Countdown to a Christmas like no other

Nphet’s efforts to deal with the virus will be decided by the realities of the Ireland that’s been created for us, writes

LOOKING forward to Christmas? Any plans yet? Next Saturday it’ll be a year since Brown Thomas opened its 2019 Christmas Shop.

A little over two months from now, working on the 2019 schedule, there’ll be selection boxes in the supermarkets and the first Christmas adverts will be popping up on TV.

Of course, the schedule we’re working off these days is a world away from that long-ago 2019.

Three midlands counties — 400,000 people — are suddenly back under lockdown. A week ago, such a twist never entered their minds.

Who knows what next week, or next month — much less next December — has in store for any of us, or all of us?

Our success or failure in dealing with this bloody virus will be decided to a great extent by the type of Ireland we’ve made.

Or, to be more accurate, the type of Ireland we’ve allowed others to make for us.

Don’t know about you, but I’ve stopped saying, “When this is over, I’m going to...”

I’m not confident Covid-19 will be beaten in my lifetime, though I’m still hopeful.

You can feel the mood in the country: tired of it, pissed off at it, we’ve done the virus thing, now let’s move on.

There’s an irritation at the Government and at Nphet, for imposing restrictions that put our lives on hold, that lock down the economy and perhaps do damage to our children.

We speak as though Nphet imposes a form of penance. And we did our penance. We flattened the curve, we followed the rules, we washed our hands, we stayed indoors. When we came outside we wore the mask, we stood apart from each other, we made dreadful sacrifices — funerals and weddings foregone, hugs and kisses denied, friends unseen, no cinema, no sports, no theatre, no shopping trips, no holidays, no restaurant meals, no pints.

Some are edging towards a wild solution: let it rip, the cure is worse than the disease, they say.

However, polls have consistently shown that the resilience of most of the people is greater than the resilience of the politicians or the pundits — whose impatience threatens us.

The virus has killed over 2,300 on the island, over 720,000 globally. Unless tamed, it has the potential to take thousands more of us. Countless numbers of those who survived it, with organs ravaged by the virus, will suffer the effects for years.

Here’s the truth about Nphet...

They’re a bunch of nerds, some of whom have devoted their lives to studying things too small to see. They know how to gather data, where to get it, how to read it, what to make of it. They’ve access to whole libraries of information on the virus — and it’s still mostly a mystery.

They’re aware that the decisions they make can damage us, the wrong decision may kill us.

It can’t be fun being them, they’re not impulsive people, they probably go to sleep thinking about this bloody thing and wake up the same way.

They are making evidence-based calls, on closely analysed data. They may get things spot on, they may make mistakes.

More then anything else, their efforts will be affected by the realities of the country they’ve been given the job of protecting.

You may already have seen the video.

Three months ago in the Dáil, Paul Murphy TD questioned the Agriculture Minister Michael Creed about the meat factories, saying all was not well and the State should intervene.

Murphy raised this more than once. Creed replied to Murphy with the selfimportance of a senior Fine Gael minister, son of another Fine Gael minister, 30 years at the top, facing down a mere TD. A lefty TD, a knownothing trouble-raiser.

All respectable politicians know they shouldn’t take lefties as seriously as they take Michael Lowry or Danny Healy-Rae.

Murphy gave details, based on the experiences of the meat factory workers and their unions.

Creed replied without detail. He dismissed Murphy’s carefully worded concerns with an unfounded accusation that Murphy was engaging in “a smear tactic dressed up as concern”.

Murphy also raised the matter with the Taoiseach, back in May. Mr Varadkar said he didn’t know, but he’d ask.

I’m sure he’ll get the answer one of these days.

The dogs in the street knew about the meat factories, so did the cows in the field. And now, we all know.

And 400,000 people in the midlands are suffering the consequences of leaving the safety of the meat factories to the factory owners.

As soon as the lockdown happened, local Fine Gael TD Charlie Flanagan roared that the measures were “draconian”. Concerns about the meat plants were flagged weeks ago, he said.

Ah, yes, Charlie, they were indeed. By Paul Murphy. Who was accused by Charlie’s Cabinet colleague, Mr Creed, of smearing the meat factories.

No doubt Charlie leaped to defend Murphy, to denounce the complacency of the government in which Charlie was Minister for Justice. I’m sure he made an angry, storming speech in defence of Murphy.

If you’ve a copy of that speech, let me know.

The meat factories might as well be designed as playgrounds for the virus.

In case the virus found meat factories too difficult, the state crammed people into direct provision facilities.

There, if you have Covid symptoms, you ‘isolate’ yourself on the other side of a ‘partition’ — a piece of wood, where you’re inches away from other beds. And you share the facilities used by those who don’t have the virus — yet.

This is the Ireland in which meat factory owners, builders, bankers, vultures and the rest of the monied classes, have the ear of the government. Where they are consulted on impending legislation.

This is the Ireland where groups of workers are paid as little as possible, with few rights, in ‘challenging’ conditions, where labour inspectors are few and far between.

They’re disposable units of labour, to be plugged in when needed, to be torn out and scrapped according to the needs of the boss.

This is the Ireland that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have for decade after decade collaborated in making.

In that Ireland, countless times, workers, trade unions, activists, left-wing politicians and concerned citizens have raised such issues.

The state of the primary schools was raised — shanty schools, leaking roofs, scant facilities, an absurd pupilteacher ratio. Now these schools are expected to be the cutting edge of the economic revival.

The state of the hospitals was raised — under-staffed, using charity to buy crucial equipment, medics working 26-hour shifts.

Now that body of medics wonders what it faces through the winter.

To break the first wave, they worked long hours in tough conditions, for weeks. They saw colleagues sicken, they saw patients die. They are worn out. By a system they told us repeatedly needed fixing.

It was moving when we put candles in the window and applauded, but it wasn’t enough.

In this same Ireland there have been grotesque excesses — vast rewards for the well-placed.

Yet, the crisis showed us who the people are who keep the country on its feet: the medics, the cleaners, those who maintain the food and transport chains. We told each other we’ll remember this, and in the Dáil the FFGreen-FG cabal voted down worker protections. Mind you, first they had to wake the leader of the Greens.

Anyway, we had the Patrick’s Day ‘like no other’; and the summer ‘like no other’. Dare we hope the Christmas is old-style?

‘Well-founded fears about the meat factories were dismissed as a smear tactic dressed up as concern’