Industrial action by nurses
Sir, – I refer to the announcement of industrial action by the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO) and various trade unions for nurses and midwives, over staffing issues, to be held on March 31st (“Hospital disruption expected with health unions to begin industrial action over staffing”, March 10th). The chief executive of the Health Service Executive, Bernard Gloster, described it as “regrettable”. It is indeed.
This is a state which has one of the highest ratios of nurses to population in the EU – 12:1,000 (The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2024). The hard questions should be asked: is the staffing crisis affecting every hospital or just some?; is nationwide industrial action/potential strike action what our patients deserve, when our waiting lists are at their highest ever, with 911,500 people on some form of waiting list (Irish Hospital Consultants Association 2024)?; and should the profession be reformed?
Nursing is a profession which is struggling to meet the demands, given its perpetual crisis, and despite our numbers. Some 76 per cent of respondents surveyed by the INMO in 2024 stated that their staffing levels and skill mix did not meet the required clinical and patient demands in their work area, with 92 per cent of those expressing concern that patient safety was at risk. Our patients deserve better.
INMO general secretary Phil Ní Sheaghdha previously referred to the “culture of silence” within nursing and claimed members are afraid to voice concerns to management, many of whom were once nurses themselves. It is time for management to listen to the nurses who have genuine patient safety concerns before we risk a collapse in the numbers of nurses willing to work in Ireland.
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Over 50 per cent of our nurses are trained abroad. The country’s over-reliance on overseas workers risks exacerbating workforce shortages.
Nursing is a difficult profession to enter, as the Leaving Cert points remain high (410 in UCD 2024 for general nursing and 498 for C & tegrated). Places need to be increased and it needs to be made more accessible to those who will not achieve those points, as it is a disincentive for many aspiring would-be excellent nurses.
Efforts to recruit and retain potential and existing nurses must be addressed. Moral distress and burnout are what’s got us to this point. Hospitals which are struggling should deal with the identified crises locally rather than impact the entire population through industrial action. It is a futile endeavour and will only worsen matters for those languishing on waiting lists. Our patients deserve better and we can do better. – Yours, etc,
FIONA MANNION,
Portmarnock,
Co Dublin.
St Patrick and stag hunting
Sir, – “The Deer’s Cry” was a prayer for protection against evil composed by St Patrick in about 433 AD.
In the 21st century it has been cited in environmental awareness campaigns, especially ones focusing on how man’s relationship with nature has broken down. Consider the sad plight of Ireland’s wildlife, the scant protection afforded to the creatures of field and forest from unsaintly folk intent on killing or tormenting them for fun.
Patrick’s alleged role in banishing snakes from Ireland can now safely be discounted, since we know that they didn’t occupy any part of Ireland during his earthly sojourn.
I’d give more credence to the legend about his intervention to save a stag from a band of marauding hunters. It says he offered sanctuary to the deer, which was on the point of dropping from exhaustion after a long chase and prevented the hounds from ripping it apart.
That has a ring of truth to it about because almost all the Irish saints – with St Brigid being the best exemplar – were noted for their love of animals and nature.
I hope Patrick, if he’s watching above, will “bestow a sweet smile” on the efforts of Jennifer Whitmore TD when she moves her Bill to ban hare coursing. Whatever about snakes, our native hare was present on this island, and in greater numbers than today, in Patrick’s lifetime, having been around since before the Ice Age of 10,000 years ago and possibly for up 60,000 years before that.
Many great days for the Irish lie ahead, but one of them will be the day when we finally end the persecution of this animal feted in Celtic song and folklore.
Politicians with forked tongues want coursing to continue, but most of us, I believe, want it banned. We should offer our iconic Irish hare the protection from harm invoked in that great prayer of St Patrick. – Yours, etc,
JOHN FITZGERALD,
Callan,
Co Kilkenny
Central Bank’s regulation of bonds
Sir, – Responding to increasing public outcry at its regulation of “Israel bonds” across European Union markets, the Central Bank has reiterated the rationale that it is “required to approve the prospectus under the Prospectus Regulation where the prospectus documentation meets standards of completeness, consistency and comprehensibility”. A bond prospectus which makes no mention of the charge of genocide faced by the Israeli state at the International Court of Justice can hardly be regarded as complete or comprehensible.
