Good morning colleagues,

RTÉ's roundup of activity, from the ICTU BDC in Belfast yesterday, includes Kevin Callinan's address to conference. Speaking on the ICTU executive council motion on the Post Pandemic State, Kevin said Ireland must learn the hard lessons of the Covid pandemic by radically expanding the role and capacity of the State, and told delegates that the country will remain vulnerable to future global shocks without a decisive shift in economic strategy and public policy. 

The Irish Times coverage leads with Dr Tom McDonnell of the NERI who said Ireland faced a looming fiscal crisis because the Government has become dependent on windfall corporate taxes receipts to fund day-to-day spending. 

In other news, the HSE has proposed phasing out the use of external companies that use public facilities and employees outside normal business hours to tackle hospital waiting lists. The Irish Times reports that HSE chief executive Bernard Gloster has warned the Minister for Health that "without increases in productivity, ending what is known as insourcing arrangements in public hospitals could result in a significant increase in the use of the private sector."

Elsewhere, Dublin Fire Brigade has presented a lorry driver with a plaque after he saved a man from a burning building in the city last week, while a number of referrals have been made to the Gards following the recent RTÉ Investigates documentary, highlighting alleged staff shortages and unsafe practices in two nursing homes.

Your Zen this morning is a recommendation to see Kevin Barry's new play The Cave which is currently running at the Abbey Theatre. Tommy Tiernan, Aaron Monaghan and Judith Roddy are superb in this funny, sad and an apposite story for the times we live in.

Niall Shanahan