CONSIDER CONTEMPORARY LIFE in Ireland: The three-hour commute because the train doesn’t exist. The GP list that’s been closed for two years. The €2,200 rent for a one-bed that would cost €900 in Vienna. The 14-month wait for an MRI on the public list, or five days if you can pay. The schools with no places, the buses that don’t come, the €12 sandwiches.

And then you’re told that Ireland is the second richest country in Europe, that the government ran a €23 billion surplus last year, that unemployment is at record lows, and that if you’re not happy with this arrangement, you should be grateful for what you have and stop complaining.

Both of these things are true, and the distance between Ireland’s wealth and Ireland’s infrastructure, I suspect, is what the fuel protests are actually about. Fuel just happened to be the thing that broke the surface in the last week, but the distance has been there for a decade, and it is growing.

Why doesn’t Ireland work?

Ireland has 43 per cent fewer hospital beds per capita than the EU average, and over 75 per cent of GP practices have closed their lists to new patients. The rail network has halved since 1920, while the motorway network per capita has grown to three times the UK’s, because we built roads for cars and forgot that other countries built trains for people. The IMF found last year that Ireland’s infrastructure lags competitor economies by 32 per cent, and the country remains the only EU member state with no gas storage at all. As rich as Denmark, but delivering less than Poland.

Haulage, farming and other protester brought the country to its knees in the past week. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo

The reason comes down to what the money becomes. Corporation tax reached €28 billion last year, with 46 per cent coming from just........

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