Government condemned by statistics

BY any standard, the metaphor coined by Barnardos illustrates in graphic terms the true scale of child poverty in this country.

There are, as the voluntary organisation points out, so many children in the grip of poverty that they would fill Croke Park for next Sunday’s All-Ireland final. To suggest 90,000 children will remain hungry and uneducated unless immediate action is taken is an indictment of successive governments and of society at large.

No political party can evade responsibility for this deplorable situation. That censure is especially relevant to the present Coalition, which held power in the boom times but then squandered much of the Celtic Tiger’s wealth on a reckless vote-buying spree.