Trevor Laffan

The Minister for Justice Helen McEntee recently launched a “safety plan” for Dublin’s north inner city, involving the deployment of “community safety wardens.” The Dublin North Inner City Local Community Safety Plan aims to tackle drug dealing, street crime and dumping.

It has been hailed by many as a positive initiative, but there is confusion about the role of the wardens. Some are under the impression that these wardens will be tackling criminals and walking the beat armed with pepper spray. That’s not the case and if it’s properly resourced, it could be great for Dublin, but that’s a big “if.”

It worked well in Cork when it was introduced back in 2008 and was based on the theory of the broken window, a crime prevention philosophy that has inspired many police forces across the world to police their jurisdictions in a certain way.

The theory suggests that if you deal with the minor offences as they arise, you will make it difficult for the more serious crimes to get a foothold. If, for example, you have a vacant house in an estate with a few broken windows as a result of anti-social behaviour, they should be fixed as soon as possible. If the problem is ignored and the windows are not repaired, it encourages further vandalism.

The same theory applies to litter and rubbish. Where rubbish is dumped in an area and nothing is done about it, the problem escalates. The amount of litter increases because there is an impression that it is acceptable. But when remedial action is taken as soon as possible, it discourages bad behaviour.

The message is simple; deal with the small stuff and the bigger stuff won’t become a problem. That kind of engagement between gardai, the community and the local authority works but putting it into practice requires resources. It was very successful in Cork until the cutbacks kicked in.

The Dublin initiative will struggle too unless it is adequately resourced and there are mixed messages coming from the capital in that regard. Minister McEntee and the garda commissioner continue to insist that everything is fine in the world of policing. They say they have adequate resources to police the city effectively.

The problem is nobody believes them anymore. As a retired member of An Garda Siochana, it shouldn’t really bother me what the Department of Justice or the senior garda management get up to these days, but it does. Especially when they’re not being straight with us, and they haven’t been for a while.

Back when they closed the rural garda stations, the then Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald, said the key objective was to promote the more efficient and effective deployment of resources. She said garda management had concluded that resources could be better deployed and more effectively used on the front line if those stations no longer had to be staffed and maintained.

The garda commissioner at the time, Noirin O’Sullivan, went along with it and we know how that worked out. Gardai are no longer visible in those communities and the sad thing is, it was entirely predictable. Decimating community policing was another move with obvious consequences. When you remove the engagement between the police and the community, something else will fill the void. Enter the far-right brigade.

Community engagement has a proven track record in this jurisdiction. The backbone of a stable policing environment, it was embraced by An Garda Siochana for decades. Identifying problems and working together to find solutions. A simple, uncomplicated system.

But it requires manpower, feet on the beat, and when they are removed, the system fails. Whether the decline in the number of gardai on the street is down to cutbacks, modernisation, reorganisation, or restructuring, the result is the same – the system breaks.

The Government response to the recent problem in Dublin has been to fire money at it. Plenty of overtime for gardai to ensure a visible presence in the capital over the Christmas period. Extra resources drafted into the city with a promise that nothing like the latest unrest will ever happen again. At least, not until the overtime runs out.

With all the attention being focussed on Dublin, I can’t help wondering, how well prepared the rest of the major cities and towns around the country are in the event of a sudden outbreak of disorder? If the far-right hooligans decide to take their rampage on a nationwide tour, who will defend the streets beyond the M50?

The Dublin Metropolitan Region has the largest piece of the pie when it comes to garda resources, but reinforcements from as far away as Sligo and Waterford were still needed to supplement their numbers when the trouble flared. They needed all the help they could get. How would rural gardai cope in a similar situation?

It was reassuring to hear the garda chief superintendent for the Cork City Division, say the city will not be exposed from a security or policing perspective following the reassignment of several gardaí from Cork to the capital in the wake of the Dublin riots.

He gave that assurance at a recent meeting of the Joint Policing Committee after news that some gardaí with public order training had been reassigned to bolster the capital’s policing capabilities. Sounds like robbing Peter to pay Paul to me and that’s why I worry about the future of policing in this country – I don’t see any evidence of a plan.

The current garda commissioner seems to be focussed on enforcement, discipline regulations and oversight which is understandable given that he came from a jurisdiction where a more militarised style of policing was the order of the day. But it’s not working here, so let’s get back to what we do best – engaging with the community.

Like most of us, I consider myself to be an ordinary Joe Soap. I’m quite content with life and I have no ambition to be rich and famous. Being ordinary isn’t for everyone though and some spend a lifetime trying to find fame without success, while others strike it lucky and become famous only to find it’s all too much.

The recently deceased Matthew Perry, star of the ‘Friends’ comedy show, is a good example of the latter. He was one of the most recognisable faces on the planet to people of a certain age. He played the part of Chandler Bing, a wise cracking, low level executive who, with his five other friends, was living the American dream.

The reality for him though was something else. He was found dead in his jacuzzi at the age of fifty-four having spent a large part of his life battling his demons. He was addicted to drugs and alcohol at various stages of his career and had attended rehab on numerous occasions.

He found his fame difficult to handle and he’s not the only one who struggled with being easily recognised. History is littered with bodies of famous stars of the stage and screen who couldn’t deal with the full glare of an adoring public. They appeared to have it all, but in, truth they often found it difficult to cope in the real world.

After a stint in the spotlight, many celebrities realise that the lifestyle isn’t for them and send out cries for help that often result in strange behaviour.

