Last night, a very dignified pensioner asked me at the meeting if it was true that the Taoiseach, Deputy Enda Kenny, had one time condemned tax on the home as wrong, and I said that I would have the opportunity to ask him directly this morning. Does the Taoiseach recognise

It is morally unjust and unfair to tax a person’s home, and by so doing grind him into the ground.
It reminds me of a vampire tax in that it drives a stake through the heart of home ownership, through enthusiasm and initiative, and sucks the life blood of people who want to own their own home and better their position.

The concession by the government on the septic tank registration charge is a desperate attempt to stem the growing opposition to household taxes. Momentum is now building against the household tax and, with 95% still not paying, the government faces mass non-registration of the first troika-imposed tax.

Huge attendances have taken place around the country in the last week at public meetings organised by the Campaign Against Household & Water Taxes, most recently last night in Carlow where 400 packed the Seven Oaks Hotel, 200 in Galway and 160 in the Old Ground Hotel, Ennis.

Hundreds also turned out last week in Mayo, Monaghan, Leitrim, Laois and Kildare. This follows a trend of monster meetings in January, largely ignored by the national media: 300 in Clonmel (16 Jan), 500 in Cork (26 Jan), 400 in Limerick,(30 Jan), 250 in Kilkenny (25 Jan) and hundreds at a series of meetings in Donegal.

CAHWT spokesperson Cllr Ruth Coppinger said:

“The vast crowds at these meetings are incensed about the household tax, but they are speaking also about a general inequality in society. They have seen their incomes slashed and their schools and hospitals cut to fund the ongoing bailout . They see this as their chance to make a statement. At the meetings, people are voicing a growing anger at the government whom they hoped would take on the bondholders but instead bowed down to them. ”

“This retreat by Minister Hogan should be seen by all opposed to the household tax as an encouragement to continue the campaign of non-registration. With 95% still not paying, the government has a real problem on its hands. History could be made and the first troika-imposed tax in Ireland could be stopped in its tracks.”

That arrogance has been in full display this week on the question of the new Eurozone ‘fiscal compact’ and on whether this should be put to the Irish people in a referendum. It will have come as no surprise that Fine Gael Transport Minister Leo Varadkar was among the first to opine that the people weren’t really up to the task of analysing the issues. ‘I don’t think referendums are very democratic’, he declared.

According to Minister Varadkar people wouldn’t vote on the Eurozone agreement but on ‘extraneous issues’, like ‘septic tanks, or the bondholders, or the banking crisis or decisions being made by the government like cutbacks.’ He should have included the household tax also, opposition to which is currently drawing people to meetings of hundreds right around the country.

The Minister is quite wrong to suggest that these issues are not related in any way to the new agreement. The reason there is such a massive funding crisis in this State is precisely because of the speculative activities of bondholders and banks and the reason we have a regime of cutbacks is because of the austerity imposed to rescue their financial markets system from its crisis.

This new ‘Austerity Treaty’ dictates a straitjacket of fiscal rigidity that would tie the hands of EU Member State governments, prohibiting them from using budgetary mechanisms that might involve necessary borrowing to kick start economic activity, necessary to get an economy out of a rut such as that into which many peripheral EU states have been cast by the present crisis. It is not public borrowing or deficits in themselves that have landed this State in the economic mire. It is borrowing for bailing out parasitic institutions and then demanding that the loans are paid by a massive transfer of resources from the Irish people which is wrecking demand in the economy and thereby causing a massive crisis of unemployment and attacks on public services.

The agreement among the twenty five EU Member States involved, demands that the annual Budget deficit be no more than 0.5% of the Gross Domestic Product and that a limit be put on total public borrowing at 60%. It is expected that the total public debt in this State – as a result of the bank bailout and the crisis it has caused – could reach something close to 120% of GDP in a few years. Imposing the level of cuts needed to meet these targets, would mean a continuation of austerity for the indefinite future.

To imagine the consequences of this, all we need do is look at the impact currently of existing cuts on Health and Education. Ongoing cuts for another ten years would leave our services in the Stone Age and pile more and more pressure on living standards as stealth taxes and other burdens would be increased. The Austerity Treaty provides for all of this to be automatically applied notwithstanding the circumstances.

In reality, power over key areas of economic policy would be moved to the bureaucracy of the European Union and away from the member States. This would be a huge attack on the democratic rights of the ordinary citizen. The reality would be that they could remove a government from power through a General Election but the economic policy, which could have been the main reason for the removal, would be required to stay the same, subject only to EU mandarins.

It should be unthinkable that an agreement of such serious importance would be imposed on the Irish people – indeed on the people of any European State – without a direct vote. Yet the Irish government is absolutely determined to deny the people such a vote. But a Red C Opinion Poll published at the weekend showing 72% wanting a referendum speaks for itself.

The government is hiding behind the referral of the agreement to the Attorney General attempting to give the impression that the final decision rests with her office and that an opinion by her that a referendum wasn’t required by the Constitution, would be the end of the matter. This is false. The Attorney General only advises, it is the government that is supposed to decide.

No doubt many concerned citizens will find ways of putting pressure on Fine Gael and the Labour Party to put the issue to a vote. Among the initiatives is one by Socialist Party/United Left Alliance MEP and colleague, Paul Murphy, who has launched an online petition demanding this at www.referendumnow.eu. Thousands should sign.

One month on: mass boycott of Household Tax on course

Mass boycott of registration for the Household Tax is on course, based on the government’s own figures of around 4% after the first month. 96% of householders have not signed up, with an actual slow-down in the rate since early January. If this rate was to continue, only 12% would have registered by March 31st. Even if the rate doubled, 76% would be boycotting the tax. Registration also includes people not liable for the charge at all, masking the real level of non-payment.

