January 2010 edition of the Socialist

PAPER OF THE SOCIALIST PARTY

ISSUE 50

JANUARY 2010

2010 - €15 BILLION FOR BANKS...

HSE cuts to Hartstown D-Doc service

T E G D U B E G SAVA S R E K R O W R O F

THE SOCIALIST Party has learned of plans by the HSE to cut the D-Doc after-hours GP service by closing down the Hartstown centre and stopping doctors’ home visits (initially) on Wednesdays from 12-midnight to 8am. This would leave the entire north city and west Dublin area reliant on one centre in Coolock that night or, more likely, falling back on the A&E services in Blanchardstown, the Mater and Beaumont.

Joe Higgins MEP said: "D-Doc is a vital service in one of the country’s most populated areas with a huge number of babies and young children who absolutely require these GP services. It is quite incredible that such a cut is being considered in the midst of a swine flu epidemic.

"Let there be no doubt that this cut is just the thin end of the wedge. If implemented, the HSE would likely cut other nights out of the service. A campaign must be waged by the local community to defend our service.

"Very sick children, elderly people and those with chronic illnesses are particularly dependent on the doctor home visit service. Lives are undoubtedly being put at risk by this cut, as there will only be one car to service the north and west Dublin catchment."

Cllr Ruth Coppinger added that : "This service was launched with fanfare by the HSE three years ago. Since then, A&E episodes have fallen by 25%. This cut will undoubtedly force people back into A&E queues as they have no alternative."

"Socialist Party local representatives will be assisting workers and users of the service in organising a public meeting to begin a community campaign to defend this service."

For more information on the campaign contact Councillor Ruth Coppinger 087 6730187.

By Kevin McLoughlin IRST IT was the flooding of November. Then the country ground to a halt because of freezing temperatures. While the real impact of climate change is been shown, these events also show that the policies of the government are putting the general public in serious danger.

They promoted house building anywhere, including on flood plains, to make a quick buck. State agencies ignored reports on the dangers of flooding because they didn't want to spend the money to keep the public safe.

Transport chaos because of the freezing weather is not inevitable. It is much worse because of their transport policy that relies on cars and roads rather than building a proper public transport system, particularly based on rail and trains.

Then they didn't have the stocks or staff to grit the roads or pavements

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properly. The potential for public services particularly the health service, which is already reeling from cutbacks and mismanagement, to collapse under pressure in these types of emergencies is clearly shown.

The need for proper public services and infrastructure is shown by these events. In fact without the existing emergency services and public servants, the problems could have been much worse. There were also many examples of ordinary people up and down the country who selflessly came to the assistance of people who were stranded or in difficulty.

In contrast promoting privatisation and greed instead of safeguarding and developing public services has been the central policy of government for years. They don't care and in fact they are intent on using the financial crisis to force through much more draconian cuts on public services over the next four years.

The chaos caused by the weather is just the latest reason why this govern-

ment must go. It’s part of a long list of reasons. That the cuts and attacks on public services are taking place so the wealth can be used to bailout bankers, builders and to continue with the profiteering policies of the capitalist market, is a disgrace.

The billions of cuts in the budget will depress economic activity. The cutting of public sector workers pay is already being used by bosses in the private sector to impose more pay cuts. The result can be a downward spiral where mass unemployment will be here to stay and living standards will be slashed. Young people will be denied a job and a future and for their trouble will be harassed by the department of social welfare and denied their rights.

The weather did what the trade union leaders refused to do – bring the country to a standstill and undermine and expose this government.

People are very uncertain about what the future holds. Many are disappointed or even a bit demoralised at the state that the country is in and

CONTACT THE SOCIALIST PARTY - (01) 6772592, PO Box 3434, Dublin 8

the lack of real fight or alternative being put forward by the trade union leaders.

After some crashes there is recovery. But in Ireland, because of the policies pursued, after this crash we are facing years of serious crisis. We need to kick out this government but we also need to fundamentally break with economic policies that put profits before peoples needs. The future of this country is not represented by this government but by the likes of the emergency workers and other ordinary people who have made a difference during the recent problems.

