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I was watching a tennis match on TV earlier this year, when I saw a young player throwing a tantrum. He has just turned nineteen years of age and has enough talent to suggest he is going to be a star in the future. An exciting prospect for sure, but he went downhill in my estimation after his antics on court, not that my opinion will upset him too much.

During one game, when things weren’t going his way, he began screaming at the box where his family and his support team were sitting. He was speaking in a foreign language but one of the commentators suggested he was ordering his mother to leave the viewing area. Shortly after his outburst, she did just that. Later at the press conference, he denied shouting at his mother and said he was aiming his tirade at someone else.

At the end of the match, both players approached the net where the etiquette of the game requires them to shake hands. The exchange wasn’t captured clearly on TV, but the young lad didn’t appear to shake hands. The surprised look on the face of his opponent seemed to indicate that no hand was proffered. That’s unacceptable but he later denied that accusation too.

I felt sorry for his parents. I don’t know anything about the family, but I do know a little about tennis and that young man would not be where he is today without the support of his parents. A player doesn’t get to that standard on talent alone and it doesn’t happen overnight either. It begins at a young age and takes a serious commitment by the family over many years.

They have obviously invested heavily in him, not only financially, but also in the time spent transporting him to and from training sessions and tournaments. He would do well to remember that but at the moment, it looks like his memory is failing him. He’s had it good for so long, he now feels entitled to behave as he sees fit.

It will be interesting to see how he develops as he matures but his current behaviour won’t do his reputation or his popularity much good. He’s acting like a spoiled young man who sees himself as the centre of the Universe, there to be loved and admired by the rest of us. A trait that is becoming all too common unfortunately.

I have said here previously that the vast majority of people I came into contact with during my thirty-five years as a member of An Garda Siochana were decent and honest. Regular people going through their daily routines while dealing with the ups and downs in life that we all have to cope with. It was only the very small minority who created problems.

The same can be said about young people and children. 95% of them were well behaved but I am beginning to see a changing pattern. I feel there is less respect for older people, property and authority now and I’m not the only one who has noticed it.

The Times UK reported recently that the plight of Britain’s schoolchildren has reached a post-pandemic crisis point. They’ve seen a rise in pupils behaving badly as well as children being sad, depressed, and anxious and their behaviour issues included defiance and violence.

Covid is being blamed for some of this, but I think it started long before the pandemic. I reckon it has to do with how difficult it is to challenge children for bad behaviour these days. My teacher friends tell me that correcting a child’s behaviour in school is fraught with danger and will often result in a confrontation with the parents. Not always confined to school grounds either.

Many parents don’t even recognise bad behaviour for what it is. Children stepping out of line, are often described as just expressing themselves. The problem with allowing them to ‘express themselves’ unchecked is that they grow up with a sense of entitlement and a belief they can do what they like.

There was a time when being corrected by teachers was normal. They weren’t afraid to challenge bad behaviour when they saw it and we were better for it. Admittedly, some of them took discipline to extremes but the gratuitous violence of old school days is long gone.

It’s no longer acceptable to slap a child. That’s now considered to be a physical attack, punishable under the Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act 1997 in the same way as any assault on an adult, or the Cruelty Against Children Act 2001. That shouldn’t mean children can’t be chastised though.

Gone are the days when it was acceptable to get a clip around the ear which is fair enough but looking back on it, I think for the majority of us, it was the shock more than the contact that hurt us. It certainly wasn’t brutal but now we’ve gone the other way and these days you can’t say boo to a child.

The modern approach is different. This is advice on how to deal with a difficult child is offered on the Internet:

If your child walks out the door after you’ve told them they can’t leave, or your child calls you a name, set the boundary: “I will not let you disrespect me” or “I won’t allow hurtful language in this home” or “I trust you will find a different way to deal with your frustration.”

Harsh consequences for disrespectful behaviour can sometimes just fuel the fire. Remember that discipline means “to teach,” show you child what kind behaviour looks like by responding with a hug.

If my generation disrespected our parents, there wasn’t much of a discussion about it and a hug was the last thing you expected.

The death penalty is a controversial subject at the best of times, and I have mixed views on it. I must admit there were times during my service in An Garda Siochana when I supported it. In fact, there were a few occasions, when I would gladly have flipped the switch myself. The subject has arisen in conversations again recently following the conviction of Stephen Silver.

Silver was jailed for life for the capital murder of Detective Garda Colm Horkan. He shot the garda eleven times, but he will not be executed. Up until 1990, the capital murder of a garda, a prison officer or a diplomat was punishable by execution in Ireland, but the death penalty was abolished in 1990 and replaced with a 40-year mandatory sentence.

The last person to be legally executed in this jurisdiction was Michael Manning, a 25-year-old Limerick man. In 1954, Manning was executed by hanging at Mountjoy Prison in Dublin, where he was later buried in an unmarked grave. According to irishcentral.com he was found guilty of the rape and murder of Catherine Cooper (65) who worked at Barrington’s Hospital in the city.

The defence team had claimed insanity and wanted the charges reduced to manslaughter as Manning had not planned the attack in advance. While there was a history of mental health issues in his family the judge sided with the prosecution and told the jury to discard the argument, as he claimed the fact that Manning has shoved clods of grass into the victim’s mouth to stop her screaming showed he was aware of the crime he was committing.

