thesocialist
PAPER OF THE SOCIALIST PARTY
ISSUE 122
Build homes for need
NOT
for profit
MAY 2019
INSIDE
Rita Harrold - socialist feminist standing in Euro election
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“We only want the earth” the case for socialist change
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NEWS THE SOCIALIST
Housing crisis An indictment of the capitalist market T
By Colm McCarthy
he housing crisis is one of the greatest indictments of this government, and indeed of the capitalist market they represent. In February the official homelessness figures crossed 10,000, despite increasingly desperate attempts by the government to use creative accounting tricks to remove categories that would previously have been included from the official stats. The March figures saw a further increase, with 3,821 of those acknowledged as homeless being children. This is merely the sharpest end of a much broader crisis. Growing distress Half a million people suffer from distress on a daily basis. Tens of thousands have been forced to move back home with their families or couchsurf. For many today, not only are they unable to buy their own home, they are increasingly unable to rent. As the crisis has worsened over recent years, the refrain from the establishment has been that this was a simple supply issue that would be resolved by the market. However, as is often the case, this has not been the case, with vulture funds and big construction firms sitting on landbanks bought for bargain basement prices from Nama. The Socialist Party supports this horded land being taken
Official homelessness figures rose above 10,000 in Febuary of this year, including 3821 homeless children
into public ownership without compensation. Anti-evictions bill The bill moved by Solidarity, which succeeded in getting passed at second stage in the Dail banning sale as grounds for eviction, is currently being refused a money message by the government - their preferred method of trying to prevent legislation they disapprove of from being implemented in the current minority government arrangement they find themselves in. It is no surprise they are acting in this way.
36% of Fine Gael and 33% of Fianna Fail TD’s are landlords, and all of them are loyal to the logic of the market system that has proved incapable of alleviating the crisis. They are unwilling to implement the minimal demand of controlled rents that are reduced to levels that are affordable. They certainly will not be in favour of banning vulture and cuckoo funds and evictions into homelessness. There is a need to build mass movements to fight for public housing on public land, glimpses of which were seen in the Take Back the City
protests in Dublin and the campaign that defeated the attempted mass eviction by vulture fund Lugus Capital at Leeside Apartments in Cork to tackle this issue. The catastrophe that is the private rental sector in Ireland caters to those who can to look to escape by buying their own home, but this too is increasingly out of reach for many. Public homes on public land Average house prices in Dublin are €383,000 and €317,500 in Cork. A 2015 study from the Society of Chartered Surveyors of Ireland found that
around half of the cost of house building were profit, land and tax related. The construction industry should be nationalised under democratic working class control so that homes are built at cost price, the same must happen to the banks so that mortgages can be reduced down. We need a programme of building public housing on public land. This would be a real programme of affordable housing in contrast with the governments model which would envision “affordable” housing well in excess of €300,000. A reversal of the decades-long campaign of denigration and neglect of social housing is also needed, with both an expansion of building, and a widening of the criteria to allow for people from throughout the working class to apply for them.
WHAT WE STAND FOR • Ban evictions and vulture funds; controls to ensure affordable rents, house prices and mortgages • Nationalise the banks and major construction companies under democratic public control • Build 100,000 public homes on public land at affordable rates to rent or buy
Outrageous and astronomical costs:
Free public childcare now! E
ploys 30,000 overwhelmingly female workers. Another 45,000 workers are employed as childminders in the home, with even less security.
By Katia Hancke
very parent of young children in Ireland already knows it, but official reports once again confirm that childcare costs in Ireland are astronomical and crippling middle and low-income families. As a percentage of income, childcare costs in Ireland are higher than anywhere else in the EU. The average weekly full-time childcare costs are €177.92 nationally, rising to €206.25 in parts of Dublin. And that’s the cost for just one child. Failure of government policy Clearly, the government policy of subsidising private creches has utterly failed in delivering accessible childcare for parents. Study after study proves that parents pay an inordinate amount of their income on childcare that doesn’t necessarily suit their children’s needs. Research also confirms that it is lone parents and low-income fami-
lies who are punished the most for being working parents. A 2015 OECD report found that net childcare costs absorbed of the average wage of lone parents in Ireland.
