Ireland is currently in a state of flux. The institutions of State, The Church and The Government and of course the Banks are all in a perilous state. People have lost faith in The Catholic Church and Fianna Fail and those who have lost money on bank shares are furious. We are in recession and people are losing their jobs. So who cares about human rights?
I do because I believe that how a country treats its weakest /most marginalised members of society is important. I could be down on my luck and I would like to know that I would be looked after. I want to know that I would get social welfare and a roof over my head. And I think that most people would be the same. I know that some people complain about those that are on the dole and call them lazy and opportunistic but a lot of decent people have lost their jobs through no fault of their own, but because they happened to be working in the construction industry and there is no work at the minute. Ireland, unlike the US has a good Social Welfare system.
The Irish Human Rights Centre in Galway has just brought out a report about Racism in the Taxi Industry and the author Vinod Jaichand has also pointed out that human rights are not just a luxury for the good times. Racism is a growing problem in Ireland and unfortunately organisations such as the National Consultative Committee to Combat Racism was disbanded in 2008. Just at a time when it is badly needed!
I am starting to think that the law is the only real remaining way of protecting citizens. After all the law is supposed to be by the people for the people. It is not enough to have laws on the Statute Books, these laws must also be enforced. It is an absolute disgrace that there was a Financial Regulator in place until 2008 who was either asleep on the job or persuaded by vested interests to turn a blind eye to what is going on in the economy. One of the best watchdogs at the minute is the Irish Human Rights Commission but unfortunately they have also had their budget cut by the Government.
Some of the current issues that were on the agenda at a recent conference between the Law Society of Ireland and the Human Rights Commission were
1) Business and Human Rights
2) Human Rights and the Environment
3) Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgendered People
2) Human Rights and the Environment
3) Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgendered People
Education is the way to address these issues. There is a problem in that almost all of the schools in Ireland are under religious patronage and this limits perspective and makes choices difficult for non-believers. Educate Together has done a lot of work in this area but that movement started with parents, not the Government, however they are now funded by the State. Travellers are not recognised by the State as an ethnic minority and because of this they may be losing out on EU protection of their identity and culture. Abortion is not freely available but the Government had their knuckles rapped last week by the European Court of Human Rights (Strasbourg) in relation of accessibility to doctors/medical care for women with crisis pregnancies.
In my view, the Irish Government is not proactive enough in relation to how it treats members of marginalised groups. Tension between different races can lead to violence as was seen recently by the death of a 15 year old schoolboy Toyosi Shittabey on Good Friday 2010. I can see the tragic irony in this, supposedly a Catholic Country. Racial tension must be addressed otherwise there will be more incidents of this nature. I always think it is wise to look ahead and see what is coming down the tracks towards us rather than burying our heads in the sand. Human Rights and Human Responsibilities belong to each and every one of us.
