The recent report by the ESRI on negative equity in the Irish housing market exposes the black hole that Irish householders were lead into by the speculators and the banks. The ESRI estimates that up to one third of mortgage holders, nearly 200,000 householders, could be trapped with mortgages vastly exceeding the value of their... More

GUE/NGL MEPs Joe Higgins and Helmut Scholz welcomed yesterday’s passing of a resolution on the GSP+ (General System of Preferences plus) trade scheme in the European Parliament. The ongoing violation of human rights in Colombia and in particular the murder of trade unionists, indigenous people and other civilians requires... More

Since August last year TEEU members in Green Isle have sustained a strike in response to the sacking of three colleagues by a firm which refuses to recognise trade unions and declined all efforts by the TEEU to negotiate an end to the dispute. The firm has throughout this dispute employed strike breakers from Britain and Ireland,... More

Bank of Scotland (Ireland) has decided to close its Halifax outlets with the resulting loss. This must not be accepted. The financial institutions should be in public ownership and run democratically to meet societies needs. There are further indications today that this announcement will be followed by an even greater slashing of... More

Minister Dara Calleary, together with the representatives of the bosses, are now more and more vocally pushing to reduce the minimum wage and tear up Registered Employment Agreements in particular sectors. This is a disgrace and must be fought. Mark Fielding, Chief Executive of ISME, spelt it out for low paid workers when he admitted... More

The Green Party is reported to be discussing with Fianna Fáil measures that will prevent householders in mortgage arrears arising from hardships such as job losses. In reality their proposals are far too little. Householders need radical reductions of the principal on their mortgages. The Greens are talk about measures like re-scheduling... More

Minister for the Environment, John Gormley, this morning, announced that the government wanted to take a billion euro a year from householders in water charges. This could mean an average of €900 a year for each household. This would simply be an intolerable burden on working people, already hit by levies and wage cuts. Mr. Gormley’s... More