The figures bear out the overwhelming opposition to the Household Tax shown in attendances at CAHWT meetings. Thousands have attended public meetings in cities and towns, such as 500 Cork, 350 Limerick, 300 west Donegal, 400 Enniscorthy, 350 Clonmel, 250 Kilkenny and thousands at localised meetings in Dublin.

The message is that ordinary people are angry but determined to resist government attempts to force them once again to pay the gambling debts of bankers and developers. People are not fooled by government claims that this tax is to fund local services – meetings in Dublin expressed their anger at the sell-off of waste collection, a key local public service, to private operators.

The Campaign steps up a gear this week with meetings in Leitrim, Kildare, Mayo, Monaghan and Roscommon and more rolled out for next week. 250,000 newsletters are being distributed door-to-door and a protest is planned to coincide with a motion on Dublin City Council next Monday evening. CAHWT will respond to any escalation in government threats or propaganda in February.

We are confident that this tax can and will be beaten. People see this as their one real chance to send a message about the onging austerity. Non-payment and non-registration are the only effective means to beat the tax and we encourage people to hold firm, ignore the government propaganda that will come and see that, by St. Patrick’s Day, we can have hundreds of thousands refusing to register and make the tax unworkable.

Why did the Government not use the lead-up to the summit to lay down demands about the disastrous consequences of the bailout of the European financial system on the backs of the Irish people? Why did the Taoiseach grossly undermine demands for getting rid of the Anglo promissory notes madness which will break the State when, in Davos and in front of the world’s capitalist and media establishment, he carelessly blamed the Irish people’s alleged greed for the financial crash instead of placing the responsibility with the crazed operations of the casino financial markets and their profiteering and speculation?

Is it any wonder photographs have appeared in the media around the world today showing President Sarkozy patting the Taoiseach on the head? I noticed in some of the television shots that a number of other prime ministers also patted him on the head as they passed him.

FAQ on the Household Tax

1. What is the Household tax?

The household tax is a new tax that every home owner in the country is to be charged, the Fine Gael and Labour government is imposing a blanket ‘Household Tax’ that will affect everyone the same. From January 2012 you will be asked to pay €100 a year just to live in your own home. This is an unjust tax because a millionaire and a low-paid worker both pay the same charge. €100 may mean nothing to Tony O’Reilly – but it will cause real hardship to people who can barely pay their mortgages. You will be required to register online to make your payment to the government.

2. But isn’t it going to be replaced by a property tax which will be based on the value of the house and will be fairer and more progressive?

It’s true that in response to criticisms of the flat nature of the household tax, the government have announced their intention to bring forward the introduction of the full property tax – probably to 2013. But this tax will be neither ‘fair’ nor ‘progressive’.

The average house can expect to pay about €800 per year – plus another €500 in water taxes from 2014. The 2009 Commission on Taxation suggested that houses valued between €150,000 and €300,000 should be levied with a property tax of €563. John Fitzgerald of the Economic and Social Research Institute (the government’s semi-official economic think-tank) has said that the new taxes should be as high as €1300 per annum on the average household. There’s not much ‘fair’ about that when we’ve already been hit with pay cuts, job losses, Universal Social Charge, VAT increases etc.

A lot of nonsense has been written about the ‘progressive’ nature of such a property tax and the need to ‘expand the tax base’. Stephen Collins in the Irish Times claimed that “extra taxes should not be imposed on work but on fixed assets like property”. But as ordinary workers, we only have one source of income – that which we get from our work. So if we have to pay a property tax we have to pay it out of the wages we earn. Unlike the wealthy sections of society we don’t have alternative sources of income such as dividends, rent etc

What is proposed is not a property tax in the real sense – one which would be levied on the wealth and assets held by the wealthiest sections of society. A real property tax would be geared at making sure that those who own real wealth would be forced to pay more taxes. Instead what is proposed is simply a home tax which if allowed to be implemented will force those of us on low and middle incomes to pay more while continuing to let the wealthy off scot free.

The government intend to use the household tax registration process to build up the database they need to introduce the property tax and the water tax. If we register we will be making it easier for them to introduce these higher taxes.

3. Isn’t property tax something the left is in favour of?

The household tax is not a traditional property tax. We are in favour of taxing wealth not supporting a flat tax that will mean Bono pays the same every year for his mansion in Killiney as a former council tenant living in a working class estate. This tax is no better than Thatcher’s poll tax, it is not fair and does not make economic sense to be taking yet more money from ordinary people that spend their income. It will increase over time and just like the bin charges it will soon apply to every house across the country.

4. How can I resist?

In order to pay this tax, the government expects everyone to go online and register to pay it. The simple way of resisting the tax is to refuse to register and refuse to pay. If everyone together refuses to register and pay, the government will find it almost impossible to impose this tax on us.

5. What are the possible consequences if I don’t register?

The legislation allows for a fine of up to €2,500 for failing to register by 31st March. But this is not an automatic fine. Under the legislation people who don’t register have to be brought to court and have a case proved against them that they did not register.

This is where the importance of building a mass campaign comes in. The government wants 1.8 million households to register by the end of March. But imagine the situation if a million plus households do not register. It would be absolutely impossible for them to take a million people to court.

And just as we did during the campaign against water charges in Dublin in the 1990s, the campaign will organise legal representation for anyone who is taken to court. By challenging each case, we can ensure that the system becomes completely clogged up. As also happened during the campaign against water charges, if someone in an area is taken to court we can organise to ensure that hundreds of fellow non-payers turn up to support them.

