The Mick Clifford Podcast

Imelda Wickham spent twenty years as a prison chaplain in one of Ireland’s largest prisons. During that time she met hundreds of prisoners and their families and her experience has led her to the conclusion that for the greater part prison doesn’t work. She talks about the kind of people she met over her years as chaplain and the families of prisoners who have to bear their own burden. She also explores why it is that only those from the poorest backgrounds who usually end up behind bars. Imelda would like to see greater emphasis on restorative justice as it would facilitate the victim but avoid what is supposed to be the last resort of prison. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Three sisters and their cousin suffered prolonged abuse as children at the home of their uncle in Dublin. On November 1, Patrick Caffrey with an address at Grove Road, Harold’s Cross was sentenced to three years in prison. The ending of the legal process was a relief for the three Odumosu sisters, Grace, Siobhan and Fiona and their cousin Linda McDonagh. But the experience from the point where they disclosed the abuse to the conviction and sentence of the perpetrator was one that exacerbated the trauma they had suffered at the hands of their uncle. Grace and Siobhan Odumosu spoke to Mick for this week’s podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Robert Harris has, for the last thirty four years, spent at least six months every year living in Skellig Michael. His job description was originally caretaker/guide but he has come to be a keeper of the Rock and its heritage and role as a bird sanctuary. Robert has now written a moving and fascinating account of the rock, its power and his relationship with it, entitled Returning Light: 30 Ye.ars of Life On Skellig Michael.Robert Harris is this week’s guest on the podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Anne Daly and Ronan Tynan’s latest documentary Bringing Assad To Justice examines the attempts by hundreds of exiled Syrians to gather enough evidence to ensure that one day Bashar al Assad will have to stand trials for his war crimes. This is the Irish filmmaker’s second piece of work on the war in Syria where at least 350,000 people have died and six million have been forced to leave the country. The documentary is particularly timely as recent events suggest there are already attempts to invite the Syrian dictator back into the international community. Ronan spoke about the making of the film, the brave people he encountered and how an Irish video journalist in the New York Times highlighted how the regime had actually targeted hospitals for bombing. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Are Irish voters moving to the left and if so why? Results from the 2020 general election appear to indicate that a growing number of voters are now voting on the left of the political spectrum. But is this a fad, or related to specific issues in that election, or is it part of a growing trend in this country? If there is a move to the left then it is coming at a time when many countries in Europe and even further afield appear to be going in the opposite direction. Political economist Aidan Regan recently co-wrote a paper on the issue and he talks on the podcast this week about what is really going on, how long it has been going on and what exactly is left populism, which appears to be in the ascendant with Irish voters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

At a time when climate change is taking up more of the public square questions are being raised as to how we can all live more sustainably. To that end environmental scientist Tara Shine has penned a book How To Save Your Planet One Object At A time. The book shows how we can all make little changes incrementally in our daily lives that will ultimately not just save the planet but most likely save money too. Tara was Mick’s guest on this week’s podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week a whistleblower told the US senate about how Facebook had suppressed research that showed the serious impact that use of the company’s Instagram platform can have on young women and girls. Frances Haugen said that anytime it came to a conflict between public safety and profit, Facebook always opted for the latter. So how harmful is the culture of Facebook and Instagram and what can be done to protect young people in particular from the worst excesses in pursuit of profit. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Are you a confident person or do you lack confidence? How does it feel to be confident and how can you get a little of that if you don’t have it. How powerful is the collective confidence in nations, large groups or even sports teams? And what is the crucial connection between confidence and action? Ian Robertson is Emeritus Professor of Psychology in Trinity College Dublin and he has written a fascinating book about the subject called How Confidence Works. He is this week’s guest on the podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

How much do the big tech companies, led by Facebook, Google and Amazon, know about you? How big an influence do they have on your life without you even realising it? The role of big tech in all our lives has increased exponentially in recent years but a question arises as to whether elected governments have kept up with them to the extent that they can protect us, the citizens.Johnny Ryan of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties is co-author of a report, Europe’s Enforcement Paralysis, which suggests we may be living in a wild west of cyberspace. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The exhumation of the body of ‘Baby John’ this week has once again awoken interest in the Kerry Babies case. The gardai are anxious to find the mother of the baby whose body was found on the White Strand in Cahirciveen in April 1984 with twenty eight stab wounds. So how close are the gardai to actually finding, after all these years, the missing person in this case of tragedy and injustice?Donal Hickey was one of the earliest reporters on the scene when the story first broke and he covered the tribunal that went down in history as a notorious example of how some women were treated in the Ireland of the time. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.