It is now necessary that workers reclaim the trade unions and turn them into fighting organisations that will defend living standards. We also need a real political alternative. The Socialist Party is campaigning for the establishment of a new mass party that opposes the domination of the economy by big business and fights for socialist policies that cater for the needs of the majority not the profits of the few. Join with us today.

info@socialistparty.net

www.socialistparty.net

January 2010

2 THE SOCIALIST

news

By Stephen Boyd CTU’S SO-CALLED "plan of action" to oppose the pay cuts imposed on public sector workers is vague and doesn’t outline a clear strategy as to how the cuts can be reversed.

ICTU’s Public Services Committee is attempting to do the impossible. They are trying to come up with a plan of industrial action which will have a minimal impact on their members pay and on services to the public, while at the same time putting sufficient pressure on the government to force them to overturn the pay cuts. It can’t be done. If there is to be a fight to reverse the €1 billion in public sector pay cuts, then it won’t succeed without major strike action that directly impacts on the functioning of government and the provision of public services.

Many public sector workers view the events of the last 12 months through jaundiced eyes. Trade unionists had their hopes raised on a number of occasions when the union leaders actually called major demonstrations and strikes. Yet, instead of driving home their advantage and following up these actions by escalating the strikes and mass mobilisations against a weak government, the union leadership chose the path of conciliation, "partnership talks" and compromise. What they got in return from the government was a kick in the teeth, the ending of "social partnership" and savage cuts in pay and funding of public services.

It is not surprising therefore, that many public sector workers question the purpose of taking further industrial action. This is not because they accept the pay cuts but because they have no faith in the union leaders. The dogged adherence to "social partnership"

by ICTU as a substitute for a concerted campaign of strike action has directly led to the major cuts in public sector workers pay.

The culmination of this strategy that was doomed to fail was the humiliating spectacle of ICTU trying to negotiate a deal with the government to deliver fundamental "reform" in the public sector.

"Reform" that would have resulted in thousands of job losses, major cuts in overtime and allowances

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ICTU leaders fail Strike action can reverse pay cuts

Despite hundreds of thousands marching last year, the union leaders backed down from struggle.

(which many depend on to supplement poor levels of basic pay) in return for a "voluntary" 12 day lay off, in effect a 5% pay cut.

The trade union leaders’ failure to stop the imposition of the public sector pay cuts has laid the basis for a major assault by employers on pay across the private sector and in semi state companies. The government has also made it clear that they intend to impose further pay cuts in the public sector. The cuts in unemployment benefit and in particular the draconian cuts in rates for young people are preparing the ground for a cut in the minimum wage.

A major attack on the pay and living standards of every worker is now on the cards. Yet we keep being told there is no alternative "we" need to be more competitive.

According to trade union economist Paul Sweeney, "It is worth noting that Ireland still has one of the highest levels of productivity in the world. However, the last three quarters…saw the biggest fall in unit labour costs in the 30 state OECD occurring in Ireland…This

undermines Minister again Lenihan’s claim that Irish unit labour costs are the highest in the Eurozone".

The government outrageously claimed that if they had not cut public sector pay then they would have run out of money to pay wages by this spring. Yet an RTE Prime Time Investigates programme on the banking system estimates that a further €15 billion will be given to the banks this year. They can find €15 billion for the banks but nothing for public services or wages!

This fact alone is proof that all of the cuts in funding for public services and the public sector pay cuts are avoidable. The budget cuts are part of a strategy to maintain a low tax regime for big business, who if they paid tax at the same rate as PAYE workers, would be contributing an extra €10 billion this year towards the funding of public services.

Jack O’Connor has said the unions need a concerted campaign of industrial action and even spoke of the need for an all out public sector strike. Yet behind the scenes he

is apparently involved, along with others, in talks with Fine Gael and Labour about resurrecting the failed "social partnership" system after the next election. Is this an indication that some union leaders have accepted defeat and are pinning their hopes on getting their "foot back in the door" with government after the next general election?

Instead of engaging in a long drawn out campaign of work to rules, selective action and lobbying of Fianna Fail TDs, from which there is little prospect of victory, there should be a united struggle that collectively involves every public sector worker.

The government and the employers have embarked on a full-scale assault to cut wages. The trade union movement needs to respond with the same type of vigour – take off the gloves and fight to defend pay and jobs.