Around that same time, there a campaign to have the death penalty abolished and in 1964, under Charles Haughey as Minister for Justice, the death penalty was abolished except for cases involving the murder of a garda or a prison officer.

Noel and Marie Murray were convicted of the capital murder of Garda Michael Reynolds following an armed robbery in Dublin in 1975. However, their capital conviction was overturned, and they received a life sentence.

Noel Callan and Michael McHugh were sentenced to death for the murder of Sergeant Patrick Morrissey following a robbery in County Louth in 1985. Their capital conviction was also overturned, and they were sentenced to 40 years in prison. A decision that wasn’t popular with many members of An Garda Siochana or the Defence Forces at the time.

Unlike Manning, Stephen Silver will not be hanged but will serve a prison sentence instead. The judge sentenced him to life imprisonment in accordance with the Criminal Justice Act 1990 and specified that he must serve a minimum of 40 years in prison.

That same Act permits remission for good behaviour, so Silver could apply for parole after serving 30 years. He will be in his mid-seventies before he can be considered for release by a parole board. Whether you agree with that or not is a moot point because that’s the system we use now. Opponents of the death penalty would argue that’s a good thing.

They cite examples of prisoners who have been executed for crimes they didn’t commit. That, of course, is an injustice that can never be rectified so for that reason alone, there are many who campaign for its abolishment. For them, life in prison is the preferred choice of punishment.

In the US, jurors have the option of sentencing convicted capital murderers to life in prison without the possibility of parole. That keeps them off the streets for good and also allows for mistakes to be corrected.

That option though, puts an onus on the State to mind them for the rest of their natural lives at enormous expense to the taxpayer but opponents would argue that years of endless appeals can be just as expensive. They also say that some family members of victims feel the death penalty doesn’t ease their pain. In fact, it can often add to it because the process can be lengthy and can prolong the agony for the family.

On the other hand, supporters say the death penalty gives closure to the victim’s families. The criminal is no longer around to haunt them, and the execution brings finality to the tragic event. DNA testing can now effectively eliminate all doubt as to a person’s guilt or innocence and while we can never be 100% certain, it’s as close as you can get.

Another interesting question though is at what point does an execution become pointless? If a prisoner on death row develops a terminal illness and is certain to die, is there really a need to go ahead with an execution? Or if an inmate becomes afflicted with dementia and can no longer remember what his crime was, is it right to execute him if he doesn’t understand why he is being punished in the first place?

Doyle Hamm was 61 and terminally ill with lymphatic cancer when Alabama tried to execute him in 2018. Hamm’s failing health rendered it impossible for prison officials to find a usable vein after hours of trying. He eventually died after a long illness in 2021.

In Ohio, officials tried and failed to execute Alva Campbell, who was already dying of cancer He was unable to walk, used a colostomy bag and required four breathing treatments per day. Officials called off the execution in 2017 after they couldn’t find a vein, and Campbell later died in his cell of natural causes.

In 2018, Vernon Madison was facing execution in Alabama even though he couldn’t remember his crime. Several strokes and dementia had wiped out his memory of murdering a police officer in 1985. The US Supreme Court ruled that people cannot be executed if they don’t understand why they are being punished. Hard to disagree with that.

I was out walking before the clocks went forward recently. It was early in the evening, but it was just starting to get dark. As I passed the local garda station in Cobh, I noticed the building was in complete darkness. From the quayside, it looked like nobody was home and for some reason I felt a little pang of sadness.

For those not familiar with Cobh, the garda station is adjacent to the railway station and behind the Heritage Centre if you know where that is. It’s a modern building, originally designed to roughly resemble the shape of a ship when viewed from the sea.

Back when it was built twenty or so years ago, it was heralded as a state-of-the-art facility. Minister of State for Rural Development at the time, Ned O’Keeffe, former TD for Cork East, described the location as being eminently suitable.

He also said, “The garda station in Cobh was extremely important when the town was the main emigrant centre and one of this country’s most important ports which is why the station achieved the status of being a superintendent’s headquarters. It was a most influential place.”

He added, “Now Cobh garda station, in common with all those situated along Ireland’s coasts, is assuming strategic importance once again – this time in the fight against drug smuggling. I am sure the new facility will be the ideal base for all the activities of a modern garda force.”

It was to accommodate 40 personnel including a superintendent, an inspector, four sergeants and about 30 gardai. It is catering for a smaller group now having lost its status as a District Headquarters. The superintendent is long gone. The strategic importance assigned to the garda station in Cobh by Ned O’Keeffe has been given less credence by those who came after him.

Mr. O’Keeffe was right to be enthused by the location of the new station. It has an unobstructed view of the harbour with plenty of space for parking but on the downside, it removed the gardai from the centre of town.

The old garda station was located in Westbourne Place, a few doors up from the Commodore Hotel and across the road from The Promenade. It was a hub of activity and a prime location in the heart of the town. The building was old and had become unsuitable from a policing perspective but maybe a renovation project could have remedied that issue but in any event, it was vacated in favour of a new build.

As a teenager I remember that premises being at the centre of things. There was always someone coming and going, and it was normal to see gardai walking around the streets. I reckon that’s how many of us who later joined An Garda Siochana, first got interested in the job. From watching these guys in action on a daily basis. We knew them by name too – they were familiar to us.

Times have changed. It’s rare to see a garda on the beat anywhere these days and Cobh is no different. The manpower isn’t there in the first place and, and garda management has other priorities for the men and women in blue.

