As much as I dislike Mary Harney - and boy, do I dislike her - I'm finding myself fairly disgusted with the calls for her step down for getting her hair done on the public purse.
It's not that I think the expenditure was justified. But I can't recall anyone saying that Bertie should step down when it was revealed that more than the average industrial wage was being spent on his make-up. People said it was excessive, certainly. But his position wasn't held to be "untenable" because of it.
You can't separate this hullaballoo from gender issues. Women in the public eye are relentlessly judged for their appearance, Harney more than many others. There is a really nasty undertone to some of the comments being made in the blogosphere about this. Women who consider standing for election know full well they'll be subject to the same excruciating level of scrutiny for their hair, their clothes, their weight. Don't think for a moment this isn't a contributing factor to the under-participation of women in politics.
Harney should resign, of course. But I've always said that. She should resign because of the millions of taxpayer euros she's giving away to developers at the expense of the public healthcare system. That's the important issue, not the fact that she - like the Taoiseach and all male office holders - has an excessive personal appearance budget.
My head's buried pretty deeply in textbooks these days, but I did think this item was worth drawing attention to:
Alistair Darling will make a high-risk bid to lead Britain out of recession tomorrow, when he is expected to cut VAT and entice the British people to go on a pre-Christmas spending spree.
...
The cut is expected to see the rate drop from its current level of 17.5 per cent
Meanwhile, of course, down here in the Free State, VAT is set to go up from 21 to 21.5% as of Monday week.
Should do wonders for the "don't shop in Newry" campaign, huh?
In other Blueshirt news,
it seems that little Terence Flanagan managed to fill only about a third of the thirty minutes alloted to him to speak on the Electoral Amendment Bill in the Dáil today.
He was the first opposition speaker to participate in the debate. I guess that's what happens when you have nobody to plagiarise ...
He was the first opposition speaker to participate in the debate. I guess that's what happens when you have nobody to plagiarise ...
Quick note on "pairing"
I'd imagine that few people, other than anoraks such as myself, had any idea what Enda Kenny was talking about when he announced that Fine Gael would refuse to "pair" with the Government over their refusal to allow a debate on the economy.
The Times helpfully explains that:
Under the vote-pairing deal, opposition TDs absent themselves from votes if a minister – with whom they have been “paired” cannot be present due to official business.
I'd just like to make it clear that it is not the case that pairing occurs only when a minister is away on official business. In fact, Fine Gael have quite willingly engaged in this practice when backbenchers have been away for personal reasons. They may be valid personal reasons, but so what? The point of pairing is to prevent important state business from grinding to a halt, which is something that all parties (at least theoretically) have an interest in. If the ruling parties can't get enough TDs elected to ensure their bills never fall due to too many non-official absences on their part, it's not the role of the opposition to give them a leg up.
And if you want to know how I know that FG (and others, incidentally, but never Sinn Féin) have engaged in this practice, it's because occasionally the list of "official pairs" inadvertently finds its way into my clutches.
The Times helpfully explains that:
Under the vote-pairing deal, opposition TDs absent themselves from votes if a minister – with whom they have been “paired” cannot be present due to official business.
I'd just like to make it clear that it is not the case that pairing occurs only when a minister is away on official business. In fact, Fine Gael have quite willingly engaged in this practice when backbenchers have been away for personal reasons. They may be valid personal reasons, but so what? The point of pairing is to prevent important state business from grinding to a halt, which is something that all parties (at least theoretically) have an interest in. If the ruling parties can't get enough TDs elected to ensure their bills never fall due to too many non-official absences on their part, it's not the role of the opposition to give them a leg up.
And if you want to know how I know that FG (and others, incidentally, but never Sinn Féin) have engaged in this practice, it's because occasionally the list of "official pairs" inadvertently finds its way into my clutches.
No sex please, we're Irish
Ah, the irony. Only yesterday over at the Cedar Lounge a contributor drew a rather smug distinction between the US and this country on the basis of the public role of religious extremists – over there, we were told, they are “political movers and shakers” while here they are confined merely to “prayer crusades”. My immediate reaction, as noted on the linked page, was to point out the flaw in that argument from a non-partitionist perspective. And then I went to have a look at today’s papers and found these news items from well below the border: 750 pornographic DVDs seized in Dublin and Labour calls for laws to fight sex shops.
