Sir, - I read your on-line version regularly to keep up with developments at "home" and I have to say I'm a little surprised at how upset and depressed everyone is over there at the allegations of political corruption now coming from the various tribunals.
Has everybody forgotten what the Irish body politic (warts and all) has accomplished in the last 20 years? The Irish success story is being held up around the world as a model of what education and good economic management, through intelligent government planning, tax cutting and the pursuit of social consensus can achieve. Just this past week, the Council of Canadian Atlantic Premiers held in-depth discussions on how they might follow the "Irish model" to resurrect their own moribund economies.
As Breda O'Brien so rightly said (The Irish Times, May 20th) "there is no anger as corrosive and no cynicism as deep as that of the disappointed idealist who still has not come to terms with the fact that human beings are not perfectible and that there is no perfect system". I live in Toronto, which is regarded by many as one of the cleanest and most efficiently-governed cities in North America. (Peter Ustinov once referred to it as "New York run by the Swiss"!) Yet we are in the middle of our own political corruption scandal right now. There is currently an uproar over the way the Ontario Realty Corp. (a provincial government agency) has being disposing of government properties over the past few years. Individuals within the corporation have been accused of kick-backs, facilitating bid-rigging and of selling properties at fire-sale prices to large contributors and other cronies of the governing provincial Tory party.
Lets face it, the bad apples are all around us and they're not going to disappear anytime soon. The Irish people should be grateful for what their politicians have been able to achieve for them. By all means, keep on trying to get it better, and of course, nail the bad guys when you catch them. But, as Ms O'Brien said: "It's time to put levels of corruption into context". - Yours, etc.,
Paul Blackbyrne, Toronto, Canada.