Yet, according to their website, An Garda Síochána is in and of the community and community policing is the key to and at the core of the ethos of the organisation. That sounds great but I’m not seeing any evidence of that ethos at the moment.

Maybe the concept of community policing has changed dramatically since I retired, but in my experience, over 35 years, the essence of community policing was engagement. That meant being out and about and mixing with the community. That’s not happening currently but maybe we could turn it around.

The present garda station is underutilised and under resourced and it doesn’t look like that’s going to change. It would make a perfect spot for a hotel. It’s a quiet location with great views, buckets of room for parking, easy access to the railway station and within walking distance of the town and it seems the timing couldn’t be better.

According to a report in the Irish Examiner, a former bank on South Mall is to be converted into a hotel “the likes of which Cork has never seen.” It is one of five planned hotels in the city which between them will add over 700 beds.

Cork City is experiencing a hotel building boom, with a new €45m, 190-bed Premier Inn nearing completion on the former Moore’s Hotel site on Morrison’s Island. On Camden Quay, across from the Opera House, work is well advanced on transforming another building into a 150-bed hotel and the owners are planning to open a Moxy Hotel and Residence Inn on the site, the first Marriott-branded hotel in Cork City.

Planning permission was also granted for redevelopment of a property on South Terrace into a 103-bed aparthotel and a fifth project has plans for a 220-bed hotel and offices on the site of the former tax office on O’Sullivan’s Quay.

All this activity suggests there is a demand for hotel beds. A recent Fáilte Ireland survey said hotel occupancy levels in Cork County reached 86% last June, at the height of the summer months so how about this?

Let’s take advantage of this boom and convert the present garda station into a hotel. That would provide additional accommodation for visitors to the area and the proceeds of the sale could be used to purchase a suitable premises in the centre of town. A building that could be adapted to function as a police station with a reduced garda workforce.

It would also relocate the members of An Garda Siochana back among the people and may even inspire a return to community engagement.

My mother-in-law, Moyra Swords, celebrated her 100^th birthday at a function in Cobh in 2019. Her party was held in a local hotel, and she was one of the last to leave in the early hours of the morning. She was very fortunate to have enjoyed amazing health right up to the time she died in her 101^st year. Not everyone is as lucky but that could be about to change.

Advancements in medicine, science and engineering have us all living longer. Early detection and successful cures for the various illnesses are vital for our survival. The medical profession no longer relies upon human and animal excrement as a cure-all remedy for diseases and injuries. No longer is donkey, dog, gazelle and fly dung celebrated for their healing properties and their ability to ward off bad spirits.

I’m not sure how they considered it to be good for us in the first place, but I would want to be seriously ill before I’d let anyone smear me with poo regardless of where it came from.

Insects are in the news again though in relation to medical matters. I read recently that scientists have discovered ants may be able to detect cancer in urine at an early stage in patients. Apparently, some cancers alter the smell of piddle and ants can pick up on it.

According to the experts, ants are fast learners and easy to train and could be used to determine whether you have a tumour or not. So far, experiments have shown that ants were able to tell the difference between mice who had cancer and those who didn’t by smelling their urine. We’ll see how that works out.

Hordes of scientists around the world are constantly searching for cures for our ailments and it’s only a matter of time before they find a remedy for cancer. Professor Luke O’Neill, the man we all came to know during the Pandemic, speculates that there will be a treatment for many of the diseases that we’re afflicted with as we get older, like arthritis, Alzheimer’s disease and heart problems.

He reckons they might be close to discovering something else too. He said scientists working in Harvard Medical School have discovered what they claim is effectively an ageing clock that can speed up or reverse the ageing process in mice. This discovery is causing a lot of excitement in the research community.

They have also reversed ageing in human cells grown in the lab so that suggests what they achieved in mice might also be possible in humans. So, it would seem it’s no longer a question of if rejuvenation is possible, but more a question of when.

Luke poses an interesting question though. If it was possible to take twenty years off your age and make your skin look twenty years younger while at the same time returning your muscle strength to what it was twenty years ago would you opt for it? If your vision and hearing could also be restored to what it was decades earlier, would you be tempted to take a chance? I’m not sure I would. It seems to me like tempting fate.

It’s a bit like ‘clocking’ the odometer in a car. Not so long ago it was common practice for unscrupulous car sellers to turn back a car’s mileage. Knocking a few thousand miles off the clock made the car more desirable because it gave the impression there was less wear and tear on the engine which would give the new owner extra years of trouble-free motoring.

I’m not sure if it still goes on with the modern cars but it is an offence under consumer protection law for a trader to give false, misleading or deceptive information about the history of a car and there’s good reasons for that.

Buying a clocked car could turn out to be expensive as well as dangerous. If you don’t know what the proper mileage is, then you can’t judge the real condition of the car, and parts that you think should be in good working order might be at the point where they are about to fail.

So, basically, if you purchase a car with the mileage reversed, you don’t know what you’re buying. You could be letting yourself in for a ton of trouble, so it makes sense not to do it. That seems similar to reversing the aging process. Trying to cheat the body into believing it’s younger than it actually is doesn’t sound very inviting to me.

There’s something else to consider too. I came across an article in the Times UK about scientists who are trying to build new appendages for the body from extra thumbs to third arms and even tentacles that can be attached to and controlled by humans.

