Changingdemographicsachallengeforsociety

More than half the current population of Louth grew up in an era in which they would have encountered few, if any, foreign nationals during their daily lives, or heard on the streets of Dundalk, Drogheda or any of the county’s other towns a language spoken other than English and their own native tongue.

Now, as the recent statistical notebook of Louth for 2019, published by the Central Statistics Office shows, there are upwards of 10,000 non nationals living in the county, and the three spoken languages other than Irish and

English are Polish, Lituanian and French.

The changing picture of Louth’s demographics is quite staggering for in the space of just over 20 years, the county and the country is almost unrecognisable as far as many are concerned.

There are very many other interesting figures in this CSO Yearbook, such as the fact that six out of every tenth person in Louth commutes to work, school or college by car, or that there is a rapid increase to 11,739 people living in rented accommodation, compared with 31,501 in owner occupied houses.

It is however the growth in the numbers of immigrants that is most revealing, especially since it is increasingly more likely that when Britain leaves the EU, that more and more eastern Europeans who make up most of the immigration numbers within Europe will seek Ireland as an alternative to Britain.

The test for us all, Government, local authorities, organisations and communities is to assimilate these newcomers into our society.

It is not going to be easy, for unlike other countries in Europe, most notably countries that colonized other parts of the world, we have no great experience in dealing with a major influx of non nationals, and it is a difficult process, even for countries with bigger populations and more resources.

On reflection we didn’t get a lot of guidance from Government, and communities have had to get by on their own, and are very fortunate that the majority who have settled here in the last 20 years have fended for themselves and have contributed to our economy and the evolving cultural changes that they have brought.

There are however emerging signs of some tensions developing between groups of younger people from different ethnic backgrounds and it is perhaps time that some attention was paid to this by those who should be showing leadership.

The changing face of Louth is moving at a pace that older people are finding it difficult to accept, but it is the reality in which the country is evolving and we must all do our best to be welcoming and to adapt.