At the same time, the type of subsidy the government provides (part time hours for 38 weeks per year only) has created low paid, precarious jobs across the sector which em-
Growing support And yet, the government is planning on doing more of the same: the new National Childcare Scheme which will be rolled out universally in November will cover approximately 10% of real childcare costs. Scandalously it will further disadvantage lone parents and low-income parents who will loose as much as €80 in subsidies per week. For many this will mean they are forced to give up work altogether. What a contrast with the general consensus amongst working class people. A Red C poll at the start of the year showed 64% support for free childcare available to all children, with much higher support amongst the 25-45 age groups. 70% of people agreed that parents should be able to look after their baby for the first year.
Public investment needed In order to deliver this, we need to stop relying on a fragmented network of small private businesses to deliver this. What is needed is a decisive shift to investment in a national public childcare service free at the point of use and funded by progressive taxation on big business and the super-rich. This would allow to guarantee proper wages and conditions for all childcare workers and the availability of free further training. These childcare services should be based in local communities and workplaces and can be run by committees of parents, workers and representatives of the wider community to assure the flexibility needed to best suit the children and families they cater for. Linked to that, parental leave should be extended to two years and should be fully paid to give parents a real choice between staying at home and going back to work.
NEWS
3
THE SOCIALIST
Workers and the recovery
We want to live, not just exist tions at the start of the crisis and the piecemeal approach to pay recovery in recent years has badly damaged the standing of the movement in the eyes of many workers. Consequently, it has created an obstacle for many young people in seeing the movement as relevant to them today. That said, the membership of 600,000 and the resources of the trade union movement are a considerable force if mobilised.
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No return to social partnership Social Partnership in the Celtic Tiger era not only meant that the real potential improvements on pay, working conditions and investment in public services were not realised. It also meant that a generation of workers were deprived of the experience of real trade union activity and the opportunity of being trained as shop stewards with real power and influence in the workplace.
Low pay drives nurses and midwives out of the profession and leads to staffing shortages
By Michael O’Brien
ECENT YEARS of economic growth and an increase in employment rates constitutes the greatest part of the government’s claim of recovery. However, the ‘recovery’ in employment rates has not brought an end the cost of living crisis experienced by hundreds of thousands of workers. A real workers’ recovery is needed
that combats precarity, struggles for real pay rises, provides for decent and socially useful jobs and unshackles the trade union movement to deliver this. This can be done by actively organising workers from below. Fight precarious work conditions! Low-hour contracts, irregular hours, bogus self employment arrangements and agency work together add up to an insecure dead-end situation predominately for young people and
For a socialist feminist voice
Vote no. 1 Rita Harrold From the housing crisis, to the cervical cancer scandal, to climate change – capitalism’s profit motive clashes with the needs of the majority. I’m Rita Harrold, a 29 year old childminder from Crumlin and a longstanding Socialist Party activist. I’ve been involved in the anti-water charges movement, in standing with workers most recently on the nurses and paramedics picket lines, and I was an organiser of ROSA Socialist Feminist movement’s pro choice actions including civil disobedience with the abortion pills that helped win 12 weeks on request. Workers, women and young people are sick of the raw deal we’ve been dealt and are fighting back!
We demand:
• A €15 minimum wage, not “minimum lives” • Homes, not vulture funds • Equality, not gender violence and hypocrisy • System change, not climate change
We won’t be confined to boxes – not tiny flats or rooms in damp house-shares because of exorbitant rents, nor the rigid gender binary and social norms pushed by this system. We are fighting for a socialist Ireland in a socialist Europe, where the wealth and resources are wrenched from big business and taken into the hands of the working class – in the words of James Connolly “we only want the earth.”
graduates but also in sectors where the majority of workers are women. ICTU’s last study in December 2017 suggested 160,000 workers experienced one of the various forms of precarity. The real driving force for change in the workplace will come from organisation and struggle. However our trade union movement in recent decades has been shackled by chains imposed externally and interally. The absence of a serious fight to defend jobs, pay and working condi-
union recognition still has not been achieved as workers in Lloyds Pharmacy, Archaeologists and Paramedics in the course of the last year have all come up against the regime. Recognition should be legislated for but the Ryanair experience shows us that effective industrial action can force the bosses to recognise the union. Transform our unions – revive the movement of Connolly and Larkin! The approach of most of our trade union leadership have led us from one disaster to the next. A thorough democratic revolution within the trade union movement is needed so that the real fighters can rise into leadership positions. We need the election of all full time officials and the right to recall them; trade union official pay linked the members they represent and restore power to the union at workplace level.
