A chara, – Fr Con McGillicuddy pleads that Cardinal Seán Brady and former auxiliary bishops should not be vilified on the premise that they are “not perfect” (March 19th). There are many things that are “not perfect” but few of them will terrify children and ruin their lives. Such a deficient ascription to the raping and abusing of innocent children (not to mention the litany of cover-ups) is simply perverse and shows nothing but categorical failure to realise the magnitude of this shocking tragedy. – Is mise,

ALEX STAVELEY,

Turvey Walk,

Donabate,

Co Dublin.

Madam, – In 1975, the year the then Fr Seán Brady conducted his investigation on behalf of the Bishop of Kilmore, I was preparing to become a fully fledged professional social worker for the Eastern Health Board. My fulltime post-graduate course at UCD. led to the British qualification in professional social work which was the qualification required to practice in both Ireland and the UK. We were a class of 30 or so mature students who had already gained experience working for the health boards, the prison service, the psychiatric services and housing authorities. We were rigorously selected and supervised on our fieldwork placements. I completed the course and was adjudged competent to carry out all the duties that might be required of a social worker irrespective of the setting,including child protection.

Child protection was one of our concerns, but I can honestly say that at no time during the course was child sexual abuse ever mentioned. We were drilled in recognising what was called “non-accidental injury” and warned to be vigilant. Even as a fully qualified social worker I hardly knew that child sexual abuse existed, never mind knowing how to deal with it. There were no guidelines and no protocols, not even for professionals working for the health boards. If I had to deal with a case, which mercifully I did not, it would not have occurred to me to go to the Garda Síochána – and I was the health board representative.

I suspect that psychologists and psychiatrists did not go to the Garda either. We were profoundly ignorant of the nature and extent of child sexual abuse and paedophilia. It was not talked about; it was not written about; victims did not speak out; they were not interviewed on radio. Thirty-five years on, knowing what we know now, that seems incredible, but it was true for me and I suspect it was true for most of my professional colleagues whose job it was to know these things. We were all truly ignorant and with what we know now were terrible consequences. It puts Fr Seán Brady’s response into context. – Yours, etc,

Madam, – Cardinal Seán Brady complains that his actions of 35 years ago are being judged by today’s standards. This is not true.  They are being judged by standards laid down 2,000 years ago for dealing with child abusers: “Better that a millstone were hanged about his neck . . .”  – Yours, etc,

Madam, – I believe a grave injustice may be done in the name of “survival” at Aer Lingus to all cabin crew personnel because they conceded money and privileges too soon in the company’s interest. It would appear that the full story of the cabin crew perspective and their recent concessions are being ignored by management.

Martin Wall (Home News, March 11th) states, “All 1,200 cabin crew in the Republic are to be sent notice of termination of their employment next month and offered new contracts involving lower salary scales and change of work practice”. He also indicated 250 compulsory redundancies, with two weeks’ pay per year worked. (Other departments which supported the management cost-cutting offer will be paid six weeks’ pay on a voluntary redundancy basis.)

I question the morality of this thinking, the legality of this proposed action and the wisdom of pursuing a plan to cancel 1,200 jobs and expect young Irish men and women to crawl back on their knees and accept this brutal retribution with loyalty and commitment. Cabin crew have already made their contribution to the company and expect a just and dignified response. – Yours, etc,

Madam, – In discussing the extent of Ministerial accountability for hospital failures, Stephen Collins (Opinion, March 13th) sees no contradiction in arguing that health professionals should be held to account (ie culpable, as defined in the dictionary) for political failures.

Tallaght hospital is funded by the Health Service Executive to provide a quantum of service to patients in its catchment area. That funding arises on foot of an annual service plan prepared by the HSE and personally approved by the Minister for Health. The hospital’s staffing at consultant level is determined in law and in fact by the HSE. The hospital is prevented from recruiting other staff under the public service recruitment embargo.

Hospital budgets have been put under increasing strain as the nation’s fiscal situation has deteriorated. This difficulty is compounded by the HSE underestimating the demand for patient care in recent years.

