Sir, – Padraig Cribben, chief executive of the Vintner’s Federation of Ireland (VFI), wants an explanation from the Government as to why Irish pubs remain shut while pubs in every other European country are reopening (News, September 2nd).
Why have pubs been singled out for special treatment in the context of a political establishment that is usually only too willing to harmonise policies with those of our EU partners?
Publicans will be aware of the rise of anti-alcohol activism in Ireland and its disproportionate influence over public health policy.
Despite consumption declining in the past decade, neo-prohibitionists are set on denormalising drink and have been emboldened by the Public Health (Alcohol) Act 2018, a strategic victory in their war on alcohol that imposed a raft of restrictions on the display of drink in supermarkets and set a minimum price for its sale.
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Neo-prohibitionists were not going to rest on their laurels, however, and the Covid-19 crisis has given them an opportunity to further gaslight the general public about their drinking habits during lockdown, while demanding politicians slap more levies and bans on drink to avert armageddon.
Another reason may relate to demographics. Pubs in rural Ireland are frequented most by that segment of the population – ordinary middle-aged men – who have been written off in recent years as our nation emerged from the shadows of patriarchal oppression into the sunlit uplands of cosmopolitan liberalism. For these men, avocado toast could be the name of a horse in the 3.30pm at Haydock. That they might be experiencing loneliness as a result of the social dislocation created by closed pubs is of no concern to the metropolitan elites who decide what’s in all our best interests.
Finally, pubs have always been places where the spread of information and exchange of ideas happens in an organic way, unmediated by the State. They are a place where grown men and women can talk politics and make their own minds up about important matters of the day.
One can imagine Sweden’s rate of Covid-19 compared to Ireland’s is not a topic the Government wants widely discussed for another few months. – Yours, etc,
PHILIP DONNELLY,
Clane,
Kildare.