Abolish the Industrial Relations Act 1990! This together with the frequent use of civil injunctions has served to diminish the impact of strike action by workers over the last thirty years. Workers must be permitted to ballot rapidly and embark on effective actions that hit the employers where it hurts. This Act needs to be defied and turned into a dead letter.
WHAT WE STAND FOR • Mandatory trade union recognition to help workers fight low hour contracts and precarious conditions and for decent pay and conditions. • A €15-an-hour minimum wage, no exemptions. • For pay equality and increase wages for all workers.
For mandatory union recognition! The centenary of 1913 Lockout came and went and mandatory trade
Minimum wage
Why we need €15 NOW!
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By Shane Finnan
ENTS SOAR, the cost of living continues upwards, all the while wages remain, for the most part, restrained. Workingclass people, especially the young, feel the pinch every week. Irish capitalism has failed to deliver for the working-class and young. Thousands of people are forced to stay at home in a state of delayed adolescence. Many are forced out of Dublin; since 2017 there have been nearly 1000 civil servants working in Dublin who have sought transfers outside of Dublin. Cost of living If you're under 35, the likelihood of you being able to access a mortgage
is next to none. Dublin is more expensive to live in than both Silicon Valley and Abu Dhabi. This is why workers need a minimum of €15 an hour now with no exemptions for young workers. The richest 300 people in Irish society have 80billion in wealth between them, and their profits continue to go up at the expense of workers and public services. All the while, 1 in 6 people in Ireland are in poverty. Inequality This grotesque wealth inequality needs to be challenged, and the trade union movement needs to mobilise its membership to struggle for a living and a dignified wage. Without workers, there would be no superprofits for bosses. Workers deserve a living wage!
4 SPECIAL FEATURE
THE SOC
The case fo DARRAGH O’DWYER and CILLIAN GILLESPIE make the case for a democratic socialist society based on need, not profit
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- James Connolly
hat type of economic system allows the 26 richest people to have as much as the 3.8 billion poorest? Why is it that, despite decades of warnings from the science community, we appear headed toward climate catastrophe? How do one in seven people go hungry while one third of all food produced goes to waste? With each passing year capitalism’s inability to solve the horrors it creates becomes all the more apparent. War, famine, poverty, and extreme weather events are a reality for hundreds of millions the world over. These are not accidental features of the system but follow the essential logic of placing the pursuit of profit before all else. The carnage and mis-
Rising tide of support for Sanders candidacy rate backed powerbrokers that control the Democratic Party . However, getting the nod from the party establishment is not the golden ticket it once was. Highend fundraisers filled with corporate executives and wealthy celebrities may make for impressive fundraising numbers, but they stand in stark contrast to the growing anti-establishment mood and support for grassroots-funded campaigns. Biden’s track record makes him both an automatic front-runner for the establishment and also a poorly positioned candidate to win over Sanders’ supporters. There is growing understanding that Sanders is likely the strongest candidate to beat Trump. His record includes enthusiastic support for mass incarceration, the Iraq War, and the disgraceful treatment of Anita Hill during her testimony about now Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’ sexual harassment.
Fearing the Sanders threat By Kailyn Nicholson- member of Socialist Alternative, sister organisation of the Socialist Party in the US THE CANDIDACY of Bernie Sanders in the US Presidential election is garnering is once garnering enormous support amongst working class and young people. His platform of $15 an hour, universal Health Care, taxing the rich and ending
corporate welfare, and the need for a “political revolution against the billionaire class” has clearly struck a chord as US society increasingly shifts to the left. In the past year this shift has been shown by the growing number of strikes and labour unrest, and polls that show an increasing support for the idea of socialism and opposition to capitalism, particularly amongst young people. This growing ferment will find an expression in the contest for who will
become the Democratic nominee in the much anticipated 2020 Presidential election, with many looking to end the rule of the Trump regime.