A campaign of strike action beginning with a one day public sector strike and escalating towards and culminating in an all out strike is the type of action

“The recapitalisation of AIB and Bank of Ireland and the nationalisation of Anglo Irish Bank have to date cost the exchequer €11 billion. The recent RTÉ Prime Time Investigates programme on the banking system estimates that a further €15 billion will be pumped into consolidating the banking sector this year. Including the estimated €54 billion for Nama, the banking crisis has cost the taxpayer €80 billion to date.”

Elaine Byrne, The Irish Times, 5 January 2010 needed to defeat the government.

ICTU’s shambolic proposals need to be challenged by union members and activists. All workers (public and private) are faced with a choice. Either struggle to defend what you have or accept further pay cuts, job losses and stealth taxes. Further strikes and struggles are inevitable as the government and the employers are determined to drive down pay and conditions even further. To stop the sell outs and rotten deals which have been a feature of the last period workers need to get organised with the aim of gaining more control over their disputes. They need to reduce the influence of full time officials and impose the democratic will of the membership based on a bottom line of what we have we hold!

Clerical abuse – prosecutions needed

By Councillor Mick Barry OUR CATHOLIC Bishops have resigned in the wake of the Murphy Report into clerical sex abuse of children and the cover up of that abuse in the Dublin Diocese.

The four - Bishop of Limerick Donal Murray, Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin Jim Moriarty, Bishop Raymond Field and Bishop Eamonn Walsh - remain within the Irish Catholic Church Hierarchy with the title of “Bishop Emeritus” and with full pension entitlements.

The fifth Bishop named in the Report, Bishop Martin Drennan of Galway, stubbornly refuses to resign stating that the “major decisions” which resulted in a cover up of child sex abuse by priests within the Diocese were made by Cardinal Desmond Connell.

What is needed now are prosecutions not resignations. The priests who abused children and the people higher up the Catholic Church ladder who covered up for

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Prosecute the guilty, including those that covered it up.

them and moved them to other parishes should answer for their actions in a court of law.

Justice Minister Dermot Ahern said on the day that the Report was published: “Justice, even where it may be delayed, will not be denied.

A collar will protect no criminal.”

These fine words, however, are

contradicted by the action, or rather the inaction, of the State down through the years.

An extremely revealing finding of the Murphy Report was the fact that the Gardai referred reports of clerical abuse to the Church authorities rather than pursuing cases through the legal process.

Despite the fact that this approach is now meant to be ended, the so-called God Squad of 20 detectives set up in 2002 to investigate clerical abuse claims has not brought forward a single case for prosecution.

And why have reports only been held into allegations of abuse in two dioceses, Ferns and Dublin? Is it not clear that abuse occurred in every diocese? Every diocese, therefore, should be investigated.

And, unlike the cases of Dublin and Ferns, prosecutions should be aggressively pursued when abuse of children and cover up of that abuse is suspected.

The craven attitude of the capitalist establishment to the Catholic Church hierarchy was graphically shown in the Dail when Taoiseach Brian Cowen mumbled excuses for the Vatican in their refusal to reply to correspondence from the commission of enquiry by “explaining” that the Vatican is a foreign state which had not been approached through “diplomatic channels”.

If that is the case why does Cowen’s government allow the agents of a foreign state to run the primary school system in this country? Catholic Church Bishops are appointed by the Pope and are the patrons of 3,200 primary schools in this State. They have the power to appoint the boards of management who are, in turn, answerable to them.

The scale of this power is shown

by Maynooth Statute 262 which states: “To avoid prejudice against the managership of schools, clerical management is forbidden to appoint any teacher or assistant, male or female, in national schools until he shall have consulted and obtained the approval of the Bishop.”

The clerical caste which covered up the sexual abuse of children should not be allowed to control our schools. The Socialist Party stands for the complete separation of Church and State and this must include removing all schools funded by the taxpayer from the control of the Church.

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January 2010

THE SOCIALIST

The

HColumn IGGINS AS WE begin a new year and a new decade, the economic crisis casts a long shadow over the lives of ordinary people.

The assertions by government ministers echoed by sections of the billionaire owned press that "the worst is over" and that "we have turned the corner" cannot be taken as anything other than cynical propaganda to hoodwink workers to take the savage cuts in their wages and living standards dictated by the recent budget and previous measures.

Morgan Kelly, Professor of Economics at University College Dublin, had a far more realistic assessment of the economic prospects when he wrote in The Irish Times.

Looking forward to 2015 he predicted that jobs and debt would be major issues to haunt society. In other words Irish

capitalism will still have features of severe crisis with people suffering the consequences. In fact that is inevitable.

