Sir, – Una Mullally observes that "Labour doesn't say what it is anymore", and that "young people don't know what it stands for" ("Losing the youth vote is part of Labour's midlife crisis", Opinion & Analysis, March 7th).
Labour has abandoned the left. By seeking broader appeal, it willingly disposed of its core beliefs in favour of power. Left-wing politics is alive in Sinn Féin and the Anti-Austerity Alliance-People Before Profit and others. The electorate has recognised this. – Yours, etc,
PAUL DALY,
Tralee, Co Kerry.
Sir, – Una Mullally asks the question as to why the country was bankrupted and has ended up pretty well ungovernable despite the fact that the “bright sparks”, the “smart students” and the “young activists” are all over the place.
The answer to that is that the young, no matter how smart they think they are, tend to be just as open to the influence of what Una Mullally calls the latest media “murmuration” as the rest of us.
During the election campaign, the fact that this country had just had a lucky escape from its worst calamity since independence, and could have ended up like Greece, was absent from the media murmuration. The fact that government since 2011 was cleaning up a mess caused by disastrous decisions made by a small number of powerful people in government and financial institutions during the pre-2010 decade of the boom was also absent from the media murmuration during the election campaign.
This is a media that day after day right through the Celtic Tiger boom rejoiced at the government decisions to treble government spending and the similar financial institution decisions to treble bank lending.
This is a media that day after day during the consequent austerity cheered the demands for taxpayers’ money of every vested interest from Ballygobackwards to the salubrious suburbs.
When the leaders of the public discourse have learned so little from the collapse, and our lucky escape from a Greek-style scenario, and have learned even less about the potentially serious consequences of the failure to form a government, why should the “bright sparks”, the “smart students” and the “young activists” be any different? – Yours, etc,
A LEAVY,
Sutton,
Dublin 13.
Sir, – –Una Mullally’s claim that “young people don’t know what Labour stands for” is wrong. Most know that Labour stands for the status quo. – Yours, etc,
CHRISTIAN MORRIS,
Howth,
Dublin 13.
Sir, – Una Mullally states that she was “genuinely shocked to hear some students talk about their party membership of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael” on a recent trip to UCD. If your columnist is serious in this statement then I strongly suggest that she broaden her world view beyond the socialist bubble she seems to inhabit. It might help explain to her why the two parties mentioned above won over 50 per cent of the vote in the recent election. – Yours, etc,
KEVIN KENNY,
Baltinglass,
Co Wicklow.