Joe Biden: capitalist establishment candidate Despite declaring late in April, former Vice President Joe Biden has generally led the field of likely candidates and has widespread support among the corpo-
While Democratic leaders like Nancy Pelosi try to downplay support for Bernie’s politics, it’s clear they recognize him as a major threat. In a recent article titled “Stop Sanders Democrats are Agonizing Over His Momentum,” the New York Times noted that top funders and party officials are holding meetings around the country to discuss how to prevent Sanders “complicating their efforts to unseat Trump”, despite many polls that show Sanders would likely beat Trump in a head-to-head race. Sanders’ recent Fox News Town Hall in
Pennsylvania steel country proved beyond doubt that his pro-worker, anti-billionaire message resonates with ordinary working class voters, including many workers who voted for Trump. If the Democratic leadership’s first priority were really to defeat Trump, Sanders would be their obvious favourite. If their priority were to reflect the views of their base, who overwhelmingly support taxing the rich and winning Medicare for All, Sanders would again be the clear choice. But their priority is to defend the interests of US capitalism. Threats of Sanders “splitting the party” don’t make sense in relation to the party base, but are more a reflection of how unacceptable he is to its corporate funders- the very billionaire class he calls for a political revolution against. To take one example, Medicare for All represents a full frontal assault on the $3 trillion for-profit health care industry. A Sanders’ presidency would destabilize U.S. capitalism and give powerful encouragement to working-class struggle in the U.S. and globally.
Sanders’ programme Sanders himself does not seek to end capitalism but seeks to reform it. Nevertheless, achieving his programme requires building a mass movement against corporate America and the entire capitalist political establishment. If elected president, he would find himself under assault from big business, with the leadership of his chosen party working against him, and without an organized mass grassroots force to back him
SPECIAL FEATURE 5
CIALIST
and
or socialist change ery capitalism inevitably leaves in its wake are but collateral damage in ensuring the maintenance of a system that benefits a tiny minority. Averting the disasters that lie before us will require not piecemeal reform, but a revolutionary socialist transformation of society. System change not climate change The biggest indictment of capitalism is the direct threat it poses to our planet. From record-breaking temperatures to destructive hurricanes, the extreme weather events experienced in recent years illustrates that climate change is a reality here and now. In 2018 these have estimated to have cost the lives of 5,000 people while a further 29 million required some form of emergency aid. Last year, the UN’s intergovernmental panel on climate change reported that we have 12 years to cap global warming at 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels and limit the more devastating effects that would come after crossing this line. Young people are drawing conclusions that this requires system change. The ruling class, where it does not openly deny climate change, attempts to shift the problem on to the backs of workers and the poor be it
up. Overcoming this will require an organized political force, which is why we have consistently called on Sanders to use his campaign to build a new party that fights 100% on the side of working people. Such a party should link Sanders important demands with a broader anticapitalist and socialist programme that would mobilise the working class people to seize the wealth and resources of society from the private ownership and control of big business and Wall Street.
Break with Democrats Sanders has not used his campaigns or elected office to build ongoing grassroots movements or a mass grassroots organization to counter the establishment’s power. He also stops short of drawing the full conclusions from the directly hostile role the establishment of the Democratic Party plays in relation to working-class interests. Before Bernie launched his campaign, Socialist Alternative argued for him to run as and independent, as we did in 2015. Despite our disagreement with Sanders’ decision to run on the Democratic Party ticket, Socialist Alternative will energetically campaign for him to win, while raising our proposals to strengthen the campaign. But if the Democratic Party establishment continues to move to block Sanders in the primary, he should not simply accept this outcome as he did in 2016, but instead take immediate steps to launch a new party for working class people that fights to break with the rule of the two parties of capitalist America.
members of a socialist government. On this basis it would be possible to democratically plan the economy the cater for the needs of the majority.