You cannot simply slash billions off public spending and in particular savage the wages of low and middle income public sector workers and hope there will be no economic consequences. Thousands of workers who would be involved in providing the goods and services of these public sector workers will lose their jobs as a consequence of their customers’ drastically reduced spending power.

The banks of course will play a central role in the years ahead just as they were instrumental in the greed fest that gave rise to the dramatic crash in the Irish property scene and subsequently in the wider economy.

The governor of the Central Bank has called for a comprehensive enquiry into how the present disaster erupted. This would mean a special look at the activities of the banks and big property speculators.

There should be such an enquiry but not one that drags on for years and becomes another bonanza for certain lawyers such as those who became millionaires through the planning tribunal.

An enquiry should be short and sharp. It should involve crucially those who are the victims of the crash such as workers who have lost their jobs and those now coping with negative equity but still shackled to monstrous mortgages which they were forced to take out for the basic right to have a roof over their heads.

Such an investigation should expose all the skulduggery that went on during the property splurge. The names should be published of those who made fortunes from the speculation and those in whose

pockets now lies the €54 billion paid in speculative property deals which have been taken into the care of the taxpayer through NAMA. The role of the media should also be investigated especially the mass circulation newspapers which made a fortune from property advertising from developers. We need to know how much lucre they got from the developers for the fat property supplements and lay out how this influenced their failure to expose the extent of the rip-off that was going on.

A genuine investigation would expose the baleful role of Fianna Fail so it will be resisted. However, why shouldn’t the trade unions conduct such an investigation independently using the enormous resources they have. It would be a great answer to the campaign of slander and denigration of public sector workers carried out by sections of the media over the last year as they created the conditions for the pulverisation of their.

shortcuts

By Eddie McCabe

Is the worst over?

IN HIS December budget speech Lenihan stated, "Today, I can report that … we are now on the road to economic recovery ... the worst is over."

Reality unfortunately begs to differ. The government’s own forecasts say 70,000 extra people will be forced onto the dole, with unemployment reaching 14% in 2010. Four companies a day are expected to go out of business this year.

Some recovery!

ID Cards – No thanks THE GOVERNMENT plans to spend €25 million on new public service identity cards for three million people over the age of 16. This scheme could potentially be an intrusion into our basic civil liberties. The cards which will contain sensitive personal information may form the basis for a controversial national identity card.

According to officials, the idea of the cards is to help in the crack down on social welfare fraud. If only the government would crack down on the real corporate criminals that have bankrupted the country instead of rewarding them with billions in taxpayers money!

In the belly of the tiger!

Public sector workers on the breadline ANN ORR spoke to LAURA who is married to a public sector worker who prior to the recent pay cuts earned €28,000 a year. They are both in their twenties and have a son who is nearly two years old. hat cuts have you been affected by over the last year?

"First, the pension levy came in.

It was rolled back a bit for lower paid civil servants so we didn’t notice it as much as we had initially thought. Then the early childcare supplement got halved and we definitely noticed that.

"To be honest, one of the hardest

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things last year was just the media campaign against public servants, knowing that we are not privileged and quite poor and struggling and yet having to hear constant attacks in the media. After six months of that it starts to really wear you down.

"Then they came out on budget day saying that they would reduce child benefit but that families on

income supplement would be protected. I knew instantly that they would find some loophole. They increased the limit of family income supplement but the change in the limit makes no difference to us. We still only get €20.” o how much worse off are you and what impact has this had on your family?

"Between the scrapping of the Early Child Supplement, the cut in child benefit and the reduction in my husband’s wages, we’ll be down around €156 a month. Most of our income goes on rent anyway, and, we’ll just have to move, and we’re living in a quite modest place already.

"Basically the rest of our money

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goes on food and bills; we don’t have any left for anything else.” s there anything you can do to improve your situation?

"That’s the most frustrating thing because there just isn’t really anything. I would love to return to work, but I just can’t. I’m young, I had a baby shortly after I left college I don’t have much work experience, even if I was successful in finding a job it would be very low paid.

“I couldn’t afford childcare. I don’t understand why the government can’t set up crèches that are not run for profit. We would need support with childcare, rent allowance or help for me to get back to college”.