According to celebritytoob.com Charlie Sheen was a cast member on one of the most successful sitcoms of its time. However, in 2011, Sheen suffered a very public emotional breakdown which resulted in him being removed from the cast of Two and a Half Men. Sheen went on to make several bizarre public statements which included him insinuating that he was a warlock.

Lindsay Lohan’s rapid rise to stardom took a toll on her mental health. She battled substance abuse issues, resulting in legal troubles and a decline in her career. Her struggles with addiction and unstable behaviour overshadowed her talent. Pop star Britney Spears faced similar pressure resulting in a highly publicized breakdown in 2007.

Fame is no guarantee of happiness and it’s no guarantee of wealth either. Annie Edson Taylor gained fame for going over the Niagara Falls in a barrel but ended up broke.

According to Historycollection.com, Annie Edson was born on October 24, 1838, in New York. She was one of eight children and at the age of 12, her father, died suddenly. Fortunately for Annie and her family, he left them financially secure, so they continued to live comfortably.

Annie eventually became a teacher. She met David Taylor, got married and had one child, a son, who passed away during infancy. Seven years later tragedy struck again when David passed away and Annie began to struggle financially. She soon found herself moving from place to place to find work as a teacher.

In her early 60s, it was becoming increasingly difficult to find employment. Taylor felt she needed to look at different options. One day, she read about people making money by performing various stunts around the world. That inspired her and at the age of 63, she decided to throw herself off Niagra Falls in a barrel. She believed this would give her fame and fortune to secure her future.

Taylor hired a manager to help her with marketing. The first thing they needed was a custom-built barrel but craftsmen in the business didn’t want to be associated with her because they believed it was a suicide mission.

Eventually, she did find someone, and they set about designing it. The barrel needed to be shaped like a regular pickle barrel but big enough to accommodate Taylor. It was five feet long, and three feet in diameter and lined with a mattress for protection. They also added a leather harness so she could be strapped in during her journey. To keep the barrel upright, they added a 200-pound anvil to the base.

Because the barrel was sealed, two air holes were made in the lid which were closed with corks which Taylor could push out if she needed more air. To test the barrel, she sent a cat down the falls in it. The cat survived with a slight head wound.

On October 24, 1901, thousands of people gathered around the 167-foot waterfall to watch the possible suicidal journey. Her crew fastened her in with the straps, screwed the top shut, and compressed air into the barrel with a bicycle pump. They plugged the air holes with corks, towed it to the middle of the river and cut it loose.

The crowd watched the barrel disappear into the mist. A few minutes later, they saw it float and come to rest on top of a rock. The rescuers set to work getting Taylor out and to everyone’s relief, she was able to walk, talk and her only injury was a small gash on her head, like the cat. She reportedly told people, “I would sooner walk up the mouth of a cannon, knowing it was going to blow me to pieces than make another trip over the falls.”

The stunt was a success and Taylor received the fame she wanted but fortune eluded her. The barrel was to be the main money spinner, but her manager ran off with it. She spent most of her money hiring private investigators to find the barrel, but it was never recovered. Taylor continued to make very little money through her souvenir shops and died penniless in 1921, at the Niagara County Infirmary.

Like I say, there’s a lot to be said for being ordinary.

I came across a story last week in the Irish Examiner Archives. It was published over 60 years ago.

At Clonakilty District Court, a man was charged with being drunk and disorderly on June 21 in 1963. Supt. P. Comer told the Justice that despite the fact that the defendant had been notified to be in court he had not turned up. The man was an itinerant and was at present on the road.

The Justice bound the defendant to the peace for two years, or in default two months imprisonment. The same defendant was also charged with the dangerous driving of a horse and trap while under the influence of drink.

Garda P. O’Leary said that while on duty at the Cross, Clonakilty, on the previous August at about 5 p.m., he saw the defendant driving a pony and cart at a very fast pace up the main street of the town. There was a passenger in the cart who was lying out over the side of it.

He stopped the vehicle, and the horse skidded to a halt. He ordered the defendant off the cart, and when he was getting down, he got entangled in the reins and fell. The passenger was staggering all over the road. He arrested the defendant, who fell several times on his way to the barracks.

Sergt. T. Horan, Clonakilty said he charged the defendant, when he became sober, and he had nothing to say. He was hopelessly drunk when arrested at 5 p.m. and was still drunk at 9 p.m. when he was meant to release him but could not.

In sentencing the defendant to one month’s imprisonment with hard labour, the Justice said, “Under present modern traffic conditions, this kind of conduct cannot be tolerated.”

The passenger in the cart, was fined 7 shillings and 6 pence for being drunk and incapable. When the defending solicitor remarked that his client’s condition was due to lack of food, the Justice remarked: “He must have been as drunk as an owl.”

An amusing tale in hindsight but if you look at many court cases past and present, you’ll notice that alcohol, or the abuse of it, continues to play a considerable role in how we conduct ourselves in this country. We have fiddled around with the legislation over the years to try and get a grip on our relationship with drink, including raising the price of it, but it hasn’t worked.

Those of us of a certain vintage will remember the old chicken suppers dished out to patrons after midnight in night clubs to legalise the consumption of alcohol after hours. If you wanted a drink, you bought your food and ate it whether you were hungry or not.

The law required the meal to be ‘substantial’ and there were many arguments in courts across the land about what constituted a substantial meal. Pubs and clubs varied the menu but rarely did the offerings go beyond the basic minimum standard required to keep the police from the door even though a substantial meal was defined as a meal which would be considered a normal mid-day meal.