Researchers have already developed an extra thumb that can be fitted to a hand and controlled wirelessly by your toes via pressure sensors, allowing its wearer to unscrew a bottle, thread a needle, or peel a banana. They believe the future of prosthetics could lie not only in creating replacements for lost or injured limbs, but also in creating augmentations to help humans perform tasks more easily.

Scientists have already created neuro-prosthetic hands which can be linked to the body’s nerves, allowing the wearer to control the movements of the fingers and grasp objects using only their thoughts. Most of the extra appendages under development are controlled by the feet or via breathing.

So where are we headed? Well, there was a time when our average life expectancy was three score and ten, but we’ve seen how that has changed already. Reversing the ageing process, eliminating terminal diseases and replacing damaged organs with manufactured ones could keep us going forever.

Not sure I like that idea.

Is there A Drug Problem in Cork? That was a question posed at a meeting held in the Metropole Hotel in Cork city back in 1983. It was a meeting of the Cork Speakers Club which was a kind of forerunner of the Joint Policing Committee (JPC) meetings we’ve become familiar with in recent times.

The Cork Examiner reported on that meeting, and it seems all the movers and shakers in the city were there along with a panel of speakers with only one question to answer. Does Cork have a drugs problem? While the answer was yes, the seriousness of the problem was a matter of divergence and overall, the general impression was that alcoholism was a far more serious issue.

As far as the garda representative at the meeting was concerned, there was a growing drug abuse problem in Ireland, especially in Dublin, and while the problem could not be classed as alarming and was not out of hand, he agreed it did appear to be growing.

The Medical Council Research Board, an independent body, had found that the drug problem in Galway, Dublin and Cork was minimal while the Southern Health Board had found it “minimal and containable.”

Professor R. J. Daly, Dept. of Psychiatry, U.C.C., and Clinical Director, Southern Health Board, said Cork had a problem with the national panic about drugs and with the gross misinformation concerning the levels of illegal drug abuse and appropriate responses on the part of the community and health services. He questioned the sources of this information on the levels of drug addiction describing it as hot gossip.

It’s easy to be critical in hindsight but there was a limited understanding of the seriousness of the growing drugs problem back then. You could argue that what was happening in other jurisdictions abroad, and in our own capital city, should have created more awareness, but there was one man at that meeting who was more informed than the others.

The then Lord Mayor of Cork, Mr. John Dennehy, disagreed with previous speakers and suggested they were facing a very serious problem. He pointed out that at least six people had already died from drugs in the Cork area.

He was right to be concerned because we were heading into an epidemic. Dublin was awash with drugs and that scourge wasn’t going to remain within the Pale.

When I went to Dublin in 1980 as a young member of An Garda Siochana, I was immediately struck by the extent of the illicit drug problem in the capital. The Dunne family were the main criminal gang at that time, and they controlled the heroin market. The stuff was everywhere.

Heroin was destroying communities to such an extent that President Hillery vowed to make the dangers of drug abuse the main focus of his second term of office when he was sworn in in 1983. He said his background as a medical doctor made him acutely conscious of the problems of drug abuse and he intended to concentrate on that issue.

He planned to invite the various interest groups involved in fighting the problem of drug abuse to a meeting in order to forge closer links between the different bodies. He wanted doctors, the gardai and social workers to meet him in Aras an Uachtarain to work out a strategy which would give them a common bond in combating the drugs problem in this country.

I don’t know if that materialised or not, but it did show that he was progressive in his thinking. He obviously had an awareness that the drug situation was escalating and presented a serious risk to communities everywhere. 

Fast forward forty years to 2023 and we are still dealing with the issue. As reported in The Echo, Chief Superintendent Tom Myers, speaking at a meeting of the Cork City Joint Policing Committee addressed concerns regarding the visibility of drugs in the city centre.

He acknowledged that drug dealing in Cork City continues to represent a “big challenge” to gardaí, and vowed to continue to target the individuals who are “destroying our communities”. He accepted that drugs are in every corner of the city now.

Fianna Fáil councillor Colm Kelleher said he witnessed open drug taking in the city centre on a Sunday afternoon on Patrick Street. He has been steadfast in his support of a supervised injection centre (SIF) for Cork City and said his faith in the idea was further solidified following a recent visit to a city in New York.

Mr. Kelleher discovered a supervised injection facility in Rochester in Upstate New York, and since it was delivered, they’ve seen an 84%-85% reduction in open drug use within their city.

Cork City Council chief executive Ann Doherty suggested that a meeting could be sought with the Minister of State at the Department of Health, Hildegarde Naughton, with a view to progressing the matter.

Back in 2011, through my involvement in community policing, I started a conversation around introducing a supervised injecting facility to Cork city. I gathered the main stakeholders together and we had a series of meetings. Progress was slow because the topic was controversial. There were many potential pitfalls from a policing, political and health perspective but we drove ahead. In 2013, I went overseas with the United Nations and as far as I am aware, those meetings petered out.

There is no magic wand solution to the drug problem, but we can mitigate the effects with supervised injecting facilities. A SIF is a clean, safe, healthcare environment where people can inject drugs under the supervision of trained health professionals which will help to reduce HIV infection rates, overdose deaths, and drug-related prison convictions. They have been successful elsewhere.

Maybe it’s time to stop talking and move on to action.

The Garda College is officially described as the national centre for police training, development and learning within the Irish State. It’s a modern campus structure on eight acres within the town of Templemore, Co. Tipperary. Back in 1979 when I joined An Garda Siochana it was known as the Garda Training Centre.

