Dear Santa . . . a letter from Ireland

Talking Property:WE KNOW it's been a very long time since we last wrote to you and indeed, we wouldnt be bothering you now, at a time when you are so hectically busy, if we didnt truly believe that you were our last hope. As youre probably well aware, given that the NPN (North Pole News) covered the story in graphic detail, things haven't been great in Ireland for some time now, but of late, we've reached an all-time low.

Firstly however, we feel we must point out that although you saw fit to give us nothing but coal in our Christmas stockings for the last couple of years, we assure you that unlike Portugal, Spain and Greece, the Irish people were most grateful for your gift as without it, we may not even have survived the last few bitter winters of discontent.

Of course, you of all people, will know if we’ve been naughty or nice over the past 12 months but we beg you to be particularly forgiving and understanding this Christmas, given that our nerves are somewhat frayed and frazzled after three years of austerity, hardship and deprivation.

Now, just to be crystal clear about this Santa, where we are beseeching you to look on us favourably, this is not a begging letter as such, as we no longer covet luxury goods such as private jets, helicopters, four-wheel drives, minimalist mansions and designer clothes. In fact, weve gone clean off all of that stuff of late.

Indeed, if we had one magic Christmas wish, it would be to turn back the clock to 2005 (a year before things got completely out of control) where we would auction off every single square inch of our little island to the highest international bidders and convert the sale proceeds into gold bars, which we’d then hide under the beds in our (rented) homes. Needless to say, we’d also have astutely avoided investing in bank shares, pension funds and property syndicates. But since it’s unlikely that even you, Santa Claus, can turn back the clock, we ask instead for the following:

If you could possible spell it out clearly to the Irish Government, the IMF, EU and the ECB that our national economic mess and our bank crash are two separate and distinct problems and should not be bundled together for the sake of saving the euro.

You might also remind them that there are limits to how much pain we can take, all in the name of saving our corrupt lending institutions. And forcing us to pay 5.8 per cent interest on our loan in the hope that such a punitive fee will put off other countries from following our lead is simply ridiculous, as no sovereign state in its right mind would purposely choose to go down this rocky route.

And while your at it, get the ECB to admit to having made a complete cock-up of stress testing Irish banks, force it to own up to having lent the same banks far too much money in the first place, get them to agree to burn the bond holders and insist that they reduce our interest rate to 3 per cent.

We’re pretty sure that you, Santa, could find some nice safe Canadian financial institutions to buy our beleaguered banks and return them to normal, conservative lending practices. (We promise that we’ve learnt our lesson and never want to hear about a 100 per cent mortgage again, for as long as we live.) And in order to avoid adding to the growing number of people defaulting on their loans and having their homes repossessed, you might consider putting your team of elves to work on renegotiating homeowners’ mortgages.

And, since you Santa, are well used to living in arctic temperatures in the North Pole, we’d happily take your advice on ways of keeping warm as were just not used to surviving in sub-zero temperatures for prolonged periods and we get the distinct feeling, that apart from climatic changes, we’re also being frozen out of it by our European neighbours.

If you get a moment, you might also ask Rudolf and his mates if they wouldn’t mind taking over from our current team of leaders, who keep going off track and losing direction. Unfortunately, we can’t even rely on our backup team either, as they haven’t pulled the sleigh for so long now, that they are unlikely to remember how to do it properly.

And Mrs Claus might be so kind as to open a rest home in Lapland for deranged estate agents, who are in dire need of care and counselling as they’re still of the firm belief that they’re extremely busy, working hard and successfully managing to sell numerous properties at “decent” prices. (Sad, but nothing that a few months rest and relaxation wouldn’t cure.)

We hope we haven’t asked for too much from you, but despite complaining on the Joe Duffy show and marching in the snow, our requests have fallen on deaf ears., You, dear Santa, are our last resort. In grateful anticipation, love from Isabel and her exhausted compatriots.

Isabel Morton is property consultant