It's just that the idea of throwing hazardous electrical equipment into the sea is so innately Irish that we make ads about it.

I think the Irish are dirty bastards, and being a Galwegian at a time when newsreaders are quoting Coleridge, dumped fridges are as ubiquitous as bungalows and the words raw sewage are still uttered with regard to the coastline makes the past month extra depressing. But hey, Galway loves to be first, biggest and craziest. Well, now she's the first Irish city in the 10thstrongest economy on earth to have water quality on a par with India.

But they love all that eastern mysticism there.

Why not make the Corrib the new Ganges, you hippy swine? Actually, that is unfair to Galway's artistic herbal tea set. It was they who tried vainly for years for a proper sewage treatment plant at Lough Atalia. They didn't want it put on Mutton Island in the middle of the bay. The city council held up Mutton Island so long that not only did it become the only choice but the plain people of Galway ended up blaming the crusties for the fact that poo was still flowing into the river.

It was built, eventually.

And they built a causeway out so you can take a stroll out to the. . . sewage. But hey, once that causeway creates a big sandbar there will be even more room for the 12 tribes of developers to build rotten Toytown apartments with a view off Mutton Island!

That's the problem with Galway. It would love to be the arty medieval town that protects the Irish language and parties till dawn but really it's a hive of greedy gits who will stop at nothing to get the next tourist euro.

Well, this time it's bitten them in the ass, because you can't even shower in Galway now. And believe me, even tourists like to shower.

"Finally, he's come to the business part, " I hear you say. It's true. Tourism contributes over 2bn to the west; 10% of all jobs are in tourism. Ireland doesn't produce anything any more . . .

the west produces, well, prosthetic limbs, sweaters and pubs, and as soon as Boston Scientific moves to China it's just sweaters and pubs. So tourism is the big Kahuna.

The government is bursting with pride at the roads it's building. So tourists can get around, but what do they get when they get there? A medieval town painted by the colour-blind, surrounded by the worst suburban architecture this side of Milton Keynes?

Traffic-lighted roundabouts visible from space? Water so contaminated with human and animal waste that you can't even wash your hands?

All those water meters they are attaching to new Irish homes mean just one thing. They are going to start charging for water . . . it's an EU directive. Hopefully when that happens Galway will finally become the revolutionary place it always claimed to be and tell the government to start printing ten-year credit notes. But I know Galway. The blame game will be played and the votes will tally up the same as before. Ruffling feathers has never been Galway's thing . . . they would rather have a festival, open a bar, go racing.

Instead of the 800th rehashing of Playboy, Druid should put on Ibsen's Enemy of the People 24 hours a day.

It's about this guy who realises after treating sick tourists that the baths in a coastal town are being polluted by the local tannery, but the townsfolk don't want financial ruin so they brand him a lunatic. Sound familiar?

Paddy Cullivan will be performing with the Camembert Quartet on 24 April in the Wexford Arts Centre at 8pm