Villagers: Letters to the Editor 2005-10-20
Senior citizens
'OAP' title out of date
Surely it is time to change the insulting and out of fashion tag of "Old Age Pensioner" to a new and more modern description for the men and women now approaching their 66th birthdays.
Many people over 65 years of age have been written to by faceless officials saying that they will qualify for the old age pension.
A person of 66 years can hardly be described as an old age pensioner these days. Life spans have increased, more active elderly people are playing vital roles in the community and I feel that the old age tag is out of fashion.
Surely a senior citizen's allowance or benefit would be far more acceptable than condemning these men and women to years as old age pensioners.
The fact that our lifestyles are changing and people are more healthy and living longer must have some effects on the departments that deal with social benefits.
For an active, hard-working man or woman to be called an old age pensioner could be deemed an insult in these enlightened times so I am suggesting that the name of the allowance be changed to take away the old-age aspect.
Surely departments have to adapt to various forms of social change and at present many men and women are performing vital tasks in the community, even if they have reached pension age. Let the payment be designated as a senior citizen's allowance.
Joe Lynch
Limerick
Discrimination
Welfare biased against women
The National Women's Council (NWCI) is urging Minister Seamus Brennan to end the discrimination against women in the social welfare system. Budget 2006 is the opportunity for the Government to get the strategy right for women.
The NWCI has been calling for change for some time. In May of this year, the Council launched its "Brown Envelope Campaign" which saw over 12,000 women and men across Ireland join with the NWCI to show their anger at the treatment of women in the social welfare system.
On this, the United Nations Day Against Poverty, the NWCI is highlighting the fact that women aged 65 years and older have a 41 per cent chance of living in relative poverty.
These are the NWCI's recommendations for change to the social welfare system in Budget 2006:
• End the discrimination against women.
• All Qualified Adult payments should be increased to 100 per cent of the personal rate and paid directly to the Qualified Adult.
• Recognise the care work of women.
• Change the homemakers 'disregards' into homemakers 'credits'.
• Make these credits retrospective for all women who engaged in unpaid care work from 1973.
• Introduce a means-tested parental allowance payment available to parents with a child under the age of five.
• Recognise the employment patterns of women. NWCI has highlighted how the Government are currently faced with a childcare dilemma of how to support parents who wish to care for their children at home and supporting childcare for parents working outside of the home.
Providing 'credits' for care work will give recognition to those who want to care for their children at home, so that they have an entitlement to pension and maternity payments.
Many of the inequalities which women experience have reached a crisis point for the Government and for society. By making the recommended changes to the system. women's economic independence would be increased, older women's poverty would be addressed in a meaningful way and women's care work and access to employment would be facilitated.
Before the launch of the NWCI's "Brown Envelope Campaign", the Council met with Minister Brennan, where he acknowledged that the social welfare system is based on a male breadwinner model and is therefore unfair to women. The Government now needs to take action in Budget 2006 to address the structural inequalities that discriminate against women.
National Women's Council of Ireland
Dublin 1 Tel: 01-8787248 Email: info@nwci.ie Web: www.nwci.ie
The environment
Climate change will hit poor first
A campaign has been launched to get all 166 TDs in the Dáil to sign a climate pledge, promising that Ireland will do its fair share to tackle global climate change. A new website, www.climatepledge.ie, enables the public to email their local TDs, urging them to sign the pledge.
This campaign is a wake-up call for Irish politicians and the public. There is a need to face up to the threat of runaway climate change. With a failure to act, climate change will have catastrophic consequences. Steps need to be taken to reduce our carbon emissions now or face unprecedented upheaval and disruption in the future.
Otherwise this century will see ever more storms, floods, droughts and famines. And the poorest and most vulnerable communities in the world will be hit first and hit hardest. For them it will mean destruction of lives and livelihoods. For Ireland it will mean flood damage, falling property values and spiralling insurance costs. But why wait for climate change to hit home? Acting before it's too late will make a difference.
