Before immigration, Ireland was a grey and colourless place to live

In the Ireland I grew up in, we had an identity, we had sovereignty, we had white skin and not a whole lot else, writes Terry Prone

DEAR Alan, Peter, and Gary, in my business, media consultancy, I warn people before a launch that something outside of their control may reduce the media space available to them. Nevertheless, I was surprised when the launch of Identity, your new political party, walked into a double whammy. First, anti-racist protesters took the shine off it, and then the cull-the-seagulls frenzy made bits of it. You must be disappointed.

I’m sure your call for us to go back to sovereignty, and to an Ireland that had a clear identity, will resonate with some people. Nostalgia for non-existent past glory is a common delusion. But it’s mostly a delusion of people who have no life. I just don’t see a huge market out there for you, as a result. I was trying to think of when we had a clear identity, and it struck me that it might be when, if you met a black man in Dublin, you knew immediately he was a student in the Royal College of Surgeons. Those were the days. Well, I assume those were the days you want to recreate. I don’t remember them as being that special. I mostly associate them with chilblains.

Your party, in trying to get us back there, is saying we need to stop migration, because the guys knocking on our doors are only letting on to be persecuted. Even officially becoming an Irish citizen is all a cod, the way you see it. They should be sent right back where they came from, even a couple of generations post-citizenship.

Now, that might be a bit bothersome to me, because, as you can probably guess from my surname, my father’s grandparents were Hugueonots named Van Proen, who fled persecution for being Protestants.

As soon as they got here, they converted to Catholicism, which is just pointlessly perverse, but every family has its problems. If your proposed ban on immigrants staying here applies across several generations, though, I might find myself in the Netherlands and, much and all as I like tulips, I’d prefer to pass on that possibility.

Then, there’s the gratitude thing. I am grateful my sister is alive. That’s not due to the Huguenots, but to the Jews who came into Ireland a while back. Before I was born, my parents and sister lived between two Jewish families. Medics, the lot of them. Which helped, because my sister, as a baby, was sick a lot.

The two families gave of their time and expertise unstintingly and without being paid, because the earner in our family, my father, was a clerk in the Dublin Gas Company and his salary didn’t stretch to paying Mr Solomon, the hospital consultant. All my parents could do to express appreciation was go into the houses on either side of them, on a Saturday, to light the gas cooker and the fire, because Orthodox Jews can’t do anything physical on their Sabbath. You’re not anti-semitic, are you? I’m sure you’re not. But you know something, the really sad thing is that the Jewish community has halved in the last decade or so. Without you being nasty to them. So it would be good to leave them alone, OK?

On the other hand, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, we’re gaining Muslims in large numbers, and I doubt you’d approve of that, perhaps — to give you the benefit of the doubt — because you’re not friends with any Muslims. I encountered a Pakistani doctor recently who was so impressive, I’d just love you to meet him. Expert. Charismatic. Courteously direct.

A senior nurse in the public hospital where he works told me that Dr X never knows the day, nor the hour, when he will get either his ethnicity or his faith thrown up at him. In one case, a patient listened to Dr X outlining the complex surgery the patient would need, and then said: “No offence, but I want a white doctor.” You have to love the “no offence”.

Dr X calmly told the patient he would take care of that for him and left the room. The nurse checked the patient’s IV and then leaned in close, so nobody could hear her tell the patient that his upcoming surgery was so difficult that, frankly, if Dr X didn’t do it, the patient was toast. It was just amazing, she said, how quickly the patient got over the colour issue, and — I’m happy to share with you — the surgery was a huge success.

Forgive me, but have you thought through this expulsion policy? I mean, if you take non-nationals and ‘new Irish’ out of the health system, including nursing homes for older people, we’re done. We’re just done. It wouldn’t be possible to take care of our people without them.

But quite apart from the health system, I can’t think of any sizeable company now that could cope, if you took that kind of action.

Another thing that bothers me is this: I have several friends who have adopted children from Russia and Vietnam and China. I’m sure those children, a bit later on, will want to go back to their country of origin and get a sense of connectedness with that aspect of their life. But for us to decide that they’re really not Irish at all, and break up their families, would be just terrible.

Maybe you’re worried that they’ll grow up and get married and dilute the Irish DNA? I hate to query Identity’s advanced thinking on this issue, but I’d have thought that would be a win/win. If we could water down our genetic enthusiasm for alcohol, for instance, wouldn’t that be a fine thing?

Or, maybe it’s the colour issue. In the village through which I pass on my way home from work is a little school. United by the same uniform and accents, dozens of children pour out of it every day, all different skin colours.

They get along with each other in the way their age group always has; one minute pushing and shoving, the next minute all sweetness and light. Since your launch, I’ve been trying to figure out why you would want them all gone. Possibly it’s because you’re too young to remember the Ireland I grew up in, where we had an identity, we had sovereignty, we had white skin and not a whole lot else, other than the miseries of that tedious old trout, Peig.

Just between you and me, days of wine and roses, they wasn’t. Days of porridge and Tintawn, more like.

Honestly, lads, now that you’ve done your bit of self-expression, you might consider folding the tent. Because when the media finds seagulls more appealing than you, your PR/marketing is going to be an uphill struggle. I hope and pray.