Mary Robinson should see how events can change our attitudes

Following her reported comments in Trinity College on November 17, it would seem that Mary Robinson expects the Irish public to disregard their instincts; to suspend their critical faculties; to erect a Chinese wall segregating the mass migration of undocumented and unidentifiable random strangers into Ireland from the threat of lethal terrorism in Europe; and to regard political promises made in their name, but without any consultation with them, as binding, not to be overshadowed by unfolding circumstances of any gravity.

That is a very tall order Mrs Robinson, especially when a Syrian passport has been discovered next to the body of a suicide bomber in the Paris massacre, and that individual entered the EU posing as a Syrian migrant intent on inflicting unprecedented brutality on innocent civilians that the entire global intelligence community was impotent to intercept or avert.

No public figure should have a better understanding of the impact of external circumstances on public priorities than Mary Robinson.