The pledge which TDs are being asked to sign acknowledges that climate change is already happening and that humanity is causing it, but states that people have the power to stop it running out of control if they do enough. It restates the international scientific consensus that to prevent dangerous levels of climate change people need to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions to 60 per cent of 1990 levels by 2050. Crucially, it acknowledges the historical responsibility of rich countries such as Ireland to lead the way as the vast bulk of past and present emissions come from rich countries. It commits each TD to doing all in their power to prevent dangerous climate change.
Friends of the Earth will be approaching each and every TD to ask them to sign the pledge and is looking to the public to play its part in supporting the campaign online at www.climatepledge.ie
Friends of the Earth Ireland
9 Upper Mount Street, Dublin 2
Shannon and the Iraq war
Ministers showing contempt for public over war
Congratulations to Vincent Browne, Colin Murphy and Stephen Grey for researching US military and intelligence operations at Shannon airport. The official "three-monkey" strategy of "hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil" serves the Irish and US governments well in their seemingly unconditional cooperation.
As an Irish citizen who took some pride in our foreign policy until late 2001, I am appalled at the erosion of what was a relatively independent foreign policy. With much talk, in recent years, of accountability and 'freedom of information', I expect truth and some real information when Ministers are questioned about US use of Irish airports and airspace.
Huge contempt for Irish people and TDs is demonstrated in answers to recent Parliamentary Questions about the use of Irish airports, particularly Shannon, by US-controlled aircraft. These 'answers' seem designed to confuse and conceal information.
Typical examples are the Foreign Affairs answers given to questions about foreign military landings and overflights: "Permission is normally granted on certain conditions ... that the aircraft is unarmed ... not taking part in military exercises, etc." A recent qualification adds: "These conditions are not legal requirements but are policy stipulations," applied at the Minister's discretion, "...and which HE CAN WAIVE OR VARY AT ANY TIME. "
It seems that Foreign Affairs Ministers, at least, have assumed sweeping powers to alter policy. This first became apparent in early 2003, when Brian Cowen, as Foreign Affairs Minister, had to recant on previous assertions that US troops, landing at Shannon, were unarmed.
The current Minister, presiding over increasing militarisation of Shannon, (234,752 troop movements from January to September 2005) follows Brian Cowen's example. Minister Dermot Ahern, during recent Priority Questions (6 October) was eventually challenged by John Gormley TD to have even a single US-controlled plane checked at Shannon. Minister Ahern, cornered, resorted to party-political jibes and personal slanging until time for the question expired, thus avoiding either answer or commitment. This passes for democratic accountability under the current administration!
Colm Roddy
Bayside, Dublin
US foreign policy
Poor media coverage of US foreign policy
For some time I have viewed your coverage of US foreign policy with disdain. Like all other European media outlets, your magazine has allowed itself to succumb to a simplistic, idiotic, insulated and short-sighted analysis of US foreign policy that fails to focus on the facts at hand and prefers to deal in caricatures. It appears that the views expressed in your magazine have been severely limited by the abject failure of your writers (including Vincent Browne) to understand the qualitative and quantitative change that has occurred in US security policy since 9/11.
Before the tragic events of 9/11, US security policy concerns centered on threats from other great powers such as China and Russia but 9/11 illustrated the very real deficiencies of this approach and demonstrated that the primary risks to US national security came from States that would not have registered under the old criteria. I speak of failed states (such as Afghanistan) and weak rogue states (such as Iraq). Also this new security paradigm adopted a new operating principle, based on probability and risk. It is in this light that the war on Iraq must be viewed. The war was based on the condition that a Saddam-controlled Iraq was extremely hostile to America and the West (he did try to assassinate George Bush Snr); that he could develop or acquire nuclear, biological or chemical capabilities and that he could develop a link with a terrorist organisation such as al Qaida or a splinter group which would be willing to perpetrate an attack on US interests. There was a significant probability that this chain of events could occur, especially since a more pious Saddam had recently publicly embraced Islam to shore up support in his domestic Sunni political base.
