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Фото: olgakurylenkoofficialInstagram | Ольга Куриленко   Зірка екрану стала гостей показу ліванського дизайнера Elie Saab. Куриленко продемонструвала елегантний образ. 45-річна французька акторка та модель Ольга Куриленко відвідала Паризький тиждень моди. Знімками зірка екрану українського походження ділиться в Instagram. «Дівчина Бонда» напередодні відвідала показ ліванського дизайнера Elie Saab у столиці Франції. «Дякую Elie Saab за те, […]

Piyush Gurbhele is an Indian dancer and choreography. He is famous for winning the dance reality show “Dance Deewane Season ...

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TV chef Kevin Dundon has defended his dancing on DWTS — telling judge Brian Redmond his Shrek efforts were worth much more than just two measly points.

The 58-year-old’s routine with partner Rebecca Scott to I’m A Believer last week was blasted by judges as ‘more donkey’ than dance, and ended up with the lowest score of the night.

Kyran OBrien

Kevin claims he could go even further in the dance show with no eliminations this Sunday[/caption]

Handout

He ended up with the lowest score of the night[/caption]

But what viewers won’t know is that he sweated inside his latest Shrek head from 9am on Sunday morning until 9pm after the show ended.

Kevin told us: “Putting on that latex head meant the heat couldn’t escape from my body. But it was worth it for the effect

“The producers had told me if I wanted to do Shrek they had a make-up artist who would come in and do me up. So I ended up in the chair for two hours on Sunday morning. It was comfortable but I was in that head all day.”

Despite a successful dress rehearsal, disaster struck on the live show that night.

Kevin said: “I missed my first step so Shrek went rogue for most of the dance.”

Worse was in store from the judges who branded the jive “a sticky, gloopy mess”.

He said: “I couldn’t believe Brian only awarded me two points. I spent two hours in make-up, getting made to look like Shrek, I wore a fat suit and I danced. Surely that’s worth more than two points Brian?”

Social media erupted when the chef survived the public vote and Ireland AM host Elaine Crowley was eliminated from the show.

However speaking to The Irish Sun, Kevin told us: “Some people say the public want me out but it’s the public that are keeping me in.

“Everyone is entitled to their opinion but I’d like to see them stand up here and dance on live TV each week. It was tough seeing Elaine going as she is a close friend.”

And Kevin claims he could go even further in the dance show with no eliminations this Sunday.

He said: “I’m thinking, if I can bring my scores up even slightly with the public vote, I might get immunity and you might have to put up with me until week eight.”

Following last week’s disastrous total of just eight points, for Dedication Week Kevin is dedicating his dance, a tango to Let’s Dance by David Bowie, to his wife Catherine who he has been married to for three decades.

He said: “It’s not often you get a chance to talk about the person you love, who stands by you. Catherine is the backbone of the family.

“We met when we were 17 at Blinkers nightclub in Leopardstown. Catherine was wearing a yellow jumpsuit and our first dance was to Bowie’s Let’s Dance.”

• Dancing With The Stars’ ­Dedication Week is on this Sunday night at 6.30pm on RTE One.

Kyran OBrien

The 58-year-old’s routine with partner Rebecca Scott to I’m A Believer last week was blasted by judges[/caption]

NEW Forestry Minister Michael Healy-Rae is waging war on trees that are positioned too close to ESB lines.

It’s in a bid to ­prevent a repeat of the mass power ­outages caused by Storm Eowyn.

Photocall Ireland

The ESB predicts the vast majority of people will have their power back in the coming days[/caption]

Alamy

Nearly 3,000 people are now working with the ESB to restore power[/caption]

PA

Michael Healy-Rae is waging war on trees that are positioned too close to ESB lines[/caption]

Up to 100,000 people remain without power and 2,800 without water seven days after the brutal storm with fears that some remote areas could be in the dark for weeks.

An army of almost 3,000 workers from across Europe are now in Ireland working to get power back up and running.

The west and north west remain the worst impacted by the outages with people using tiny petrol generators to try and heat their homes while others stay wrapped up in bed to battle the cold.

Minister Healy-Rae told The Irish Sun: “We’re going to be very proactive about this in the future and try to ensure that everything that happened won’t happen again.

