Did Derry duo pay for McCanns' mistake?

Lindy McDowell

Lindy McDowell, Belfast Telegraph

Wednesday, May 07, 2008

We are all very quick to rush to judgement. Or, in the case of Co Londonderry couple Eamon and Antoinette McGuckin, to set ourselves up as judge, jury and child protection agency.

The couple hit the headlines earlier this week when reports of how on holiday in the Algarve they had become "so drunk they had passed out" in their hotel bar and their children aged, one, two and six years had to be temporarily taken into care.

It seems indeed a shocking case. On the face of it ... For, at the time of writing anyway, we have still only heard one side of the story — the account from the hotel manager and the boss of the care home where the children were taken.

Is it possible the parents might not be as terrible as they have initially been painted? Their neighbours definitely see it as out of character.

One local describes the pair as attentive and loving and insists that those who know them are shocked that they have been involved in such an incident.

Says one: "They are a lovely family. We just can't believe this is the same family."

The hotel manager tells reporters that the couple only left the hotel to go drinking at 8pm. They'd had a meal. They were back again by 10pm.

But by this time reports say the couple were unsteady on their feet and vomiting.

The husband, says the manager: "Tried to sit down on the sofa but fell through it."

This may be down to a language malfunction on the part of the manager. If he did indeed "fall through it", surely this would suggest that it was the sofa, not the man, which was primarily at fault.

The man who had been sick in reception now fell into a coma.

His wife, who'd also been sick, collapsed unconscious, too. We are left to assume this was entirely due to the drink. Might it not also have something to do with what they'd eaten?

And as for the drink — maybe they just weren't used to it ... maybe it was much stronger than they'd thought ... maybe they'd drunk something that had seemed innocuous but which packed a lethal punch ...

They certainly seem to have got very, very drunk indeed for a pair who would have been drinking for a couple of hours — on a full stomach.

Of course, many people reading this will be tut-tutting and saying none of this makes it right. They are parents of young children.

What were they thinking of drinking while they were in charge of two infants and a six-year-old?

The reality is that's what many people do — go out en famille for a few drinks when on holiday.

I doubt, judging by the comments of their neighbours, that the McGuckins are the sort who planned to drink themselves into a coma. Rather they sound like many other loving parents who work hard and on their annual break, choose to relax and enjoy themselves by having a few drinks.

The fact that they got so drunk so quickly would seem to suggest they were far from hardened drinkers, the fact that they'd taken their children along does not fit in with the portrait of neglectful parents.

But then ... try telling that to the Portuguese. And here we come to the crux of the matter. Two words — Madeleine McCann.

Coming as it did in the same weekend that marked the first anniversary of the little girl's disappearance, the story was always going to make front page news.

And fitting as it does the current Portuguese perception that parents from the UK are neglectful and selfish, the McGuckins were not going to win much sympathy from the authorities.

Me, I'd just like to hear their side of the story. I can't help feeling that if this couple had chosen, say, a resort in Spain, we would never have heard a word about it all.

Which brings us back to the question about the furore this week — was it really about the family from Upperlands?

Or Madeleine McCann?