18April2014Relapse

I go all the way around the park listening to the Men from the Ministry: Our heroes face a terrible fate A Price of Araby comes to visitPriceless

Mary in hospital brief visit she has had a relapse

No Scrabbletoday, Perhaps Iwill win tomorrow.

Obituary:

Guardian:

We were not surprised that Scotland Yard concluded there was no evidence of fraud at Tower Hamlets council (Report, 17 April). Senior officers reached this conclusion after examining files handed over by communities secretary Eric Pickles following a Panorama programme condemned as having racial overtones, not least by a whistleblowing member of the production team. The programme alleged that directly elected mayor Lutfur Rahman was channelling disproportionate grant funding into Bengali-run organisations, but such organisations only received 8% of funding, despite these communities making up a third of the population. It called the mayor unaccountable, despite the fact he has answered more questions in council and attended more scrutiny committees than any other borough mayor.

The United Nations secretary general’s 2014 report on Western Sahara calls for “sustained, independent and impartial monitoring of human rights” in the region. But despite reports of torture and violence systematically used by Morocco to repress the Saharawi poeple, the UK, US, and France remain reluctant to allow this (Rights fears as Moroccan editor faces trial, 28 October 2013). This week the drafting of a UN resolution on Western Sahara begins and there will be an opportunity to mandate the UN peacekeeping mission there actively to monitor human rights violations. Monitoring is vital because it will act as a strong deterrent.

Before the prime minister proclaimed his born-again Christianity (I’m evangelical about Christianity – Cameron, 17 April), did he reconnect with verses 44 and 45 of chapter 2 of Acts of the Apostles? In present day language these describe the early Christians as having all things in common and as selling their possessions and distributing them to all men and women according to their need. They are arguably the two most important verses in the Bible because they tell Christians how to live rather than what to believe. They are as relevant to governments as to individuals, and so it is reasonable to apply them in judging a government led by a self-proclaimed Christian.

Independent:

I find David Cameron’s attempt to claim religious authority for his hard-right agenda distasteful in the extreme (“We all benefit from living in a Christian country, says Cameron,”  17 April).

Many clerics of all faiths have denounced the deliberate destitution of the already poor by arbitrary withdrawal of benefits for weeks on end at the whim of overworked DWP clerks, because of draconian tightening of eligibility criteria by his government. Increasing numbers of poor people are facing eviction and homelessness because of his policies. The poor in our inner cities and buy-to-let slums are starting to starve, driven to food banks in despair.

The pious Mr Cameron feels no need to govern in the interest of areas like the de-industrialised North, the broken pit villages, the communities abandoned by global capitalism. He thinks the powerless and penniless should somehow make their own salvation, pulling themselves up by their bootstraps and becoming entrepreneurs, handbag designers and hedge fund managers, with government intervention limited to threats of imprisonment and enforced poverty.

His concern is directed entirely towards the already well-off, motivating them to succeed by lowering taxes and relieving them of regulatory burdens, allowing them to shelter their wealth from the Revenue and pass it down the generations, entrenching the socially corrosive inequality that shames our nation.

The Prime Minister should govern for everyone, especially the poor and powerless. That is the mark of a real Christian. Co-opting the church to provide cover for class war is a despicable act, from which the truly religious would recoil in horror.

John Boulton, Edgware, Middlesex

The threefold increase in food handouts juxtaposed in your spread (16 April) with the 17 per cent increase in London house prices, both over the past year, comes in the wake of Chris Grayling’s decision that prisoners should be denied free access to books of their choice a couple of weeks ago, and the decision of Theresa May’s Home Office last week to deny Oliver Cameron the kidney of his non-British sister.

Together they tell us the meaning of David Cameron’s Big Society and the Tory slogan “We are all in it together”. No wonder so many Scots would prefer to live in a probably not poorer but undoubtedly fairer social democratic country.

David McDowall, Richmond, Surrey

So Cameron is now evangelical. Well, talking to the poor is certainly a lot cheaper than feeding them.

Martin London, Henllan, DenbighshireCardiff academics speak their mind

I was at the meeting of Cardiff University’s Court on 10 April (“Academics block Griff Rhys Jones as Chancellor”, 15 April), and no one at that meeting said anything critical about Mr Rhys Jones. No one expressed resentment at a senior academic being replaced by a comedian. The discussion, heated at times, was entirely concerned with the question of why our current Chancellor, Sir Martin Evans, had not been asked to continue.

There is however another story. Academics at Cardiff University, in Senate, in the University’s Council and at Court, are much more willing than they used to be to put forward views, to challenge decisions, to hold the executive to account and to exercise what Rowan Williams characterised as “moral vigour” in debate. The days of “rubber stamping” are over, and this is surely a good thing.

James Whitley, Professor of Mediterranean Archaeology, Cardiff University

School discipline needs legal backing

The cat has scratched through the bag and we know what we knew in our hearts of hearts: the biggest pressure on schools is the irksome pupil body (letter, 15 April).

I would not like to return to the days when teachers could beat the living daylights out of you, but I think disciplinary procedures of a disagreeable sort should be agreed upon by headteachers and parents, and adhered to.

Detention after lunch, without appeal from parents. Community service, to be undertaken at school and at home. Expulsion. A parent may appeal but must go with  the decision of the headteacher.

The whole thing should be backed by a law in which undermining the school is a civil offence, pursuable at a small claims court, with criminal charges for those evading the sanctions awarded.

Spare the children and parents, and watch another unskilled, uncouth generation fall on to the street.

Cole Davis, London NW2

While I agree with some of what Rosie Millard had to say (16 April) about a 10-hour school day, I have to challenge her statement: “The classrooms are out of bounds and the teachers have all gone home.”

In my last five years of teaching in a large primary school I didn’t know any teacher who left school before 6pm. We could be seen leaving the building alongside the after-school-club staff as the caretaker came round jangling his keys to lock up the building.

Ann Bird, Sheffield

How to house MPs without scandal

With the clangs of yet another MP housing scam still ringing in our ears, let’s take a look at how a less dysfunctional country handles the issue of accommodating their MPs.

Just across the water is Denmark, pretty similar to the UK, or so you’d imagine. There are 179 MPs. The total budget for providing accommodation for them all is £541,700, plus a bunch of apartments provided by the state for MPs to live in, free of charge.

The apartments are an investment, owned by the good citizens of Denmark – who never stop complaining that the flats are far too luxurious. So absolutely no speculative shenanigans for Danish MPs.

And still there seems to be no shortage of candidates coming forward for election. Could it really be that, in Denmark, people still want to represent their fellow citizens for reasons other than money?

Kirsten de Keyser, London N6

Dyslexic people really can do degrees

I appreciate that Matthew Norman’s column is written tongue-in-cheek, but must take issue with the assumptions about dyslexics revealed in his comments about MP Charlotte Leslie (14 April). Being dyslexic clearly makes reading and writing more or less challenging for the individual but it is in no way the insurmountable obstacle to academic achievement suggested.

Many schools and universities spend a great deal of time, effort and money supporting students with learning disabilities, including dyslexia. With support they are perfectly capable of completing “literate” degrees and holding down careers entailing vast quantities of reading and writing.

A dyslexic friend is a barrister, and having completed a degree at Oxford now enjoys practical and ongoing support from her chambers. My own dyslexic daughter is studying archaeology and anthropology at university. And, yes, she can spell the name of her chosen subject.

Please don’t make jibes about politicians at the expense of people who have made considerable efforts to get to grips with their learning disabilities and are not cowed by the challenges.

Kathy Moyse, Cobham, Surrey

‘Green’ gas is just a distraction

Vernon Yarker (Letters, 16 April) tries to justify shale gas as a bridging technology to genuinely low carbon or zero-carbon renewables. He is probably unaware that the gas industry has been using this argument for over 30 years, so it is high time that we reached the other side of the bridge. Fracking in the UK will simply divert money from renewables and result in another 30 years of “locked-in” fossil-fuel dependency. By that time, as the IPCC emphasises, we will be beyond the point of no return.

Dr Robin Russell-Jones, Stoke Poges, Buckinghamshire

Gay ‘catastrophe’ in Africa

The Archbishop of Canterbury is quoted as saying that gay marriage could be “catastrophic” for Christians in Africa. What is catastrophic in Africa is the power of Christianity, influential in the imprisonment, molestation and killing, even, of gays. Inevitably gay marriage must be against the teaching of a church which refuses, point blank, to learn.

Peter Forster, London N4

History of holes in the road

Andy McSmith (11 April) and C R Atkinson (15 April) raise the issue of potholes in our roads. They are well behind the curve. That acerbic social and political commentator John Lennon drew our attention to the problem back in 1967 when he sang of, “four thousand holes in Blackburn, Lancashire”. Like the poor, potholes are always with us.

Nigel Scott, London N22

Times:

Telegraph:

SIR – I have only felt obliged to follow the convention of leaving the bottom waistcoat button undone because of the cut of British waistcoats, which taper away at the bottom.

SIR – Michael Gove, the Education Secretary, is entirely correct to appoint someone with background knowledge of radical Islamic movements to investigate the alleged plot to impose Muslim control on various schools.

SIR – Admiral Sir George Zambellas, the First Sea Lord, hits the bull’s eye concerning the point of the referendum for Scottish independence. The arguments about which currency to use, membership of the EU, the use of oil revenues and so on are irrelevant when the defence of the realm is at stake.

Irish Times:

Sir, – As Prof Ferriter states, allegiances and loyalties that prevailed in Ireland 100 years ago were complex and multi-layered. Might I suggest that, rather than distort history, as he fears, the presence of a royal representative at the 1916 commemorations might serve to honour the soldiers of the Irish regiments which, prior to deployment of reinforcements from England, were charged with suppression of the rebellion? In his capacity as colonel of the Irish Guards, and thus representative of the service of generations of Irishmen in the crown forces, even unto the present day, the photogenic young Duke of Cambridge, accompanied by his delightful wife, would be eminently suitable.

Historical hypothesis is a fraught area, but it is difficult to conjecture that any form of Irish “freedom” would in the context of the time have resulted in an entity that diverged significantly from the economic, intellectual and cultural sterility that characterised the Free State. To paraphrase Bismarck, one might ask if the entire violent enterprise was worth the bones of a single “volunteer”, or, indeed, those of the civilians killed? Yours, etc,

ENDA HARDIMAN,

Harbour Plaza,

Kowloon,

Hong Kong

Sir, – If ever an event needed the calming effect of a royal presence it must surely be the rapidly approaching Easter Rising commemorations. The real fun and games will kick off when we get that bit closer to D-Day and myriad nationalist groups begin jockeying for pole position. I can assure Prof John A Murphy (Letters, April 16th) that historical accuracy and reasoned debate will count for nothing when the bands start playing and speeches are littered with sanitised accounts of selfless devotion to the “cause”.

Once again, the winners here will be Sinn Féin and its many offshoots. After all, they can claim a certain legitimacy as the true heirs of the 1916 leadership. Yours, etc,

NIALL GINTY,

The Demesne,

Killester,

Dublin 5

Sir, – An Taoiseach is “very pleased” to hear the queen’s declaration that her family and government would “stand alongside” Ireland during the upcoming commemorations (April 10th). He is, I would suggest, a little premature in believing that this translates into a prospective royal presence at the 2016 GPO ceremony.

The GPO commemoration pays tribute to all those who died in the cause of Irish freedom and that is its sole purpose. One can presume that the Queen does not assume inclusion in its guest list yet to be announced. Ministers would work with “authentic historians” before deciding what events the royal family will attend, An Taoiseach assures us. He and his Ministers might also consider working with descendants of those executed in 1916 to establish their views on this unprecedented proposal. After all they occupy their present positions as a direct result of that supreme sacrifice. Yours, etc,

• 1

• 2

• Next ›

JAMES CONNOLLY

HERON,

Oxford Road,

Dublin 6

Sir, – Felix M Larkin (Letters, April 17th) has offered us an admirable and succinct tutorial in the high politics of British governments and Irish political movements in the years between 1910 and 1922.

He clearly identifies the genesis for the physical force movement of the period as residing within the Ulster Volunteer Force and unionist opposition to home rule. We should not ignore, however, the fact that it suited certain factions within the Irish revoluntionary movement to have the Ulster unionists doing what they did.

And as Irish history is an endless circularity, I’m not sure that nationalist Ireland hadn’t learnt, long before the UVF had ever been thought of, that British politicians, at the last, would only really understand force.

Nevertheless, in 1914 the fact was that home rule, in some shape or form for most of the island, was going to happen after the war; moreover, it had been conceded with barely a shot being fired.

The 1916 rebellion changed the rules of engagement, however, and retrospectively validated the Ulster unionists’ pre-war actions – just as the 1918 election was represented as providing post-validation for the rebellion. Yours, etc,

IAN D’ALTON,

Rathasker Heights,

Naas,

Co Kildare

Sir, – Declan Kiberd’s likening of Anglo-Irish relations to “the narcissism of small differences” has elicited letters strongly in support and strongly against.

The phrase was coined by Sigmund Freud (as der Narzissmus der kleinen Differenzen ) in a 1917 paper “ The Taboo of Virginity ” to emphasise that we express our strongest emotions towards those who resemble us most rather than those who differ from us. Freud developed the idea further in a 1930 lecture “ Civilisation and its Discontents ”, applying it to the rivalries between Spaniards and Portuguese and between North Germans and South Germans. He saw this narcissistic phenomenon as a useful safety valve for the hostility felt by near-identical communities with adjoining territories. Yours, etc,

DR JOHN DOHERTY,

Operngasse,

Vienna 1040

Sir, – The discussion of an invitation to British royalty to attend the commemoration of the 1916 Rising should surely extend to the surviving senior members of the Hohenzollern dynasty. After all, the leaders of that Rising spoke in their proclamation of their “gallant allies in Europe”, and this presumab.ly would include the Kaiser and the German imperial general staff. Yours, etc,

SEÁN Mc DONAGH,

Bettyglen,

Raheny,

Dublin 5

Sir, – Thanks to Eamonn McCann for his alternative perspective on the recent presidential visit to Britain. What a welcome antidote it was to the craven “gush and mush ” we have read from other commentators. Yours, etc,

NORA HARKIN,

Dalkey Park,

Dalkey,

Co Dublin

Sir, – I usually enjoy Martyn Turner’s cartoons but that in the paper of April 16th, while bigoted and nasty, was also spectacularly unfunny. The entire readership is aware of your paper’s longstanding anti-religious stance but this cartoon marks a new low. It is a great pity that the same zeal for anti-religious comment, so prevalent in your newspaper, is not applied to critical analysis of current government scandals. Perhaps your paper’s deference to the Labour Party is preventing such analysis and criticism. Yours, etc,

ALEX FORAN,

Knockabawn,

Rush,

Co Dublin

Sir, – As a reader of your paper for 55 years I am disappointed that you allowed the publication of the offensive Turner cartoon on April 16th. Its publication was an error of judgement and warrants an apology to the priests of Ireland and to your readers. Yours, etc,

JOE FALLON,

Taylors Hill.

Sir, – Martyn Turner’s cartoon of April 16th was a new low in Irish journalism. When I saw it I was immediately reminded of the 19th-century cartoonist Thomas Nast and his sectarian cartoons. The Irish Times is doing its best to win the race to the bottom in Irish print journalism. Yours, etc,

LIAM FOLEY,

University Road,

Newcastle

Galway

Sir, – Perhaps Martyn Turner’s cartoon (April 16th) was a bit below the cincture but he’s a satirical cartoonist. It’s his job to be offensive! Yours, etc,

PAUL DELANEY,

Beacon Hill,

Dalkey

Sir – Desmond FitzGerald, in his letter denigrating Palestinian “apologists”, makes the intentional mistake common to Zionists of conflating historical Palestine with Jordan in an attempt to delegitimise Palestinian identity. It is a trait typical of colonialists that after they steal your land they tell you that it was never yours in the first place.

Palestine has existed as an historical region separate to Jordan/Transjordan since biblical times and unlike Jordan has been called just that during Roman, Byzantine, Ottoman, British & Israeli occupations. It will continue to be called Palestine after the current occupation ends and no amount of historical revisionism from Mr FitzGerald and Mr Meleady will change that. Yours, etc,

CIAN CARLIN,

Priory Road,

London N8

Sir, – I’ve just won a small wager with myself – to the effect that any recitation of the facts and/or criticism of Israeli policies (however mild and accurate) would very soon be characterised as “anti-Semitic rant” (Letters, April 17th). My bet was, of course, a sure thing! Yours, etc,

MAURICE KING,

Inistioge,

Co Kilkenny

Sir, – I believe that Caroline Morse of the Huffington Post website (report, April 17th), and the many Irish commentators in agreement with her, are only thinking about Temple Bar Square rather than the entire Temple Bar area.

Temple Bar Square is certainly guilty of being a ripoff tourist trap, but the wider area of Temple Bar is still not without character. Meeting House Square, the outdoor room complete with foldaway stage and cinema screen, is a marvelous piece of urban planning, and has a fantastic Saturday food market.

Temple Bar Square aside, you cannot throw a stone without hitting some sort of cultural institution, all of which create a vibe in the area that is not centred around binge drinking.

I must concede to Ms Morse, however, that any tourists who are here to sample our famous pub culture will have a more authentic experience in almost any other part of this island. Yours, etc,

DARREN KELLY,

Racehill,

Ashbourne,

Co Meath

Sir – Temple Bar is accurately described by Frank McDonald as a collection of sordid gin palaces connected by vomit-carpeted streets, shoe box apartments ill-suited to any sort of stable human habitation, and the constant screech of amplified oirish muzak; the creation of all of which has been facilitated by the transfer of large sums of public money to private individuals. But come on Frank, what planet are you living on? Far from being a failure, such a development is, in an Irish context, a howling success. Yours, etc,

ALAN O’BRIEN,

Barnhill Avenue,

Dalkey,

Sir, — Joseph O’Connor has written recently in your paper of the “heroes … forgotten by Official Ireland and Official Britain” (“Older legacy fades by popular demand”, April 4th) in reference to the tens of thousands of soldiers, sailors, doctors, nurses, etc, who never expected to be remembered. Yet what of their heroes, the contemporaries they were not allowed to celebrate?

I have been putting together biographies of some of those who enjoyed fame here before the emergence of “Irish-Ireland” between the 1880s and the 1920s saw them written down or out of history altogether: men and women who fell between two stools – not Irish enough to be remembered in their homeland, and not British enough to be imperial heroes.

There was William J Lawrence, a self-taught Protestant Northerner who was forced to find a living in America, where he became a Harvard professor and the toast of the nation’s Ivy League universities. Austin Clarke and TS Eliot berated Ireland for their failure to acknowledge him as the “supreme authority” in his field of Shakespearean studies. Lawrence spent his last decades exiled from the Dublin he loved and died “poor and disappointed” in London.

Joe O’Gorman, a fiery former plumber, trade unionist and comedian from Dublin, fought for tolerable conditions for tens of thousands of workers by organising the “Music Hall War”, a 1907 strike. Although encouraged by friends like Jim Larkin and TP O’Connor MP to stand for parliament for Labour, O’Gorman stayed on the stage but suffered blackballing by every music hall in Britain for being a Larkinite. As the “Uncrowned King of British Music Hall” he starred on Broadway and the London Palladium, and was part of the first modern cross-talking duo, subsequently copied by such acts as Laurel and Hardy and Morecambe and Wise.

Or Mary Connolly, a Dorset Street tenement girl, whose patrons – Ballsbridge doctors, Belfast dockers and James Joyce’s voice coach – helped her become one of the highest-grossing acts in British music hall and variety theatre in the years after the first World War. Although she single-handedly saved the Olympia theatre from bankruptcy and the wrecker’s ball, having taken the soup of the British stage she died forgotten, and her final burial place is unknown.

Or two ex-British soldiers, John King from Moy, Co Tyrone, and Robert O’Hara Burke of Galway, who to this day remain among Australia’s greatest heroes but are virtually unknown in Ireland. King was the only survivor of the Burke and Wills expedition that became the first to cross Australia – it was the Victorian equivalent of the moon landing.

With a view to a book, I am gathering other biographies and would be delighted to hear from anyone with any “names”, or indeed with any further knowledge of those I have mentioned. Yours, etc,

ERIC VILLIERS,

The Thatched Cottage,

Tirnascobe Road,

Sir, – Further to discussions about moving the Spire and alternative uses for it, a few of suggestions:

1. We could use it to lance future property bubbles;

2. We could use it to inject some life into the domestic economy; or

3. Given the recent protests regarding plans for renewable energy, we could lend it to some local Don Quixote to tilt at windfarms. Yours, etc

ROB SADLIER,

Stocking Avenue,

Rathfarnham,

Dublin 16

Sir,- There does exist a precedent for the removal of the Spire. In February 1891, my grand-uncle Adam and a fellow trader in Upper O’Connell Street, publisher Henry Gill, promoted a private member’s Bill to remove Nelson’s Pillar from where the Spire now stands to another less obtrusive position in the street. Their concern was that the pillar prevented free communication between Henry Street and Earl Street, and also that it was a hindrance to the development of trade in the upper end of the street. The Bill was carried by a majority of five, the fifth being Charles Stewart Parnell, who strolled in as the bell rang, knowing nothing of what was going on and voted in favour. Tim Healy MP contributed: “Monuments in a public street are a public nuisance, and I should be prepared to support a Bill not only for the removal of this monument but also for those to O’Connell, Father Mathew and Sir John Gray. If it is desirable to commemorate the memory of the great dead the statutes ought to be placed somewhere where they will not be in the way of the living.” Yours, etc,

ALEX FINDLATER.

Cong,

Co Mayo

Sir, – Timber!!! Yours, etc,

MICHELE SAVAGE,

Glendale Park,

Sir, – Reports of rising tension in Ukraine are worrying, not to say confusing. What is even more worrying, nearer home, is our Government’s apparent willingness to go along with whatever the USA, Germany and Nato want. Ireland is still a neutral state. We should be opposing the drift to war, not accommodating one power bloc against another. Bismarck once said the Balkans were not worth the bones of a single Pomeranian grenadier. Unfortunately he was not around in 1914. I don’t expect Ireland to produce a Bismarck, but we don’t need a John Redmond either. Yours, etc,

PADRAIG YEATES,

The Links,

Portmarnock,

Co Dublin

Irish Independent:

The Wednesday after Easter will be the 1,000th anniversary of the Battle of Clontarf, which is perhaps the only event in Irish history to have a major international significance.

Also in this section

‘What would we do here, if we were a real country?’

Demurring to the monstrous gods of capitalism

Letters: Bible is a collection of metaphors, not a book of evidence

It may be the only major battle that we ever won. An Post has celebrated our having the guts kicked out of us at the Battle of Kinsale with suitable stamps.

Our last surviving innards were displaced at the Battle of the Boyne – more suitable stamps celebrating the launch of more oppression for us.

I eagerly awaited what An Post might do about Clontarf. I had just seen its recent launch of a set of four stamps on contemporary “art” – one of which was of a woman’s head inside a basket. Surely a minority taste!

Recently An Post’s booklet – ‘The Collector’ – arrived. No stamp will mention Clontarf at all. Instead, two stamps will commemorate our “Viking Heritage” … Carlsberg?

We won, for goodness sake. If victories embarrass us and make us uneasy because they are not PC then why not celebrate the O’Brien heritage instead?

I could think of some handsome candidates.

Miceal Ross, Monkstown, Co Dublin

CHILDREN FIRST, ALWAYS

* Children first. It’s a simple concept. Children before tradition. Children before pride. Children before Canon law. Children before doctrine. Children before personal opinion. Children before the reputation of any institution. Children before God. There is no argument. Children first.

GOSPEL ACCORDING TO THE SELFISH

* Reading in your paper (Irish Independent, April 17) about a proposal that the Catholic Church should ordain married men is probably the best idea I have heard since somebody decided to stick handlebars on a bike.

I don’t think I am exaggerating when I state that our country is seriously deficient in morality and selflessness. How many of our churches on Sunday mornings are the dwellings of those who consider themselves Christian, but ride the rule of selfishness in their daily lives?

How many of the central figures in Ireland’s recent history of political and corporate corruption attend churches every Sunday because it is what we do as a nation?

I am not a practicing Catholic, but I am an ardent Christian. Most of the wisest advice I have received has been from others, like me, who remember Jesus’s message and don’t treat his memory as another club to join.

GAA DESERVES A PLAYER REVOLT

* When I think back on the 1950s when we, as young fellas, set off from Cloone, Co Leitrim, for Hyde Park to cheer on our heroes against Galway, or to Breffni Park in Cavan to meet Meath, it makes me sad.

Those of us in the sunset years of life are not able to go to such games and our only enjoyment on such Sundays was to be all set for the throw-in on TV. We often rang each other on Monday mornings to do a Pat Spillane and Colm O’Rourke among ourselves on the games.

Our phone calls had to stop as the Government has taken away any free calls. They have also taken away our free line rental. Of late my mail is polluted with junk from SKY. We ould fellas can’t afford SKY and, as I write these few lines, tears are in my eyes as to why the GAA has let us down.

If I had any sway, I would be asking the footballers of Ireland to revolt.

DO THE MATHS ON FUTURE OF IRISH

* Coming up to exam time, a recent conversation with my peers provoked me to write this letter.

As a student sitting my Leaving Cert this year, I believe that it’s an outrage that 25 extra points are offered for only one of the three core subjects – maths, Irish and English.

In particular, I think it is outrageous that these extra points are not offered for our native language.

In recent months, I have observed the number of candidates opting for higher-level Irish in the Leaving Cert decline. The sole reason? Students cannot maintain both higher-level maths and Irish. Which subject will the candidate opt for? The subject that offers the most CAO points.

Has the work of our ancestors, who worked tediously to preserve this ancient language, gone to waste?

COUNTRY CAN ARISE UNITED

* James Plunkett described the Irish people of 1914 as the ‘Risen People’. Bono describes the Irish people of a 100 years later as those who “bailed-out the State” and who were “screwed and fought back with dignity”. The historic and current events show that change can be achieved.

Despite major achievements since 1916, the Declaration of Independence still sets ambitious goals like equal rights and opportunities and the ownership of Ireland to the people of Ireland.

The state visit to the UK has shown the friendship which has developed between our two countries. This friendship, and the Good Friday Agreement, provide a platform to discuss the merits of a United Ireland.

A United Ireland offers economic benefits as the bigger Irish domestic market would make it more attractive for investment – and the North could have an economic policy which suits a small country.

Unionists could have significant influence, as they would form a significant part of the population. The Twelfth could become an all-island celebration, while the Easter Rising could be commemorated to show thankfulness that never again a minority will be divided from the majority.

RAISING A GLASS TO SOBRIETY

* I have a good friend who has mixed feelings about Easter.

For Lent he gives up sobriety. He starts drinking on Ash Wednesday and stops on Holy Saturday. He has had a problem with alcohol since his school days. So, years ago, he decided to stay sober except for the days of Lent. He says the pubs treat him like gold during Lent because sometimes he is the only one there.

BRING BACK ‘GUARDS’ OF HONOUR

* Hear, hear to Martina Devlin for her opportune piece (Irish Independent, April 17). Modern policing techniques, allied to fiscal policy, has destroyed the bond between the people and police.

When I was growing up they were affectionately and otherwise known as ‘guards’. The term conveyed both respect and a certain warmth. Today they are just another crisis-infected ‘police force’.

Withdrawn from rural Ireland, undermanned and politicised, the once vaunted guards are at the crossroads visited by the clergy.

The disconnect between the people and police is real. It appears that younger police don’t want to patrol and footslog. It’s not cool or exciting but it is more effective long-term.

In Dunboyne, wider population circa 5,000, a patrol car from Ashbourne passes by. Yes the station opens for one-and-a-half hours per day but no one knows the local bobby because there is none. Meanwhile, with Shell/Shannon just allocate a thousand. Retired dignitaries and Dail politicians, another few hundred.

Perhaps it’s time to redefine the role of gardai and remove it from the secretive enclave of the Justice department and back in the bosom of the people. Then the police might become “guards” again.

Write to Letters to the Editor, Irish Independent, 27/32 Talbot Street, Dublin 1, or e-mail them to independent.letters@independent.ie

Irish Independent

19 April 2014 Much better
I go all the way around the park listening to the Men from the Ministry: Our heroes face a terrible fate suppressing smut Priceless
Mary in hospital brief visit she has had a recovery
Scrabble today, Mary wins by 30 points Perhaps I will win tomorrow.

Obituary:

Richard Broke – obituary
Richard Broke was a television producer whose drama The Monocled Mutineer drew the ire of Norman Tebbit and the military

Richard Broke
7:11PM BST 17 Apr 2014
3 Comments
Richard Broke, who has died aged 70, was a television producer with a flair for contentious drama; by bringing The Monocled Mutineer (1986) and Tumbledown (1988) to the screen, he found himself at the centre of a national debate on Britain’s military reputation.
When The Monocled Mutineer (1986) was screened it caused furore amongst critics, politicians and military historians alike. The four-part BBC serial (written by Alan Bleasdale and starring Paul McGann) told the story of Percy Toplis, a deserter in the First World War. Norman Tebbit, then the Chairman of the Conservative Party, declared that the drama was further evidence of a Left-wing bias in the BBC. The programme’s historical adviser, Julian Putkowski, distanced himself, as Broke defended the “examples of dramatic licence” incorporated into the script.

Paul McGann in The Monocled Mutineer
Related Articles
Allan McKeown
29 Dec 2013
Jim O’Brien
01 May 2012
Nigel Farrell
12 Oct 2011
He addressed a more recent conflict with Tumbledown — about the Falklands War. The BBC film starred Colin Firth as Robert Lawrence, MC, a real-life Scots Guards officer left partially paralysed after the Battle of Mount Tumbledown during the advance on Port Stanley. The film was notable for showing apathy by government and Army officials to those wounded in the war; it also highlighted the protagonist’s gung-ho attitude to the campaign. Before it was screened, one of Lawrence’s fellow soldiers, Captain James Stuart, won a legal battle to have a sequence — which he believed identified him as an officer who encourages desertion — to be cut. Broke also handled casting complaints. Kenneth Branagh was initially to play the central role – “But Lawrence,” Broke explained, “who always saw himself as rather posh, was not happy.”
The film’s director, Richard Eyre, said the film was intended to be “deeply political”. Broke’s ambitions, however, remained dramatic: “Tumbledown is not meant to be a documentary. It’s a play acted by actors.”
With both productions his professional hunch paid off — The Monocled Mutineer and Tumbledown each won Bafta awards for Best Single Drama.

