We are also to blame for flooding

Some exceptional weather and global warming may genuinely have increased frequency of serious flooding in Ireland but some of this is likely our own doing.

The destruction of bogs and ill-informed turf cutting has removed the natural soakage basins around our rivers turning controlled flows into spate floods at times of heavy rain.

Perhaps we might also reflect on the urgent need to save and restore our bogs as part of our natural flood defences?