Invest in schools properly for safe September start
THE historic lack of investment in primary and post-primary education by the State has meant that we have crammed too many children into our classes for too long. This is testing our politicians as they try to accommodate social distancing guidelines in their plans for reopening schools.
In so far as we can hope for any positives from the pandemic, this presents an opportunity for old wrongs to be righted.
Rather than cobbling together an unworkable plan that would see children at home for half of the school day, our new government should focus on delivering a plan that reduces the risk of viral spread at the same time as it improves the educational outcome for our children.
The answer is simple, if expensive: more teachers, more rooms, better education and better health.
Grace Powell, Dublin 22
Precious resources
A ‘LOCKDOWN labour’ I recently undertook was to tidy the rarely visited, ‘invisible’ presses and lockers in the house. The amount of mobile telephones lying extinct, outcasts in the ultradisposable world of communications technology, in one of these locations would embarrass a parish, not to speak of a household whose couple of members would still extol the virtues of their favourite Nokia.
A phone dump, caused by an industry which uses the ‘free upgrade’ as a marketing ploy of lame probity and of questionable transparency, to say the least.
Some of these phones were never unboxed due to the nuisance of transferring data and of having to get used to a different handling system while the incumbent instrument was fully functional.
Most others were close to mint condition scarcely indicating signs of a short working life, while there were only a few showing sustained activity. I don’t think it would be an exaggeration to suggest that our household is not unique in this matter.
A smartphone is a mine of precious metals containing tens of different elements, some difficult to extract and others whose availabilities are dwindling.
It is also a haven of various toxic materials. Considering that penetration rates are near 90% in the world’s developed countries, the manufacture, use and disposal of mobile phones present a critical challenge in terms of environmental sustainability.
Against such a backdrop the ongoing manipulation and contrivance of obsolescence of such equipment must not be tolerated any longer.
I’m sure the national herd would appreciate ‘a word’ on the matter from the Green Party.
Michael Gannon, Kilkenny city.
Walsh’s point is right
I DON’T always see eye to eye with your columnist Niamh Walsh but as regards Ms Lynn Ruane and her dress code (Manifesto, MoS, June 7), I am with you
100%. It was just an attentionseeking ploy.
Keep up the good work and call those people out all the time . Justin Dawson, Dublin 24.
‘Anti-Brit’ racism
INTERESTING to see those great humanitarians, Sinn Féin, jumping on the anti-racism bandwagon. I presume that they will now denounce anyone who smacks of being anti-Brit.
Pat O’Mahony, Dalkey, Co. Dublin.
Mary Lou’s pickle
THE thought often occurs to me if the statue of Seán Russell – a man who embraced the Nazis during the Second World War – was taken down would Mary Lou McDonald, who is a great admirer of his, go on a hunger strike?
Tony Moriarty, Harold’s Cross, Dublin 6w.
Our Trump shame
MANY of us here in Ireland cannot understand why anyone in the US would support Donald Trump, especially given his mishandling of the pandemic and his tin ear when it comes to addressing the issues of systemic racism, not just in the criminal justice system, but in all levels of
US society, even if some of it might be unconscious bias.
I say this having spent over a decade living there. And, sadly, many Irish-Americans are part of Trump’s base, from the working class to CEOs.
But what’s deeply embarrassing is how many Irish-Americans have worked in, or are still part of, his administration.
There’s Mick Mulvaney, former chief of staff, the notorious Steve Bannon, VP Mike Pence, National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien and new press secretary
Kayleigh McEnany, who told reporters at her first press conference that she would never tell them a lie. Cynics might say that was her first untruth.
All these officials are enablers of Trump’s literally toxic agenda. For instance, in 2018 his administration lifted heavy restrictions on the use of asbestos in construction, despite the carcinogen being linked to lung cancer.
Having said that, last week when Trump got pushback over forcibly removing hundreds of peaceful protesters from near the White House so he could pose with a Bible, it was a whole phalanx of generals who lead the charge. And, thankfully, they were mostly Irish-Americans. So there is some hope after all.
Declan Donnelly, via email.