Colin Firth in Tumbledown
Richard Broke was born in London on December 2 1943 and educated at Eton after which he worked in repertory theatre before joining the BBC.
In the mid-Seventies he worked on the Play for Today series but his big break came with Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years (1981) — an eight-part serial for Southern Television starring Robert Hardy and Nigel Havers — on which he worked for two years. “I am still very proud of that,” he said, “it was a landmark for me.” The controversy surrounding The Monocled Mutineer five years later showed that Broke could weather a storm. “The government juggernaut was gunning for the BBC,” he said, “when The Monocled Mutineer was on the zebra crossing.”
Throughout his career he brought veteran talents to his productions, coaxing swansong performances out of Alec Guinness, Alan Bates and Lauren Bacall. In 1985, in a rare excursion into screenwriting, he adapted Graham Greene’s last novel, Dr Fischer of Geneva — providing James Mason with his final role, as the titular misanthropic tycoon. Three years later Tumbledown took him back into controversial waters.
As the executive producer of the BBC’s Screen One drama portfolio he was responsible for approximately 50 films. In 1992 he teamed up with the Hollywood director John Schlesinger for the award-winning A Question of Attribution, an adaptation of Alan Bennett’s play detailing the downfall of the traitor Sir Anthony Blunt.
Three years later the pair collaborated again for a television take on Stella Gibbons’s novel Cold Comfort Farm (scripted by Malcolm Bradbury and starring Ian McKellen and Eileen Atkins).
During the rest of the Nineties and into the Noughties he continued to work on single dramas and popular series, including Where the Heart Is, The Murder Room and Messiah: The Rapture.
Richard Broke twice served on the Bafta Council. Although he became synonymous with difficult material it was, he said, strong emotional content that he was most interested in. “I never set out to make controversial drama,” he stated. “I would fall flat on my face if I did so.”
He married, in 1988, Elaine Carew, who survives him with their two daughters.
Richard Broke, born December 2 1943, died April 14 2014

Guardian:

I was saddened to see that War Horse has sacked its live musicians (Report, 16 April) to replace them with recorded music, and that the National Theatre’s executive director thinks the play is “better off without them”. Having seen the play three times, I found that the live music grounded the play in its rural Devonian origins and enriched the experience. But of course I’m just a punter, without the “expertise to assess such matters” which the NT so arrogantly asserts.
Liz Meerabeau
London
• Providential – definition: opportune, advantageous, favourable, auspicious, propitious, heaven-sent, expedient; or is it simply chance that we seem to have stumbled (or managed ourselves) into a mini-cold war with Russia just when we are exiting from Afghanistan and some – especially Nato – are seeking desperately to find reasons to ramp-up tensions in support of defence spending and the military-industrial complex?
Tom Palin
Southport
• Following the installation of the “uncomfortable” seats in Dover town centre (Dover benches designed to be uncomfortable, 10 April), the same councillor you quote, Sue Jones, has opened her new kiosk, Pebbles, situated on the sea front at the eastern end of the promenade. The kiosk boasts the “prettiest toilets” in the town, which feature unique ceramic art work by Rob Turner, Kent artist. Well worth an Easter visit…
Cllr Linda Keen
Dover district council
• Interesting to read that “UK £50bn better off thanks to Bank’s QE” (18 April). Where did the other £325bn go?
Moira Hankinson
Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire
• In respect of place names (Letters, passim), I cannot help smiling, every time I am on the road to Clitheroe en route for fishing, at the public library in Read.
Henry Phillips
Stockport
• Lost on the road to Seville, I took a picture of my husband beside the road sign when we came to Moron for the second time.
Mary Milne-Day
London

We are Haringey council tenants and supporters. We are aware that Haringey and other councils are planning to allow a tsunami of greedy profit-driven property developers to swamp our council estates and families, buying and demolishing many blocks to build luxury flats, so evicting tenants and destroying established communities.
Last month developers paid the council £13,000 to send a cabinet member and an official to Cannes to meet them on a luxury yacht to discuss their joint plans. We will reject these heartless plans of freemarket profiteers with as much interest in our wellbeing as a Michelin chef boiling lobsters for their expensive gourmet dinners.
Paul Burnham
Haringey Defend Council Housing
Keith Flett
Haringey Trades Union Council
Dave Morris
Haringey Federation of Residents Associations
Jenny Sutton
CONEL, University and College Union
Jane LaPorte
Haringey Housing Action Group
Rev Paul Nicolson
Taxpayers Against Poverty

Whether or not a referendum of all members is a good way to decide on Co-op governance reform (My view of the Co-op will protect its values, 14 April), Paul Myners has correctly identified the democratic deficit in the Co-op’s structures. In fact, Co-op democracy is an embarrassing sham. Members can only vote for area committee members on the basis of anodyne and very brief personal statements which make no mention of political affiliation and posts already held. Candidates are specifically forbidden to canvass. Area committee members then elect regional board members, and regional board members then elect a large proportion of the national board. This is a system the old GDR would have been proud of.
If you track down an area committee member on Twitter you might be able to establish some communication if they happen to be reform-minded. Otherwise, area, regional and national board members are (for the ordinary member) completely uncontactable. This rigged electoral system, lack of transparency and accountability and pathological secretiveness is shameful. Reform is urgently needed if the Co-op is to survive.
Ian Healey
Brighton
• As a member of the Co-op I agree with almost all Paul Myners says about the present structure of the management boards. Where I disagree with him is when he says he is not in position to negotiate on reform. As a member of House of Lords he can purpose an act of parliament to regulate the Co-op. There are good precedents for regulating membership and mutual organisations by act of parliament, and with a large group of MPs sitting in the Co-op party interest it should be possible to get a bill though parliament quickly.
The only way to cut through the byzantine boards and committees is to go for the big-bang solution – and I would prefer one proposed by Myners to any alternative advanced by the big banks and the present Tory-dominated government.
David Spafford
Brighton
• So, Unite the union has waded into the discussion about the future of the Co-operative Group (End boardroom bickering, say Co-op workers, 15 April). I wonder how Unite members would feel if there was a lively debate within the union on a key policy issue – the relationship with the Labour party for example – and an employer was to suggest that they should end this “public politicking”. Co-operatives are founded on the principle of member control and democracy, one member one vote. Precisely the same governance arrangement as trade unions. It is therefore up to us, the members, to discuss how the crisis in our business is best to be resolved. Lord Myners is absolutely right in pointing out that ordinary members of the Co-operative Group have not had a real say in its affairs. Whether or not his proposed solution is the right one is a matter for discussion.
Two hundred years ago the boundary between trade unions and co-operatives was often fluid. Both movements were set up on the principle that unless workers controlled capitalism, then capitalism would control workers. It’s a shame that a trade unionist accepts uncritically the idea that a co-operative should be run in the same way as a plc, and suggests an ignorance of the philosophical basis of co-operative enterprise. It’s time for a fresh look at the common history and – hopefully – common future of two movements that stand for the principle that profit and greed is not the only basis to run society.
Stirling Smith
Bolton
• Its not just Lord Myner’s proposed Co-op Group reforms that may be rejected by the Co-op Group Board (Report, 14 April) but also Co-op members’ proposals for community buy-outs of the group’s farms. It is shocking that the group has ditched its co-op values and principles by a distress sale of its farm estate, having ignored invitations from co-operators for community co-op buy-outs of the farms. The sale was only recently announced, and even though Savills have not had time to draw up farm particulars, we understand that bids are needed by the end of May. This means that the Co-op Group is selling off the family silver to wealthy people, hedge funds and speculators, and that the Co-op farm estate will be lost as a commonly owned asset.
So, we propose that Ursula Lidbetter, the Co-op Group chair, urgently convene a meeting to discuss how some of the farms can be bought at a fair price by co-operative community buy-outs.
Martin Large Biodynamic Land Trust, Charlotte Hollins Fordhall Farm, Pete Riley, Mark Walton Shared Assets, Zoe Wangler Ecological Land Co-op, Mark Simmonds Co-operative Culture, Ruth West, Colin Tudge Campaign for Real Farming
Ken Livingstone and his colleagues yesterday (Letters, 17 April) accused my Panorama programme on the mayor of Tower Hamlets, Lutfur Rahman, of “muckraking”. Rahman has separately accused me of racism, Islamophobia and lying. All untrue – and all because the BBC had the temerity to investigate longstanding concerns about the way Rahman, an elected official, spends public funds. For the avoidance of doubt, the Metropolitan police were not investigating any allegations made in the programme, since the programme did not allege that the mayor had committed any crime. Panorama did not accuse Rahman of fraud in his award of grants to third-sector organisations. Rather it raised questions about some surprising interventions by the mayor in the disbursement of these grants to groups in his local power base.
Livingstone et al’s claims that only 8% of grants awarded by Rahman have gone to Bengali and Somali groups do not withstand scrutiny. This is currently the subject of a separate investigation by external auditors tasked by the communities and local government department – a matter unrelated to police inquiries, which terminated this week. The letter-writers assert that the mayor has “answered more questions in council and attended more scrutiny committees than any other borough mayor”. This puts Livingstone at odds with Labour colleagues on Tower Hamlets council, who complain at the mayor’s failure to answer questions in these forums.
The programme was a measured and valid inquiry into governance under Rahman. It is not the BBC but Livingstone who is damaging community spirit by dignifying the inflammatory and vituperative response by sections of the Bengali media, the mayor and some of his supporters.
John Ware
Films of Record, for BBC Panorama
During his time as head of Screen One at the BBC, in 1991 I pitched Richard Broke a project called A Foreign Field, with an ageing cast that included Alec Guinness, Leo McKern, Lauren Bacall and Jeanne Moreau. “I’d better commission that now” said Richard, “or they’ll all croak before we shoot it.”
Throughout the production, in France and at Pinewood, Richard’s impish humour and gossipy good fun sustained the whole cast and crew.
Some time later, the film had a festival showing in Los Angeles. Richard was staying at the Chateau Marmont, so he had to cross eight lanes of Sunset Boulevard to get to the screening. Normally he wouldn’t allow anyone to assist with his wheelchair but when his wheel jammed halfway across, I steered him through the honking traffic. He was pleased not to be late because Charlton Heston was introducing our film on stage sporting an orange wig. “Did you ever see such a bad syrup?” said Richard in his stage whisper.
Yet for all his wonderful wit, Richard was a devout and devoted man with an incisive intelligence. We loved being entertained by him, but we also loved being challenged by him intellectually. He really was unique.
Independent:

Jane Merrick (“It’s two decades since ‘education, education, education’, but still Britain’s primary school admissions are a farce”, 17 April) made two contradictory points.
She argues that parents need to be provided with more choice, while also criticising the Government for setting up free schools in areas with a surplus of places. She can’t have it both ways. While there is a clear need to address the shortage of places, this does not by itself increase choice. It is only by creating new schools and new school places across the country that we can provide a genuine choice for parents. We are confronting both of these challenges.
We have made an additional £5bn of funding available in this parliament alone to councils to create new school places – double the amount spent by the previous government over the same period – leading to the creation of 260,000 new school places by May 2013, with many more in the pipeline.
We are also allowing good schools to expand without the restrictions and bureaucracy they faced in the past. Nearly 80 per cent of new primary places created are in good or outstanding schools and, thanks to our reforms, the number of children in failing secondary schools has already fallen by a quarter of a million since 2010.
We have opened more than 170 free schools for 80,000 pupils, and the vast majority are in areas facing a shortage of school places or are in deprived communities. They are proving hugely popular with parents – attracting almost three applications for every available place – and offer good value for money.
We are building schools at a fraction of the cost of the former government’s Building Schools for the Future programme.
Ensuring enough school places for the growing population is one of our top priorities. Most councils are on track towards creating enough places, with 212,000 new primary places created between May 2010 and May 2013. There are no easy solutions, but this Government has made great strides in driving up the number and quality  of places.
David Laws, Minister of State for Schools, London SW1

Jane Merrick aims at the wrong targets when she says parents haven’t truly been given “choice” over which schools their children can attend. If all schools were capable of educating our children to a high standard, there would be no need to have any notion, however spurious, of “choice”.
That our schools are not in a position to do this is down to the failure of successive governments which, instead of being accountable for this negligence, promote a specious concept of parental choice as a smokescreen to hide behind.
As Merrick correctly points out, no such choice exists, yet parents are led to believe it is they, rather than the Government, who have failed their children.
Michael O’Hare, Northwood, London

Church has a role  to play in state
The arguments Mary Dejevsky deploys to urge a separation between Church and State fail to convince (“If Cameron is invoking God to make his party appear less nasty, then he really hasn’t a prayer”,  17 April).
She mentions the diplomatic minefields such as a PM converting to Catholicism, but we have managed to navigate these and other instances with aplomb over hundreds of years. Then she cites the diversity of the population, but many non-Christian faith groups support the current set-up. They reason that religion in the UK is protected through an established church, with the Church of England providing a buffer for this.
And in relation to the spats between the Archbishops of Canterbury and governments, these are a sign of a healthy democracy. Faith leaders should have a voice in the public debate, just as much as other civil society leaders, though they must be sensitive to the fact that this brings no automatic entitlement to shape laws.
Zaki Cooper, Trustee, Council of Christians and Jews, London NW4

Excerpts from The Gospel According to David Cameron for Easter:
“Consider the lilies of the field. They do not labour or spin. Typical of the something-for-nothing culture we are determined to end.”
“And he welcomed the moneylenders into the Temple – and gave them all huge bonuses.”
“It is easier for Eric Pickles to go through the eye of a needle than for Starbucks, Google and Amazon to pay corporation tax.”
“And he said unto the leper: ‘Atos says you’re fit to work. We’re taking you off disability benefits.’”
“There are many mansions in my heavenly father’s house, but if you’re on benefits, in council accommodation and have a spare room, we’ll hit you with the bedroom tax.”
“Love thy neighbour as thyself – unless they’re a Bulgarian or Romanian immigrant.”
Sasha Simic, London N16

What is it that David Cameron does or refrains from doing because of his Christian faith? Without being clear about that, surely his profession of faith is meaningless? “Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead” (James 2:17).
Mark Walford, London N12

Whatever happened  to progress?
I’ve just finished re-reading a book that was given to me by my mother on my 16th birthday. It was published in 1914 and tells a story of poverty wages, starvation, charities providing essentials, short-time contracts, zero hours, corrupt businesses that own politicians and vice-versa, and an apathetic population who mistakenly vote for their own drudgery.
They only want “plenty of work” and are encouraged to live a vicarious existence, marvelling at the antics of the rich and famous. We haven’t advanced much in 100 years have we? The book? The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell.
Martin Carty, Aldridge, Walsall

Music can thrill without being painful
Chris Maume (“It isn’t a proper rock gig if you don’t leave with your ears ringing”, 17 April) may be being deliberately provocative, but to believe that rock music has to be painfully loud is stupid.
Perhaps groups play so loudly in order to drown out the moronic shouting and whistling which seems to accompany every gig I hear on the radio.
Does Chris ever go to a classical music concert? Part of the appeal is the contrast between the whisper-quiet passages and the fortissimo of almost a hundred musicians playing flat out. They do not need to be amplified. The loud music is thrilling, but not painful.
When Maume needs hearing aids several years before he should because of exposing his ears to excessive volume, I suppose he will expect me to pay for them out of my taxes.
Seriously, we are storing up huge costs for the NHS because of this insane liking for loud live music, and the use of portable music players on public transport with their monotonous percussion noises leaking from the earphones.
I like certain kinds of rock music but I refuse to go to excessively loud gigs. And to suggest that one wears earplugs is adding one stupid idea to another.
Peter Grove, Salisbury, Wiltshire

Days of the celibate priest are numbered
Your report “Catholic bishops call for priests to be able to marry” (18 April) on the possibility of change relating to the discipline of celibacy for Roman Catholic priests is timely.
The recently reported remarks of Pope Francis, suggesting that local diocesan bishops must take responsibility for the solution of local problems, has opened the door to discussion in a new way.
For too long, the whole matter of celibacy for those ordained in the Roman Catholic communion has been a closed book. The Church, through the example of Francis, is experiencing a re-examination of its mission.
This one aspect of Church discipline (for that is all it is) is now being questioned. The answering of a call to ministry need not be associated with an altogether separate calling to the celibate life. The time has come to revoke a discipline that has become a hindrance to vocation.
Chris McDonnell , Secretary, Movement for Married Clergy UK, Little Haywood, Staffordshire

There’s nothing funny about ‘comedic’
I do not agree with Guy Keleny’s dismissal of the word “comedic” (Errors and Omissions, 12 April). If the word “comic” were used in the sentence he examined, it could be taken to mean that the sensibility is comic, in the sense of being funny, rather than relating to comedy.
Most people would probably not be confused for long by “distinctive visual and comic sensibility”. However, I think “comedic” works well and removes any ambiguity even if it is a neologism. I like “tragedic” for similar reasons and would like to start a campaign for its adoption.
Alan Knight, Helston, Cornwal
Times:

Topham Picturepoint/Press Association Images
Published at 12:01AM, April 19 2014

Who was the ‘father’ of the standard issue gas mask? How much did a soldier earn?
Sir, Further to your item about gas (The A-Z of the First World War, Apr 14), my great-grandfather, Lieutenant Colonel Edward F Harrison, according to records at the Imperial War Museum, was credited with the invention of the “perfect” gas mask which saved thousands of British and Allied lives.
The small box respirator which he developed became universal issue to troops in August 1916. In a letter to his widow, the Minister of Munitions, Winston Churchill, wrote “It is in large measure to him that our troops have been given effectual protection from the German poisonous gases”, and that he would have been promoted to Brigadier-general in charge of all chemical warfare.
The Rev Rachel Borgars
Bath
Sir, It is incorrect to suggest that espionage was not a major component of intelligence in the First World War (poster, Apr 14). Signals intelligence through wireless intercept and air photographic intelligence were in their infancy and the Allies on the Western Front and in the Middle East also relied upon espionage for intelligence behind the enemy lines.
In occupied Belgium and northern France the principal form of espionage was to watch troop trains and calculate the types of units by counting the rolling stock and identifying equipment and insignia. For instance, it took 22 trains to move a German infantry division. By early 1916 the British had located all but two divisions, which became crucial when the Germans launched its 1918 spring offensive in France using forces moved from fighting the Russians. Most of the information came from resistance circuits supported by Allied intelligence officers based in Paris and Folkestone.
In at least one instance an Allied officer infiltrated an occupied country by balloon. Homing pigeons carrying coded messages proved successful.
In Palestine, Jewish networks of recent immigrants provided substantial information on Turkish dispositions that eased the advance of General Allenby’s forces to Jerusalem and then Damascus.
As with all resistance activities, the cost was high in terms of lives, but in many respects the First World War networks laid the foundations for the circuits and the management of intelligence from occupied countries during the Second World War. German counter-intelligence also learnt how to disrupt resistance operations.
Nick van der Bijl
Mark, Somerset
Sir, Was it strictly true that Captain Noel Chavasse was the war’s only double VC winner (poster, Apr 17)? Lt Col A Martin-Leake, also of the Medical Corps, won his first VC in the Boer war and was awarded his second in 1914 at Zonnebeke, a short distance from where Chavasse was mortally wounded in 1917.
James P McCamley
Derby
Sir, You say that one day’s base pay for a British private soldier was one shilling (A-Z of the First World War,
Apr 15).
I have my grandfather’s (2300 Saddler G R Hunt Royal Horse and Royal Field Artillery) soldier’s pay book before me, and on January 11, 1918, his daily rate of pay was made up as follows: regimental pay: 2 shillings, proficiency pay: 6d, war pay: 3d; total 2 shillings and 9 pence.
Geoff Howland
Teddington, Middx
Cambridge and Oxford are overrun with visitors, and the cities’ antique institutions are struggling to cope
Sir, Mary Beard knows the damage tourists have done to Pompeii. She cannot mean to wish the same fate on Cambridge (“Cambridge is a ‘divided city’ as university tightens security and shuts the public out”, Apr 16).
Historic Oxford and Cambridge are small medieval towns swamped by hordes of tourists. The colleges protect themselves by opening for limited hours and many charge entry. Cambridge university protects the Senate House, its Yard and the Old Schools by excluding tourists. In Oxford, alas, the Sheldonian, Bodleian Library and Radcliffe Camera areas are open to invasion. Tourists climb on the statuary and mouldings, tailgate their way into the library, abuse the staff, and shout and run about in the quads in gangs, picnic on the private lawns, and leave their crisp packets and fag ends on the flagstones.
Students have written in the comments book of the misery of trying to revise for exams with tourist faces pressed against the windows.
There is a balance to be struck between welcoming the world to see places of historical interest and protecting them from threats to their fabric and proper use. At present Cambridge has got that more right than Oxford.
Professor GR Evans
Cambridge
Sir, My experience of Cambridge is of town and gown working, playing and living happily together and I see little evidence of the divisions Mary Beard discusses.
The university museums are all open free of charge. I can walk through King’s College with a resident’s pass. I can watch theatre performed by students. My children love the science and the humanities festivals each year when we explore numerous university departments.
We go to the Observatory and the Botanic gardens, we punt past the Backs and neither my husband nor myself attended the university. And we attend a city-centre church where Professor Beard can regularly witness town and gown, cheek by jowl in unison.
Sandra Byatt
Hardwick, Cambs

Changes in countryside management are much more damaging than so-called invasive foreign plants species
Sir, Our society holds comprehensive data on all the wild plants of Britain and Ireland, native or alien. In representations to the Commons Environmental Audit Commission (report, Apr 16), we agreed that some (very few) alien plants were a nuisance and often made a bad situation worse. This, however, is truly minor compared with invasions by native plants (brambles, bracken, gorse, reeds, nettles and others), often resulting from changes in land use over the past 50 years, such as under-grazing or the lack of traditional woodland management. This, and the nitrogen pumped out by modern transport, has a far greater impact on biodiversity than any alien ever will. Our members know this well, but emotional headlines about “foreign” invaders win the research funding.
David Pearman
Past president, Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland
A UN inspector criticised the levels of sexism in the UK. A well-travelled reader says she has seen much worse
Sir, I was disappointed to read that a UN inspector found that sexism in Britain is the world’s worst (Apr 16). Having travelled in several countries and been confronted by much more blatant sexism than at home I find that hard to believe.
I cannot deny that in some places there is a “boys’ club sexist culture”, but it is very much less than some years ago. And I certainly now feel able to criticise such behaviour and expect my point of view to be accepted. When I was studying chemistry at university in the 1960s the departmental magazine printed “a chemical analysis of a woman” which concluded “Highly explosive in inexperienced hands; very complex and results in many unexplained reactions; highly unpredictable; should be watched at all times.”
In my year there were seven woman and 48 men/boys. We few had little difficulty in keeping them in their places.
olive hogg
Newcastle upon Tyne

One reader was less impressed than the head of the Highways Agency with the new system on London’s orbital
Sir, I read “Hard-shoulder driving begins with ‘an almighty jam’” (Apr 15) with considerable interest. I was one of the thousands of beneficiaries of this wonderful system and the extra hour added to a 90-minute journey. My congratulations to the boffins at the Highway Agency (“M25 — ‘no jams’, letter, Apr 17).
Peter Wing
Manuden, Cambs

Telegraph:

SIR – It’s true that the literati shunned Daphne Du Maurier in her lifetime (report, April 15). But recently scholars such as Nina Auerbach, Avril Horner and Sue Zlosnik have paid her serious attention.
Virago reprinted her entire oeuvre, and my own Daphne Du Maurier Companion contains fresh scholarship on a remarkable woman’s life and work. Writers from Susan Hill to Stephen King have reworked her great stories and themes, and the loan of papers of the whole Du Maurier family, from George to Daphne, to the University of Exeter library, has encouraged international research.
Professor Helen Taylor
University of Exeter
Exeter, Devon
SIR – For the last 30 years of her life, my mother’s eyesight was poor, so every evening I would read aloud to her. This is quite different from reading to oneself, and my favourite author to read aloud was Daphne Du Maurier. The words just flowed so easily. The stories were great, too.
Christine Simmonds
Redruth, Cornwall

SIR – It may be true that greater capacity at Heathrow would allow competition and probably lower fares, but the airport’s expansion has long since passed the limits of public acceptability.
As the most noise-polluting airport in Europe, hemmed in by homes and motorways on a site half the size of Paris’s Charles de Gaulle, Heathrow has simply outgrown its premises.
It is time that Heathrow joined with the Mayor of London, who has championed aviation since he came to office, to work for the new hub airport Britain needs, located where noise is not a problem.
London’s population will be 10 million by 2030 and the Heathrow site could provide homes and jobs for many of them. To see crowded west London as the only airport solution is a recipe for inaction.
Daniel Moylan
Chief adviser to the Mayor of London on aviation
London SE1
Related Articles
Du Maurier from Rebecca to The Scapegoat
18 Apr 2014
Good drugs, bad drugs
SIR – Cannabis is slightly less addictive and harmful than coffee. This has been shown by many studies using much larger sample sizes than the 20 users in the study you report.
For most adults, cannabis is good in moderation. It is a natural supplement to our endocannabinoid system and helps to protect against autoimmune conditions such as diabetes and cancer. It promotes neurogenesis, so is useful for the treatment of brain injury, stroke, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease. The United States government holds a patent for the use of cannabinoids in treating such conditions.
Peter Reynolds
Clear: Cannabis Law Reform
Sutton Poyntz, Dorset
SIR – Professor Simon Gibbons highlighted the lack of information available to children aged 10, 11 and 12 about the misuse of drugs.
I chair a local charity that has been presenting programmes in primary schools for ages four to 12 for the past 20 years.
These promote a healthy lifestyle and inform children about the effects of legal and illegal drug use. The object is to equip them to resist peer pressure as they move on to secondary education.
Costs are kept to a minimum and our charges to schools have not changed for 10 years, but we have seen a reduction in bookings solely because of the demands on school budgets in the past few years.
David Brown
Leicestershire Life Education Centres Trust
Cropston, Leicestershire
Post costs a packet
SIR – I operate a tiny postal business and have absorbed the highly publicised increases for internal mail of about 5 per cent. I also send 800-1,000 small packets a year, and 150-250 by recorded delivery to America, mostly weighing under 40 grams.
Until March 31 the costs were £1.88 and £7.18 each; they now cost £3.80 and £9. I have somehow missed any publicity about these increases from the Royal Mail.
Alan Judd
Bramcote, Nottinghamshire
Sorry site
SIR – As an unemployed web developer, I have been told by my local Jobcentre Plus that I must use the DWP website, Universal Job Match, to look for a job. This is like driving around in Del Boy Trotter’s Reliant Regal when what I really need is a BMW.
Andy Preston
Swindon, Wiltshire
Cathedral bypass
SIR – The Dean of Ely writes in support of an elevated bypass that threatens the unique southern river view of Ely cathedral.
At the recent hearing into the East Cambridgeshire Draft Local Plan, it was agreed that the controversial bypass should be omitted from the document and replaced with a more neutral statement on the need to tackle the Ely bottleneck.
The district planners had admitted to the inspector that the bypass was not uniquely essential to the delivery of the local plan – with all its growth targets – and by implication that another solution could achieve similar gains. This is the second time that a planning inspector has questioned the scheme.
The matter rests for the moment with the county council, unhappily both applicant and determining authority in this case.
John Maddison
Ely, Cambridgeshire
Deciding who’s born
SIR – Like Ron Giddens, I was born with a club foot, and received excellent care. But parents should not be denied the choice of whether to abort a foetus with this condition. I know how much extra care my mother provided me with. If a parent is unwilling to provide this care but is refused an abortion, I doubt that the result will be happy for the child.
K R Brown
Portishead, Somerset
SIR – We have a delightful son who happens to have Down’s Syndrome and autism along with other “problems” but who brings happiness to everyone he meets. Despite his profound learning difficulties, he enjoys his life to the full.
Who are we to judge whether or not he should have been born?
Paddy Fagan
Goostrey, Cheshire
Braces bagged
SIR – I have closed the waistcoat gap since acquiring braces in 2003 during a post-case dinner with Courtney Griffiths QC and Mr Justice David Poole. I admired the pair Courtney was wearing (scarlet with black skull and crossbones – my school house colours).
“You can have them,” he said, taking them off and passing them across the table. At the end of the evening he stood up and his trousers fell down.
John Bromley-Davenport QC
London EC2
Heavenly addition to dinner-party banana split
SIR – Dinner party disasters took me back to the Sixties, in Kenya. It was our first dinner party as a married couple, and my husband’s boss was invited. As I was whipping cream for the dessert with my electric whisk a little pink gecko dropped from the ceiling into the bowl, where, I regret to say, it met a sticky end.
What to do? No one could contemplate a banana split without cream and I had never heard of death by gecko poisoning.
Nobody seemed to notice that the cream had a vaguely pink tinge and everyone cleared their plates.
Val Crane
Evesham, Worcestershire

SIR – I do not find it refreshing to have a Prime Minister who does “do God”.
Christians who have defended the Bible teaching on marriage have been sidelined and persecuted and he has done nothing to help. More than 500,000 Christians signed up to the Coalition for Marriage and were ignored by David Cameron and his government.
His weasel words will not convince us, and we do not believe him. No amount of “God-speak” will now save him.
If it is any comfort to him, the other main political parties are no better.
Alec Taylor
Trowbridge, Wiltshire
Related Articles
Du Maurier from Rebecca to The Scapegoat
18 Apr 2014
SIR – David Cameron’s comments on Christianity and faith are welcome just before Easter.
He might have been more assertive and made the point that the Christian religion has been the single most important force in driving Western individualism, capitalism and civilisation – which would have caught many secularists off guard.
Christianity focuses on the moral actions of individuals; the Bible teaches us to work hard, respect others and their property, be charitable and not be led into temptation. This has shaped the modern individual that we call “ourselves” and the economic system that we use.
James A Paton
Billericay, Essex
SIR – It appears that there is nothing that David Cameron is not prepared to do to win a few more votes. In his latest ploy to “do God” he claimed to “have felt at first hand the healing power” of the Church. The National Health Service used to be relied upon to provide as much.
Dr Max Gammon
London SE16
SIR – “The legalisation of same-sex marriage infuriated many traditional Christians”. Many Christians, not just “traditional” ones, continue to be infuriated by the same-sex marriage legislation.
Christopher Whitfeld
Shillingstone, Dorset
SIR – David Cameron, in this instance, is either ignorant of, or unwilling to recognise the scientific facts about, the origins of the universe, and instead follows the teachings of ancient prophets, who explained existence by means of a made-up god.
How can we trust such a person to make logical judgments on matters of state, since he has already shown his gullibility?
B W Jervis
Sheffield, South Yorkshire
SIR – The Prime Minister “puts God back into politics”. Exams are to be arranged around Ramadan. The British are the most sceptical about religion in the world. I’m confused.
Kate Graeme-Cook
Blandford Forum, Dorset
Irish Times:

Sir, – I wish to add my voice of protest to those condemning the nasty, bigoted cartoon you chose to publish (April 16th) featuring a group of priests outside a confessional. It was extremely offensive to Catholics and cruel and hurtful to priests; it demonstrates very clearly the anti-Catholic bias of your newspaper. In publishing this cartoon a line has been crossed and a new low has been reached. It is doubtful that this just slipped past the editor unnoticed, so quite clearly it is not just the cartoonist who is bigoted. An apology from the editor is the least we can expect. Yours, etc,
FR DONAL ROCHE,
St Patrick’s Parish,
Wicklow
Sir, – I am appalled at the cartoon by Martyn Turner which you published (April 16th). Its message is without justification or context right now. If you think this cheap shot is only hurtful to priests, think again. It displays a crassness and an attitude which I am very disappointed to find in the pages of The Irish Times . I suppose an apology would be out of the question? Yours , etc,
FRANK DALY,
Rathdown Park,
Terenure,
Dublin 6W
Sir, – I am disturbed but not suprised at the letters and comments condemning the Martyn Turner cartoon of April 16th. Some are upset because it wan’t funny (cartoon = funny), others because it was satirical on the subject of the seal of confession of the Catholic Church. The victim card is being flourished, even by the moderate champion Archbishop Diarmuid Martin. They all seem to miss the point of the cartoon. It simply states the official views and position of the Church itself. The reaction is to avoid comment on the subject itself and circle the wagons. I think we’ve seen this before, protect the institution and deny the reality. As for it being offensive? Satire is meant to be hard and to make people think afresh but it seems to have failed with these tunnel-visionists. Yours, etc,
PADDY McGARR.
Monread Close,
Naas
Sir, – Borrowing the words of Fathers Kenny and Curran, I wish to object in the strongest possible terms and register my absolute disgust and abhorrence at the removal from the Irish Times website of Martyn Turner’s cartoon of April 16th. Yours, etc,
MARK HAYDEN,
rue des Sables ,
Brussels
Sir, – I wish to register my disgust and abhorrence at Catholic priests’ unwillingness to break the seal of the confessional and report child abuse to the authorities. Is mise le meas,
MAIRÉAD CRUSHELL,
Newcastle Road,
Brighton,
Massachusetts,
USA
Sir, – I note the kerfuffle which is raging following the publication of Martyn Turner’s cartoon. If ever a molehill has become a mountain this must be it. This is I believe a one-day wonder and we would be well advised to leave it alone. Silence may be the best policy and I would counsel caution. Calls for apologies from The Irish Times are in my view ill-considered and ill-advised. As a Catholic priest, I believe it is most unwise to draw an audience onto ground where we are vulnerable. Yours, etc,
FR IGGY O’DONOVAN,
O’Connell Street,
Limerick
See second editorial (this page).

Sir, – A number of your recent articles and reports, including pieces by Paul Gillespie, Arthur Beesley, Breda O’Brien and Dick Alhstrom, collectively paint a picture of an insidious and profound cultural shift.
Thomas Piketty’s landmark book Capital in the Twenty-First Century identifies how public wealth is being systematically transferred into the hands of the super-rich, who have effectively usurped democracy and captured the political process. Consequently, any additional revenue generated by Ireland’s current economic upturn cannot be deployed to support decimated public services, but must be funnelled up into the Great Casino of the financial markets to be gambled away.
The dependence of universities on corporate patronage means education has become more about product development and marketable skills than independent research or critical reflection. The humanities are being downgraded and history removed as a core subject, inducing a cultural amnesia that leaves our young people more susceptible to manipulation and demagoguery. Their labour is already shamelessly exploited through unpaid internships and low-paid “employment schemes”.
Workers’ rights are being eroded as big business demands a flexible, cheap workforce. It would appear that as a nation, we are sleepwalking our way into a thinly disguised slave camp, run by, and for, the wealthiest people in the world.
Domestic economies and their workers were traditionally insulated from the vagaries of global markets by socio-fiscal protections such as those embedded in the Glass-Steagall Act, FDR’s New Deal and Europe’s postwar social democratic “mixed economy”. The inexorable dismantling of these safeguards has left us at the mercy of a heartless, predatory, economic system which operates transnationally without regulation, cynically plundering economies, national currencies and natural resources for short-term gain.
President Higgins is one of the few public figures prepared to call it like it is. Politicians worldwide need to come together to face down this new, global, neo-liberal hegemony, to insist that public services, workers’ rights and domestic sovereignty be ring-fenced and protected and that international financial and corporate regulation be reinstated. To Capitalism Sans Frontières, we must say No. Yours, etc,
MAEVE HALPIN,
Ranelagh,
Dublin 6

Sir, – The Arts Council established Aosdána in 1981 to honour those whose work has made an outstanding contribution to the arts in Ireland and to encourage and assist members in devoting their energies fully to their art.
The work of Irish artists is the bedrock of a multi-billion-euro cultural industry but Ian Kilroy, (Opinion & Analysis, April 16th), concentrates, almost exclusively, on the funding of Aosdána – the cost rather than the value.
Aosdána is an affiliation of individual artists who devote themselves to their art. It has included Nobel laureates, artists across all disciplines who have received international recognition of their work and the founders of most of the cultural institutions of the State.
The cnuas, a subsidy means-tested by the Arts Council which represents substantially less than half the average industrial wage, is available to members to enable them to concentrate exclusively on their work and to help to subvent the not inconsiderable expense of producing art. Many members who benefit from the cnuas have forgone secure, pensionable employment and will never retire. Their work will, however, continue to benefit Irish society long after they die.
Aosdána has always supported the recognition of other groups who wish to form similar bodies and has continually sought to broaden its membership.
There is nothing remotely secret about the work of Aosdána. The art that its members produce is available to all. Its proceedings are published and everyone is welcome to attend the public session of the annual general assembly. Yours, etc,
MARY FitzGERALD,
Chair of the Toscaireacht,
Aosdána,
70 Merrion Square,
Dublin 2

Sir, – Rev Chris Hayden’s rebuttal of the charges in the article by Paddy Agnew on the late Pope John Paul II (Letters, April 15th) does not stand up.
Pope John Paul was a fine Christian in many ways but his response to US-sponsored repression in Latin America was disgraceful. The papacy has access to world leaders and papal opinion can change things. The pope’s lack of action to stop killings and torture during the 1980s did not convey the message of Jesus. The Vatican, at the highest level, allowed the murder of priests and nuns and, as mentioned by Mr Agnew, Bishop Oscar Romero.
Furthermore, l iberation theology is not a Marxist doctrine but the message of Jesus put into action. In the words of Luke 6:20: “Blessed are you who are poor for yours is the kingdom of heaven.” Yours, etc,
DEREK M REID,
Lough Derg Road ,
Dublin 5
Sir, – Fr Chris Hayden is unfair to Paddy Agnew when he accuses him of substantially misrepresenting the late pope’s position on liberation theology. Though Fr Hayden quotes John Paul II as stating that liberation theology was timely, useful and necessary, this is not the clinching put-down it might seem. John Paul said a lot of lovely things about the Second Vatican Council but under his watch did everything he could to stymie its reforms. Ditto, liberation theology. Actions speak louder than words. Yours, etc,
FR BRENDAN HOBAN,
Ballina,
Co Mayo
Sir, – Your editorial of April 16th states that “rural development means different things to different people”. Referring to “difficulties currently being experienced by local communities and small retailers”, it goes on to state that “growing numbers of closed shops and vacant properties provide evidence of accelerating decay”. The reality is that the decline of family retail businesses is almost entirely attributable to the expansion of multiples. The arrival of huge retail giants has sealed the fate of many small businesses and that of their suppliers and employees. In Mayo it has destroyed the commercial and social fabric of many towns and villages. Here we have a concentration of national and multinational retail development which is completely disproportionate to our population.
This is a fact and is patently obvious for all to see. Why we remain in denial of this jumbo elephant in the room is difficult to fathom. Yours, etc,
JOHN KILKELLY,
Curragh,
Castlebar,

Sir, – Your newspaper (April 17th) quotes the president of the GAA, Páiric Duffy, taking issue with the recent ESRI report Keeping Them in the Game . Mr Duffy says that “ … the point I would have with the ESRI report is that drop-off affects all sports if they are honest”.
Part of being honest is stating truths that people may not want to hear. The ESRI report was based on three nationally representative data-sets, one of which sampled over 26,000 people aged 16 and over. The report shows that drop-out affects all sports. It also shows that the rate of drop-out from Gaelic football and hurling is particularly high compared to other sports. Indeed, the data reveal that among young adults the drop-out rate from Gaelic games is more than twice the equivalent rates for soccer and rugby. The report offers a constructive analysis of possible reasons for the GAA’s higher drop-out rate.
The ESRI’s research in this area is funded by the Irish Sports Council and aims to provide evidence on which to base policy to increase participation in regular sport and exercise. We strive to treat all sports equally. Several sporting governing bodies are engaging constructively with the findings and are using them to try to improve their level of participation. Others might benefit from doing the same. Yours, etc,
DR PETE LUNN,
ESRI,
Whitaker Square,
Sir John Rogerson’s Quay,

