Letters to the Editor: Will Greens capitulate to support hare coursing?

Neasa Hourigan’s political evisceration brings into question the draconian whip system

Protesters against the end of the eviction ban outside Leinster House, in an event organised by Raise the Roof and People Before Profit. Picture: Sasko Lazarov / RollingNews.ie

The severe sanctions imposed on Green Party TD, Neasa Hourigan, for backing a motion that sought the retention of the eviction ban contrasts starkly with the way Minster Niall Collins had been treated by the Government in the wake of those unanswered questions about a planning application.

I hope the Greens will press for a little “parity of esteem” in Leinster House because; after all, what’s sauce for the Green goose should also be sauce for the Fianna Fáil gander.

Ms Hourigan’s political evisceration also brings into question the draconian whip system that coerces elected representatives into doing a party’s bidding instead of what the voters elected them to do.

The issue around people losing their homes should surely have qualified for a conscientious vote, given the grave ethical implications of being responsible, directly or indirectly, for swelling the ranks of the homeless at a time when the lack of suitable housing has reached frightening proportions.

Will the contentious issue of hare coursing be debated before the Dáil? Picture: PA

CLIMATE & SUSTAINABILITY HUB

Other issue will come before the Dáil in the coming months that should equally be debated and voted on without the whip. One that concerns me is Paul Murphy’s Bill to ban hare coursing.

The Green Party has an official policy of opposition to this abhorrent practice, a form of animal cruelty outlawed in many jurisdictions, but its TDs will be expected to back hare coursing unless a free vote is allowed on the Bill.

While compromise is inevitable in coalition arrangements, Green Party support for hare coursing would be more than just a retrograde or lamentable step for it to take. 

It would signal the beginning of the end of the party, though not of the wider green movement in Ireland with its dedicated animal protection campaigners and advocates against biodiversity loss.

For a Green TD to vote for hare coursing would be on par with saying yes to climate change, applauding the hole in the ozone layer, or saying it’s OK to pull the last dozen polar bears off the ice-floes and throw them to the sharks.

Unfortunately, a government that can ram through a measure that will clearly exacerbate the homeless crisis, thus adding to the sum total of human misery on this island, is not too likely to be worried about a humble hare being hounded in a real — as distinct from a political — blood sport.

John Fitzgerald

Callan

Co Kilkenny

Garda was epitome of a public servant

At about 1.45pm on St Patrick’s Day we got a puncture in Glanmire village on the outskirts of Cork city but continued to travel slowly to the lay-by near the roundabout for Tivoli and the city.

As it happened a garda was standing there next to a garda car and directed us to pull in. He said immediately “you have a punctured wheel”, and straight away asked for the jack and spanner. He changed the wheel, put all the gear back, and waved us on our way.

We were so lucky to encounter such a helpful gentleman, a public servant, a kind garda, who is a credit to his calling.

We thanked him so inadequately that we believe that his kind and selfless act which is a measure of our exemplary Garda Síochána, should be acknowledged publicly.

Name and address with Editor

We should follow St Patrick’s way

How fitting it is to respect our great St Patrick each year as we commemorate his death on March 17 (and on March 30 for our fellow Orthodox Christians) and celebrate the great gifts of Christianity he has bestowed on our nation and also to reflect on how we can honour his legacy by promoting the spiritual and humane values of truth, justice and peace in our island nation and across the world.

These values are the true characteristics of the Irish people which make our Irish Defence Forces renowned peacekeepers, our impartiality as a neutral nation gives us the real power to promote diplomacy over conflict and to help belligerent countries resolve their differences by being respected mediators.

It is therefore shocking and shameful to see this current Irish government abandon our political and military neutrality by behaving like a puppet state of the pro-western Nato countries in their anti-Russian drive to escalate the war and suffering in Ukraine rather than seek dialogue and negotiations for peace between the Russian and the Ukrainian governments.