I can remember studying that Intoxicating Liquor Act in my early days in the Garda College in Templemore back in the late seventies. It was without doubt the single most complicated piece of legislation we had to digest.

There were certain hours during the day when you could have a drink, but those hours varied depending on the day of the week. They also differed on certain times of the year and there were days when drinking alcohol was completely illegal like Good Friday and Christmas Day but there were exceptions.

There was a bar and a café in Kent Railway Station once upon a time and if you had a ticket to travel by train you could have a pint there on either of those days. Or if you took a ferry to the UK you could have your pint on board or in the airport if you were booked on a flight. There were many happy customers in those days with train tickets in their pocket who had no intention of going any further than the bar counter.

There were special rules for clubs and specific rules for theatres. You could have a drink half an hour before the commencement of a show and up to a half an hour after it finished. You needed a book of rules in your pocket to figure out when to go for a pint.

A liquor licence was required to sell alcohol, but they weren’t straight forward either. An Ordinary Publicans On- Licence allowed for the consumption of alcohol on the premises while an Off – Licence permitted the sale of alcohol for consumption at some other place. There was a Special Exemption Licence which allowed the license holder to continue serving alcohol for a period after normal closing time.

Then there was a restaurant Licence, a restaurant certificate, a limited restaurant certificate, and a wine retailers on-licence all of which had special conditions attached. You could get an occasional licence for special event being held at a place which did not otherwise hold a license for up to maximum of six days. An occasional license allowed the holder of an on license to sell alcohol which his on license allowed at a place to which no license was attached. Confused?

Well, the proposed Sale of Alcohol Bill aims to replace the country’s patchwork of 100 laws governing alcohol sales in pubs, restaurants and off licences, some of which date back more than 200 years, with a single, modern piece of legislation.

That’s long overdue but unless there is a cultural shift in how we treat alcohol, we’ll never be rid of the drunken owls.

Trish Browne comes from the seaside town of Youghal in Co. Cork. She is the youngest of a family of fourteen, ten boys and four girls, and her early life wasn’t easy. Her father died when she was only two years old, and she lost her mother to cancer twelve years later when she was only fourteen.

That didn’t hold her back though and for the last twenty-three years Trish has made her home in Cyprus where she runs her own company, Blue Surf Property.  An estate agency which is located in the heart of Protaras on the east coast of the island. It’s a thriving business.

Some credit for this must go to her mother. Mrs. Browne appreciated the value of a good education so when Trish left the Presentation Convent in Youghal, her mother sent her to Scoil na Nog, an all-Irish boarding school in Glanmire. That move traumatised the youngster who hadn’t a word of Irish and hated the place from the word go. It quickly grew on her though and she absolutely loved it in the end.

Following the death of her mother, Trish lived with various family members when she wasn’t in boarding school, so she never really had a place to call home. The siblings looked after her well, but it wasn’t the same.

After finishing primary school, she spent the next six years in Colaiste an Phiarsaig and following her leaving certificate, headed to DCU to begin communication studies. She soon became disillusioned with that though and began to have doubts about her choice of course.

She decided to take some time out and go travelling. She had been doing a little part-time bar work while attending DCU and her boss told her about a friend of his who had a bar in Cyprus. He said if she was going to travel then she would have to experience Cyprus. She took his advice and accompanied by a friend of hers, headed for the airport.

On the 28th of January 1999, she got a one-way ticket to Cyprus. Her plan was to spend some time there to begin with and then travel further afield but as soon as she arrived, she began to wonder if she had made a terrible mistake.

January was not a good time to visit the island for the first time. Everything was closed for the winter and the only thing she could see moving on the streets back then was tumbleweed. It wasn’t quite the image Trish had in her head, but she had made her bed and turning back wasn’t an option.

She had no work initially and rationed her savings as best she could. Fortunately, in those days you could live very cheaply so she survived until the tourist season started when she got a job in a local bar. By the end of the season, she had fallen in love with the country.

She enjoyed the bar work and gave it her all and at that stage she thought she would probably end up running her own pub but by the end of the following season, she had changed her mind. She knew from the time she was a teenager that she wanted to have her own business. She was ambitious and she had lots of ideas on how to make money. Many of them were daft, but she consoled herself in the fact that she was at least thinking.

She changed tack after that and went working for a travel agency for a year selling cruises to Egypt and Israel but soon got bored with it and the following season, she got a job with First Choice who owned JWT and Falcon Holidays. They had just lost a couple of holiday reps, so she was thrown in at the deep end without any training, but says it was the best learning experience she ever had.

She soon got used to problem solving and dealing with dissatisfied customers and while she was a shy person by nature, the experience gave her lots of confidence. By then, Cyprus was preparing to join the EU and the regulations around buying and selling property were easing. Property was changing hands quickly.

Giovani property developers approached Trish with an offer to join their team as a salesperson and after just a few weeks working for them, she knew this was what she wanted to do with her life. It wasn’t just about selling property. She was also selling a lifestyle and she got a buzz from it. She did that for the next seven years.

By now she was married to a Cypriot and after her maternity leave following the birth of her first son, she got the opportunity to work under the licence of another property agency, Island Homes. She worked there for another seven years until she got itchy feet and decided to open her own agency.

