Letters to the Editor: Instead of a new-build frenzy, bring our derelict buildings back into use
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Tánaiste Micheál Martin says the Government needs to build 60,000 homes a year. That translates as 600,000 homes in 10 years if fulfilled, effectively almost a Dublin-sized city scattered out across the country. How does this sit with other aims of the government, such as the ‘rewilding’ of Ireland or climate change controls?
Every house built means that much less grass, flowers, trees and space for our wildlife, is gone for good. Not just the space occupied by the house itself but by all the ancillary works too — roads, kerbs, sewage, the mature trees that will be knocked and probably replaced with non-native species that will take generations to reach the same maturity and provide the same level of sustenance to our fauna, the light pollution from windows and street lamps that wreaks havoc on our bird population and their nesting habits and makes clear night skies almost impossible.
Maybe we should start by taking the derelict housing stock that’s already available and plough the money into making that habitable first?
A few months ago I spent a pleasant day in Clonmel, taking a walking tour of the town and its many interesting historic buildings and sights.
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However, along the way I was struck by the number of derelict buildings everywhere, abandoned, weeds growing out of them, even a whole shopping district replete with boarded up shops, arcades, over-shop apartments: All closed up and abandoned like a ghost town of the Wild West.
Similar scenes are evident all over the country. There are even half-finished housing estates left over from the building frenzy of the Celtic Tiger.
Yet here is the Tánaiste, arguing we need another building frenzy of 60,000 houses a year — good for the exchequer no doubt and making the Government look like its ‘providing jobs’ as if no lessons were learned from the past. But different thinking is required now.
Let’s ‘take stock of our derelict stock’ first and make it fit for use.
That alone would go a long way to solving the housing crisis without the need to build a single new house and help rejuvenate and repopulate our many smaller towns and villages and take some of the pressure off bigger cities.
I found the recent research from the Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (Tilda) at Trinity College Dublin to be somewhat intriguing.
The research shows that loneliness in older adults is associated with an increased risk of individuals wishing for their own death.
However, the study also showed that older people attending religious services is an important protective barrier against loneliness.
I believe religious services provide social interactions and a sense of community for our elderly demographic.
As a clinician, I would always encourage this cohort to take up a hobby, such as gardening, going to the gym, crosswords, jigsaws, puzzles, or knitting, etc. I believe that small activities can provide a person with energy and positive feelings.
It’s important that these pursuits are fun or fulfilling. One should also be careful about working too hard or watching too much TV which shows simply as a distraction. This will only delay or suppress one’s feelings and could actually make a person’s mental health worse.
I would encourage people to take courses or listen to podcasts about anything from politics, comedy, to fitness.
Just listening to the voice of somebody one likes can assist people to feel less lonely. As a therapist, I am acutely aware of how talking therapy can be hard to get, but if one can find a suitable counsellor, this will provide one with a safe place to work through one’s feelings and thoughts without judgement.
Social media can also help one’s mental health or indeed harm it. I would suggest in trying to find digital communities that share one’s interests and passions. Most importantly, one should be aware of how one feels when one uses social media. It’s always recommended that one focuses on topics and activities that works best for one.
I would like to now make a clarion call to our policymakers in ensuring that they provide an enhanced focus on improving mental health and addressing social isolation in older people.
As Ireland readies ourselves for a general election it is vital to highlight the serious issues people with disabilities are experiencing. With the recent announcement that Ireland is now the second most expensive country in Europe, the Government must implement policies that tackle this: By reinstating all the services available to people with disabilities that were removed in the budget in 2012; give every person with a disability the free travel pass; remove means-testing; and ensure people with disabilities can equally access education, training, and employment.
Government policies must also be flexible and meet the needs of people with disabilities and give them proper access to social services.
Our human minds have difficulty coping with the reality of large statistics of human suffering. It’s important to focus on individual cases of suffering and trauma to better understand the level of trauma being suffered by the people of Palestine.
On August 18 an Israeli bomb struck the home of teacher Hala Khattab in Deir al-Balah, Gaza, killing her and her six children. They included her oldest son, Hussein, age 15, her nine-year-old quadruplets, Kinan, Hamman, Lujain, Sibal, and her baby girl, Wakeen, aged 18 months.
One-hundred-and -fifteen newborn babies have been reported killed in Gaza since October 2023. This statistic includes twins Ayssel Arafa and Asser Arafa who were three days old when they and their mother Joumana Arafa, a medical doctor, were killed in an Israeli airstrike on August 13. Doctors, teachers, hospitals and schools have all been targeted by the Israeli military. The killing of children and adult civilians in Gaza, by bombing, snipers bullets, starvation, and destruction of the water and sewerage systems, is neither accidental, nor due to ‘military necessity’.
The grim statistics, amounting to genocide, include at least 40,265 people killed, including 16,500 children. At least 289 UNRWA and aid workers and 885 health workers have been killed. At least 116 journalists and media workers were killed. More than half of Gaza’s homes, 80% of commercial facilities, 85% of school buildings, were destroyed or damaged, and only 16 out of 36 hospitals are partially functioning; 65% of road networks are destroyed, 65% of cropland is damaged. The slaughter of so many innocent children especially cannot be allowed to continue.
On Monday, August 26, Namibia denied docking at Walvis Bay to MV Kathrin, a cargo ship sailing under the flag of Portugal from Vietnam on route to the Mediterranean. The ship was suspected of carrying arms to Israel. Namibian human rights organisation, the Economic and Social Justice Trust (ESJT), wrote on August 21, to the Namibian Ports Authority (Namport) calling for the ship to be blocked on the basis that “by allowing a ship carrying ammunition and equipment that will possibly be used in the commission of genocide, to dock at any Namibian harbour, Namport may be making itself and the country complicit to genocide”.
Confirming the ship would be blocked, Namibian justice minister Yvonne Dausab said “Namibia complies with our obligation not to support or be complicit in Israeli war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide, as well as its unlawful occupation of Palestine”.
In Ireland, by contrast, there is credible evidence that Israeli cargo ships have flown through Irish airspace carrying weapons of war to Israel for its genocide in Gaza. US planes continue to have unfettered access to Shannon airport, granted by the Minister for Transport. The government has indicated it will continue to trade with Israeli arms companies: Israeli companies which supply weapons for the genocide in Gaza can tender to supply 14 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) worth €600,000 in the next 12 months to the Irish Defence Forces.
Ireland must, like Namibia, take its responsibilities under the Genocide Convention seriously. As the government fails/refuses to take action to ensure Irish airports and Irish airspace are not complicit in genocide, the trade union movement can, and must, take action and show real solidarity with the people of Gaza. Workers have the right, and responsibility, not to be complicit in genocide. They have the right to demand that any and every plane which might have arms, bombs or technical support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza, be inspected. Similarly air traffic controllers have the right, and responsibility, not to facilitate movement of Israeli cargo planes, suspected of carrying arms, through Irish airspace. The members of the Irish Defence Forces must refuse to allow UAVs to be bought from companies that are supplying the weapons for the genocide in Gaza. The trade unions which organise the workers in Shannon must lead the way supported by the whole of the Irish trade union movement.