Could this bring the Boyne Valley planners to their senses?
Submitted by AngieLake on Sunday, 29 August 2004 Page Views: 4433
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Joe Horgan writes in this week's Irish Post, Fantasy Ireland:
It is not really about the environment, social justice, or even a fair distribution of the wealth generated in the last 10 years in this country. All of those things come into it, but it is essentially about something else.
When we discuss the development of Ireland we are only really discussing one core theme, and that is just what kind of country do we want? What is Ireland going to be?
To be on one side of this debate is easy. Any argument can be buttressed with the words 'progress' and 'modern' and 'future' and the case is set. To be on the other side is more complex, especially if you are an outsider.
When the protestors took to the trees in Wicklow, to try and save the remnants of ancient Irish woodland from another new road, coverage focused intensely on the fact that they were primarily people from outside the state. Many people have suggested that this often ties in with an old view of nature as being preserved by those within the walls of the demesne whilst the real Irish tried to survive on the land for real, not as a realm of the imagination.
But is there only one way of being modern; is there only one future? And what kind of country are we? Is there more to this nation than the economy? Is there more to being Irish than our pockets?
Thank God, we may have defeated the scourge of poverty at long last in Ireland, though with a country that has levels of inequality comparable to the USA many would dispute that. But what now? Now that we've won what are we going to do with the spoils? If nothing else matters but the economy then we should just say so. We should just say that money calls all the shots and that beliefs and principles have no place in modern Ireland.
When Bertie Ahern, in trying to save the Government's doomed decentralisation plans for the civil service, argued that Dubliners could all build mansions down in the country, he maybe said more than he intended to. Apart from revealing the crass love of wealth that his government has epitomised he also revealed that to the powers that be the Irish countryside is merely a place awaiting development.
Fair enough, but then let us just say it. Let us say that rural Ireland is a place for developers to build holiday homes and make money and for affluent city dwellers to invest in second and third properties. Let us admit that it has no intrinsic value and that environment, habitat and wildlife are irrelevant. Let us be clear about it and just say that.
Let us go further and say that all the conservationists and all the tree huggers are washed-up old hippies and probably not even Irish. Come on let's not beat about the bush. No more government ministers paying meaningless lip service to the preservation of the rural environment and Bord Failte pretences about a different pace of life. The countryside is to be suburbanised and the cities serviced by a network of broad motorways. Let us just admit that we are secretly ashamed of any hint of backwardness, that the only priniciple is the making of money and that tourist Ireland is worth keeping only as long as it is profitable in terms of ripping off enough people each year.
After all, Mary Harney spoke honestly recently about how the only principle was the market place and that for those who didn't make it, well, that was just unfortunate. She stated clearly her values - let the rest of them do the same. Come clean. All cards on the table. Ireland? Well, okay, the whole thing is for sale, the whole lot. How much cash have you got?
Of course, that could all be wrong. It may be the case that there is a debate going on at governmental level with regards to the future of the country, rather than a continuous cosying up to whichever financial master is spending this week. Perhaps the government really does intend to implement all of the environmental legislation that Europe is hounding it to do. Perhaps it really does care about the country outside of the context of the economy and the market. Perhaps we are still more than that.
In the 1950s and 1960s when the areas around the Boyne Valley and Tara were being excavated archaeologists were told by local people about rumours regarding one of the sites. These rumours aside, there was no strong evidence to suggest that the opening at Newgrange in Co. Meath would have an aperture that on the day of the winter solstice was so perfectly aligned that it would light up the whole inner chamber. it had been overgrown and hidden for perhaps a thousand years. Yet, remarkably, a local memory of sorts survived.
Okay, by many values both the Newgrange site itself and the tendril of memory around it are worthless. In the world of market they are both of little value. Far less value anyway than the planned motorway that will cut through the area and contain two tolls along it which will further enrich the investors.
If we are now a nation that attaches no value to such things, then let us just say so. If the financial backers of motorways and tolls hold sway let's just say so. If prehistoric wonders like Newgrange, if landscape, wildlife, people and culture have no value, are not worth investing in, let's just say so and be done with the whole thing.
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