Let’s look at these one at a time. The first article tells us that the DVDs were seized “as a result of an ongoing Community Policing Unit investigation into breaches of the Video Recording Act of 1989”. Yes, you read that correctly. A Community Policing Unit investigation into porn videos. In Dublin 2. Honestly, have the community police there no better use of their time? Maybe going after the tourist-muggers in Temple Bar? The gangs that hang round ATMs on Grafton Street waiting to distract you and grab your cash? The bicycle thieves on George’s Street? If the residential areas in that part of the city are anything like mine, I’d guess there are a few social housing estates whose residents have all but given up phoning the police when there are problems because the response is so thoroughly inadequate it isn’t even worth the effort. Well, now we know why. Maybe instead of reporting break-ins, drug dealing and cars on fire, they should tell the Gardaí there’s a porno outside.
The second article tells us that those champions of progressive, liberal values the Labour Party are shocked – shocked! – to find that not only do such DVDs exist, but the shops that sell them are subject to the same rules as any other shop. Not good enough apparently; they should have to apply for a specific change of use so that the wishes of those residents who would patronise such a shop can be vetoed by those residents who think they shouldn’t.
Labour’s Joe Costello is particularly outraged that two adult shops were able to open across from churches in his constituency. That’s my constituency too, and I know at least one of the shops he’s referring to, and frankly the fact that anyone could get exercised about it suggests to me that they are either stuck in de Valeraland or have far too much time on their hands. The part of the shop that is visible to anyone outside it is very discreetly-designed; there is no merchandise in view or any images whatsoever. If you couldn’t read enough English to know what “adult shop” meant, you wouldn’t even know what it was. Apart from the extraneous apostrophe in “DVD’s”, in fact, I’m hard pressed to find anything offensive about it. And so the fuck what if it’s across from a church? What gives people coming to or going from church the right not to encounter any reminders of how the human race reproduces?
There’s an argument to be made, from a community perspective, against having a whole conglomerate of these shops in one neighbourhood. An area that has come to be known as a red light district can be fairly unpleasant to live in, in some cases even unsafe. But that’s not the argument Labour are making. Effectively, they want local authorities to be able to prevent any sex shop from opening anywhere if enough people (and how many is “enough”?) complain that it’s unsuitable. The Council’s attempt less than ten years ago to close the Ann Summers on O’Connell Street – O’Connell Street, for fuck’s sake – suggests that such a power is likely to be interpreted broadly, making adult shops all but impossible to open in the State. Would it be the end of the world if that happened? Of course not, but it would further undermine any claim of Ireland (south) to be somehow more secularly advanced than the US.
We may not put people like Sarah Palin in high office here, but it doesn't look to me like we need them.
Let’s look at these one at a time. The first article tells us that the DVDs were seized “as a result of an ongoing Community Policing Unit investigation into breaches of the Video Recording Act of 1989”. Yes, you read that correctly. A Community Policing Unit investigation into porn videos. In Dublin 2. Honestly, have the community police there no better use of their time? Maybe going after the tourist-muggers in Temple Bar? The gangs that hang round ATMs on Grafton Street waiting to distract you and grab your cash? The bicycle thieves on George’s Street? If the residential areas in that part of the city are anything like mine, I’d guess there are a few social housing estates whose residents have all but given up phoning the police when there are problems because the response is so thoroughly inadequate it isn’t even worth the effort. Well, now we know why. Maybe instead of reporting break-ins, drug dealing and cars on fire, they should tell the Gardaí there’s a porno outside.
The second article tells us that those champions of progressive, liberal values the Labour Party are shocked – shocked! – to find that not only do such DVDs exist, but the shops that sell them are subject to the same rules as any other shop. Not good enough apparently; they should have to apply for a specific change of use so that the wishes of those residents who would patronise such a shop can be vetoed by those residents who think they shouldn’t.