She rented a small office and took on three other girls and Blue Surf Property was born. Her advanced knowledge of Greek allowed her to take the real estate exam and she became the only non-Cypriot person on the island of Cyprus to hold this licence.

The business has gone from strength to strength, and she now employs a staff of eleven. After twenty-three years here, she still feels blessed to be doing what she’s doing and is grateful for the freedom it gives her to be able to spend time with the people she cares most about and having the time to enjoy life.

In her spare time, she does triathlons, organises an annual run for Autism with two thousand participants, swims regularly and loves to paddle board. The only problem she has with Cyprus is that there aren’t enough Irish people here and Barry’s Tea is hard to come by.

When I retired from An Garda Siochana after thirty-five years, I did so with an unblemished record. I know this to be a fact because they gave me a piece of paper that said so. That certificate serves no purpose other than giving me the personal satisfaction of knowing that I did OK. A little pat on the back for myself.

There was one occasion during my service though when I was mildly reprimanded. I was driving a patrol car one night and during a pursuit of a stolen car, I was involved in an accident. Just some damage to a few cars, nothing serious.

The following morning my superintendent called me to his office, asked me if I was OK and told me not to fret about the damage to the cars. That can all be repaired he said, and I shouldn’t worry about it. I was not going to be hung drawn and quartered, happy days.

Sometime after that, there was a claim for compensation submitted by a third party, and I was summoned to the super’s office once again. He told me about the claim and informed me that the investigation file in relation to the accident had been returned to him from headquarters with a new recommendation attached. 

The powers that be had reviewed the file and had now considered that I was partially responsible for the accident and as such I should be cautioned about my future driving. My super told me not to worry about the caution and he seemed a little embarrassed to be even giving it to me. He was a decent man and a good boss, so I accepted the ruling and left his office suitably chastened.

That was over thirty years ago but if it happened today, I would behave differently. I would not admit there was an accident in the first place. I wouldn’t even admit being in the patrol car and then I would tell him to relax because systems had been put in place to make sure nothing like that could ever happen again.

That would be the end of it because as far as I can see, that’s how things work these days. Nobody is accountable. There is no need to take responsibility when things go pear shaped and no need to apologise for anything either and I’ll explain why.

I wrote recently about my wife’s all-night vigil in the Mercy University Hospital and the lack of empathy shown to her. The response I got to that tale of woe left me in no doubt that her case was not an isolated one.

A few weeks later my brother-in-law was sent to the CUMH for a 6.30pm appointment and ended up sitting in a chair until the following morning. The nurses were very caring. They checked on him regularly and apologised for the delay but said there were only two doctors working the night shift in that busy department and they were run off their feet. This is common but who is accountable or responsible?

The HSE overspent by €1.1 billion this year. It’s difficult to visualise such a vast sum of money so let’s put it another way.  A billion is a thousand million or written numerically it’s 1,000,000,000 so €1.1 billion is €1,100,000,000. That’s just the deficit.

The HSE budget for 2024 is €22.5 billion or in simple language, €22,500,000,000 and the HSE boss is already predicting it won’t be enough. Don’t worry though because Minister Donnelly is working “very closely” with HSE officials to implement measures to drive the budget overspend down.

Minister Donnelly said the main driver of the budget shortfall is “price and volume levels that were not provisioned for.” In plain English, too many patients. “The number of patients presenting is higher than was anticipated. We’re seeing it in Ireland, we’re seeing it right across Europe. We’re seeing a very significant post-Covid surge, and we’re seeing healthcare inflation higher than was provisioned for as well.”

He added: “Part of this is within the control of the HSE and that’s the bit they’re working very hard on and part of it is not in control of the HSE. It’s demographics, it’s post-Covid, it’s patient volumes, and it’s prices of medicines and wage increases and so forth.”

So, there you have it. It’s nobody’s fault really, certainly not the fault of those being paid enormous salaries to manage the system. The problem would sort itself out if people just stopped getting sick and attending hospital.

RTE is another organisation in crisis and could be insolvent by next spring without proper funding, according to its director general Kevin Bakhurst. He made the claim at a hearing of the Oireachtas Public Affairs Committee.

Mr Bakhurst said that the broadcaster was in a challenging financial situation but trying to figure out who is responsible for this mess has proven to be a very difficult task, but we do know that a lot of people were being paid huge salaries with little accountability.

An Garda Siochana too in turmoil. They lack resources, their recruitment campaign is a shambles, they’re struggling with retention issues, nobody wants the job of deputy commissioner and rank and file members voted no confidence in the garda commissioner. So, who’s responsible for this mess?

Well, nobody is, apparently, because there is no problem. Minister for Justice Helen McEntee keeps reminding us everything is just tickety boo. She has regular meetings with the commissioner, and he assures her that all is well in the world so that’s that.

So, I reckon the best way to survive a calamity, is to deny there is a problem in the first place, insist that everything is fine and then just carry on as normal. Pity I didn’t know that all those years ago.

The ghost city of Varosha lies in the Famagusta District on the eastern part of the island of Cyprus. It has been unoccupied since it was abandoned in 1974 after the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. In the sixties, the popular holiday resort of Vorosha was in high demand because of the wonderful climate and beautiful beaches.

It was a playground for the rich and famous, frequented by the likes Richard Burton, Liz Taylor and Brigette Bardot. Those names probably won’t mean much to anyone who hasn’t reached grandfather status but take my word for it, they were the movers and shakers in the movie business at that time.

