Irish Examiner view: Joe’s salon showed what a local business really is

Thu, 17 Oct, 2024 - 01:00

It has been a punishing time for small businesses everywhere in Ireland, and this week we learned that yet another will close soon.

Due to health reasons, Joe Byrne will shut Joseph’s Hair Salon in Glasheen in Cork at the end of December.

The loss of any business is a blow, but this news is particularly piercing because of the work Joseph’s Hair Salon has done in and for its community.

For many years, the salon has cut the hair of homeless people for free, making a significant difference in the lives of the most vulnerable members of society.

In doing so, the staff recognised people as individuals rather than types, and helped to bolster their confidence when needed.

The value of such work is difficult to overstate.

This week Joe himself recalled one interaction: “After I had finished drying his hair, he turned to me and said: ‘That’s the first human touch I’ve had in so long. You have no idea what that means.’

“He was just there to get his hair cut, and yet there was this huge impact on his self-confidence.”

The salon has not restricted its work to the homeless.

It has helped those struggling with addiction, and it has been particularly proactive with children in need, providing back-to-school packs and aid at First Communion time.

It goes without saying that Joe, his husband Darren Kilkenny, and the salon staff deserve huge credit for the work they have done to improve the lives of people.

Darren Kilkenny and Joseph Byrne. Picture: Larry Cummins

The obvious comparison is with the faceless multinationals which remain at a remove from communities, and whose core business often seems aimed at undermining bonds in those communities rather than underpinning them.

When we lament the disappearance of small businesses, these are the kinds of ancillary benefits that are rarely mentioned — the commitment of such businesses to improving the lives of people in their localities.

Sometimes the farewells to such disappearing businesses can appear to be pro forma tributes or empty formulae, but not in this case.

Joseph’s Hair Salon showed what a local business really is.

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Darkest days of the Troubles

Tributes were paid this week across the water to General Mike Jackson, the former head of the British army.

As might be expected, the tone of the eulogies to be found in the right-wing British press was fawning.

For instance, the Daily Mail recalled a stand-off between Jackson and an American general in Kosovo, depicting Jackson as the man who had single-handedly stopped a third world war from breaking out.

The Telegraph opened its obituary as follows: “General Sir Mike Jackson, who has died aged 80, was Chief of the General Staff from 2003 until 2006, having come to prominence as the formidable commander of Nato peace-keeping troops in the former Yugoslavia.”

For a sizeable constituency in Ireland, Jackson came to prominence not because he was “redoubtable and straight-talking” (again, The Telegraph), but for his involvement in some of the darkest days of the Troubles.

Jackson was a captain in the Parachute Regiment when its soldiers shot 13 people dead in Derry on Bloody Sunday.

The 1998 Saville Inquiry, which found the soldiers were not justified in opening fire, examined Jackson’s role in the incident with particular reference to a list he compiled at the time suggesting — falsely — that those killed had been armed.

At the Ballymurphy Inquest in 2019, which examined 10 killings in Belfast in 1971, Jackson claimed the deaths arose during a firefight between the Parachute Regiment and the IRA, though the inquest found all those killed were innocent civilians.

He also admitted he could not explain the lack of investigation of the killings, and had “probably” told the Belfast Telegraph that two of those killed in Ballymurphy were gunmen when they were not.

Clearly there were serious questions to be asked about Jackson’s record during the Troubles.

The fact he progressed up the ranks to head the British army suggests that those questions were either not addressed or not taken seriously.

Many Irish people would incline to the view of the Bloody Sunday Trust, that Jackson ought to have faced criminal charges for the events in Derry.

That would have been an appropriate forum for the “straight-talking” soldier.

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Thomas Tuchel will have a tough job

Another England football manager appointment means the beginning of another England football manager hype cycle.

Thomas Tuchel is a successful manager with a Champions League victory the highlight of an impressive CV, but he is, of course, German.

Given the England followers’ traditional dislike of Germany, it means Tuchel faces a significant task in winning over fans accustomed to outgoing manager Gareth Southgate’s soothing affect.

It will be particularly interesting, for instance, to see if he is hounded the way interim boss Lee Carsley was for not singing the English national anthem.

Thomas Tuchel faces a significant task in winning over England fans.

The controversy which was confected over Carsley’s silence for the anthem was a classic English media storm in a teacup.

It was brief and inconsequential — and neatly omitted any reference to Fabio Capello, a previous England manager who had not sung the anthem either.

Tuchel no doubt noted the furore and showed his previous experience of the English media with a neat side-step yesterday, saying he had not made up his mind on the issue.

The fact that he even had to outline his position helps explain why the job is so difficult.

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