You would imagine that some people in the migrancy sector might have come to be cautious when speaking about the likely numbers of peole ready to land up in Ireland over the coming years.
The state itself has certainly of late been downplaying all of this, despite another 2,000 new applicants having arrived to claim International Protection here in the first six weeks of 2024.
Fintan Drury of Sport Against Racism Ireland (SARI), however, was not hiding the light of diversity under a bushel when he spoke at the weekend to Brendan O’Connor. In a discussion of the issues arising from the controversy surrounding the use of D Hotel in Drogheda, Drury reprised the old Bachman Turner Overdrive number You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet.
"The numbers coming here, as a result of the climate crisis, in the next 10, 20, 30 years is beyond what we can conceive of right now"
Fintan Drury, Chair Sport Against Racism Ireland pic.twitter.com/Jw2id8fqSr
— Irishman (@IrishmanIRL) February 18, 2024
“The numbers coming here, as a result of the climate crisis, in the next 10, 20, 30 years is beyond what we can conceive of right now,” he said.
Drury said that the Irish state needs a “masterplan” to prepare for “what we know for certainty is a greater influx of people to this wealthy nation and that they will come here by any means they can. And that this is going to be significantly augmented by the climate crisis.”
The numbers involved will be “beyond what we can conceive of right now, and we will have a responsibility to care for those people.”
If “we” means Sport Against Racism Ireland, perhaps we can look forward to a few more soccer kickarounds in the Phoenix Park. If “we” means the Irish citizens and state then it will mean further billions of funding diverted into looking after the citizens of other countries, at the ultimate cost to not only the citizens’ pocket but to their quality of life.
So who are SARI? They were founded in 1997. If the Dancing Priest of Father Ted could dance for peace, then these lads would kick football against racism. Among their patrons are former Irish soccer manager Brian Kerr who once declared that he thought the Irish team was “too white.”
According to their accounts for 2022, they had an income of €285,879 but managed to spend €310,044. Of that income €70,900 came directly from the taxpayer, with another €182,852 from philanthropies. Just €1,311 came from “general donations” from members of the public. Staff costs amounted to €144,300.
One of the directors and founding members, English photographer Perry Ogden, who is also secretary of SARI, was paid €6,640 for the use of his office at 136 Capel Street. Ogden also received a further €1,640 for the use of “light and heat” at those premises, and Ogden’s company Lír Films is also due payments for expenses and for an outstanding loan.
The current directors of SARI are Chinedu Onejelem who was a director of Concern and the Nigerian Citizens Information and Advice Bureau; Denis Kerr who owns Cyball management consultants; Amina Moustafa who is a director of Euroburg International Youth Work; Dhruba Banerjee who is a director of Strike Films; Eamonn O’Shea who is director and shareholder in Global Currency Exchange; and Zak Moradi who played gaelic football for Leitrim.
Then there is Fintan Drury. Fintan has a rather impressive CV and certainly one that would distinguish him from your normal run-of-the-mill leftie NGO types. He was a journalist with RTÉ before becoming Chairperson of that body for a year between 2005 and 2006. He was also a non-executive director of the much beloved and missed Anglo Irish Bank for six years.
He served during the noughties as Chairperson of Paddy Power bookmakers and remained for a number of years as a director of Flutter the now gigantic gambling company that includes the merger of Paddy Power and Betfair. With a more climate friendly entrepreneurial hat on, Drury was also for a time a director of Mainstream Renewable Power.
Mainstream was founded by the late Eddie O’Connor who was also a founder of Airtricity that emerged from the privatisation of much of the Irish energy sector in the 1990s. O’Connor was also on the board of the Ireland China Institute. He was previously CEO of Bord na Mona.
It is very doubtful that the likes of the Ireland China Institute will spend much time worrying over China’s obligation to take in and be “responsible to care for those people” fleeing the climate change that the Chinese seem happily unbothered about. They continue to break world historical records for coal mining, concrete construction, and other stuff our Paddys and Patsys are being told they are obligated to provide a solution to.
What appears to be missing in all of this forecasting of millions of climate refugees heading for Ireland is the possibility that none of it is inevitable. If it does happen then it will lead to the collapse of western societies as we know them.
Above all, what is missing in this discussion is that there is no obligation on the Irish people, or any other, to take in all of these people. None.