“The way I would envisage it is that where appropriate, ­contractors would be sent in because clearing those lines is a very skilled operation.

“Sometimes the terrain you are working on is very difficult.

“For example, in a place called Brosna during the recent snow, the weight of the snow on the cables meant that they snapped under pressure. We had a situation where I remember there were three helicopters in the air dropping personnel from the ESB into the middle of woods in a remote area.

“They had to do their repairs in this remote forest and then be picked up after so many hours by the helicopter again.

“I don’t want to see a situation where people’s lives will be put at risk doing that type of work.

“The knock-on effect afterwards when people are cut off from their ESB and telecommunications can put lives at risk so it is very serious work that has to be undertaken by people. We’re going to work very diligently.”

Four more large-scale generators arrived in Rosslare Port from Poland on Wednesday night with several more flown in from Denmark and Luxembourg yesterday.

Further international crews arrived in Ireland from ­Germany and the Netherlands with nearly 3,000 people now working with the ESB to restore power.

Minister of Defence Simon Harris has also been informed that a number of generators arrived at Dublin Airport from Romania yesterday and will be transported around the country by the Defence Forces.

All of these generators are being used by Irish Water to power treatment plants and get water running in people’s homes with 2,800 people remaining without water last night, drastically down from a high of 140,000 last week.

The record-breaking winds of Storm Eowyn pulled down trees across the country that destroyed power lines and left close to 800,000 people without power.

The ESB predicts the vast majority of people will have their power back in the coming days. However, people in remote areas will have to wait longer with outages running into February.

FOREST WINDBLOW TASKFORCE

A briefing provided to ministers said schools that were closed yesterday because of power outages will be back up and running in time to reopen on Monday.

Taoiseach Micheal Martin met with officials from the National Emergency Co-ordination Group as he pressed for increased humanitarian efforts for the regions still without power.

They discussed improving preparations for further extreme weather events as attention now turns to making Ireland’s infrastructure more resilient.

Minister Healy-Rae believes that farmers should also be protected from the cost of cutting back trees as he wants to see the State taking on this job to protect vital infrastructure.

The Department of Agriculture has created a new Forest Windblow Taskforce to bring together all the relevant ­agencies of the State to focus on the issue.

More than 150 emergency community hubs have been set up across the country to enable people to use showers and charge their phones.

Mother-of-three Lhara Mullins and her family have been without power for seven days at their homes in Co Galway and she feels they are being forgotten by the State.

She told RTE: “I suppose we feel a little bit forgotten about. I expected to see somebody.

RURAL AREAS STRUGGLING

“So this is the first time I’ve experienced this, you know, I’ve only been two years living in a rural area. I thought that somebody would knock on the door or that there would be a leaflet or a letter put in the door to say, look, this is what’s happening, we know you’re there, and there wasn’t. There was none of that. I haven’t seen anybody delivering aid.”

The family have been using a small generator to try and heat the home but the noise and smell is distressing for her children who are autistic.

She said: “We’re moving this little blow heater around the rooms but the noise and smell from the heater presents sensory issues for the kids. So everybody’s mood is low.”

Several healthcare clinics in Co Galway have been without power for the past week with Sinn Fein’s Mairead Farrell urging the State to prioritise health facilities when it comes to using generators.

ESB officials met with the Fine Gael parliamentary party in Leinster House on Wednesday night to brief them about the efforts to get power back up and running.

Minister for Disability Hildegarde Naughton admitted: “We do need to plan better the next time.

“When something like this happens, these designated hubs need to be identified now for the next time a storm happens.

“Those centres need to have generators in place, showering facilities and where people can get hot food, charge phones and know exactly where to go when this happens.

“I want to reassure people who are really angry, I hear them. They are contacting my office and we are doing everything we can to get their ESB restored. Communications and telecoms are important because if people cannot communicate, that is part of the fear.”

PA

Workers clearing a fallen tree on Grove Park Drive in Dublin[/caption]

HOW are you not at your wits’ end living in Ireland?

Every time you venture to the shop, the pub, the restaurant, the chemist, the doctor, your bank account is assaulted, quickly drained of any money you might have.

