The People’s Letters Page

Here is this week’s People’s Letters Page…

Dear Editor:

I beg to refer to the candidacy of Dublin’s Lord Mayor Hazel Chu as reported in Southside People 31 March.

Green Party TDs and senators supported a motion to ask Hazel Chu to step aside from her duties as party person while she is campaigning for the Seanad by-election.

The motion was passed by 11-5 votes at a meeting of the parliamentary party, who have relayed that decision to the executive committee.

Hazel Chu is currently a councillor and Lord Mayor of Dublin. Green Party leader Eamon Ryan said the candidacy of Ms Hazel Chu in the Seanad by-election comes at a sensitive time for the coalition government and supporting other Government candidates would augment the party’s ability to implement the promises in the programme for government.

But Deputy leader Catherine Martin who endorsed Hazel Chu argued the motion should not proceed as it would be divisive.

Other members argued the motion would not have been tabled had Ms Chu “done the right thing” and stepped back from her role as chair of the party while the Seanad campaign is under way.

Others argued the motion was necessary to restore confidence in the functioning of the party in Government.

Under the Green Party constitution, it is only by way of a vote of the party membership that can force her to stand down.

The candidate contesting an unwinnable Seanad election can decide to contest the vote and remain as chair of the Green Party.

She is not obligated to step aside temporarily after the parliamentary party’s vote.

Yours sincerely
Gerry Coughlan Kilnamanagh,

Dear Editor,

Could somebody please explain to me why local authorities in Dublin have been removing public bins from busy areas?

In my own area in north Dublin the litter problem is gradually getting worse and worse.

With more people out walking and using the local parks we are seeing the lack of bins manifest into a health hazard.

The bins in St Anne’s Park are regularly overflowing with the overspill sometimes contaminating the ground around the bins.

Now more than ever we need more frequent emptying of bins in order to keep people safe.

The ever-increasing dog population are also creating health hazards. Well, no sorry their owners are! The councils need to provide more public bins right now

It also comes down to personal responsibility for the people who are using our parks and amenities.

Everything at the moment is takeaway culture so we are now seeing lots of food and drink containers.

Is it now acceptable to just stand up and walk away from the waste that you’ve left behind?
Please take your rubbish with you if there’s no room in the bin!

Yours sincerely,

Anne O’Donnell
Raheny
Dublin 5

Dear Editor,

I love John Spillane’s Dawn Chorus, a new song that features in an upcoming album titled 100 snow white horses.

The song resonates with how we’ve come closer to nature during the Pandemic.

The world might be at war with Covid, but we can savour the sweet notes of robins, blackbirds and thrushes when they begin their choral presentation in the early hours, to be joined as the morning progresses by woodpigeons, wrens and warblers, and a little later by such melodious background singers as the great tits, blue tits, sparrows and finches, all contributing to nature’s soothing concerto.

Over the past year, people have re-discovered wonders that were always there but went largely unnoticed.

But I can’t help wondering, and worrying, about what will happen when, as we all hope, the Pandemic ends a few months from now.

Will we witness again the reckless cutting of hedges in March, and the burning of vegetation in upland areas?

The hedgerow provides habitat for nesting birds and a vital food source for several bird and animal species, as well as nectar to sustain bees and butterflies.
Walkers have been regaled by the spectacle of a multi-hued pheasant rising into the sky from a tree or hedgerow, its crest and speckled plumage displaying all the colours of the rainbow.

Will hand-reared pheasants be targeted for “sport” later in the year when “normality” returns to the countryside?

Foxes have got good press lately, with increasing numbers of them eating food scraps out of the hands of friendly humans who, often for the first time, have realised that An Madra Rua isn’t the demonic entity of popular legend, intent only on henhouse havoc.

This wild dog can warm to humans as easily as any domestic canine. But come winter will he have to run from a pack of hounds until his lungs give out and exhaustion sets in?

Will the shrill sound of a hunting horn ring in his ears as the skin is ripped from his bones?

The gentle Irish Hare has been with us since before the last Ice Age of 10,000 ago and may have around for around 60,000 years before that, but only in the past year, with lockdown blighting our lives, have many of us found time to admire this flagship of Ireland’s biodiversity.

We caught fleeting glimpses of it… frolicking in a March meadow, or dashing at jaw-dropping speed across a field or hillside as we trudged along a country lane on our permitted daily exercise.

How sad that thousands of these supposedly protected native mammals may again be captured by coursing clubs in September for the purpose of setting dogs on them.

Unfortunately, once the Pandemic ends the cruelty virus may reassert itself…or maybe not.

Perhaps there’s been a national change of heart and mind arising from our new-found rapport with nature.

I hope so, because, in the words of another song: “All God’s creatures have a place in the choir.”

Thanking you,
Sincerely
John Fitzgerald

Dear Editor,

It is encouraging to see the growing awareness of how cruel and thoughtless we humans have become to the non-humans with whom we share the planet.

And what a great letter on your People’s Letters Page, 31st March last from Bernie Wright who focuses attention on the suffering inflicted on animals for our pleasure, convenience or profit.

Not long ago, there was uproar and sanctimonious outrage in the media about a man sitting on a dead horse (disrespectful and regrettable as the man admitted).

But must an animal be dead to be respected? It seems to be perfectly acceptable to saddle, mount and even whip a horse while alive so long as you respect him when dead.

Let’s be honest, it doesn’t really matter to the poor horse at that stage.

How is it okay to exploit, torment and slaughter living animals for their produce, their flesh, their fur, or for sport, as Ms. Wright vividly illustrates, if it is so awful to disrespect them when they are dead?

The time to show real respect is surely while the animal is alive.

And might I suggest that a good place to start would be if we stopped eating them.

Yours sincerely,
Joan E. Norton,
Dublin 12.