For example, at one infamous meeting of the City Council the Limerick Leader was denounced for highlighting attacks on women in the general area of the campus. The newspaper was accused of deterring industrialists from coming to Limerick. The story was corroborated by the students' union but in the corridors of local power public relations took precedence over security. That was years ago. But, as the CCTV plan itself suggests, there has been cause for concern ever since.
Shocking photographs illustrating some recent incidents are in private circulation.
But it would be wrong to lay the blame for the current situation entirely on students. Boys will be boys. What seems to have happened at Castletroy over the years is that willy-nilly students ghettos have been created in rented accommodation in neighbourhoods that would normally be peopled almost exclusively by families. Speculators have cashed in on student demand. But they have only been able to do so because of the failure over the years of Plassey bosses and of local and national government to synchronise a sufficient supply of suitable accommodation with the rapid expansion of the university.