Sir, - Mr Austin Deasy's suggestion that the State should embark on a programme of birth control for travellers is not as fabulous or as unbelievable as you may think. Other countries have already tried to deal with "problem" groups in this way.
I refer to Nazi Germany's policy of controlling the gypsy population and those afflicted with what it termed "inherited feeble mindedness" by a system of birth control using legally enforced sterilisation. As the world now knows enforced sterilisation was subsequently replaced by the final solution. The moral I draw from this admittedly crude summary of the history of genocide is that when the State thinks that it has right of life over people then nasty things invariably happen.
Can I infer from his Dail statement that Mr Deasy agrees with the Chinese government's "one child" policy, involving as it does strict birth control which is supplemented as necessary (after all accidents happen) by enforced sterilisation and abortion? The Chinese also claim that they are acting out of necessity because they are unable to provide adequately for their rapidly growing population? - Yours, etc.,
Seaview Terrace,
Dublin 4.