Extreme weather events on the rise: wildfires wreaked unprecedented devastation in California forests last year
through carbon taxes or empty moralising about personal responsibility. Yet the fact that just 100 companies have contributed more that 70% of CO2 emissions since 1988 demonstrates the inextricable connection between the capitalist mode of production and ecological degradation. In reality, capitalism has always operated with a complete disregard for the environment. The rich biodiversity of nature is relegated to a mere means of generating profit. Overfishing, pollution of rivers and oceans and deforestation have since 1970 led to a reduction in the global wildlife population by a staggering 60%. All of this points to why we should never expect the ruling class to embrace solutions required to tackle the climate crisis - for these also mean uprooting the very system upon which their existence depends. Wealth inequality Of course, why wouldn’t they defend an economic model that last year saw 200 billionaires increase their wealth by 12% at the same time as the poorest half of humanity’s share fell by 11%? Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, was one such beneficiary. Now the world’s richest man, he makes more in 11 seconds than the lowest-earning Amazon employee does in a year while a mere 1% of his 121 billion net worth is equivalent to Ethiopia's annual health budget. The greed of the capitalist class knows no bounds as they go to every measure, legal or otherwise, to avoid paying taxes. Globally, the super-rich hide an estimated 7.6 trillion in offshore accounts. In Ireland, successive neoliberal governments have actively encouraged tax-avoidance with meager corporation rates. Despite the fact that 1 in 5 children here are living below the poverty line, a housing crisis that’s left 10, 000 people homeless and a crumbling healthcare system, the FG/FF government would rather mollycoddle multinationals than properly fund public services. With all of this in a supposed period of economic growth, it does not bode well for what might come in the next recession, already on the horizon.
Nonetheless, although inequality has drastically increased since in the last number of decades our we should have no illusions in a return to a fairer capitalism. A programme to meet our needs The Socialist Party stands for €15-anhour minimum wage, the building of public homes on public land, real rent controls that are reduced to affordable levels, free access to childcare, free public transport, the abolition of third-level fees and a national health service that is free at the point of use. The question is where will the resources comes from to pay for these important reforms? Clearly the wealth exists in society to do so. We need to end Ireland’s status for a tax haven for the super-rich and big business. Corporation tax should be doubled and the massive tax breaks and sweetheart deals for companies for companies like Apple, which owes the state €19 billion in unpaid tax, should be brought to end. However, if our needs, and those of our planet, are to be met we must end the rule of a system that is driven by the brutal drive for profit. We need to end the private ownership of the wealth and resources of society by a
small minority that the capitalist system is built on. The bosses will find ways through a “strike of capital” ie refusing to invest their money in the economy and taking it off shore to avoid measures that will cut across their ability to garner profits. The capitalist class has acquired its vast fortunes through the exploitation of the collective labour of the working class over generations, it’s a system based on organised theft. It is we who produce the good and services that our essential for this system to survive and thrive, not the so-called “masters of the universe”. “Expropriate the expropriators” This is why Karl Marx wrote of the need to “expropriate the expropriators”, that being a need for a struggle by working class people to seize the resources owned by the ruling class. Concretely, this means a programme that involves taking the major financial institutions and companies that dominate the economy into public ownership under democratic workers control and management. The boards of these companies would have democratically elected representatives from in its own workforce, from the broader working class
Planning for human need Many capitalist economists rubbish the idea that it’s possible to plan something as complex as a modern economy. They ignore the reality that major and detailed planning by big business takes place all the time and also the existence of technology that makes such a task much easier – to monitor our consumption or potential consumption patterns, for example. The ads that appear on your Facebook feed are there because companies are able to track which websites you visit or what you search on Google. Companies like Tescos decipher the data from ‘loyalty cards’ to determine what it is they need to order into their stores. In the early 2000s, US company Walmart utilised developments in modern technology to: “reduce the cost of transactions within the supply chain by providing daily scan-data to suppliers, creating a system in which items are rarely out of stock.” Naturally, this planning is done in the interests of private profit, not human need. Planning in a socialist economy, however, could determine what schools, hospitals and childcare facilities are needed to cater for our communities. International socialism An internationally planned economy based on human need would rid our planet of the obscenity that is the global arms trade. Between 2001 and 2016, expenditure on this industry rose from $1.14 trillion to $1.7 trillion. It is shameful that these merchants of death have profited from the bloodshed and misery brought about by wars waged for power, profit and prestige in places like Afghanistan, the Middle East and North Africa. A socialist world would be based on solidarity, compassion and co-operation. It would use its natural, technological and human resources for the benefit of all.