Further, Senator Alice Mary Higgins has clearly explained that EU regulations allow central banks to apply “other particular requirements” around the approval of bond prospectuses and has observed that Ireland’s Central Bank could resolve the dilemma, without even specifying the Israeli state, by adding a requirement that they will not approve bond prospectuses where “the issuer” is being investigated under the Genocide Convention.
In its assurance that it will “adhere to any financial sanctions or restrictive measures that are imposed under law”, the leadership of the Central Bank has signposted its refusal to invoke the powers at its disposal.
It is clearly time for the Government to take action. Taoiseach Micheál Martin has admitted – albeit amid a flurry of pre-election promises – that he believes that the Israeli state has been committing genocide in the Gaza Strip.
With Israel once again cutting off the means of subsistence to the Gaza Strip, and the Trump administration inciting carnage, public revulsion at our Central Bank’s role in financing Israeli atrocities is only going to increase. Our Government must move decisively to end this abysmal practice while they still retain a shred of credibility. – Yours, etc,
BRIAN Ó ÉIGEARTAIGH,
Donnybrook,
Dublin 4.
Animal cruelty
Sir, – In a video published on The Irish Times website on March 13th, animal rights activists presented the most devastating footage from what they say was their second undercover investigation into Irish pig farming in the last 12 months.
I was appalled to see the desperate suffering that takes place within Irish agriculture, and to learn that it does not happen at the hands of “a few rotten apples”. Sadly, it would appear from the six randomly chosen farms in the investigations, that abject cruelty, abuse and neglect is widespread.
Anyone who is brave enough to watch the evidence presented in the video surely can be in no doubt that intensive pig farming has no place in a modern society.
The increasing interest in plant-based foods we have seen in recent years is therefore hardly surprising, and based on your video it seems we need to seriously rethink how we feed ourselves as a nation. – Yours, etc,
Dr ANNETTE JORGENSEN,
Carrick-On-Shannon,
Co Leitrim.
Sir, Having watched The Irish Times video from March 13th about the recent pig farm investigation, I am left wondering how we can inflict such abhorrent cruelty on intelligent and sentient beings. At what point will we wake up to the horrors of industrial animal farming? – Yours, etc,
GARY O’NEILL
Dublin 8.
Neutrality in a changing world
Sir, – Newton Emerson managed to be rather condescending to those who believe in a non-belligerent approach to international peace – on either side of the Border – when he described Irish neutrality’s support by “the allegedly anti-war left” as “hardly conducive to it being taken seriously” (“Unionists eager to join chorus over Republic’s ‘free ride’”, Opinion, March 13th). So, were Éamon de Valera and Frank Aiken members of the “allegedly anti-war left”? The latter was a fearless proponent of a non-aligned, pro-peace agenda at the height of the (old) Cold War.
There are different kinds of power to that which grows out of a gun, a drone or a nuclear bomb. The problem is partly that the Irish Government wishes to simply throw in its lot with the “power grows out of the barrel of a gun” lobby of Nato and EU militarism and not nurture the immense possibilities of a positive neutrality (think Frank Aiken again). The lack of imagination shown and the failure to understand how conflict develops – and wars happen – is astonishing. – Yours, etc,
ROB FAIRMICHAEL,
Belfast.
Hotel breakfasts
Sir, – I concur with Emer McLysaght – a hotel breakfast buffet operates like a delicate ecosystem, demanding patience, precision, and a certain level of nerve (“Dancing the dance of the hotel breakfast buffet”, Life, March 14th). If you arrive too early, you find yourself in an unsettling silence amid overzealous early risers, all decked out in hiking gear. Arriving too late leaves you with the last few scraps, a somewhat apologetic croissant, and a fruit salad that’s mostly melon.
The queue for the toaster is where tempers tend to flare. Someone always tries to insert their bread while yours is still halfway through the cycle, leading to a tense game of chicken as both slices precariously balance on the edge.
However, the real danger of the breakfast buffet lies in my tendency to lose all sense of proportion. I pile my plate high and end up consuming more food in one sitting than I would in an entire day at home. – Yours, etc,
ENDA CULLEN,
Armagh
