If Conor McGregor ever becomes President will the last person leaving Ireland please turn off the lights? He made a right twat of himself in his much publicised interview with Tucker Carson unfortunately watched by millions of adoring Americans. He told lie after lie about our great little country and portrayed a picture that every town and village is being overrun by illegal immigrants, out to destroy our society, take our jobs and change our way of life. It is the kind of rhetoric which won Donald Trump the White House for a damaging second term. However the truth is there is no comparison between the millions of illegal aliens flooding the United States from South America and the tens of thousands coming in here in recent years. Yes the USA has a serious problem with illegal immigration, so does Britain but thankfully we really don't. There is no doubt that in recent years here every Tom. Dick and Harry were coming here and claiming political asylum. Many were coming from countries that were safe but we had not classified them as such. Thankfully in the past year that has all changed. Some Ministers in the previous Government had their own liberal agendas and were prepared to turn a blind eye and let it happen. But a massive backlash in rural Ireland in the run up to the November General Election brought the Cabinet as a whole to their senses and a number of vital changes in the International Protection System were made. The Department of Integration left a lot to be desired and behaved like dictators in recent years moving people into hotels and bed and breakfasts in many small towns and villages, without any consultation with the local community. They claimed they consulted but it was all nonsense and I know this by the way they moved refugees into the only hotel open for business and tourists, the D Hotel in my home town Drogheda. They only consulted with the politicians when the deal with the hotel was done. Thankfully now many of these contracts in hotels are not being renewed which means all these places especially in the west will be available to accommodate tourists. The refugee gravy train which the owners were making a fortune out of is grinding to a halt. The number of civil servant staff dealing with immigration as a whole has soared and people are now being stopped and turned back at our airports and ports day in day out. The appeal system for International Protection applicants is in the process of being reduced from 18 down to 6 months, so those refused will be kicked out quicker. I am all for bringing in people to work in Ireland but each and everyone of them must apply through the proper channels for a visa before they are allowed in here. We are going to need more and more foreign workers for various jobs from mechanics, bus drivers, meat factory workers, fruit and vegetable pickers, as the economy hopefully continues to grow. We have not so far lost our Irish way of life or culture by welcoming our new friends and neighbours despite what the likes of Conor McGregor says. Ireland is still a Christian country and if anything there are more people going to mass now than there were a decade ago. We have one of the smallest Islamic communities in the whole of Europe for instance. If the likes of McGregor really hates what Ireland has become why doesn't he just head off and go and live in his beloved America. Let me tell you something I wouldn't live in the United States now for all the money in. the world. My view has nothing to do with Trump and all do with the cost of living there. Ireland is a thousand times better place to live than the United States. Our health and education systems for all their faults are way better than America and at least you won't go bankrupt if you have to have open heart surgery or send your kids to college. The cost of food as I have told you here before is scandalous and the yanks don't have the competition in the grocery stores that we have. They reckon it takes a quarter of a million dollars to have an ordinary life and rear a family of two kids in America - and that says it all. Money of course would never bother McGregor because he is worth a couple of hundred million and good luck to him. But he has committed the cardinal sin - no Irish man or woman would slag off their beloved Republic to a foreign audience like he has. As bad as things may be from time to time we Irish don't wash our dirty linen in public. Ireland may not be perfect but it is our country. We are slowly building a decent society and by and far most people are better off compared to when I was growing up. Very few of my generation went to college but we couldn't afford to, now nearly every kid does. Yes we need more houses, more infrastructure, energy security, the list is long. But we are not being overrun by illegal immigrants despite what McGregor and his idiot pal President Trump might think. I will still visit the States a couple of times a year to see my relatives but I would never live there. The opinion polls have already said McGregor has not a chance in hell of becoming President of Ireland. That is because the Irish people have far more sense than we give them credit for. Our way of life will always be protected and we will continue to take in immigrants as we should when we need them but on our terms. Most of the new Irish that I have met in recent years have made a positive contribution to our society and love our little country. Of course there will be the odd bad apple but they are few and far between. For more of the latest breaking news from the Irish Mirror check out our homepage by clicking here