Sir, – Is Charles Haughey and the Generators a new hipster band I should be aware of? Yours, etc,
NIALL McARDLE,
Wellington Street,
Eganville,
Ontario
CANADA
Sir, – Solicitors, it seems, are not happy that they get only 1.6 per cent of judge appointments on a pro rata basis vis a vis their barrister colleagues (“Lack of solicitors as judges criticised”, April 18th).
However, the “relics of the past” argument cuts both ways. One of those relics is that clients generally cannot access barristers without a solicitor being present. But solicitors get paid for what some clients might view as a “childminding” role – pushing up the cost of barrister advice for clients, who would often prefer direct access. Solicitors also sometimes get paid “uplift fees” for not having hired a barrister at circuit court hearings. If solicitors want to be viewed with equal favour in assessment for appointment to the bench (which of course they should), they could start by refusing to play “second fiddle” in their legal advice roles. They cannot have their cake and eat it too. Yours, etc,
KIERAN FITZPATRICK,
Cummer,
Co Galway
Sir, – With reference to AJ Quinn’s letter (April 16th) I also fail to understand why the purchase of a property does not come with the usual warnings we get with most financial investment instruments.
We thought we would never forget the lessons from the last economic collapse. However, it would appear that many people need to be constantly reminded that over a 20- or 30-year mortgage term the price of properties and the size of wage packages can decrease as well as increase. Yours, etc,
PETER McNAMARA,
Ashbrook,
Ennis Road,
Limerick

Sir, – Vincent Browne is indulging in selective amnesia when he bemoans the fact that, as he sees it, “much has remained depressingly the same” in this country over a long period (Opinion & Analysis, April 16th).
He seems to have missed the fact that this country was bankrupted during the course of that period by the decisions of a small number of its own most powerful citizens. When he states that the euro “opened the floodgates to … the financial crash” he forgets that most of the countries which joined did not become bankrupt.
For the ordinary citizens, to their cost, nothing will ever be the same in this country as a result of the failures of its dominant institutions – government, finance, academia and media – during the boom.
Ironically, the institution which has remained most depressingly the same is the media, which still indulges in the same celebrity-driven, personality-obsessed, flogging-dead-horses coverage of public affairs as it did during the boom. Yours, etc,
ANTHONY LEAVY,
Shielmartin Drive,
Sutton,
Dublin 13
Sir, – I enjoy Eamonn McCann’s articles but occasionally he loses his way when he reverts to deep republicanism! It should be remembered by him and others that Irishmen and women were a constant presence in the governance at a senior level of the British empire. Therefore, Arthur Griffith was wrong in feeling that the Irish people were demeaned. It was their empire too! As for the crimes of the British royal family, Sinn Féin/IRA has a pretty good competitive record in that regard. Yours, etc,
NICK STRONG,
Glin,
Co Limerick

Irish Independent:

Rob Sadlier Rathfarnham, Dublin 16 – Published 19 April 2014 02:30 AM
If only it were that simple. My first question is: which Bible? There is no single Bible. Many different Bibles have existed and exist. Different books with differing contents feature within the biblical canons of different religious groups. Which one are we talking about?
Also in this section
Where is the stamp of approval for the Battle of Clontarf?
‘What would we do here, if we were a real country?’
Demurring to the monstrous gods of capitalism
Moving on from that minor detail, the trouble is that many people have throughout the centuries considered, and many people living today consider, that their particular version of the Bible is a work of divine revelation, to be interpreted literally.
For example, young earth creationists advocate a strict literal interpretation and believe all life on Earth was created by direct acts of a god between 5,700 and 10,000 years ago. A 2011 Gallup survey revealed that 30pc of adults in the US – the most powerful and in some ways the most advanced country in the world – said they interpreted the Bible literally.
But, let’s assume that they’re all collections of metaphors. How are these metaphors to be interpreted and who is to interpret them? This is dangerous territory. It can and has resulted in people relinquishing their critical faculties and in brainwashing.
The Bible has been used to justify murder, torture, slavery and homophobia.
It is still happening to this day: the extreme homophobia prevalent in parts of Africa is justified based on biblical interpretations. Archbishop Diarmuid Martin said recently: “Certainly, the teaching of the Catholic Church could be used by some people in a homophobic way.”
I have read through various versions of the Bible. Great works of literature no doubt. So are the works of Shakespeare and Joyce, but nobody claims that their works are sources of divine revelation.
I find the concept of human sacrifice (especially in the context of a self/filial sacrifice by a supposedly eternal super-being) morally repugnant.
I also find the concept of hell morally repugnant.
The Catholic Church still teaches that hell exists, yet the church is strangely silent on this matter these days and who will end up there. Practising Catholics often dismiss morally the objectionable concepts and injunctions of the Bible on the basis that they emanate from the Old Testament, but it’s the New Testament that introduces us to the concept of hell.
Thankfully, there is not a shred of evidence that such a place exits.
If such a place does exist, I look forward to having a drink with Mr Hitchens by the fire.
LET’S NOT REWRITE HISTORY
* Hopefully we can always have happy and friendly relations with our British neighbours, but without turning history on its head.
DUBLIN 9
DRIVEN TO DISTRACTION
* Transport Minister Leo Varadkar is mistaken in increasing the number of penalty points and fines for texting while ignoring eating, drinking, smoking and the operation of a radio and DVDs while driving.
Previous ministers blamed speed, drunk driving, talking on a phone and not wearing seatbelts for road traffic accidents.
Essential Driver Training was introduced by Mr Varadkar with great fanfare in 2011, but in 2013 road fatalities increased by 30 on the 2012 statistics so texting is now deemed the cause of accidents.
If statistics are to be believed, 25pc of fatal accident drivers were drunk, 20pc were not wearing seatbelts and now 20-30pc were deemed to be texting.
A car radio has as many knobs, buttons, numbers and stations as a mobile telephone.
Is texting on a fixed mobile phone more dangerous than operating the radio controls on a moving steering wheel or watching a sat-nav display while driving?
POST OFFICES ARE HUB OF RURAL LIFE
* The possible closures of post offices strikes another blow at rural Ireland following closures of local banks, garda stations, and health clinics while many schools remain under threat.
For many, the local post office is a focal point for communities and its loss would have an enormous impact on community life.
The social aspect of the post office should be taken into consideration by government, because the post offices are at the heart of the community in towns and villages. The local postmaster provides a personal service that will be lost when they will be forced to close their doors.
It is unacceptable that older people and people with disabilities may now be forced to travel long distances to join the already lengthening queues at bank branches to receive their social welfare payments and pensions, where they also face extra charges along with a customer service that has reached deplorable levels.
It is the elderly and the less fortunate in society who are continually being targeted and the closure of the post office is another aspect of this.
Their closure will inevitably lead to increased levels of isolation and loneliness.
In many areas, the only available shop is attached to a post office and sometimes is the only outlet for social interaction that many older people have.
The banks played a major part in destroying this country. It now appears that it is government policy to get the banks back on their feet by directing more business towards their way.
In doing this, they will have killed off what life is left in rural towns and villages, and the Government could possibly be described as the most anti-rural government we have had in this country.
WHO WILL PAY FOR COUNCIL LEAKS?
l According to the Dublin City Council (DCC) website “water leakage levels have been reduced from 43pc to 29pc from 1997 to 2009″.
With the ongoing installation of water meters, one wonders if DCC will have an extra-large meter installed and be charged accordingly for their water losses?
ROYAL ASSENT FOR RISING?
* David Quinn asked recently whether the Easter Rising was worth it? (Irish Independent, April 11).
As a follower of James Connolly’s Citizen Army rather than the Republican Brotherhood and Patrick Pearse’s Volunteers, I would look at King George V himself for an answer.
Following his very successful 1911 visit to Dublin, during which he visited a tenement, he wrote to the British Surgeon General: “Is it possible that my people live in such awful conditions?
“I tell you, Mr Wheatley, that if I had to live in conditions like that, I would be a revolutionary myself.”
Despite my grand-uncle Austin being in the Volunteers, and my cousin James Arthur dying in British khaki on Easter Monday, I hope that I would have fought for James Connolly’s vision of a People’s Republic – had I lived 100 years ago.
That is in no way to be confused with giving support to the current Labour Party, who in my opinion sold their soul for a handful of bling and a seat on the government jet.
Irish Independent
æ¢

20April2014Wendy and Susan

I go all the way around the park listening to the Men from the Ministry: Our heroes face a terrible fate getting rid of London’s pigeonsPriceless

Mary in hospital brief visit she Wendy ans Susan join us

Scrabbletoday, I win band get over 400 Perhaps Iwill again win tomorrow.

Obituary:

Paolo Filo Della Torre, who has died aged 80, was one of the foremost foreign correspondents in London and a noted figure on the London social scene.

Guardian:

Independent:

Jane Merrick (“It’s two decades since ‘education, education, education’, but still Britain’s primary school admissions are a farce”, 17 April) made two contradictory points.

She argues that parents need to be provided with more choice, while also criticising the Government for setting up free schools in areas with a surplus of places. She can’t have it both ways. While there is a clear need to address the shortage of places, this does not by itself increase choice. It is only by creating new schools and new school places across the country that we can provide a genuine choice for parents. We are confronting both of these challenges.

We have made an additional £5bn of funding available in this parliament alone to councils to create new school places – double the amount spent by the previous government over the same period – leading to the creation of 260,000 new school places by May 2013, with many more in the pipeline.

We are also allowing good schools to expand without the restrictions and bureaucracy they faced in the past. Nearly 80 per cent of new primary places created are in good or outstanding schools and, thanks to our reforms, the number of children in failing secondary schools has already fallen by a quarter of a million since 2010.

We have opened more than 170 free schools for 80,000 pupils, and the vast majority are in areas facing a shortage of school places or are in deprived communities. They are proving hugely popular with parents – attracting almost three applications for every available place – and offer good value for money.

We are building schools at a fraction of the cost of the former government’s Building Schools for the Future programme.

Ensuring enough school places for the growing population is one of our top priorities. Most councils are on track towards creating enough places, with 212,000 new primary places created between May 2010 and May 2013. There are no easy solutions, but this Government has made great strides in driving up the number and quality  of places.

David Laws, Minister of State for Schools, London SW1

Jane Merrick aims at the wrong targets when she says parents haven’t truly been given “choice” over which schools their children can attend. If all schools were capable of educating our children to a high standard, there would be no need to have any notion, however spurious, of “choice”.

That our schools are not in a position to do this is down to the failure of successive governments which, instead of being accountable for this negligence, promote a specious concept of parental choice as a smokescreen to hide behind.

As Merrick correctly points out, no such choice exists, yet parents are led to believe it is they, rather than the Government, who have failed their children.

Michael O’Hare, Northwood, London

Church has a role  to play in state

The arguments Mary Dejevsky deploys to urge a separation between Church and State fail to convince (“If Cameron is invoking God to make his party appear less nasty, then he really hasn’t a prayer”,  17 April).

She mentions the diplomatic minefields such as a PM converting to Catholicism, but we have managed to navigate these and other instances with aplomb over hundreds of years. Then she cites the diversity of the population, but many non-Christian faith groups support the current set-up. They reason that religion in the UK is protected through an established church, with the Church of England providing a buffer for this.

And in relation to the spats between the Archbishops of Canterbury and governments, these are a sign of a healthy democracy. Faith leaders should have a voice in the public debate, just as much as other civil society leaders, though they must be sensitive to the fact that this brings no automatic entitlement to shape laws.

Zaki Cooper, Trustee, Council of Christians and Jews, London NW4

Excerpts from The Gospel According to David Cameron for Easter:

“Consider the lilies of the field. They do not labour or spin. Typical of the something-for-nothing culture we are determined to end.”

“And he welcomed the moneylenders into the Temple – and gave them all huge bonuses.”

“It is easier for Eric Pickles to go through the eye of a needle than for Starbucks, Google and Amazon to pay corporation tax.”

“And he said unto the leper: ‘Atos says you’re fit to work. We’re taking you off disability benefits.’”

“There are many mansions in my heavenly father’s house, but if you’re on benefits, in council accommodation and have a spare room, we’ll hit you with the bedroom tax.”

“Love thy neighbour as thyself – unless they’re a Bulgarian or Romanian immigrant.”

Sasha Simic, London N16

What is it that David Cameron does or refrains from doing because of his Christian faith? Without being clear about that, surely his profession of faith is meaningless? “Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead” (James 2:17).

Mark Walford, London N12

Whatever happened  to progress?

I’ve just finished re-reading a book that was given to me by my mother on my 16th birthday. It was published in 1914 and tells a story of poverty wages, starvation, charities providing essentials, short-time contracts, zero hours, corrupt businesses that own politicians and vice-versa, and an apathetic population who mistakenly vote for their own drudgery.

They only want “plenty of work” and are encouraged to live a vicarious existence, marvelling at the antics of the rich and famous. We haven’t advanced much in 100 years have we? The book? The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell.

Martin Carty, Aldridge, Walsall

Music can thrill without being painful

Chris Maume (“It isn’t a proper rock gig if you don’t leave with your ears ringing”, 17 April) may be being deliberately provocative, but to believe that rock music has to be painfully loud is stupid.

Perhaps groups play so loudly in order to drown out the moronic shouting and whistling which seems to accompany every gig I hear on the radio.

Does Chris ever go to a classical music concert? Part of the appeal is the contrast between the whisper-quiet passages and the fortissimo of almost a hundred musicians playing flat out. They do not need to be amplified. The loud music is thrilling, but not painful.

When Maume needs hearing aids several years before he should because of exposing his ears to excessive volume, I suppose he will expect me to pay for them out of my taxes.

Seriously, we are storing up huge costs for the NHS because of this insane liking for loud live music, and the use of portable music players on public transport with their monotonous percussion noises leaking from the earphones.

I like certain kinds of rock music but I refuse to go to excessively loud gigs. And to suggest that one wears earplugs is adding one stupid idea to another.

Peter Grove, Salisbury, Wiltshire

Days of the celibate priest are numbered

Your report “Catholic bishops call for priests to be able to marry” (18 April) on the possibility of change relating to the discipline of celibacy for Roman Catholic priests is timely.

The recently reported remarks of Pope Francis, suggesting that local diocesan bishops must take responsibility for the solution of local problems, has opened the door to discussion in a new way.

For too long, the whole matter of celibacy for those ordained in the Roman Catholic communion has been a closed book. The Church, through the example of Francis, is experiencing a re-examination of its mission.

This one aspect of Church discipline (for that is all it is) is now being questioned. The answering of a call to ministry need not be associated with an altogether separate calling to the celibate life. The time has come to revoke a discipline that has become a hindrance to vocation.

Chris McDonnell , Secretary, Movement for Married Clergy UK, Little Haywood, Staffordshire

There’s nothing funny about ‘comedic’

I do not agree with Guy Keleny’s dismissal of the word “comedic” (Errors and Omissions, 12 April). If the word “comic” were used in the sentence he examined, it could be taken to mean that the sensibility is comic, in the sense of being funny, rather than relating to comedy.

Most people would probably not be confused for long by “distinctive visual and comic sensibility”. However, I think “comedic” works well and removes any ambiguity even if it is a neologism. I like “tragedic” for similar reasons and would like to start a campaign for its adoption.

Alan Knight, Helston, Cornwall

Times:

Muslim community vilified unjustly for school ‘Islamism’

WE ARE concerned, after  your article “Gove in war on Islamic takeover of state schools” (News, last week) and editorial “Keep Islamism out of the classroom”, that the Muslim community is being unfairly victimised.

Religious communities are encouraged to be more involved in local schools — including, for example, setting up faith-based academies — yet this idea is now being demonised. The perception of a “witch-hunt” is supported by David Hughes, a Christian and a trustee and governor at Birmingham’s Park View School, which was referred to in your news story, for more than 15 years.

Where there are serious allegations, they must be investigated, but smearing the entire community cannot be ethical. Baroness Warsi’s statement “Islamophobia has passed the dinner-table test” is proving all too true.
Farooq Murad, Muslim Council of Britain

Slow learners
It is disturbing that it has taken the Department for Education (DfE) so long to realise there are issues in schools serving largely Muslim areas. It is also surprising the DfE apparently failed to evaluate properly proposals to convert many of the schools to academies or to establish free schools and then to monitor them effectively.

Birmingham city council must also take responsibility for its processes in appointing and training governors and in responding to complaints.

There two key underlying policy issues. One is the clear message from Michael Gove that academies and free schools are better than schools controlled by local authorities because they give communities power to do what they want.

The second is that the state funding of religious schools needs to be addressed. It allows voluntary aided (VA) schools to promote religious practices, and arguably some of the schools now being inspected would not have some of their activities (such as not celebrating Christmas) criticised if they were Muslim VA schools, just as a VA Church of England school would not be condemned for not celebrating Eid. Radicalisation must be stopped, but this is not the same as religious conservatism.

If all state schools were secular, radicalisation would be unable to hide behind the veil of religion.
John Gaskin, York

Neutral ground
We are a multicultural society with a diverse population and a wide range of religious and secular beliefs. What people teach children at home cannot be controlled, but what is taught in state schools has to be religiously neutral.
Paul Kustow, by email

Degrees of separation
We still have not learnt from Northern Ireland, where religious division has been fed by separate schools. If parents want their children to have a religious education, let them attend Sunday school or a madrasah. Mainstream schooling should teach skills for life, and if religion is spoken of at all, it should be as a concept, not as a specific ideology. Continue on this route in Britain and in years to come Northern Ireland’s problems will be as nothing in comparison.
Alan Brook, Launceston, Cornwall

Radical autism therapy top of the class

THANK YOU for running a story about how applied behaviour analysis (ABA) can help children with autism (“Tough love”, Magazine, last week). My son has benefited tremendously from the therapy. Initially diagnosed with moderate to severe autism, he is now attending a mainstream school and is one of the top pupils in his class.

When he was three we couldn’t even take him to the playground as he had severe social phobia and would cry, scream and run the other way if he saw other children. Sadly, when you get an autism diagnosis from the NHS you are given no advice or hope and are told to “mourn” your child because autism is a lifelong disability.
Khalida Rizi, London N21

Not so ‘tough’
Congratulations on publishing a potentially life-changing article for many parents of children with autism. Interventions devised by ABA professionals are designed to teach skills but also to address challenging behaviour.

ABA is the application of the natural science of behaviour analysis, is evidence-based and uses scientific findings in an individualised manner. The outcomes are so effective that it is funded through health insurance in most states in America and is increasingly acknowledged globally as an effective intervention.

Autism education is one of hundreds of applications of the science and the emphasis is on the ability to analyse, understand and work with the motivation of such children, rather than “tough love”.
Neil Martin, European Association for Behaviour Analysis; Professor Mickey Keenan, University of Ulster; Professor Karola Dillenburger and  Lyn McKerr (parent of young adult with autism), Queen’s University, Belfast; Nichola Booth, Behaviour Analyst; Jacqueline Schenk, Erasmus University, Rotterdam; Lise Roll-Pettersson, Stockholm University; Giovambattista Presti, Kore University of Enna; Professor Paolo Moderato, IULM University, Milan

Private funding
We have had to fund this therapy privately, which has put a financial strain on our family, but the gains our son has made in a short space of time have been astounding. It is ridiculous that the NHS will not offer this to our child.
Nicola and Chris Evans, Swansea

Wasted time
Caroline Scott reports on the dysfunctional state provision for children with autism. My son languished for two crucial early years in a special school for autism where they could not teach him to speak. Within a month of starting ABA he began using functional language. The NHS should not waste resources on therapies that do not work.
June Goh, by email

Ill treatment
ABA as a therapy for severely autistic children is abuse, at least partly. While it may produce measureable “results”, it ignores the fact that autistic people have an interior life. Some of the conditioning methods in ABA are considered unethical in training dogs.

One alarming example was to “noise-barrage” some autistic children until they stop showing a negative response to noise, a therapy comparable to dressing a child with sensitive skin in a hair shirt and telling them it will only be taken off when they stop scratching. Speaking as an adult on the autism spectrum, I feel we should have the right to live for ourselves so long as it is safe.
Arwen Bird, London N4

Leaps and bouds
My son has been receiving 15 hours of ABA a week for a year and is doing amazingly well. Without it he would probably still be wandering the house, banging cupboards. Instead he has learnt his alphabet and numbers, can spell and do puzzles and is starting to talk.
Natalie McClay, Pontefract, West Yorkshire

No case for persecution of the CPS

AS A victim-support volunteer in the London courts I found the criticism of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) in the profile of the former deputy Speaker Nigel Evans (“Mr Fumble wins show of hands in court”, last week) beggared belief. It is thanks to the strenuous efforts of the police and the CPS that many more victims of sexual offences, including child sex abuse, have in recent years come forward to tell their stories, and many successful prosecutions have ensued. It is also not unusual for witnesses to change their testimony during a trial, a point not mentioned in much of the media coverage.

Well done to Evans on his acquittal, but the politicians now calling for the CPS to be held to account might first reflect on what should be their priority — an inquiry into Westminster’s culture of heavy drinking and promiscuity.
Crawford Chalmers, Weybridge, Surrey

Identity parade
The solution to the problems surrounding rape cases is simple: the CPS and the police should not name or identify the accused until after a conviction is achieved, but the present system of anonymity for the victim should be preserved so they continue to come forward.
Rowell Wilkinson, London E10

Off the record
Until recently I was under the impression that if asked by the police to give a statement on some matter I was compelled to do so. However, one is under no such obligation. If the men who appeared in the witness box at Evans’s trial had refused to give a statement, the police would not have been able to bring a case against him and much public money and embarrassment on the part of the CPS would have been saved.
George McCoy, Stone, Staffordshire

Points

Syrian tragedy
The murder of a faithful priest renowned for his care and compassion for all, regardless of their creed, is symptomatic of the tragedy that is Syria (“Killing of priest was ‘rebel punishment’”, World News, last week). But far sadder still and to our great shame is the fact that the West did not listen to the vast majority of Syrians who, across the religious and tribal divides, knew that Bashar al-Assad was the only one who could prevent the nightmare of civil war. Indeed, as Father Francis Van der Lugt wrote in 2012: “Most Syrians do not support the opposition. Therefore you cannot say that this is a popular uprising.” From its outset the insurrection was yet another example of the West’s arrogant political adventurism and meddling either directly or indirectly in countries and cultures our governments simply despise.
Reverend RC Paget, Brenchley, Kent

Diesel damage report
In your article “Diesel blamed for deaths” (News, April 6) you highlighted the fact that nearly a third of UK cars are now diesel-powered, a figure dwarfed by the proportion of our diesel-engine vans (95%). I am disturbed that so many drivers run their engines while stationary: this is illegal but the law is widely ignored. Now we know diesel pollution is responsible for irreversible health damage, we must enforce the law more rigorously.
Mohammad Royapoor, Newcastle upon Tyne

Emission statement
Apparently newer, greener diesel engines used in buses and elsewhere have an additional and more insidious problem. Because they are more efficient and operate at higher pressures, the particles that they emit are smaller than those from conventional diesel units. These particles are harder if not impossible to filter out of emissions and pass more easily from the lungs to the rest of the body. The irony is that these so-called greener engines are more dangerous than the older ones.
John Bornholt, by email

Computer says no
While I appreciate that an online GP consultation, according to government thinking, would be no problem for many “silver surfers” (“See your GP any time — on Skype”, News, last week), what about the rest of the ageing population who cannot afford a computer or an iPad? Or those who find technology complicated and frustrating and, like me, have no one to offer assistance when things go wrong and are therefore forced to pay for an engineer to come out?
Molly Drinnan, Richmond, London

Age concern
What is clear is that, to be  more accountable, general practice has to shed some of  its burdens and distractions. The transfer of public health  to local authorities could be accompanied by shifting  some screening and services such as immunisation to pharmacies or other agencies. My particular interest is the frail elderly, for whom the model of diagnosis/ treatment/prevention is wanting. I feel it is remarkable that people survive the  system as often as they do.
Professor Clive Bowman, Falmouth, Cornwall

Trust me, I’m a nurse
Why do we insist on thinking care and medical advice can come only from doctors? My local practice clearly doesn’t think so, since the agenda for a recent patient open day allocated 15 minutes for a talk on what a doctor does and 30 minutes for what a nurse practitioner does.
Catherine Inwood, Wallingford, Oxfordshire

Corrections and clarifications

Complaints about inaccuracies in all sections of The Sunday Times, including online, should be addressed to editor@sunday-times.co.uk or The Editor, The Sunday Times, 3 Thomas More Square, London E98 1ST. In addition, the Press Complaints Commission (complaints@pcc.org.uk or 020 7831 0022) examines formal complaints about the editorial content of UK newspapers and magazines (and their websites)

Birthdays

Felix Baumgartner, first skydiver to go faster than the speed of sound, 45; Sebastian Faulks, author, 61; Sir John Eliot Gardiner, conductor, 71; Jessica Lange, actress, 65; Nicholas Lyndhurst, actor, 53; Ryan O’Neal, actor, 73; Leslie Phillips, actor, 90; Ken Scott, record producer, 67; Andy Serkis, actor, 50; George Takei, actor, 77

Anniversaries

1889 birth of Adolf Hitler; 1968 Enoch Powell makes his “Rivers of Blood” speech; 1992 death of Benny Hill, comedian; 1999 Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold kill 13 people before committing suicide at Columbine High School, Colorado; 2010 Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explodes in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11

Telegraph:

SIR – Peter Reynolds (Letters, April 18) wrote that “cannabis is slightly less addictive and harmful than coffee”. What utter nonsense.

SIR – One of the problems with the alien Spanish bluebell is that it breeds with the poor old English bluebell, forming hybrids.

SIR – During the 1997 general election, I was an agent for the Referendum Party. The Referendum Party did not win a single seat, but the Labour Party swept to power with a majority of more than 160 seats over all the other parties combined.

Irish Times:

Irish Independent:

30 AM

Madam – Last week, while Frank Flannery, former CEO of the Rehab group, complained that his “basic human rights” were being infringed (Sunday Independent, April 13, 2014), 5,000 people in Ireland were at risk of homelessness; 396,000 people were unemployed, wondering if they would ever again get the opportunity to exercise their constitutional right to earn a livelihood; and 16,000 Irish homeowners were in danger of losing their homes to the banks. Many more thousands would have been unable to adequately heat their homes or pay basic utility bills.

Also in this section

Harris, give the Taoiseach a break

Easter reminder

Slavery and human rights

What about the fundamental rights of these citizens?

Sadly, they do not have the money, the power, the influence or possibly even the energy to engage a legal team to represent them in matters that Frank Flannery calls “natural and constitutional justice”.

Charities are under the spotlight, and there can be little doubt that there are some excellent charities in this country. The work and research they engage in and the information they provide forms part of the fabric of our society. Without their dedicated staff, many people would be unable to live independent, active and fulfilling lives.

However, during boom times many charities created senior, highly paid positions – possibly where no real need existed.

Then, when public funding was reduced, the post-holders had watertight contracts. Their salaries had to be paid no matter what. Cuts would be found elsewhere. Sadly, the service user and staff of the charities were the losers as these inflated salaries came before the greater good of the organisation and indeed of society.

Despite the unfairness and obvious injustice of all this, charities still frequently focus on promoting a strong moral ethos. In its mission statement for example, Rehab is committed to “promoting equality” and “fighting disadvantage”.

Many other charities cite their obligation to justice, equity, compassion and service. But, these are action words – there is no point in just saying them. They have to be exercised. Unfortunately, there has been very little justice or compassion in the way many senior charity personnel have conducted their business during these times of unprecedented economic crisis.

Caroline Collins,
Ennis, Co Clare

Letters: Waters‘ thoughts truly offensive

Madam – I see John Waters says in his interview with Niamh Horan: “I’ve been put on trial over my beliefs,”(Sunday Independent, April 13, 2014) and that he is afraid to go into Dublin city centre at night. As well as alienating the gay community and the majority of people in this country who believe same-sex couples have the right to marry, he now seems intent on alienating people who suffer from depression; “I don’t believe in depression. There’s no such thing. It’s an invention. It’s bullshit, it’s a cop out.”

Mr Waters was very quick to defend himself in his claim he was recently defamed on RTE. Yet he shows scant regard for the feelings of people who suffer from depression by dismissing it in such a vulgar fashion.

I suggest he pays a visit to a psychiatric hospital or attends the depression support group Aware. Then he might gain some insight into what it’s like for people who endure such suffering and see how offensive his comments are.

Then again maybe that’s not such a good idea.

Thomas Roddy,
Galway

Losing pals over insulting views

Madam – The interview with John Waters was disgusting.

He speaks about how he was demonised over his comments on ‘Pantigate’ and that he has no friends in the media now.

Well, I can assure Mr Waters he will have fewer friends after his comments about depression.

He says there is no such thing as depression. But for those who have gone through depression, and the families who supported them, and the medical profession and counsellors who have helped, his comments were insulting.

Maureen Sneyd,
Bishopstown, Cork

Depression is a real condition

Madam – Aware disagrees with the comments about depression as reported in the Sunday Independent article (April 13, 2014). Depression is a very real condition and there are hundreds of thousands of people in this country who can testify to that reality.

Depression generally impacts a person’s thoughts, feelings, behaviour, and can affect their ability to fully live and enjoy their life. It can also impact on their sense of self-worth and even cause them to question their value in the world.

We ask everyone who is involving themselves in a conversation about depression to please remember this. Personal opinions must not distract us from the thousands of individuals across the country who are facing their own difficult moments.

We remind anyone who is impacted by depression that Aware provides a range of services which can make a real difference in their life. Reaching out for help might feel too hard, but it is worth it.

Dr Claire Hayes,
Clinical Director,
Aware, Dublin 2

Writer is Irish version of Havel

Madam – Is John Waters an Irish version of former playwright, author and president Vaclav Havel? Vaclav Havel opposed the status quo of communism in the former Czechoslovakia and remained resilient while others were terrorised into silence by state and media.

Being isolated for his stance on same-sex marriage and adoption by those of his own profession, it is disturbing that every statement the journalist makes has a tendency to be blown out of proportion.

Marion Murphy,
Sallins, Co Kildare

Reality check on mental health

Madam – Last Sunday John Waters is quoted in your well-read paper as stating that there is no such thing as depression. According to the bold John it is a cop-out and bullshit.

Well, John, try telling that to the thousands who have a family member who suffers from what you say is just bullshit. Better still, try telling that to anyone who has been left to rear children after their spouse has taken their own life.

Coroners have stated that some of these people, who died by suicide, could see no way out from their depressed situation due to their serious financial position. But John Waters says there is no such thing as depression. God help us, but we are still rearing them.

Ray O’Leary,
Cork

Keep up good work, John

Madam – Please permit me to comment on John Waters.

1. Mr Waters asks: “What is the great crime in taking money off the state broadcaster?” No crime, Mr Waters. However, you did not take the money from the state broadcaster, you took it from the Irish taxpayer.

2. Mr Waters continues with a comment on his position on gay marriage and adoption: “This is about free speech. It is about the rights of people to speak about what is important without being demonised.”

Yes, you have the right, perhaps even the obligation, to express yourself publicly, Mr Waters, but so also does the listener/reader have the right to demonise your views if that is his/her perception.

3. I agree with Mr Waters that those people who shout and do not want to engage in conversations are “cowards” filled with hatred: they are dangerous to democratic principles, but they have the right to be cowards and dangerous if one truly values free speech.

Mr Waters, I do not agree with your stance on gay marriage and gay adoption but I respect you and admire you for your public utterances. Please keep up the good work.

Vincent J Lavery,
Irish Free Speech Movement,
Dalkey, Co Dublin

Pity for author quickly vanished

Madam – I am not a big fan of John Waters, regardless of his views on gay marriage. Reading his interview in the Sunday Independent (April 13, 2014), I had a brief spell of pity for him, especially since he was being verbally abused by members of the public on the street.

Then, he reminds us of his ignorance. He says: “I don’t believe in depression. There’s no such thing. It’s an invention, it’s bullshit.” I couldn’t believe it. Any pity for him disappeared. I was so angry I could almost go and find him on the street to shout abuse at him. Just one more to add to the mob.

Barry Pringle,
Dublin

DJs aren’t the whipping boys

Madam – I got a huge reaction to an article I wrote for the Sunday Independent last week under the provocative heading: “It’s time to whip disc jockeys into shape.”

I understand that the headline drew many people in who might otherwise not have read the piece. Unfortunately I fear it also gave the impression that my gripe was with radio presenters. One DJ I met asked me if I had my whip with me – I think he was joking.

But just to avoid every DJ in the country being out for my blood – blood on my tracks.

Can I just clarify that it’s not DJs I have a grievance with – but their bosses, who want to turn them into robots.

Let’s hope the piece I wrote turns out to be the start of a proper debate about that. Remember, We Live On Air.

Johnny Duhan,
Limerick

Slavery and human rights

Madam – I take issue with Stephen Tallon (Letters, Sunday Independent, April 13, 2014), who said Britain‘s involvement in the First World War was motivated by human rights.

According to his description of events, Britain was “defending human rights against the dictatorial regimes of Kaiser Germany, Sultanate Turkey and the Austrian-Hungarian Empire”.

How does he reconcile that with the fact that the majority of British citizens did not have the right to vote, and the fact that Glaswegian women were threatened with eviction from tenements they lived in by a greedy landlord class while their husbands, brothers and sons were away fighting in Belgium and France? There was also Britain’s maintenance of concentration camps in South Africa after the Boer War and the shameful massacre of Indian citizens at Amritsar in 1919, which was not very becoming of the human rights he proclaimed Britain was defending, as well as the part it played in the punitive settlement imposed on Germany by the Versailles Treaty which facilitated Hitler’s rise to power.

Mr Tallon also bemoans how Britain “could no longer afford a global role as all their gold was gone and they had massive debts”. Well, of course they had, they learned a hard lesson that fighting a war as an empire has an unsustainable price.

The Left has been wrong about many of the arguments of the last 100 years but should be commended for calling the war what it was – or as its figurehead Lenin aptly described the pretext of the conflict: “One slave owner, Germany, is fighting another slave owner, England, for a fairer distribution of the slaves.”

Robert Byrne,
Dublin 13

Towards a united Ireland

Madam – The State visit to the UK has shown the friendship between our two countries. This could provide a platform to discuss the merits of a united Ireland. Aside from economic benefits, Orange Day could become an all-island celebration to mark the contributions of unionists to Irish culture and society, while the Easter Rising could be commemorated to show thankfulness that never again will a minority be divided from the majority.

Patrick Bamming,
Dublin 1

Sunday Independent

26April2014Settling down

I go all the way around the park listening to the Men from the Ministry: Our heroes face a terrible fate invisible planePriceless

Mary home first full day

Scrabbletoday, Mary nearly got 400, Perhaps Iwill win tomorrow.

Obituary:

Guardian:

Polly Toynbee says the continuing levels of bonuses paid to bankers and others can’t go on (£5m for a banker: disgusting. So is £71 for the unemployed, 25 April). But it will, of course, go on unless there is direct state intervention. Attempting to limit bonuses and salaries is tackling the problem from the wrong end. Since the fat cats will not voluntarily leap off the gravy train and they all sit on each others’ remuneration committees, it will be necessary to claw the money back through the tax system. A tax on organisations, equal to the size of their bonus pot, might make them think twice. This could be accompanied by more progressive increases in income tax for individuals, starting with a 50% rate for those on £150,000 and an extra 5% for every £100,000 above that, rising to a maximum of 90%. This would give someone with a gross income of £1m a net income of about £330,000 and even the chief executive of Barclays, with his £5.1m package, would have a net income of about £750,000, not exactly leaving him destitute. If banks chose to increase bonuses to compensate, this would increase the tax on the bonus pot, providing more income for the exchequer.

