Stormont politicians offered a ‘Lough Neagh smoothie’ over toxic pollution in waterways

In 2016, when the town of Flint, Michigan in the USA was still suffering from having its water supply poisoned by lead from ancient pipes, renowned war criminal Barack Obama turned up to reassure residents that it was in fact safe to consume liquid tainted by the brain damaging substance. In typically mendacious fashion, he raised a glass of the toxic H2O to his lips, pretended to drink approximately three millilitres of it, then encouraged the inhabitants of the blighted town to start downing it without a care. Not to be outdone, the politicians of the occupied six counties have been busy in recent years trashing our own water supply, rendering Lough Neagh a toxic swamp. Enter Bea Shrewsbury, a County Down grandmother who turned up yesterday at Stormont to invite Stormont politicians to indulge in their own version of Mr Obama’s Oscar-worthy performance.

‘Lough Neagh smoothie’: polluted waters

Armed with her ‘Lough Neagh smoothie’, an unappetising green concoction drawn from the festering body of water, our noble representatives were spared a visit to A&E and/or a BAFTA ceremony by security swiftly ushering the would-be poisoner off the premises.

Explaining her motivations with the Lough Neagh smoothie to the Belfast Telegraph, Shrewsbury said:

I’m here today as a voter, a member of the public, someone who drinks water in Northern Ireland and as a grandmother of two small children who also drink water from Lough Neagh, and I’m here because I am so, so concerned now about what is happening to Lough Neagh.

I actually came here with my Lough Neagh smoothie, which is Lough Neagh water, and the reason I came to Stormont in particular is because I believe that smooth talking MLAs who are doing consultation after consultation are not actually doing any action to solve the problems of Lough Neagh.

And it’s true – just as they avoided an encounter with Shrewsbury’s sludge, North of Ireland politicians avoided dealing with the ongoing issue of Lough Neagh’s pollution. So too Moy Park – who earns its living torturing and massacring defenceless chickens for a living – and has avoided prosecution for their role in our foul waterways.

A BBC investigation found “hundreds of breaches of the company’s trade effluent consents”, which are one factor in the algal blooms destroying the body of water, the largest lake across all of Ireland and Britain.

Agri-food expansion and algal blooms

Moy Park’s criminality was just part of a massive agri-food expansion supported across the political spectrum. It was directed by now First Minister Michelle O’Neill (the Minister for Agriculture) which saw an ever-expanding mass murder of animals combined with pumping a near infinite torrent of shit into local rivers and lakes. The 2010s saw a 72% increase of pig and poultry production respectively. With fines that were so low it was cheaper to pollute, destruction of the ecosystem was an inevitability.

As Shrewsbury asked as she delivered her Lough Neagh smoothie:

surely they [MLAs] don’t want their families to be drinking this water?

Yet therein lies the self-devouring nature of a system like capitalism. It devours animals, the environment, the working class, and ultimately even the people who promote this singularly destructive force.

Featured image via the Canary