Not only has the name changed, but the entry requirements have also been altered too. According to GardaEntry.ie there are now three stages to the recruitment process.

Stage one invites applicants to complete a series of online assessments which are completed at home in an unsupervised environment on a laptop or PC. Stage two is a competency-based interview which is a structured interview designed to establish if the candidate is suitable to serve effectively as a member of An Garda Síochána.

The third stage is the Physical Competence Test (PCT) & Medical Examination. This is described as the final stage and is not considered to be a major obstacle for candidates who are fit and healthy, but it cannot be taken for granted.

The medical examination was always tough and rightly so. In 1979 when I was going through the application process, the medical examiner noticed a scar on my abdomen. It was a throwback to surgery I had as a five-year-old child. When the records for the operation could not be located in the hospital, I had to undergo tests to satisfy the authorities that the problem had been successfully dealt with. Fair enough.

There was no physical test at entry level back then but there is now and while they say it’s generally not a major obstacle, it does seem to be causing some controversary. Fianna Fail T.D. Jim O’Callaghan told RTE that the fitness tests were too demanding and were blocking a recruitment drive and one-sixth of garda applicants last year failed the test.

The Physical Competency Test (PCT) comprises of a shuttle run (bleep test) and push-ups. Following a two-hour break, trainees must then overcome an obstacle course and the push–pull machine, which recreates a physical row. Some 55 of 315 of the garda recruit candidates who took the fitness assessment last year failed.

Mr O’Callaghan said the obstacle course must be completed three times in under three minutes and 20 seconds and if you fail any component, you must repeat the whole test. He expressed concern that the fitness test is too demanding, out of step with other jurisdictions and is blocking recruitment.

This could pose a problem for the Government’s plan to recruit one thousand new gardai. I learned recently that fifty-two potential candidates were invited to participate in the PCT but only thirty-seven turned up. Of those who turned up, twenty-five failed the run and only twelve passed all aspects of the test. At that rate, enlisting a thousand new recruits this year seems like a daunting prospect.

It seems to me that this fitness test could be preventing good candidates from applying for An Garda Siochana and eliminating candidates with good potential simply because they can’t negotiate an obstacle course or pass a bleep test.

You could take that a step further with a marching test and eliminate any candidate who can’t march in formation. For their graduation, students will be required to perform a complicated routine on the Parade Ground while keeping in step. It’s not easy and they wouldn’t have a hope of achieving that on day one without lots of instruction and hours of practice.

If that PCT had been in existence back in 1979, I reckon a sizeable number of my intake of 90 or so recruits would have been sent packing early on. I know for sure I would have struggled. Some of the lads were fit like Matt Connor, who played football for Offaly at the time, but I certainly wasn’t. I had other strengths though.

There were ropes suspended from the beams in the high roof of the gym. We had to climb these, touch the beam and shimmy back down again. I had spent years working on building sites with my father, climbing up and down scaffolding so I had strong arms and shoulders. I could scale these ropes while others struggled. Horses for courses.

By the time I left Templemore I was a lot fitter than I was when I went in thanks to instructors and training. I even marked the late John Egan, the well-known Kerry footballer, in a soccer match shortly before we passed out. Although the less said about that the better. He smiled and said hello to me before we started the game, but I didn’t see much of him after that. He was all over the place and left me for dead. He was like a ghost.

I’m not objecting to the fitness test, just the timing of it. Once a person is certified as being medically fit, they should be capable of reaching the required level of physical fitness with the necessary training. A PCT would be more appropriate at the end of that training to assess their progress.

Placing such emphasis on physical fitness before even being accepted into the organisation seems strange given that for the rest of their service it won’t be an issue. Their level of fitness will never again be measured in the course of their service unless it is required for a specialist unit.

I was very fortunate during my thirty-five years to have worked with some of the finest policemen and women the Force had to offer. Like me, many of them wouldn’t have worried Sonia O’Sullivan in a sprint and wouldn’t have qualified for Ireland’s Fittest Family either but they gave distinguished service all the same.

For me, the character of the person is the most important attribute.  Everything else can be taught.

I had hoped to be in Cyprus by now. Flights were arranged months ago, and I was looking forward to the trip but like the best laid plans of mice and men, the wheels came off. A trip of a different kind was on my flight path, and I ended up in Mater Hospital instead.

I’ve had a dodgy back for years and when I was leaving Cyprus to come home last November, I slipped on a wet floor in an elevator. I grabbed hold of the handrail to prevent a fall, but I knew straightaway that I had jarred something in my back and trouble wasn’t too far away. Sure enough, by the time I arrived home to Cobh, I was banjaxed.

My left leg was numb, so my GP sent me for an MRI and afterwards suggested that I should see Mr. Paul Kiely, an orthopaedic spine surgeon in the Mater Hospital. When I met him, I was hoping he would sprinkle some magic dust on the affected area and send me home to rest, but he had other plans.

After reading the MRI and x-rays, he told me I needed a couple of rods in my back to stabilise my spine. Wasn’t expecting that.

From the word go and I knew Mr. Kiely was the right man for the job. His confidence was infectious. Following the surgery, the wound stubbornly refused to dry up, so I got to see a lot more of him over my three weeks stay than was originally envisaged. He was extremely professional, thorough and caring.

