Madam, - In his insightful column of June 20th, Vincent Browne outlined the task of politics in campaigning for a "fairer, more equal, more just order".
The Progressive Democrats espoused the "common sense" view that privatising health care would deliver efficiency and that ultimately the market would regulate society. The electorate showed what they thought of this ideology by rejecting the party's candidates at the election. Yet Mary Harney is again in the powerful position of Minister for Health.
Just as her former colleague Michael McDowell believed inequality was good for society, Mary Harney believes that separating public and private patients (i.e. those who can pay and those who cannot) is one of the solutions to providing a better healthcare system.
Despite the opposition of many fine medical personnel (as shown by letters to this page), despite international experts warning that this policy would produce more inequality than ever in healthcare, but most of all despite what the Irish people had to say about the neo-liberal policies of her party, Mary Harney will press on until she gets her much desired co-located hospitals.
Like Vincent Browne, I have no doubt that future generations will look back "in wonderment at how rational, compassionate people could have justified the scale of inequality that now prevails". - Yours, etc,
LENA DEEVY, Belmont Park, Ballinlough, Cork.