6. I’ve heard that they are going to deduct fines for not registering – or the tax itself – from people’s wages or social welfare

Under current legislation this is not possible. To allow the government to do this would require a change in the law. Again if we build a mass campaign and if a million households are collectively saying to the government ‘your tax is unacceptable to us’ they are much less likely to try to bring forward such legislation. As it develops, the Campaign will build links with trade unions and will be calling on trade unionists to boycott any work that would assist the government in organising deductions.

7. I don’t want to register but I’m still worried that I might end up with a big fine. What if I don’t register but loads of people do? Those of us who haven’t registered will be left vulnerable.

According to the legislation, nobody has to register until the end of March. Because of the threats some people may be considering registering despite not wanting to. But our advice is – don’t do it yet.

Why not wait until St Patrick’s Day (two weeks before the registration deadline) and see how the Campaign goes. At that time you will hopefully see that we have enough non-payers to defeat the Government and to stop them from robbing you and your household.

In the meantime it’s important that as well as not registering yourself you do all that you can to convince your friends, neighbours, family members, workmates etc not to register either. Everybody has a part to play in convincing others to resist this tax. Don’t just leave it to others but get involved and do your own bit.

8. But haven’t loads of people registered already.

In fact no. Despite attempts at media spin regarding the numbers who have registered less than 30,000 people have registered just under 2 weeks into the year (as of Thurs. 13th).

To put that figure into context: the government want 1.8 million households to register by 31st March (1.6 million that are expected to pay and 200,000 that have to register to claim a waiver) – that would require 150,000 households to register every week. 30,000 in just under 2 weeks is a long way short of that. In fact only 1.7% of those expected to register have done so. That makes a non-registration rate of 98.3%.

9. Isn’t there a danger I’ll end up with a big debt, as happened to some people in Dublin after the bin tax campaign?

This campaign, unlike the bin charges, is a nationwide campaign that will be easier to fight if we can get our communities organised to resist. Ultimately the bin tax campaign lost because not enough people joined the non-payment campaign. The challenge is to build a campaign that has mass involvement.

It still remains the case that anyone who refused to pay for bin charges during the bin charges campaign will pay significantly less than those that chose to pay from the beginning. We know from past experience that only mass non payment and industrial action by workers who lost their jobs through the privatisation of waste collection could have forced the government to back down.

We can however beat the Household Tax if we all join together in a mass non-payment campaign, build membership of the campaign through the €5 membership fee and get onto the streets in large numbers. Over the coming months we will build the campaign across the country. Already there have been meetings of hundreds and we are well on the way to constructing a solid nationwide campaign.
These charges can be defeated by mass popular resistance. In 1990, huge numbers protested against the ‘poll tax’ in Britain and Maggie Thatcher was driven out of office. Resistance worked.

In the 1990s, the Irish government was forced to withdraw water charges from domestic users because of a boycott campaign. Resistance worked again.

10. Who is organising the campaign?

The campaign was initiated by political organisations from across the left, trade unionists, representatives of residents’ associations and ordinary people willing to take a stand and say Enough is Enough.

The objective is to build local campaigns in every area which will be run by the members and which will then send delegates to the Dublin and national steering committees. The strength of the campaign will be the involvement of ordinary people so please do get involved and help to get our communities organised.

11. What can I do to help?
The strength of the campaign is in mass participation so we need everyone to get involved to whatever extent you can.

First don’t register.

Put a ‘We’re Not Paying’ poster in your window and a car sticker on your car. If people see posters and stickers up around the place, it helps create awareness of the campaign, encourages others not to pay and gives confidence to those who may feel intimidated into paying.

Take some Campaign newsletters, posters and car stickers to give to your neighbours, friends, workmates, family members etc. Do your bit to convince others to be part of the campaign.

Help out with your local campaign group when we go out to canvass your area.

Attend your local activists’ meetings to help plan the campaign locally.

If there hasn’t been a local meeting in your area, help to organise one. The campaign can provide people to help with this and provide speakers etc if necessary. Advertise it well with posters in local shops and door to door leafleting.

Put a resolution to your residents’ association or trade union meeting to support the campaign of non-payment and organise together.

Become a member of the Campaign – the €5 membership fee will go towards producing Campaign materials such as newsletters, posters, car stickers etc and also to build up a legal defence fund.

12. Isn’t the money raised going to improve our local services?

Not one cent from the household tax will be used to improve local council services. Not one cent will be used to improve services such as health and education. The money will be used to bail out the bankers and the speculators. By taking money out of the pockets of ordinary people they will depress demand for goods and services and make the crisis worse, not better.

Central government funding for local councils has been cut. The local Council is being further starved of funds and instead the money that used to pay for services such as lighting, housing, cleansing etc. is going to bail out private bank speculation.

For three years now Fianna Fail, The Green Party, Fine Gael and Labour have been making us foot the bill for the crimes of bankers and speculators. This is a great opportunity to strike back and start the job of reversing the tide. This is our chance to take a stand and show our opposition to austerity policies. Let’s make sure we use it!

13. €100 isn’t that much really, why should I have the stress of this debt around my neck?

Do not be fooled. The government has every intention of increasing this tax on an annual or bi annual basis. Remember the figures – The average house can expect to pay about €800 per year – plus another €500 in water taxes from 2014. The 2009 Commission on Taxation suggested that houses valued between €150,000 and €300,000 should be levied with a property tax of €563. John Fitzgerald of the Economic and Social Research Institute (the government’s semi-official economic think-tank) has said that the new taxes should be as high as €1300 per annum on the average household.

