Please Help Me!!!

They really shipped you the Celestron Scope : I sent them an email and they said they would not send it because of a Celestron Policy :

so surely the 'private' shops would have the choice to ship to ireland or not.

Unfortunately No:( Each USA based celestron dealer has a very specific agreement with celestron (and meade too) not to ship outside the USA or Canada. You see all meade and celestron scopes are shipped from the manufacturer and not the dealer so theres no way they can do it anyway.

Even though the site may appear like it will ship these to ireland. You will find that even if you do manage to order it the dealer will be in touch to say 'sorry cant do'.

It sucks, I know.

Not sure what to make of that policy about not shipping outside the US and Canada, I had heard that before but at the same time telescopes.com shipped me a Celestron Nexstar 102 SLT four months ago? But it would have worked out cheaper if I had bought it from Greenwich.