There is a fundamental question that society must address. What is to happen if the service which the HSE contracts for in a given year is delivered by a hospital but the demand for that service exceeds its capacity to supply. It is for that reason the Irish Hospital Consultants Association argued that the HSE should not be responsible for any investigation into the Tallaght affair. That call has been echoed by others with an understanding of our health service structure and funding In a year when health budgets, excluding pay, are being cut by €400 million it is likely that other shortcomings will arise in service delivery. There is something inherently unjust in holding the messengers to account for a factor that may well be outside their control. – Yours, etc,

Madam, – The 2,200-page report published on the collapse of Lehman Brothers makes grim reading. The layman can rightly ask where the auditors were and how can they squirm away from the responsibility they owe people seeking to rely on their work – investors.

Given the importance of the banking sector to all our lives whether we like it or them (bankers) or not, there is now surely a very convincing case to have bank audits made the subject of government appointment and not subject to any fee tender pressure. The “Big Four” accountancy firms will always be the only realistic audit options for appointment but they should be regularly rotated to prevent the chance of any relationship developing between client and auditor which could colour judgment and independence – ­ the bedrock of an audit opinion.

Auditors should be like investigating Revenue officials – feared. The night before the audit starts should be a restless one for the banker rather than the present system which prevails where the investors toss and turn all night. – Yours, etc,

Madam, – Once again the British head of state is engaged in undermining the republican, egalitarian and separatist ethos of the sovereign Irish State. I refer to your report on the conferring of an honorary OBE by Queen Elizabeth II on the artistic director of the Gate Theatre Michael Colgan (Home News, March 18th). The intervention into our republican system by the British monarch to elevate chosen Irish citizens and to place them symbolically above their fellow Irish is an unwelcome intrusion into our political and civic space.

This is not a case of petty, mean-spirited anti-British rhetoric. It is an issue of fundamental political principle. We are a sovereign republic that has repudiated monarchy and imperialism. My views on these awards are no different to those of Canada, a country that has been a most loyal member of the Commonwealth. Because Canada is not a republic, Queen Elizabeth II is head of state. Nevertheless, when it comes to matters of citizenship and sovereignty, Canada takes a very firm line.

Despite the British ancestry of most of Canada’s population, no Canadian may accept a British knighthood or peerage unless he/she first renounces their Canadian citizenship.

In the past 20 years, the British monarch has bestowed in excess of 50 titles/awards on Irish citizens resident in the republic, as if they were her own British subjects. By accepting these awards and titles, the recipients become, objectively speaking, part of the British establishment. Inexplicably, the Irish Government has remained silent on this issue throughout.

The Irish State should adopt the same policy as Canada in this matter, and any Irish citizen who accepts a British title should be denied the privilege of Irish citizenship and surrender their Irish passport. The esteem and affection of one’s fellow citizens is the ultimate honour and accolade that can be bestowed on any person, for such an honour cannot be bought, sold or bartered. – Yours, etc,

Madam, – It was with great excitement that I landed in Dublin late last month for the first time in 10 years. Having first left Ireland in 1990 I have had limited opportunities to visit, but now I was eager to immerse my accompanying eight-year-old son in the rich Dublin culture that I remembered.

I expected the cold, the rain, the terrible traffic – what I did not expect was the cold reception, the guarded hostility, the general rudeness. Maybe I just had a bad experience.

Maybe Dublin has always been like this and I chose only to remember the good times. No matter, I left with neither regrets nor a great yearning to return. Dublin – yes, but in name only. – Yours, etc,

Madam, – Walking through the centre of Dublin following the parade on St Patrick’s Day, I immediately understood why our elected officials exit the country for the day. The streets were lined with fast food wrappers, empty bottles and various others items of rubbish alongside teenage drunks and puddles of vomit. A horrible sight at any time, but on our national holiday? – Yours, etc,

Madam, – The Oxford Concise Dictionary defines a myth as “traditional narrative usually involving supernatural or imaginary persons and often embodying popular ideas on natural or social phenomena, etc.”

The attendance of 650,000 persons reported in your headline (Home News, March 18th) as attending the Dublin St Patrick’s Day parade has by now surely entered into the realms of Patrician mythology along with the snakes and shamrocks. What a fabulous number, 200 people squashed into every linear metre of the route. It could only be a miracle.

And whom do we have to thank for this startling statistic? Why the organisers, of course. To paraphrase Mandy Rice-Davies during one of the Profumo affair trials in 1963 when Lord Astor denied ever meeting or having an affair with her: Well they would, wouldn’t they? – Yours, etc,

Madam, – Regarding September 1913and all that, (Editorial, March 17th), what a pity successive ministers for finance couldn’t foretell the death of the Irish economy. Bankers, pass by! – Yours, etc,