If you do not resist this charge now then you will be paying up to thousands every year. The government can increase this charge anytime they like. We must defeat this now at registration stage or you will soon be paying huge volumes of extra tax for absolutely nothing new in return.

There are vast amounts of wealth in this country, the top 1% have over €100 billion tucked away. 33,000 millionaires own wealth of €121 billion, the 300 richest people are reported to be worth close to €50 billion.

A new wealth or asset tax on those that can afford to pay would generate far more money than this new household tax, this is money that otherwise would not be used in our society. We could employ thousands on the dole overnight if the political will was there. This is the type of property/wealth tax we should strive to introduce. If you pay, it will be €100 now and thousands later. Resist now or pay later!

In a lead article in Monday’s Irish Daily Mail by political editor Senan Moloney and labelled ‘exclusive’, we are given a flavour of what that approach may be. Apparently unemployed people generally are to be given a target date by which they are expected to be off the Live Register or have a good reason as to why not. This is to be called the ‘Prediction of Exit’ date. This sounds rather sinister in itself but it is what happens if you have not ‘exited’ by your assigned date that should be closely watched.

According to the Mail article there will be a ‘challenging’ interview awaiting those who have not been fortunate enough to find work or who otherwise have not made themselves scarce off the official list. It is quite clear that the intention is to harass and harangue people so as to make life very uncomfortable for them in receiving their unemployment allowances. This is underlined by the suggestion that they will be called to participate in ‘Alcoholic Anonymous style meetings’. It is further underlined by the report that senior officials in the Department of Social Protection are referring to their new programme as ‘Operation Transformation’, which, as many readers would know, is an RTE project following people who are undertaking stringent routines to move from being seriously overweight.

In June 2007, not counting those on short time, there were 103,100 unemployed according to official figures. Four years later that figure had risen to 304,500 an increase of over 200,000. These workers were the victims of the economic crash caused by the profiteering and greed of a small minority facilitated by Irish and European banks for major profits. The policy of austerity pursued first by Fianna Fail and the Green Party, and now replicated by Fine Gael and Labour, means that the domestic economy can come nowhere near providing the level of jobs output needed to turn this situation around.

Notwithstanding this, we now have in preparation a plethora of measures referred to as a ‘labour activation’ programme that might as well be operating on the basis that a plague of mass laziness had blighted the personalities of a fifth of a million and that they need shock therapy to cure this blight. It would seem that we are about to move into a period that will see the demonization of the unemployed and institutionalised pressure on them to take any work whatever that might become available regardless of whether it was highly exploitative in terms of the wages and conditions attached.
The Troika has been pushing measures such as this in all the countries which are the subject of bailout programmes. It tallies with pressure from the same quarter to abolish the protection in legislation of low paid workers in areas such as catering and cleaning. This is supposed to be a strategy for weaker economies to ‘regain competitiveness’ and thereby be in a position to stay in the same economic league. In the meantime they must be bled dry to repay the speculators. That policy, part of the austerity agenda, has proved a disastrous failure up to now.

There is an obvious way to drastically cut unemployment, that is by creating real jobs as opposed to harassing the unemployed into makeshift programmes that simply make the figures look better. The Fine Gael/Labour Coalition has refused to contemplate the radical measures that could be taken. They opt instead to capitulate to the diktats of the troika that billions of our people’s resources be funnelled into the vaults of the gambling bondholders of the former Anglo Irish Bank.

This week we saw the radical steps that could have been taken. The astounding €1.25 billion that was handed over on Wednesday to financial market speculators could instead have gone into a public investment programme designed to create tens of thousands of jobs. Instead of the cynical Tory ploy of blaming the victims of the crisis, a project could have been designed, for example, to have a nationwide remediation schedule of septic tanks in rural areas that currently are causing ground water pollution. Billions of taxpayers’ money was spent on equivalent work in urban areas, why not in rural Ireland also? Thousands of jobs could have been created and a serious environmental problem resolved.

This is referred to in a sinister turn of phrase as the “prediction of exit date”, something one might associate more with sentencing in a capital trial rather than with how people who find themselves in difficult circumstances should be treated. If the unemployed person is not off the live register by that date, he or she will face what has been referred to as a “challenging interview”.

Apparently, senior officials in the Department are referring to this among themselves as “Operation Transformation”, a reference to an RTE project as part of which people who consider themselves to be overweight or seriously obese undertake a stringent programme to overcome the problem.

Press statement 25 Jan 2012 – issued after protest at Anglo Irish Bank offices, Dublin, by Campaign Against Household & Water Taxes.
The protest was supported by 9 TDs backing the non-payment of the household tax.

Single Anglo payment dwarfs household & austerity taxes

Witholding Household Tax can send powerful message about the bailouts

The payment today of €1.25 billion to Anglo Irish Bank unsecured bondholders is a national scandal. This payment in a single day equates to eight years full collection of Household Tax. The government threatens householders hoping to collect €160 million in a year, but meekly transfers over eight times that amount in one payment in one day to Anglo!

Ordinary people are being asked to accept penury to enrich anonymous bondolders in this and other banks.The ongoing funding of Anglo requires no end of new taxes and charges be placed on householders. All the resources of the state are being geared for the bailout.

The annual transfers promised to Anglo will overwhelm and swallow up any amount of property and water taxes. The sums are staggering and completely contradict government claims that new taxes will benefit public services.

€74 billion is the estimated ongoing cost for Anglo and means that every single man, woman and child in the State will pay €16,157 to cover the promissory note to a toxic bank that no longer holds deposits. This is €24 billion more than the cost of running the State for a full year. It would fund the entire health system for nine and a half years.