To have ignored the very real probability of such an outcome would inevitably lead to accusations of short-sightedness on the part of the US security analysts and would undoubtedly have led to a further significant attack on US soil.
As regards the present unstable condition of Iraq, it would have been virtually impossible to prevent them. Iraq is a colonially-designed state where three contesting tribes have been thrown together, the largest of which has been subjected to severe coercion by a population half its size for two generations. It was always going to be impossible to arrive at a situation where the ruling minority, who had been in charge for so long, would readily relinquish their control and that the Shi'ite majority would not seek some retribution for the long years of persecution. Conflict was inevitable but the US Army has worked tirelessly and thanklessly to restrict the levels of violence which would undoubtedly proliferate without their presence and allow Iraq to descend into a Hobbesian war of all against all. Without them, life in Iraq would most definitely be "nasty, brutish and shorter". Instead of walking away, the US government and military have committed considerable resources to Iraq to facilitate a transition that, although currently painful, will result in a strong democracy at the heart of the Middle East. It is a painful and long process, but change always is.
In the end a transformed Iraq will become a beacon of hope to democratic sympathisers throughout a currently autocratic Middle East (except, of course, the Lebanon, which is moving towards democracy, thanks to US pressure). For this very worthwhile and very grand scheme it deserves our support; for this alone it deserves less ignorance.
Robert O' Driscoll
Dublin 16
Chechynan Crisis
Russia fails Chechnya
Last week's assault on the Russian city of Nalchik by Chechen Rebels of the "Caucasus Front" demonstrates that the war in the region has taken a more sinister turn. There has been a noticeable change in the tactics of the Chechen rebels, under the leadership of Abdul Saydullayev. This was the first of the large-scale attacks on Russian territory, that were promised since the the relatively dovish Aslan Maskhadov was assassinated by Russian forces.
The attack shows that the rebels are growing in numbers and popularity. There is one reason for this. Russia has created a situation in Chechnya where young people grow up utterly without hope. The Russian policy in Chechnya seems to revolve around subjugation, torture, "disappearances" and general brutality. There has been no effort to try and win the "hearts and minds" of the general Chechen population. With unemployment at around 90 per cent, young men and women, who are harassed daily by the 80,000 troops that saturate the area, are being driven into the arms of the rebels. It's almost as if Russia wants the war to continue for decades to come.
If Russia continues down this road, attacks like Nalchik will become more prevalent, and could well push the wider North Caucasus into full-scale war.
Cormac O'Brien
Malahide, Co Dublin
1916
1916 and World War One
Pierce Martin says that the political context I gave for the 1916 Rising and the success of the War of Independence "is sheer myth, it simply did not exist" (Village, 13-19 October). However, he then proceeds to tell me that I should "remember that, of the 200,000 volunteers fighting at the front, 60 per cent were Catholic," but neglects to remind me why they were there. Not for the sake of their Catholicism, I am sure he would agree. But, as he must surely admit, they were there for "the freedom of small nations" and that Ireland was uppermost in their minds. Nobody with the most elemental knowledge of that War could deny this – but no doubt Pierce will. It was the betrayal of that ideal that ensured the success of the War of Independence and the acceptance that the 1916 rebels had been right in their revolt.
Tom Barry was one of 200,000 very determined, very effective (and Catholic) men who were placed across a number of fronts in Europe and into Mesopotamia, now Iraq. As "Gunner Barry", he was a hero of the war, with the appropriate songs written about him and he raised the Union Jack in celebration in Bandon after the War. "Gunner Barry" then became the leading military man of the IRA. The rest, as they say, is history. But why did he become what he is famous for? Pierce should ask himself this. It was his realisation that he, along with 60 per cent of the 200,000, had been taken for fools and their courage, decency and honesty viciously betrayed. It is not rocket science to understand this.
