Time to put Ireland first and Europe second

With a seasons change almost at our door, a change to our days and nights already occurring and a change to the governing of this country imminent, I wish to ask each member of the current Government and opposition one question:

What’s more important to you, the people of this country, or re-election?

It appears most elected Irish governments focus on the latter.

However, if a government puts its people first, then surely the latter should take care of itself.

I’m an Irish citizen since the day of my birth over 34 years ago.

I’ve voted in elections for more than a decade and I’ve watched governments focus on re-election campaigns, focus on favours owed – the funding of a general election campaign an interesting one – and I’ve watched as my country, Ireland, has been re-shaped and re-sized to Brussels ‘fit’.

I’m an Irish citizen first and foremost, a European secondly.

However, it feels as if my Irishness has become somewhat diluted, as if Brussels has its fingers on my passport.

To all of you, I wish to say, I’d much rather be poor and Irish, ruled by an Irish government whose only care is to govern its people to the absolute best of its capabilities, placing the Irish people and this Island as its focus, as opposed to being rich and European, and slowly losing my land, my people, my laws, to another country, another agenda.

Marie Hanna

Ballinalsoe

Co Galway