Prior to being admitted to hospital, I had to attend the Mater for a pre-surgery assessment and one of the first things they required was a blood sample. For this procedure I was introduced to a phlebotomist. I’ve had blood drawn from me many times over the years, but this was the first time I had heard this term. One of the other nurses told me she is also referred to as the vampire, but I hoped she was joking.

Phlebotomy isn’t a new term though. According to History.com for thousands of years, medical practitioners clung to the belief that sickness was merely the result of a little “bad blood.” Bloodletting or phlebotomy, probably began with the ancient Sumerians and Egyptians, but it didn’t become common practice until the time of classical Greece and Rome.

Patients with a fever or other ailment were often diagnosed with an overabundance of blood. To restore bodily harmony, their doctor would simply cut open a vein and drain some of their vital fluids into a receptacle. In some cases, leeches were even used to suck the blood directly from the skin.

While it could easily result in accidental death from blood loss, phlebotomy endured as a common medical practice well into the 19th century. Medieval doctors prescribed blood draining as a treatment for everything from a sore throat to the plague, and some barbers listed it as a service along with haircuts and shaves.

The practice finally went out of fashion after new research showed that it might be doing more harm than good, but leeching and controlled bloodletting are still used today as treatments for certain rare illnesses. Luckily my phlebotomist was up to date with modern practices and didn’t resort to leeches or cut a vein. She just used a needle.

The ancient Egyptian physicians had their own peculiar remedies. They often used lizard blood, dead mice, mud and mouldy bread as topical ointments and dressings, and women were sometimes dosed with horse saliva as a cure for an impaired libido.

They also used human and animal excrement as a cure-all remedy for diseases and injuries. Donkey, dog, gazelle and fly dung were all celebrated for their healing properties and their ability to ward off bad spirits.

Thankfully, Paul Kiely and his staff are a lot more sophisticated and there wasn’t an animal to be seen. The nursing staff, the catering staff, the physiotherapists and the cleaning staff were amazing, and we even managed to have some fun along the way.

My stay gave me the opportunity to see how a busy hospital functions on a daily basis and it was an eyeopener. It takes a large team of highly trained, dedicated professionals, working in unison in a sterile, often stressful, environment while maintaining a calm, pleasant demeanour.

That’s not always easy as I know from my own experience of working with the public. It can be trying at times but the abuse they have to put up with is totally unacceptable.

The Echo had a report on nurses being assaulted in our hospitals every day. Thousands of assaults on nurses, most of whom are female, occurred between January 2021, and October 2022, according to the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO). And that’s only the assaults that were actually reported.

INMO General Secretary Phil Ní Sheaghdha said over 9,000 assaults occurred during that period, almost double the figure recorded by the HSE. They included being shouted at, spat at, having things thrown at them and even being threatened with stabbing.

Assaulting nurses is so mind numbingly stupid that anyone found guilty of an offence of that nature should be automatically jailed.

According to the Irish Examiner, Judge Olann Kelleher agrees with me. He said, “People acting the maggot with hospital staff should go to prison.” He was addressing a defendant in court who was highly intoxicated and became violent towards hospital staff at the Mercy University Hospital.

He pleaded guilty to the charges and Judge told him, “I know one person who is out of work for nine months from A&E because of people like you.” Instead of sending him to prison though, he issued him with a fine. The mind boggles.

Apparently, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar is in favour of a proposal to introduce the teaching of transgender issues to primary school children. He said the purpose of education is to prepare children for life and to teach them about the world.

Children’s Minister Roderic O’Gorman also believes transgender education should be part of the primary cycle to promote a greater understanding of the diversity in modern Irish society.

In their opinion trans people have always existed so it makes sense for schools to just inform children about the world around them and they should be taught what it means to be transgender. They are supported by BeLonG To, an organisation representing LGBT young people.

I must admit I had never heard of BeLonG to until I read a piece by Eoin English in the Irish Examiner. He wrote that the chief executive of that organisation, Moninne Griffith, said children as young as six and seven can know that they are LGBT, and educating children about trans issues could help trans children “feel safe and included in their school”.

“We know from research that 12 is the most common age for a young person to know they are LGBT, but I know from talking to teachers and parents all over the country that there are young people, as young as six and seven, who know they are LGBT,” she said.

Hang on there now for a second while I catch my breath, I’m starting to get palpitations. I’m not normally argumentative and I don’t consider myself to be a militant person. I don’t join demonstrations or protest marches, but that might be about to change.

I am completely against the notion of introducing transgender issues to primary school kids. I feel so strongly about this that I am prepared to leave my recliner and go stand at the school gates with a placard on my shoulder.

I have raised two children and I have three grandchildren, so I have some experience of dealing with kids. Anyone who has had dealt with smallies knows that at primary school age they are innocent. They believe in Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny and that’s OK. That’s how it should be.

They love bedtime stories, hugs and cuddles, their toys, their warm beds comfort blankets and their teddies. How are they supposed to get their heads around transgender speak when it is such a complicated topic. Many of us adults struggle with it never mind the kids.

I’m not the only one who thinks this is a daft idea. There has been considerable backlash from the Catholic Primary Schools Management Association (CPSMA). They believe a more prudent and sensible policy is to teach children to respect every human being and to allow children to be children.

Many parents and teachers have also spoken out and taken to social media to voice their concerns and I’m glad about that. I’m happy it’s not just me. Having just hit the age of 65 recently, I was afraid that maybe it was only the older generation like me who had difficulty with trying to cope with the pace of change, but it seems not.