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AT THE height of the boom Surinder Singh began working for a Longford-based businessman. He usually worked up to 100 hours a week!

However, the scrooge-like employer never paid him the full minimum wage. After taking the case to court Surinder was awarded the difference between what he was paid and the legal minimum wage, which over the course of seven years amounted to a staggering €202,400!

Bertie’s Christmas bonus

One parent family cuts

By Robert Connolly ARY HANAFIN, the Minster for Social and Family Affairs, has raised a proposal to attack the One Parent Family Payment (OFP).

She is arguing for a change in the allowance that’s paid to lone parents by stopping the payment once a child reaches thirteen.

Recent figures show that almost 18% of lone parent families are in "consistent poverty" while 37% are "at risk of poverty". If introduced, this cutback would further impoverish tens of thousands of lone parents whose children are above the age of thirteen. The majority of lone parents work and, as it is now, these workers can only earn up to €146.50 before their OFP payment is reduced - if their income goes above €425 (hardly a princely sum)

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the payment is cut off altogether.

Many of these workers, who are already struggling to make ends meet will be badly affected by the proposed cut which would see them suffer a dramatic fall in income.

Capping the payment at 13 would also be an indirect economic attack on the teenage children of lone parents. As the above figures show, it’s working class young people who will suffer most - yet another example of how many of the government’s recent cuts are systematically punishing working class young people in particular.

Minister Hanafin has claimed that her proposed cutback would help end the "dependency" of these lone parents on state assistance.

During the boom, it was the uninviting prospect of low wages and the unaffordability of childcare that has forced some unemployed

Young people pay the price.

lone parents to become dependent on this payment. Now that capital-

ism has bankrupted the economy, the government wants to forcefully encourage some unemployed lone parents onto the jobs market what jobs are there now? Even if some low-paid jobs do become available, these lone parents will not benefit - it is only the government’s best friends the employers, who will benefit.

If the government was serious about getting one parent families out of poverty and off benefits, then they would provide a comprehensive state childcare system. If they were serious then, they wouldn’t be introducing cuts in funding to community services that lone parents depend on for education, training and creche facilities. No one wants to be on benefits but the alternative of a decent well paid job with the back up of affordable or state funded childcare just isn’t on offer for most lone parents.

THE TAX-FREE artists exemption scheme is awarded to a work that is "original and creative" and is "generally recognised as having cultural or artistic merit". Of course it is only right that former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern’s autobiography should be given this honour.

For his "creativity" regarding his personal finances and the contribution he made to the "culture" of greed and corruption at the top of Irish society is, if nothing else, a great work of fiction!

opinion & news

JOE

You cannot simply slash billions off public spending and in particular savage the wages of low and middle income public sector workers and hope there will be no economic consequences.

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January 2010

feature

THE SO

STEPHEN RIGNEY argues that the failure of the Copenhagen talks last December has completely exposed the bankruptcy of the world’s leaders and of their ability to come up with credible solutions to the climate change crisis.

EEKS BEFORE the talks even started, it had become apparent that no significant deal would be reached, particularly after President Obama had ruled out reaching any legally binding agreement on reductions in omissions. Despite initial optimism about a politically binding agreement being reached, the Danish presidency of the talks was forced to declare that nothing would really come out of the summit.

The final agreement, which needs to be ratified by all 192 UN members for it to become legally binding, falls far short of even the most conservative estimates of what is necessary to combat global warming. While the final text of the accord recognises the importance of restricting temperature increases to a maximum of two degrees centigrade, it doesn’t set any targets or commitments on emission reductions, which are an absolute necessity for restricting an increase in temperatures. This is despite a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change calling for reductions of 25-40% by 2020 and 5080% by 2050, based on the 1990 base year levels.

The blame game on who was at fault in blocking a legally binding solution began even before the delegates had arrived. The Sudanese leader of G77 group of so-called "developing nations", Lumumba DiAping, went as far as to compare the proposed deal to the Holocaust and as a "suicide pact" for Africa.

As part of the deal, the advanced capitalist countries are expected to help the neo-colonial world to prepare for climate change through financial aid and economic programmes, which will "maintain the economic dependence of a few countries [on the imperialist countries]."

The aim is to provide $30 billion a year to the neo-colonial world by 2020 and $100 billion by 2050.

