8.10am It Says in the Papers

Now Lisa Pereira is here with a look at what it says in today's papers.

"We buttered lots of parsnips." That was a comment by Taoiseach Micheál Martin to Claire Byrne on News Talk yesterday, and it's used as a headline on the front of the Irish Sun. Mr. Martin was speaking in the context of unions preparing to strike instead of coming to the negotiating table. He said he was baffled by the move, but the Sun also spoke to ICTU General Secretary Owen Reidy, who said he thinks the government doesn't understand the genuine frustration amongst workers. He referred to fuel protesters who blockaded ports earlier this year and were, he said, treated with kid gloves. "If unions did that, we'd be arrested and brought before the courts," he said. "Traitors," says the Irish Daily Mirror, below a photo of Simon Harris' face, photoshopped into a hooded costume from the hit show. The paper reports that the Tanaiste was asked why the USC hadn't been abolished. "The honest-to-God answer," he replied, "is that we now rely on the five billion euro it brings in. The USC is here to stay," says the Mirror. That report is taken from Simon Harris' appearance on the Today program with David McCullough on RTÉ Radio 1 yesterday, and RTÉ is the main story for several papers. Headlines focus on the surprise announcement yesterday that RTÉ's funding is to be cut by twenty million euro. The Irish Independent writes that Minister for Culture Patrick O'Donovan failed to rule out the possibility of compulsory redundancies, saying that was a matter for the RTÉ board. The Irish Examiner reports that the budget cut could jeopardize the purchase of a site for a new RTÉ studio in Cork. The Irish Daily Mail says there are now concerns within the coalition that RTÉ Director General Kevin Bakhurst could leave. Pentobarbital has ended up being used for something its creators could never have imagined. That's in the Mirror. Under the headline American Horror Story, Christopher Bucktin writes about Christa Pike, who was supposed to be executed by the drug but is instead lying shackled to a hospital bed while she awaits her fate. For decades, writes Bucktin, pentobarbital was used as a therapeutic drug to sedate patients and control serious seizures. It's also used to put seriously ill or injured animals to sleep. A drug designed to relieve suffering has ended up being used to execute criminals and has famously failed, says the paper. A man is in a critical condition in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital after, uh, the attempted robbery of his e-scooter. The Irish Daily Star reports that the victim, in his forties, was seriously injured after two men tried to take his e-scooter in Dundalk on Tuesday night. A man in his thirties with a significant history of offending was arrested and remains in custody. Both the Irish News and the Belfast Telegraph report on the case of a man who was driving at ninety miles per hour in a thirty mile per hour zone before striking a man out walking his dog in Belfast. Both the man and the dog died. The accused, who failed to remain at the scene, has twice been convicted of speeding since the fatal collision in February 2021. Back to the budget, and the