Jeremy Irons urges more action on waste
Irons, who lives near Skibbereen in West Cork, was speaking at UCC after a screening of his documentary Trashed which investigates the causes and effects of pollution on the world.
The actor revealed he previously screened the film in Dublin for the Government, but only two attended.
“I’d like a government that fights on our side,” he said. “The reality is, we’re preaching to the converted here. We need to reach people in the political world to really make a difference. Those are the people we need to get to.”
The honorary Corkman also criticised plans for a new incinerator in Dublin’s Ringsend, calling it “an enormous step back for the whole country”.
Dealing with incinerators in the award-winning documentary, originally screened at the Cannes Film Festival, Irons raises various concerns with the practice and highlights health problems potentially caused by dioxins — chemical compounds produced by incinerators.
“Anything that comes up, comes down. So it either comes down in the sea and gets into the ecological system in the sea, or it comes down on land in which case it goes into the ground, it comes up in the grass and it’s eaten by cattle, and we drink those things in our milk,” he said.
“They are absorbed in the food chain and they’re held in the fatty tissue of the body. Men have no way of getting rid of it, it just stays in them. Women get rid of it in their first born,” he says.
In the documentary, Irons features a town in France which was near a now-closed incinerator. It reveals 26% of the population has cancer.
The actor also investigates the effect of large doses of concentrated dioxins, travelling to Vietnam where Americans sprayed Agent Orange during the Vietnam War. He met many badly malformed children of parents affected describing it as “deeply upsetting”.
More info on Trashed: www.trashedfilm.com
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