BOOK OF THE DAY: SARA BURKEreviews Notes from the Margins: A Decade of Irish LifeBy Fergus Finlay Hachette Books Ireland 362pp, €14.99
FERGUS FINLAY’S book chronicles many of the vital moments in Irish life over the last decade. Some of these “notes” record the growth and progress Ireland has experienced, but many more are a poignant reflection upon what we failed to do for those who needed it most.
Notes from the Margins is a compilation of Finlay’s weekly columns published in the Irish Examiner and broadcast on RTÉ Radio 1’s Drivetime programme. Often such collections are a lazy way of book publishing. Not so here: each is carefully selected.
This book must have gone to print before the publication of the Ryan report, yet all of the columns in the first section, Seen But Not Heard, should be compulsory reading for those who are responsible for remedying the repeated damage done to Irish children.
Columns written seven and 10 years ago accurately predict the scale of the insult that the inadequate response of the Church and State was to those who were sent to institutions. These columns are also a cogent reminder of where we continue to fail many children.
Some document cases where the State has stood in obstinate refusal to take on responsibility for education for people with disabilities (in the case of Jamie Sinnott) and for teachers in schools who abuse children (the case of Louise OKeeffe).These are cases of which no Irish person could be proud. These are the moments we may choose to forget, but we’d be a better people if we did not.
The author’s political nous is never far from the surface. The reader is reminded of Charlie McCreevy’s legacy: his SSIA giveaway; his low-tax regime; his betting tax, where each cent collected is reinvested in racing. Last year €149 million was allocated to horse and greyhound racing: the same year that Mary Harney declared we could not afford a €9 million annual budget for the cervical cancer vaccine. We are reminded of Michael McDowell’s belief that inequality is good for you.
In a wonderful column, Finlay uses the O’Connell St Spire as an analogy for what the Government thinks of the Irish people. I shall never walk up O’Connell St again without thinking of Bertie Ahern or Brian Cowen saying “up yours”. But it is in his words about ability and disability, about his and his wife Frieda’s life-enhancing experiences with their daughter, Mandy, where Finlay is most at home. It is here that hope and goodness triumph. And don’t we all need some hope these days.
Sara Burke is a journalist and health policy analyst. Her first book, Irish Apartheid: Healthcare Inequality in Ireland, has just been published by New Island