Those once famous hotels have been idle for over forty-eight years and most of the properties have fallen into disrepair. The damaged landscape is a constant reminder of a troubled time. Many of the family homes abandoned hurriedly in the middle of the night are visible to the naked eye from viewing points along the border in neighbouring Dherynia on the southern side of the border.

It makes painful viewing for the families who fled the fighting in the belief that the absence would be temporary. They thought they would be back home soon, but that didn’t happen. The city was fenced off and the only inhabitants over the decades, apart from the local wildlife, were the Peacekeepers attached to the United Nations and the military from the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus who controlled part of it.

That changed in 2020 when, controversially, the Turkish Cypriot administration took a decision to open a section of the Varosha beachfront to attract visitors. The city is open to tourists now too, so I hopped over the border for a look and what I saw was amazing.

It was like the set from a movie about a post-apocalyptic world. Untouched for almost fifty years, the first thing that struck me was the peace and quiet. You don’t expect that in a city but then there is nothing to disturb the peace. The shops, offices, schools, hotels and garages are empty and there is no traffic.

Access to the buildings is denied as most are dilapidated and unstable. Few of the windows remain intact and there are signs everywhere advising visitors to be aware of crumbling masonry.

It’s easy to imagine what it would have been like as a bustling commercial centre in the sixties and early seventies before it all came to an abrupt halt in July 1974. That’s when Cyprus became a divided nation with two separate communities claiming loyalty to two different countries on one little island.

Cyprus is only about the size of Munster, with a population of around 1.2 million. Two thirds of the island is occupied by Greek Cypriots in the south and a third is occupied by Turkish Cypriots in the north which they refer to as the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, (TRNC).

They have two separate governments, different currencies, two independent police forces and two opposing armies, kept apart from each other by a border that runs east to west. There is also a buffer zone between the two territories that was established in the aftermath of the events of 1974 and that area is protected by the United Nations.

In July of that year, the Turkish army invaded Cyprus and to understand why, we need to look back in time. Worldabandoned.com have described the events in detail but I will give a shortened version.

In 1570, the Ottomans captured Cyprus. Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots lived side by side but after the Greek War of Independence in 1821, there were calls for a union between Greece and Cyprus after centuries of neglect and poverty under the Ottomans.

In 1878, Cyprus was “leased” to the British Empire but when the Ottoman Empire entered World War I in 1914, the British Empire formally annexed Cyprus. After the war, the Turks withdrew all claim to Cyprus, and it became a British crown colony in 1925.

On 16 August 1960, Cyprus became an independent country following an agreement between Britain, Greece and Turkey but violence soon erupted between the two sides. Turkey threatened to invade the island in 1964 to protect the Turkish minority.

On 15 July 1974, president Makarios III of Cyprus was ousted by the Greek military junta who planned to force the country into a union with Greece. In response, the Turkish army invaded the island five days later on 20 July to restore the constitutional order agreed in 1960.

The Turks captured an area from Kyrenia on the northern coast, down to the Turkish areas of the capital Nicosia. A ceasefire was quickly agreed but despite the ceasefire, a second Turkish invasion occurred on August 14 and this time, they took further territory in the northern part of the island, including Famagusta.

It was during this invasion that city of Varosha was evacuated and sealed off. The Turkish army fenced it off and refused to let anyone in. Up until then, Varosha had been an affluent, tourist area with hotels, restaurants and bars. It was popular among travellers from north and west Europe, as well as wealthy Greeks. Then it became a no-go area.

During the invasion, the majority Greek Cypriot population fled the fighting in Famagusta. Many went south to Paralimni, Dherynia and Larnaca and were helped by the British military who had kept their bases on the island from when it was a crown colony. Following the invasion, a UN Buffer Zone was created to separate the island.

180,000 Greek Cypriots had been evicted from their homes in the north and 50,000 Turkish Cypriots were displaced from the south. Now, almost 50 years later, both sides can at least go back and visit what remains of the city.

If I saw a TV show depicting a guy breaking out of a modern prison by clinging to the underside of a delivery van, I would immediately switch channels. Too far-fetched. No way in this day and age, could a prisoner escape so simply and yet that’s precisely what did happen.

A former soldier absconded from the prison kitchen at HMP Wandsworth by strapping himself to the underside of a delivery van. Daniel Abed Khalife, 21, changed out of the prison kitchen uniform into a black baseball cap, black T-shirt and dark-coloured trousers to prepare himself for life on the outside.

Unfortunately for him, his freedom was short-lived. He escaped at 7.30am on a Wednesday and was declared missing twenty minutes later. The van was stopped by police less than an hour after that but Mr. Khalife was no longer attached to it. He was arrested a few days later on Saturday and returned to prison.

A few red-faced officials were left scratching their heads in the aftermath of the escape but it’s not the first-time prison authorities got caught on the hop and it probably won’t be the last.

Alcatraz prison in San Francisco served as a federal prison from 1934 to 1963 and housed some of the most dangerous prisoners of all time. Known as The Rock, it was supposed to be impossible to escape from. Attempts were rare, but a few inmates did manage it but whether they survived the currents of the bay, or the sharks is unknown.

According to History.com there were 14 different escape attempts involving 36 inmates. The most celebrated effort took place in June 1962, when three prisoners fled the island on a raft constructed from raincoats. In the months leading up to their daring escape, the men had used homemade tools to widen the ventilation holes in the walls of their cells, which they crawled through on the night they vanished.

