Suffering of flood victims not a political football

The floods have created enormous hardship and heartache. The prospect of such flooding recurring is a major concern.

As we face into an election, political minds are suddenly focused on the issue, to gain at the expense of suffering. It is wrong to make a political football out of this misfortune.

All of the parties of governance ought to share blame for inaction.

Bad planning practices of the past have contributed to the problem.

We need a solution, but politicians’ first response is the imposition of yet another levy on insurance policies to cover costs, as if the public didn’t have enough levies to cope with already. Such a levy will not solve flooding. Successive governments have failed to address aspects of the insurance industry that have contributed to the cost of premiums.

They have failed to tackle the legal system in the processing of claims, which, in most cases, are larger than they ought to be and are a large contributory factor to the cost of premiums.

Of course, it is easier to impose a further levy on consumers, so as to allow the legal system to continue without control.

Since major funding will be required to properly address the issue, why does the Government not also stop, or substantially reduce, the yearly funding being sent out of this country in overseas aid, which will amount to €640m in 2016, all of it borrowed money?

The time has surely come for this government, or the next, to address the many issues facing the people, but without imposing more costs. Surely, this yearly €640m, along with tackling the legal system, would go some way to addressing the problems faced by our own flood victims. Other areas are also in urgent need of funding within our society.

No country came to our aid when €70bn of foreign-banking debt was imposed on the citizens of this country.

It is about time that our out-of-touch politicians came out of their ivory towers and started working for the people who put them there, besides engaging in empty rhetoric and seeking cheap publicity for their own benefit, on the backs of flood victims.

Christy Kelly

Templeglantine

Co Limerick