Mrs Kinsella's Creche, Donnycarney, Dublin Nine

'Get us a cup of tea will ya Jimmy?' croaked Mrs Kinsella, drawing heavily on the three smouldering cigarettes she held in her fist. 'You what? I know you bleedin' scalded yourself with the kettle yesterday. Did yer mammy not put any Sudocreme on it? Jaysus. Neglect, that's what it is. Pure and utter neglect.'

Jimmy was five. He looked quite terrified, and his right hand was covered with bandages.

'C'm'ere t'me Jayden. Yeah, you,' roared Mrs Kinsella. 'Have y'any of them jelly babies left? No? You bleedin' glutton.'

'I gave the last one to you, Mrs Kinsella,' said Jayden, his eyes fixed on the ground in an intense stare of shame.

'Yeah, but who ate the rest of them? It wasn't me, was it Jayden? You cheeky little shite. Fuck off now and go back to cleanin' the bath.'

Mrs Kinsella got up out of her armchair with great effort. She fastened her pink dressinggown around her waist. 'Ah Jaysus, me back,' she moaned.

Mrs Kinsella was only twenty-nine years old, but she already had seven children of her own, all of whom she sent to boarding school as soon as they were old enough. The creche didn't make her quite enough money to afford all the school fees, but she also had the social, her disability allowance, her father's CIE pension money and the compensation she got from the hairdresser who burned her ear with a GHD in 2009.

Mrs Kinsella was nothing if not enterprising. Ten quid a day to look after a child was quite a bargain, and so every mother in the area dropped their children to Mrs Kinsella in the mornings. Her two-bed council house was small, but it just about accommodated the fifty-two children she looked after daily. It was good life experience for them, Mrs Kinsella told the mothers. They learned useful skills like making tea, cleaning out ashtrays, ironing, basic sewing, and polishing things with Brasso.

Speaking of which, Janice Dempsey was polishing the fender around the fireplace as Mrs Kinsella stepped over some small boys to get to the cupboard where she kept her vodka bottles.

'Janice!' shouted Mrs Kinsella. 'The fuck are ya doin'? There's bleedin' streaks alloverih. Go an' get yourself a clean yellow cloth.'

'There aren't any more cloths Mrs Kinsella,' said Janice, almost despairing. She had been using the same filthy cloth for the last week in repeated failed attempts to clean the fender. She was seven.

'De fuck do I care? Get yourself on the 20B and go down to Talbot Street and get a few new ones. There's fifty p. Bring me back a Cornetto as well.'

Janice was about to say something in response but Mrs Kinsella cut across her. 'Hurry up to fuck!'

​Mrs Kinsella's creche was eventually closed down when she was reported to the police for locking three​ small children in the broom cupboard which she alleged was inhabited by a mythical Chinese man. Her profiteering from innocent children's misery was of course denounced in all the red-tops, but secretly most of her neighbours were envious: why hadn't they thought of doing that?

Social Democrats Fight to the Death

Following the departure of Stephen Donnelly TD from the Social Democrats party, remaining co-leaders Roisin Shortall and Catherine Murphy will Fight to the Death in order to see Who is Better.

Ringside seats will be available for the public spectacle of a left-of-centre bitchfight, which is to take place in a large purple boxing ring, to be erected specially on the lawn of Leinster House, Merrion Square, Dublin Two.