The Campaign Against Household & Water Taxes calls on all ordinary people to state ‘we will not pay for bankers and speculators’ by witholding payment of the new Household Taxes. A mass non-registration, non-payment campaign against this new austerity measure is our first real chance to send a message to government about the opposition of our people to the bailout of bondholders.

“There has been no delivery yet on whistleblowing legislation. Indeed the Labour Party presented such legislation when in opposition in 1999. The non renewal of Ms Bayliss’s contract is a loss to the psychiatric care sector and cannot but be seen as a vindictive response by the HSE, who part fund her post, to her role in exposing the mistreatment of patients.

“Similarly a member of staff in Blanchardstown Hospital has been the subject of a disciplinary hearing for allegedly sharing information related to cuts with the Defend Blanchardstown Hospital campaign.

“Whistleblowers don’t just require protection but active encouragement. More timely whistleblowing by decent people in the financial sector, the Catholic church, the nursing homes, in the Garda Siochana and many other places would have well served us in recent years.”

The protest is over draconian cuts in funding of these schools which will result in a serious loss of teachers notwithstanding the attempt by Minister for Education Quinn to play down their effects. These cuts fit into the overall slashing of €76million in the Education Budget for 2012 rising to €241 in 2014.

It is the intention of the government that, next Wednesday, a massive €1.25 billion be paid to unsecured Anglo Irish Bank bondholders. Most likely these are not even the original gamblers who speculated a fortune in the bank’s property splurge, but are speculators who bought the bonds at a substantial discount as a risk investment in the hope of a quick financial killing.

In March €3 billion will be paid directly from taxpayers’ funds to meet the bailout terms demanded by the EU/IMF/ECB Troika to salvage the major European banks from their catastrophic losses in gambling with the same bank on Irish property deals.

Should there be any need to argue further about the perverse insanity of the Fine Gael/Labour Government carrying on the identical self same approach as their predecessors? The heart is being torn out of the heart of our Education service with cuts that will devastate the future prospects of a generation of children so that the parasites of corporate finance who speculate for massive profits on the financial markets are protected.

We frequently hear shrill demands of ‘value for money’ in the public sector from the advocates of the markets. Well, demonstrably, value for money has been achieved with the DEIS programme. Speaking to the Dáil last week, The Minister spoke of three evaluation reports on DEIS schools by the Educational Research Centre. In urban primary schools there was an overall improvement which was ‘statistically significant’ at all grade levels in English and mathematics. Greater improvements were recorded at lower grades especially among children with ‘lower levels of achievement.’

What this means is that despite the chronic inequality that is intrinsic to capitalist society, State intervention with public funds was able to go some way to begin to redress the balance in favour of the poor with the possibility of making a huge difference to the lives of many children as they grew through adolescence to adulthood. For many this would mean the difference between carving out a positive lifestyle as opposed to being overwhelmed by powerful influences pulling them downwards into social isolation and nihilism.

It is not just the schools and children in areas hit by economic hardship that will suffer if Minister Quinn’s cuts are implemented. There is a very serious attack planned in smaller rural schools and, within this subset, greater difficulties again for schools in Gaeltacht areas.

Some 1500 schools with four teachers or less face higher pupil teacher ratios which will mean the loss of significant numbers of teachers and the remaining teachers having responsibility for a greater spread of classes with the disadvantages for children’s education that will follow from that situation.

In schools in Gaeltacht areas, there was a slightly more favourable pupil teacher ratio taking account of the fact that numbers of children would not be fully fluent in Irish as well, of course, as having children whose first language was neither English nor Irish. At a stroke, the Minister is dictating the same ratio for all rural schools, meaning that small Gaeltacht schools would have to see relatively higher numbers of children registering to maintain existing teaching posts. In practice many Gaeltacht schools could lose teaching posts with detrimental consequences for the children and for the efficacy of the teaching of spoken Irish.

Yesterday the Troika pronounced itself satisfied with the austerity programme being forced down the throats of the Irish people so that their resources continue to flow to international bankers. But for how long more will this catastrophic situation be allowed to continue? Yesterday’s marvellous protest should be merely a curtain raiser for united, national action to save our children’s education.

Already, apart from the Deis and rural schools, deep wounds have been inflicted on a very wide swathe of schools with losses of Special Needs Assistants, Resource Teachers including for Traveller community children and Language Support Teachers. All schools, their teachers and parents should now come together and launch a one day, national school strike with major demonstrations demanding reversal of the cuts and a change from the catastrophic austerity policy that is transfusing the very lifeblood of our society into the bloated bellies of Europe’s financial speculators.

Campaign goes nationwide as 97.5% still not paying Household Tax

* CAHWT vows to build mass non-registration by St Patrick’s Day

* Nationwide meetings, poster and newsletter launched

The Campaign Against Household & Water Taxes today (Friday 20 Jan) launched a national poster and 250,000 newsletters to build a series of nationwide meetings.

Speaking at the launch today, Cllr Matt Waine of the CAHWT steering group said:

“We are part of the 97.5% who still have not registered to pay this new unjust tax. Why should we pay another tax for the bankers and speculators? The Campaign is bringing a message to householders ‘Don’t Register, Don’t Pay’, instead get involved in the campaign and build mass non-registration by St Patrick’s Day, at which time we believe hundreds of thousands of householders boycotting together would give the collective strength to go all the way. This is how we make fines and threats unworkable and pile political pressure on the government.

Already, very large meetings have been held in the past week, with attendances of 100 to 400. These turnouts should act as a warning to the government to back off and instead tax the considerable wealth that exists in this country.”