We need system change: just 100 companies are responsible for 70% of greenhouse gas emissions
NEWS
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THE SOCIALIST
Revulsion and anger over killing of Lyria McKee T
HE KILLING of Lyra McKee on Thursday April 19th sent a wave of shock across Northern Ireland. Lyra was only 29 but had already made a name for herself as a journalist, an author and an activist. Whilst over 3,800 have died in the “Troubles” since 1969 some killings strike a particular chord. Lyra’s age means that she was a member of the generation which has only known the “peace” delivered by the Good Friday Agreement (GFA; also known as the Belfast Agreement), signed almost exactly 21 years before the day of her death. Her activism means that for many young people her life represents their hope for a better future. Amongst trade union activists in particular there is intense anger that Lyra was a journalist doing her job when she died. Trade union movement must act Protests and vigils, initiated by the National Union of Journalists and local Trades Councils, and Lyra’s friends and family, took place in Derry, Belfast, Omagh, Enniskillen, Strabane, Cookstown, Newry, Dungannon, Dublin, Glasgow and London and elsewhere in the aftermath of her death. These were important events giving expression to the widespread anger and revulsion over her death. The trade union movement, which unites 250,000 Catholic and Protestant workers, is the only body which can now provide the lead which is required. A mass, trade union-led campaign can check the growth of paramilitarism, get the armed groups
them on both sides of the sectarian divide, is by providing a political alternative. This means however challenging all the sectarian political parties, including those which lined up to condemn the New IRA in the last few days. The call by a priest at Lyra’s funeral for the DUP and Sinn Fein to “get together” was applauded by those present. Their response was genuine and is one more illustration of the frustration of working class people after 800 days of political stalemate. Now talks between the parties are to be initiated by the British and Irish governments but even if agreement is reached this will not provide a way forward. The sectarian parties are part of the problem, not part of the solution.
#NotInOurName: working class people and youth across the sectarian divide oppose a return to the violent conflict of the past
off the backs of working class communities, and ensure that a new generation do not waste their lives in prison cells. Proud tradition The trade union movement has a proud tradition of standing up against sectarian forces from all sides, especially when workers are under threat. Already this year paramilitary attacks have been answered by protests by working class people. In January the public sector union
NIPSA organised a rally in Derry after a series of attacks, disruption and threats. Vehicles were hijacked at gunpoint and there was a car bomb explosion outside the courthouse in Bishop Street. The New IRA was behind the bomb and the security alerts. After Lyra’s death there was a similar ground-up, trade union-led, response. National Union of Journalist (NUJ) activists, including Socialist Party member and NUJ Executive member Anton McCabe, took the lead in organising several protests. The
Trades Councils in Derry, Enniskillen, Omagh and Mid-Ulster joined NUJ events or organised their own. NUJ activists came together in solidarity protests in Glasgow and London on the day of Lyra’s funeral. The role of sectarian parties It is not only the absence of a robust trade-union wide response which is a problem however, but the tendency of the unions to avoid politics. The only way to effectively challenge Saoradh and other organisations like
Working class anti-sectarian party needed A sustained trade union-led movement against paramilitarism, against sectarianism, against repression, and against austerity, must be launched now. On each and every occasion that working people face threats, intimidation and attack the movement must respond, including through strike action when necessary. The trade unions must, with genuine anti-sectarian socialist groups and individuals, begin to build a mass political party that challenges sectarian politics and sectarian politicians and unites the working class, Protestant and Catholic, in a struggle for a shared socialist future. This is an edited version of a Socialist Party statement from 26 April 2019 which can be found at www.socialistparty.ie.