Bryn Colton/Getty Images

The cost of everything. Christ, it’s enough to drive you to drink.
Except the price of booze is likely to bankrupt you, too.

Diageo, the makers of Guinness, has put up the price of the pint yet AGAIN — the FOURTH rise in just two years.

From next week, an extra 20 to 30 cent will be slapped on a creamy.

Depending on where you live, you’ll be forking out anything from €6 to €11 (the extortionate price of partying in Temple Bar) for the pleasure of one drink.

Scandalous.

But before you blame the boozers, or Diageo for that matter, consider this: For every pint you buy, the government takes, between excise duty and VAT, 35 per cent in taxes.

So, if you pay €6 for your pint, the exchequer pockets a princely €2.10. Gulp.

The taxes levied by the State have decimated, and continue to decimate Ireland’s hospitality industry.

Everything in this country is so damned expensive because of the Government’s greedy hand.

Micheal, Simon et al claim we pay among the lowest taxes in the western world. That may be the case when it comes to your pay packet.

But they hide the fact they double dip your hard-earned cash with an array of indirect taxes on everything you buy.

When it comes to alcohol, the Government loves to fleece you.

Ireland’s excise and VAT duties on the demon drink are the SECOND HIGHEST in the EU. Only the Finns pay more for a drop.

Drink is an easy target for government gluttony.

The levy on a pint of beer in Ireland is ELEVEN TIMES higher than in Germany. Our lot grabs 55 cent in excise duty on every pint. In Germany, the finance ministry takes just five cent.

A pint of pilsner in Berlin won’t cost you more than €4. Here, well, you know how much you must pay.

It’s no surprise pubs are closing at an alarming rate. 

When it comes to a glass of wine, start crying. Our government levies 80 cent in excise duty on EVERY glass of red, white or rosé sold in a restaurant or pub. Here, you’ll pay up to €8 for a glass of plonk. 

Like a snifter of whiskey? Well, the reason you’ll pay more than €6 for a small glass of spirits is because the Government takes 60 cent a glass in excise alone.

EXCISE DUTY

Slap another 23 per cent in VAT on top of the excise cut and that’s why you’re being hammered for a night on the town.

Throw in pubs and restaurants’ wage, heating and lighting bills, high commercial rents and extortionate insurance costs, and you don’t have to be Einstein to understand why our pubs are up s**t creek without a paddle.

The governments of Spain, Italy and Portugal have a different view of drink.

They are among the 15 EU countries that levy NOTHING in excise duty on wine.  

A glass of wine in Spain will set you back around €2.

Go to the Basque country, home of Rioja, and it’s even cheaper. Many places in cities such as Bilbao and San Sebastian sell a top quality glass of vino for around €1.50.

Their bars and restaurants are packed as a result. Nobody drinks at home.

By refusing to levy taxes on wine and very little on beer (just 5 cent), the Spanish government has created a vibrant cultural oasis centred around the bar and the restaurant.

As well as promoting thriving local neighbourhoods, the zero-tax policy of the Spanish state has created a booming tourist industry, too.

No such forward thinking among the drab grey men in Leinster House. Not a visionary among them. No sense of what is happening to our hospitality sector because of the high tax policies.

No understanding of what is quickly being lost forever.

The Government now has the drink and food industry firmly in a tax chokehold.

CULTURAL IMPACT

It’s a short-sighted, money-first policy that is destroying a cultural heritage that deserves to be protected and cherished. But the Government doesn’t seem to care.

Successive administrations have REFUSED to lower excise duties and VAT rates.

They don’t see any need to do it in the near future either, despite it being a no-brainer to do so.

Nightlife could enjoy a renaissance if excise duty and VAT were reduced to ZERO. The price of the pint would fall to less than €4. Imagine that.

Government ignorance is costing livelihoods. Its stubbornness is destroying a cultural gem. If we lose the Irish pub, we lose our soul.

And it’s happening before our eyes.

LIFE FOR YOUNG IS MISERY

THE richest little country on earth and 70 per cent of 25-year-olds live with their mammy and daddy.

Being “rich” means nothing if you can’t afford a roof over your head.

