Why on earth would we be part of the UK?
ONE can only imagine Ireland’s problems will multiply many-fold should, as your correspondent suggests (Letters, yesterday), we rejoin the United Kingdom.
Former US diplomat Richard Haass was spot-on when he said Brexit and the Stormont crisis could reignite violence in the North due to poor leadership there.
Rejoining the UK certainly won’t solve these problems – in fact it would exacerbate them.
It’s important to look at the reality of life in the whole of the United Kingdom at present: inflation is rising, wages are suppressed, basic services are starved of money and the government is in disarray over Brexit. The country is also sliding down the table of world’s wealthiest nations.
In short, the country is rudderless with a weak prime minister who clings to power simply because the opposition within her own party is incompetent and unappealing.
By contrast, the outlook for the Republic of Ireland is somewhat rosier, notwithstanding the generally lower calibre of politicians running the place.
We are in the (healthier) eurozone with a good outlook on trade and are part of the world’s largest economic bloc. We have a healthy trade surplus and good living standards.
It is time we looked beyond the UK for our future but we must keep up our cordial relations. Who knows? Perhaps one day, the UK will want to join us instead.
Now that would be, in the words of your correspondent, be mind-boggling.
AOIFE KELLY, Cork.
Dangerous gimmick
DRIVERLESS cars will prove to be for transport what 3D TV was for home entertainment: a hyped product no-one needs or wants.
Automotive technologies, such as anti-lock brakes and blind spot detection, make driving safer, but they are there to assist, not replace, the driver.
The argument for autonomous cars is that as up to 95% of crashes are caused by driver error, so human input should be removed.
Driverless vehicles avoid human frailties such as distraction or tiredness, but fortunately drivers counter-balance these with intuition, experience and the capacity for qualitative judgment.
As these qualities prevent collisions rather than cause them, data-crunchers overlook them. How many times have you made allowances for learner drivers or aggressive motorists?
And remember that even sophisticated technology can fail.
Any hoped-for safety gain with driverless cars might not be as significant as claimed. N. WATERS, Berrynarbor, Devon.
Help for parents
IN the Irish Daily Mail on Tuesday, you state the Ronald McDonald House Charity is sponsoring a ‘wing’ of our new children’s hospital. This is inaccurate.
The Ronald McDonald House is an independent charity and, as is the case at many children’s hospitals internationally and indeed at Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital, Crumlin, its purpose is to provide accommodation, care and support for parents when their children are seriously ill, long-term, in hospital.
Each of the 53 individual family units in the facility being built adjacent to the new children’s hospital will feature a kitchen and sitting room so families can prepare their own food and eat together in a family setting.
This represents a significant increase on what is currently offered at the three Dublin children’s hospitals and will provide a welcome and invaluable service to families whose children are receiving treatment in the new children’s hospital. EILÍSH HARDIMAN, Chief Executive, Phoenix Children’s Health.
Phone wars
I DON’T want to be a slave to a mobile phone (Letters), much to the chagrin of my wife and family, who complain they can’t contact me wherever I am. But as I have repeatedly told them: ‘Phone the golf club and the course marshal will be dispatched to find me – however, make sure you do this only in an emergency.’
JOHN HOLDSWORTH, Kent.