Labour’s Joe Costello is particularly outraged that two adult shops were able to open across from churches in his constituency. That’s my constituency too, and I know at least one of the shops he’s referring to, and frankly the fact that anyone could get exercised about it suggests to me that they are either stuck in de Valeraland or have far too much time on their hands. The part of the shop that is visible to anyone outside it is very discreetly-designed; there is no merchandise in view or any images whatsoever. If you couldn’t read enough English to know what “adult shop” meant, you wouldn’t even know what it was. Apart from the extraneous apostrophe in “DVD’s”, in fact, I’m hard pressed to find anything offensive about it. And so the fuck what if it’s across from a church? What gives people coming to or going from church the right not to encounter any reminders of how the human race reproduces?
There’s an argument to be made, from a community perspective, against having a whole conglomerate of these shops in one neighbourhood. An area that has come to be known as a red light district can be fairly unpleasant to live in, in some cases even unsafe. But that’s not the argument Labour are making. Effectively, they want local authorities to be able to prevent any sex shop from opening anywhere if enough people (and how many is “enough”?) complain that it’s unsuitable. The Council’s attempt less than ten years ago to close the Ann Summers on O’Connell Street – O’Connell Street, for fuck’s sake – suggests that such a power is likely to be interpreted broadly, making adult shops all but impossible to open in the State. Would it be the end of the world if that happened? Of course not, but it would further undermine any claim of Ireland (south) to be somehow more secularly advanced than the US.
We may not put people like Sarah Palin in high office here, but it doesn't look to me like we need them.
Labels:
Crime,
Garda Síochána,
Labour,
Religion,
sex industry,
USA
What's wrong with this picture?
From today's Times:
A 17-YEAR-old girl, whom gardaí believe was trafficked into Ireland to work in the sex industry, has been remanded on continuing bail.
...
The girl, who is from Nigeria and cannot be named for legal reasons, is charged with failing to produce a passport or another form of identification.
Now maybe this is a product of my wild imagination, but I can think of a pretty good reason why a person who had been trafficked into the country might not have a passport or another form of identification. A few pretty good reasons, in fact.
The Government has repeatedly justified its refusal to legislate for the rights of trafficking victims on the basis that the Garda Síochána treat all such persons "sympathetically", "with respect and dignity" and so on. Yes, that's exactly how I would describe bringing criminal charges against someone for not making sure they had their identity papers with them when they were trafficked.
The threat of prosecution, deportation and other such punitive measures is a very effective way to discourage trafficking victims coming forward. This is a no-brainer. It's so obvious that even Michael McDowell as Minister always insisted (not in so many words, admittedly) that it didn't happen. And yet that's precisely what's happening right now in Carlow-Kilkenny.
It's a disgrace and a scandal and I cannot understand why the migrant and women's rights sectors are not all over it.
A 17-YEAR-old girl, whom gardaí believe was trafficked into Ireland to work in the sex industry, has been remanded on continuing bail.
...
The girl, who is from Nigeria and cannot be named for legal reasons, is charged with failing to produce a passport or another form of identification.
Now maybe this is a product of my wild imagination, but I can think of a pretty good reason why a person who had been trafficked into the country might not have a passport or another form of identification. A few pretty good reasons, in fact.
The Government has repeatedly justified its refusal to legislate for the rights of trafficking victims on the basis that the Garda Síochána treat all such persons "sympathetically", "with respect and dignity" and so on. Yes, that's exactly how I would describe bringing criminal charges against someone for not making sure they had their identity papers with them when they were trafficked.
The threat of prosecution, deportation and other such punitive measures is a very effective way to discourage trafficking victims coming forward. This is a no-brainer. It's so obvious that even Michael McDowell as Minister always insisted (not in so many words, admittedly) that it didn't happen. And yet that's precisely what's happening right now in Carlow-Kilkenny.
It's a disgrace and a scandal and I cannot understand why the migrant and women's rights sectors are not all over it.
As the dwindling numbers of people who read this blog will know, I haven't been excited by much Irish news lately. But this article, pressing as it does a number of my buttons, made me sit up and take notice:
TEACHERS last night gave a guarded backing to calls for immigrant children who cannot speak English properly to be "segregated" in our classrooms.
