Pat Leahy and Harry McGee join Hugh Linehan to look back on the week in politics:

• The fallout from Budget 2027 has been minimal, save for Minister for Media Patrick O’Donovan’s eleventh-hour decision to cut State subvention to RTÉ by €20 million. Having seen his department pre-budget demands not being met, the Minister warned that the Government – not just his department - “will renege on the three-year funding deal agreed with RTÉ in July 2024.”
• Unlike O’Donovan, Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers saw his political capital augment this week. It took a giveaway budget of €8.5bn to avoid putting anyone’s nose seriously out of joint, but at least he kept to the 6 per cent spending margin for 2027.
• Public sector pay demands will see industrial action rather than negotiations in the short-term but perhaps the Government and the unions will sit down and talk before both sides become entrenched.
• And once lobbied by property developers like Johnny Ronan, former minister Simon Coveney now lobbies on his behalf. Ronan is redeveloping the former Irish Glass Bottle site in Ringsend with up to 3,800 apartments planned. Dublin City Council are now urging Coveney to honour affordable housing plans for the site, drawn up while he was housing minister.

Plus, the panel picks their favourite Irish Times pieces of the week:

• The factors underpinning France’s school protests, fear among Ireland’s Jewish community, and Ireland’s place in a changing Europe.