Although the World Bank, which is no friend of the poor or neo-colonial countries, has already calculated that between $75-100 billion is needed immediately and consistently until 2050. (World Bank Press Release, 30 September 2009). Whether these modest targets can be reached has to be seriously questioned in the context of the global recession.

Capitalist governments are already faced with massive debts as

Capi gam and

FAILURE IN COPENHAGEN

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Over 100,000 protesters marched in Copenhagen demanding real action to combat global warming

a result of bailing out the bankers and speculators responsible for the economic crash. In order to reduce this debt, they are gearing up for a massive assault on government spending and workers’ wages and conditions and are unlikely to increase their aid budgets willingly.

Role of China While Gordon Brown has commented that the deal is "a vital first step", Barack Obama was far closer to the truth when he pointed out that "this progress is not enough."

However, despite this statement from Obama, the US administration, along with other developed countries have been quick to point the finger at China.

The US has demanded that the dividing line between "developed" and "developing nations" (who are not required to cut emissions) be removed or at least be re-assessed particularly in relation to rapidly industrialising countries like China and India.

While China has or will soon surpass the US as the biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, Chinese per capita rates are far lower than that of the US. What is driving the tit-for-tat accusations though is nothing to do with fairness or genuine concern for the environment but narrow, economic nationalism and protectionism.

The ability of China to produce lowcost goods because of the slave wages that are paid to Chinese workers has had a significant impact on US exports. The US administration is worried that if it is forced to reduce its emissions while China remains free to pollute as it pleases, US capitalism will suffer. As Republican Senator Charles Grassley put it, "Uncle Sam will become Uncle Sucker and export all our jobs to China".

The global warming crisis cannot

be alleviated on the basis of capitalism. Capitalist governments and the multinationals will continue to focus on production based purely on maximising profits and winning greater market share – whatever the cost to the environment. As the global economic crisis unfolds it will sharpen and intensify the divisions between different nation states as they compete economically for shares of a shrunken global market. No capitalist ruling class can afford to take unilateral measures to address climate change that would impact on their economic competitiveness and profit levels that on the basis of capitalism could result in further increases in unemployment and falls in government revenue with subsequent political consequences.

Is de-industrialisation an option?

The arguments put forward by some climate campaigners that the only solution is to de-industrialise and effectively consign the poor to a permanent life of poverty do not hold up either. For the first time we have the technology and the economic ability to provide housing, food, clothing and medicine to planet’s entire population. But the real issue is who owns and controls this technology.

Under capitalism, there has been a refusal to develop renewable resources such as wind, solar and wave power on a mass scale because of the initial costs of such programmes but also because fossil fuels are still such a profitable venture, despite the impact they have on the environment. This is demonstrated by the resistance that US energy companies have put up to developing more efficient car engines. Most ridiculously though, is the fact that energy companies often develop and patent new forms of

energy production, not in order to actually implement them but to cut across competitors patenting them first. They have no intention of actually applying these technologies until it becomes more profitable to do so than to continue burning fossil fuels.

The economic crisis will further restrict investment in green technology. Even before the recession had really begun to bite, an article in the Financial Times in November 2008 pointed out that global investment in renewable technologies had fallen by 24% in the third quarter of 2008. A further report by Deloitte claimed that investment had dropped by 48% in the first quarter of 2009.

Over 600 workers at Vestas, the only wind turbine blade manufacturer in the UK were sacked last year while $9 trillion has been handed over to the banks and nearly $4 billion is spent each month on the war in Afghanistan. This is the chaos of the capitalist market!

The only feasible solution to the crisis that threatens the future of this planet is socialism. By taking the means of production and technology out of private hands, we could rapidly respond to climate change by using renewable energies on a mass scale without worrying about the interests of profit and big business. Production of food and commodities based on people’s needs not profits would open the door to using the planets’ resources to benefit the majority in such a way as not to cause further damage to the environment.

But this would take planning and genuine co-operation on a global scale, something capitalism is incapable of. Humankind faces a bleak future unless we address the issue of climate change. The world’s capitalist leaders showed by their total failure to reach an effective agreement in Copenhagen that they are part of the problem not part of the solution.

Copenhag with polic

By Michael O’Brien HE CHARADE of world leaders pretending to save the planet did not go unchallenged.

Thousands of activists from across the world converged on Copenhagen to hold counterevents to both protest against the rotten deals being proposed but also to discuss real political alternatives that could cut C02 emissions to the degree required.

