Do It Yourself

It would be pointless to discuss the comments of Minister Pat Rabbitte in respect of the Croke Park Agreement and its possible renegotiation. The fact that a politician of his longevity is only seeing fit to mention it now should speak for itself. However, it does signal the shift in perception that is taking place even in the fossilised minds of the social-partnership elite, and the possibility that some kind of sense will prevail in the direction of public policy, even at this late stage.

The Irish government and its European counterparts have been juggling monetary figures for so long they have become meaningless. The latest summit in Brussels may as well have been discussing monopoly scores for all the difference it made to the underlying chasm of debt that shows no signs of going away. There also seems little doubt that ordinary people are giving up on the politicians, and even the State, for the more certain refuge of their own resources. This is worrying for the generations who have been raised in the embrace of the welfare state and who turn to it as they used to turn to mother. But mother has gone and we're beginning to be resigned to that.

Instead, enterprising and resourceful people are rediscovering the skills of their youth or even of their forebears and growing their own food and fixing their own property. Some of the more adventurous are even planning their own homes without reference to local authorities or banks. These are often built from the natural resources around them - such as straw or clay - and cost a fraction of houses built from the products of big industry and financed by big business. Is this a good thing? You bet!