But which party would have the guts? Not Labour, judging by its puny announcement about how it would tackle zero hours contracts. Not the Lib Dems, judging by Vince Cable‘s risible letter asking for restraint. Perhaps our tired political system has run its course, with the main parties hopelessly in hock to big corporations, and we need to create a new bottom-up system driven by fairness and equality, possibly based around revamped trade unions and the Greens. Just a thought.
Alan Healey
Milson, Shropshire

• Your article (Shareholders scorn Barclays over bonuses, 25 April) demonstrates exactly how helpless shareholders are in controlling soaring executive bonuses. Their organisation is too fragmented to allow them to counter boardroom excess with any certainty. What is required, of course, is the presence of informed and independent employee representatives on the boards of UK companies who will exercise a moderating influence. Evidence from Germany reveals that employee board-level representation is significantly related to lower levels of executive pay. We require a system that refocuses incentives away from the short-term obsession with share price towards the long-term interests of a wider range of corporate stakeholders, including workers.

One way forward would be to link the issue with moves towards increasing the number of female directors on the boards of UK companies. f trade unions in the UK had the right to elect their own board-level representatives – and if they prioritised women trade unionists to this end – then we would promote greater corporate accountability and gender equality in the boardroom at one fell swoop.
Michael Gold
Professor of comparative employment relations, Royal Holloway University of London

• The claim by the chair of Barclays’ remuneration committee that they have to pay the rate for the job is simply a means of guaranteeing a perpetual upward ratchet on pay at the top, not justified by performance, value-added, productivity or anything other than a self-referential rationale. All this nonsense, so rightly pilloried by Polly Toynbee, is only made possible by the state underwriting the banks. That promise, beyond depositor guarantees, should be withdrawn alongside the introduction of a legally enforceable ratio between top and median pay which would create a ratchet down at the top and up at the bottom, to general benefit.
Roy Boffy
Walsall, West Midlands

• Today’s Guardian reports “Shareholders scorn Barclays over bonuses”, “AstraZeneca shareholders revolt over pay”, “Bosses shocked by recruitment firm pay rebels” and Polly Toynbee’s article “£5 for a banker: disgusting. So is £71 for the unemployed”. Vince Cable resorts to appealing to shareholders’ and top executives’ morality to curb their obscene greed as they continue to dip their sticky fingers into corporate tills. This crocodile-tears pantomime of helpless hand-wringing could be cured at a stroke by this or any government imposing the 60% to 98% surtax and supertax rates applied in the 1950s and 60s to successfully boost the post-war economy; to be introduced, this week, with no new legislation required.
Noel Hodson
Oxford

• After 50 years I’ve finally taken the first faltering step towards ditching my Barclays accounts. The relationship has survived numerous crises and scandals over the years, mainly due to my inertia but also backed by the belief that they knew what they were doing as a bank. B ut when they think a 30% fall in profits merits a 10% increase in bonuses then the horrible truth finally dawns. Barclays really is a piggy bank!
Owen McLaughliny
Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire

• The chair of Barclays’ remuneration committee tells shareholders that “only the most discerning will appreciate” the need to pay increased bonuses after a year in which profits have fallen by 32%. Am I the only person who is reminded of the tailors who told an emperor that only intelligent people would be able to appreciate the fine cut of his suit?
Simon Cherry
Claygate, Surrey

Independent:

As one of the anti-competitive left mentioned in your editorial of 22 April, I’d like to stand up for Xenophanes.

Competition against others is often meaningless; if you win, it could be because they are having a bad day; or you could creditably surpass yourself and come last in a brilliant field. Differences in sporting performance may be minuscule, but the glory goes to a single victor. Recall the devastation of some Olympic silver medallists who scored only a fraction of a point less than the winner.

High achievers will still make scientific breakthroughs and execute works of art because they are determined to do as well as they possibly can. They compete against their own previous best. Our young people should be encouraged to do what they do because it’s worth doing, not because they might secure plaudits for what may be a pointless exercise.

Determination to come out on top has given us: the demeaning bear garden of Prime Minister’s Question Time; footballers who are paid more in a week than others are in 10 years; and an economic system that increasingly rewards the rich and powerful at the expense of the poor.

Susan Alexander, Frampton Cotterell, South Gloucestershire

The writer of your editorial clearly hasn’t read Margaret Heffernan’s recent book A Bigger Prize – why competition isn’t everything. She makes a convincing case that on the whole competition undermines rather than motivates school pupils. The few winners may come out well, but the rest, believing they will not reach the top, are likely to make less effort in their studies.

Sure, it is good if we strive to do better than we did last time, but it is not necessary to set one pupil against another, or one school against another, to achieve good results. We may have gained in art and science as a result of competition over the years, but let us not discount the profound ill effects that unbridled competition brings. On the whole, co-operation is a more grown-up, intelligent and humane way of living.

John Gamlin, East Bergholt, Suffolk

The sport of baiting cold callers

I was initially delighted to read of Sean O’Grady’s approach to cold calling (“Don’t hang up on a cold caller”, 24 April) but this soon turned to disappointment when I realised that my personal best of six minutes 20 seconds keeping one of these pests on the line is as nothing compared with his 43 minutes. Respect!

I urge Independent readers not already engaged in this sport to take it up. And if you’re stuck for conversation, ask your cold caller who their client is, what the data will be used for and whether they are conducting their “research” in accordance with the Market Research Code of Conduct. They should then provide a free phone number to enable you to check their status.

Beryl Wall, London W4

Sean O’Grady tells us what a hoot he has wasting the time of cold callers. As a former cold caller, allow me to tell you some truths.

No one wants to do it; we do it because we have to. It is an awful job enduring abuse all day. Treating us badly does nothing to hurt the businesses that employ us, it just hurts us. I always let down cold callers quickly and with courtesy.

Sean Nee, Edinburgh

TV drama with Authentic mumbling

Instead of being criticised, the director of the BBC’s Jamaica Inn and the actor playing Joss Merlyn should be praised for an authentic characterisation. They have obviously referred back to Daphne du Maurier’s book, where Aunt Patience attempts to reassure Mary Yellan: “Your Uncle must be humoured, you know; he has his ways, and strangers don’t understand him at first.”

John E Orton, Bristol

Amid the brickbats thrown at the BBC for mumbling in the recent TV Jamaica Inn, let’s give Auntie a huge bouquet for the wonderful Radio 3 performance of Antony and Cleopatra on 20 April. Kenneth Branagh, Alex Kingston and the rest of the cast gave full measure to every spell-binding word of Shakespeare’s poetry. Words do matter, but only the steam radio seems to know it.

Jane Jakeman, Oxford

Reasons for a drop in crime

Your editorial of 24 April suggests that the downward trend in violent crime may be due to alcohol having become more expensive relative to earnings. But an even more important influence may be closed-circuit television cameras.

You can now hardly do anything or go anywhere without being recorded, and anyone contemplating a crime knows this. No one really likes snooping cameras, but they may be helping to keep us safe.

Richard Bass, Leigh, Surrey

Union’s democratic decision-making

To claim, as Mark Leftly does, that Mark Serwotka “seized control” of the Public and Commercial Services union is just absurd (Westminster Outlook, 18 April).

The truth is that in 2000 Mark won a democratic election of the union’s membership and Barry Reamsbottom, whose name was not on the ballot paper, tried to cling on to his former position, vacating it only when ordered to do so by a High Court judge after we had been forced to initiate a legal challenge.

The possibility of a merger has been suggested precisely because, thankfully, we are now a union that aims to build the most effective possible trade union fightback against damaging cuts and privatisation. Decisions on merger will be made by our members after a full, open and democratic process.

Janice Godrich, National President, Public and Commercial Services Union, London SW11

The raunchy side of solar energy

The photograph above a short article on the first page of last week’s Your Money section caught my eye. The article was about a scheme to invest in solar energy for schools. The photograph showed a group of young women dressed in mini skirts and stockings with the caption: “The sun could shine on St Trinian’s under a solar panel scheme for schools.” This looks like  a cheap way of “spicing up” the Your Money section.

Patricia Bartley, York

Patron saint of Anatolia?

Amid all the gentle humour surrounding the origins of England’s national saint, can we at least stop referring to St George as a “Turk” (letter, 25 April). This is an anachronism on a par with calling an ancient Briton an Englishman, or an Aztec an American.

The influx of Turks into Anatolia, and its subsequent definition as Turkey, occurs largely from the 11th century onwards. Polyglot Greek, Palestinian, Levantine – the one thing St George is definitely not, by over 500 years, is a Turk.

Christopher Dawes, London W11

Times:

Sir, The City would do well to follow the shift of culture we are seeing in medicine towards both men and women working less than full time (“Fathers with City jobs are shunning paternity leave”, Apr 23).

Diminishing numbers of men or women can take five days a week of full-on clinical work seeing patients for 12 hours a day. More and more doctors are burning out and leaving the profession early, in the same way that City workers retire in their fifties, often for health reasons.

Men should be encouraged to take leave under the new parental leave arrangements and reap the benefits of forming strong relationships with their children as well as understanding what their wives do.

Employers will realise that there is no difference between men and women in terms of potential leave for childbearing as they could well split the parental leave equally. This will help to prevent the misconception that women are seen as less desirable to employ.

Young women with university degrees are less and less inclined to play the “supporting, non-working wife” role, which is needed if jobs in the City continue to demand such long hours that participation in family life is impossible.

Medicine is well on the way to busting the myth that we are individually indispensable and must therefore be present at work for 60 plus hours a week. Doctors who work less than full time can still reach the top of their careers. Dame Fiona Caldicott revealed that her most satisfying achievement was that she was the first president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists to have trained on a less than full-time basis, while bringing up children.

Both men and women benefit from having a balance between work and family. We need to remove the stigma attached to fathers who wish to participate in their children’s lives and benefit from the new parental leave arrangements.

Let us celebrate a remarkable group of new women presidents: Jane Dacre, president-elect of the Royal College of Physicians, Clare Marx, soon to be the first woman president of the Royal College of Surgeons and Suzy Lishman, president-elect of the Royal College of Pathologists. They will join Maureen Baker, chair of the Royal College of GPs.

Dr Fiona Cornish

President,
Medical Women’s Federation

Cambridge

Published at 12:01AM, April 26 2014

Telegraph:

SIR – Lord Dannatt, the former chief of the general staff, complains that the UK Independence Party’s depiction on a poster of the Union flag on fire is “disrespectful and inappropriate”.

SIR – How might a resident of Looe, St Ives or even Lanhydrock have a distinctive culture that is different from mine? Surely we read the same newspapers, watch the same television and most importantly, speak the same recognisable form of English?

SIR – David Cameron is to be commended for pointing out that Britain’s religious tradition is Christian.

Irish Times:

Sir, – The call by a Conservative MP, Michael Fabricant, for Ireland to rejoin the British Commonwealth following the successful state visit to the UK of President Michael D Higgins comes as no surprise. However, the response by Fine Gael TD Brian Hayes, who said “such a proposal should be considered”, does.

The Irish State formally left the British Commonwealth in 1949.  At that time, this policy was seen as a natural further step in the direction of a fully sovereign State. Today, 65 years later, there are Irish political figures, and not just Brian Hayes, who are calling for the restoration of the Commonwealth link.

However, despite their machinations, there is no significant degree of support among the population for re-entry. Rejoining the Commonwealth would have the effect of gradually “re-Britishing” the Irish State and would amount to a rejection of the separatist aspect of Irish nationalism.

Because the British monarch has always been head of the Commonwealth, this would mean that symbolically speaking, the monarch would occupy a higher position politically than that of our own democratically elected head of state. We could find ourselves being embarrassed in the course of future royal visits, or state ceremonial occasions involving representatives of “Her Majesty”.

A “British dimension” would be restored to our political life. In terms of international affairs, we would once again become a white Commonwealth dominion. Much of Europe would interpret our move as a “return to the fold” and a rejection of our policies of separation from Great Britain.

Alongside the armies of Commonwealth nations, the Irish Defence Forces would be expected to participate in Armistice Day ceremonies and to ensure that army personnel wear the poppy.  The re-Britishing of the 26 counties would restore attitudes of subservience and servility among sections of our political and social elite. Britain would continue the practice of handing out “hongs” to selected Irish citizens in the form of knighthoods and other titles of “nobility”.

The import of Brian Hayes’s statement must be clarified by Taoiseach Enda Kenny. I regard Ireland’s sovereignty as sacrosanct, probably because we had such a long and hard battle to secure it.

Irish separation from the embrace of the British polity and the existence of a Republic are non-negotiable basic principles. Ironically, it was a Fine Gael taoiseach, John A Costello, who in 1949 ended the last formal British link over most of Ireland.

It is imperative that we ensure that some in modern Fine Gael don’t try to undo that achievement. Yours, etc,

TOM COOPER,

Templeville Road,

Dublin 6W

Sir, – Hugh Pierce (Letters, April 25th) stated: “Throughout the modern era Christians of all denominations have been enthusiastic practitioners, proponents and facilitators of the death penalty.” Yet Amnesty International provides figures for 2013 which show the US as the only country in the Christian Americas that performed state executions.

In the EU, not practising capital punishment is a prerequisite for membership. Those few European countries outside the EU which still have capital punishment on their statute books performed no executions last year.

According to Amnesty there were 22 countries worldwide that carried out state executions in 2013. Of those only the US and South Sudan could be said to have Christianity as the religion of a sizeable proportion of their populations. It seems to me that in the modern era “Christian” countries are increasingly following the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament. Yours, etc,

JOHN BELLEW,

Dunleer,

Co Louth

Sir, – Further to the letters discussing Christianity and judicial execution, the catechism of the Catholic Church states (para 2267) that the “teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor”. Yours, etc,

DR JOHN DOHERTY,

Cnoc an Stollaire,

Gaoth Dobhair

Sir, – Your letters page will surely flourish for as long as we read, alternately, that “throughout the modern era Christians of all denominations have been enthusiastic practitioners, proponents and facilitators of the death penalty” (Hugh Pierce); that Christ Himself “blessed murderers, calling for their forgiveness and asked His followers to do the same” (Geoff Scargill); that “one can be a perfectly authentic Christian and support capital punishment” (Sean Alexander Smith); that Christ’s three most recent representatives on Earth “reaffirmed the Holy See’s support for the abolition of the death penalty as part of the Church’s defence of the dignity of human life” (Ian d’Alton) – and all this against a backdrop of Christ’s own Father having definitively decreed that “whomsoever takes a life shall surely be put to death” (Hugh Pierce).

All I know, sir, is that, along with the aforementioned chroniclers, you have me all of a doodah. Yours, etc,

OWEN MORTON,

Station Road,

Sutton,

Dublin 13

Sir, – I wish to support general secretary Pat King’s condemnation of a minority group at the ASTI convention who barracked, heckled and abused Mr Quinn throughout his speech. The teacher who used the megaphone and his main supporter who addressed the media are founding members of the self-styled “ASTI Fightback Group”. This small group of disaffected ASTI members (comprising seven or eight activists) do not have the right to use the acronym ASTI in their rather melodramatic title; the group is not a recognised or legal structure within the union and does not have a mandate from its 18,000 members.

My colleagues and I do not pay our union subscription to have crucial business and procedures at annual convention derailed by a small, very vocal group who hog the microphone throughout convention debate yet whose raison d’être at conference is simply to wait for the Minister to arrive and disrupt proceedings. By harnessing the complete attention of the media and the general public for their own political agenda, the thuggish behaviour of these people has deflected attention from the crucial issues and real concerns surrounding Junior Cycle reform and assessment and other important educational matters.

This group has done great damage to students, teachers and the union. I am appalled at this outcome, which has, in effect, swung the pendulum in Mr Quinn’s favour. I am reminded of the lines from Yeats: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.” Yours , etc,

COLETTE PHILLIPS,

Celbridge,

Co Kildare

Sir, – Amid charges that teachers who interrupted and heckled Ruairí Quinn were guilty of disgracing the profession and harming students, teachers and the profession, I feel I should respond as one who, very reluctantly, engaged in such heckling. I did this because of deep frustration that we have a Minister of Education who has refused to listen to those very people who know best when it comes to educational reform and the negative effects of the new Junior Cert.

None of us likes resorting to this kind of behaviour but I thought it appropriate that the Minister experience the deep anger that teachers throughout the country are feeling. The “fightback” group, who do have considerable support, are a response by some ordinary and concerned ASTI members that the leadership of the union is not sufficiently defending the pay and conditions of teachers, especially the most vulnerable young and non-permanent members.

I do hope that people who got upset at this expression of anger display the same upset at policies that have devastated families and communities throughout this country. Yours, etc,

MARTIN McMULLAN,

Beauvale Park,

Dubliin 5

Sir, – I have been involved in GP training for the last 36 years and this is the first time we have failed to recruit sufficient suitable candidates. Young graduate doctors are leaving, voting with their feet. We cannot afford for them to go as we have too few GPs as it is and a lot of older colleagues ready to retire. It is a time for meaningful dialogue not diktat. Yours, etc.

DR FERGUS O’KELLY,

Rialto,

Dublin 8

Sir, – How nice it was to see that our Polish friends chose, fittingly, to thank us in our national language (“Poland thanks Ireland of the welcomes”, April 24th).

It shows that the more recent arrivals to our nation don’t necessarily share the cultural inferiority complex that an influential minority among us harbour regarding anything too Irish and above all, the most Irish thing of all, our language. It was therefore somewhat ironic that the need was felt to specify in the same article that Polish, with 120,000 Poles living here, is the second most widely spoken language in the State.

While I am sure the reporter was only reconveying information she picked up elsewhere it is important to recognise the ideological basis of such a claim in the language context of Ireland. Ideological because claims about the death of the Irish language began to be made in the sixteenth century when it was the most widely spoken language in the country and are a tool to justify curtailing speakers’ rights, and untrue because Census 2011, which tells us that there are 119,526 people who speak Polish in the State, also tells us that there are 187,827 people here who speak Irish every day or every week.

This figure probably represents the core of fluent speakers from the 1,777,437 people who reported that they spoke Irish. Unfortunately, due to the dire economic straits we are in, the next census will probably show a decrease in the number of Polish speakers in the State. However, given that the trend in all recent censuses is for increasing numbers of Irish speakers there are likely to be even more of them by the time of the next census. It remains to be seen if the media will then feel compelled to seek different rationales for ignoring Irish. Yours, etc,

ROBERT GUNNING,

Bóthar Choill na

bhFuinseog,

Cluain Dolcáin,

BÁC 22

Sir, – Reading Hilary Fannin’s column (April 25th) about the perception of women becoming invisible after the age of 50 I remembered a photograph of an elderly woman which I saw in the Kathmandu Post in Nepal. She was dressed in festive garments and crowds gathered to pay homage to her because she had attained the auspicious age of 77 years 7 months and 7 days and was now being revered as a god. She belonged to the Newar tribe in the Kathmandu Valley. Perhaps we women should follow the Newari tradition and instead of becoming invisible after 50 aim to become gods once we reach the auspicious age of 77. Yours, etc,

VALERIE BURRIS,

Woodlawn Park,

Churchtown,

Dublin 14

Sir, – It is surprising to see a headline stating that Nama is set to give €5 million for project on Dublin’s Moore Street. This would mean that the agency is about to give millions to the developer of a commercial mall, so that a limited number of those houses where James Connolly, PH Pearse, Joseph Plunkett, Thomas Clarke and Sean MacDiarmada spent their last hours of freedom, can be “developed” into what is described as “a monument project”.

Are we thus abandoning the republic of equals Connolly, Pearse, Ceannt, MacDonagh, O’Rahilly and our Citizen Army, Irish Volunteers and Cumann na mBan fought for, and allowing this historic site to remain in private hands?

May I ask the Dáil to instead mandate compulsory purchase of the properties where the GPO garrison spent the last days of the Rising, and from which they walked out to surrender and prison – or for the leaders death – for an Irish republic. Yours, etc,

LUCILLE REDMOND,

Harold’s Cross,

Dublin 6

Sir, – The story featured on the front page of your newspaper (April 25th) showing a mother and three children forced to sleep and live in a car represents an appalling injustice. It was ironic to read on the same day the supplement celebrating 10 years of the Ombudsman for Children.

We are getting ready to celebrate the centenary of the declaration of the Irish Republic and yet families are being forced out of accommodation in circumstances akin to the evictions of over 150 years ago. Those three children will be seven, five and three when the 2016 celebrations occur. It is up to all of as a society to make sure that they are properly housed immediately. Government bodies need to give themselves a shake-up. Yours, etc,

MONICA DOLAN,

Manor Street,

Dublin 7

Irish Independent:

* As one who believes in a higher power, having experienced many spiritual occurrences in my 64 years, I too often ponder on the questions posed by Rob Sadlier in his interesting ‘epistle’ (Letters, April 24).

Also in this section

Definition of insanity: voting same way, expecting change

Letters: God works in mysterious ways

Letters: To go far on climate change, we have to go together

And I have no intention of trying to change any person’s belief or disbelief, bearing in mind we have free will. I study philosophy in attempts to reconcile similar questions of my own.

Rob’s question, why a loving god allows human suffering without intervention, was discussed by early Jewish, Christian and Islamic philosophers, many of whom believed that God does not see the particular/ individual; rather, He/She/They see the overall or general.

In my considered opinion, the Irish RC church, in its past teachings, presented a God more akin to a Fairy Godmother, where life was black and white, with no grey, let alone reality.

Earthly life is so varied, yet also similar, but it is man’s greed destroying the gifts given to us by Gaia that can lead to “a parasitic worm boring through the eye of a boy sitting on the bank of a river in west Africa“.

The Greek bible says “God is an enigma”, therefore are we not also individual enigmas? We have talents and gifts for the good of mankind and nature.

Alas, in Ireland today we see a Government totally bereft of humanity, or accountability to its people, while a great number of its members proclaim their Catholicism. Do they imagine God only sees them in church on Sunday?

Eastern people’s lives have been based on philosophy of love for oneself and their fellow humans.

The enormous damage done to many non-European nations by conquerors in the name of earthly and heavenly regents has led to the cult of the individual, and this should be of greater concern to humans than a trinity in the ether watching over us, supposedly waiting to toss the soul into an eternal fire.

I am of the firm opinion that there is an element of woman in God. For any who may be interested, there is a website “History of Philosophy without any gaps” from Kings College London, where you can access a weekly lecture on philosophy from its earliest known days: http://www.historyofphilosophy.net/

Declan Foley, Berwick, Australia

GOOD AND EVIL – AND ENVELOPES

* Nearly all recognised religions have two stories. The first is that there is a kind, loving God and the second is that there is an evil entity. We are meant to do what God asks us and reject the evil entity.

Nearly all religions also have a communal “praying” ceremony and if you like a bit of music and a bit of bread and wine, then there is one religion that will throw most of that in for you if you place an anonymous amount of money into a not-so-anonymous envelope.

Meanwhile, apparently, God will look down and extend eternal life to you for having religiously attended these ceremonies.

If I was to look for evidence of the existence of God, I would look to Florence Nightingale, not Adolf Hitler. The atheist argument is that there is no God because Hitler existed. I find it next to impossible to understand how the religious orders of the world have not advanced the counter argument along the lines: “Ah, no, what you are doing there Mr Atheist is presenting evidence of Satan as proof that God doesn’t exist. We have told you about Satan and how you are meant to reject him, so well done on recognising the evil that he can spread throughout our species.”

Dermot Ryan, Attymon, Athenry, Co Galway

POSTER BOYS AND GIRLS

* Election posters. What a load of botox. Never have I seen so many Irish men and women looking so well and blemish-free. Many of those in my own area I know personally. What have they done? Can ‘Operation Transformation’ have had such a health-inducing impact on so many?

We need more of this. Problems faced by the HSE will be ended with such a healthy-looking population. In recent years, there have been many calls for politicians to clean up their act. It would seem that the local and EU election candidates have done just that . . . at least on the face of it!

Philip Byrne, Co Wicklow

SHAME ON OUR SOCIETY

* We have really hit the floor with a mother and her three tiny children sleeping in a car (Irish Independent, April 25).

What has happened to Ireland?

Where I live in Dun Laoghaire, all along the main street there are three-storey premises going back to the Georgian era, which in better days had shops on the ground floor. Sadly far too many of them are now vacant.

Any one of these buildings could house several families.

Rather than rezone and rebuild, even as the wind whistles through the ghost estates, why can we not convert and adapt or free up the thousands of potential dwellings we already have?

Have we as a society, economy, government, come to a place whereby we have actually become indifferent to the plight of a mother and three little children reduced to living in a small car?

God help them.

God help us.

D Fullam, Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin

BAN DISTRACTING ELECTION POSTERS

* I agree with Mark Keane (Irish Independent, April 25) with regard to election posters being an eyesore and contributing to the litter problem.

But even more serious is the added danger they bring to the motorist, as your eye is inevitably attracted towards the various posters, which could cause a serious accident.

We should be the first, just like with the smoking ban, and make a complete ban on election posters.

If it was to prevent one serious accident on our roads, then surely there can be no argument.

Brian McDevitt, Ardconnaill, Glenties, Co Donegal

WE CAN’T AFFORD PAY RISES YET

* The National Competitive Council (NCC) has warned that Ireland has largely failed in recent years to regain the virtuous position it once held briefly in the 1990s. The NCC further warns that today, 2014, our national competitive position is now disimproving again.

The vocal minority in trade unions are all seeking pay rises now at the first mention of the word recovery, a recovery that is elusive to most. The indigenous retail industry is on its knees, with no meaningful or sustained signs of any growth.

If not me, we should heed the NCC. It explains that pay rises now will further erode our weakened competitiveness, prolong long-term unemployment, and discourage any incentives to create employment.

Self-interested trade union bosses seem only concerned with their members and show little interest in the unemployed. Ireland’s troubled economy is a long, long way from the luxury of awarding pay rises.

Brian Cooper, Old Youghal Road, Cork

PILLARS OF THE COMMUNITY

* I can remember a time when teachers were considered role models for kids, when bankers were considered to be pillars of the community, when priests were looked on for moral guidance, and when gardai could be trusted without reproach.

I must be getting old.

RA Blackburn, Abbey Hill, Naul, Co Dublin

SAINTLY MIRACLES

* Pope Francis is now eligible to become a saint. He just performed two miracles by making Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II saints.

Kevin Devitte, Mill Street, Westport, Co Mayo

Irish Independent

27 April 2014 Quiet day
I go all the way around the park listening to the Men from the Ministry: Our heroes face a terrible fate new furniture Priceless
Mary home fsettling in
Scrabble today, Mary nearly got 400, Perhaps I will win tomorrow.

Obituary:

Mark Shand – obituary
Mark Shand was an adventurer and travel writer who found his true mission in the conservation of the Asian elephant

Mark Shand: ‘I’ve always loved animals’
2:30PM BST 24 Apr 2014
29 Comments
Mark Shand, who has died aged 62, was the brother of the Duchess of Cornwall and a noted conservationist.
An adventurer in the best sense of the word, Shand never tied himself to anything so tedious as a full-time job. Among his earliest heroes was the 19th-century explorer Sir Richard Burton, and his exploits included riding on horseback through the Andes, journeying to Tibet and being shipwrecked in the western Pacific during a hurricane. His first book, Skulduggery (1987), told of an expedition to an uncharted territory in the Indonesian archipelago, Irian Jaya, which was said to be seething with cannibals.
All this might have degenerated into a life of exotic dilettantism. But while travelling in India in 1988, Shand come across an emaciated captive female elephant being used for begging purposes by her owners: “My mouth went dry,” he later wrote of the moment when he first saw her. “I knew then that I had to have her.” He bought the animal, named her Tara and rode her 750 miles from Konarak on the Bay of Bengal to the Sonepur Mela, the ancient elephant trading fair at Patna on the Ganges. Travels on My Elephant (1992), his account of the journey, was a bestseller and won him the Travel Writer of the Year Award.
Shand followed this with Queen of the Elephants (1995), the story of his 300-mile trek across East Bengal and Assam on the back of an elephant with Parbato Barua, India’s only female elephant trainer. The book won the 1996 Thomas Cook Travel Book Award and the Prix Litteraire d’Amis, and formed the basis for a BBC documentary.

Related Articles
Major Bruce Shand
12 Jun 2006
Mark Shand: adventurer, conservationist and Duchess of Cornwall’s little brother
24 Apr 2014
Michael Jacobs
17 Jan 2014
Norman Lewis
23 Jul 2003
Eric Newby
23 Oct 2006
Mark Shand with his elder sister, the Duchess of Cornwall (REX)
By now Shand was passionate about the long-term welfare of the Asian elephant. He had a cause. In 2002 he gave up his “day job” (selling Cartier jewellery) and founded Elephant Family, devoted to the animal’s survival. “There are only 50,000 of them,” Shand said, “compared with half a million African ones. Yet bigger, uglier African elephants grab all the attention.” Every day, he pointed out, an elephant kills a human being and a human being kills an elephant. He added: “It is our fault, because we humans have driven them away from their natural habitat. To cut the risk of human-elephant conflict and casualties, we are securing habitat all over Asia and purchasing corridors of land for elephants and helping local people relocate.” The charity has so far invested more than £6 million in a range of such projects.
Shand was not only well-placed to be a fundraiser (having contacts in the Royal family, the aristocracy and the merely very rich), he was also good at it. In 2010 he organised an exhibition of 250 60-inch-tall fibreglass elephants to stand on plinths across London; they were mysteriously removed overnight later in the summer — a visual metaphor for extinction. Each animal was decorated by a celebrity or an artist, and each was later auctioned off.
In 2013 he accompanied the Prince of Wales on part of his visit to India, “to highlight the work of Elephant Family, and show him what remains of Asia’s incredible wildlife”, later declaring: “There has never been such an unprecedented threat to world wildlife. The illegal wildlife trade is now worth an estimated £6 billion a year, and it’s growing.”
Born on June 28 1951, Mark Roland Shand was the son of Major Bruce Shand, who won an MC and Bar as a cavalry officer with the 12th Lancers, and his wife Rosalind (née Cubitt), daughter of the 3rd Lord Ashcombe . Mark and his elder sister Camilla (now the Duchess of Cornwall) and younger sister Annabel (the interior designer Annabel Elliot) were brought up in a country house at Plumpton, East Sussex.
Mark loved animals from childhood, later recalling: “When I was about eight years old my mother would go to Harrods every two weeks to do her shopping and while she was buying boring things I’d sneak off to the pet department. In those days they had lions and tigers and there was a lot of squeaking and growling going on. To me it was the most exotic place in the world.”

Mark Shand (EPA)
His education at Milton Abbey ended abruptly when he was expelled at the age of 16 — allegedly for smoking dope. Major Shand told his son: “Don’t —- around London, Mark — do something.” So the young man went East: “I did the hippie trail and lived in Bali for a while.”
Having worked as a porter at Sotheby’s, Shand started a business with the Earl of Westmoreland’s son, Harry Fane, selling Cartier jewellery. He was soon being touted as one of the most eligible bachelors of the Seventies, and he was linked in the gossip columns to President John Kennedy’s daughter Caroline, to Bianca Jagger, Princess Lee Radziwill, and to the model Marie Helvin.
He later described his youth as “misspent”, adding: “I don’t have many regrets. I’ve got lots of tattoos, though, a serpent on my forearm, which I got when I was working in the packing room of Sotheby’s, the crab on my shoulder in Texas, and a tiger I found after I woke up with a bunch of Algerian soldiers. On my foot I’ve got some markings which were made by Dyaks in Borneo while I was fairly intoxicated on anything that was remotely available.”
Many women found him mesmerising, one gushing: “He is an Adonis. He’s the nearest thing to a real-life Indiana Jones. He’s always turning up at parties, deep brown, just back from India and telling extraordinary stories.” The novelist Jilly Cooper once said: “I sat next to him at a dinner party, and I was trembling with excitement.”