On the home front this tripartite Irish government will disgracefully throw vulnerable people onto the street by ending the eviction ban in the middle of a housing crisis. 

They have created a State where only the wealthy can prosper while the majority of the people struggle to make ends meet.

We must be a nation worthy of Saint Patrick, the great enlightener of Ireland, a people with a government who believes in creating a caring society where we hold our values more precious than wealth or power; a country that inspires truth, justice and peace with our shared humanity.

Michael Hagan

Dunmurry

Co Antrim

No need to change Constitution

There’s no need to change Article 41.2 of the Constitution — which refers to women in the home — because the existing wording shows more respect for women in the home than “modern” society does!

Working mothers have been forced back into the home because they can’t afford crèches. This is no better than de Valera’s intentions when writing the Constitution.

Article 40.3.2 protects, inter alia, the right to property. The barbaric and criminal homelessness rates in Ireland should be tried in The Hague!

Dr Florence Craven

Bracknagh

Co Offaly

Ireland is not a big global polluter

‘Unless we, in wealthy countries like Ireland, are prepared to accept tough choices right now and bear our full share of the burden of keeping the global climate system within the 1.5 to 2C threshold beyond which lies climate collapse, to be absolutely clear, we are instead choosing to dig our children and our grandchildren’s graves’.

So wrote John Gibbons, environmental journalist in the Irish Examiner (March 20).

However, baseless opinion and heightened rhetoric such as the above statement borders on the hysterical, and is counterproductive and an irresponsible exaggeration devoid of scientific evidence. 

It only serves to unnecessarily increase public anxiety, particularly among young people, already bombarded by politicians, academics, commentators, and others in the thriving climate industry, with morbid messages of impending doom here in Ireland.

John Gibbons, however, like many politicians and commentators on climate issues, confuses and conflates Ireland’s tiny contribution to global warming with the main polluters in China, Russia, USA, India as well as other countries across the EU and Asia, resulting in dangerous hyperbole as above.

Ireland's contribution to global warming is arguably smaller than bigger countries.

Clearly, he is not aware that the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has stated that Ireland is responsible for a miniscule 0.1135% of global warming. 

Perusal of the world map will confirm to him that we are a tiny island with a tiny land mass measuring 0.0575% of the entire world land area.

Maybe Mr Gibbons and the coalition are not aware that the UNFCCC has also recommended that each country should address their responsibility for global warming based on their financial capability, and more significantly, on their contribution to the problem of global warming. 

Is he aware that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has recommended countries like Ireland should focus resources on adaptation against probable disasters like rising sea levels to come?

The combined common sense and intelligence of the Irish public recognise that global warming is real and the main culprits are elsewhere. History has shown they will not be frogmarched without a sliver of consultation into accepting increasingly unnecessary draconian measures, foisted across the entire society to salve the egos of a minority political regime.

A sensible solution to this dilemma will only come through a democratic referendum where all the facts, devoid of hype and exaggeration, are put before the people.

John Leahy

Wilton Road

Cork

Protecting children by homeschooling

I was disappointed that Alison O’Connor wrote she comes ‘out in a rash’ when she hears the word ‘homeschooling’ — ‘ Why the idea of homeschooling brings me out in a bit of a rash’ (Irish Examiner, March 24).

When your autistic child actually experiences eczema due to the stress and anxiety of mainstream schooling you acquire a more nuanced perspective.

When you are told your teenager is teetering on the edge of depression, due to pressures they cannot handle, you just do what is right for them.

In common with Tánaiste Micheál Martin, Ms O’Connor makes reference to a ‘certain family’ and extrapolates from there to make ill-informed generalisations about the rest of us.

‘Hard cases make bad law’ and the expression ‘walk in our shoes before you judge us’ also comes to mind. 

It is high-handed and simplistic to tar all home-educators with the same brush based on one eccentric family. Sometimes we are just trying to protect our children’s health.

Kevin Foley

Castlemaine

Co Kerry