End the scandal of a two-tier health service and gynaecology services to be free from religious interference. We need to end church control of our hospitals and health services. A public outcry at the time cause the government to squirm, we need a movement from below to force full separation of church and state, the conservative political establishment aren’t willing to act.
By Rita Harrold SUCCESSIVE GOVERNMENTS have presided over the implementation of cuts and austerity that have devastated our health service. We have a criminal situation where the existence of a two-tier health system means if you want to have proper access to healthcare you must pay up. Over 100,000 people have been on outpatient waiting lists for over 18 months. With 9,714 patients. including 117 children, on trolleys in hospitals across the country, March of this year saw a 14%increase on the previous month. On the picket lines of paramedics you hear of the need for more ambulances as well as chronic shortages where rotas are being covered by overtime because there aren’t enough staff. These workers in the NASRA branch of the PNA are on strike for union recognition.
Relying on the private system Approximately 45% of people in Ireland have private health insurance. Timely access to diagnostic tests is one of the key issues pushing people towards expensive private services.
Profiteering pharmaceutical companies
As we have seen with the Cervical Check scandal delays in diagnosis can have devastating consequences and people are afraid to take the risk and will pay to wait in a shorter queue so long as the public service is so underresourced.
Separate Church & State As well as private companies out to make a profit there is also the issue of church control. The government are essentially gifting the new National Maternity Hospital to a religious order. Needless to say, it is vital for obstetrics
Pharmaceutical companies are holding sick people to ransom and charging outrageous fees for life-saving and quality of life-saving medications. Two examples in the Irish media recently are Orkambi which can help people with Cystic Fibrosis and the cancer drug Pembro. In the US there have been reports of people with diabetes dying after trying the ration their insulin supply when prices doubled in 4 years. Public investment in pharmaceutical development is needed so that new drugs can be accessed by all who need them, not just those with the money. This industry must be brought into public ownership and taken out of the private ownership of the profiteers that control it.
A national health service Mental health services, obstetrics and gynaecology, scoliosis treatment, the list of crisis points in the health service goes on. The Socialist Party is fighting for a national health service run for need, not profit. Only a properly funded national health service that is free at the point of use and under the democratic control of health workers and the wider working class can guarantee decent wages for health workers and proper healthcare for all.
Socialist Party stands for: • Increased public spending on health to reverse all austerity cuts • Pay restoration – no to two-tier pay • End the outsourcing of jobs in the health service – for all staff to be directly employed • For a fully funded, secular national public health service free at the point of use • Take all private hospitals, pharmaceutical and healthcare companies out of hands of profiteers by putting them into democratic public ownership.
NEWS
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THE SOCIALIST
Demand free public transport now! W
By Manus Lenihan
E NEED to transform our cities and communities through free public transport. As well as abolishing fares, we need for a vast improvement in quality: an integrated public transport system based on trains, trams, buses and bicycles. No-one in a city or town should live or work more than a fiveminute walk from public transport links, with frequent services. School buses should cover all public schools and be completely free of charge. Impact on workers & young people This has been done. Ask the residents of Dunkirk, France; Tallinn, Estonia or one of over 120 other cities around the world that run public transport without fares. In Dunkirk, a quarter of the city centre used to be car parks. Now, buses pass every ten minutes. Bus usage has risen from 50% to 85%. Motorists have switched over in big numbers. For the unemployed, young people, working-class people and the elderly, their city has been opened up. As researcher Wojciech Keblowski has pointed out, free public transport has proved to be “a social policy that redistributes access to the city”. Free public transport must become a key demand of the protests against government inaction on climate change. What other policy would do so much to reduce emissions, while also doing so much to improve people’s lives in the short term? Far fewer cars on Irish roads would mean vast public spaces opened up; an end to people wasting hours of their lives in daily traffic; deaths and injuries and damage avoided. Massive investment needed Delivering free quality public trans-
Bus Éireann, Luas and Dublin bus workers took strike action in 2016