Participants included the likes of Ian Terry, a former Vestas worker from the Isle of Wight in England.

Vestas, who make wind turbines, closed resulting in 600 job losses which were fiercely resisted by Ian and his co-workers who occupied the factory for 18 days. The New Labour government’s refusal to intervene to

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January 2010

5

OCIALIST

What does the recession mean for global warming?

By Michael O’Brien FROM A number of perspectives it has been argued that the global recession of the last year and a half and future economic turmoil will mean that conscious action to deal with climate change will be less urgent. The logic being applied here is that recession means less economic activity equals fewer emissions. Simple?

In fact, so-called eco-fundamentalists see further economic catastrophe as the only means to save the planet because they rightly dismiss inter-governmental deals while wrongly and pessimistically dismiss any prospect that international people power can be harnessed to effect change.

People will not be mobilised to save the planet on the basis of an even poorer existence via a monumental decline in economic activity, which would have to be a multiple of the current recession in any case to have the "desired" effect on C02 emissions.

To put some perspective on this, the 50% decline in economic activity in the Russian economy in the 1990s did have a corresponding impact on that country’s emissions but at a huge human cost in terms of unemployment, crime, population decline and shortened life span. A similar decline in the advanced capitalist countries would be unlikely to have the same effect on emissions as smoke stack industries, which have long ceased to be a decisive part of western economies, were precisely the type

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of factories which were mainly effected in Russia.

In any case, the recession will end and growth will return to the global economy to a point where emissions will increase again and in hindsight we will see that the reduction of emissions during the recession will not have slowed global warming.

A key demand of the socialist and environmental movement should be the rapid development of renewable energy and environmentally friendly production techniques backed up by state investment.

Such a changeover would itself be a huge source of economic activity that would both create jobs as well as benefit society as a whole.

However, such a course of events can be ruled out under capitalism. In fact, the recession has seen a decline in investment in research and development into renewable energy and into private companies seeking to pioneer mass renewable generation technology. For example Ausra, a Californian company which has developed a promising form of solar thermal power which involves harnessing and concentrating solar energy to generate steam to drive generators cannot raise the capital to progress their work. In fact, private investors have been swayed by the episodic decline in world oil prices to turn away from renewables.

For a more detailed argument taking up the negligable effects of recession on global warming see an article by Pete Dickenson at www.socialistworld.net/eng/2008/12/2401.html

gen protests met ce repression save the plant typifies the true level of sincerity of the governments participating in the summit.

The counter summit events and protests met with constant repression from the Danish police with the support of the local political establishment. In advance of the summit new "hooligan" laws were passed allowing the police to make "preventative" and "administrative" arrests if they thought that somebody was about the engage in "disorder" or even if they were bystanders to "disorder".

In practice these draconian laws resulted in 968 people being arrested out of a demonstration of 100,000.

Overall between 1,500 and 2,000 people were arrested during the summit yet charges were only pressed against a tiny handful. Karin Wallmark was one of 40 Committee for a Workers

International (the international organisation to which the Socialist Party is affiliated) members arrested at the demonstration. She commented: “Everything in the demonstration changed when a crowd of policemen ran out of an alley and blocked the road in front of us. We stopped and stayed calm, wanting to avoid provoking them. We understood that the police as well as some media would see any further violence as a confirmation of the correctness of the massive police presence in Copenhagen and the new antidemocratic ‘hooligan laws’ introduced before the summit.

But our being completely peaceful and innocent did not stop the police from carrying out their attacks”.

The CWI started an immediate defence campaign, including phone calls from Joe Higgins, Socialist Party MEP to the Copenhagen police. Most CWI members were released around midnight, with their fighting spirit intact despite back pain, hunger and tiredness. A well attended press conference co-hosted by the CWI’s Swedish section and Sweden’s section of Friends of the Earth detailed to the media the physical brutality of the Danish police. Questions are being asked in wider Danish society about the powers being given to the police and the local Police Ombudsman is conducting an investigation. CWI members and other activists intend prosecuting the police to both hold them to account but also use the resulting media attention to put the socialist alternative to capitalist environmental destruction.

CWI members from across Europe attended protests arguing for a socialist solution.

