Madam, - Citing the UN report "Replacement Migration", Áine Ní Chonaill of the Immigration Control Platform writes (Opinion, August 10th): "The authors concluded that the scale of migration needed to change the demographic profile of a whole country is so large as to be 'out of reach'."
She also quotes the Wanless Report for the British Treasury as finding that "demographic changes have had less of an impact on health spending than many people tend to think".
So the "floods" were phantoms and the threat to the health services (wasn't that the original rationalisation for our recent emergency amendment) was just another useful political mirage.
Meantime the coffin-ships keep breaking up against the southern flank of the fortress ("Italians arrest crew after boat deaths", World News, August 10th).
Do we excuse ourselves by claiming it's the "culture of the times"? - Yours, etc.,
DAMIEN FLINTER, Tullyvoheen, Clifden, Co Galway.