12/12 The Front Pages

On the front page of The Sunday Times is ‘Fine Gael split over IMF vote.’ Fine Gael enterprise spokesman Richard Bruton suggested he would voted for the deal, saying, “We are critical of elements of it but we also had discussions with the IMF and EU, and pointed out the areas where we would be looking to develop new policies.

“There was an openness to that within certain parameters. Reform of the whole public service was one area and Fine Gael’s NewEra agenda of investment in infrastructure was another. There are problems with it but there is also scope and flexibility to work within it.”

Communications spokesman Leo Varadkar, on the other hand, said he was unlikely to vote for the deal. “I anticipate our decision will be what it was when we saw the details of the bailout,” he said. “That is, we don’t think it’s a good deal. The interest rate is too high, there’s nothing on jobs and growth, and the bank deal says nothing about sharing the cost with bondholders.”

The headline in the Sunday Independent, meanwhile, is ‘No probe into Ryan Cocaine suppliers.’ Last Friday’s inquest revealed that Gerry Ryan died of arrhythmia brought on by snorting cocaine and drinking alcohol. Gardai believe that Ryan received the drug from a personal contact operating second or third hand from the criminal gang and that the RTE DJ “would have paid over the odds and that may contributed to his debts”.

It is alleged that the cocaine originally from a gang controlled by Fat’ Freddie Thompson, a notorious criminal. No investigation will take place, however, as no traces of the drug were discovered when his body was found last April in his apartment in Leeson Street.