Pierce's continuing abuse of a whole variety of people, British and Irish, living and dead, male and female, will not do as analysis and at this point of our debate it only proves, once again, that paper will accept anything that's written on it.
Jack Lane
Millstreet, Co Cork
Recycling
More recycling bins in Clondalkin
It is only recently that I have come across a place to recycle our plastic milk containers, bottles, and in general most things plastic in Clondalkin. The difference that this has made to my general waste bin is considerable and the savings are worth the effort.
Beforehand, we were putting our waste bin out every week, now we put it out every three weeks. This is for a family of four young children and two adults. Could I ask the authorities to please have these recycling banks at a more convenient places and to have more of them.
I am sure that the vast majority of the general public are not aware of their recycling areas and more importantly the savings that can be made on this already expensive waste bin collection charge.
Paul Doran
Dublin 22
Limerick
Violent Limerick neighbours
Desperate City Council tenants in Limerick are now reported to be considering burning down their own homes in order to escape from anti-social neighbours.
In the north side of the city the problem of violent neighbours is now so bad that tenants are considering resorting to desperate methods to escape from some housing schemes. It is a scandal that ordinary decent families are being forced to consider torching their own homes. The fault lies with the Limerick City Council because the Council has failed to tackle the problem of anti-social behaviour.
Gangs are terrorising families and elderly people in some of the city's problem estates, but the Council's anti-social behaviour policy, while it looks good on paper, is not being implemented and the victims are left to the cruel mercies of the thugs.
The Council insists that the victims of anti-social behaviour identify their tormentors – but this public confrontation is more than the victims can bear and it leads to further harassment and intimidation.
In recent weeks the problem for some families has become to unbearable that reports in the community say they have resorted to setting fire to their own homes in order to be re-housed away from violent neighbours.
This problem for many Limerick families will not go away, but only get worse and the City Council must now back up its anti-social behaviour policy with firm action rather than useless words.
Michael Ryan
Ballymanty, Limerick
Traffic chaos
Pooling cars not viable
Vincent Salafia's statement (carried in your 13 October issue) about the so-called Clare Street Initiative on Dublin's traffic problems neglected to mention perhaps the worst "solution" of all suggested at this and other forums, namely a proposal floated by the AA and Fine Gael to open Dublin's buslanes to "pooled" cars with three or more occupants.
This idea would have two principal effects: firstly, it would slow down buses and thus claw back the gains made by public transport in Dublin in recent years; secondly, it would free up more space in the centre of the road for single occupancy cars, thus encouraging more of them on the road. Even the "pooling" itself could be farcical, since many of the extra car-occupants would as likely as not be people given lifts from bus stops, thus reducing bus occupancy. I hope as many people as possible will make their opposition known to any move to implement this retrograde idea, even on a trial basis.
Richard Barrett
Dublin 6
The original Nazis
As yet another controversy flares in Northern Ireland about who and what is a Nazi, perhaps it is timely to reflect on the actual history and practice of world conquest and the extermination of inferior races.
For example: "(The) final extermination was a large-scale event, undertaken with the co-operation of the military and the judiciary. Soldiers of the (Waffen SS) drove the natives between two great rock formations, shot all the men and dragged the women and children out of fissures in the rocks to knock their brains out."
Except that this was not the Balkans in the twentieth century, and it was not a Nazi atrocity. It was actually not the Waffen SS. It was the Fortieth Regiment of the British Army in 19th century Tasmania, as described by Wilhelm Ziehr in Hell in Paradise.
In 1900 the British policy of world domination and extermination was described as follows by Gilbert Murray (Oxford Regius Professor of Classics, President of the League Of Nations and Chairperson of the United Nations Association): "… the subject races in the British Empire … those whom we cannot utilise we exterminate … Tasmanians were useless, and are all dead…. Go, if you dare, into a searching comparison between the treatment of the Queensland Kanakas, who were useful beasts of burden, and that of the Queensland aborigines, who were regarded as vermin, and you will bless the lot of the half-enslaved Kanaka."
