Kneecap have described the decision to ban them from Hungary as 'political distraction'

Irish rap group Kneecap said "there is no legal basis" for Hungary banning the act from entering the country ahead of their scheduled appearance at a music festival.

The trio, who are outspoken supporters of Palestine, were due to perform at Sziget Festival on 11 August and remain on the line-up on its website.

This morning on The Agenda we spoke to Showbiz Editor at The Irish Sun, Ken Sweeney, who told us more about this.

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Yesterday the Gorvernment unveiled its new Action Plan on Insurance Reform with a range of priorities aimed at lowering insurance premiums. This Action Plan covers the remainder of 2025 to 2029 and will build on the progress of the 2020 Action Plan.

The Action Plan is focussed on 6 key themes, each with a range of specific actions to deliver better outcomes for consumers and businesses.

Minister of State at the Department of Finance and Fianna Fail TD Robert Troy spoke to us this morning on The Agenda to tell us more. 

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After four months of a near-total Israeli siege, Gaza’s few remaining hospitals now have wards for the growing number of malnourished children whose tiny bodies are just the width of their bones.

Doctors are famished to the point that they have dizzy spells as they make their rounds, medics say, and the journalists documenting their caseloads are often too weak to even walk to the clinics.

Executive Director at UNICEF Ireland, Peter Power, joined us on The Agenda this morning to talk to us some more about this. 

We were also joined by trauma surgeon Nick Maynard, who has been working in Gaza and is seeing first-hand the devastation and alarming levels of malnutrition, particularly among children - and evidence of targeted shootings of civilians at Israel’s militarised distribution points.

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Clubs in Meath are facing levies of up to €500 per month in order to service a proposed €2 million loan towards the re-development of Páirc Tailteann.

This emerged from Wednesday night's County Board meeting in Dunganny which, in the main, dealt with the proposed financing of the Stadium project and how the County would fund its share of the total outlay needed to bring the redevelopment to fruition.

While the tendering process is underway after the go ahead was given last week by Croke Park, the grant money which has been secured so far will fall short of the entire cost of the project, and so the County is facing the reality of having to fundraise itself.

Chair of Meath GAA, Jason Plunkett, joined us on The Agenda this morning to speak to us some more about this.

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Figures released by Early Childhood Ireland show that early years services in Meath have a shocking 21 per cent staff turnover, as childcare facilities struggle to retain staff.

To help address recruitment and retention challenges in Meath, Early Childhood Ireland is calling on the government to name a date to bring Early Years and School Age Care graduates' pay within public sector pay and conditions, in line with primary school teachers.

In its Budget 2026 submission, the leading membership and advocacy organisation has urged the government to name a date to introduce pay parity for Early Years and School Age Care graduates, who are educated and trained to the same level as their peers in primary education.

Frances Byrne, Director of Policy at Early Childhood Ireland, joined us on The Agenda this morning to talk to us about the childcare situation in both Louth and Meath, and about how bad the staffing retention issue is.

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Groups in Louth working to prevent suicide are voicing concern over a worrying number of tragedies in recent weeks in which people have lost their lives to suicide.

“We have noticed a worrying spike in the number of suicides in the county over the last month and we want to let people know that we are here to help,” says Mark Gordan PRO of SAFE Castlebellingham, a mental health and suicide prevention charity set up following the deaths of two young brothers in 2021.

The community rallied together to provide a free confidential service so that people in crisis could avail of support services.

We were joined this morning on The Agenda by Sandra Byrne, Chair of SAFE Castlebellingham, and by Mark Gordon, PRO of SAFE Castlebellingham, who told us more about this.

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Unions have described Government plans to cut the VAT rate for the hospitality sector in the budget as “economic vandalism” after it emerged such a move could severely limit the room for other tax cuts in the budget.

Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe confirmed on Tuesday that moving ahead with the plan would carry a full-year cost of up to €1 billion from a tax package worth up to €1.5 billion – in turn limiting the scope for income tax cuts or for tax measures aimed at encouraging the supply of new homes.

In a statement on Wednesday, the Irish Congress of Trade Unions said the facts about the hospitality sector do not justify the tax cuts, arguing the sector is now growing, with 11 new companies incorporated for every liquidation – and employment 7 per cent higher than in the first three months of this year than a year earlier.

ICTU general secretary Owen Reidy said that the proposal “flies in the face of all available evidence and would amount to nothing less than economic vandalism”, and Owen spoke to us this morning on The Agenda about this.

We also spoke to Adrian Cummins from the Restaurant Association of Ireland to get his thoughts on this.

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Landlords are turning down pet owners because they worry about the smell of their animals, a spokesperson for the Irish Property Owners Association has said. 

A petition demanding the Government bans rental agreements that do not allow people to keep pets has been signed by over 20,000 animal lovers. 

The move comes after Dogs Trust revealed they have been inundated with surrenders by heartbroken pet owners, forced to choose between a roof over their heads and their animals. 

Irish Property Owners Association spokesperson Maurice Deverell says there are several reasons why landlords do not like renting to pet owners, and Maurice spoke to us this morning on The Agenda about this.

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Yesterday on the programme we spoke to one of the two mother and baby home survivors who are bringing judicial review proceedings against the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability and Youth over the compensation scheme it approved last year, as the State says they don't meet the strict criteria set out in legislation.

The High Court has been told that two institutions - one in Meath and another in Dublin, were left out of the Mother and Baby Home Redress Scheme as they did not provide ante or post natal care.

We spoke to John Duncan Morris, who lived in St Clare’s in Stamullen for a while. 

This morning on The Agenda we spoke to the other survivor, Marie Thornton, who also took her case to court with John Duncan Morris.

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Videos have been circulating on social media over the past number of days claiming that 50 migrant men have been placed in The Ashbourne Court Hotel in Ashbourne.

This morning on The Agenda we spoke to local Fine Gael Councillor Alan Tobin and heard from Meath TD Gillian Toole, who say these claims were false.

Councillor Tobin is also calling for a clampdown on social media companies allowing this rhetoric to be posted and spread with their algorithms, and notice board admins reposting it.

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