Sir, - I feel that many correspondents to your Letters page on the above topic do not get full value from their morning paper, as confusion still arises over a distinction which was succinctly explained by you on numerous occasions.
It is this, and I repeat it knowing that, by doing so, I may well bring the label of "racist" on myself for ever more: Just because a newly-arrived person has a slightly different skin tone to ours does not make him or her an "asylum-seeker", or a "political refugee". They may be an immigrant, legal or illegal; but very unlikely, in this day and age, to be a person whose very being is at risk if deported - a true "asylum-seeker".
Ivor Callely, in bringing this to our notice and by highlighting the potentially explosive situation which is now developing with regard to accommodation in the Eastern Health Board area, is doing us a service by not burying his head in the sand, like many other politicians. Indeed, it is incumbent on Mr Callely, as boss of the body which is most affected by these people, to warn us of impending problems regarding accommodation shortages.
If we do introduce more stringent controls here with regard to illegal immigrants (as distinct from genuine political refugees), we would only be following in the footsteps of virtually every other European country, as well as our friends the Americans, who also introduced strict entry requirements in order to quell the hordes of Irish (but not English) arriving on their shores.
The vast majority of the recent immigration influx (a dubious Transylvanian choir being a case in point) are here purely to jump on the gravy train with the Celtic Tiger in its tank - a tiger brought about by the hard efforts of the workers of this land, who succeeded despite a punitive tax regime and the most despicable corruption in high places. We, the workers, should now be the reapers of what we sowed - for goodness' sake, we have enough freeloaders of our own without importing them as well. - Yours, etc., D.K. Henderson,
Castle Avenue, Clontarf, Dublin 3.