Cllr Brid Smith said:

“Meetings are now arranged for every county of Ireland against the Household and the septic tank tax, with TDs opposed to the taxes on the platforms. The CAHWT will be postering every county in the next weeks for these meetings, increasing the confidence of householders to not register for these taxes as part of a huge protest movement. The government ignores the angry mood of both rural and urban people at their peril.”

Nationwide meetings of CAHWT

Munster

Limerick: 30th of January, 8pm, Clarion Hotel, Steamboat Quay, Dock Rd.

Cork – 26th January, 8pm Imperial Hotel

Waterford – 7th of February 8pm

Tipperary:

Clonmel: Mon 16th Jan 8pm Hearn’s Hotel

Carrick On Suir: Thurs 19th Jan 8pm Carraig Hotel

Tipperary Town: Fri 20th Jan 8pm Community Services Centre.

North Tipperary- planned.

Kerry: Killarney 13 Feb.

Connaught

Galway – 6th February, 8pm, Harbour Hotel

Roscommon – 3rd of February, Gleesons, Roscommon

Leitrim (Ballinamore) 31st Jan, 7.30, McGirl’s Bar

Mayo (Castlebar) – 1st Feb, 7:30pm Welcome Inn

Clare (Ennis) 6th Feb

Sligo 9th February

Ulster

Monaghan – 2nd February, 8pm Four Seasons Hotel

Cavan 15 Feb

Donegal: Sun. 15 Jan. Inver;Mon 16 Jan Dungloe;

Mon 16 Jan Burt; Sat 21 Jan Árainn Mhór

Mon 23 Jan Letterkenny; Wed 25 Jan Ramelton;

Sat 28 Jan Buncrana.

Leinster

Louth – Dundalk – 8th February

Longford – 7th February, 8pm Longford Arms

Offaly (Tullamore) 9th February, 8pm,

Laois 30th of January, 7:30pm, Portlaoise GAA Club

Kildare: 31st January, 8pm Keadeen Hotel

Carlow – 6th February, 7:30pm Seven Oaks Hotel

Meath (Navan), Newgrange Hotel, 9th Feb 8pm

Kilkenny – 25th January, 8pm Kyteler’s Inn

Wexford:

Thur 19 Jan 8pmWhites Hotel

Saturday 21 Jan 7pm Scaville Lodge, Duncormick

Mon 23 Jan 7.30pm Astro Active Community workshop, Enniscorthy.

Wicklow:

Monday 16th January 7:30pm Little Bray Community Centre

Thursday 19th January 8pm, Lee’s, Kilcoole

Thursday 26th January 7.30pm, Ballywaltrim Community Centre, Bray

Campaign Against Household and Water Taxes

Minister Hogan’s comments vindicate campaigns warning of €1,000 per
year charge on hard pressed families

Household tax the first step to property and water taxes

The Campaign Against Household and Water Taxes today claimed that
Government plans to introduce water taxes by 2014 mean that ordinary
households will be hit with stealth taxes of 1000+ euro within two
years when the combined cost of water tax and property tax are taken
into account.

The Campaign challenged Minister Hogan’s contention that water
metering and water taxes would create 1000s of new jobs and argued
that the opposite is the case. Cllr Mick Barry, an activist with the
Campaign said, “water taxes would take money out of people’s pockets
and further deflate the economy costing jobs. Jobs should be created
instead by a state-funded investment plan to improve the water
distribution network and minimise leaks which is up to 40%
nationally.”

The Campaign warned that taking control of water supply from the hands
of local authorities and centralising control of water services in the
hands of a new utility, Irish Water, was a step in the direction of
privatisation of water services. Charging for water would make water
supply potentially lucrative and multinational corporations would bang
hard on the door to gain control of this service. The Campaign
claimed that Minister Hogan’s comments on Newstalk that he “wants to
attract private investment into the equation” was a sure sign that the
Government are planning to go down this road.

Mr Barry continued, “the Campaign is calling on members of the public
to refuse to register for the new household tax given that
registration was necessary to give the state the information necessary
for a database to levy property and water taxes.

“The Campaign is encouraging communities to organise “people power”
gatherings aimed at preventing the installation of water meters at
peoples’ homes when the programme is rolled out in the autumn.

‘The store that you work in ceased trading this morning and all stock has been prepared for collection. As a result of your store having ceased to trade the Administrators regret to inform you that the company is no longer able to make payments to you for services rendered under the terms of your employment. Your employment with the company is therefore terminated with immediate effect.

A letter along with a booklet detailing your rights to claim arrears of wages, holiday entitlement, statutory notice and redundancy pay will be sent to you very shortly. The letter will contain contact details for a KPMG representative who will be able to answer your question regarding what monies you can claim and can provide assistance with completing the claim form.

’This was the unbelievably callous treatment meted out to almost 120 workers at the La Senza retail company stores in Dublin and Cork this week. The shock which those workers felt at being suddenly unemployed was compounded by the absence of even the tiniest shred of humanity or compassion on the part of their bosses. And to add insult to injury, the redundancy pay referred to is to be claimed from the State and not the company.

La Senza was owned by Lion Capital, a major multinational with assets of €2.8 billion. It owns major internationally known brands including food manufacturers and department stores. In 2004 it bought Weetabix for Stg£640 million and this year paid US$980 million for Bumble Bee Foods based in the United States.

La Senza closed nearly 100 outlets in both Britain and Ireland with about 1,300 workers thrown on the scrapheap. Lion Capital is hugely profitable. It is known as a venture capital company but the treatment of its workers merits the description of ‘vulture capital’. This is capitalism red in tooth and claw which walks all over the rights and dignity of workers. It makes a mockery of all the guff in establishment business circles about the development of ‘corporate social responsibility’, meaning that major corporations have a social conscience and would at all times deal with workers ethically and morally.