Getty

Which is why one in eight 25-year-olds now live abroad, and a 21 per cent don’t see themselves ever coming back to live in Ireland.

Why would they? To live in their childhood bedroom? That’s no life. No life at all.

The study of 25-year-olds by the Central Statistics Office is shocking.

Some 98 per cent of the survey’s 3,380 respondents reported being “somewhat” or “very concerned” about access to housing. Only 3.8 per cent of them owned their own home.

Two in three 25-year-olds report severe financial pressures. One in three said they had real difficulties making ends meet, while one in 20 (5.3 per cent) reported “great difficulty”.

Some 82 per cent of 25-year-olds have a job – and 60 per cent of them have a university degree. Highly educated and working, yet living miserable lives.

Among this age group, 31.5 per cent of women and 18.5 per cent of men suffer with depression or anxiety.

The failure of government to provide a life for our young is nothing short of a national scandal.

MARY’S SUPER

BRAVO Mary Lou McDonald, the Sinn Fein leader, for taking the Government to court to uphold the Constitution.

If she didn’t do it, no one would have.

Maxwell's/PA Wire

The cabinet cannot have more than 15 ministers. But the new administration has 18 – three of whom are so-called “Super Junior ministers”.

This is against the law and should not be allowed to proceed.

The Constitution is the Constitution, after all. If the Government wants more than 15 ministers in its Cabinet, then hold a referendum to change the Constitution. Let the people decide.

Until then, Super Juniors Hildegarde Naughton, Sean Canney and Noel Grealish must be kept out of the room.

No more bending the rules to suit yourselves, lads.

BLUNDER WALL IS A BIG JOKE

THE Government (as well as fleecing us) loves nothing better than to WASTE millions upon millions on consultants and reports and €336,000 bike sheds and €1.4m security huts and €700,000 bus shelters and so on, ad infinitum.

This week, it was revealed the OPW (Office of Public Waste) spent an astonishing €490,000 replacing an “unsafe” wall around the Dublin HQ of the Workplace Relations Commission.

The wall is 70 metres long and is made up of bricks and mortar.
Ten grand shy of HALF A MILLION bucks to build a wall. Peak Ireland.

Ask any brickie how much he’d charge to build a 70-metre wall and if he came back quoting half a million euro you’d tell him to take a run and jump, wouldn’t you?

Well, it seems the Government (and they’ll blame some unnamed officials in the OPW) don’t care much for spending YOUR money wisely.

It cost them €240,000 to DEMOLISH the wall and to rebuild it. How in God’s name does it cost that much?

A live ESB cable and a leaking pipe were discovered during preliminary works on the wall, which led to extensive delays and added a further €250,000 to the final bill. Ah, here.

The OPW gave the ESB €54,000 to “redirect” the live wire.

They gave a further €61,000 to Dublin City Council to, eh, close off footpaths and limit parking.

Now, there’s taking the p**s and they’re taking the p**s.

MEL PIC WAS A SHOP

AMERICA’S First Lady Melania Trump released her “official portrait” on Monday.

The black and white image, by top ­snapper Régine Mahaux, shows Trump’s missus as a woman “in charge” – or so we have been told.

Regine Mahaux / White House via CNP/Polaris

Chip Somodevilla/Pool Photo via AP

What’s obvious is that the photo has been heavily photoshopped. No way anyone looks like that in real life.

It was picked to pieces on Twitter/X, with one person writing: “How many filters were used for this? She looks like she just hatched from an egg. And her face is very crooked.”

Which may be cruel. She looked much better at Don’s inauguration, wearing that giant Hooded-Claw-like rimmed hat beneath which you could not see.

TOURIST RIP-OFF

THE ridiculous spending of public money isn’t just confined to Dublin.

Down in Bantry, west Cork some €670,000 was spent on erecting 20 tourist information signs, footpath renewal and a couple of seats.

As the council put it: “These include one large stainless-steel portal on Wolfe Tone Square, six totem signs, eight lectern structures and eight directional fingerpost signs.”

Sprucing up our towns and villages is all fine and dandy, but why does it cost an arm and a leg?

Bantry was chosen by Failte Ireland to test out a national scheme to promote tourist destinations.

