Are we citizens or economic units?

THE High Court ruling on Tara changes nothing. The decision to put a motorway in this sensitive and sacred landscape was wrong, is wrong and always will be wrong.

As for the Minister ignoring the clear view of Dr Wallace of the National Museum that the motorway should not go through the Tara valley, we now know for sure that the only safeguard that remained to Irish people for the protection of important heritage has gone the same way as Dúchas and the Monuments Act - down the Swanee.

We Irish have become a sad race with a very narrow view of what real progress means. Those who value something more than the economic bottom line are increasingly marginalised and seen as a nuisance.

If the Government succeeds in bringing its fast-tracking Strategic Infrastructure Bill into law, it will put the final nail in the coffin of meaningful public participation. The genuine and valid questions and concerns of the citizen will be steamrolled like the Tara landscape.

Is it not time for us Irish to ask ourselves what kind of future we want for ourselves and our children?

a) a society with democracy and participation at its core or

b) a tyrannical, unsustainable economy with competitiveness at its core.

Who chooses?

Claire Oakes

Bellinter

Navan

Co Meath