Mark Shand with his wife Clio and their daughter Ayesha (GETTY)
In 1990 Shand married the actress Clio Goldsmith, niece of the billionaire entrepreneur Sir James Goldsmith. They had a daughter, Ayesha.
For relaxation, Shand enjoyed watching television series such as The Killing and Game of Thrones. He also liked browsing in antique markets. He once had a pet mongoose which escaped in a restaurant and helped itself to a fellow diner’s plate of spaghetti; he also had a myna bird “who spoke in an Irish accent” and a Staffordshire bull terrier called Satan, “who I looked after for a friend while he was ‘a guest of Her Majesty’”.
His favourite books were Brazilian Adventure by Peter Fleming; Eric Newby’s A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush; and Rodney Stone by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
Mark Shand, whose marriage was dissolved, died from a head injury after a fall in New York, where he had been supporting a charity auction at Sotheby’s in aid of Elephant Family and underprivileged children.
Mark Shand, born June 28 1951, died April 23 2014

Guardian:
There are already enough planning permissions for a large increase in the rate of housebuilding, but the major firms all maximise their profits by building only limited numbers of houses, mainly in preferred locations (“Ten steps to release the pressure in Britain’s housing superbubble”, Business). Indeed, when Ed Miliband last year pledged a Labour government to ensure that by 2020 an annual 200,000 new homes would be built (well short of the agreed need for 250,000), the industry bosses exploded that this was far in excess of their capacity.
The real problem is the cost of land and its increase in value when planning permission is granted. Ten acres of farmland worth £8,000 an acre can multiply 80 times with a stroke of the planner’s pen. This is lunatic; having created this value, the community then stuffs it into the pockets of builders and developers (often the same people) apart from painfully extracting a few symbolic goodies in the shape of such things as a new surgery; a road improvement; a sports or community facility.
Politicians are terrified of the effect on existing house prices of a new building programme large enough to deal with existing and future demand. The objectives must be to ensure that more houses are built without fancy schemes to finance their purchase being necessary; and that a high proportion of the increased land values generated returns to the community that creates them.
Harvey Cole
Former leader, Hampshire county council
Winchester
Hampshire
It is not good enough for the property adviser to dismiss increased housebuilding and “garden cities” as solutions to the “housing superbubble”, saying it would take too long and they are not big enough. What happened to forward planning? At the 50th anniversary of the creation of the last wave of new towns, has not the time come to re-examine a mechanism that through an integrated infrastructure, despite all its faults in implementation, provided a civilised environment for thousands of families? This mechanism still exists in the Commission for New Towns, retained to administer new town assets and which combined with the Urban Regeneration Agency to create English Partnerships in 1999.
But it will not happen in the current mania for buzzwords and the “quick fix”. So our hard-won expertise will continue to migrate to those countries that plan for the future and mock our beggarly housing, low in volume and built down to a price instead of up to a standard.
David Jackson
Kelsall
Cheshire
More homes on the scale needed require a planned infrastructure and planning is something that “the market” does not do, other than for its own profitable purposes.  Kevin Albertson’s letter ticks all the right boxes, but I am not holding my breath, waiting for these essential ideas to be implemented.
I live in a village of just over 11,000 people in beautiful countryside. Over the next few years, we are faced with developers building more than 1,000 houses on the green fields here. There are no plans that I know of to deal with the increased traffic flow through the village centre or through the narrow village streets along the A281 on the way to Guildford, or to build additional classrooms or to enlarge the excellent village health centre that opened only last year
Like many other towns and villages, we are being encouraged to engage in developing a neighbourhood plan, but this will not be able to control the number of new houses, only advise on where they should be built; anyway, it will take at least two years to complete.  As the new houses will be built by then, it is all a bit of a sad joke, paying lip service to the government’s idea of localism.
There are some areas where perhaps a “small state” is needed, but there are others where the state must become involved in planning and delivery.  The current need for housing is one of those areas.
David Weaver
Cranleigh
Surrey
Having 30 years’ experience in working with foster carers and the children in their care, I was moved by John Mulholland’s article “The kids are all right” (Magazine) about how a group of young people who have been in care have literally found a platform for their “voice”. I am full of admiration for their resilience and courage, even though we, as a society, have failed to understand properly their needs and ensure these are met.
Foster carers, who have the major responsibility for enabling these kids to build stable relationships, are undervalued. We must ensure foster carers have the knowledge and skills they need. Dr Robert Epstein’s invaluable research on parenting competencies leads the way in showing us what foster carers need. By identifying the top three competencies as love and affection, stress management and relationships, his research findings highlight some of the issues raised in the damming report Couldn’t Care Less (Centre for Social Justice 2008). Let’s treat foster carers like the professionals they are by paying and training them accordingly.
Margaret Hueting
Fostering Relationships Partnership
Eastbourne
Hail the probation service
Jonathan Aitken is to be commended for helping to turn around the life of one fellow inmate in Belmarsh prison on release (“Jonathan Aitken calls for prison ‘mentors’ to tackle reoffending”, News). Volunteers have always played a role in probation work, but volunteers are not a cheap fix to solve reoffending. Without proper training and professional support, the risks multiply and support becomes personalised, often leading to inappropriate relationships or failure, or perhaps a relationship tinged with the self-gratification of those who seek to advertise their good works as part of their own redemptive narrative. We still have a successful public system – the probation service – that uses mentors wisely and trains them well, though Chris Grayling’s plans to privatise the service and to enrich corporations of dubious repute through using cheap and ill-trained or untrained mentors threaten this.
Joanna Hughes
Campaigning committee
National Association of Probation Officers
Cheltenham
Christians thrive in Israel
Your piece “West Bank pilgrims find the Easter path to the Via Dolorosa an ever harder road”(News) on access to Jerusalem’s holy sites at Easter places the blame on the declining Christian population in Jerusalem’s Old City, “from 30,000 in 1944 to 11,000 today”, while failing to state that the Christian population had declined to roughly 14,000 by 1948. Since 1967, when Israel regained control of the Old City, the size of the Christian population has remained stable. This is a time when throughout the Middle East hundreds of thousands of Christians are fleeing, their churches destroyed and their way of life endangered as never before. It is important to state that only in Israel does the Christian population continue to grow and flourish.
Yiftah Curiel
Embassy of Israel
London
Compassion in our society
Having some connection with the food bank movement, I can refute the criticisms of them made by Tories (“Food bank charity quotes PM to rebuff Tory critics”, News). Applicants for food are assessed as being in need. It should be added that some hungry citizens do not approach food banks. Last week, I was with a penniless woman who was too ashamed to go. Others live too far away.
Further individuals often help the needy outside of agencies. Parents and grandparents support family members whose income is not sufficient for essentials. I can think of those suffering from the wretched bedroom tax, whose benefits are delayed, who are in debt. They have been helped by friends from their own pockets.
Official figures underestimate the extent and hardship of poverty. These actions cannot counter the harshness so beloved by the government. But they do demonstrate that many citizens desire a more compassionate society.
Bob Holman
Glasgow
Don’t blame Eurosceptics
In relation to the article “Eurosceptics go on the offensive in new row over war centenary”, (News), it is the government that induced the delay over the Europe for Citizens programme. As respects both First and Second World War commemorations, all of which I strongly support, I shall be going to Normandy where my father was killed and won the Military Cross, at Maltot near Caen in July 1944.
I and other committee members deemed that, because we thought the Europe for Citizens programme was of such legal or political importance, within our standing orders we would recommend that the matter be debated, and which, once we have so ordered, has to take place before the government ministers can authorise the proposals. We urged an earlier debate. It is regrettable that the proposals themselves mixed up the question of archives and commemorations that were uncontentious.
Bill Cash, MP for Stone
House of Commons,
London SW1
Independent:

Times:
Possessions no substitute for a full-time mother
WHAT is the point of a woman working long hours and having to forfeit nearly 75% of her earnings to pay for childcare (“Slave mothers wield a love that smothers”, News Review, last week)? The first 10 years of a child’s life are crucial, as is the support of the mother. I was the product of working parents, something I resent to this day.
Computers, iPhones and bicycles are no substitute for coming home to an empty house, or not having parental support at the school play, sports day or class outing. Yes, I had plenty of free time, and I learnt to be streetwise, to recognise the dangers and to be self-assured, but when I got married and had two children I never worked.
I did voluntary work but was always home to give my children tea and listen to their problems. They were very happy with second-hand bikes, and we had one TV and no computers. Both say they wouldn’t swap me for them.
Women should not be made to feel less competent just because they don’t work.
Sue Sussman, London NW11
Mother load
I can identify with the points Eleanor Mills raised. I was one of those “slave mothers” and missed out on quality moments with my children as I was hellbent on making sure they had everything lined up to keep them busy.
And, yes, I was that parent at the school gate with the healthy snacks and change of clothes ready for them to go on to the next activity. I was a child of the 1970s, with “make sure you are back for your tea” as the only rule, but for my own children I took a totally different route, wanting to provide everything for them, to protect and smother them.
Gail Sheppard, Canterbury
Right to choose
I had my first child at 40, and as my job as a school teacher started with breakfast club at 7.30am and usually ended at 8pm, I reasonably thought that fitting a newborn baby into this schedule would be difficult so I gave up work.
A second child followed shortly afterwards, and over the years (my children are in their late teens) I worked part-time and full-time for a short period and am now at home. So what’s wrong with that? It’s about allowing women choice, not dictating how they should live.
Susan Comer-Jones, Taunton, Somerset
Maternity benefits
We have had enough of being told how to parent our offspring. I am at home with my three children (and expecting a fourth) and relish their development. I have degrees, but being a mum is my career right now. Victoria Beckham has not much in common with regular mothers, and holding her up as an example of how to master the art of motherhood while being a successful businesswoman is neither here nor there.
And why are women so focused on what other women are doing? Can we not simply be true to ourselves and get on with it?
Caroline Olivier, Kilcock, Co Kildare

Everybody deserves to have a compassionate death
THANK YOU, Camilla Cavendish, for the cogent and sensitive article on assisted dying (“He asks for Beethoven and eternal rest; we show a pet more compassion”, Comment, last week). My godmother, Elisabeth Rivers- Bulkeley, a distinguished and fiercely independent woman who was one of the first female members of the London stock exchange, travelled to Dignitas in Switzerland several years ago after her diagnosis of terminal cancer.
According to the account of the friend who accompanied her, the experience was bleak, the process furtive and the surroundings unsavoury. If we are supposed to live in a civilised society, why can we not grant the freedom to Sir Chris Woodhead to end his days at home as he wishes, surrounded by loved ones, with Beethoven and bordeaux — or perhaps, in the case of my late godmother, with Mozart and champagne?
Jessica Pulay, London W11
A means to an end
Death with Dignitas is not with a bearded social worker but with a kindly and competent assistant to ensure that the lethal liquid is taken without mishap. Friends and relatives are encouraged to be present, and Beethoven or any other choice of music is often played. If bordeaux is the chosen tipple it must be swallowed quickly before sleep supervenes in three or four minutes.
Lord Falconer’s Assisted Dying Bill would not have helped Tony Nicklinson; nor will it help Woodhead, as applicants must be within six months of death. The late Margo MacDonald’s Assisted Suicide (Scotland) Bill initially proposed that not only those who are terminally ill but also those “permanently physically incapacitated to such an extent as not to be able to live independently and find life intolerable” would have the right to die.
As a sufferer in the final but probably several-years-long stages of multiple sclerosis said to me: “I wish I had terminal cancer. Then at least I’d know I would die.”
Dr Elizabeth Wilson, Glasgow
Home and away
I accompanied my friend Ann to Dignitas in February. Her assisted suicide was dignified, compassionate, gentle and very moving — not a social worker in sight, or a beard.
The tragedy was that Ann, who was in the final stages of supranuclear palsy, should never have had to travel abroad to bring her suffering to an end. She too wanted to die in her own home. There is much to be learnt from Dignitas. Solidarity and support for a change in the law is what we need.
Carol Taylor OBE, Matlock, Derbyshire

EU must not show weakness in negotiations with Putin
WITHOUT gas revenues, Vladimir Putin’s power base and Russia would quickly disintegrate (“Let me put it in black and white: Putin is no grandmaster”, Comment, last week). As late as the winter of 1999 and early 2000 people were stealing potatoes to survive, and the then economic minister in Novosibirsk told me his No 1 priority was to make sure people did not starve.
As Dominic Lawson states, Putin is not a strategist and acts on impulse — very much a Russian characteristic. Our weakness is that the EU is incapable of negotiating an internal position, never mind presenting a coherent case to the outside world, which provides Putin with opportunities for his (mis)adventures.
I worked for a long time in Moscow for the EC, and there is one feature of working with the Russians that I tell everyone who has to negotiate with them: you must, so to speak, slam your gun down on the table when you sit opposite them.
We must form a cogent policy or face the consequence that they will interpret inaction as weakness or a lack of interest. Putin’s current line is economically and politically suicidal. At the same time, we do not want a weak or disunited Russia.
Keith Little, Prescot, Merseyside

Disagreements on Ted Hughes biography
THE estate of Ted Hughes takes issue with some of the claims in the article on Professor Jonathan Bate and his proposed biography of the former poet laureate (“Hughes widow lays cloak over the poet’s life”, News, March 30). The decision to withdraw support for the book, and permission to quote from unpublished, copyright material from the poet’s archive (now on view in the British Library), was not made — as Professor Bate suggests — out of concern that he might unearth “revelations about [the poet’s] private life” in the archive.
There is no “secret being guarded” there, as Bate speculates. And the poet’s widow, Carol Hughes, strongly rejects his suggestion that she “unnecessarily reneged” on the agreement to write what he originally proposed as a literary life of the poet, focusing on the work rather than a traditional biography. The estate had told Bate that it would not support or allow use of copyright material in any “authorised” biography since Ted Hughes had made clear he did not want one.
Regrettably, Bate ignored repeated concerns expressed by the estate and the publisher that he might be straying from his own remit, and resisted repeated requests to see more of his work in progress, as previously agreed. The Ted Hughes estate believes it is important to put these points on the public record.
Damon Parker (Harcus Sinclair), Solicitor to the Ted Hughes Estate

Points
Caution on cancer tests
I support your campaign to beat cancer, but when discussing early diagnosis we must be careful to differentiate between screening tests and those used to investigate patients presenting with symptoms (“Young die as NHS rules deny them cancer tests”, News, April 13). In Britain screening for cervical cancer is restricted to those aged over 25. Medical literature demonstrates that routinely performing smear tests on women younger than this does little to reduce rates of invasive cancer or mortality, but does increase the number of false positive results obtained — along with all the attendant harms (such as worry and stress, further invasive investigations and unpleasant treatments).
Conversely, a young woman presenting to her doctor with symptoms that are suggestive of cervical cancer should, of course, be offered appropriate and timely investigation, regardless of her age.
Dr Liam Scott, Cheltenham
Extreme prejudice
What evidence does William Shawcross, chairman of the Charity Commission, have for his assertion that “Islamist extremism” is a growing problem for UK charities (“‘Deadliest threat’ to charities is extremism”, News, last week)? A recent survey of Muslim aid agencies by us found that 88% had regulations in place to prevent the financing of terrorism and had adopted measures to protect against terrorist abuse. Shawcross says Islamist extremism is not the most widespread abuse that charities face, so why not focus on what he believes the most prevalent problem to be?
Dr Hany El-Banna OBE, Chairman, Muslim Charities Forum, London W5
Religious conviction
David Cameron is right to state that England is a predominantly Christian country (“In praise of mild faith”, Focus, last week). Though many are not churchgoers, we have a shared sense of morality derived from Christian values. It is right that we stand up and argue the case for the majority of people in this country rather than suffer the perpetual pleas for special treatment for minorities.
Bernie Green, Birmingham
Just the ticket
I smiled at Roland White’s report on the hunt for the hedge fund commuter who dodged almost £43,000 of rail fares (“Now at platform 1, the suspicion express”, News Review, last week). I was a British Rail area manager in the 1980s and had a superb travelling ticket inspector. He reported stories of “City types” who had many tricks, but luckily his knowledge usually led to prosecution. One commuter would use up to eight different stations to start his journeys, hoping to shake off the inspector, but he caught him and he was prosecuted. The culprit lived in an expensive home and his wife was a magistrate but this did not deter him from getting a thrill by trying to cheat the system. It is other travellers who have to pay for the revenue shortfall.
Alex Green, Templecombe, Somerset

Corrections and clarifications
A report (“Palace outgun Cardiff”, Sport, April 6) on the match between Cardiff City football club and Crystal Palace referred to speculation that Iain Moody, Palace’s sporting director and formerly head of recruitment at Cardiff, had been refused entry to the Cardiff directors’ box by the club’s owner, Vincent Tan. We now understand, and accept, that Mr Moody did not even request entry to the Cardiff directors’ box — he was not banned by Mr Tan. We are happy to clarify the position. In the article “Private detective trailed police whistleblower” (News, April 6) a picture caption wrongly stated that Sergeant Peter Brett had died “in the line of duty”. In fact he died in 2011 after he had retired. We are happy to make this clear.

Birthday
Darcey Bussell, ballerina, 45; Jenna-Louise Coleman, actress, 28; Tess Daly, TV presenter, 45; Russell T Davies, screenwriter, 51; Sheena Easton, singer, 55; Michael Fish, weatherman, 70; Sally Hawkins, actress, 38; Mica Paris, singer, 45; Neil Pearson, actor, 55; Ann Peebles, singer, 67; Sir Nicholas Serota, director of the Tate, 68

Anniversaries
1828 the Zoological Gardens open in Regent’s Park, London; 1908 opening ceremony of the first London Olympics; 1984 siege of the Libyan embassy in London ends; 1992 Betty Boothroyd becomes the first woman to be elected Speaker of the Commons; 1994 first general election in South Africa in which citizens of all races can vote

Telegraph:

SIR – It is through Sir George Young’s attention to detail, and his regular presence at constituency activities, that the Tories have been able to call north-west Hampshire a safe seat.
I fear that, should Boris Johnson be nominated to fight the seat on Sir George’s retirement, there would be an erosion of confidence in the electorate and a reduction in Tory votes.
E A Sclater
Ibthorpe, Hampshire
SIR – As a resident of north-west Hampshire for more than 40 years, I am insulted that David Cameron feels that he can send his man, Boris Johnson, here from London to represent our constituency. But then, isn’t that what happened with Sir George Young?
As a contributor to Harrogate Agenda, which aims to improve our system of democracy, I agreed with members who mooted a minimum residence requirement for any parliamentary candidate of 10 years.
Our system has changed from bottom-up to top-down, causing people to lose faith in the democratic process and hold the political class in contempt.
Stuart Noyes
Andover, Hampshire
Ukraine tactics
SIR – The Russian government has said that “Kiev is using its army against its own people”.
They should know, as that’s exactly what Russians have done in Chechnya for years.
Lt-Col Richard King-Evans
Hambye, Normandy, France
SIR – Are we sure that the Kiev government and its American allies would be sorry to lose Ukraine’s eastern provinces to Russia?
With the pro-Russian east out of any elections, the current pro-EU government in Kiev can guarantee victory in future votes. And who could then blame a pared-down Ukraine for seeking immediate membership of Nato to protect itself from the aggressor next door?
Colin Burke
Manchester
Limits of right to roam
SIR – The 82nd anniversary of the Kinder Scout mass trespass has been offered as a reason for placing more demands on landowners, but this does not acknowledge the limitations of the “right to roam”. The Act specifically excludes cultivated land, which may not be clear to the general public, many of whom, through ignorance, treat farmed land as their back garden.
Our neighbouring estate keeps its footpaths well maintained and spends considerable sums of money to protect walkers from the unpredictable temper of Continental breeds of cattle. Yet many people and their dogs wander at will, disturbing the wildlife that this responsible landowner is aiming to protect.
Penny Roberts
Moreton-in-Marsh, Gloucestershire
Properly addressed
SIR – Perhaps the reason that people are reluctant to use the word “madam” is because of its unfortunate connotations. One of our postmen used to call me “my lady”, which I much preferred.
Dr Heather Williams
Prestatyn, Denbighshire
SIR – I enjoy visiting my local florist, who often says: “Hello, handsome” when I enter her shop, but I suspect her greeting is directed at my dog rather than at me.
Ian Burton
Boxmoor, Hertfordshire
Cornish devolution
SIR – How long will it be before Cornwall demands a devolved parliament, followed by a referendum on the creation of a separate sovereign state? Should David Cameron order military manoeuvres in the west of Devon to protect English-speaking peoples in Cornwall?
George Noon
Fulwood, Lancashire
SIR – Now that the Cornish have joined the Welsh, Scots and Irish in achieving “national minority status”, surely the English cannot be far behind.
David Bainbridge
Ketford, Gloucestershire
A long goodbye
SIR – I can sympathise with Robert Warner, who has difficulty getting his wife away from parties. I had the same problem with my husband, the only difference being that, when I finally got him out of the door, he would suddenly remember that he hadn’t said goodbye to our hosts and had to go back again.
It is telling that Mr Warner refers to his wife “switching off the engine” and “putting away her driving glasses”. Is his wife required to drive to parties so that he can drink as much as he likes?
Madeleine Hindley
Naunton, Gloucestershire
SIR – I’m afraid I have to counter Mr Warner’s thoughts on slow getaways, lest anyone thinks it is a female trait. In our household, it is my husband whom I find difficult to winkle out of a party. If it wasn’t for my chivvying him along, we would always be the last to leave.
Incidentally, our daughter is about to tie the knot with Mr Warner’s son. I wonder which gene will prevail.
Pamela Orsborn
Crondall, Surrey

SIR – Rear-Admiral John Trewby suggests that onshore wind farms are cheaper than offshore. That is because developers refuse to pay compensation to house-owners for the loss of value when turbines 425ft high are constructed nearby.
A draft report from the London School of Economics shows evidence that properties within 1.2 miles of wind farms lose an average of 11 per cent in value. If this is factored in, together with the erratic wind speeds, I think he will find that onshore is not so cheap to build or run.
T A Parkhouse
Norbury, Staffordshire
SIR – Rear-Admiral Trewby mentions a Royal Academy of Engineering report comparing offshore and onshore wind power, but it seems to offer only well-known comparisons – for example, that offshore wind farms suffer more corrosion (only too clear from operating offshore oil and gas platforms, as I have done).
It would have been more valuable to have the Academy’s take on climate change – which alone has encouraged the building of all such structures, with the parallel need for heavy subsidies that land up in electricity users’ annual bills.
Dr Harold Hughes
Kingston upon Thames, Surrey
SIR – With the suggestion that no more onshore wind farms will be approved if the Conservatives win the next election, perhaps more attention will be applied to harnessing energy from river flows. The Queen has successfully installed two Archimedean screws in the river Thames near Windsor.
River currents are available all the time, unlike wind and solar energy, and the greatest flow is in winter, when there is most demand for heat and light. Furthermore, connections to towns and existing power lines are shorter than those to hilltop and offshore wind turbines. Despite the advantages, hydro power seems to have been overlooked.
R L Sunley
Twyford, Berkshire
The bureaucratic bar to laying flowers on D-Day
SIR – It isn’t only the actual D-Day veterans who will be facing difficulties in Normandy this June.
A strong party of those of us who served in the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry in the Fifties, together with our wives and families, will be at Pegasus and Horsa bridges to honour the memory of our predecessors, led by Major John Howard, who captured the two bridges in a daring, glider-borne coup de main in the first minutes of June 6 1944.
We will remember Lt Den Brotheridge, killed as he led his platoon over Pegasus bridge, who is buried in the village churchyard at Ranville. His daughter Margaret will want to lay flowers on her father’s grave on the 70th anniversary of his sacrifice, but may be prevented from doing so by French bureaucracy, as she was 10 years ago. Then, as now, the presence of the Prince of Wales caused heightened security.
Those of us who also want to travel to the villages of Escoville and Hérouvillette, where men of our regiment are buried, may be denied that opportunity, and may have to confine our activities to the area around the museum and the landing zone.
June 6 2014 may prove to be not “The Longest Day”, but the most frustrating for the heirs of the heroes of D-Day.
Roy Bailey
Great Shefford, Berkshire
Established tradition: the Queen at the Maundy service at Blackburn cathedral last week  Photo: Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty
7:00AM BST 26 Apr 2014
108 Comments
SIR – After failing with the Alternative Vote and reform of the House of Lords, Nick Clegg’s call to disestablish the Church of England will be welcome news for those who support the status quo.
Malcolm Watson
Welford, Berkshire
SIR – Why does Mr Clegg think he speaks for people such as me? The Queen has been a guiding symbol of the Church of England through the reigns of weak archbishops and, by her example, has encouraged ordinary believers to carry on through thick and thin. Take away this anchor and I’m ready to throw in the towel.
Valerie Kemp
Chester
SIR – How dare Mr Clegg suggest that the Queen step down as the head of the Church of England. She has excelled in her dual role. At the Coronation, she promised to fulfil her duties regarding the Church.
How cruel to suggest disestablishment when the Queen has no chance to reply.
Elizabeth Rhys Jones
Guisborough, North Yorkshire
SIR – If the C of E is misguided enough to want the Queen to step down as its constitutional head, it should make the request, not the Deputy Prime Minister.
Robert Riding
London SW19
SIR – Seemingly forgetting his oath as a privy counsellor in his fifth-form debating society attack on 500 years of constitutional settlement is par for Mr Clegg’s course.
Loving England much, but Europe more, he demonstrates the truth of Elizabeth I’s dictum: “Who hath two strings to one bow may shoot strong but never straight.”
Robert Stephenson
Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire
SIR – When Mr Clegg was sworn of the Privy Council, did he take the oath or affirm?
J C Craig
Bodmin, Cornwall
SIR – As an agnostic, may I suggest we treat atheism as a religion, as it seems to be imbued with the cardinal marker of all religions – absolute certainty.
Roger Spriggs
Hythe, Hampshire
SIR – I am grateful to David Cameron for rejecting Nick Clegg’s call. His embracing of antidisestablishmentarianism has allowed me to achieve my long-held ambition to use this word in context.
Dr S V Steinberg
Prestwich, Lancashire
Irish Times:
Irish Independent:
Madam – Dan O’Brien (Sunday Independent, April 13, 2014), gives thoughtful consideration to the value to small states of multilateralism in general and the Commonwealth in particular.
Also in this section
Democracy will suffer
Tribal idols dismantled
DJs are pawns in a corporate game
However, there is ample evidence to counter his assertion that the Commonwealth is “not a hugely important organisation for any of the 53 countries in it”.
As he himself acknowledges, smaller, more vulnerable states have more to gain from being in to ‘clubs’ where all members are bound by the same rules.
For that reason, and many others, membership of the Commonwealth is central to those of our 31 members with populations of less than 1.5 million, the internationally agreed definition for a ‘small state’. A quarter of the members of the G20 also belong to the Commonwealth.
This offers opportunities for interface, and direct and crucial global advocacy facilitated by the Commonwealth plays a vital role in ensuring that due consideration is given to the concerns of developing and vulnerable nations when decisions are made that can have very significant impact on their trade, environment, social and economic stability, sustainability and resilience, and addressing serious capacity shortages.
Kamalesh Sharma,
Commonwealth Secretary-General,
Marlborough House, London
ECONOMICS AND SCIENCE DON’T MIX
Madam – Congratulations to Dan O’Brien on his piece ‘Economics is now a science almost devoid of agreement’, (Sunday Independent, April 20, 2014). His account of the interaction between Mario Draghi and Christine Lagarde, and the contributions from George Osborne, Larry Summers and Robert Gordon very aptly illustrate his view of the multiplicity of variables in current economic debate.
Perhaps it is worth recalling the advice of John Maynard Keynes that in trying to forecast the market, one would be better off looking into the entrails of dead sheep, as the ancient Romans did. Indeed, “entrail-gazing” has come to be accepted as an appropriate definition of economic theorising by many commentators.
I have one quibble with Mr O’Brien’s ruminations. He refers to economics as a science – a frequently expressed view by, of course, economists. Let us see. At the end of 2007, 50 highly paid American economists and analysts predicted their country would not “sink into a recession” the following year. In fact, they predicted that 2008 would be a solid but unspectacular year. Not one of them foretold the crash. That was economics.
Three hundred years earlier, Edmond Halley used the mathematics of his friend Isaac Newton to predict that the comet that now bears his name would appear in 1758, which it did. In our own lifetime, we were confident it would appear again in 1987 (it did), and we know it will appear again in 2061. That is science.
So why could a 16th Century amateur correctly predict events 350 years in the future, but a slew of computer-aided experts couldn’t manage to guess one year ahead? Quite simply because one prediction is based on science, the other comes from entrail-gazing guesswork and shows how misleading it is to couple the words economics and science.
Mike O’Shea,
Killarney, Co Kerry
KATIE IS AS IRISH AS THEY COME
Madam – Declan Lynch, in his TV review (Sunday Independent, April 20, 2014), questioned the ‘Irishness’ of several well-known people including Katie Taylor. He made the point that Katie’s father is English. Which is true, and no doubt he is also a proud one. Katie has an Irish mother and was born and raised in Ireland. More tellingly, she was Ireland’s flag bearer at the 2012 London Olympics. I hope I included enough facts to put any ‘uncertainty’ to bed. In this country we have a tendency to categorise people as either being rabid nationalistic or one who recoils at any hint of nationalism. I suspect Declan Lynch would place himself in the latter category. I find it sad that in this day and age we still cannot celebrate our compatriots without being pigeon-holed as fervently nationalistic.
John Bellew,
Dunleer, Co Louth
CULTURE DESERTS GALWAY QUARTER
Madam – Many years ago, I was ordered out of a lane in Temple Bar for busking. Dear me, how things have changed. I read with great interest Donal Lynch’s item, ‘City’s grimy heart is flooded by a sea of tourists and boozers’ (Sunday Independent, April 20, 2014). Regrettably, it reminded me of Galway city’s soi-disant ‘Latin Quarter,’ a new historical construction, in which boozing, general mayhem, and dreadfully fashionless ‘hen’ parties at weekends are the main attractions.
That said, I noticed that Donal incorrectly quotes Charles Haughey as describing Temple Bar as ‘Ireland’s West Bank.’ Before we fall over ourselves laughing, I ought to say that this description is more correctly ascribed to that most knowledgeable of political men, Bertie Ahern, and not Charlie. Bertie meant ‘Left Bank,’ of course. But Donal may have been having a laugh and besides, the place resembles the West Bank more than the Left Bank on some nights.
There was a time when the Temple Bar area was inhabited by penniless art students, musicians, trad-heads like myself making a bob or two and at least a sense of cultural energy. The artistic ‘edginess’ is long gone. Somebody somewhere decided to tart the place up and, as always, culture went out the window.
Fred Johnston,
Galway
VALUABLE DEBATE ON PAST AND FUTURE
Madam – Eoghan Harris made a glowing reference to me in last week’s column for which I am grateful. However, he concludes with a direct quote from me stating that, “I think the answer to the question whether the struggle for independence was worth it is a resounding No.”
As those reading the essay will see, I was referring to the struggle for independence from the perspective of my parents’ generation, the urban working poor in the decades after the formation of the Irish Free State. The more general point I make is that, “It is only by turning the spotlight on those who failed to benefit from the new dispensation that we can identify and rectify at least some of the shortcomings of the Irish revolution”.
I wholly agree with him on the dangerously seductive power of elitist militarism in the nationalist narrative and the way various forms of mass action and other forms of passive resistance to British rule have been virtually ignored by many mainstream historians. However I would not include Diarmaid Ferriter in their ranks. He is one of the best historians we have. This is not to say that I agree with everything he says, any more than I do with everything Eoghan Harris says, but I do welcome and value the independence and intellectual courage of both men in the debate on our past – and future for that matter.
Padraig Yeates,
Portmarnock, Co Dublin
CREDIT DUE TO EOGHAN HARRIS
Madam – As ever, and to his great credit, Eoghan Harris tried heroically to shed some reason and reality, based on the facts, on Irish issues, and latterly on the intricate questions of whether the Rising was necessary and whether royalty should attend. (Sunday Independent, April 20, 2014)
It occurs to one that ‘necessary’ may be interpreted in two distinct senses.
Firstly, was the Rising necessary in the sense that a break with Britain would be followed by a flourishing and prosperous Ireland? In hindsight we know to our cost that this was not the case.
Secondly, was it necessary in the sense that Ireland could not otherwise have achieved anything from a modicum of self-government to complete independence? Here again the answer must be a resounding no. One goes along with Mr Harris’s views regarding ‘civil disobedience’ etc but, with respect, he omitted to emphasise, in my view sufficiently, the one crucial factor, namely democracy. By 1918 Britain had almost achieved universal suffrage which she ultimately gained in 1928. In short it was simply a matter of playing for time.
As to whether royalty should be invited, it would seem on the face of it to give succour to those who support the Rising. One has to admit to a perception of infra dig on the part of Her Majesty during some of her Irish visit.
On the other hand, if one may indulge in a little ‘soothsaying’, it could auger a brighter future when Ireland will fulfil her obligations in the prosperity and governance of these islands, the corollorary being an acknowledgement of her debt to Britain.
Perhaps there is a point to Oscar Wilde’s remark: “The one duty we owe to history is to rewrite it.”
William Barrett,
Bletchingley, Surrey, UK
Sunday Independent

28April2014Busy day

I go all the way around the park listening to the Men from the Ministry: Our heroes face a terrible fate a defense job Priceless

Mary homesort out books

Scrabbletoday, I got 400, Perhaps Marywill win tomorrow.

Obituary:

Guardian:

Alamy

Steve Bloomfield’s article (Broadcast views, 25 April) is hardly a balanced view of the Russia Today channel. I have not noticed any “conspiracy theories”, still less the “antisemitism” ascribed to presenters, actually being aired.

Independent:

You are to be applauded for highlighting the failure of the United States to keep the Middle East peace process on the road (“Yet another betrayal of the Palestinians”, 26 April).

In practice, there has been no realistic peace process since the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995. The Israeli government complains that it has had no partner for peace, yet Mahmoud Abbas has always been a willing partner. The recent agreements between Fatah and Hamas are merely being used by Israel as an excuse to stall the process still further.

Israel has never been willing to accept the idea of an independent Palestinian state as an equal partner. The most it was prepared to concede was a client state cut into non-contiguous zones by vast swathes of Israeli settlements on the West Bank.

It is also unrealistic to expect any Palestinian negotiator to recognise Israel as a Jewish state. This is to deny full rights of citizenship to that significant minority of Israel’s population, mainly Palestinian Arabs, who are either Muslim or Christian.

In a recent speech, Peter Hain said that many significant players, such as John Kerry and William Hague, believe that time is rapidly running out for a two-state solution, and that we need to consider various models of a common-state solution as the only realistic way forward.

Speaking at a meeting in Liverpool recently, the Palestinian envoy to the UK, Professor Manuel Hassassian, looked back to medieval Andalucia as a golden age when Jews, Muslims and Christians lived together in harmony in a vibrant and intellectually productive culture, and suggested that this could be a model for a future state.

Although, as he pointed out, this is not the policy of the PLO or the Palestinian Authority, it is a solution that should be seriously considered.

I have visited both Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and found, underneath the conflict, a vast fund of goodwill on both sides, which could be exploited to achieve it.

The West should stop pursuing the chimera of a two-state solution as if it were the only show in town, and seriously consider the option of a common state.

David W Forster, Liverpool

Benjamin Netanyahu announces a halt to the peace process in response to unity between Hamas and Fatah. How will we notice the difference?

There are no serious peace talks and never were; the Israelis continue to take more Palestinian land; Abbas isn’t strong enough to agree a deal that involves major concessions to Israel, which any final settlement is bound to include.

However, a unified Hamas-Fatah government might just be able to sell such a solution to the Palestinian people.

Netanyahu loves to say of the Palestinians that “they never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity”. Now the opportunity of a lifetime is staring him in the face: a Palestinian government with enough authority to deliver a solution. The question is: is he strong enough to seize it or is he going to do the usual politician thing and settle for the comfortable option of doing nothing while blaming others?

John Sears, Brentford, London

The front page of The Independent is where I expect to receive news, not opinions. Robert Fisk’s report of the cessation of the talks between Israel and the Palestinians was a biased summary.

One gets the impression from his article that if only Mr Fisk were in charge of running US foreign policy, then he could have made peace within a few days. For some reason, he is being ignored by policy-makers.

Please try to save the front page for objective news reporting.

Dr Stephen Malnick, Rehovot, Israel

Welcome step towards low-carbon energy

We at the Institution of Engineering and Technology welcome the announcement by the Department of Energy  and Climate Change of  private-sector investment  in eight major new renewable energy projects and hope that it will be the first of many.

If the policy is to supply 15 per cent of total energy from renewables by 2020, this is a welcome step in that direction. At present, renewables supply about 4 per cent of total UK energy use, and around another 2 per cent is already approved or under construction.

These latest contracts will add a further 1 per cent. Bearing in mind that to complete the final design, build and commissioning of a sizeable project takes three or four years, the renewable capacity that will be in service by 2020 will have to be given the go-ahead within the next two years or so – we need an announcement like this every couple of months for the next two years.

A diverse range of low-carbon energy projects needs to be accompanied by energy demand reduction and development of the underpinning electricity network infrastructure to create a fully functioning low-carbon energy system for the 2020s.

Professor Roger Kemp, Institution of Engineering and Technology, London WC2

Myopic and political intransigence are driving a scheme (“‘Breathtaking spending spree’ used to boost Green Deal”, 26 April) that is fundamentally flawed in every aspect.

If any of our politicians spent time reading the professional architectural and construction-industry press, they would have long ago abandoned such a deal. It doesn’t and never has stacked up, even if loans were at 0 per cent interest rates. I pity the 2,100 homes that have already been duped into the scheme.

We urgently need significantly to improve the energy efficiency of our homes, but not with this Green Deal.

Peter Gibson, Great Rollright, Oxfordshire

New Turkish visas are user-friendly

The article by Simon Calder “Turkish delights get tangled in red tape” (5 April) admirably portrayed the joy of the holiday season in Turkey, albeit with some misleading information regarding Turkey’s visa procedures.

The new system is neither expensive nor complicated. Most importantly, the e-visa system does not require the applicants to go through tiresome and time-consuming face-to-face visa interviews. The concerns that some holidaymakers would not be allowed on board their planes to Turkey because they did not know about changing visa procedures are misplaced. The visa-on-arrival practice will continue until we are certain that everybody is “on board”.

