Letters to the Editor

On the Children’s Referendum   Dear Editor, The Government statement that the proposed children’s rights amendment to the Constitution will be a “strong, robust article designed to enhance the constitutional protection of children from abusive situations” is somewhat lacking in credibility. Already we have two child-specific constitutional obligations in our Constitution, neither of which is implemented. The first is the obligation on the State to provide for free primary education. It isn’t free and it is but a pious aspiration. The second issue that concerns us and many parents  –  including those who made their heart-broken feelings known to the Irish Human Rights Commission in 2010  –  is the obligation on the State to ensure that any child may attend any school which is in receipt of public money without being indoctrinated while in class (Article 44.4.2). Under human rights conventions children whose parents don’t want them indoctrinated in a particular religion are entitled not to be marginalised, discriminated against and disadvantaged in the exercise of this right.  The Whitaker Commission on the Constitution (1996) acknowledged that the treatment of such children now is unconstitutional.  This was, at last, recognised by the Minister for Education, Ruairí Quinn, when he set up a Committee on Pluralism and Patronage. This body recommended that the arrangements for religious instruction and formation in our stand-alone national schools, ie, where there’s no inclusive school available locally, must be changed.  This is to ensure that the children of non-religious and minority religion parents are not denied their constitutional rights in publicly-funded schools under the patronage of a particular Church.  It is not good enough that youngsters be left twiddling their thumbs for at least two and a half hours at the back of the class while the rest learn their prayers in the same room. They are entitled to respect and to effective education in what is already a very short teaching week. The failure of the Government to move on Professor Coolahan’s Committee’s recommendations for stand-alone national schools is most disturbing and one has to question whether the commitment to their constitutional obligations to children is a genuine one in the light of this. We hope that undue deference to the interests of institutional churches is not trumping the existing constitutional rights of parents and their children. The Government should act now to remove the appearance of insincerity by giving effect to their existing constitutional obligations to children before the referendum date. If time is too short then it would be better to defer the referendum until this is done and, having regard for our financial predicament, hold it with the next national elections. Yours faithfully,   John Colgan, Michael McKillen, Dick Spicer, 3 Seaview Terrace, Dublin 4     On community television and Saorview   Dear Editor, As the analogue television service was switched off after 50 years on the 24th October, the focus was very much on TV’s past. In contrast to the promises made during the (failed) bidding process for the commercial DTT (Digital Terrestrial Television), there were no exciting new packages of channels enticing us to switch. Even some of those new channels which were supposed to be on the free, public digital terrestrial service, such as Oireachtas TV, didn’t manage to negotiate carriage on RTÉ’s new network. The Department of Communications invested in an advertising campaign which was not allowed to really promote the option of non-subscription television, instead treating terrestrial television as a relic, of interest only to the elderly and uninformed. The figure of 15% of the population accessing terrestrial television was repeated ad nauseum – ignoring the second TV sets in so many homes, which were still relying on the ‘rabbit’s ears’. This was a huge missed opportunity. Community Television in Ireland responded to the BAI’s request for expressions of interest in new digital channels with an imaginative partnership between local community TV in Dublin, Belfast and Cork to create the first true 32-county channel, transmitted North and South. While receiving positive words from the regulator, Irish policy is too mired in a commercial pay TV model which has failed to see a way to supporting new services coming on board. This limits the options for Saorview viewers to the five existing domestic channels (RTÉ 1 & 2, TV3, 3e, TG4) and some rebadged RTÉ content (RTÉ News Now, RTÉ jr, RTÉ 1 +1) rather than the 40+ channels available in the UK and technically viable for the spectrum. In the UK, the switchover to digital was combined with a bidding process for a new local TV mix, which saw three community channels win out in three of the pilot cities – Grimsby, Sheffield and Liverpool. When the new government took office they were faced with an economy and society saddled with debt and huge amounts of under-used resources, whether physical or human capital. It is unfortunate to see our broadcasting sector in the same situation, with RTÉ Networks saddled with a €70m transmission system designed for a commercial digital TV client who will not materialise. If our current Minister for Communications wants to offer a real choice to Irish citizens of free to air TV, if he wishes to see resources being used in innovative and exciting ways, he could do worse than allowing communities around Ireland use the freed up TV spectrum, even on a short term basis. If Minister Rabbitte is serious about providing true diversity and choice to Irish TV viewers, the DTT system needs to prioritise the addition of new mixes and new channels under a viable cost structure, based on current realities, rather than the failed commercial model of the previous government. Yours faithfully,   Ciarán Moore Manager, Dublin Community Television Guinness Enterprise Centre, Taylor’s Lane, Dublin 8

