From corsets to craft beer: CSO’s social history

From corsets and fountain pens to craft beers and e-cigarettes, the make-up of an average Irish shopping basket has changed drastically over the decades. As it prepares to announce the composition of the new basket of goods used to determine the rate of inflation today, the CSO published a snapshot of some of the changes over the past 50 years and Ellen O’Regan was there to capture this little slice of social and economic history.

Miner Kenmare, which has been led by Michael Carvill for the past 38 years, is feeling the heat as 6 per cent shareholder JO Hambro calls for a strategic review and possible sale of the business following a disappointing pre-Christmas trading statement that pointed to lower production forecasts, investment costs running over budget and the prospect of smaller dividends. Joe Brennan reports.

Ires Reit is of course no stranger to feeling the heat of activist shareholders. In advance of a crunch EGM on Friday which will determine the future of the current board and possibly of Ireland’s largest private sector landlord itself, Ires was able to reassure shareholders whose ballots were affected by a glitch on a key third party voting platform late last week that all those votes have been successfully resubmitted, writes Joe Brennan.

Greystar, the US-based group looking to develop a €180m build to rent scheme in the grounds of the protected Dalguise House in Monkstown, south Dublin, have secured the green light for 387 apartments from An Bord Pleanála. Gordon Deegan has the details.

Helping offshore energy developers factor the impact on nature into their planning process

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Google Pixel 8a review: It follows predecessors by removing unnecessary features while still being useful

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Interruptions undermine workplace focus and productivity

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It seems an improbable odyssey for London to ever become the new Silicon Valley

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Closing a gap that could mean thousands of people whose mortgages were sold to vulture funds have no recourse to the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman will have the full support of the Central Bank, one of its senior executives told Sinn Féin finance spokesman Pearse Doherty when the matter was raised at an Oireachtas committee. Ian Curran was there.

At a separate Oireachtas committee, TDs and senators were told more businesses are closing this year than previously, but not at crisis rates. The committee was assessing the impact of increased Government burdens on small business insolvency alongside the need to address warehoused debt. The sectors worst affected, Barry O’Halloran heard, were those most impacted by Covid restrictions..

LloydsPharmacy Ireland plans to make a fresh submission for clearance for its planned takeover of McCabes Pharmacy with competition authorities, after hitting a setback with its original filing, made last October. Joe Brennan reports that the deal, if ultimately cleared, would create a business with turnover of more than €200 million.

In Technology, Ciara O’Brien meets, Jay Graber, the chief executive of Bluesky which started as an internal Twitter project but is now pitching to become an alternative to the platform Elon Musk has renamed X after moving on last week from an invite-only system to one open to all comers. She believes there is ground for optimism around fresh thinking being able to save social media

In her Tech review, she puts the Canyon DVR40GPS dashcam through its paces and is happy that it is easy to set up and produces high quality footage, even when driving on bumpier roads.

And in Innovation, we look at biotechnology start-ups that are looking to use psychedelic drugs to treat mental health disorders, which are raising hundreds of millions of dollars as investors are tempted back to the sector.

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