Madam, – I cried when I heard the news that 900 primary schoolchildren with learning difficulties are to lose their resource teachers in further cutbacks against vulnerable children by Minister for Education Batt O’Keeffe. At the same time, the Government is spending €7 billion bailing out the banks and details have emerged of the massive pay-outs being given to the former financial regulator.
How have we become a country where our leaders believe it is acceptable to sacrifice the education of our weakest children to fund the very people who have been responsible for so much of our current problems?
I’m not a sentimental fool. I do understand the big picture. There is a global economic crisis and we are only a part of this. The banks and the Government can’t be blamed for everything and savings have to be made.
But sometimes you have to look at the small picture too. In the boom times, children with special needs received a Cinderella service with parents throughout the country having to battle for every little concession they got. Now we are in recession, what little they did get is being eroded in a series of cuts. This is wrong, and we should not support it, whatever the bigger picture. – Yours, etc,
CAITRÍONA MAC AONGHUSA,
Myrtle Park,
Dun Laoghaire,
Co Dublin.
Madam, – One recoils in disgust from the latest cuts in education affecting “children with mild learning disabilities”. Cowardly in their design and cruel in their implementation, these cuts are targeted at the most vulnerable members of our society – children who cannot be properly taught in normal schoolrooms.
What astonishes, however, is not merely the callousness of the cuts, but their petty meanness. The savings brought about by these measures could hardly be commensurate with the long-term, intractable and wholly unforeseeable damage they will cause to young lives. And it will not only be special-needs children and their parents who will lose out: the cost, in teaching time and effort, of reintroducing special-needs children to regular classes will be incalculable. In short, all children will lose out.
We should call this what it is: a national disgrace. Rarely has a Government loved by so few so actively sought the scorn of so many. – Yours, etc,
SEÁN COLEMAN,
Lindisfarne Lawn,
Dublin 22.
A Chara, – Philip Malone (February 10th) refers to the Chicago School of Economics as “pro-privatisation, anti-union, and ultra-free-market”, while articulating his belief that Ireland’s current condition is a result of our adherence to such a model.
Mr Malone has clearly ignored the State’s continuing ownership of ESB and CIÉ which offer the public high-cost but low-quality services. He also strategically omits to recall the State’s unwavering belief in social partnership, which, instead of ignoring trade unions, has given them a damagingly large role in Irish economic management. Measures such as the television licence, the minimum wage, and increased VAT would also strike me as anything but “ultra-free-market”.
Perhaps if the State had paid more deference to the benefits of a liberal economy, the chances of restimulating our stuttering finances would be far better. I urge Mr Malone to take a proper look at the works of Milton Friedman or Dr Ron Paul before he continues to dance on the purported grave of the free market. – Is mise,
PATRICK CARROLL,
Glendown Park,
Dublin 6W.
Madam, – Philip Malone asks why Eircom was privatised and suggests it may simply have been the fashionable option. Your columnist Fintan O’Toole raised the same question recently.
Both of them seem to have forgotten that before privatisation of the phone services it could take years to have a phone installed and Eircom gave us much evidence that it was run as a union benefit scheme where work was a dirty word.
The other arm of the original Department of Posts and Telegraphs, An Post, is a living reminder of the success of State-run enterprises. – Yours, etc,
NATHANIEL HEALY,
Newcastle,
Co Wicklow.
Madam, – Brian Cowen is credited with masterminding Fianna Fáil’s victory in the last election based on his ability to manage the economy. This was underpinned by his assurance that we were not over-dependent on revenue from the construction industry.
Last Sunday on RTÉ's The Week in PoliticsBrian Lenihan conceded that we may indeed have been too dependant on this source of revenue. I await with interest a statement from Brian Cowen saying either that he misled us prior to the election or that Brian Lenihan got it wrong last Sunday.
I fancy my chances of winning the Lotto first. – Yours etc,
NIALL HAYDEN,
Carrick Road,
Dundalk,
Co Louth.
Madam, – President Obama and his government are e-mailing me regularly with personal, detailed updates on how the sparkly new White House is helping me and my fellow countrymen and countrywomen through the current crisis. In turn, they ask me to help them by hosting crisis-beating meetings at my house for family, neighbours and friends, sending our findings and ideas back to the White House. Would that I could.
The Irish Government? Not a dickie-bird to anyone, unless you count that off-the-cuff speech, talks with the erstwhile social “partners” and “negotiations” with our not-so-slumdog millionaire bankers.
On Tuesday, though, your website heightened my delusions of political grandeur with the news that the British government now owns 68 per cent of RBS, which in turn owns Ulster Bank and First Active; so thousands of lucky Irish people now have their personal and mortgage accounts with those spanking new bankers Messrs Darling and Brown. Another “Anglo-Irish” bank?
Off to check the e-mail. There might be something from Michelle. – Yours, etc,
MIRIAM O’CALLAGHAN,
Florence,
Italy.
Madam, – I am appalled to read about the alleged current salary of Denis Casey, CEO of Irish Life and Permanent.
It has been stated he has accepted a reduced salary of €890,000 (down from €1.3 million).
This translates to a weekly payment of approximately €17,000 – which is higher than the annual minimum wage or 52 times its equivalent. No one individual banker can justify this obscene level of payment .
I am quite certain that in the prevailing economic climate there are many fine people in the country who could gladly relieve him of his post and perform an equally satisfactory role at 25 per cent of this Salary.
To repeat a well known saying from a different era, this is a “thundering disgrace”. – Yours, etc,
JAMES HOGAN,
Park Lawn,
Dublin 3.
Madam, – In these times of economic restraint it is encouraging to see our elected representatives taking steps to control the pay of some of those in the banking sector. It would also seem appropriate for politicians to be answerable to the electorate in this regard.
I suggest that each person seeking election should stipulate the salary they wish to be paid if elected. The electorate would then be in a position to vote on their worth – eg, to select a new face at €30,000 or an experienced one at €100,000. It would be interesting to compare how the various parties price themselves. – Yours, etc,
MICHAEL O’TOOLE,
Rochestown Avenue,
Dun Laoghaire,
Co Dublin.