Bohermore Woods near Galway Shopping CentreI am astonished that Galway was recently declared Ireland's cleanest city by the 'Irish Business Against Litter' (IBAL) and An Taisce, Ireland's Heritage Watchdog.
While not denying that some good progress has been made in certain areas thanks to the Mayor's publicity stunts & the efforts of the council's own litter wardens, nevertheless the city is sinking deeper and deeper in squalor. With toxic elements in our water supply, pollution in our rivers, chemical fertilisers in our fields and drink bottles and cans covering our green and pleasant parks, we are far from having a clean environment.
While all of us can do our bit to help rectify (I regularly take part in clean-ups), there is no doubt that John Gormley Minister for the Environment and leader of the Green Party can use his powers to do a lot more in this area that would improve our health and protect the country's increasingly threatened wildlife.
Click here to see why in my article and photos on the Greenwatch Galway website
2 comments:
Another rather 'unclean' habit that has surfaced in Galway, and in the realm of the literary arts or late, is the Stalinist practice of newspaper letters and other articles critical of Galway's arts scene being sent under anonymity to The Arts Council in an effort to undermine the sender. This happened recently when letters I had published in local papers were forwarded to the Arts Council as 'proof' that I was devisive and causing 'fracture' in the arts in the city and consequently the Western Writers' Centre was not deserving of funds. The Council withdrew their funding, citing, among other things, this dubiously-sent material. Perhaps sensing the danger of trespassing so freely on free speech, and indeed punishing people for it, they have subsequently tried to back-track on this issue. This anonymous letter business is a despicable practice and has become almost a commonplace here in some aspects of the arts. Yet local journalists seem reluctant to investigate it.
In my comment, in the first paragraph, 'undermine the sender' should read 'undermine the original author.'
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