The three-minutes average time for obtaining an e-visa is not merely a claim but a fact of statistics generated from more than 1.3 million e-visa applications. Moreover, e-visa fee is cheaper than visa-on-arrival.

The article correctly pointed out that for “nationality” travellers from Britain must select “United Kingdom” rather than “British”. To correct this, the term “nationality” has been replaced with “country/region”. Family and group e-visa applications have already been introduced.

Since its launch in April 2013, more than a million people have obtained their visas through the e-visa system. Almost a quarter of the applicants are from the United Kingdom. We invite our British friends to try the e-visa system out for themselves and visit Turkey.

Unal Cevikoz , Ambassador, Turkish Embassy, London SW1

The subtext is: these actors lack training

Howard Jacobson (26 April) will have noticed that subtitles on foreign-language TV series actually make one pay attention to the dialogue. That may be one reason we find the plots more absorbing.

But the muttering and lack of clarity (realism?) which is so infuriating on much TV drama stems from a school of acting that relies on microphone technology to get round actors’ lack of stage training and experience. Stage acting requires good voice projection. TV does as well, but our TV-addicted producers and directors haven’t worked that out yet.

Martin Hughes, Winchester

Howard Jacobson’s suggestion that the BBC should attach subtitles to all its programmes and do away with sound altogether could perhaps be extended further by also doing away with the pictures.

The display of words alone could start a whole new trend, but a name for this innovation is obviously needed. Er, perhaps “books”?

Malcolm Marsters, New Malden, London

British version of Christianity

Is Britain a Christian country? Only if Christian is a synonym for a capitalist, military, industrial complex with lots of pomp.

Lee Dalton, Weymouth, Dorset

How to put the heat on a cold caller

A friend has a method with cold callers (letters, 26 April) which I’ve not had the chutzpah to try out myself.

He lets them talk on and on and then says, breathing heavily: “I say, your voice  is so sexy. What have you got on?”

Peter Forster, London N4

Times:

Telegraph:

SIR – In your report about the Prime Minister’s Challenge Fund (April 13), Norman Lamb, the health minister, describes wanting to discuss four personal health concerns in a single appointment with his GP.

SIR – For over 60 years, each generation of Britons has enjoyed increasing wealth and rising income. Yet we have failed to save – in fact, each generation has saved less and borrowed and spent more. Those of us retiring now and in the next few years will be the last to enjoy financial security during our lifetimes unless action is taken.

SIR – In a recent advertisement in your newspaper, I noted the English National Ballet is to be performing Romeo & Juliet but was bemused to note that all of the principal dancers are foreign: Carlos Acosta (Cuba), Tamara Rojo (Spain), Vadim Muntagirov (Russia), Daria Klimentová (Czech), Friedemann Vogel (Romania) and Alina Cojocaru (Romania).

SIR – As a previous governor (1993-99) and senior teacher at Park View School, I fully endorse the reporting by Andrew Gilligan into the alleged Islamist plot in the six Birmingham state schools.

As an alliance of organisations concerned with improving energy efficiency through the refurbishment of Britain’s homes, we are writing to express our grave concern regarding proposed changes to energy efficiency legislation and to ask that you reconsider the dramatically reduced target for solid wall insulation (SWI).

The eight million British households currently living in energy-leaking solid wall homes, including half of our most hard-pressed “fuel poor” families, have been badly served by successive Governments. Through their energy bills they have paid £2.7bn into “energy efficiency obligations” over the last decade and have received very little in return.

The proposals set out in your Government’s “Future of the Energy Company Obligation (ECO)” consultation, which closed earlier this month, will perpetuate this unfair situation for the foreseeable future.

A more than 75pc reduction in the ambition for SWI under ECO will cripple the growing SWI industry, result in 20,000 job losses, and leave those living in solid wall properties suffering from the highest fuel bills.

At the rate proposed in your consultation, it will take 300 years to get these homes to a decent state of energy efficiency. In the meantime, the lack of SWI means that these eight million properties are emitting 6m tonnes of unnecessary carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year.

A report published by the Institute for Public Policy Research demonstrates the substantial benefits of SWI to the UK. With the right support framework, for every £1 invested in the installation of SWI, the Exchequer will recover 50pc to 100pc or more in the same year, proving that Government investment in SWI makes economic sense.

The report also demonstrates that the positive impacts through employment, health and social benefits for residents present a compelling case for continued and strengthened investment in SWI rather than cutbacks.

The SWI industry fully understands the economic and political pressures that necessitated a cut in “green levies”.

However, the response of the recognised trade association for SWI, the Insulated Render and Cladding Association (Inca), to your consultation presents very strong evidence that actual savings to the ‘big six’ go far beyond the £35 you have persuaded them to give back to customers, representing a £1bn-2bn windfall to energy suppliers over the next three years.

We therefore urge you to reconsider this dramatically reduced target for SWI. The windfall saving that energy companies have enjoyed means that a doubling of the SWI minimum in ECO to 200,000 installations over the next three years can be achieved without incremental cost to consumers.

Combined with effective targeting of the new Green Deal incentives at solid walled properties, this would go a long way to restore the balance, and demonstrate that this Government cares about the eight million families left stranded in cold, leaky properties by successive Governments in the past.

Yours sincerely,

Insulated Render and Cladding Association (INCA)
The recognised trade association for the external wall insulation (EWI) industry

Centre of Refurbishment Excellence (CoRE)
The not for profit, national centre of excellence for green building retrofit

National Energy Foundation
The independent charity dedicated to improving the use of energy in buildings

Sustainable Homes
The leading training and advisory consultancy operating in the field of sustainable housing

Irish Times:

Sir , – Based on the assumption that “Christians believe that the Bible is literally the word of their god”, Hugo Pierce quotes from the Old Testament various endorsements of capital punishment for various crimes (Letters, April 25th). Some Christians do indeed still follow this tradition and continue to believe that God wills that human life be taken – “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth”.

However, for Christians who believe that God does indeed reveal Himself/ Herself and the ways for the proper respect of human life in society this revelation is a progressive one, where God gradually reveals in history a better way of living.

Jesus of Nazareth, eventhough he came from the Jewish tradition of the Torah quoted by Hugo Pierce, revealed through his life, words and actions that this ancient practice of a life for a life was not the will of God.

Even though eminent Christians still refuse to acknowledge this revolutionary teaching of Jesus that the reign of God has no place for violence, capital or otherwise, against the human person regardless of race, colour, gender, sexual orientation – or indeed of any crime committed by any human person – that doesn’t mean that they represent all Christians. Yours, etc,

BRENDAN BUTLER,

The Moorings ,

Malahide ,

Co Dublin

A chara, – Hugh Pierce (Letters, April 25th) does not have an accurate understanding of Christians and the Bible when he writes: “Christians believe that the Bible is literally the word of their god.” The Bible for Christians bears testimony to the developing understanding that people have had over many centuries about their relationship with God.

Consider the specific example of how we respond to evil done to us. In the case of Cain in Genesis 1:15, sevenfold vengeance is seen as the deterrent. In Genesis 1:24, seventy-sevenfold vengeance is what Lamech threatens. The vicious cycle of vengeance was quickly spiralling out of control. So we have a principle to limit this in Exodus 21:24: “Eye for eye, tooth for tooth.”

This principle is still applied in places today. For Christians it is long since superseded by the sayings of Jesus in Matthew 5:38-48: the radical teaching of “Love your enemies.”

In Matthew 18:21-22, Peter has a problem with such teaching, and asks: “How often must I forgive one who wrongs me? As often as seven times?” “Seven” here is not a numerical value, but shorthand for “always”. Jesus responds in dramatic fashion, echoing Lamech in Genesis and totally reversing the standard for his disciples: “Not seven times, but seventy-seven times.”

Christians have often failed disastrously in living up to this, but it is still the gold standard, in relation to the death penalty and so much else. This is where we stand. Is mise,

PÁDRAIG McCARTHY,

Blackthorn Court,

Sandyford,

Dublin 16

Sir, – It now seems a proponent of the death penalty in Ireland can expect about as warm a response as a minister of education at an ASTI conference. I remain unmoved, but lest your readers think that I am a bloodthirsty barbarian, I shall make no further appeals to Antonin Scalia to support my argument.

Let me resort to a more celestial power. The catechism of the Catholic Church, (paragraph 2266), after acknowledging the state’s “right and duty to inflict penalties commensurate with the gravity of the crime”, declares “the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude, presupposing full ascertainment of the identity and responsibility of the offender, recourse to the death penalty …”

So far so good, except that the catechism then presents some important qualifiers and ends by quoting John Paul II’s disapproving counsels on capital punishment. However, the clear absence of a bright-line teaching on this issue is telling in a document not otherwise known for fudge (compare this language with the infamous and absolutely clear text on homosexual acts, paragraph 2357).

As a historian of the church, I venture that this ambiguity is unavoidable given 1) the clear support for the death penalty in Scripture, both Old and New Testaments; 2) the church’s millennial record of support for the idea that the state was God’s earthly “sword”, and its lengthy application of this principle in the Papal States and elsewhere; and 3) the continuing fair-minded disagreement among theologians on this question.

Despite what other letterwriters would have us believe, the incompatibility of Christianity and the death penalty has nowhere been conclusively established.

I am satisfied that I am not mad. Yours, etc,

DR SEAN ALEXANDER

SMITH,

Aiken Village,

Sandyford,

Dublin 18

Sir, – Tom Cooper (Letters, April 26th) is worried that if Ireland joined the Commonwealth it would lead to the “re-Britishing” of the country. Such concerns are not borne out by the experience of the 50-odd member-states of the Commonwealth, a majority of them republics, who maintain their distinct national identifies alongside membership of an organisation that hasn’t been called “British” since 1949.

The Commonwealth is an association of free, democratic and sovereign states. Indeed, in the 1920s and 1930s the Irish Free State played a crucial role in the transformation of the Commonwealth from a form of the British empire into an independent organisation. By agreement of the member states the queen is head of the Commonwealth, but only as the symbol of a free association of independent countries.

Members of the Commonwealth share a common heritage and history, including an Irish diaspora of some 20 million people. The values of the Commonwealth are the same as those of the Irish state – democracy, peace, human rights, sustainable development and the rule of law.

Of course, the Commonwealth is not some ideal organisation: it has problems of its own, not least the failure of some states to live up to the obligations of membership. But its aspirations are as admirable as its practical activities. As a member Ireland could make a significant contribution to the further realisation of the Commonwealth’s values and ideas.

A decision to join would be commensurate with those developments in British-Irish relations that seem to cause Mr Cooper so much anxiety: the reciprocal state visits of Queen Elizabeth and President Higgins and the invitation to members of the British royal family to attend the 100th anniversary commemoration of 1916.

Ireland’s membership of the Commonwealth would also build more bridges to the unionist community in Northern Ireland, where it would be seen as a significant gesture of reconciliation.

To paraphrase Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the only thing to fear about the prospect of Ireland joining the Commonwealth is fear itself. Yours, etc,

PROF GEOFFREY

ROBERTS,

School of History,

University College Cork

Sir, – The call by a Conservative MP, Michael Fabricant, for Ireland to join the Commonwealth following the successful state visit to the UK of President Michael D Higgins is most welcome. Fine Gael’s Brian Hayes deserves the support of all Irish people who cherish the values of reconciliation, conflict resolution and peaceful cooperation.

The Commonwealth includes many republics as members. Ireland would not once again become a white Commonwealth dominion but remain a republic. In contrast to EU membership, membership of the Commonwealth would not affect Irish sovereignty, which constitutionally is a matter for the Irish people alone. A referendum would not be required.

Ireland is of course very “British” already, probably more so than most Commonwealth states other than the UK itself. This is due to to geography, economics, shared history over hundreds of years, movement of population in both directions, close family ties, the English language, and media penetration.

Have India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Ghana, and South Africa been “re-Britished”? Are Canada, New Zealand and Australia more “British” than they were in 1949?  Commonwealth membership is a distinct issue from Anglo-Irish co-operation, but Ireland has closer political links and a more healthy relationship with the UK than ever before in her history due to Anglo-Irish rapprochement and the unprecedented co-operation necessitated by Republican terrorism over the last few decades.

Ireland’s presence in the Commonwealth would reassure many other nations with not dissimilar histories in what is a free association of states, many with substantial populations of Irish origin, all devoted to conflict resolution, peace, reconciliation, mutual co-operation and mutual support. Yours, etc,

JEREMIAH P WALSH,

Kew Green,

Richmond,

Surrey

Sir, – Elements of the political class seem to believe the Commonwealth is some sort of effective international forum; it is not . Last year, despite herculean efforts by William Hague, it could not even agree on the decriminalisation of homosexuality. Commonwealth membership made sense when we had dominion status and were able to secure the “freedom to achieve freedom” under the Statute of Westminster 1931 . It is an absurd conservative relic in the 21st century. Yours, etc,

BRIAN DINEEN LLM,

Henry Street,

Limerick

Sir, – “I regard Ireland’s sovereignty as sacrosanct,” says Tom Cooper (Letters, April 26th).Tell that to the troika! Yours, etc,

PAUL DELANEY,

Beacon Hill,

Dalkey

Sir – Kitty Holland (“Homeless crisis in need of urgent action”, April 26th) highlights the new homelessness of families with children.

Solutions include the most obvious, making more homes available by renovating vacant properties and building more houses. While voluntary housing agencies also suggest increased rent allowances and the introduction of rent controls, these may have unintended consequences in terms of additional rent increases or reduced supply of rental accommodation.

But there also needs to be creative thinking in terms of resolving this latest crisis. Many local authorities have a significant stock of three- and two-bedroom units, but one-bedroom units are like gold dust. The result is that families who separate, as in the case of Sabrina McMahon, can leave one partner alone in a family home and another homeless with children.

I am part of a national housing strategy group and am aware that councils are considering the concept of “room rate liveable rooms”, where larger houses are divided up into bedsit type units and single people can have tenancies within a divided house.

While this may be below the expectations of many, it is nevertheless a practical way to make the best use in the interim of existing council accommodation, and is already a model that is in place in other jurisdictions. Yours, etc,

FRANK BROWNE,

Ballyroan Park,

Templeogue,

Dublin 16

Mon, Apr 28, 2014, 01:45

First published: Mon, Apr 28, 2014, 01:45

Sir, – Alan Ahearne (“More homes in right places needed”, April 26th) is one of those people of whom it can be truly said he kept his head while all around were losing theirs.

His succinct remarks on media-driven comment during the boom/bust of recent years should be burned into the minds of all aspiring journalists, editors, economists and commentators: “ … some of the drop in house prices nationwide of more than 50 per cent from peak to trough may have been in response to the excessive pessimism about the country’s economic future that became a feature of the national debate during the height of the crisis. For a while it seemed that commentators were tripping over themselves to produce the gloomiest predictions. Indeed, economic commentary has generally been pro-cyclical over the past decade, exacerbating both the boom and the bust.”

His warnings about what might go wrong and what should now be done are equally succinct and wise: “The biggest concern is that today’s heady gains in house prices in some places become embedded in expectations of future prices.”

Therefore, “ramp up supply in the right places” (ie cities) and use the financial policy tools available to “ensure that prices in, say 2020, will not be too far above today’s levels”.

As simple as it is brilliant. Let’s hope he is listened to this time! Yours, etc,

PHILIP O’CONNOR,

St Peter’s Terrace,

Howth,

Dublin 13

Sir, – President Higgins and Olivia O’Leary, among others, informed one and all that the word ceiliuradh has a many-layered depth of meaning, encompassing memory of what is best in our traditions of artistic endeavour and capacity to enjoy ourselves, etc. Dinneen’s dictionary conveys something different. In order, he refers to an act of bidding farewell, to chirping and birdsong, to solemnisation and the celebration of Mass. Treating of the verbal noun and verb, he introduces the rather contradictory notions of greeting and bidding farewell, and of reneging at cards.

Much of this seems to have little to do with the glorious rumpus in the Albert Hall. It does appear that in the sense of “celebration” the word ceiliuradh signifies solemnisation, eg of the Eucharist, rather than of nine minutes of The Auld Thriangle . Perhaps the Gaelic scholars among your readers would care to comment. Just as the word leithreas, meaning a convenient abbreviation in writing, has mistakenly been taken to signify a “convenience” in the sense of a (public) lavatory, might it not be that in the modern era we are running away with ourselves in attributing to reneging at cards the sense of rí rá agus ruaile buaile that the word ceiliuradh possibly never had? Yours, etc,

DAVID NELIGAN,

Silcheater Road,

Glenageary,

Co Dublin

Sir, – I agree with your questioning of Mr Quinn’s proposals for assessment in the new Junior Certificate (“Turbulence on teachers front”, April 25th). His proposals are the educational version of the deregulation of the financial services industry. Look where that led us. Will Ministers and their advisers ever learn? Not if they refuse to listen to reasonable arguments as he does. Yours, etc,

DERMOT LUCEY,

Greenfields,

Ballincollig,

Co Cork

Sir, – It has been surprising to read letters published that appear to advocate indiscipline in our schools in response to the scenes at this week’s ASTI conference. A question of collective guilt or collective punishment? I’m pretty sure they would not accept this for their own children. Yours, etc,

BARRY HENNESSY.

Turvey Walk,

Donabate,

Co. Dublin

Sir, – Breda O’Brien gives us an unusual perspective on sainthood (Opinion & Analysis. April 26th). John Paul ll “was a man of prayer”, who “achieved greatness not through personal ambition or ability but through being able to let go and be guided by a power greater than himself”, she says.

But what is “a man of prayer”? , and what does it mean to “let go” and be “guided by a power greater than himself”? Benedict XVl is also considered to be a man of prayer, yet both of these men allowed appalling sexual abuse to continue under their prayerful watch. It would seem that prayer is not always enough to make a man do the right thing. Certainly with these two men it wasn’t. Prayer often renders a man pious only.

Could it be that Ms O’Brien, and the Vatican, have mistaken piety for saintliness?

Yours, etc,

DECLAN KELLY,

9 Whitechurch Rd,

Dublin 14

Sir, – Ian O’Riordan (April 26th) claimed that “there is simply no counter argument” to making “PE a core examinable subject in the Leaving Certificate”.  I disagree, partly because I am one of those who at school was picked last, if at all, for teams . The prospect of having to pass a PE exam would have filled me with dread.

Mr O’Riordan began with a quote from Mark Twain.  Here is another: “Golf is a good walk spoiled.“  Exercise is undeniably beneficial, but is sport the best way to obtain it?  Many sports, such as rugby, involve the risk of serious injury to participants.  Others have been tainted by doping scandals. Soccer may entertain vast numbers. but did that justify spending vast sums on the World Cup in South Africa, where millions don’t have clean drinking water?

Roger Bannister’s achievements were indeed amazing. But please spare a thought for those of us whose memories of sport at school were of being forced to stand on the sidelines of a muddy pitch in the rain. Yours, etc,

MICHAEL DURKAN,

St James’s Walk,

Irish Independent:

With reference to Diarmaid Ferriter’s recent article (Irish Independent, April 17), a republic is ‘res publica’ – the thing of the people. The people are sacred and the state only a thing.

Also in this section

Democracy will suffer

Tribal idols dismantled

DJs are pawns in a corporate game

A republic is an open society where you are free to be different and its measure is the degree of diversity retained. The 1916 leaders were nationalist quasi-republicans. Irish nationalism was a mutation of race and religion leading to compulsory conformity.

John A Costello declared the Pope king of Ireland in 1948. Without a vote of his cabinet or the people, he declared a republic in Canada in 1949.

A republic can be judged by the human rights enjoyed. After 1922, the human rights of women suffered. They were denied access to contraceptives and divorce. Their right to work in the civil service and to serve on juries was restricted. The old-age pension was reduced for women. The Land Commission was active in compulsorily acquiring the land of single women.

Thomas Jefferson rejoiced over the economic success of Jews in the US, demonstrating the quality of liberty delivered by the American constitution.

We got independence in 1922 but people who were outside the norm lost their liberty.

Padraig Pearse wrote in ‘The Murder Machine’ of “…the ideal of those who shaped the Gaelic polity nearly two thousand years ago. It is not that the old Irish had a good education system: they had the best and noblest that has ever been known among men”.

Pearse wanted to bring us back from a creative scientific society in a time machine to a tribal Gaelic world where, in the words of Thomas Hobbes, life was short, brutal and bloody.

Kate Casey, Barrington Street, Limerick

HELPING OUR YOUNG TEACHERS

One thing that stood out to me during the teachers’ much-publicised internal disagreements was the fact that the teachers who were not happy with the treatment of Ruairi Quinn during his visit seemed to be of a more mature age group, and quite happy with their lot, coming to pension age, and that they definitely don’t want the boat rocked.

Perhaps they should take a leaf out of the dissenters’ book and try to do something positive for the young teachers who have to deal with the changes being forced upon them.

While they are at it, they might give a thought to the future teachers who will bear the brunt of the financial cutbacks. It is as simple as that; try and think of others.

Matt Dunne, Swords, Co Dublin

AN UNFAIR TAX ON ILLNESS

The Irish Medical Organisation deserves to be congratulated for its stance regarding the prescription charge. Delegates drew attention at their conference to the appalling situation where people on social welfare or small incomes cannot afford to pay for all medications and are opting to take only some of their medication.

Each item on their prescription costs €2.50 and even with the monthly upper limit set at €25, it is just too much for many people. Our Government seems to be unaware of or blind to the plight of people who are medical card holders and simply find this charge too much. It is a tax on illness, which is, I believe, discriminatory and downright unfair.

Surely it is wrong to target people who are struggling with life-changing or life-threatening diseases or simply trying to recover from an illness using prescribed medication.

Declan Moriarty, Clancy Road, Finglas, D11

BLIND SPOT IN GOD DENIAL

The blind spot in Rod Saidleir’s denial (Letters, April 24) of the existence of a merciful God because of horrific injuries that nature inflicts on people is that no human being, even if calamitously indisposed in any way, can be denied the opportunity to become a member of our creator’s family. There is only one ultimate deprivation and that is not to gain paradise.

Religious belief, understood as being at the core of a fully meaningful life on earth, has been consistently witnessed to in every part of our world at all times and in all cultures and civilisations.

In our own times, Communism and Nazism, both rooted in anti-religion conceptions, wreaked misery in Europe and further afield.

But Viktor Frankl, founder of Logotherepy, found hope and meaning even while incarcerated in Auschwitz where his mother died and as his wife died in Bergen-Belsen.

In responding to this degradation as a task to be fulfilled, he survived. Thus, meaning can always be found in the search for self-realisation in any human circumstance.

In our own historical experience of suffering, religion gave ultimate meaning to our people in praying the Mass at secret locations.

They risked their lives and homes by hiding the hunted priests and endowed us with much that is finest in our essential Irishness.

Colm O Torna, Garran Ghleann Sceiche, Ard Aidhin, Baile Atha Cliath 5

CHARGE OF THE LABOUR BRIGADE

Liz O’Donnell’s article (Irish Independent, April 25) on the ‘courage’ of the Labour Party in implementing austerity at the expense of its own popularity reminds me of the ‘courage’ of the Light Brigade, the British cavalry formation during the Crimean War who, impervious to the outcome, charged a line of Russian heavy artillery and were duly slaughtered.

The Labour Party has systematically destroyed its own power base, the public service, low earners, the poor.

It has broken almost every election promise and wedded itself so closely to the senior party in Government that some have taken to calling the Labour Party ‘Fine Gael lite.’

Perhaps in the upcoming EU and local election, we shall see history repeated and witness the charge of the lite brigade.

John Hanamy, Ranelagh, Dublin 6

QUESTIONS ON THE UNKNOWABLE

Philip O’Neill stated (Letters, April 22) that religious questions are not amenable to scientific investigation or verification, then asked ‘does that make them meaningless?’ To which he answers, of course not. I’m afraid he, as the physicist Wolfgang Pauli once said, is not even wrong.

Plainly, the assertion that religious questions are not amenable to scientific investigation or verification is incorrect. Did God create the universe? This, I presume, would qualify as a religious question. If so, then it is as open to investigation and verification as any other question about the origin of the universe.

Further, if Mr O’Neill thinks that questions, the answers of which are unverifiable, aren’t meaningless, then what constitutes meaning? We could all attest to be able to sprout wings and fly, but if it’s not verifiable then it is most certainly a meaningless claim.

Later in his letter, he says: “God has its provenance in intelligent reflection and imagination.” Again, a mere assertion. There are myriad gods, with myriad origins; it’s certainly nice that his originated from intelligent reflection and imagination, but it again is meaningless.

Mr O’Neill goes on to state: “It (concept of God) arises from the capacity not just to go where the evidence leads us but to be open to possibilities that are at the edge of what is knowable.” But what could be more meaningless that this? By definition, if it is at the edge of what’s knowable, then it is devoid of any supernatural claim, it is being investigated and potentially verified; if it is not, then how can we expect to know something that is, by Mr O’Neill’s own say so, unknowable?

A much safer bet than to expect to be able to experience and know what is “at the edge of knowable”, is to follow the evidence and take our knowledge from the conclusions, rather than to set up a potential unknowable and try to shape the evidence or experience toward it.

Brian Murphy, British Columbia, Canada

Irish Independent

29April2014Bout and about

I go all the way around the park listening to the Men from the Ministry: Our heroes face a terrible fate helping the farmers Priceless

Mary Post two books do some shopping

Scrabbletoday, Mary gets350, Perhaps Iwill win tomorrow.

Obituary:

Professor Noel Gale – obituary

Professor Noel Gale was a physicist whose work on isotope fingerprinting gave archaeologists insight into long-lost trading routes

7:36PM BST 28 Apr 2014

Comment

Guardian:

As good, enlightened, Guardian-reading parents in the 80s, we had a policy of non-gender-specific toys for our two children (Load of old pony, G2, 23 April). This backfired when we caught our son (aged four) biting a piece of toast into the shape of a handgun, and later building a sword from Duplo bricks. Our daughter, having kicked a ball with me from when she could first walk, came home from her first day at nursery and exclaimed loudly that: “Girls don’t play football!” Good luck to today’s parents of young children.
Patrick Russell
London

A worrying omission from the headline figures in the Crime Survey for England and Wales (Fall in murder and violent crime, but increase in rape, survey finds, 25 April) are those relating to religious and race hate incidents. This category is absent from the survey report and enquirers to the Office for National Statistics (ONS) are instead pointed in the direction of the Home Office, whose “overview” of hate crime wraps up together religious, race hate, homophobic and disability hatred and comes to the conclusion that there has been a steady fall over the past five years.

Independent:

It is not true that any free schools are “empty” (“Scandal of the empty free schools”, 24 April). Less than three years after the first opened, 24,000 pupils are attending free schools and most are proving wildly popular with parents.

For this September, free schools are attracting an average of almost three applications per place. It is not unusual for a school to have spare places; only 20 per cent of state schools are entirely full.

The story was deeply wrong to claim that the figures are based on “new research”. In fact they are taken from a National Audit Office report in December last year. That report made clear that free schools fill more places the longer they are open and that seven in 10 free school places are in areas with a shortage.

The story also misinformed your readers by suggesting that free schools have diverted money from areas facing a shortage. The DfE is spending three times as much on addressing the shortage of places across the school system as we are investing in free schools – 28 per cent of the department’s capital budget compared to 8 per cent. Our investment has already led to the creation of 260,000 places where they are needed, with many thousands more in the pipeline.

Elizabeth Truss, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Childcare, Department for Education, London SW1

Richard Garner is right to highlight “the scandal of the empty free schools” and the cost in terms of much-needed places elsewhere.

Free schools, rather than addressing the need for more parental choice, are often disruptive to local provision and in some cases are little more than vanity projects for interest groups. Ministers have failed to address the lack of suitable premises in catchments where places are needed, the main justification for the programme at inception. Few of those now established will be sustainable as standalone schools and many will merge with academy chains in the absence of local authority support.

While free schools once offered hope for change, ministers and civil servants have become bogged down in the mire of ideology that pervades our education system.

Neil Roskilly, Chief Executive, The Independent Schools Association, Saffron Walden, Essex

Michael Gove’s enthusiasm for free schools seems to have stemmed from what he heard about the Swedish experience. But perhaps he heard selectively.

Stockholm University monitored the experience of introducing such schools in Sweden, and initially reported that the arrival of such a school in an area had a beneficial effect.

Its 2009 report, however, showed that by that time the uplift was no longer apparent.

Swedes are currently greatly concerned to see a decline in their overall educational achievement standards, in contrast to the highly-regarded standards of the past. Numbers of people feel that there is a connection between the lower standards and the growth of the free school movement.

There has also been trouble with bankruptcies in free-school groups, resulting in sudden demands for the state education authorities to pick up the pieces and find room for sometimes large numbers of abandoned pupils.

During a visit earlier this month, I noted the results of a survey showing the extent to which school teachers were properly trained.

In the Stockholm area, the 19 worst schools were all free schools. Seven of those had fewer than 50 per cent of trained teachers, and in one free school little more than a quarter of the teachers were trained.

I hope Mr Gove is tracking all this, and wonder why, other than dogma, he doesn’t take a leaf out of the very successful Finnish book.

John Tippler, Spalding, Lincolnshire

Helping small firms to get bigger

Chris Blackhurst’s column of 23 April makes a timely intervention on the issue of how we finance small companies and help them become large ones. Unfortunately he is wrong to point the finger at private equity and venture capital, which are in fact, a significant part of the solution.

He says that all that’s talked about among venture capitalists is the importance of an “exit”. It is only a shame that he didn’t speak to more BVCA members. They are long-term investors of typically 10 years or more in small, high-risk high-growth companies. What they talk about is the importance of raising enough capital to be able to support these companies, so they don’t have to make an early exit to a US trade buyer and instead can receive many more funding rounds till they are finally ready to list.

What we need to focus on is how we can encourage more institutional investors to commit capital to the venture funds investing in UK SMEs. This is how we can help small companies become large ones. Giving businesses a tax-free savings account might help but it won’t solve the problem Mr Blackhurst has identified.

Tim Hames, Director General, British Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (BVCA), London WC2

A world of minorities

So the Cornish are now an official minority, whatever that might mean in practice. Where does that leave the Cockneys, the Men of Kent, the Brummies, the Scousers, and the Geordies? Before we know where we are we shall be having referendums for every part of the country, as we can all delve into history and make a case for our individual claim to a specific identity.

Roll on the day when we all learn to live together and realise that we are all human beings.

Bill Fletcher, Cirencester, Gloucestershire

I don’t wish to be difficult, but what exactly is the “Cornish way of life” which everyone seems so anxious to protect, through the granting of minority status to Cornwall? Don’t Cornish people go to Tesco, walk the dog, watch Take Me Out and play on Xbox like the rest of us?

Are they doing something secretly Cornish that those of us up the road in Dorset, for example, can barely imagine?

Helen Clutton, Dorchester, Dorset

A doctor writes, in Latin

Howard Jacobson (26 April) refers to a friend who presented to his doctor terrified by the presence of white spots on his scrotum and was disappointed that the GP could not produce a diagnosis.

So would I, as a retired GP, have been. The great secret of medicine is that all you have to do is translate the symptoms into either Greek or Latin and the patient immediately goes away satisfied. Thus, the patient complaining of severe pain in the rectum has got proctalgia, the patient with a left sided headache has migraine (hemicrania) and if you have got white spots on your scrotum you have got  acne alba scrotorum. It’s as simple as that.

Dr Nick Maurice, Marlborough, Wiltshire

Blair’s rejection of democracy

It is little surprise that Tony Blair is still incapable of accepting that he has done more to foster Islamic extremism than any other British politician.

However, his support for the Egyptian military in his Bloomberg speech is staggering. They overthrew a freely elected democratic government. What would Blair have thought if the British Army had rebelled against his illegal invasion of Iraq and removed him as Prime Minister, then imprisoning him and murdering his supporters?

Peter Berman, Wiveliscombe, Somerset

Educated for unemployment

Much is being made of the Ukip claim that immigrants are taking low-paid jobs. No one seems to focus on the biggest problem: our education system.

The policy of increasing the number of students going on to university has led to a focus on exam grades and league tables. University study has never been the correct road for all, but we seem to have forgotten about encouraging less academic students to take other paths. We now have a lost generation of young people feeling failures because no one has made enough of their importance in the workplace. Other European countries and beyond have not made this mistake; hence the immigrants queueing up to work in this country.

Valerie Morgan, Leigh on Sea, Essex

Don’t give in to classroom trolls

Martin Murray (letter, 22 April) suggests that teachers should refrain from using social media in order to avoid abuse and harassment from their pupils. So the victims should change their behaviour and lifestyles in order to escape the irresponsibility and nastiness of bullies and delinquents? What signal does that send to the pupils involved?

For goodness sake, get a grip. Punish the pupils (or their couldn’t care-less-what-my-kids-are-doing parents) who are using social media to denigrate and insult their teachers.

Pete Dorey, Bath

Times:

Rex Features

Published at 12:01AM, April 29 2014

Telegraph:

SIR – I spent years driving my children from Winchester to school in Truro. We loved looking out at the wonderful sight of the magnificent stones of Stonehenge as they appeared on the skyline.

SIR – Surely we should be bringing the data to the people, not the people to the data. For a fraction of the cost of HS2, digital communications could be vastly improved nationwide.

SIR – It is remarkable that the CBI finds it “too political” to campaign for retaining the successful Union with Scotland, which has lasted for 300 years, but is enthusiastic in campaigning for the dysfunctional European Union, in which we have been floundering for 40 years.

Irish Times:

Sir, – “Correlation is not causation” was the first important principle of good research we learned in college. Thus, to associate the taking of ordinary level maths at leaving certificate with poor outcomes in primary school is not just offensive, it’s ridiculous.

The grasp of maths concepts is incremental, closely linked with language proficiency and cognitive development based on the use of concrete materials and problem-solving. There are many factors correlated to difficulties in maths; developmental delay, language difficulties, inadequate access to concrete materials and, oops, high pupil teacher ratio.

Higher level maths are no use to the teacher trying to support 30 pupils with varying needs and learning styles who has to borrow counting blocks from the next classroom, unless of course, he’s a big strong man. Then he’ll be fine and the pupils will be brainboxes I’m sure.

I am of the generation where I had to choose between higher level Irish and maths and I chose Irish. However, as a school principal I am committed to the full implementation of the numeracy strategy and would love to lead my staff and pupils towards the highest standards in maths. I intend to do just that, after I’ve dragged the bins out, unblocked the toilet, figured out who’ll repair the window for what I can give after I’ve retained VAT and RCT, explained the bewildering resource application process to the non-English-speaking parent of a junior infant with special educational needs, sold raffle tickets to replace the bulb in the projector etc.

Minister, just let us do our jobs. You’d be surprised what we could do if we were allowed and if the pupils had the resources they need and are entitled to. Yours, etc,

ANNE McCLUSKEY

River View,

Old Bawn,

Dublin 24

Sir, – I read with some interest David Robert Grimes’s piece (Weekend Review, April 26th) in support of Mr Quinn’s assertion that primary teachers be required to have honours mathematics. In September I will need a teacher for a class of 30 junior infants presenting with a myriad of challenges and difficulties. I hope I can find a teacher who can adequately respond to the needs of this diverse group and, most importantly now, has an A in honours mathematics. Le Meas,

RONAN Mac NAMARA,

Principal,

St Kilian’s NS,

Mullagh,

Co Cavan

Sir, – If Ruairí Quinn chooses to “reform” by megaphone, what response can he expect? Yours, etc,

DES CURLEY,

Boyle,

Co Roscommon.