If we were to believe the succession of documentaries, films and other propaganda to which we are endlessly subjected, Britain finally came good in 1939 and set out selflessly to free the tormented victims of the concentration camps. Sadly, the facts tell a very different story. Having helped bring about the downfall of the democratic German government in 1933, Britain supported and consolidated the Nazi regime until Britain suddenly decided in 1939 that there was room for only one world-dominating power.
Then, having declared war on Germany it failed to prosecute its war and was driven out of Europe in 1940. The Nazis, whose movement was inspired and motivated by the British empire, were finally defeated by their intended victims in Eastern Europe.
And is it all in the past now? I'm afraid not. While Christian civilisation was once conferred on benighted savages by means of bayonet, whip and cudgel, Britain and its allies now deliver human rights and democracy to the world via the tank, the bomb and the bullet.
Pat Muldowney
Magee College, University of Ulster
Perceptions of Protestantism
Alec Reid was being preposterously over the top when he described unionists as similar to Nazis, but would he still be in trouble if he had said they were like fascists? Will it soon be a matter of incitement to hatred to assert the simple sociological fact that unionism is a 20th-century phenomenon, part of a European fascist movement? The variant seen in Northern Ireland simply outlived all the others.
This obvious fact is obscured from us by the all-pervasive 'Whig view of history'. The phrase is derived from Herbert Butterfield, who rightly questioned the automatic unhistorical assumption that Protestantism has always and everywhere been a harbinger of enlightenment and democracy. Most people are aware of the Catholic Church's disgraceful record in Nazi Germany, but few people are aware that the Lutheran church in Germany behaved even worse. For years the Irish saw their role in the world as one of the few First World peoples who knew the colonial experience.
I suggest that our current unique value in the world is that we alone, within the dominant Anglophone sphere, realise that the 'Whig view of history' is cartoon history. We should be shouting it from the roof-tops, rather than hounding the hapless Alec Reid. Orangeism's self-righteous, belligerent sectarianism is all of a piece with the war-mongering racism of Bush's red states in America.
While Protestantism brought enlightenment and tolerance to Scandinavia, Holland and even England, it sponsored the exact opposite in Northern Ireland, in Hitler's Germany and in the American heartland. We are best placed to bring this truth to our British and American friends and we should have the moral courage to do it.
Tim O'Halloran Ferndale Road, Dublin 11
Statement: Giant insects invade streets of Belfast
A swarm of brightly-coloured giant illuminated insects will invade the streets of Belfast on Friday 21 October to mark the opening of this year's Belfast Festival at Queen's, which runs until Sunday 6 November.
Gigantic, colourful ants, bees, spiders, butterflies and even a preying mantis will parade from Belfast City Hall to Custom House Square as part of Insectes, a street procession by Spanish company Sarruga. The insects will be interacting with the audience and will be accompanied by drummers from the Beat Initiative and local young people and community groups.
To be part of Insectes, simply come along to the front gates of City Hall for 6.30pm and join in the fun, which starts at 6.45pm on 21 October. The event is supported by Laganside Corporation, Arts Council of Northern Ireland National Lottery Fund and Belfast City Council.
Insectes is just one example of the packed programme of local, national and international artists who will be performing throughout the 17 day festival. Festivities continue after the parade with the Ulster Bank Opening Concert – Symphony by the River at the Waterfront Hall, featuring legendary 60s music icon Marianne Faithfull and band in performance with the Ulster Orchestra and the Renaissance Singers.
Returning to the Belfast Festival at Queen's for a second time is award-winning Lithuanian director Oskaras Korsunovas, who stunned festival audiences in 2001 with his version of A Midsummer Night's Dream and returns in 2005 with the UK premiere of another Shakespearean classic, Romeo and Juliet, on Thursday 20 October.
