Ireland Has No Provision For 'State Of Emergency'

In the wake of the state grinding to halt during the recent freezing conditions, the Labour Party has said that it is "astonishing" Ireland has no provisions for declaring a state of emergency.

According to Labour spokesman Ciarán Lynch, the revelation emerged yesterday during a meeting of the Oireachtas Environment Committee.

Speaking after the meeting, Mr Lynch said: "One of the most remarkable facts that emerged is that while local authorities, an Garda Siochana or the HSE may declare an emergency at local level, there is no provision for the Government or for any Minister to declare a national emergency.

"The result of this is that instead of fostering a centralised focused response to the recent crisis situations such as the November flooding or the current big freeze, we have a hodge-podge of local responses operating in an uncoordinated fashion across a variety of agencies and depts. What we got was a discordant melody of local responses, operating in an individual orchestrated manner but with no national conductor."

Ireland last announced a national state of emergency on 2 September 1939 during World War II under an emergency powers act, which has since been rescinded.

Mr Lynch went on to say he was also astonished to hear that at no stage in recent months was a state of emergency declared in Cork.

"During this time millions of litres of water were pouring onto city streets, houses were being destroyed, schools were forced to close, roads became impassable and hospital A&E wards became even more overcrowded than usual. It seems that incredibly, despite the chaos that was playing out in front of our eyes, the protocol in place for declaring a state of emergency

(DW/GK)