Sir, – I spent this past weekend with a good friend who is English. During our conversation, he innocently referred to the Irish as British and said that while he thought England should allow Scotland independence, he didn’t think it would be a good idea considering the troubles it (independence) had caused in Ireland. In a separate conversation with an English colleague in my London office, he referred to the Irish as Anglo-Saxon.

English people are generally good and well-meaning. However, there is a distinct lack of understanding of the Irish experience. Joining the Commonwealth would only serve to blur the history between Ireland and Great Britain without having any economic reasoning to support it.

The UK Independence Party (Ukip) is enthused at the idea of reviving the Commonwealth. A spokesman for the party recently told me that almost all the Commonwealth countries “have stronger cultural, legal and linguistic ties to the UK than any continental country”. This is profoundly untrue given that the majority of Commonwealth countries are non-white and non-English-speaking. It is a mere clutch at an imperialist past, an attitude for which Russia is currently being heavily criticised.

When I mentioned Ukip’s aims to a fellow journalist in London, British-Indian and Catholic with strong positive feelings towards Britain, he retorted that it was a useless institution. There is no argument for joining the Commonwealth except to ease the discomfort of an Irish elite who wish to revel in the past glory of their British counterparts. Yours, etc,

NATASHA BROWNE.

Woodford New Road,

London E17 3PT

Sir, – Geoffrey Roberts (Letters, April 28th) grafts hard to dismiss any reluctance, fears and suspicions felt by those who would baulk at Ireland’s re-entry to the Commonwealth. Yet he offers not one valid, viable or valuable benefit that such a move might produce. He proffers “democracy, peace, human rights, sustainable development and the rule of law ” as being qualities to which Ireland and the Commonwealth aspire and resonate. Aren’t we already integrated to the EU, on foot those very same tenets?

As a republic we should spurn any such notion of reigniting our colonial past, and plough on with European countries, along with all other nations, dedicated to “democracy, peace, human rights, sustainable development and the rule of law ”. Up the republic of conscientious objectors, where hope and history can rhyme without galling our gast or palling our past. Yours, etc,

JIM COSGROVE,

Chapel Street ,

Lismore,

Co Waterford

Sir, – The very idea of rejoining the Commonwealth fills me with revulsion. Do Messrs Roberts and Walsh (Letters, April 28th) not realise that most of the member countries of the Commonwealth of Nations criminalise sexual acts between consenting adults of the same sex?

In Uganda, a member of the Commonwealth, vicious anti-gay witch-hunts and violent acts are carried out with the support of the Ugandan parliament. Please, no more talk of the Commonwealth. Yours, etc,

PATRICK O’BYRNE,

Shandon Crescent,

Phibsborough,

Dublin 7

Sir, – Harry McGee’s criticism (Opinion & Analysis, April 28th) of the “ludicrous rationale” of European Parliament constituencies that go from the Dublin suburbs to the islands of Kerry and Donegal is right.

I am not sure, however, if his solution of having one single-seat constituency for the whole country is much better. The ballot paper would be miles long and every “celebrity” in the country would be on it. The obvious solution is to have a five-seat urban constituency for Dublin and adjoining commuter belt counties and two three-seat rural constituencies in the rest of the country. This would be much more coherent than the present arrangement. Yours, etc,

ANTHONY LEAVY,

Shielmartin Drive,

Sutton,

Dublin 13

Sir, – Never in my wildest dreams did I expect to look at an election poster of Donegal man Pat the Cope Gallagher, EU candidate for downtown Leixlip, Co Kildare, on our main street. I am only nine miles from O’Connell Bridge. Could we not have had a larger metropolitan constituency to cover all within commuting distance of the metropole? I would even put up with a fringe MEP as the price! Yours, etc,

JOHN COLGAN,

Dublin Road Street,

Leixlip

Sir, – Over the next few weeks while people are out canvassing for my vote in the upcoming local and European elections, this is what I would like to know about them.

What have you done? Give me your CV. Please don’t tell me what you are going to do. You don’t know what you are going to do. You know what you would like to do but – as we know – that doesn’t always work out.

No, tell me if you have ever started your own business. Have you worked in the private sector, and for how long? Have you ever lost your job because the business had to close? I want to know that you have experienced all the vagaries of life that will allow you to make fully informed choices for the rest of us who have perhaps lost our jobs, who have started our own businesses, who are working in the private sector.

We have too many career politicians making vital decisions about how we live and they are just not getting it right. This has to change and the only way we can do that is to amend the job spec and start asking the right questions.

The next general election in 2016 is also racing towards us and this time we really need to be ready to make an informed choice. Yours, etc,

LULU CLEARY,

Palmerston Park,

Rathmines,

Dublin 6

Sir, – My friend and colleague Dr Michael Foley makes a very good point (Opinion, April 25th) about the gaping internet-shaped hole in the fractured landscape of Irish journalism regulation. However, he goes beyond the available evidence when he says the existing system of scrutinising the press, an industry-funded complaints process based on a press ombudsman and a press council, has had a “good first six years” and has been “a success”.

It would take more than a few words of British praise for “the Irish model” to support the contention that the system is working in a meaningful way. Have member publications seen an improvement in their journalism since 2008? Has public trust in them increased? Or how about a more realistic question: are users of the service and other interested parties happy with it?

This last question was addressed in a piece of research commissioned in 2011 by the Office of the Press Ombudsman and the Press Council. But I know about this study only because, as a journalism lecturer, I was one of the people interviewed for it: the results were not published.

To seek such evidence is not to question the integrity of the retiring press ombudsman, Prof John Horgan, nor of the various members of the council. But from its tightly limited remit to the adversarial process it engenders, from the low proportion of upheld complaints to the even lower percentage of successful appeals, the system raises obvious issues that can only be answered by a thorough review.

As a recent (partly successful) complainant myself, I have been contacted by people who are dissatisfied by their dealings with the Office of the Press Ombudsman. Like the positive notes sounded by Dr Foley, such anecdotes can be deemed representative only if they are supported by proper research.

Any system of would-be regulation should be at least as transparent and accountable as the industry it seeks to regulate. Neither Irish journalism nor the Press Council has any grounds for complacency. Yours, etc,

HARRY BROWNE,

School of Media,

Dublin Institute

of Technology,

Dublin 2

Sir, – Perhaps, instead of penalising new-to-the-market but older purchasers of private health insurance to compensate for the lack of younger people entering the market, Mr Reilly should remove the €399 levy/tax the Government has placed on all private health insurance premiums.

Excessive cost is one of the reasons why the private health insurance industry is failing to attract younger members whose earnings have fallen substantially over the recent years.

Also, for an older person not to get private health insurance it is hard not to think of a better reason than the knowledge that you are to be penalised for no other reason than that you are an older person.

I had thought that discrimination on age grounds was forbidden under the law. Yours, etc,

DAVID DORAN,

Ashfield Royal,

Oak Road,

Bagenalstown,

Co Carlow

Sir, – I fail to understand the comment of Dr Alan Ahearne (Opinion & Analysis, April 26th) to the effect that “double-digit growth in the Dublin house prices is less of a problem today than at the height of the bubble because prices are much lower”. This is the type of logic that got us into the mess we were in during the Celtic Tiger period. If the 15 per cent house price increase experienced last year was to continue for a further four years, prices would be back to the levels that they were at the height of the bubble. Something needs to be done immediately to stop this madness, but is the Government too concerned with the election fever to do anything about it? I fear it is. Yours, etc,

BRENDAN O’DONOGHUE,

Killerig,

Co Carlow

Sir, – I think April 27th will go down in the annals of rugby as the day the game all of us knew, played, lived, loved and watched changed forever. We saw one of the icons of European rugby marginally outperformed by a team of foreign mercenaries assembled at enormous cost at the whim of one wealthy individual.

He and his associates in French rugby and his counterparts in English rugby seem to think this is the way forward. It is not. It signals the death of rugby as we know it and heralds a future when ageing southern hemisphere and Pacific Island musclebound giants will dominate and destroy European rugby, and perhaps worse, encourage young Irish and other players to try and emulate the most likely unhealthy physical specimens that this version of the game demands.

I can’t think of an appropriate protest that all could participate in without further damaging our sport but I am sure there are those out there with the anger and the vision that can suggest a way forward. I for one will choose to play golf, do the garden, or my wife’s bidding rather than watch this travesty. Yours, etc,

DEREK MacHUGH,

Westminster Lawns,

Dublin 18

Sir, – Listening at the weekend to the playback of the tribute to Seamus Heaney from the National Concert Hall I appreciate my television licence fee. I felt I was there listening to the most beautiful poets and musicians pay their respects. Public service broadcasting of such a wonderful evening in Dublin, available the length and breadth of Ireland. In grateful appreciation, Yours, etc,

CLARE BOURKE,

Foyle Road,

Fairview,

Dublin 3

Sir, – I was delighted to read (Sports Saturday, April 26th) that physical education is still considered to be “central to developing academic excellence”. I would love to know more about plans for physical education in primary schools, where I believe the foundation for second level PE must be built. Would it be too much to envisage a specialist PE teacher in primary schools after all these years? Yours, etc,

BRIGID KILKELLY,

Castlebar,

Co Mayo

Sir, – Mark Twain was not the only literary figure who failed to see any sense to sport. Kipling referred to “the flannelled fools at the wickets or the muddied oafs at the goals”. George Orwell claimed that sport was bound up with “hatred, jealousy and total disregard for all rules”. TS Eliot felt sorry for anyone whose only monument was “the asphalt road and a thousand lost golf balls”. Yours, etc,

MATTIE LENNON,

Blessington,

Co. Wicklow

Irish Independent:

Philip O’Neill Edith Road, Oxford – Published 29 April 2014 02:30 AM

* Rob Sadlier’s letter (April 24) rightly shows that my recent contribution to your pages appears to have dodged the implications for belief in God of the world’s suffering.

Also in this section

Letters: A republic for the people

Democracy will suffer

Tribal idols dismantled

The extermination of six million Jews, the death of an innocent child as a result of reckless drunken driving, and the loss of hundreds of young people in the South Korean disaster at sea are all events that challenge our faith to the core. The heartfelt cry of those caught up in these experiences is often, “where was God?” To tell the bereaved that it was the will of God is meaningless and offensive.

In the face of these challenging realities, all we can say to the question, “how did God allow it?” is, “I don’t know” or “there is no God”.

This is where hope comes in. Hope is not the desire for things to turn out well but the belief that, whatever the outcome, it will make sense.

A lack of hope, particularly in the face of human suffering, is unbearable. The most I can say is not, “what is God doing?” but “what are we doing?”

Nobody can prove the existence of God or the non-existence of a deity.

What I can do is say why I believe in some kind of reality at the heart of my experience of life. People with similar experiences may come to different conclusions.

The philosopher Thomas Aquinas is often attributed with the provision of five proofs for the existence of God. He provided five ways to consider the question of God, not five proofs.

Even science no longer deals with proven certainty but with various levels of probability.

The most I can do is provide reasons why I believe. What I believe is another matter. The ‘why’ question and the ‘what’ question are regularly confused.

Borrowing from mathematics, I see God as the X to be determined – the unknown at the heart of things. When troubled by doubts, my default position is that, more than likely, there is a God.

Philip O’Neill

Edith Road, Oxford

TIME TO HEAL THE DIVIDES

* Declan Foley (Letters, April 26) tries to answer those who ponder if there were a God at all, in the midst of tragedy. He claims that enormous damage was done to many non-European nations by conquerors in the name of earthly and heavenly regents. I beg to differ.

It is true that non-European nations are passing through states of bloodletting, sectarian, ethnic, social and religious adversities. However, this should not blind us to the salient fact that such attitudes were/are alien to the noble mores upon which religious scriptures were built.

Past and recent horrors have demonstrated that Europe itself was/is not immune from religious and ethnic strifes and crises. The mass slaughter of six million Jews, the oppression and genocide of Armenians during the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans, the genocide of Muslims in Bosnia, entrench negative stereotypes about divine religions, but who said that religious doctrines indoctrinate their adherents to dehumanise, demoralise, despise and loathe each other and others?

Does Christianity allow child sexual abuse in places of worship, and the following cover-up? Does Christianity endorse the ethnic cleansing of indigenous aboriginals in Australia?

Doesn’t Islam safeguard the freedom to worship without coercion and the inviolable rights of the disenfranchised; and promote tolerance and the sacredness of human life?

Does Judaism promote the Judaisation of the holy land, the annexation of Arab and Muslim territories and the ethnic cleansing of indigenous Palestinians?

The conflicts we witness are not religious-based. They are fuelled by greed and power. The world at large is going through a critical juncture.

This is the time to reject extremism and isolationism. This is the time to heal divides, promote benevolence and pluralism and reach out to others immersed in anguish and despair.

Dr Munjed Farid Al Qutob

London NW2

STILL CHASING WOMEN

* I recently saw a quote from Bob Hope, which may be of interest to those of us of a certain vintage: “I was still chasing women in my seventies . . . but only downhill.”

Tom Gilsenan

Beaumont, D9

PRAISE FOR WHISTLEBLOWERS

* Ten years ago, on April 21, 2004, I was proud to be present with 100 international observers at the release of whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu in Ashkelon, Israel. In this prison he had served 18 years, 11 of these in solitary confinement.

I witnessed at first hand the extreme hostility he faced as he emerged from the prison gates. We, his supporters, were pelted with eggs, water bombs and urine bombs.

Since his release, he has been confined to Israel, forced to live in an area the size of Munster where he is hated by the population.

Vanunu is a truth-teller who told the world about Israel’s stockpile of nuclear weapons.

As I recall his sacrifice, I am reminded of other brave whistleblowers who have suffered similarly within their own communities for telling the truth, not least the two brave gardai John Wilson and Maurice McCabe.

All whistleblowers are honourable people. They deserve to be cherished by any nation that values decency and integrity.

Justin Morahan

Rathfarnham, Dublin 16

CLAMPING CONTROVERSY

* Now that city clampers have been set the target of 60,000 cars in 2014, motorists can expect to fork out more money for the City Council. What’s more interesting is that they will get €2,000 bonus if they achieve that.

So, not only – save for really blatant parking offences – has clamping become an easy and sneaky way of extracting money from motorists’ pockets, clampers are now further motivated to make a bigger kill.

Concetto La Malfa

Dublin 4

POLITICS AND ST PATRICK

* Adlai Stevenson, the great American diplomat and orator, once said that a hypocrite is someone that cuts down a giant redwood tree, then jumps on the stump and makes a speech about conservation.

In the political arena, we have our version of the tree cutter. Every year, at the taxpayers’ expense, our Taoiseach and ministers traverse the globe celebrating St Patrick’s Day and St Patrick. However, a substantial number of these ladies and gents, if they had their way, would remove St Patrick and what he preached.

For instance, Ruairi Quinn’s attempts at removing religion from schools; Eamon Gilmore withdrawing the Vatican diplomat; Mr Kenny playing with his mobile phone in the Pope’s presence, and so forth.

Now, lest it be thought I was discriminating against the anti-Christians, I would suggest a ‘jolly boys’ and girls’ outing’ be arranged.

North Korea springs to mind because there they will see a religious free state and be taught a few tricks to how it’s achieved, and where everybody will be equal – that’s equally miserable and hungry.

I started with a quote so I will end with another, this time from Khrushchev: “Politicians will tell you that they will build a bridge were there’s no river.” Remember this when you are looking at your ballot paper.

Michael O’Callaghan

Whites Cross, Cork

Irish Independent

30April2014Attendance

I go all the way around the park listening to the Men from the Ministry: Our heroes face a terrible fate helping the fiber board Priceless

Mary Jill comes to vist and the Benefits lady

Scrabbletoday, Mary getsnearly400, 395, Perhaps Iwill win tomorrow.

Obituary:

Guardian:

Exactly a year ago, the UK carried out its first drone strike from RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire. Like the more than 450 other remote weapon launches carried out by UK drones, no details about the strike or the resulting casualties have ever been made public. As British troops pack to leave Afghanistan at the end of 2014, information leaks suggest that the UK’s armed Reaper drones will not be brought back to the UK, but rather be deployed for a counter-insurgency/counter-terrorism role in Africa and the Middle East.

I read your report on the IPCC’s conclusions and it is clear that the world is facing a serious climate crisis (‘Go green to save the planet’, 18 April). But we, the public, seem to be happy for our governments to pacify us with token gestures.

One policy option that seems to be glaringly absent from the debate is the path of taxation and regulation. So why are these policies not part of the fight against climate change? Why not ban the advertising of flippant air travel and overpowered cars? Why not put a hefty tax on aviation fuel and on petrol? Why not limit the size and power of private cars and commercial trucks? Or even better, tax and subsidise us out of our cars on to bicycles and public transport. Why not use taxation to increase the price of electricity and gas? And restrict imports that carry a large carbon, chemical, pollution or exploitation footprint? It’s not rocket science and, indeed, such tax-and-regulate policies have, in health matters, been shown to dramatically cut levels of smoking.

Of course, we the public would howl with indignation at having our convenience, our self-pampering and our “goodies” taken away, but if we abandon car-dependent suburban living, switch to more localised production and live more modestly, we would actually find more satisfaction in our lives.

And I am sure that it would not be completely hair-shirt living because, as fossil-fuel based consumption were “prised” away from us, human ingenuity would kick in and many conveniences would live on in a modified form.

It is a clear decision: either cut the pampering or fry the planet. Unfortunately, we seem to have chosen the second option.
Alan Mitcham
Cologne, Germany

• Your leader and associated articles describes an express train overloaded with fossil fuels, racing towards irreversible collision with the biosphere.

Nothing was said about thinking outside the box. Anhydrous ammonia, which can be safely stored in cylinders, can be used to drive transport vehicles. It was employed to power rail cars in New Orleans in 1879 and buses in Brussels in 1943, when diesel was appropriated for military purposes. Its use is currently being exploited for ammonia-diesel hybrid, and eventually pure ammonia-driven turbines and private cars in Canada and the US. Traditionally synthesised using energy from combustion of the powerful greenhouse gas methane, ammonia can now be manufactured using non-polluting, endlessly renewable energy from our offshore nuclear fusion reactor, the sun.

The International Monetary Fund advocates a radical transformation of the global energy system over coming decades. If miners and other industrialists can be persuaded to leave fossil fuels in the ground, preserve the photosynthesising carbon sinks of old growth forests and jump aboard the sidelined train, it could become mainline.
Bryan Furnass
Canberra, Australia

• It is with relief that I finally read positive news about climate change. The report warns that decisions and changes need to be made now. What’s our part in all of this?

I suggest our part is to take a moment and contact our federal politicians. Tell them we want an end to fossil-fuel subsidies. We want our tax dollars back.

And we want the big polluters to pay for dumping carbon into our air, for free. After all, we would charge them for polluting our drinking water or our back yard.

And we want the money the big carbon-polluting companies pay to be given back fairly to all of us in an annual payment, or through lower taxes or more clean energy. It’s called a carbon tax. The big polluters pay the carbon tax and we reap the rewards.

Politicians want to hear from us. They want to hear what we want them to do. So tell them. It only takes a moment.
Maureen Milledge
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Putin may just be smarter

Putin is smarter than our leaders in the west (28 March). Take Syria. The west seems to have learned nothing in the last 12 years. We may not have liked the old dictators in the Middle East, Saddam, Gaddafi and Mubarak, but at least they maintained secular states in which religious conflict was contained and some sort of order was maintained.

And do we really like what has replaced them through our efforts? It is not our beloved democracy, but mayhem and chaos and breeding grounds for Muslim extremism, only redeemed in Egypt by a replacement dictator.

In Syria, Putin rightly saw that the so-called revolution would be overtaken by al-Qaida and its associates, and he backed Assad. What has the west gained by backing the rebels? Only mayhem and chaos and a breeding ground for Muslim extremism. We delude ourselves if we think that a western-style democracy can be established in these societies as they are today. Putin is under no such illusion, and perhaps his way is actually more humanitarian in terms of human suffering.

As for Ukraine: the west foolishly backed a popular revolution in Kiev that overthrew an elected president, then ratted on an agreement to which it was a party to find a way forward by negotiation. Putin understood that Ukraine was a dangerously divided country with ethnic and linguistic fractures that could easily tear it apart. Of course he wants to maintain Russian influence there. The west wants to maintain its influence. But the west’s foolish provocation of the eastern Ukrainians has only pushed them further into the arms of Putin.

I may not like Putin personally, but we would do better to listen to him than demonise him. He may just be smarter than we are.
Martin Down
Witney, UK

Capitalism is in trouble

The excess of the income of capital, compared with that of wages, may seem outrageous (Capitalism is in trouble, 18 April). But you can be both among the greatest world’s capitalists and philanthropists. For instance Bill Gates and Warren Buffett: the latter is supposed to have handed 85% of his fortune to the charity of the former, the two still peaking at the highest positions on Forbes list. No doubt those geniuses and their likes will eventually save the world … or is there an error?
Marc Jachym
Les Ulis, France

• Will Hutton is right: “The huge gap between rich and poor threatens to destroy us”. Yes, it certainly does, but clinging to the capitalist myth that infinite growth in a finite system is possible will destroy us. Logic has a way of imposing itself on reality.
Molly M Radke
Hansville, Washington, US

Stop running down the US

I am British, a naturalised citizen of the US, a former resident of Canada and now resident in Europe. I have experienced both capitalist and socialist societies, commencing with the Soviet Union in 1979.

A few years ago, a journal, Rage, with which I was associated, conducted a survey of opinions of the US and its policies expressed by citizens of the US and by foreign citizens. The result very convincingly showed that those inside the US expressed pride and confidence while those outside expressed what can best be described as jealousy. Since that survey, letters to the Guardian Weekly have confirmed these findings over and over again. Jennifer Coopersmith’s letter (Reply, 11 April) is a case in point.

She decries the American Dream with no other objective than to express jealousy. Europe, for example, suppresses initiative and entrepreneurialism with regulations and taxes, and I have first-hand knowledge how the best around the world move to the US for a chance. Australia and Canada join Europe in preferring regularised government and compliant citizens over people who are willing to follow their dreams and move on.

We need to stop running down the US: its citizens are perfectly capable of looking after themselves. Instead, we need to cure the drag with which erstwhile British colonies and Europe encumber their citizens.
John Graham
Hoogstraten, Belgium

We must value the psyche

Thank you for your feature on Daniel Kahneman’s book, Thinking, Fast and Slow (21 March). Of the five intellectuals quoted only one, the woman, Salley Vickers, mentions the psyche. Like Cinderella in the kitchen ashes, the psyche has been waiting for her missing half. The male intellectual mind has been turning its back on its natural partner, the psyche, with its attendant emotions and feelings and trying to explain how the world works and what we humans are with only half a tool kit.

Wisdom that the Asian world is and has been familiar with for millennia is very slowly seeping into western male intellectual consciousness. Thinkers in our past knew about it – Emerson and Whitman, for example – and Carl Jung delved deep into the psyche and understood its value and the value of intuition and feelings.

The psyche, by the way, is not located in the mind; it pervades the body and can be felt in the chest area when one is happy, or in love with life; “mental” problems are really dysfunctions of emotions and feelings. Think “emotional health”, not “mental” health.
Mary MacMakin
Kabul, Afghanistan

• Steven Pinker said that Daniel Kahneman made a powerful and important discovery that “human reason left to its own devices is apt to engage in a number of fallacies and systematic errors”. Far from being a new discovery, this is one of the oldest themes in philosophy, going back to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave and the Bhagavad-Gita’s statement that all living things are born into illusion.
Stephen Porsche
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Briefly

• As experts fear Thierry Jamin’s expedition to Peru would bring disease to the indigenous Nanti people, as happened in Australia and New Zealand, why don’t they send in a drone to scan the top of the “strange square mountain”? (18 April).
Edward Black
Church Point, NSW, Australia

Independent:

During the next five months Uefa will select 13 host cities for its Euro 2020 football competition. We appeal to Uefa to exclude Jerusalem from this list of hosts.

Israel flouts the UN position that Jerusalem should be an open city for all, making it impossible for most Palestinians to visit the holy sites there, or to visit relatives. The Israeli state supports the confiscation of Palestinian land and homes in East Jerusalem for the use of illegal settlers.

In February this year, Amnesty International published a report entitled Trigger Happy which documents the treatment of Palestinians by the Israeli occupation forces. The report describes this treatment as “unnecessary, arbitrary and brutal”.

Just one example of this was seen earlier this year when Israeli soldiers shot repeatedly at the legs and feet of two talented teenage Palestinian footballers at a checkpoint, maiming them for life.

Israel continues to perpetrate its devastating military occupation of the Palestinian territories, flouts international law, totally disregards UN resolutions, and imprisons hundreds of Palestinians, including children, without charge.

It would be a mockery of Fifa’s Mission and Statutes if Jerusalem were awarded the status of hosting  games in this tournament.

Leaders of international football must respond to the pleas from suffering Palestinians to sanction Israel in the community of nations.

John Austin

Victoria Brittain

Rodney Bickerstaffe

Breyten Breytenbach

Caryl Churchill

William Dalrymple

The Rev Garth Hewitt

Dr Ghada Karmi

Bruce Kent

Paul Laverty

Mike Leigh

Ken Loach

Miriam Margolyes

Mairead Maguire

Kika Markham

Professor Nur Masalha

Karma Nabulsi

Professor Steven Rose

Professor Hilary Rose

Salman Abu Sitta

Ahdaf Souief

Baroness Jenny Tonge

Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Alice Walker

Roger Waters

Orthodox economic model has failed

As an economics graduate (from 1970), I am at one with the students at Manchester University who are challenging the paradigm that has dominated the teaching of the subject over the past 30 years (“Manchester students man the barricades”, 26 April).

The teaching of the subject today appears to be have been captured by “quants” and purveyors of free-market dogma. (Even The Independent’s Hamish McRae recently referred to investment in equities and property as “real” investment in contrast to investment in government which was supposedly “unreal”.)

I am reminded of some words of wisdom of the great Paul Samuelson, the first economics Nobel laureate. When asked what his advice to economics undergraduates would be he replied: “Read history.” That is where all the important economic data lies.

Too heavy an emphasis on arcane theoretical models based on faith in “efficient markets”, where the only requirement for academic success is mathematical prowess, has distorted the discipline and allowed it to be subverted by “right-wing think-tanks” serving the interests of the corporate and financial sector.

The result: the failed paradigm that caused the great crash of 1929 has returned with a vengeance to cause the great crash of 2007-8, and the only response from academia appears to be to rebuild the paradigm and not make the same mistakes next time.

It is not necessary to be a Marxist radical to say that economics has failed to serve the interests of any but the richest and most powerful. It is time for change, and among the correctives should be a compulsory unit on economic history for all economics undergraduates.

Chris Forse, Snitterfield,  Warwickshire

Are the “Manchester students manning the barricades to overthrow economic orthodoxy” going so far as to question “growth”?

Orthodox economics seems to require an ever increasing population, with an infinite supply of environmental resources, to pay for an ever longer-living number of the elderly. At some point a new economic philosophy will be needed.

R J Buchanan, London SE18

How can we sign on every day?

Your front-page headline of 28 April – “Jobless must sign on every day” – has me perplexed.

I am long-term unemployed and am familiar with the problems my local JobCentre has just dealing with me once a fortnight. You are never seen on time and getting access to the “job points” to look for vacancies on the website can be difficult. Getting access to a phone to ring up about a job can incur a long wait. What will it be like if 10 times as many are forced to visit at the same time? They may have to move the JobCentre to Gateshead International Stadium to accommodate us all.

Derek Holmes, Gateshead,  Tyne and Wear

How are the jobless expected to report to their nearest JobCentre each day or undertake voluntary work when many rural bus services run only once or twice per week or not at all, following severe cuts? Those services that still operate often allow only a fixed time at their destination; missing the return bus could entail a very long walk, as I doubt that JobCentres will be reimbursing taxi fares.

Many of the unemployed in rural areas formerly worked as bus drivers or in low-paid public-sector jobs which have been axed.

Dr John Disney, Nottingham  Business School

The Coalition knows nothing of life in the northern towns and cities of England. Here unemployment has lasted since the decline of traditional heavy industry a generation ago, while many away from London just haven’t got the rail services that make commuting a possibility.

So rather than being helped back to work, all those on the dole face is more attendance at JobCentres (which will surely mean more civil servants to deal with them), and yet more compulsory voluntary work that offers no extra payments.

At least Scotland has the chance to cut away from the capital’s dominance. Perhaps we in the North should have the option to join them at some future date?

Tim Mickleburgh, Grimsby,  Lincolnshire

A-level scientists must get into the lab

Charles Tracy, of the Institute of Physics, (letter, 24 April) suggests that students could get top grades in future science A-levels without doing practical work. That is not so. Students can get top grades now with very little lab experience. They will need to do more, and to do the practical work most valued by higher education, to win top grades in future.

Students will be required to do a minimum of 12 pieces of practical work, for which they will receive a separate grade, and exam papers will include questions on the knowledge and skills obtained in the lab – on the student’s ability to take a question or a conundrum, to design an experiment to solve it, and to interpret the results.

Many science teachers are thumping the air with delight at the chance to truly teach experimentation, and to see students develop valuable skills rather than simply jump through predictable assessment hoops.

As I said recently, we will monitor new and reformed qualifications to make sure that any necessary adjustments are made, but I am confident that these changes will benefit students, as many science teachers recognise.

Amanda Spielman, Chair, Ofqual. Coventry

Cornwall takes its rightful place

With Cornwall at last, and not before time, recognised as the UK’s fifth home nation, surely we can now have our team in the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow this summer. The British Olympics team had a few Cornish gold medal winners, including Helen Glover.

We Cornish loved the UK Olympic Games and supporting our British team, but at the Glasgow games only a Cornish team will do, or perhaps if necessary “England with Kernow” as a transitionary team to 2018.

Tim James, Penzance

“Don’t Cornish people go to Tesco, walk the dog, watch Take Me Out and play on XBox like the rest of us?” asks Helen Clutton (letter, 29 April). No longer owning a dog, I shudder at the idea that the rest of the things your correspondent sees as normal are normal.

Eddie Dougall, Walsham le Willows, Suffolk

I don’t go to Tesco, haven’t got a dog, have never heard of Take Me Out, and wouldn’t know an XBox if I fell over one. Does that make me Cornish?

Michael Hart, Osmington, Dorset

Times:

Telegraph:

6:58AM BST 29 Apr 2014

72 Comments

SIR – Boris Johnson’s suggestions on reform of the electoral system for MEPs omits reference to two issues. The European Parliament cannot initiate legislation – only the Commission or the Council of Ministers can, and their legislative initiatives are usually rubber stamped by the parliament. So the ability of British MEPs to promote or protect British interests is minimal.

SIR – Patrick McLoughlin, the Transport Secretary, compares HS2 protesters to the self-interested Victorian landowners who opposed the railways. The protesters I have met have not been relentless Luddites, but farmers and small business people facing ruin, concerned taxpayers, infuriated commuters whose lines are starved of investment, and those who distrust “legacy” policies.

Irish Times:

Sir, – Regarding your editorial on the Hamas-Fatah unity agreement (April 28th), there are various points you make that I would disagree with but one in particular stands out.

You say that the Israeli government’s demand that Israel be recognised by the Palestinians as the Jewish state is “a wrecking condition” insisted upon by Mr Netanyahu, and that if this was accepted by the Palestinians it would mean them acknowledging second-class status for Israel’s Arab minority. This presupposes that Mahmoud Abbas’s determination not to recognise Israel as the Jewish state is because of some concern he has about Israeli Arabs.

As Israelis, we don’t need Mr Abbas to lecture us on the rights of our Arab citizens. In Israel, Arab citizens, who are about a quarter of the population, are fully equal in law to Jewish citizens. Arabic is Israel’s official second language. Israeli Arabs serve in the army and police, the judiciary and civil service, and they are fully part of the political system of the state. They have free speech, free press – all the attributes of a civilised democracy. They are certainly freer than any Arabs who live in the other countries of the Middle East. They are certainly better off than Arabs in the squalidly corrupt Palestinian Authority.

One should ask not why Mr Netanyahu insists on Palestinian recognition of Israel as the Jewish state but why President Abbas opposes it so much. The real reason Mr Abbas and his acolytes do not recognise Israel as the Jewish state is because that would mean the end of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and they are not ready for that, at least not yet.

Their “recognition” of Israel, therefore, is to be only temporary and tactical, so as to create an interim Palestinian state, after which further demands will be placed on Israel, including the absurd “right of return” which, it is hoped, will swamp Israel with millions of so-called refugees from around the world who can claim some Palestinian heritage. This is why Mr Abbas will not recognise Israel as the Jewish state – because he wants the Palestinian state to replace Israel, not to live in peace with it.

We have long had our suspicions about Mr Abbas’s genuine commitment to a two-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians. Alas, his decision last week to form a unity government with the terrorist organisation Hamas – which has not changed its absolutist position on Israel – gives credence to such pessimism. Yours, etc,

BOAZ MODAI,

Ambassador of Israel,

Pembroke Road,

Ballsbridge,

Dublin 4

Sir, – Dr Sean Alexander Smith may have satisfied himself that he is sane, but I am not satisfied that he is civilised. Surely it is not necessary for religious believers to have recourse to their respective traditions to decide whether the state has the right to kill its citizens? Here we need only look to our recent history. A number of Irish people were wrongly convicted of capital crimes in the 1980s in England. Will Dr Smith argue that these people should have been hanged? Christians may believe in resurrection, but can they resurrect a hanged man so that he can appeal his sentence?

Guilt or innocence is not the issue however, but the question of certainty. Is any justice system infallible? There is a strange contradiction it seems to me in the attitudes of the demented tricorne-hat-wearing reactionaries of the United States who decry what they call “big government” while at the same time advocating the death penalty. Excessive interference by government in the lives of its citizens has surely no more perfect manifestation than that it should be able to kill them as a normal part of its business.

None of the Christian scriptures cited in the previous letters on this subject mentioned that Jesus himself was asked to be judge in one capital case where guilt was, apparently, certain. His judgement? “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.” [John 8:7] Is this not enough? What more do you want? Any further argument would seem to be pharisaical casuistry. Yours, etc,

GARETH COLGAN,

Hazel Villas,

Kilmacud,

Co Dublin

Sir, – As an agnostic, I approach the death penalty debate with a different perspective from that of most of your contributors. To my mind the arguments of all those theists, whatever their religious persuasion, who claim to respect the “sanctity” of human life and yet approve of judicial murder, are both perplexing and abhorrent, and I assess them accordingly. As a wise man is reputed to have said long ago: “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves … By their fruits ye shall know them.” Yours, etc,

VICTOR DIXON,

Charleville Road,

Dublin 6

Sir, – Harry McGee (April 28th) is quite correct to propose one single constituency for Ireland in the European elections. Not only are the countries and places he mentioned one big constituency, even states like Spain are. Spain of course uses a closed list system, where you vote for a party not a person.