In their beds, they left lifelike dummy heads as decoys. Despite a lengthy, large-scale manhunt, the fugitives were never heard from again and authorities believe they likely drowned in the San Francisco Bay’s strong, cold currents. Clint Eastwood starred in a 1979 movie about that breakout called “Escape from Alcatraz.”

Of all the prisoners who attempted to flee Alcatraz, 23 were captured, six were shot and killed while trying to escape and two drowned. An additional five, including the three who broke out in 1962, remain unaccounted for and are presumed drowned.

A century earlier, on February 9, 1864, 109 Union officers tunnelled their way out of Libby Prison, a bleak, Confederate prisoner-of-war facility in Richmond, Virginia. After opening in March 1962, the prison, situated in a former tobacco warehouse, quickly became an overcrowded, disease-ridden place where prisoners were subjected to severe food shortages.

Starting in the Autumn of 1863, a group of inmates made three failed attempts to dig tunnels out of the prison. With rats crawling over them as they laboured in secret, the men finally managed to dig a fourth tunnel 50 feet long and escaped. Fifty-nine of the men eventually reached Union territory, while 48 were recaptured and two drowned.

On February 22, 2014, one of the world’s most-wanted criminals, drug trafficker Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman Loera, was arrested after outrunning law enforcement for more than a decade. Guzman, a third-grade dropout, was first arrested in 1993 and sentenced to 20 years behind bars for murder.

While locked up in a high-security prison in the Mexican state of Jalisco, he paid off the staff and continued to run his criminal enterprise. In 2001, he escaped the facility; some accounts claim Guzman was wheeled out in a laundry cart, while other sources suggest prison officials simply let him walk out.

For years afterward, he used violence, bribery and a large network of informants to help him remain a fugitive. His cartel grew into the largest supplier of illegal narcotics to America, and the U.S. government offered a $5 million reward for information leading to his arrest.

On February 22, 2014, law enforcement agents finally tracked him down to an apartment in Mazatlán, Mexico, and arrested him. However, on July 11, 2015, Guzman, then incarcerated at the nation’s highest-security penitentiary, Altiplano beyond Mexico City, once again escaped, this time via a hole in the floor of his cell and out through a mile-long tunnel that had been secretly dug and equipped with lights and ventilation. Guzman was re-captured by Mexican authorities in 2016.

Security must have been a bit more relaxed in the eighteenth century. After joining the Jacobite rebellion of 1715, Catholic nobleman William Maxwell, 5th Earl of Nithsdale, was locked up in the Tower of London, found guilty of treason and sentenced to die. Shortly before her husband was to be executed, Lady Nithsdale went to visit him in prison in 1716, accompanied by her maid and several female friends.

The group smuggled in women’s clothing for the earl then spirited him out of the Tower of London disguised as a female. The earl fled England, this time masquerading as a servant to a Venetian ambassador and ended up in Rome. Lady Nithsdale fled Britain separately to meet her husband in Rome, where they resided in exile.

Not every escape attempt was as well thought out as that though. Kenneth Burnum, a prisoner in Hamilton County Jail in Tennessee, heard another prisoner was about to be released on bail. His plan was to pretend to be the other inmate and take his place when officers arrived to collect him.

Burnum stood up when Taylor’s name was called and filled out the release forms but when he was sent for final identity verification, officers discovered one glaring distinction between the two men. The prisoner scheduled for release was black while Burnum was white.

I saw a cartoon recently somewhere which depicted Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly filling a bucket with water. The bucket was full of holes, so the water poured out as fast as he put it in. An advisor looking on suggested it might be advisable to fix the holes first. In other words, deal with the root cause of the problem.

Good advice that could equally apply to Minister of state at the Department of Transport Jack Chambers. He wants to fiddle with the Road Traffic Act again. Not only would he have us driving around our towns at 30kph, but motorists who commit traffic offences such as speeding or not wearing a seatbelt could face higher penalty points on bank holiday weekends.

According to the Irish Examiner, under his proposed new legislation, powers would be granted to vary the number of penalty points during specific times when road safety risks are higher. It is not yet clear what the points would increase by, and the legislation allows just for the variation at this stage.

Data shows there has been a consecutive increase in the number of people caught speeding over the most recent bank holiday weekends, as well as increases in drink and drug-driving arrests.

Justice Minister Helen McEntee has defended garda enforcement on the roads, insisting their presence is “strong”. “We will need to do everything we can to make it even stronger,” said Ms McEntee. “I think what we are seeing is changing trends and changing behaviours, and we need to be able to respond to that.”

I have no idea what she means by that, but I think it’s fair to say that enforcement is sadly lacking and that lies at the heart of the matter. Introducing laws that legislate for specific times of the year, like bank holidays, is like trying fill the leaky bucket. It won’t fix the root cause of traffic accidents which is poor driving standards.

The basic issue with the Road Traffic Act is not the quality of the law but the lack of enforcement of it. Minister Helen McEntee and Commissioner Drew Harris can prattle on ad infinitum about having adequate resources to police our small State, but everyone knows that’s a load of nonsense. There is no point in spinning that line anymore because nobody believes it.

It’s very simple. If they have the resources they need, then questions must be asked of garda management about the deployment. Where are they? Gardai are not a visible presence on our streets in 2023 so please stop trying to convince us otherwise because it simply isn’t credible. Let me give you an idea of what a police presence and real enforcement looks like.