I have discussed this with many of my friends too and as far as I can see most of us are struggling, particularly when it comes to the new non-binary language and the use of pronouns.

For example, I came across this on the Internet recently, “Fae/faer pronouns are neopronouns first invented by a demi-girl for demi-girls to use. fae/faer pronouns are sometimes called offensive, though these pronouns are not intended to be offensive, and if you don’t feel comfortable using them for cultural reasons, just ask the person if fae would be okay with you using they/them for faer. Never ask anyone to change their personal pronouns for your benefit.”

I couldn’t make head nor tail of this so to get a better understanding, I looked for some expert guidance. I turned to Health, a publication that was founded in 1981 to provide health and wellness information. It reaches over 120 million people annually with accurate, empathetic, and actionable health information so it seemed like an appropriate source.

They say, for the most part, people typically fall into two categories: male or female and that idea is known as a gender binary. But not everyone fits so perfectly into the man-or-woman categories and that’s where the term “non-binary” comes into play.

The Human Rights Campaign defined non-binary as “an adjective describing a person who does not identify exclusively as a man or a woman.” The campaign additionally said that while some non-binary people also identify as transgender, not all non-binary people identify that way.

While non-binary is a specific gender identity, it’s also often used as an umbrella term for others who don’t identify with being a man, a woman, or another gender. Most people who are non-binary prefer the pronoun “they,” but it never hurts to ask someone how they wish to be identified because there are a number of pronouns that can be used:

She, her, hers, and herself

He, him, his, and himself

They, them, their, theirs, and themself

Ze/zie, hir, hir, hirs, and hirself

Xe, xem, xyr, xyrs, and xemself

Ve, ver, vis, vis, and verself

Now, honestly speaking, I would never set out to be intentionally disrespectful to anyone, so apologies in advance if I should ever use the incorrect pronoun, but I’m pretty sure it’s going to happen because I can’t get the hang of this language. You’ll just have to make allowances for the fact that I’m old and can’t keep up.

But rest assured, if there is any attempt to introduce this subject matter to my grandchildren in primary school, you’ll find me on the picket line.

Many of us have had our flights disrupted over the years for various reasons. Volcanic ash clouds, the pandemic, a shortage of ground crew in airports and the occasional strike here and there. Things happen that we can’t always control. We accept that and just get on with things and put it down to bad luck. But now we’re facing further disruption and there’s nothing unfortunate about it. It’s deliberate.

There is a new craze emerging, that of flying drones near international airports which is causing chaos. Apart from the disruption and expense it causes, it’s also highly dangerous. There is a genuine risk to life, and I can’t for the life of me understand why there is so much faffing around trying to find a solution.

Bring the damn things down and figure out the legislation later. Lives are at stake here.

I was out in my back garden one day when I heard a distinctive buzzing sound overhead. When I looked up, I saw a drone hovering above me. It hung there for a short while before moving off. I have no idea what it was doing but if I had some method of bringing it crashing to Earth I would happily have done so. It was intrusive.

These things can be annoying, but they also have a more sinister side to them. Flight operations had to be temporarily suspended at Dublin Airport recently and three flights had to be diverted to Belfast and Shannon after a drone was seen flying near the airfield.

It’s not the first time. It is the sixth time since early January that flights have been suspended at that airport due to drone activity. The Irish Airline Pilots’ Association president Captain Evan Cullen told RTE that his organisation raised major concerns about drones with all the relevant stakeholders as far back as 2017, only to receive a “very poor response.”

Captain Cullen warned the DAA, the Irish Aviation Authority, and the Government of the “real-life risk” drones pose to passengers and crew on board flights. “A drone can take out a jet engine in a matter of seconds,” he said. “It can also penetrate the windscreen of a cockpit and therefore kill the pilots while in flight. They pose a real threat. They are not toys.”

So, what are they? They are described as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drones, which are aircraft that can be controlled remotely by a pilot, or by pre-programmed plans or automation systems that enable them to fly autonomously. A large number of industries and organizations are adopting this technology, including military, government, commercial, and recreational users.

The manufacture and sale of drones is a multi-billion-dollar industry. The number of them in existence varies from source to source but one website claimed the total number of consumer drone shipments worldwide was around 5 million units in 2020. That number is expected to increase over the next decade, reaching 9.6 million shipments globally by 2030.

With so many of these things about, and growing in popularity, there should be some regulations in place to control their use. It doesn’t make sense that anyone can buy a drone and set it off over an airfield to cause mayhem. So, what are the rules and who enforces them?

Well apparently, drones are not allowed to fly within 5 kilometres of an airport or within 30 meters of people, crowds, vehicles, or buildings and cannot be flown over national monuments. Direct visual contact by the operator with the drone is required, and the operating distance should not exceed 500 meters. Operators should avoid flying too close to residential areas or populated areas. 

I have no idea whether these restrictions are adhered to but there seems to be some uncertainty about who is responsible for enforcing them. There are obviously responsible drone users out there who use their machines for legitimate purposes but who will bring the rogue operators into line?

Well, the good news is that Minister for Transport Eamon Ryan is on the case. He told Brian O’Donovan of RTE that the Government is looking at ways to police and take down drones that are causing disruption. He also said he met DAA and other regulatory authorities and that they are committed to doing everything they can to stop, what he described, as a real risk.

