EDITOR – On the weekend’s news it was revealed that this country is to be fined €1bn per year henceforth for a number of years – because our beloved EU says we haven’t met our climate responsibilities.
This amount equates to around €160 per head which, by my former calculations, roughly doubles our normal ‘net contributor’ contribution.
A large proportion of our wind travels from the west or north west, across the country, before disappearing off the south coast to merge with the predominantly south westerlies that then head for the UK and Scandinavia.
Ireland is to be hit with a hefty fine for missing EU climate targets. (Photo: Shutterstock)
No doubt our pollution-belching Asian neighbours enjoy our nice clean air before doing their worst with it.
As we are all invited to elect our EU representatives this week, I note there is one candidate who is running on the premise that, along with several much larger member states, his party feels enough is enough.
Maybe we should make a point of challenging those asking for our vote as to their belief (or frustration) in a continued subscription that also obliges us to accommodate refugees?
Nick Turner,
Drimoleague.
The Taoiseach has no magic wand to house immigrants
EDITOR – A recent cartoon in your pages depicted a bad leak on the ‘Irish’ side of a boat, with water flowing in.
The first remedy for any government is to stop the flow of people coming in to our country, especially those coming over the border.
It’s extraordinary that they have tents so easily available to them.
The main opposition party leader in the Dáil has called on the Taoiseach Simon Harris to provide housing for them. I do not expect him to wave a magic wand and solve the problem.
We are only a small country, and a partitioned one at that, and clearly not able to take all these people.
Good opposition should be highlighting these pressing issues as these matters will affect future generations of our people.
Jeremiah McCarthy,
Tawnies Grove,
Clonakilty.
We are spiralling towards the destruction of humanity
EDITOR – As we look back on a completely lacklustre European election campaign, we see that it ignored the most important challenge facing our continent, namely the impending social and economic collapse which is seen as inevitable by multiple demographic statisticians.
No generation is replacing itself and we are spiralling towards the destruction of our own humanity and the very existence of civilisation as we know it.
The evidence is there in front of us all, but opinion influencers continue to ignore it, in much the same way as those in charge of the Titanic failed to act on reports of iceberg-infested waters up ahead.
We have a political class dissociated from reality, just as they were in the immediate run-up to the collapse of the iron curtin or the economic crash of 2008, or more recently the eruption of wars in Ukraine and in Gaza.
They continue to act like puppets for simplistic Punch-and-Judy shows, presented as media debates, all of which must fit within an overarching narrative which sees human life, family, religion and national identity as dispensable accessories in a world where consumerism is the primary concern.
Those who refuse to go along with this phony consensus are ostracised as despicable deplorables (irrelevant and/or dangerous). Why concern the public – the unsuspecting passengers – with inconvenient truths that liberalism has actually brought about?
And yet something inside each of us, irrespective of our political hue, issues that summons: ‘To thine own self be true’.
Gearóid Duffy,
Lee Road,
Cork.
Minister must end hunting of the endangered plover
EDITOR – One of Ireland’s most attractive birds – the golden plover – is celebrated on an An Post stamp currently winging its way around the world.
While many will see the airmail stamp, few will enjoy the pleasure of spotting the actual bird with its striking black, white, and gold plumage, and its distinctive call.
This is because, sadly, it is on a red list of species whose population is in dramatic decline. At wetland survey sites across the country, numbers have plummeted by more than 50% in the past three decades.
Despite its perilous position, golden plovers may be shot by hunters for 153 days of the year from September to the end of January.
I believe the killing of any birds is reprehensible but especially those who are struggling for survival.
Minister for Nature Malcolm Noonan has removed some of the at-risk avians from the open season shooting list due to ‘a great decline in numbers’ but other vulnerable ones remain in the firing line.
Red-listed birds are categorised as ‘highest conservation concern’, with fears of eventual extinction.
Minister Noonan must urgently prioritise protection and stamp out the persecution of Golden Plovers, and all endangered birds, before it’s too late.
Philip Kiernan,
Irish Council Against Blood Sports,
Mullingar,
Co Westmeath