I drove down to Paphos Airport in Cyprus last week to collect some family members. It’s a two-hour drive from my place in Paralimni. They were due to arrive at 6pm so I struck off around three in the afternoon. I took my time and because they were slightly delayed, we were back on the road again by 7pm and by then it was dark.

My brother-in-law commented on the number of police cars and speed detection vans he saw on the way home. I’m used to seeing them on a daily basis, so it didn’t surprise me. I didn’t count them because I wasn’t taking too much notice but from then on, I counted three speed vans in operation and five motorists who had been pulled in by the police at different points along the route.

That was just on our side of the motorway and to put that into perspective, the island of Cyprus, is roughly the size of Munster with a population of somewhere in the region of 1.2 million.

The town of Paralimni has an official population of just short of 15,000 people according to the 2022 figures from the Municipality so it would be similar in size to towns like Cobh, in Co. Cork. There is one major difference though; you will not travel any distance here, day or night, without seeing a police car or a speed detection van.

They have a substantial presence and while they may have their critics in terms of efficiency, there is no arguing about their visibility. There are regular speed van checks in the area and the police are constantly out and about with their speed guns. They’re everywhere and that’s what a real police presence looks like.

A couple of days before my brother-in-law came here, he attended an event in the National Concert Hall in Dublin. The following day he had some time to kill so he went for a walk in the city centre. He was strolling around for a couple of hours and didn’t see one member of An Garda Siochana on the streets.

This is something regularly commented on by people living and working in the area. Shop keepers have related horrific stories of their daily interaction with shoplifters, drunks, thieves and troublemakers. Many natives and visitors have also complained of feeling unsafe in our capital city. So, it’s time to stop this ridiculous game of bluff by Harris, McEntee, Chambers and others.

Stop trying to placate us with sound bites and knee jerk responses to road fatalities. Additional pieces of legislation that make no sense and won’t be enforced aren’t fooling anyone.

If you really want to make a difference, take a leaf out of the Cypriots’s book and put boots on the ground. Try calling a spade a spade for a change instead of trying to persuade us it’s a pitchfork. You would earn far more respect from the general public if you told it as it is and maybe once you accept there is a problem, you might even start to fix it.

Jeremy Clarkson the former Top Gear presenter once claimed that everyone who bought a bicycle during the COVID-19 pandemic was an idiot. He criticised the government for installing infrastructure that helps people get around on bikes and said cycling was “anti-capitalism with handlebars.”

He also insulted the lycra clothing that cyclists wear, criticised how they behave on roads and suggested that most people cycling in major cities aren’t even going anywhere; they’re only out to annoy motorists.

I wouldn’t consider myself to be completely in the Clarkson camp, but I have to admit that cyclists often drive me nuts. It’s no fun crawling behind them when they’re driving three a breast on a secondary road enjoying a chat while I’m trying to get somewhere.

I drove down a one-way street recently and when I got to the bottom of it, I stopped at the stop line before merging into traffic. There was a cyclist coming from my right, so I stayed where I was to let him pass. He didn’t cross my path though. As he reached my car, he came up beside me and shot the wrong way up the one-way system against the flow of traffic. He didn’t indicate his intention to do so either.

He had a beard, so he wasn’t a child and while these guys regularly moan about the lack of respect shown to them by motorists, many of them believe there is one rule of the road for motorists and another rule for cyclists. They’re not all irresponsible but there is no shortage of bikers out there who don’t make much of an effort to champion their cause.

They regularly weave in and out of traffic, break red lights, cycle on footpaths and other pedestrian areas. They demand that drivers observe a car doors width when overtaking them for safety yet, they have no issue squeezing into tight spaces between cars to get ahead in slow city driving. Their safety concerns can be dispensed with when it suits them.

There is another issue too and that’s visibility of not just cyclists but all vulnerable road users including children. It’s not unusual to encounter cyclists dressed in dark clothing in fading light. Maybe these people don’t drive cars in which case it’s understandable they might have less appreciation of how vulnerable they really are.

Oncoming car headlights often put these unlit cyclists/pedestrians in a driver’s blind spot, making them difficult to see so I was delighted to see the Road Safety Authority issuing advice about vulnerable people wearing high-vis vests when they’re out and about.

They launched its ‘be seen, be safe’ campaign for pedestrians and cyclists to encourage them to wear high-visibility clothing. Makes total sense to me and you would imagine that anything that improves visibility and safety has to be welcomed, especially as we head into the winter. Not so.

High-vis vests worn by cyclists don’t have any impact on the behaviour of motorists according to one Galway City Councillor who called for the notion that hi-vis clothes will keep children safe on roads to be challenged.

He said putting the onus for road safety on young children is ‘misguided’. “I suppose I’d just like to challenge the narrative that high-vis vests save people’s lives,” he said. “The RSA have published a lot of research looking at the efficacy of high-vis vests, I don’t think a lot of it adds up.”

“There’s a lot of research out there that shows that high-vis vests make people more visible, absolutely I’m not going to dispute that. My big concern is that I don’t see how high-vis vests have any impact on the behaviour of motorists. In particular the campaign about dressing five and six-year-olds up like construction workers and putting the onus on them to be responsible for their own safety I think is misguided.”

The RSA responded saying there is no shortage of research to prove that hi-vis clothing is effective and cited several research papers to show that high visibility clothing improved motorists’ ability to see vulnerable road users.