This should be applied also to Dáil elections. One single list per party and you vote for that list. Nothing would stop independents standing as single person lists if they wanted. This would help focus debates on politics and not the personality, as so often happens now. Yours, etc,

GEARÓID Ó LOINGSIGH

Bogotá,

Colombia

Sir, – With reference to Harry McGee’s article , it seems to me that the elephant in the room is the Electoral Act 1997. What is wrong with having a two-seat constituency?  The population of the Irish Republic is, according to the 2011 Census, 4,588,000. Eleven MEPs represents a seat ratio of one MEP to 417,000 people. Using four constituencies while observing local authority and county boundaries, the following would be a better outcome: Dublin three seats (population 1,273,000, ratio 424,000); rest of Leinster three seats (population 1,231,000, ratio 410,000); Munster three seats (population 1,246,000, ratio 415,000); Connacht/Ulster two seats, (population 838,000, ratio 419,000). Why let the tail wag the dog? Yours, etc,

T MARTIN,

Temple Mills,

Celbridge,

Co Kildare

Sir, – If Brian Hayes TD wishes to run for the European Parliament then surely he first needs to clear up his commitment to his Dáil constituents. If he no longer wishes to represent them, ought he not to resign his seat? Yours, etc,

BERNARD KEOGH,

Dollymount Park,

Dublin 3

Sir, – As a member of the Labour Party for more than 50 years, I have experienced more than enough of our party’s ups and downs in polls and elections, indeed more downs than ups. It seems to me that the Irish electorate wants Laboury-type policies yet continues to vote for our conservative parties, Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and now, it seems, Sinn Féin. The Labour Party has been in government from time to time over the years, but never as the majority party.

Labour usually receives most of the blame for those periods in government, and little of the credit. Sometimes indeed it might have been “cuter” to have stayed out, especially after the last election when years of profligacy and mismanagement (from parties supported by the Irish electorate with its votes) left our country almost as an outcast among democracies.

At the time many experts suggested we would need at least 10 years before coming out of “banana republic” status. Recent reports suggest we are well ahead of that in returning to some sort of reasonable health. Obviously, most people have been hurt during this recovery process, and some more than others.

Regarding the call by our MEP Phil Prendergast for Eamon Gilmore to resign as party leader, if Ms Prendergast sees the leadership as being a problem, she is entitled to say so. But it’s hard to see a change as solving any problem. I suggest that even if all Labour Party elected representatives were to resign their positions it would not improve things one bit; indeed it would certainly make them worse. What is required instead is for each voter to take much greater care in deciding who, or which party, deserves their vote, with their own and our country’s future welfare in mind. Yours, etc,

CHRISTOPHER SANDS,

Collinswood,

Dublin 9

Sir, – As to Phil Prendergast and her advice to Eamon Gilmore, a story comes to mind. As a Limerick team was going from rugby bar to rugby bar in celebration of winning a very handsome plaque, the voice of a friend of mine was heard to say: “I’d keep the noise down until ye’ve won something ye can drink out of.” Yours, etc,

MARTIN BYRNES,

Newcastlewest,

Co Limerick

Sir, – In response to Clare Bourke (April 29th) on the apparent “value” of the licence fee, perhaps someone should point her toward YouTube. It provides, free of charge, wonderful concerts from the National Concert Hall and elsewhere. There is no need for the bloated national station.

The public broadcasting model is outdated and is yet another tax: the worst value for money, €160 a year for two overhyped stations – and we have no choice but to pay. I fail to see the value in being forced to pay for a poor service you don’t want. I believe RTÉ should go down the road of all the other stealth taxes: those who use pay. I guarantee if you made the paying of this tax optional RTÉ would quickly see how little value it really has in the open market. Let the people choose. Yours, etc,

CONAR DUNNE,

Glen Grove,

Swords ,

Co Dublin

Sir, – Paul Gillespie’s World View column (“Climate change is key to modern ethics”, April 26th) is a further encouraging sign that debate on climate change is being seen in the greater context of global economic orthodoxy.

The statistics Dr Gillespie presents outlining how the richest 10 per cent account for 60 per cent of the world’s consumption align well with Thomas Pikettys recent thesis ( Capital in the Twenty-First Century ) regarding the growth of inequality.

The global economy is set up to facilitate an accumulation of wealth among a minority. This group drives accelerated growth in consumption in the economy to enhance its own standing amongits peers, as to stand still in an anathema.

However, in doing so, it consigns the remainder of the planet to increased indebtedness to feed this unnecessary consumption and also deplete the finite resources of the planet.

Climate change is but one manifestation, albeit a most serious one, of the malignancy of the current economic orthodoxy.

Inequality, injustice, rampant poverty and, increasingly, the subversion of democracy through legalised political corruption, can also be seen as symptoms.

However, whereas these latter ailments mainly affect only those impoverished by the system, climate change is not so selective and as a result the idea of a change in economic approach may yet gain some mileage. Yours, etc,

BARRY WALSH,

Linden Avenue,

Blackrock,

Cork

Sir, – As the Government plans to roll out subsidised high-speed broadband countrywide, what measures will be put in place to protect children against the tsunami of pornography that will follow in its wake?

In the UK the biggest viewers of pornography are children of 11 to 17 years; this is causing significant mental health problems, while internet pornography is also now a leading facilitator of child abuse.

The increasing availability of out-of-home Wi-Fi connections has made it nearly impossible for parents to protect their children from disturbing material. The Government is paying for the high-speed roll-out; the Government issues the telecoms with their internet licences; therefore it is up to the Government to make sure the telecoms behave responsibly. Yours, etc,

JOHN DEVLIN,

Erne Terrace,

Dublin 2

Sir, – In your issue of April 26th two articles appear under the respective headlines “State approves €500m for broadband” and “Homeless crisis ‘bloody awful and getting worse’”.

As a country it appears to be quite obvious where the priorities lie in regard to the welfare of citizens. God help the lady living in the car and so many other unfortunates. Surely the feeding and housing of all people, including the necessary financial support, must receive absolute precedence over all other requirements. Yours, etc,

STANLEY BELFORD,

Merville Road,

Stillorgan,

Co Dublin

Sir, – Your front page top headline (April 26th) reads “State approves €500 for broadband”. Further down the page the headline reads “Homeless crisis ‘bloody awful and getting worse’”. We are told there are 952 long-term vacant council houses and flats in need of renovation and that €15 million has just been allocated for that purpose and, further, that Waterford Hospital has no funds to replace 300 torn and dirty matresses.

Has nobody in government got any sense of priorities? What is wrong with this country and the people who are supposed to be running it? Yours, etc,

KW SUPPLE KANE,

Castlebellingham,

Co Louth

Sir, – Derek MacHugh is correct to be worried about European and six nations rugby. Vanity teams backed by endless funds can only damage the game for everyone. While players are entitled to be well paid for their undoubted talents and efforts, some balance is required between players, owners and supporters. One way to stem the tide of last-gasp mercenaries and poached players would be to limit the number of non-nationally-qualified players to three or four per team. In this way the power of money might be limited. Yours, etc,

JOHN K ROGERS,

Rathowen,

Co Westmeath

Sir, – As a cyclist, I welcome reports that the cycle network is to be increased over the coming years. Extrapolating from the practices on the current network, it is likely that many of the new routes will be shared with footpaths.

Given that pedestrians often pay as much attention to shared cycle lanes as many cyclists do to red lights, perhaps we should dispense with 2,840km worth of red tarmac, white lines and road markings, and accept that they are just free-for-alls. It might even come in under budget! Yours, etc,

MICK McMULLIN,

Granville Road,

Dún Laoghaire,

Co Dublin

Sir, – Olivia Kelly (April 19th) might have mentioned the importance of the Bike-to-Work scheme in popularising cycling in Dublin and in other parts of the country. Yours, etc,

PAUL SCHWARTZMAN,

Leopardstown Abbey,

Dublin 18

Sir, – The Church of Ireland (report, April 29th) in its official response to Sinn Féin’s motion in the Stormont Assembly in favour of same sex marriage has affirmed “that marriage is in its purpose a union permanent and life-long … of one man with one woman, to the exclusion of all others on either side …The Church of Ireland recognises … no other understanding of marriage.”

Just over a year ago an electoral college of the same church elected to the see of Meath a cleric in that diocese who had remarried after his first marriage ended in divorce. His election was subsequently ratified by the House of Bishops. He was obliged to withdraw from the position days before his consecration was due to take place when (as newspapers reported widely at the time) disclosures were made regarding his conduct as rector of a parish in Northern Ireland.

The Church of Ireland  believes that it is appropriate for a divorced and remarried man to be a candidate for the office of bishop; other divorced and remarried men still act as clergy in the church. The remarriage in church of divorcees is no longer uncommon. In that case why does the church continue to affirm its commitment in principle to a theology of marriage which it cannot be bothered to honour in practice? Yours, etc,

CDC ARMSTRONG,

Ulidia House,

Belfast BT125JN

Irish Independent:

0 Comments

• Email

• Print

• Font Size

Published 30 April 2014 02:30 AM

* According to Ian O’Doherty (Irish Independent, April 28), Gabrielle McFadden’s claim to a Dail seat is based on ‘a promise’ she made to succeed her late sister, Nicky McFadden TD, shortly before she died.

Also in this section

Finding hope when troubled by doubts

Letters: A republic for the people

Democracy will suffer

It would seem that a Dail seat is to be regarded as a family heirloom; a chattel that can be bequeathed with less formality than a legacy in a will, which is at least signed and witnessed; and that Ms McFadden is counting on the mystical inertia of a distracted electorate to fulfil her ambition.

There are 24 TDs in the Dail who are connected to family dynasties and 13 of these directly succeeded a close relative in winning a seat, reflecting a strong culture of nepotism embedded in the Oireachtas.

The familial nature of this culture is further aggravated when TDs employ relatives as drivers, assistants and advisers in sinecures funded by taxpayers. It is from these foundations that parish pump favouritism and chicanery flourishes.

How can Ireland ever evolve as a transparent and ethical meritocracy when nepotism drives our political system? Would the public good, for example, be enhanced if county managers, senior public servants and heads of state organisations were allowed to slither their close relatives into privileged positions in order to succeed them?

It is time for Ireland to grow up politically and for the electorate to think more carefully about the severe limitations of these family dynasties. No new thinking will ever emerge from a system that only looks defensible to people who are related to each other and whose span of accountability and vicariousness does not transcend their own tribe.

MYLES DUFFY

GLENAGEARY, CO DUBLIN

MAGNA CARTA‘S 800TH BIRTHDAY

* On President Higgins’s recent state visit to Britain, I think it would have been appropriate if Runnymede near Windsor had been part of the itinerary.

It is the place where the Magna Carta was agreed and signed in 1215. It is the embryo from which our modern democracies and human rights grew. The principles of liberty came from Runnymede. The US Supreme Court has ruled that its democracy and Bill of Rights have their foundation in the Magna Carta.

Next year will be the 800th anniversary and all the great democratic leaders will be there including President Obama and, I hope, we will be well represented too.

NOEL FLANNERY

SOUTH CIRCULAR ROAD, CO LIMERICK

DON’T RUSH NEW CURRICULUM

* Regarding ‘Quinn should teach these wolves a lesson’ (Irish Independent, April 27), first, all three unions did not treat Education Minister Ruairi Quinn with disdain. The TUI listened respectfully.

Also, that “They earn more than €60,000 a year on average, take three months’ paid holiday, have protected pensions, and jobs for life”, is simply not true. I do not know one teacher who earns €60,000 a year.

The teachers I know are taking extra jobs in order to supplement their incomes. Also, I know several teachers who have gone from school to school because of the ‘casualisation’ of teaching. It is virtually impossible to get a permanent role in today’s climate.

The main reason teachers are up in arms over Mr Quinn’s new plans is because they care about the future of education and don’t want to see a new curriculum rushed in without adequate planning.

BRIDIN DELANEY

AL AIN, UAE

MY GOD, IT’S UNBELIEVABLE

* God exists in the minds of people only, because no human has ever produced a scintilla of proof that a god or gods exist or ever did exist. We now know that the Earth is billions of years old, and science has proved that life forms started about four billion years ago.

Of all the millions of species of life that exist on Earth man in his present form is a very recent arrival and we represent less than 10pc of all life on this planet; insects represent about 80pc of life here.

Man has everything in common with animals – he reproduces in the same manner; he must eat, drink and breathe to stay alive; he has the same internal organs as an animal. All life is related, and all living things on Earth, from microbes to elephants and everything in between, will die, decompose and turn to dust.

Man has invented and worshipped gods from the dawn of time. It is amazing that so many people choose to live in total ignorance of the workings of nature and of the world around them even when it is beamed into their living rooms and explained to them in great detail by some of the greatest naturalists and scientists of our time, such as David Attenborough and others.

PADDY O’BRIEN

BALBRIGGAN, CO DUBLIN

LABOUR’S MADE ITS BED . . .

* What’s wrong with Labour? Where has its vote gone? . . . Frankfurt?

Eamon Gilmore is under pressure from a colleague who represents nigh on half of the country geographically at European level, which doesn’t really look good for a man who represents the people of a Dail constituency at a national level.

The party is certainly under political pressure. Is it because the Government can’t hide behind the troika any more? Is it because the traditional union vote has collapsed following a High Court decision to prevent a mandated strike from taking place while a ‘Labour man’ sits in the office of Tanaiste? Is it, to put it very simply, as my child might say, people don’t like Mr Gilmore any more?

The way Ireland works is very simple. Politicians put their faces up on poles, seep into the conscience of the nation and get elected. The unfortunate side-effect of this is that the Irish have become used to putting faces with policies.

DERMOT RYAN

ATHENRY, CO GALWAY

HEAVEN SCENT?

* Every cloud has a silver lining . . . the introduction of water charges may have deodorant manufacturers rubbing their hands in glee . . . or indeed raising their arms.

TOM GILSENAN

BEAUMONT, DUBLIN 9

A SAVINGS LEVEL PLAYING FIELD

* An Post published its results for 2013 on April 24. The annual report says the State Savings Schemes, amounting to €18bn, continue to attract large inflows of cash. It also states that these schemes account for 16pc of personal savings.

What the report does not say is that it operates under the umbrella of a ‘state subsidy’. For example:

* With these schemes, there is no DIRT deducted. This is a subsidy of 41pc per annum on gains.

* There is no investment levy applied on entry to the schemes. The levy for insurance-wrapped non-state savings is 1pc on entry and for any new investments added.

* It distorts the market for bank deposits and credit union savings as these are subject to 41pc DIRT.

Why is there not a level playing field and why should some savings be tax free while others are not?

DERMOT O’MAHONEY

BLACKROCK, CO CORK

LEARN PRIVATE SECTOR LESSON

* As a private sector worker without any pension, no guaranteed employment and less than two weeks’ holiday a year, I would like to welcome back the 27,000 teachers after their two-week Easter holiday on full pay, guaranteed jobs and pensions for life.

From the antics at your annual ‘Whingefests’ (conferences), it would appear many of you feel underpaid, overworked and not appreciated.

Guess what? None of the 70pc workforce I belong to in the private sector feel your pain, and any stress you’re feeling will be softened by the fact that it will be no time at all until the two-month fully paid summer holidays kick in.

PAUL O’SULLIVAN

DONEGAL TOWN

Irish Independent

1 May2014Sore feet

I go all the way around the park listening to the Men from the Ministry: Our heroes face a terrible fate helping the farmer Priceless

Mary both of us very tred my feet very sore

Scrabbletoday, Mary getsnearly350Perhaps Iwill win tomorrow.

Obituary:

Guardian:

It’s essential the government uses all available measures to block this American attempt to buy AstraZeneca (MPs to call for investigation into Pfizer’s proposed takeover of AstraZeneca, 29 April). AZ is a strategic company in a strategic sector for the British economy, accounting for 2.3% of UK exports, £2.8bn in R&D, and 7,000 jobs. Pfizer has a bad record in putting short-term business profits before long-term research effort, even though drugs R&D should be what the pharmaceutical industry is all about. It not only notoriously closed its UK research facility at Sandwich in Kent with the loss of 2,400 jobs, but also bought the US drug company Wyeth and cut 19,000 jobs.

Independent:

I think I’ve finally rumbled Ukip’s cunning plan. I’ve been puzzled by all those seemingly stupid and bigoted pronouncements we’ve been hearing from Ukip activists. Surely anyone with any common sense would keep quiet about such views.

But now the strategy seems obvious. These so-called “renegades” are picking up votes from the BNP, and from those for whom the overt racism of that party was unappealing but who are happy to have someone who promises to curb the flow of alien invaders who are driving down wages and stealing their jobs.

At the same time, Nigel Farage works overtime to cultivate the beer-tippling, fag-smoking man-of-the-people image while also taking care to retain his no-nonsense, anti-regulation, anti-EU city-slicker credentials that appeal to the ultra-Conservative, Thatcherite fringe among Tory voters. It’s a winning combination.

And there was me thinking that these Ukippers were just a load of mean-spirited bigots pining for the days when Britain was a proud nation not afraid to stand alone and take on all comers. How wrong can you be?

Francis Kirkham, Crediton, Devon

Every second day brings fresh evidence of the racist ugliness at the heart of Ukip. Yet, confronted with the outrage over the remarks of William Henwood, Andre Lampitt and others, Nigel Farage briskly dismisses “a few bad apples” and “Walter Mittys” before bleating about establishment-led witchhunts, with not an apology to be heard to the many offended by the rancid, simple-minded opinions of his associates.

How is such inquisition so unacceptable? As a warrior righteously fighting the cynicism of the political classes, surely Mr Farage will agree it’s only proper to hold up to scrutiny all who aspire to public office. In the case of Ukip, such examination is doubly important, since the party’s vetting procedures clearly can’t distinguish outspoken, arguably misguided yet essentially decent individuals from the objectionable bigots who appear more and more to comprise the party’s rump.

It is worrying that national support for the party is rising, despite – or, even more depressingly, because of – the obnoxious views of so many of its advocates.

Richard Butterworth, St Day, Cornwall

The claim repeatedly made by Ukip that most of our laws are made by the EU treats legislation such as the Financial Services Act or the Same-Sex Marriage Act as equivalent to a regulation on the sale of cabbages. If legislation is assessed in this way, why not throw in every local authority bylaw?

The significance of laws does not depend on the quantity of words used, but on what the words say. To pretend otherwise is nonsense.

John Eekelaar, Oxford

The  attempt to brand Ukip as racist has not decreased support for the party. The probable reason for this is that most people who agree with Ukip know that they are not themselves racist and therefore see through the smears.

Robert Edwards, Hornchurch, Essex

Don’t blame churches for ‘archaic’ blight

I read with dismay your article (26 April) on chancel repair liability (CRL). This was variously described as “parishes enforcing archaic laws”, “an evil and unfair liability” and “a blight on housing”.

CRL is a side-effect of Henry VIII asset-stripping the monasteries. The monasteries had previously had responsibility for ensuring that certain church chancels were kept wind- and water-tight. The King cannily ensured that those who received the stolen monastic land also took on the CRL.

Almost 500 years on, some of those lands are still in the hands of the original families. CRL has been a known fact of life for generations. However where fields have been subdivided, and houses built, then the CRL passes on to the new owners. Purchasers’ solicitors are supposed to be able to identify such liabilities. If a purchaser does not trust the solicitor to get it right, it is possible to purchase insurance against an unsuspected liability being discovered.

CRL is not new; nothing has changed since Henry VIII’s day. The only new factor is that parishes have been required to register CRL or lose it when the land is next sold.

In law, CRL is a charity asset. A church council which fails to register CRL has in effect given this asset away. In the worst case, church council members could be held personally liable for the loss which the church has suffered.

If you want to blame someone for the present situation, then I would suggest a list that includes a rapacious monarch, incompetent solicitors, and a government which wants national heritage preserved but is unwilling to pay for it. But don’t blame church councils; they are doing an outstanding job in the teeth of unjustified vituperation.

The Venerable Paddy Benson, Archdeacon of Hereford

Gove’s botched  free-school crusade

The dismissal by Elizabeth Truss, the schools minister, of your article about the scandal of free-school places (letter, 29 April) smacks of desperation, as it seems to rely on the assertion that free schools are “wildly popular” with parents.

They aren’t wildly popular with Ofsted though. The failure rate of new free schools is running at three times the national average. In addition, some 79 per cent of state schools are rated good or outstanding by Ofsted, yet only 68 per cent of free schools reach that standard.

Free schools are a very expensive ideological experiment introduced by the Secretary of State, Michael Gove, based on the Swedish model. It is obvious that the Swedish model is failing badly and children’s education is being put at risk both in Sweden and in the UK.

I fear that the writing is on the wall for this botched crusade and after the May elections Mr Gove will be moved on. He will leave behind a disjointed and largely unaccountable system.

Simon G Gosden, Rayleigh,  Essex

Elizabeth Truss’s abuse of statistics is a cause for regret, at the least.

She says: “24,000 are attending free schools”. This from a school population of over 6 million represents less than 0.4 per cent. She then states that the DfE is devoting 28 per cent of the department’s capital expenditure to the schools educating 99.6 per cent of children and 8 per cent to schools educating  less than 0.4 per cent. Extraordinarily, she states that as if it was a positive.

From my experience of working in the Department for Education, I would assume that the figures have not come from its professional statisticians, or, if they have, Elizabeth Truss has been very selective in the statistics provided to her that she has chosen to use.

It is more likely that her “special advisers” have provided the figures and obvious slant – if this is the case then she needs to get rid of them if she wants to do her job properly.

Roy Hicks, Bristol

Was this ever a truly Christian country?

So now, according to Lord (Rowan) Williams, this is a post-Christian country. But there is still that attempt to lead us back to Christianity, as we are told that we are still affected by the legacy of Christian influence.

Any study of our history makes it hard to claim that this was ever a truly Christian country. It may, for some time, have been a church-attending country, in the days when one  man owned one or more villages, and the peasants had to go to church or risk losing their cottages and livelihood. Even in my lifetime I knew someone who was forced to make this choice.

The Industrial Revolution began the decline of this system, but it was a very long time dying. The result is what we see today. As science and technology progress, the country can only move further away from religion.

Whether that is good or bad will long be debated.

Bill Fletcher, Cirencester,  Gloucestershire

Heritage  industry

Helen Clutton (letter, 29 April) asks what is the “Cornish way of life”.

Some years ago, a regular pub customer of mine was bemoaning the dire economic state of his home county, and he firmly believed that the Cornish should revert to their traditional industry, for which they were well known.

When I asked what it was he replied: “Smuggling.”

Pete Henderson, Worthing,  West Sussex

Three generations, one wedding dress

Reading your fashion article on bridal dresses (28 April) I was once more amazed at what women will pay for a one-day outfit.

My mother was married in 1945 in a dress costing £9 and 10 shillings. I wore it for my wedding in 1988 and my niece looked very fashionably retro in it for hers in 2009.

Mary Evans, Reading

Times:

Che gelido vino: opera goers picnic on the lawns at Glyndebourne in Sussex Getty Images

Last updated at 5:37PM, April 30 2014

We should resist any move by religious radicals to relegate our daughters to “the back of the class”

Sir, Janice Turner (Apr 26) hit the nail on the head. As a nation which has striven to give equal chances to women we should resist any move by religious radicals to relegate our daughters to “the back of the class”. Let’s stop bending over backwards to appease their intolerance.

Joan Marshall

Telegraph:

SIR – You report that red deer in the Czech Republic are not straying into Germanyin spite of theborder fence having been removed 25 years ago.

SIR – Chris Grayling, the Lord Chancellor, has heralded new cuts to prevent “legal aid abusers” tarnishing the justice system. Specific restrictions were said to be justified to restrict judicial reviews “instigated by pressure groups, designed to force the Government to change its mind over properly taken decisions by democratically elected politicians”.

SIR – Nima Sanandaji is right to say that Britain needs more innovative entrepreneurs. But his advice that government’s only role in this is to cut taxes and “do as little as possible” is not borne out by the evidence.

Irish Times:

Sir, – For at least five years the public, egged on by politicians, has been baying for the blood of the bankers on the understanding that they were the cause of all the ills that befell our economy.

Hopefully, Judge Nolan’s decision to highlight the role of the regulator in an illegal share support operation will be the start of a new focus on those truly responsible – the Government.

While there may have been some elements of criminality – yet to be fully uncovered – in the actions of bankers, the main reason behind their reckless lending was sheer stupidity. They decided, with the herd mentality that has always been a characteristic of that profession, that there would not be a downturn in the property market. This view was shared by thousands of borrowers and by a political caste which did not want to call an end to the party.

It is the regulator’s job to stand back from the crowd and consider the possible downside of actions taken by bankers, and to rein them in accordingly. Not only, as has been found in this case, did the regulator allow and encourage the Anglo Irish directors to give loans to support their share price, he also – and more damagingly – allowed the banks to build up massive exposure to a single sector of the economy and to relax lending rules to the extent that the smallest shock would inevitably lead to immense bad debts.

It is the Government which is ultimately responsible for failing to ensure that their regulator was competent. But not only did it fail to do so, it also ran the economy in a manner which fostered the banks’ ability to indulge in a lending splurge. Both those in charge at the time of the crash and the new political incumbents have attempted to exonerate themselves by blaming the bankers, and in the process have virtually encouraged reckless borrowers to renege on the debts they took on – at the expense of the taxpayers.

I would award the politicians a gold star for the success of their campaign to divert responsibility from where it really lies. Hopefully the Nolan judgement will mark the beginning of the end of this brainwashing. Yours, etc,

SARA MacARTHUR,

Limetree Avnue,

Portmarnock,

Co Dublin

Sir, – Surely those who contributed to the financial destruction of the country from their positions in public jobs should not be rewarded for their incompetence. The state pension is all that they should receive, but I will not hold my breath for that measure to be implemented. Yours, etc,

AVRIL HEDDERMAN,

Priory Grove,

Stillorgan,

Co Dublin

Sir, – I agree with Judge Nolan’s decision not to jail the former directors of the failed Anglo Irish Bank. Our cultural environment at the time of the events contributed to behaviour that perhaps at a different time and in a different place would not have occurred. So what next? Certainly the premises of the regulator’s office should have a dressing down and operate out of some obvious inferior building and thus serve as a constant reminder not only of the financial crash and its impact. We might incorporate a new motto into its letterhead: (Invisible) money makes you mindless. Remember 2007. Yours, etc,

JANE KINSELLA,

Rochestown Avenue,

Dún Laoghaire,

Co Dublin

Sir, – So, it was a case of “the big boys made me do it”? Or if not the big boys, then perhaps the inadequate boys? The pronouncement by Judge Martin Nolan that one arm of the State could not punish an offence that was encouraged by another State body, namely the financial regulator’s office, disregards the well understood legal principle of “joint enterprise”.

It seems that the much loved loopholes enjoyed by the people who got us into this mess continue to be enjoyed when the State acts to try to hold some to account. Meanwhile, back in the non-loophole world, poor people are threatened with jail with no possibility of excuse if they don’t pay property tax, TV licences or water tax. This is no republic. Yours, etc,

DECLAN DOYLE,

Lisdowney,

Kilkenny

Sir, – Re the non-jailing of the two Anglo-Irish executives, can we take it that ignorance of the law will now be regarded as a mitigating factor in white collar crimes? It certainly doesn’t seem to apply in other areas of our legal system. Yours, etc,

LOUIS HOGAN,

Harbour View,

Wicklow Town

Sir, – So it’s clear. The function of very costly corporate lawyers is to give advice which if found to be wrong will ensure you don’t go to jail for your part in bankrupting a country. No wonder we were, and probably still are, regarded as the “Wild West” of finance. Some times you just can’t help but feel ashamed to be Irish. Yours, etc,

NIALL GOUGH,

Dunluce Road,

Clontarf,

Dublin 3

Sir, – The inaction and/or incompetence of a state agency and its servants is now an excuse for a non-custodial sentence. I look forward to future judgements in relation to memb ers of marginalised communities where surely it can be argued that the State has failed to provide adequate health, education and recreational amenities. Yours, etc,

PADRAIG McGARTY,

Mohill,

Co Leitrim

Sir, – When I was a child I never got away with something on the grounds that “he made me do it”, nor with saying “I didn’t know it was his”. When we played football next to a neighbour’s window, the fact that I didn’t kick the fateful shot didn’t absolve me of my collective responsibility. Common sense arguments with a child. However, in the adult world all of this is turned on its head. I am looking forward to Judge Nolan absolving petty criminals on the grounds that their motive wasn’t greed or avarice but feeding their child. But no: one law for the rich and another for the rest of us. Yours, etc,

GEARÓID Ó LOINGSIGH,

Bogotá,

Colombia

Sir, – Perhaps the current pause in the farcical Middle East peace talks will finally mean a dose of reality can be brought into the discussions.

There can never be a two-state solution, not because both people can’t live in peace, although the Arabs seem to have more difficulty with the concept of peace than Israelis do, which is probably because of their jealousy at the success of the Israeli state over the last 60-plus years.

The real reason is because the two-state solution has never been credible but no one has had the honesty to point this out. A Palestinian state can never be self-sufficient or sustainable, even if its political class wasn’t corrupt on a scale that would make their African counterparts blush, because the very notion of what would form that state makes it impossible. No state split in two parts the way the proposed Palestinian state would be can be a success.

However, the elephant in the room that no one seems to want to recognise is that the solution is quite easy. Gaza should become part of Egypt and the West Bank should become part of Jordan, the countries which annexed these areas in 1948 anyway, without any objection from Palestinians then. There is no difference between a Palestinian and a Jordanian: they are both from the same tribe. Then full citizenship should be offered to Palestinians in Egypt and Jordan with a set window of opportunity for anyone who wants to move between Gaza and the West Bank before their citizenship is fixed.

The nonsensical right of return policy for Arabs should end because if Arabs can make such a claim, then it stands to reason that all the Jewish people who have been expelled and had their property seized in Arab countries should also have a right of return and receive compensation for their losses. Jerusalem should then be formally split into two, with half in Israel and half in Jordan.

Both sides will have to suck it up and accept compromises on where that line is drawn, with Arabs losing the chip on their shoulder and dealing with the anti-Semitism that is endemic within their culture and Israelis also giving up a few sacred cows, especially among the settler community. They should also forget this voodoo rubbish that God intended them to live in a certain place.

The international community can stump up the costs involved in moving people and businesses where required and providing grants for new communities. The agreement, which should require an explicit recognition of Israel and the right of her people to live in peace, should be ratified in each country by referendum and formally supported by the UN, EU and the Arab League.

Then western aid, which currently disappears into a black hole of Palestinian corruption and never makes it to the people it is intended to help, together with billions from the oil-rich Arab countries, can be used to provide the physical infrastructure and civil society structures each community will need to bed in these changes.

Solving the Middle East crisis doesn’t need a messiah. It just needs a bit of truth-telling to both sides and someone with the guts to admit that the two-state solution was never credible. It’s time to stop wasting everyone’s time and focus on the solution that is realistic and can work. Yours, etc,

DESMOND FitzGERALD,

Canary Wharf,

London

Sir, – Boaz Modai (Letters, April 30th) feels that the notion of a “right of return” to lands from which Palestinians were forced to flee in 1948 is “absurd”. Obviously this does not apply to the Jewish diaspora, who continue to return each year to their historical homeland, with which many have only the most tenuous of connections. The fact that Mr Modai is writing in his professional capacity as ambassador of Israel indicates that this is an official position.

I think Mr Modai’s letter tells us more about Israeli attitudes to Palestinian aspirations than his diatribe does about Mr Abbas’s attitude to Israel. Yours , etc,

BARRY WALSH,

Linden Avenue,

Blackrock,

Cork

Sir, – Anne McCluskey (Letters, April 29th) presents a list of practical difficulties associated with teaching young children but fails to mention the one hurdle we have all experienced in many subjects, namely poor quality of teaching. Ms McCluskey is so busy, as she says, putting out bins and unblocking toilets she probably has no time to do her annual staff appraisals. In every profession there are the successful, the less successful and the unsuccessful, and it is this last group which requires the closest monitoring, and if necessary advice and counselling about a career change. Yours, etc,

MIKE CORMACK.

Ardagh Close,

Blackrock,

Co Dublin

Sir, – Higher level or ordinary level leaving certificate maths for prospective primary teachers is not the question. The question is how one adult can choreograph meaningful learning experiences for 30-plus children whose problems may include ADHD, dyslexia, autism and general learning difficulties (this is not an exaggeration) as well as handling the usual mixed range of abilities. Excellent new approaches to numeracy have been developed, approaches which would enable any teacher to be an effective maths teacher and which would break the tyranny of bad textbooks, but quality teaching and learning in maths can only become the norm if teachers have smaller classes and children with special needs have more support. Yours, etc,

CLARE SHERIDAN,

Ardmore Park,

Bray

Sir, – Ruairí Quinn’s comment that honours maths should be required for primary teachers was on a par with Sheila Nunan’s assertion that it was boys doing honours maths that caused the crash – both seem fairly nonsensical. Yours, etc,

TOM FARRELL,

Forest Road,

Swords,

Co Dublin

Sir, – Once again (report, April 30th) Aosdána circles its wagons and complains about “hostile scrutiny” from the media. This is an organisation that seems to do little except perpetuate cliques and argue shrilly for support from the taxpayer.

It’s good to see one of its number (James Hanley) suggest that there could be better communication about what it actually does. It has certainly, for example, helped many fine artists create full-time rather than dissipate their energies elsewhere.

But how many? Aosdána is often referred to as an Irish equivalent of the Académie Française. It has 40 members from a population of 65 million while Aosdána has 248 members from a population of six million. Yours, etc.

JOHN P O’SULLIVAN,

Saval Park Crescent

Dalkey ,

Co Dublin

Sir, – Is there any reason not to believe that the number of distinguished individuals capable of accounting for important output, prestige and making a credible difference to the stature of the arts in Ireland is closer to 25 than 250 persons? Should Mr Deenihan be spending taxpayers’ money more strategically? Yours, etc,

MYLES DUFFY,

Bellevue Avenue,

Glenageary,

Co Dublin

Sir, – In response to Robin Heather’s question about the use of mobile phones while driving (Letters, April 29th) the answer is that it is never safe to use a mobile phone when driving, whether hands-free or otherwise. Repeated studies have shown that holding a telephone conversation while driving is seriously detrimental to concentration. To justify endangering every other road user with the excuse that you have a business to run is simply not acceptable. Yours, etc,

ANTHONY MORAN,

Knocknacarra Park,

Salthill,

Sir, – One of the features of modern professional football is the frequency with which inane comments are touted as though they were pearls of supreme wisdom. Thus when Vincent Browne, who really should know better, quotes Jamie Carragher as saying “If you assemble a squad of players with talent and the right attitude and character, you’ll win more football matches than you lose” you can almost hear football fans up and down the country nodding sagely and commenting “That’s a good point and well made.” Yet it is surely akin to an athletics writer saying “If you are faster than the other competitors you will win more races than you lose.” In this environment Mary Hannigan stands out like a shining beacon in a sea of clichéd mediocrity. Yours, etc,

DAVE ROBBIE,

Seafield Crescent,

Booterstown,

Co Dublin

Sir, – Perhaps Conar Dunne (Letters, April 30th.) would be kind enough to let me know where on YouTube he found the concerts from the National Concert Hall in Dublin. I have been unable to find them.