Ireland's Eye: What's going on in the old sod

Seeking marriage help

A Roscommon farmer having trouble with his wife took a unique approach back in 1980 and wrote to the then Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Charles Haughey for help.

According to the recently published state papers for 1980, the farmer was having problems with his wife of four years.

He told Haughey she hadn’t a penny when he married her, but she “has refused to have a child, cook, wash or clean the house. All she does is walk the roads and lie in bed all day. When I ask her what she intends doing, she tells me mind my own business, that she will do as she likes.”
He claimed that she left the house for four months the previous year “dossing around with old bachelor men.”

He explained that he had tried to prevent her return home, but she got into the house “in spite of me.”

“Could you please tell me is she entitled to equal share in my property, as I think she is entitled to none of it,” he asked Haughey. Haughey’s secretary said that only the man’s legal adviser could clarify his position in law.

Meanwhile, on November 1, 1980, contraceptives became legally available in Ireland for the first time in 45 years, but only on prescription from a doctor. These regulations enacted the Family Planning Act 1979, described by Haughey as an “Irish solution to an Irish problem.”

A group of women from Ballaghaderreen wrote to Haughey warning him of the “abhorrent inevitable consequences” of the bill, including that Ireland would “cease to be one of the last outposts of moral society.” 

Mary T. Geever, recalled former Fine Gael Taoiseach Liam Cosgrave as a “man of moral conscience.”

“Would you want the people of Ireland to remember you as the taoiseach who introduced contraception, facilitating sin among weak-willed teenagers?” she wrote, adding that the move would impose a financial burden on taxpayers who would have to finance the treatment of “veneral
(sic) disease.”
- Roscommon Herald

Over the counter morning after

The Irish College of General Practitioners says it has concerns about a move by pharmacy chain Boots to offer emergency contraception over the counter without a prescription for the first time.
Until now, women who wished to take the morning after pill had to visit their doctor first.

Dr. Mel Bates, chair of the Irish College of General Practitioners, said dispensing emergency contraception in this way raised issues about the quality and continuity of care given to patients.
He said that in a doctor setting, women could be offered advice about contraception and sexually transmitted infections.

Boots says it will offer the morning after pill in all its Irish pharmacies from Wednesday of this week.

It says it is able to do legally under a patient group direction. This allows its medical director to instruct non-doctors on following certain protocols.
- RTE News

Recession pressure

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Nster.com