Letters: Time to cop on and demand widespread action as rich countries pollute while poor get poorer

This annual conference is being held this year in the United Arab Emirates, which has the world’s biggest climate-busting oil plans.

The state oil company has the largest net-zero-busting expansion plans of any company in the world.

A recent report by Oxfam suggests the richest 1pc in the world cause as much global warming as 66pc of the entire global population.

Even in Ireland, the report suggests the richest 10pc of the population are responsible for 27pc of our greenhouse gas emissions.

With their private planes, yachts, gas-guzzlers and lavish lifestyles, the biggest polluters are the richest nations on the planet.

China has 1,118 coal-fired power plants and rising, India has 285, the US 225, Japan 92, Indonesia 87, Russia 71 and Germany 63. Ireland has one, at Moneypoint, after closing down Bord na Móna, and we are now importing peat briquettes from Latvia, causing much transport pollution.

How clever is that? These are the wealthy countries that will make the rules at Cop28. The rich cause climate change and the poor countries suffer the consequences.

Last year at Cop27 in Egypt, the conference agreed that a Loss and Damage Fund should be set up, whereby poorer countries suffering the worst effects of climate change would be helped financially.

But no agreement was reached on who was going to pay the piper. Will that change this year? Probably not, as no one wants to talk about the elephant in the room while the rich get richer and the poor get a few crumbs from the rich table and suffer the extremes of climate change.

The world needs to cop on before future generations suffer the consequences of major inaction by our super-rich present-day elite and apparently non-caring nations.

Tom Towey, Cloonacool, Co Sligo

It’s particularly poignant that MacGowan should die in run-up to Christmas

The death of Shane MacGowan in the run-up to Christmas adds to its pathos.

His duet with Kirsty MacColl on Fairytale of New York is an iconic image of our times, and the song itself is a classic in the history of popular music.

Suaimhneas síoraí dá anam uasal gaelach.

John Glennon, Hollywood, Co Wicklow

Poet Shane’s lyrical genius was a generous gift from Ireland to English music

Farewell, Shane MacGowan, a man who straddled the grey area inhabited by second-generation Irish across the Irish Sea.

Having emigrated to England while young from the west of Ireland, I came across hundreds of Irish who knew they would never get back and hundreds more whose identity was daily challenged – were they Irish or were they English? Both sides often rejected them.

Shane fused it into poetry and turned it into music.

Like Morrissey, Marr, the rest of the Smiths, Stone Roses, Dexys and Kevin Rowland and, indeed, the Beatles, Shane MacGowan was the gift to English music from Ireland.

Rum, Sodomy and the Lash was the coda for a strand of the Celt. His Rainy Night in Soho was from God.

John Cuffe, Co Meath

McEntee’s choice of words in Dáil concerning city riots serves only to divide

I was disappointed at the language used by Justice Minister Helen McEntee in the Dáil when discussing the riots in Dublin in the aftermath of the horrific knife attacks on innocent children and their carers.

This type of language is very divisive and contributes to the alienation of certain sections of our community.

I appreciate there is anger in society arising from these riots, but this anger should be directed in a more appropriate fashion by discussing fairly the circumstances that contributed to the violence occurring.

I have heard very little discussion about the innocent people injured in the knife attacks and the gardaí injured while responding to the riots.

In the midst of all these discussions, let us remember the five-year-old girl who remains in a critical condition in hospital.

Eamonn O’Hara, Manorcunningham, Co Donegal

Rescue of mineworkers in India in stark contrast to bombs falling elsewhere

Reading Thursday’s report by Shweta Shams makes one appreciate how sweet life is (‘Tunnel collapse survivors prayed, never lost hope’, Irish Independent, November 30).

While 41 mine workers were being rescued from an Indian tunnel after being trapped deep inside for 17 days following a structural collapse, preparations were being made elsewhere in the world to bomb and annihilate our fellow humans.

When are we ever going to learn?

Leo Gormley, Dundalk, Co Louth

It’s beyond shameful that anyone in Ireland should be forced to sleep in a tent

I read with dismay of plans to house refugees and asylum-seekers in tents because of a lack of alternative accommodation.

It is beyond shameful that anyone in this wealthy country should be forced to sleep on the streets in sub-zero temperatures while large buildings remain empty.

I say to people protesting against the arrival of people who need shelter: Whatever about your concerns, where is your humanity?

We can welcome people to this wonderful village and work with the authorities and our political representatives to make sure this community has the services and supports it needs. Will you help?

Bernie Linnane, Dromahair, Co Leitrim

Gardaí shackled by rules while wrongdoers bang on about their ‘rights’

“Once upon a time”, as the late, great Michael P O’Connor used to say, gardaí would go out to work and, if necessary, arrest and handcuff law-breakers and bring them before the courts.

But now, lo and behold, things have changed.

Gardaí have to handcuff themselves while criminals seemingly do what they like.

It’s truly incredible the amount of rights the wrongdoers have. It reminds one of the old saying about the lunatics running the asylum.

Of course, there are no such things as lunatics, just those wonderful and marvellous misunderstood people.

You have to wonder who makes these rules – no doubt it is the Intelligent Democratic Individuals of This State (Idiots).

The only question remaining is: Will we all live happily ever after?

T Donoghue, Doocastle, Co Mayo

Give hard-pressed farmers a break – they contribute enormously to economy

Monday’s early evening TV news on RTÉ One correctly reported that Irish agricultural exports increased by 22pc to €19bn last year.

RTÉ then stated that agriculture is responsible for one-third of Ireland’s greenhouse gas emissions. This leaves the public thinking we should greatly reduce farm food production when the opposite is actually the case.

Why did they not say that Ireland’s farm-produced food has the lowest carbon footprint in Europe and the lowest in the world in the case of dairy, so any reduction in Irish food production will be replaced by products with a much higher carbon footprint and increase the world emissions?

Ireland is known internationally as a natural, quality food-producing country. Our food exports are important to our national economy.

Why do our authorities and RTÉ keep wrongly discrediting our hard-working farmers and their produce at every opportunity, especially seeing that Teagasc research has shown farmers’ income has fallen by 44pc this year while the price of their produce has hardly reduced in retail outlets?

Where would Ireland be without the farmers? Our food exports would suffer badly. So, please, let us stop the anti-farmer campaign.

David Thompson, Co Limerick

One was soon put in one’s place when one started putting on airs and graces

Sean O’Byrne’s letter regarding restaurant staff addressing customers as “guys” reminded me of an incident in my working life.

I approached a customer and said: “May one help you?”

He replied: “I’m not sure – perhaps it might take two of ye.”

Tom Gilsenan, Beaumont, Dublin 9