Irish Examiner view: Read My Lips campaign urges women to get cervical screening
Even now, almost a year on since her death, it can seem strange to speak of Vicky Phelan in the past tense, so powerful and passionate was her presence. File picture: Cathal Noonan
Vicky Phelan, tireless campaigner in the Cervical Check cancer scandal and advocate for cervical cancer screening, died on November 14, 2022. Even now, almost a year on, it can seem strange to speak of her in the past tense, so powerful and passionate was her presence.
In her time raising awareness and pushing for change she touched many lives and effected positive change, and now, even though she is gone, she continues to have an impact.
The Irish Examiner is launching the Read My Lips campaign to encourage women to follow where Vicky led: In the campaign, high-profile women wear lipstick and pose in front of the camera to encourage other women to get a cervical screening test.
Among those women are sports broadcaster Jacqui Hurley, TV presenter Muireann O’Connell, beauty entrepreneur Aimee Connolly, authors Sarah Breen and Emer McLysaght, lecturer and GP Sumi Dunne, and 221+ founding member Lorraine Walsh, all of whom will feature in the campaign.
The extraordinary impact that Vicky Phelan had in driving her campaigns is too strong and too important to be allowed to dissipate. That is why the Irish Examiner is now carrying on her activism and continuing her fight.
The successful rollout of the vaccine and new HPV testing means that Ireland is now one of the first countries in the world to commit to cervical cancer elimination, or fewer than four cases diagnosed for every 100,000; screening helps to detect precancerous cells in thousands of Irish women every year.
That is a hopeful sign for the future, but there is still no room for complacency. The message must be driven home, reiterated, absorbed, learned, and passed on to others: Screening saves lives.
Many of us learned that lesson from Vicky Phelan. It needs to be shared with as many people as possible.
Whenever deliberations on a legal case border on the interminable there’s an obvious comparison: The infamous Jarndyce v Jarndyce probate case of Charles Dickens’ Bleak House, which appears set to meander through the courts forever.
Is this fictional case about to be overtaken by a real-life counterpart, however? The Apple tax case has now been rumbling on for the best part of a decade and looks as far away as ever from a conclusion.
On Thursday, we learned that the advocate general of the European Court of Justice had come out in favour of the EU Commission’s €13bn tax order to Apple, an order made in 2016. That decision was annulled in turn by the general court of the EU in 2020.
The commission’s original order came after a three-year investigation into tax regimes which date back to the early part of this century, and Thursday’s announcement comes as the European Court of Justice prepares a decision of its own next year — though that decision, when it comes, may precipitate further proceedings in turn, stretching the case on and on.
Experts in European law will no doubt feast on the implications of the advocate general’s findings versus the decisions of the general court of the EU, not to mention the force in law of the European Commission’s orders.
From the Irish perspective, Apple has been a significant economic presence here for four decades and billions of euro are involved in this case, but there are also other implications.
In that sense, it was instructive to see comments from Finance Minister Michael McGrath on Thursday: “It has always been, and remains, Ireland’s position that the correct amount of Irish tax was paid and that Ireland provided no State aid to Apple.” Financial sovereignty — the freedom to determine fiscal policy and tax regimes — is a cornerstone of national independence, even set within the framework of EU tax harmonisation. Mr McGrath’s focus on the Irish taxation system was a significant comment in that context.
Many readers have had to endure delays when flying, whether stuck on planes or stranded in airports.
It was interesting, then, to see the footage of a trad session on a recent Aer Lingus flight. Young members of the Cavan Town branch of Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann had been visiting Kurnach and Wurzburg on an Erasmus programme which follows the path of Co Cavan native St Killian when they boarded a plane for the return flight from Frankfurt to Dublin.
When it was announced that the plane would be delayed due to the weather, the Cavan teens took their instruments out of the overhead baggage compartments and played music for the rest of the passengers.
Footage of the session soon went viral, showing the Comhaltas members playing fiddles, flutes, banjos, and bodhrans in the aisles of the plane.
There were no doubt many passengers who enjoyed the music and found it an entertaining way to pass the time, including traditional music fans for whom the session was an unexpected treat.
Is it curmudgeonly to ask whether it was fair that all passengers had to listen to the music? It was a fine gesture from the Cavan natives to offer to entertain their fellow passengers, but it seems a little unfair to impose a particular brand of music on everyone travelling on the flight.
If a group of passengers insisted on playing Schubert or Snoop Dogg loud enough for the entire plane to hear then the reaction would be quite different, yet the principle involved here is the same.
