It’s an illusion that this country cherishes all of its children

ACHTUNG Bertie! The Taoiseach could take a lead from the Germans who have embarked on a campaign to get the rest of the world to think their country is sexy.

Germany wants to re-invent itself as the land of 100,000 willkommen and throw off the widespread perception that they're an arrogant nation of sunbed-stealers.

It may not be coincidence that the German tetchiness about their image comes in the wake of the unfortunate comparison Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi made between a German politician and a Nazi.

That was an outrageous comment, but the Teutonic temperature was about settling down when insult was added to injury by the Italian junior minister for tourism.

Given that he is in charge of the country's tourism, it was not a good idea for Stefano Stefani to describe Germans as "uniform supernationalistic blonds" who "loudly invade" Italy's beaches each summer. Seeing that about 10 million German tourists spend billions of euros in Italy every year, it was definitely not a good idea.

It would be rather similar to Bord Fáilte coming out with slogans like: "Yankees Go Home," or "Brits Out".

Consequently, the first prospective German tourist to announce he was cancelling his Italian holiday was Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, who probably won't be too worried about losing his deposit.

Instead, the Schroeders will be relaxing this year in their home town of Hanover, where there probably isn't too much of a rush on the sunbeds.

Now, while the insult from Silvio Berlusconi was totally unacceptable, it might be that most non-German tourists could identify with the comment about the sunbeds. For whatever reason, they have an obsession with getting the choice spots by the pool and hell-bent on doing so, which is irritating to everybody else and leads to an outbreak of a war of wits.

It's not an exaggeration to say that most of us have engaged in strategies involving dusk (or dawn) manoeuvres to the pool with an armful of towels to defeat the German invasion. A fortnight in the sun can turn into a war of wills, with most other nationalities collaborating to defeat the Germans in the battle of the beds. So maybe they're a bit too touchy on that subject.

To try to change their image, the Germans would rather have their national brand be identified with celebrities such as the supermodel Claudia Schiffer and sporting heroes like footballer Juergen Klinsmann and former tennis player Boris Becker.

Their first target, metaphorically speaking, is France, where a sexy and suggestive slogan will try to woo the French with the message: "There is so much we can do together."

From next year, the Germans will try to capture the goodwill of the people in Eastern Europe, which could be a rather difficult exercise, getting over those painful memories. Presumably, they'll come up with a different slogan to France because I don't think "There is so much we can do together" would go down too well in Poland.

As part of the new image, they airbrushed the Luftwaffe logo from aircraft used by Mr Schroeder and other top government officials, because it tended to be a reminder that cities like Warsaw were reduced to rubble by the German air force.

Maybe he was so incensed at the latest insult from the Italian junior tourism minister, or he hasn't adjusted to the new image, but the German economy and Labour Minister Wolfgang Clement might be more careful in the kind of language he uses himself. He was quoted in the mass-selling Bild newspaper as saying Mr Stefani should be "taken out of circulation".

There are, of course, a number of interpretations you could take out of that but I hope he did not mean the most obvious one. It just wouldn't sit too well with the new image.

A new image, too, is what the Fianna Fáil-PD conglomeration could well do with. Bertie Ahern would badly need a campaign similar to the German effort to convince the world that this country is a democracy where people enjoy fundamental rights instead of the hypocritical state we actually live in.

It is especially so if you need the health service or you're a youngster attending one of our dangerous schools, or have special needs.

The immensely successful staging of the Special Olympics last month could give the wrong impression that this is a country where children and those with special needs are looked after. As we know, the opposite it true, because the facts speak for themselves. An ombudsman for children has not been appointed because the Government has refused to provide the necessary money.

Surprise, surprise it was part of the Programme for Government, but like most of the promises in that fairytale book, it wasn't delivered.

Despite the fact that when Fianna Fáil and the PDs were in office the previous term, the Ombudsman for Children Act was passed, but that's as far as it went. In the meantime, as the Labour Party's spokeswoman on children's affairs, Senator Kathleen O'Meara pointed out, breaches of children's rights and welfare by public bodies cannot now be investigated.

Those with a complaint children themselves, their parents or somebody acting on behalf of a child have nowhere to go except to court.

In a country which professes to cherish all children equally, it might be imagined that looking after their fundamental rights would be automatic.

Far from it, as we know because when it comes to getting rights they're entitled to, especially children with special needs, the Government threatens legal action and invariably delivers on that threat.

It would cost only €317,000 for an ombudsman and three support staff, which actually has been set aside in this year's estimates, according to the Department of Health. Possibly, getting anybody to take the job could be the difficulty because of the workload they would face, from fighting for special needs to the provision of decent and safe schools.

Whoever was to blame for the cancellation of heart surgery for little Róisín Ruddle, who tragically died within hours, the fact is that it should never have happened in one of Europe's wealthiest countries.

Neither should premature baby Bronagh Livingstone have died last December, after her mother was turned away from Monaghan General Hospital and dispatched by ambulance to Cavan.

It was by the grace of God that no child or teacher was seriously injured, or worse, when the roof of a classroom caved in at St Nessan's school at Mungret, Co Limerick, not too long ago.

But there are too many other schools around the country where accidents are just waiting to happen and, unfortunately, it is inevitable that one will.