It’s obvious that we can expect this disgusting abuse of workers to become more common. Already we have the example of Vita Cortex also closing and leaving its workers high and dry. It’s quite clear that elements of big business believes it can use the economic crisis as a cover to behave like callous charlatans, evading their financial and social obligations to workers.

I believe that such corporations are emboldened by how the financial markets composed of major banks, hedge funds and speculators are dictating policies to the political establishment that protect and enhance their private profits at enormous cost to society. If EU leaders like Chancellor Merkel and Sarkhozy as well as our own Taoiseach and government abase themselves before the sharks in the markets, meekly carrying out their diktats, is it any wonder that other ruthless operators think they can throw their weight around also? That feeling is reinforced by the weakness of most of the leadership of the trade union movement in responding to such attacks.

In the shameful La Senza affair, KPMG has the most serious questions to answer also. This company considers as a prestigious player in the in the world wide accountancy and business advisory fields. But how does it account for colluding with the shameful methods adopted by Lion Capital? On Monday night representatives of KPMG rang a number of workers telling them peremptorily that their jobs were gone and not to come into work on Tuesday. In one case the accountancy firm’s representative asked a worker to ring her colleagues to tell them that their jobs were gone also as he ‘didn’t have their numbers.’

Clearly the administration process was being prepared between Lion Capital and KPMG for a considerable period of time. Why were the workers not informed and consulted in an honest way?

Just like the Vita Cortex workers in Cork who have been callously treated also, the La Senza workers occupied the store in the Liffey Valley shopping centre in Dublin. They should be massively supported by workers and trade unionists everywhere to send the strongest message to big business and the government that this abuse of w

The workers are victims of the private equity vulture company, Lion Capital, which in the most callous way planned to walk away from its workforce to maximise its profit, handing it over to another company which will be equally ruthless, and treating these workers in the most disgusting fashion. This is capitalism red in tooth and claw and must be challenged.

Fine Gael and Labour Party Deputies come here and champion workers. They are the people who make and stand over the laws. For a change, let us have emergency laws to allow workers to receive their rights and to stop these gangsters behaving in this gangster-like fashion.

I call on the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and its leaders to come out of hiding and meet fire with fire. They should mobilise the power of working people in the country to stand together with the Vita Cortex and La Senza workers. Workers standing together will show the power they have, forcing the Government to act and these companies to pay what they should.

Does he not see the significant contradiction in a supposedly sovereign Dáil meeting when, 100 metres from here, the EU, IMF and ECB are in Government Buildings enforcing the diktat of private institutions and European financial markets to the effect that their speculators must be repaid tens of billions of euro by the Irish people for gambling private debts and demanding that the Government channel these tens of billions of euro while it shreds jobs, living standards and health and education services?

Does the Taoiseach not accept that the Government is not much more than a puppet government? Does he not see that its decision to continue almost identically the bailout and austerity policy of its predecessor is poisoning every aspect of life in the State?

Is it not clear that Revenue, for example, felt under considerable pressure when it sent thousands of letters scarifying pensioners to beat out the €45 million that the Minister for Finance secretly, quietly and sneakily included in the budget?

Press statement 11 January 2012

National Hotline 1890 – 98 98 00

Launched by Anti Household Tax Campaign
National hotline launched today by the Campaign Against Household & Water Taxes in response to government threats;
*CAHWT plans to organise meetings in every county and major town of Ireland.
* National activists meeting this Saturday 1pm in Teacher’s Club, Parnell Square, Dublin to gear up Campaign.

The Campaign Against Household & Water Taxes today launched a national hotline. The launch was attended by the following public represenatives: Mick Wallace TD, Thomas Pringle TD,Clare Daly TD, Seamus Healy TD, Joe Higgins TD, Joan Collins TD, Richard Boyd-Barrett TD, Paul Murphy MEP.

Speaking at the launch of the Anti Household Tax national phoneline, Cllr Ruth Coppinger from the CAHWT Steering Group said:

“The launch of this phoneline allows householders to contact the Campaign to deal with their queries and to link them to their nearest campaign group. The number — 1890 98 98 00 — will be staffed by volunteers or will respond very quickly to messages. This hotline shows the serious intent of this Campaign to reach as many people as possible and to build mass non-Registraton over the next two and half months.

We call on people not to be bullied by the extraordinary fines and threats of this government. A stand can and must be taken against what is simply another austerity measure on ordinary people. We will not pay for the bankers and speculators. We will explain to people that this €100 euro will next year be several hundred in a hefty misnamed ‘property tax’ and then an additional water tax.

Mass non-registration can neuter government intimidation. For example, one million refusing to register would stun the government in its implementation of this tax, make threats of fines inoperable and create political pressure to repeal the tax.

Plans are underway to organise county-wide and local meetings and we call on people not to register but to attend those meetings and hear what the Campaign is saying.”
ends

Paul Murphy MEP slams increase in Dublin Bus fare rates as scandalous

Dublin Bus fare rates have been increased on average across the city by 15% since January 01. At a time when many people will be struggling financially in the post-Christmas period, this fare increase is yet another blow to ordinary people’s purse strings. The new fares represent an increase five times greater than that of inflation and the Consumer Price Index of 2.9% (November 2011).

Responding to the increase Paul Murphy MEP said:

“This increase of 15% is yet another shameless and scandalous attack on ordinary people. The new fares now mean that a journey in-and-out of Dublin city centre will cost many suburb dwellers more than €5. For users of Dublin Bus this is simply not affordable on a regular basis. Even though the new integrated transport ticket system is welcome news, it also represents a hike in fare prices.”