If they’re going to spend €670,000 on one town, what’s it gonna cost to roll it out nationwide?

More than a billion, I’d wager.

RTE News

GUTTED darts star Willie O’Connor said “it’s soul destroying” and “we have got a chance” as he opened up on his struggles in the sport.

The Irishman, 38, is a top name in the world of darts.

X

Willie O’Connor has lamented the changes made to the European Tour[/caption]

He won his first-ever PDC title in 2019.

And three years later O’Connor made it to the semis of the UK Open.

In December he failed to get past the first round of the World Championship with a 3-1 loss to Dylan Slevin.

And now he has opened up on the changes to the European Tour.

The PDC announced earlier this month that “the Top16 of the Main Order of Merit will newly be seeded into second-round action.”

Meanwhile, “the Pro Tour Order of Merit’s Top16 will compete in the first round of European Tour events.”

But O’Connor feels this has made the challenge more difficult.

He declared the changes “soul destroying” while adding players of his standing “haven’t got a chance” of succeeding.

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O’Connor said: “It’s relentless, it’s so difficult.

“Like, the tour is, it’s soul destroying. You can go in and play in the best darts of your life and still go home with no money in the bank.

“So yeah, the tour is so hard, it’s the best players in the world.

“It’s not the best players in Ireland or England or Germany, it’s the best players in the world, and that’s what you’re against every week.

“The European Tour is such a huge part of the Pro Tour, and now eight qualify for the Pro Tour?

“I’m sorry for the Europeans, it’s like we haven’t a chance. How do you break into the top 32?

“How do you break in? I mean like whatever opportunity I have to pull it out from under you, and it makes it so difficult.

“So even if you qualify for one or two of those in the year, it’s going to be huge.

“You can’t catch the big boys. They are where they are and they’re going to stay there.”

ZEN gangster Ross Browning has declared that it is “time to let go of hate and negative lows” in his latest piece of poetry released in nearly a year.

The Kinahan gangster – who the Criminal Assets Bureau declared was the cartel’s No 1 man in Ireland – has posted a number of his musings on social media over the 18 months.

Social Media Collect

Padraig O'Reilly

In the fitness fanatic’s latest post he sent out his “love and a big hug” as he posed for pictures juggling tennis balls.

And his poem read: “My soul and my heart knows, with inner work it grows, and on the outside it shows.

“This bright light glows, in all the highs and lows.

“It’s time to let go of hate and negative lows. Connect to your hearts and your souls.

“Your inner world knows, my soul sisters and my soul bros”.

The gangland thug then signed off with, “blessings, Ross.”

In another post, Browning declared: “New beginnings.”

The exterior the goon poses as on social media is a far cry from his life as a career criminal with a long association with organised crime.

The Criminal Assets Bureau stripped €1.5million of assets from him as the High Court established that he was mob boss Daniel Kinahan’s topman here.

In the judgement from the High Court, it read: “The evidence tendered on behalf of the Bureau establishes as a matter of probability that Ross Browning has had an ongoing significant involvement in organised crime for a number of years and is a senior member of the Kinahan organised crime gang.

“This transnational gang is involved in importation and distribution of drugs and firearms in Ireland.”

It added: “Ross Browning has associations with Daniel Kinahan and other senior members of the Kinahan organised crime gang and of the Byrne gang.

“The Byrne gang is a subset of the Kinahan gang.”

BROWNING’S BACKSTORY

Browning, who grew up in the Hardwicke Street flats in Dublin’s north inner city, first came to garda attention in 2001 when he was involved in a cash-in-transit robbery with senior cartel member Robert Browne.

Browne is currently behind bars over the foiled plot to kill Gerry ‘The Monk’ Hutch’s brother Patsy in March 2018.

By 2007, it had become clear that Browning had become a close ally of the Kinahan cartel’s hierarchy, attending Christopher Jnr’s wedding that year.

Two years later he moved to Spain where the mob’s HQ was based at the time and when his residence was raided as part of Operation Shovel in 2010 a handgun was recovered.

Senior gardai established that Browning – who also attended Daniel Kinahan’s 2017 wedding in Dubai – is the mob’s “principal representative” here but plays a “hands off” role in handling drugs.

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