port would obviously demand a lot of investment. Anyway, right now we pay painful amounts of money for our cars – it’s relentless: insurance, tax, fuel, maintenance. As a society, we pay billions for motor infrastructure. If it’s a question of money, then basing all of society around the car is the most expensive option imaginable. Investment can be paid for by taxing the profits of big business and more generally utilising the resources of society through a socialist plan of society based on public ownership of
the key sectors of the economy. But in broader terms, our environment pays the heaviest price of all. We have known about global warming for decades – but our money is still being pumped into massive infrastructure projects and communities designed around a totally false assumption: the idea that everyone is going to keep driving cars for another 50 years. Capitalist establishment failure But far from valuing and promoting
public transport, Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil, Labour and the “Independents” in government have kept degrading the service, leading to a whole series of public transport strikes – Bus Éireann, Luas, Dublin Bus. On the other hand, those who want to defend public transport and those who want to save the environment should see their common interest: the bus drivers on the picket lines and the students walking out of school are on the same side. The growing demand for socialist
politics, which delivers for people and environment, has led to Trump accusing socialists of wanting to confiscate people’s cars! This is the opposite of the truth: right now people are forced to buy cars. In Dublin, “You cannot move around unless you have a car, so you have to buy a car” according to James Wickham a Trinity based academic. What socialists want is to liberate people from gridlock and crippling expenses by opening up public transport, making it top-quality and free of charge.
new movements are showing that sexual violence and harassment will no longer be excused or accepted: a new generation of young people is demanding action.
united working class movement as a whole and stands against all forms of oppression.
End gender-based violence By Eleanor Crossey Malone In March, three women in Ireland were murdered by their partners. In 90% of femicide cases, the victims were murdered by men they knew. Cases of family annihilation have also been in the spotlight, and their portrayal in the media has been alarming. After the murder of Clodagh Hawe and her three sons by their father, media coverage focused on the mental ill health of the murderer, who was portrayed as a pillar of the community, and how unexpected his behaviour was, rather than on the loss that the victim’s deaths represented to society. These murders as rooted in a culture of backward gender roles and to highlight the reality that gender-based violence is a deeply embedded societal issue, and can only be effectively challenged by fighting for a fundamental transformation of the society we live in.
#MeToo movement The global #MeToo movement, which has seen millions of people collectively breaking their silence and exposing the prevalence of sexual violence and harassment. Though it began as a hashtag on social media, it has spilled over into protests and industrial action, with thousands of Google workers walking out worldwide to demand action on workplace harassment, and McDonald’s workers going on strike in the US. Ireland has also had its “#MeToo moments”, with thousands protesting in the aftermath of the so-called Ulster Rugby Rape Trial and again after the Cork rape trial. Both cases exposed the extreme backwardness and victim-blaming ideology that is used against claimants in courts and which also exists throughout society. The women’s clothes were also scrutinised by the defence to provide evidence that they had consented. In addition to objective sex education that is based on consent, the legal system, which offers no justice for women and survivors of sexual violence, must be transformed. The
The change we need This generation of young people and school students have shown they are willing to stand up and fight - for action on climate change, for abortion rights in Ireland and to end the housing crisis. Real objective and inclusive sex education in schools, not controlled by the church, is essential to challenge backward ideas about consent and sexuality that pose a threat to women and LGBTQ+ people. The trade unions must follow the example of the workers in #MeToo strikes around the world and take the lead in fighting against sexual violence and harassment at work. In order to rid our society of gender-based violence, along with all manifestations of sexism, we must build a socialist feminist movement that fights for far-reaching social and political change and end the rule of this oppressive capitalist system we live under. To do this we need a
What we stand for • A massive investment in education and services to challenge gender violence- Tax big business and the superrich • Trade unions must take the lead in organising to end sexual harassment in the workplace • Transformation of the legal and health systems to provide justice, protection and care for survivors of violence and abuse • Consent-based, LGBTQ inclusive sex education in a secular education system • Build a socialist feminist movement that fights in solidarity with the working class and oppressed against the capitalist system that fosters and profits from sexism
CAPITALISM IS BURNING THE PLANET
thesocialist
PAPER OF THE SOCIALIST PARTY
ISSUE 122
MAY 2019
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