Stop the health cuts   Dear Editor, The assets of the wealthiest 300 Irish citizens have increased by 12 billion to 62 billion over the past two years. Net assets of the top 300 Irish citizens have increased by 4.9 billion Euro in the year 2011 and by 12 billion Euro in the past two years to a new high level of 62 billion Euro! Research has been carried out which has established the above figures and identified the 300 individuals concerned. Those who have gone “bust” or have much reduced wealth have been replaced by 44 new entrants. Wealth has not disappeared but some has moved between asset holders. Rather than taking a further 130 million out of a health service already devastated by cuts, why not tax these assets? A further reduction of 700 million Euro in funding of health services next year has been promised by the Minister for Bad Health James Reilly. Instead of taxing these assets and incomes of the super-rich Minister for Ill Health Dr Reilly wants to reduce the pay and conditions of health service workers whose pay has already been cut and who are working in the most difficult conditions due to staff cuts. Of the eight cost-cutting proposals in the Health Service Executive plan, at least three will affect older people or the disabled exclusively. Services for both groups are likely to be seriously affected by a 600,000-hour cut in home help hours, as well as a reduction of 200 home care packages and a €10 million reduction in hours for personal assistants for people who need high levels of support trying to live independently. Services and supports for these patients have already been severely curtailed. These barbaric cuts must be halted immediately. Yours faithfully,   Pól Ó Cionsalígh, 53 Garrán Lorcaín Seantrabh, Báile Átha Cliath 9       Common ground in the North   Dear Editor, The recent visit of Orange leader Drew Nelson to Leinster House opens up a need to search for unrecognised common ground. Over a decade ago I reviewed historian Cecil Kirkpatrick’s Life of William of Orange for Books Ireland. This work recognised William’s popular role as the leading defender of the Dutch Republic (where he represented Zeeland on the Council of State) and drew attention to his use of Dutch republican experience in the subsequent imposition of constitutional control over the then absolute monarchy in Britain. He also reminded the brethren that in the European war of which the Boyne battle was an episode, the Pope was William’s ally, and the victory was celebrated by a mass in the Vatican. Thus William deserves the title ‘Republican Monarch’ and, and some credit is due from Sinn Fein for his pioneering role in the evolution of European democracy. There is however another episode less worthy of credit, and perhaps needing an apology: the deal done in 1914 with a German arms supplier, which led, in collusion with the British Tories in opposition, to the Larne gun-running in April of that year. This, and the subsequent Howth gun-running, also from Germany in June 1914, was interpreted by the Germans as implying that the British would be too much occupied with civil war on their home ground to be concerned about war on the continent, so they attacked France via Belgium, thereby avoiding the French defences on their common frontier. The British were then able to come into the war ‘in defence of small nations’, thinking (somewhat over-optimistically) that by taking Germany by surprise, they would all be ‘home by Christmas’. This strategic imperial thinking was based on their perceived need to frustrate German imperial plans for Africa, which the British saw as a serious threat. Was the Howth gun-running facilitated by the Liberal wing of the imperial strategic leadership, not only to deceive the Germans, but also to ensure, in their own imperial interest, that all-Ireland Home Rule would be undermined by sectarian militarism, in a procedure used subsequently when they abandoned direct rule of India? Yours  faithfully,   Dr Roy H W Johnston Rathmines,  Dublin 6       Arrests of nationalists in Ardoyne   Dear Editor, Alan Lundy from Ardoyne has become the latest political hostage in the game of cat and mouse being played out between Irish political opposition and the British state in the north of Ireland. Alan acted as a steward for the Ardoyne residents parade organised to protest the Orange Parade which is allowed to march through the nationalist Ardoyne area of North Belfast every 12th July.  Trouble arises annually during and after this event. Wearing a high visibility jacket, Alan can be seen on social media networks acting as steward on behalf of Greater Ardoyne Residents Collective (GARK) on 12th July this year.  At no time did Alan, who tried to restrain local youths and prevent trouble,  engage in public disorder on 12th July or at any other time. Alan’s detention, along with a number of others, among them ex-prisoner Thomas McWilliams, and three Belfast men who were granted bail under very restrictive conditions, is a clear attack on people’s right to hold a protest. This policy of selective internment of political opponents (as in the high-profile cases of Marian Price, Martin Corey and Gerry McGeogh) is in stark contrast to the treatment of loyalist demonstrators who remained unpoliced while attempting to attack a legally held residents protest. Alan Lundy has also been charged with riotous assembly on 12th July 2005.  Surely if there were such a case, charges would have been brought many years ago? Internment is nothing new to the people of Ardoyne.  These latest arrests are an attack on their human rights and civil rights.  The nationalist people of Ardoyne are being punished because they dared to organise a protest. Yours faithfully,   Mark Duggan,  Dublin 1