Dance fans can look forward to the Ireland premiere of Love Me, a trilogy of new work by Australian choreographer Lucy Guerin, based around the theme of relationships, which will be performed at the Waterfront Hall studio on Tuesday 1 and Wednesday 2 November.
Kicking off this year's jazz programme is world renowned Polish jazz band the Tomasz Stanko Quartet at the Elmwood Hall on Friday, 21 October. Jazz fans can also catch jazz trio Melt, featuring Bangor drummer Steve Davis at the Spring and Airbrake on Sunday, 23 October.
Comedy is as popular as ever with TV favourite Harry Hill performing at the Whitla Hall on Sunday 23 October and former member of The Nualas, Karen Egan, celebrating the diversity of European cabaret at the Spring and Airbrake on Thursday 27 October.
The BT Talks programme returns with a fascinating range of voices from the worlds of broadcast, politics, literature and the legal profession, including Michael Mansfield Q.C., best-selling children's author G.P. Taylor and Chocolat author, Joanne Harris.
Legendary singer-songwriter Jimmy Webb will perform classics including Wichita Lineman at the Elmwood Hall on Friday 28 October, while "the Jimi Hendrix of the bagpipe", Carlos Nunez, brings his dazzling fusion of Celtic and flamenco music to the Whitla Hall on the same night, in the company of the Field Marshal Montgomery Pipe Band.
And that's not all. With a huge range of films, exhibitions, family events, outreach activities and free events, the Belfast Festival at Queen's has something for every taste and pocket this year.
Further information and tickets for all events are available from the Festival Box Office on 028 9097 1197 or by visiting www.belfastfestival.com
Sarah Hughes
Culture and Arts Division, Queen's University Belfast
A voice for homeless people
Street Seen has organised several demonstrations in Dublin over the past month around the campaign of 'No more deaths on our streets – Killed by indifference'. The deaths referred to are the preventable deaths of members of the homeless community. The indifference is that of our Government to these deaths and to the issue of homelessness in general, an issue the Government seems content to leave to charities to solve. This is unacceptable, as homelessness is a social problem that requires political solutions and a political will to push through these solutions.
While the Government squanders hundreds of millions of euro, homeless people continue to suffer the most horrendous deprivations. They are susceptible to changes in the weather, to serious assault, including assaults of a sexual nature, to robberies and to verbal assaults, dished out to them by many unsympathetic members of the public. After several deaths amongst their community, the homeless began to organise themselves and to vocalise their demands. It is a campaign which is organised by and for the homeless community. Many street meetings have been held over the past month by members of the homeless community. A new voice has emerged: it is a voice of the experience of hundreds of homeless people who have been ignored by the so-called Celtic Tiger and who have been ignored by successive governments. This voice can only be silenced by eradicating homelessness once and for all.
The actions that the homeless activists have taken over the past month include a sleep-out at the Dáil to welcome the Government back from their overpaid and overextended summer holidays. The campaign is currently calling on the Government to hand over the old UCD veterinary site in Ballsbridge to Dublin City Council to deal with the homeless crisis. The support from the public for this has been overwhelming. We have gathered more than 15,000 signatures in support over the past several weeks. Handing over this land to Dublin City Council to address the homeless problem would be one step closer to eradicating homelessness. More importantly, it would be a signal from the Government that they are beginning to address the issue of homelessness in Ireland. If the Government continue to ignore the homeless community, then the homeless community will return to the gates of the Dáil and will sleep out until the Government takes action. This campaign must win, as the homeless community can't afford to lose.
Mark Grehan
Editor with Street Seen, a campaigning anti-poverty newspaper
streetseen@hotmail.co.uk or contact 087 7974622
From next week homeless people involved in Street Seen will write a weekly contribution to Villagers