The Pride Parade takes place in Sligo Town on Saturday and there are several other events in Sligo and Leitrim which may appeal to those interested in partying or taking the air at a beach barbecue.

NW Pride 2008 – photo Dave Dellow

Community involvement and support of allies is one of the really fascinating things about the way in which Northwest Pride has developed. It’s a wonderful weekend of events with all kinds of people, young and old,  local and visitor alike in attendance.

I’ve attended each year since 2006 and see again that this year the organisers have continued to work with local groups in seeking support and co-operation and a welcome for all. It’s not easy coming out as LGBT in rural Ireland or in a small town and the support from other groups and public representatives towards the festival and inclusive nature of the entire event needs to be applauded! And this event is just about being there, it’s not about commercial ventures, one track campaigns, or personal gain.

Sligo Town had the title of being the smallest town to host a pride event but on Sunday will be beaten by the town of Easkey (pop. 250).  The local Family Resource Centre has invited the festival and the local lgbt community to a reception in the centre followed by a  Shoreside Barbecue.

Next year presumably there will be a competition to host an event in an even smaller town the way things are going   And maybe this will spread to other Pride events throughout the country!

Campaigning politician of the year – Brian Hayes

Wigmore award – Gaffe of the year – Terence Flanagan (for copying Joan Burton’s speech)

One to watch – Sean Sherlock

Political Humourist of the year - John Drennan

Heckler of the year, Willie O’Dea

Media relations of the Year – John Downing

Survivor of the Year - Bertie Ahern

Senator of the year – Eugene Regan

TD of the year – Joan Burton

MEP of the year - Gay Mitchell

Minister of the Year - Brian Lenihan

Politician of the Year - Brian Cowen

Lifetime Achievement – PJ Mara

The judging panel consisted of –

Ursula Halligan – TV3, Ken Murry – INN, Paul O Brien – Examiner, Michael O Reagan – Irish Times, Eamon Delaney – Magill, Eileen Brophy – Q102, Pat Leahy – Sunday Business Post, Alan Ruddock – Sunday Independent, Jody Cocoran – Sunday Independent, Stephen O’Brien – Sunday Times, Justin McCarthy – Today FM, Fionnan Sheahan – Irish Independent, John Lee – Daily Mail

Ciaran Cuffe – is this what doing a deal with the devil is all about? Today on Lunchtime on Newstalk you were laying out the various reasons why it might not be the right time to vote in favour of redebating the Labour Party’s Civil Unions Bill, a motion on which will go before the Dáil in private members time tomorrow night. The Green Party voted in favour of the Bill when in oppostion in February 2007 – yes that’s last February.

Deputy Cuffe has been talking to his Government Colleagues and getting with the programme. It seems we’ll have to wait for the Zappone/Gilligan ruling – even though this was about a foreign marriage recognition and not about civil registration of same sex partnerships – different things entirely Deputy but hey you have swallowed McDowell’s previous mantra which has passed to Brian Lenihan.

But please don’t be telling lesbians and gay men that we’re going to cost money to give equality to and that figures need to be crunched. It’s lame!!! And it’s downright offensive! You ignore the sacrifices, loss, grief, pain and poverty faced by lesbian and gay couples for decades in that chestnut.

We knew that it wouldn’t be long till there was a shining example of the Greens selling out – now they are walking all over us. Ah sure there will be some lame promise or commitment to a change in the next few years and the so called wiggle room will emerge for the Greens to save face. But it’s far too late. Most lesbians and gay men have lost faith in the Greens – and whenever legal recognition of relationships is introduced I can bet that Ciaran Cuffe will be taking to the airwaves explaining why the law won’t grant full equality and offering more lame excuses. ‘Ah we cost too much, we should accept what we get, it’s better than nothing’……..

For the first podcast myself (‘lifestyle’ blogger according to them would you believe!) and Cian were interviewed about elections and blogging. Find out more about the podcast here and how you can listen to it – for the uninitiated – you can listen online, download it as an MP3 file, or use your MP3 software to grab each episode and put it on your player. Inside Out have had a great variety of guests to date and with the new podcast relationship with IE it looks like we’re going to have some interesting listening in the weeks ahead especially when the silly season was over!

Stick it in your itunes subscriptions or rss feed – gwan, it’ll be out every week and will be interesting to see how it develops !

The Quota is 4230  – Spoilt votes 60

Total Valid Poll 16917

Bacik 2794
Conway 214
Douglas 183
Efobi 201
Gueret 1155
Hutchinson Edgar 330
McDonagh 684
Martin 223
Norris 5240
O’Connor 514
Ross 5379

Shane Ross and David Norris were elected on the first count and Bacik will be elected tomorrow when the count resumes at 10 a.m.

How long will we wait for someone to call for someone to resign/retire?

All this and more on Irishelection.com where I have moved for the past few weeks. The new site looks great – the new gadgets are bloody amazing – I really really like mysay.com - I think this Irish created technology is going to go big tomorrow (it was probably big before this, I’m just a bit slow!)

Tomorrow night in the Teachers Club you’ll find a lot of bloggers having a bit of count watching craic. Please come along!

And now to sleep for a few hours before the fun begins. But before I go, and before it all ends – many thanks and much appreciation to Cian, Simon, Damien and everyone else for all their work, debate and craic that I have had watching and thinking and for all that will no doubt follow in the days to come.

The Green Party’s Party Political Broadcast – is that Ireland? Are’nt they all lovely childer? Wouldn’t you want to vote for them too! The stars would probably do a better job than some of the adults! (Wouldn’t be hard!)  I bet some of them would like to see their Mammies home in time to put them to bed and read them a story as well as their Daddies though…
Back to work -

It’s about trust Bertie – and who thinks about renting a house before it’s bought by a landlord, expresses interest in buying it before renting it before it’s bought the first time, rents it, does it up with landlords money, their own money and then buys it? All this with no bank accounts, bank accounts in girlfriends name, money in and out of safes, stamp duty, curtains and interior designers.

So was he hiding his money from his ex wife, or in cahoots with her to let on he had no money in exchange for the house. I’m tired of being told about delicate matters in family courts and protecting the family etc. – at this stage that is far too convenient a cop out. His private finances are public issues especially when there are whip rounds, planning issues and fundamental matters of trust. It’s not all over yet. And the silence of the women involved is deafening.