystems, through Organic Certification or in-conversion status 4. Commercial activity - able to demonstrate a minimum annual production value of €8,000

Public bodies depend on the availability of competent interpreters to deliver essential services effectively. People who cannot adequately understand or communicate in English depend on competent interpreters to access essential services and exercise their rights, including the right to a fair trial. The availability of experienced and suitably qualified interpreters is therefore integral to the effective delivery of justice, not merely an administrative convenience.  In practice, some intermediary interpreting agencies offer contractual terms under which they pay only for time spent actually interpreting, while significant costs and professional time associated with fulfilling the assignment are transferred to the interpreter. These may include several hours of return travel, vehicle and fuel costs, parking and tolls, as well as the loss of other work when a substantial period has been reserved for an assignment that is subsequently cancelled at short notice.    By way of illustration, an interpreter may be offered an 8-hour assignment with a minimum guaranteed duration of one hour and a minimum total payment of €22. The same terms may provide for a cancellation payment of only €11 if the assignment is cancelled within one hour of the scheduled start. In effect, the interpreter may have to reserve an entire working day and, if the assignment is cancelled within one hour of the scheduled start, receive only €11. Where the assignment finishes early or is cancelled at short notice, replacing the lost work is highly unlikely, as interpreting assignments are commonly arranged in advance.    Where contractual conditions discourage experienced professionals from accepting publicly funded assignments, the consequences can affect service quality, continuity and efficiency, and ultimately the value obtained from public expenditure.  If experienced interpreters increasingly decline assignments, public bodies may face a smaller pool of available qualified interpreters and greater difficulty securing appropriate interpreting services when they are needed.  Apparent savings on interpreting costs can create wider costs for public services through delays, adjournments, additional administrative work and urgent replacement arrangements. Poor-quality interpreting can prolong proceedings or, in serious cases, undermine them altogether. In 2021, the Court of Appeal quashed convictions in an Irish criminal case after finding that serious interpretation errors had rendered the trial unfair. The lowest immediate cost of an interpreter does not necessarily deliver the best value for public money. Full text of the petition may be found here.