A chara, - I welcome Pat Rabbitte's recent words on the implications of so many migrant workers coming into Ireland. It is refreshing to see a political leader posing important questions to the electorate.
Your Editorial of January 4th calls for an honest but sensitive debate on the matter, while calling Mr Rabbitte's remark that "there are 40 million or so Poles" a crude aside. Not so; many people fear the rapid transformation being undergone by our small population is laying the foundation for major social difficulties.
Pat Rabbitte, Jack O'Connor, Micheál Martin and your Editorial speak about the economy. But who is looking after society? Who is considering the plight of other societies being denuded of skilled personnel, who are sucked into our economy? - Yours, etc,
ANTHONY JORDAN,
Gilford Road,
Dublin 4.
Madam, - It was probably inevitable after the outcome of the Irish Ferries dispute that immigration control would surface as a response to displacement and exploitation. It is disturbing to see it actually come from a source with formal links to the trade unions - Pat Rabbitte, in his Irish Times interview of January 3rd.
The response of Siptu to Irish Ferries' plans was to resist them and to make the dispute into a stand on the issue in general. Public opinion and the labour movement rallied to this stand in a manner unprecedented in a generation. The unions declined to press this opportunity decisively to halt displacement and super-exploitation, and the result was somewhere between a temporary retreat to lines further back and a defeat. The national minimum wage is neither the union rate nor even a threshold of decency.
For a responsible voice to put forward such a divisive solution is dangerous. The same voice might instead be urging the unions to a steadier stand the next time, and to big-scale recruitment in the meantime. It might be campaigning for the Government (as well as Fine Gael) to drop its support for the EU services directive and its opposition to EU maritime and agency workers directives. It might be insisting on new legislation to protect employment standards and the inspectors to enforce them. - Yours, etc,
DES DERWIN, Comyn Place, Drumcondra, Dublin, 9.
Madam, - I am surprised by the lack of protest in your letters page at Pat Rabbitte's remark about "40 million Poles". I am convinced that if Michael McDowell had uttered these words your Letters page would be groaning under the weight of angry missives. - Is mise,
MUIRIS MAC GEARAILT, Bramley Park, Castleknock, Dublin 15.