Elderly forced to ‘scavenge ditches’ for wood as fuel crisis continues to impact rural Wexford

By Simon Bourke, Wexford People

Elderly residents in Co Wexford are being forced to scavenge “the ditches looking for bits of wood” because they can’t afford to pay for heating oil, it has been claimed. While fuel prices have stabliised following the ceasefire between the US and Iran, many are still struggling to pay for kerosene to heat their homes as the calendar inches slowly towards summer.

During a special presentation at the April meeting of the Rosslare Municipal District (RMD), an agriculture contractor from south Wexford summed up the devastation the recent increases in prices has caused in his locality.

“Kerosene has increase by between 90-100 pc,” said Pierce Cousins of Cousins Agri & Plant Ltd. “Pensioners in my community can’t afford to fill their tanks, they’re scavenging the ditches looking for bits of wood, I’ve seen it with my own eyes, a 78-year-old man cutting up branches for the fire, it’s 2026, not 1926.”

With farmers, fishermen, bus operators, and hauliers hit hardest by the sudden rise in fuel costs, Pierce and many others from the RMD were forced to set up a blockade in Rosslare to express their discontent at the government’s unwillingness to listen to their concerns.

And while there have been suggestions that an “unsavoury element” sought to annex the protest for its own means, Pierce said that those who had been on the frontlines from the outset “voluntarily stood down”.

“We were told we’d have to get out or face the risk of having our machinery damaged by the public order unit when they turned up,” he recounted. “We had a great relationship with Gda Casey over the three days, we liaised with him throughout, but when he told us he was no longer going to be in charge a decision was made to pull out the gear.”

Pierce received support from Sinn Féin councillor Aoife Rose O’Brien who said “the average Irish person is being crippled beyond measure by the price of fuel and the cost-of-living”.

"What people don’t realise is that if the fisherman can’t pay the extra €1,500 to fill his tank, the consumer will feel the pinch further along the line,” she added.

The fuel protests may have been unprecedented but, according to Cllr Jim Codd, Ireland has been “grinding to a halt long before these protests started”.

"There’s been 20 years of talking and it’s worse it’s getting. Our rural community is in a dire situation,” he added.

Cllr Codd also took issue with how The Wexford People had covered the protest, brandishing a copy of the paper as he accused the press of unfairly tarnishing a delegation who attended a recent council meeting.

“These people took part in a peaceful protest and have been depicted terribly in the press. I wonder is the press at all interested in the plight of these people, they’d want to be a little bit fairer than this,” he said as he held the weekly edition aloft.

At the county meeting two days prior, two emergency motions condemning the government’s handling of the protest had been stymied by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. However, with a majority of three required to pass a motion in the five-seat RMD, Cathaoirleach Ger Carthy proposed that the following motion be forwarded to the offices of the taoiseach.

"The RMD calls on the government to engage in a meaningful way with lobby groups to address the current crisis in rural Ireland pertaining to cost of living increases for all its residents, to include the price of diesel, petrol, home heating oil, and all those affected in the farming, fishing, agri-contract, and haulier sector, and condemn the government's threat to deploy the army on protest lines in advance of meaningful engagement. "

The motion was subsequently carried following votes in favour from Cllrs Carthy, Codd, and O’Brien.