That the RSA should find it necessary to defend this initiative in the first place is baffling. Why would you even need research to demonstrate that it’s easier to see someone in the dark if they’re wearing bright luminous clothing than if they’re dressed all in black? It’s ludicrous but there are others out there too with strange opinions on road safety.

An Garda Siochana tweeted recently on ‘X’, which most of us still call Twitter, and the tweet was accompanied by a photo of a garda in a classroom talking to primary school children. It said “It’s crucial that we spread the road safety message among children from the very first opportunity. Garda Michelle Doherty called in to see them all in Kincora Kids, Killaloe Co. Clare and brought along some high-vis vests for wearing while out on the road.”

One particular reader was incensed and Tweeted; “Stop telling children it’s their job to not get killed by drivers. In 2017/18, 26,000 motorists were caught using a phone at the wheel while driving. You should focus on that.”

Seems to me it’s possible to do both. There are many aspects relating to road safety that need to be addressed and visibility is just one of those.

In my time as a member of An Garda Siochana, there was a structured school’s programme delivered to third class pupils in primary schools over the course of the school year. It covered many topics, and I would be surprised if the subject of wearing hi-vis clothing was delivered in isolation by the garda in Clare.

So, let’s have less of this attention seeking nonsense and support the initiatives that are designed to make everyone a little safer on the road.

Flying isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. Many people have a fear of being sealed in a tin can flying at thirty thousand feet at speeds of several hundred miles per hour. That’s completely understandable and even if they conquer their fear of flying, there are other hazards to contend with.

The changing air pressure and oxygen levels in an aeroplane at altitude can do things to the body that won’t agree with everyone. Ringing in the ears, dehydration, jet lag, and motion sickness are common issues. Being in a confined space with others can expose you to germs from those around you who might be under the weather.

A greater risk comes from deep vein thrombosis (DVT) from sitting in the one place for too long. It’s described by the HSE as a blood clot in a vein, usually the leg but can occur in the veins of the calf, thigh or pelvis and can be dangerous. They can break loose, travel through your bloodstream and get stuck in your lungs.

These things are largely preventable though. Wearing a face mask and using hand sanitiser will help to protect against germs. Drinking water will prevent dehydration while simply sucking on a sweet can often sort the problem with the ringing ears. Wearing flight socks and keeping the legs moving helps to combat DVT. So, not huge issues after all.

In fact, there is nothing to fear about flying according to the experts who tell us it is still one of the safest modes of transport. According to simpleflying.com, every year, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) releases its global safety report. Its findings showed that, in 2022, the aviation industry saw a 9.8% decrease in accidents compared to 2020.

Interestingly, these numbers have fallen despite an 11% increase in total scheduled flights. The ICAO attributes the improvements in safety to the safety commitments shared across the industry. In fact, the trend across many years of aviation is that, today, it is safer than ever to fly.

There are numerous ingredients that go together to make air travel the safe environment it is now. Flight crew, air traffic controllers and dispatchers all work together to ensure a safe flight so you can be confident you’re flying with highly trained, certified individuals.

That’s good to know and very reassuring, but how safe are we in the airport itself before we even board the plane? Travelling by air isn’t without its difficulties and passengers can often find themselves hanging around departure areas for longer than they anticipated. Flights can be delayed for a variety of reasons so it’s not unusual to have large numbers congregating in these spaces.

I found myself wondering recently about how well airports are prepared for the evacuation of passengers from the terminal building in the event of a catastrophic event. An event that would necessitate their speedy and safe removal from the area. I have a reason for asking this.

I was originally meant to travel to Cyprus on 2nd September but cancelled the flights after my wife broke her collarbone. As soon as she improved, I rebooked for September 27^th. Unfortunately for me, that was the same date Storm Agnes decided to visit.

I arrived in Cork Airport in plenty of time for my 4.50pm Ryanair flight to London Gatwick and I was delighted to see that the flight was still on schedule. The storm was petering out by then, so it all looked very promising, and we were called for boarding on time. I boarded the plane, put my knapsack in the overhead locker and took my seat. Happy days.

However, just as I was searching for the buckle of my seat belt, the captain made an announcement. He told us he had some bad news. Unfortunately, this plane would not now be going to London after all, so we were asked to disembark. There was no explanation given. Bummer.

We were all herded back the way we came to the departure lounge, but we couldn’t access the terminal building. Passengers who arrived at the building first were coming back down the stairs as the rest of us were trying to go up because there was no way out up there. Confusion reigned and the poor lady with the high vis jacket and the walkie talkie didn’t seem to be any wiser than the rest of us.

Eventually we were guided through a different route, back to the departure gate. A large queue of passengers had formed where we had been earlier, and they were preparing to board our flight. We watched jealously as they took our plane and our seats and headed for Lanzarote.

In the meantime, more flights were being cancelled and delayed. Some passengers were collected by bus and transferred to Shannon, some gave up and went home and others held tough hoping for better news. There was a lot of confusion and there didn’t seem to be any figure of authority to provide accurate information.

My flight was delayed a few more times and it got to the stage where I was going to miss my connecting flight in Gatwick, so I threw in the towel and called my son to come and collect me. To get out of the airport, a few of us went back through duty free and returned to the security area, but the security personnel weren’t too sure what to do with us.

They eventually allowed us out but now we were in the lanes outside security, walking against the passengers heading in the opposite direction. It was far from ideal. Progress was slow and that got me wondering how a large volume of passengers would be evacuated from that part of the terminal if the need arose? Hopefully there’s a plan.