“Many of the problems that Dublin Bus is currently facing are due to a lack of capital investment and a reduction in demand. This reduction is directly attributable to many not being able to afford public transport and obviously many others no longer commuting to work due to job loss. This is yet another indictment of austerity as being a clear excarebator of deflation and unemployment”

He added:

“Public transport should be a vital part of any urban area in terms of jobs and infrastrucutre. There are also environmental factors to consider in relation to making bus services less attractive. In the past we have seen Governments hiking up prices to make privatisation more attractive for potential investors. I call on the Minister for Transport, Tourism to reverse these price hikes and to give a guarantee that Dublin Bus’ services will be safeguared and not privatised.”

Responding to the occupation by workers of the La Senza lingerie outlet in Liffey Valley Shopping Centre following the sudden announcement of the firm’s closure of all its Irish operations Socialist Party/United Left Alliance TD Clare Daly said:

“Like Vita Cortex and Lagan Brick and countless previous examples since the crisis began here we have another situation where workers are treated with utter contempt.

“With no arrangements for redundancy and no opportunity for the workers to be involved at looking at options to save their jobs the occupation of the shops in Liffey Valley and Cork is 100% justiftlet in Liffey Valley Shopping Centre following the sudden announcement of the firm’s closure of all its Irish operations Socialist Party/United Left Alliance TD Clare Daly said:

“Like Vita Cortex and Lagan Brick and countless previous examples since the crisis began here we have another situation where workers are treated with utter contempt.

“With no arrangements for redundancy and no opportunity for the workers to be involved at looking at options to save their jobs the occupation of the shops in Liffey Valley and Cork is 100% justified. Workers from the closed outlets in Grafton Street and Dundrum have joined their colleagues in Liffey Valley.

“These workers deserve the active support of their community and workers everywhere. Ways of forging links with workers in the closed chains in the North and Britain should be found so that maximum organised pressure can be put on the company.

“The determined stand taken by these workers demonstrates that the ground for a massive unionisation drive in the retail sector is very fertile. Our trade union movement must be equal to the task.

“It is also becoming increasingly obvious to workers that militant tactics are required to protect their rights. The principles of the global occupation movement have found there way into the popular consciousness of workers in Ireland which is something the Socialist Party welcomes.”

In an astonishingly frank column in the Financial Times on December 1 last he declares baldly, ‘The succession of political dramas in Europe . . . . . . . again shows the financial markets acting like a global supra-government. They oust entrenched regimes where normal political processes could not do so. They force austerity, banking bail-outs and other major policy changes. Their influence dwarfs multilateral institutions such as the International Monetary Fund. Indeed, leaving aside unusable nuclear weapons, they have become the most powerful force on earth.’

Altman goes on to argue, however, that the ‘dictatorship’ of the markets can have positive effects. He would certainly believe that there is not an alternative to the markets system.

Former Deputy Editor of The Irish Times and now columnist with the Irish Independent, James Downey, agrees with him. In a look back on the year just ended he acknowledges that , ‘Europe, and the world, are going through a crisis of capitalism full equal to anything that has gone before’ but then declares, ‘Almost nobody believes there is any alternative to capitalism. So we have to make it work.’ For good measure he declares that in relation to the current crisis there will be no ‘worthwhile proposals’ coming from the United Left Alliance the only group in the Dáil advocating a socialist alternative.

Christina Patterson, who writes for a range of media outlets in Britain from The Independent to New Statesman, patronisingly dismissed in a recent article the ‘Occupy’ movement that has reflected the growing unease among wider strata of society with the present financial system implying that only totalitarian Stalinism can be imagined as an alternative to the present system.

Referring to the monstrous regime in North Korea which has been much in the news following the death of dictator Kim Jong Il she writes, ‘The people around the world, in London, and New York, and Italy, and Spain, who have been waving placards saying capitalism has failed might want to remember that the only alternative to capitalism that has so far been developed hasn’t done all that well.’

These establishment commentators lack creativity and imagination with regard to the possibility to reorganising society where powerful corporations and profit propelled speculators are not the economic masters. They would no doubt treat with cynicism the aspirations expressed in John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’, where he asks us to imagine a different world where there was , ‘No need for greed or hunger/A brotherhood of man/Imagine all the people/Sharing all the world…’

Of course it is not a lack of imagination that inspires the contempt for the idea of a socialist alternative among the economic elite and evident in most establishment media. It is naked self interest. The wealth, power and privilege to which these groups are wedded are delivered by their disproportionate ownership of, and control over, the resources of society. The sharing out of the wealth in an equitable way is therefore resisted bitterly.

However among ordinary people, that it the vast majority who are not the owners of banks or major shareholders in big corporate entities, there is a growing questioning of the present system and a search for an alternative. This is shown in the results of a survey in the United States in attitudes to socialism and capitalism conducted by the Pew Research Center which describes itself as ‘a non partisan fact tank that provides information on the issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world.’ It is chaired by former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.

In a poll published at the end of December, Pew found that 49% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 reactively ‘positively’ to the idea of socialism with 43% reacting ‘negatively’. Considering the immense amount of propaganda in US media denouncing and distorting the idea of socialism this shows a real openness to alternatives to the system that has given rise to the present economic crisis evident in the United States as in Europe.

We can expect the search for an alternative to grow right across the globe as the cruel ruthlessness of the markets system is more and more exposed. It does not take a huge leap of imagination, in fact, to see how the major wealth and resources of society could be developed infinitely better in public ownership and democratic control for the benefit of all rather than being in the grip of a tiny minority driven by greed for private profits. That is the basis of the socialist alternative and expect to see growing support for this idea in 2012. Happy New Year.