The Irish Times has former transport minister Eamon Ryan guesting as a columnist now he's out of public life. Today he writes "Ireland’s risk-averse civil service cannot speed up delivery of the things we need most - We are going to have to decarbonise and dampen down current spending to avoid overheating the economy."

In aviation news, troubled aerospace giant Boeing says it delivered just 348 aircraft to its customers last year, its lowest output since the pandemic. Boeing ended the year with a backlog of 5,595 unfilled orders, a sizable chunk of these orders are from Ryanair.

Elsewhere, the RSA says 68,000 learner drivers are waiting to sit their driving test, with some facing waits of about seven-and-a-half months. Senior representatives of the Jewish community in Ireland have objected to President Michael D Higgins giving the keynote speech at the Holocaust Memorial Day commemoration later this month, while the Irish Defence Forces has deployed an aircraft to monitor a vessel from Russia’s so called “shadow fleet” which has appeared in Irish-controlled waters.

In Limerick, a group of Ukrainian refugees have been told they will be moved to new accommodation with 48 hours’ notice, but with no details of where their new accommodation will be.

Zen 

Zen today is a great cover version of a great (if somewhat overlooked) song. The Passions' I'm in love with a German film star performed by Andy Bell, Dot Allison and Michael Rother.

Have a great day. 

Niall Shanahan