This followed a Fine Gael call yesterday for the Government to separate immigrant children with poor language skills from the rest of their classmates.
...
His comments attracted qualified support from the ASTI [secondary teachers' union] last night. However, they preferred to describe the teaching of immigrant children apart as putting them in “immersion classes” rather than “segregation”.
The ASTI spokeswoman said an understanding of English was the key to the integration of immigrant children in schools.
Doubtless there will be knee-jerk responses to this from both sides. Not that anybody listens to me, but I would plead for a few points to be kept in mind. The first being that there are several different considerations involved here, such as:
TEACHERS last night gave a guarded backing to calls for immigrant children who cannot speak English properly to be "segregated" in our classrooms.
This followed a Fine Gael call yesterday for the Government to separate immigrant children with poor language skills from the rest of their classmates.
...
His comments attracted qualified support from the ASTI [secondary teachers' union] last night. However, they preferred to describe the teaching of immigrant children apart as putting them in “immersion classes” rather than “segregation”.
The ASTI spokeswoman said an understanding of English was the key to the integration of immigrant children in schools.
Doubtless there will be knee-jerk responses to this from both sides. Not that anybody listens to me, but I would plead for a few points to be kept in mind. The first being that there are several different considerations involved here, such as:
- How non-English speaking children can learn the language as quickly as possible
- How to prevent them falling behind in their other subjects
- How to ensure English-speaking children aren't brought down as a result of all this
The biggest problem, it seems to me, is that there isn't necessarily one solution that effectively addresses all three of these issues (and that's before we even get into the subject of the social and psychological effects of separating students). I remember the bilingual education debate that was raging in California when I lived there in the 1990s - for all I know, it still is. One side presented studies showing that totally immersing the kids in English was the quickest way to teach them the language. The other side presented studies showing that own-language education in addition to intensive English was the most effective way to promote their all-around academic achievement. Sometimes, these were the same studies. Even proponents of one particular viewpoint were at times forced to admit that it wasn't necessarily a question of finding the "right" solution, but of deciding which aim to prioritise.
Language is a funny beast. It arouses almost inexplicable passions in people, often in inverse proportion to the amount they actually know about it. As was once pointed out to me by a friend of mine with an advanced degree in the subject, so much about language is counter-intuitive - and yet there seems to be hardly anyone out there without a very firm, almost visceral, opinion on the right way to deal with the vexing linguistic issues that arise. It's true for a lot of subjects, of course, that people form views from which they can't be swayed no matter how much contrary evidence is put in front of them. But language seems to me to be exceptional in the extent to which people care so much on the basis of so little understanding of how it actually works.
And it hardly needs to be added that people's views on the subject are often influenced to a great degree by their views on immigration and multiculturalism in general. This makes it difficult, at times, to sort out legitimate concerns about educational standards from lumpen xenophobia just looking for a respectable excuse to latch onto. Of course this works in reverse too: those of us who think of diversity as a positive end in itself are sometimes guilty of not thinking through the practical consequences of policies designed to promote it.
The education of children is an area where society simply cannot afford the hazards of such knee-jerk reactions from either side. It's too important to be decided on the basis of who's shouting the loudest, or which policy fits most neatly within a particular overall ideological framework. The government needs to look very closely at the available evidence - of which there is plenty, just ask the Californians - and make the decision that is demonstrated to be genuinely best for the children, regardless of how (un)popular it is. I know what I hope that decision turns out to be, but it's not for me to advocate. I don't really understand how it works either.
Labels:
children's rights,
Education,
Fine Gael,
Immigration
Overheard in Leinster House
A Fine Gael TD making a call on their mobile:
"Hello ... , can I get back that €20 I loaned you yesterday? I'm meeting someone for coffee."
No wonder Enda Kenny has been so critical of the Government this week. You know times are tough when even culchies earning upwards of €95,000 have to go around begging for change for a cuppa.
"Hello ... , can I get back that €20 I loaned you yesterday? I'm meeting someone for coffee."
No wonder Enda Kenny has been so critical of the Government this week. You know times are tough when even culchies earning upwards of €95,000 have to go around begging for change for a cuppa.
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