But hypocrisy is. Certain things must not be said. Michael Lowry must be very sceptical of returning to power and influence - or to any party where he's likely to be a member of exercising power - if he's speaking out against the drink-driving laws. Which he is. He told the Irish Times last week that "gardaí and the minister for justice would be expected to apply the same level of vigilance [as they do to enforcing the drink driving laws] in other areas where murders, robberies and personal assaults were going unsolved. This is what half the men propping up the bars of Ireland say; why are they picking on harmless little me who was only doing 80 when they haven't even found out yet who kidnapped Shergar?" It's a pretty silly thing to say, in general, though it has the widespread appeal of being in a remote sense a dig at Michael McDowell. The police have a preventative role as well as a detective one, and stopping people from killing themselves and other people does prevent all kinds of damage and suffering.

Still - Michael Lowry wasn't playing to the gallery. He could hardly be more popular in his constituency than he is already. And - the note of rancour aside - what he's saying is quite true and a lot of people are saying it. The drink-driving laws, whether or not you agree that they are over-stringently enforced, are having a damaging effect on rural communities. He's right when he says that rural communities have become more isolated as local post offices and creameries disappear - mind you, they've become less isolated in other ways, with the internet and widespread car ownership, but opportunities for informal group contact have lessened. He's exaggerating, of course, when he says that people are afraid now to go out to have even one or two drinks. But he's right when he says that the pub is the only point of contact for many people in rural Ireland.

I couldn't agree more with him about the community role of the Irish rural pub. I don't think Dublin people realise at all how dull and lonely country life can be and how it is not a luxury but a necessity for many men and women to have a local to drop into late in the evening or at weekends. It's a married couple thing and a community thing - not a bit like a lounge bar or a saloon. But it's also highly individualised. People go to the pub as and how it suits their circumstances and they may or may not join in the crack and they'll stay or go depending on the company and their mood and how much money they have in their pocket. The idea that pubs, or areas containing pubs could get minibuses to leave people home - I've suggested this myself - comes up against the individuality of the act of going to the pub. There's a society made up of individuals in a pub. The clientele are not like old people going shopping, to be told when to get back to the coach.

I agree with everything that's said in praise of rural pubs as such. They're a most wonderful institution - in fact, the main thing wrong with other countries is that they don't have them the same way we do. At this time of year, especially, the fire and the welcome and the chat and the possibility of music or a quiz or a collective look at the television video - it's wonderful. The place would, in sober fact, be intolerable without them. But at the centre of it all is alcohol.

The real attraction of a pub is the likelihood of shifting or altering the state you're in.

Through alcohol. Otherwise, community centres would have caught on. And if by chance you're not drinking yourself you have the interest and amusement of watching other people drinking - that is changing. A sociable night in the pub is, just under the surface, a blood sport.

Pubs are for getting a little bit or more or very drunk in. That's what no one, including Michael Lowry, will say. It's no use claiming, as he did, that he's against drink-driving but he wants the gardaí to be less 'inflexible' - that is, to go easy. The only way to get from a rural pub to home is by car, and people leaving pubs have drink on them. If pubs are to survive at all there are going to be fatalities. The fact is that the gardaí tread a very delicate line between turning a blind eye to that fact, and overreacting to it. They always did. Maybe sometimes in some places they call it wrong, and they either allow too much drinking or they mount intimidatory surveillance, but there's a limit to how good they can be at a social exercise so difficult. Don't forget, Mr Lowry - they're the ones who enforce the laws, and they're also the public servants who pull the drinkers from the wrecks.