Galway Advertiser 2003/2003_06_05/GA_05062003_E1_022.pdf 

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Letters

Alderman calls for city housing officials to be named and shamed

Smoking the new sin
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I'd like to raise the issue of smoking, 'air' it a bit, you might say. For I find atti tudes towards it mighty odd. And decidedly = ill liberal" for a society that likes to describe itself as such. Let's look at law, health and safety, and personal choice this week. Governments, until very recently, when making laws, made an important distinction between those risks to health and safety that citizens might voluntarily assume, and those from which the Stale should protect them. Since every act of protection by the stale involves a loss of freedom, lawmakers assumed that only in very special cases should the state remove our risk taking. In matters of public hygiene, where the risks taken by one person also fall upon others, it seemed legitimate for the state to inter vene: for example, the state could compel people to maintain standards of cleanliness in public places or to undergo vaccinations against contagious diseases. However, it should not forbid a person to consume a certain product, merely because there is a possible risk to his own physical well-being. For the state to extend its juris diction so far involves a serious invasion of privacy, in matters that affect the citizen alone and that have no adverse consequences on others, the citizen should be free to choose. The state can inform him of the risk, but it should not forbid the choice. Such, at any rate, was the orthodox position, as defended by the philosopher John Stuart Mill, who could be described as one of the founders of liberal thinking on social and political matters. It is not. however, the position adopted by our modern legislators, who do their best to remove both the risk and the freedom to run it. In fact. liberal democratic states have led the way in preventing people from deciding for themselves whether they want to take the risk. Ireland, along with several European governments, is currently proposing to outlaw smoking in public places. In New York City, this is now the law, and the onus for seeing that the law is obeyed falls not on the smoker but the owner of the bar or restaurant, with whacking great fines for failure to secure the totally smoke free zone. There is no question that tobacco is a risk lo health: of course il is. In fact, it's just about the only product on the market thai says so. SMOKING KILLS. SMOKING CAN LEAD TO A LONG LINGERING DEATH. SMOKING CAUSES HEART DIS EASE. Pick up a pack of cigarettes today and the first thing you see are warnings that are designed to frighten the hell out of you. The health risk, however, doesn't really explain the violence of the attacks on it, or the extraordinary attempts by governments and bureaucracies to portray cigarette smoke as the single most important threat lo our well-being. For the risk tobacco poses, when compared with those associated with dangerous driving, fatty food, alcohol, or sedentary ways of life, is not actually that serious. My own view, for what's it's worth, is that what we're really dealing with here is a kind of post-modem 'religious' transgression. Think about it for a moment: when it comes to smoking it's almost like there's some thing inherently evil about the practice, that those who smoke are wicked and must be saved from the error of their ways. It's as if governments and bureaucracies are filled with men and women who have never recovered from the sight of Marlon Brando in motorcycle boots, a cigarette dangling from the side of his mouth. When I was young and growing up in the US. the same kind of official watchdogs used lo call troubling making teenagers JDs - juvenille delinquents, and one of the ways to spot them was the fact that ihey smoked. And if they smoked too much.' THEY'D DIE! AND THEY'D DESERVE TO DIE! Consider another aspect of smoking that offends our health wardens: it's pleasurable. I know you're not supposed to say so. bul it's true. Ask even the former smoker in the small hours of the night when no one's around lo overhear and the most honest will admit this terrible, shameful fact. "Yes! I enjoyed il! From the the first puff in ihe morn ing lo ihe last, lingering pulT at night. I loved il. Il put me al my ease and got me through many a tough hour." It's pleasurable, but precisely this raises the hackles of those who are furious al the sight of others so simply and sociably enjoying themselves. Smoking, thus, is so politically incorrect, so much against the (cachings of the new religion of Life-Style, wilh its fear of taking hurcacralically prohibited unacceptable risks', that a medieval churchman finding himself suddenly landed in the 21 si century would quite naturally conclude thai smoking' was the new word lor 'sin'. Of course I'm exaggerating. Bul Ihe point I am trying lo make is still an important one: The stale can inform me of Ihe risk, but il should not lorbid me the choice. The smoker is a normal, responsible member of ihe community, and he can usually be relied upon, when asked politely, lo put out his fag.

