Part One: Tadhg O Cruadhlaoich described the film ‘ATLANTIC’, and explained and stressed its importance and particularly its screening at the prestigious Berlinale film festival, due to be screened on 14th February. Only the best films are shown at this festival. There followed a discussion about the destruction and over fishing in Ireland’s waters where there huge factory ships are devastating our fishing resources, vessels which are rightly banned in other jurisdictions. The discussion pointed out that when Ireland joined what was then the EEC Irish fisheries were traded for a deal for farmers and also that later oil and gas resources were given away for multi-national corporations to make vast profits, for example the Corrib Gas project in Mayo. The authorisation by the Irish Government of and the importance of cannabis in the treatment of certain conditions was mentioned briefly-and reference was made to a comprehensive report in the Irish Independent Saturday 11th February by Eilish O’Regan

Part Two: Tadhg O Cruadhlaoich outlined the draft programme for The Irish Latin American Film Festival due to take place in April. Full details are available on the LASC, Latin American Solidarity Centre’s website and it was agreed that this festival would give people a very good picture of what is happening in South America. The program talked about the importance of President Michael D. Higgins visit to South America and Cuba. The Irish have been involved historically in the history of South America. On President Higgins’s visit to Peru President Pedro Pablo Kaczynski, conferred on him the country’s top honour, the ‘Gran Collar’ of the Order of the Sun and in doing so mention was made of a namesake of the president who played an important role in that country’s history.

For Tadhg O Cruadhlaoich the Irish language is extremely important and a ‘cupla focal’ were spoken for that reason.

John pointed out that John Denver played an important role in creating awareness of the importance of the natural environment and co-founded a conservation project called the Windstar Foundation Education and Research Centre which was located at 2317 Snowmass Creek Road Snowmass, Colorado 81654 U.S.A. Apart from promoting environmental awareness it was to the fore in environmental initiatives such as renewable energy. This was very innovative in the 1970s. His songs demonstrate his interest and knowledge of deep ecology and have been an inspiration for Enviro.

Presenter: John Haughton

Studio Guest: Tadhg O Cruadhlaoich

Panellists: Joseph Dunne and Robert Navan