“This is a real danger, this is a real crime,” Mr Ryan said. “The justice system will be carrying out further investigations and we are working with justice department looking at other mechanisms where we can police and take down drones, but it’s not an easy issue to address.”

“We’ve seen this at airports right across Europe but absolutely it’s at centre stage of all of the Government’s efforts, particularly from the justice and defence side because this is a criminal act.” Mr Ryan said that due to safety rules at airports you cannot just shoot things down.

Authorities are reluctant to use that method because the resulting debris could cause further problems. Not as many problems though, I would imagine, as a downed plane full of passengers and luggage might cause.

There are other ways to bring a drone down. Plucking it out of the sky using prey birds is an option. Eagles were trained at one stage to attack drones. They wore shin-guards to protect their legs from drone rotors, but they didn’t always respond to orders and animal rights activists had an issue with using them.

Jamming the signal is another possibility or disabling them with nets fired from handheld canons or dropped from another drone. Other airports are ahead of the game and have systems in place already. Minister Ryan is playing catch-up and needs to get his act together quickly before there is a fatality.

The Lord Mayor of Cork said recently that there are some streets she wouldn’t walk down in Cork city alone. Cllr Deirdre Forde said it’s a “sad reflection” on the city that people don’t feel safe, and she called for more gardai to be on patrol.

There have been calls for more gardai on the streets of Dublin too following the well-publicised assaults on members of the Force. Residents, businesspeople and visitors have also complained about feeling unsafe on the streets of the capital.

Leaders of the Garda Representative Association (GRA), and the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors (AGSI), have echoed the call for extra resources but admit that not only are they failing to attract new candidates, they are also struggling to hold on to the members they have.

The large number of resignations it is experiencing is leaving a significant hole in the organisation. Figures, released by Garda headquarters to various sources show an increase in the number of resignations from around 41 in 2017 to 94 in 2021 and 109 in 2022.

They are now talking about introducing exit interviews to try and work out why so many are leaving before their time, something that was unheard of in my day.

Changes to pension, pay and conditions are being cited as the main cause. Recent controversaries haven’t helped either and have contributed to the poor morale being experienced throughout the Force. Excessive oversight also seems to be a factor.

Brendan O’Connor, President of the GRA said the failing recruitment drive was impacting policing. “The failure to meet recruitment targets, coupled with significant numbers of resignations has the potential to further impact on the effectiveness of the policing service, that the public can expect to rely on.”

Some have cited the increased animosity towards gardai as being one obstacle to recruitment and retention while others have suggested that management and oversight within the organisation is also causing problems. Retired Garda Inspector Tony Gallagher told the Journal.ie recently that he believes gardaí are choosing to leave the career rather than deal with the difficult internal environment.   

“To start with, the probationer training system is too academic, there needs to be a greater emphasis for on-the-job training.”

Gallagher also believes that the multiple bodies set up to oversee the gardaí, such as the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission, the Policing Authority and the Policing Inspectorate are making the work of gardaí more difficult.   

“The garda organisation is now haemorrhaging personnel, with young members deciding to leave. There is absolutely no doubt that the training system and stifling oversight by numerous bodies is a factor,” he added.

So, here’s the problem. Morale is low, there’s a gulf between the gardai and the public, violence against gardai is on the increase and there is a lack of garda presence on the streets. The blame for the current situation can’t be laid entirely at the feet of the current garda commissioner, but it is happening on his watch.

I don’t know Drew Harris. I’ve never met the man, but I’m told has the reputation for being a strong disciplinarian and is seen by many as aloof and distant. Someone who wants things done his way and his way only.

He is obviously a very qualified police officer but most of that experience was gained as a member of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (P.S.N.I.), a different organisation entirely to An Garda Siochana.

He has brought some of his former colleagues with him to the Phoenix Park and their combined policing experience is bound to influence how An Garda Siochana functions. But unlike the P.S.N.I., An Garda Siochana is a community-based organisation and the relationship between the community and the police in this jurisdiction has always been what set us apart. Maybe it’s time to examine what we had and seek a compromise.

In 1979, I arrived with eighty-nine other guys in the Garda Training Centre in Templemore and during our six-month training period we learned the basics of policing. How to investigate a traffic accident, how to deal with a shoplifter, how to make an arrest, how to serve a summons and execute a warrant. We also learned how to give evidence in court and generally how to represent the organisation in the real world beyond the confines of the training centre. 

The rest, we were told, we would learn from our colleagues when we reached our allocated stations. The practical experience we would gain from being thrown in at the deep end and from dealing with real life issues could not be learned in a training environment, so our mentors wished us well and sent us on our way.

When we arrived at our new stations, we were ready to deal with most of whatever presented itself and sought guidance from the older guys for everything else. We took our orders from the sergeant and spent our early years learning the ropes while performing foot patrols or ‘walking the beat.’ This was how we familiarised ourselves with the locality.

It also taught us about camaraderie because we had to look out for one another. It allowed us to engage with the locals and develop relationships which was, and should still be, a very important aspect of policing.

Local knowledge is a major weapon in a policeman’s armoury and to get that you need to be out and about, meeting the locals, engaging with young people and being involved in community life but that strategy seems to have been discarded.

An Garda Siochana is more effective, and more appealing to potential applicants, when gardai are seen to be part and parcel of the local community. That relationship is essential but it’s impossible to develop when you’re under resourced, stifled by oversight and controlled by a computer system.