Dear Editor, I would like the opportunity to respond to Cllr O'Flaherly's letter printed in the Galway Advertiser last week. Since becoming a councillor in 1999, 1 have never ceased to be appalled and angry at the number of empty /hoarded up houses in Galway city al a time when 2.000 applicants are on our waiting list, a figure given lo housing applicants when they ring the City Council looking for a house and are repeatedly told they have not done their time. I would consider such anger completely justified and make absolutely no apology for it. Since 1999. I and my colleague Cllr Costello alone, have consistently asked for coherent and comprehensive reports in relation to the actual number of empty houses. After much initial hostility and reluctance by the city council to share this information, we are now happily in the situation since 2002 where we get three monthly reports on the housing situation gener ally including the number of empty houses at any given time. It is from these reports that I draw my factual information which Cllr O'Flaherty describes as misleading. In the latest quarterly report for 2003 the Vacant Property Report informs us that 66 houses are actually vacant. Of that 66. only two are listed as abandoned and both in December 2002. One of them was reallocated in the record time of two months and over five months later, the work is still to com mence on the other. That leaves 64 houses not aban doned by tenants, yet Cllr O'Flaherty wishes to pursue a policy of naming and shaming. In the interests of fair

ness and justice however, I'm sure she would agree that if such a policy is to be pursued, then quite logically the rel evant housing officials would also have to be named and shamed, begin ning with the city manager in relation to the vast majority of empty houses not abandoned by tenants. Cllr Flaherty's letter is also very interesting from the viewpoint of what it excludes as much as what it includes. She singles out the refurbishment of Finbarr's Terrace and the Walter Slacken Flat complex as one of the major reasons for the high number of empty houses. What she fails to point out is that the last quarterly report tells us that houses in Finbarr's Terrace have been waiting for the Refurbishment Scheme for periods varying from 1998. 1999. and 2000 and still there is no practical progress in sight for the residents. In taking personal credit for the allocation of taxpayers' monies for the refurbishment of the Walter Macken flats complex, her arrogance is astounding and a complete denigration of all city councillors' efforts who have consistently fought to get the scheme up and running. She has not commented on two houses in the Henry St area which have been empty now for over three years with nine different reports on same, all with completely conflicting information as to why they remain empty and with absolutely no question of these houses having been aban doned. She also fails to comment on the report which included comments such as "awaiting allocation', work in

progress, major work required, work to commence, and "change of tenancy" for periods varying from five months up to three years as explanations for why a substantial number of houses are empty. She fails to comment on the fact that often when ihe quarterly report noies that a house is allocated, it still remains empty for further considerable periods of time which means ihe empty number of houses is actually potentially much higher than the 66 listed. In conclusion, rather than pursuing a blatantly unjust and discriminatory policy of naming and shaming, there is of course a solution lo the problem of empty houses. Firstly the serious extern of the problem must be acknowledged and precise information given to council lors. Secondly the city council must adopt a policy which will not tolerate a house being empty for any period longer than a number of weeks. Thirdly the existing tenanl liaison officer scheme must be adequately resourced and funded to deal proactively with problems as they arise. Fourthly and most importantly, there must be a designated housing crew with adequate staffing and funds to deal with the renovation/refurbishment of houses as and when they become vacant. I would very much welcome Cllr Flaherty's support across party lines in pursuing such a positive proactive approach. Yours, Aid Catherine Connolly, The Claddagh, Galway

R e a d e r concerned about slow g a r d a response to flasher at city school
Dear Editor,

R E P S scheme is the way forward for Connemara farmers

D e a r Editor, F a r m d e v e l o p m e n t is a c r u c i a l issue a n d very Al 11.55 am on Tuesday of last week when I was passing the school on Fr Griffin Rd, I saw a man leaning against a important concept in the West of Ireland. tree with his genitals exposed. I had left my mobile phone at F a r m development problems can be coped with in home charging so I called to the cafe across the street and t h e w e s t a n d s p e c i f i c a l l y in t h e N o r t h / S o u t h asked staff to call the gardai which they agreed to do. C o n n e m a r a areas; On the other hand, it can be very Al 12.35. 1 called lo the Garda Station at Mill St lo sec if difficult to d e v e l o p certain f a r m s and to e x p a n d the mailer had been dealt with and a garda promised that them to b e c o m e profitable concerns. someone would be sent. On my way home I noticed thai the man was still there and in ihe same stale, so I sat on the wall for over 20 minutes so that I could point him out to the gardai when they arrived. Needless to say. they hadn't arrived by the time I had lo leave. Are the gardai so under-resourced that Ihey can't send someone lo deal with a (lasher outside a children's school just around the corner from their own station? Yours, Disappointed Resident, Whitestrand Park, Galway lName and full address with editor) H o w e v e r , I feel t h a t t h e a d v e n t of t h e R E P S scheme is a massive boost for farmers in the region. It helps farmers big and small to fix and develop their farms up to a m a x i m u m of 100 acres. It pro vides a regular source of income for the farmer and helps and motivates them to organise their farms. I hope this will make more progress possible for the small farmer as it is n o w time for them to advance. Yours, Padraic S e o i g h e ,

BY J E F F

O'CONNELL

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