Sir, - Full marks to Austin Deasy for having the courage to stand up publicly and question the whole approach to the traveller question. It is not quite PC to do so. Anyone who dares is described as racist and any adverse comment about their behaviour is an affront to their so called. culture.
But what is cultural about pushing young children out to beg from an early age? This is all the more appalling when they do it during harsh winter weather. Of course, this is designed to touch the heart strings. Not of the parents, I hasten to add, but ours who are persecuted by their persistent door knocking or see the tiny mites begging on O'Connell bridge.
Apart from drawing the dole and making their women pregnant for the umpteenth time what do male travellers do all day? Maybe they are too tired to work. Do the few who dabble in tarmacadam or collect scrap pay tax like the rest of us? Any bets?
I do support Mervyn Taylor's defence of the travellers' right to have large families. I have eight of my own. But the difference with the settled community is that they do not get weekly handouts from the State. And if a minority do, when employed they pay their tax like the rest of us. We have no choice!
I take exception to this so called ethnic group being called travellers. It is misleading. It is an euphemism used so that they are not too upset being called what they are, namely nomads. My dictionary describes a nomad as a member of a tribe roaming from place to place. But is it PC to describe them this? - Yours, etc.,
Hazelbrook Road,
Terenure,
Dublin 6W.