What to do if you meet a climate change sceptic

By Michael O’Brien THERE ARE certain scientific questions which are considered settled, for example that smoking causes lung cancer. Questions like this are settled to a point that it would be ludicrous for a media outlet to stage a debate on it in the interest of "balance". Yet among the scientific community there is likewise a near absolute consensus regarding facts of global warming arising from human activity. However, just as there was opposition from the tobacco firms to the early findings linking their products to cancer powerful corporate interests have stepped up their efforts to sow scepticism among the wider public that anthropogenic (as a result of human activity) climate change is a reality.

The latest culprit is Professor Ian Plimer, a geologist and director of three mining firms in Australia who has recently written an undeservedly well publicised book falsely claiming volcanic activity is the greatest contributor to climate change. Plimer was a guest on Pat Kenny’s RTE Radio One show, during which Kenny defended him and exposed himself as a

climate change sceptic. Plimer has since been shredded in an Australian TV debate with the environmental campaigner and journalist George Monbiot.

That is not to say that all advocates of anthropogenic climate change behave impeccably. A recent hacked e-mail from the University of East Anglia exposed two scientists conspiring to bury data that did not tally with one line of argument that backs up climate change reality. This has been seized as a propaganda weapon by the deniers but the reality is that there are hundreds of strands of peer reviewed evidence that support anthropogenic climate change.

George Monbiot advises us to pose four questions to anybody we encounter who claims they are sceptical about climate change. "1. Does the atmosphere contain carbon dioxide? 2. Does atmospheric carbon dioxide influence global temperatures? 3. Will that influence be enhanced by the addition of more carbon dioxide? 4. Have human activities led to a net emission of carbon dioxide? It would be interesting to discover at which point they answer no - at which point, in other words, they choose to part company with basic physics."

feature

italist leaders mble with climate environment

6

January 2010

THE SOCIALIST

Water charges on the way back Boycott the Meter – Boycott the Charge!

Psychiatric services “unfit for human habitation

By Michael Murphy

By John Gahan

HANKS TO the Green Party and Fianna Fail’s continued attempts to make ordinary workers pay for the economic crisis, domestic water charges are on the way back for householders, 15 years after they were abolished.

A mass campaign of non-payment in Dublin organised by the Federation of Dublin Anti Water Charges Campaigns, a campaign in which the Socialist Party played a crucial central role, forced the then rainbow government of Labour, Fine Gael and Democratic Left to abolish them throughout the country.

The new charges are to be introduced on the basis of metering, which is an attempt to put an environmental spin on them. According to the government, households will be allocated a "free" quantity of water and only when they exceed this amount will they start paying.

Of course, if you are wealthy you are free to use as much as you wish because you can afford to pay for it.

Many households who are suffering financially would be forced to monitor every drop they use to keep their

REPORT from the mental health inspectors has stated that wards in a number of psychiatric hospitals are "unfit for human habitation".

Other wards were "dilapidated, desolate and depressing". At St Ita’s in Portrane, Co Dublin, they said 125 people were being forced to live in "appalling conditions" and it was "difficult to convey the extent of dilapidation". "Toilets with no privacy, paint peeling, mould in showers, broken furniture, ill-fitting doors, cramped dormitories, the smell of urine, poor ventilation and a bare drab environment were clearly evident."

One in four of our population require psychiatric services at some stage in their lives.

However, resources are scarce and health authorities have written to the Department of Finance, seeking the urgent return of more than €40 million raised in recent years from the sale of land used by mental health services.

Some €36 million was raised from the sale of land at St. Loman's hospital in Mullingar in 2004, and €6.3 million for Verville retreat in Clontarf in 2005. This money ended up being used as part of the general exchequer funds, despite pledges by government ministers that the money would be ring fenced for use in mental health services.

Plans to sell off more public land should be stopped. These publicly owned lands should be left in the hands of the state, and not sold off for the benefit of select groups in our society, such as developers and speculators. We have seen the consequences of a society led by these groups in the past decade. These state owned lands should be used to benefit local communities.

The psychiatric service has seen funding drop from 10.6% in 1990 to below 6.8% at present. Funding for mental health care dwindles year by year and mental health services fall further behind in their ability to meet the needs of service users.

Although the public psychiatric service has suffered a reduction of inpatient beds, the private service has experienced the opposite. For example, a new 236 bed private hospital is currently being developed on a site adjacent to St. Vincent's hospital Elm Park. Other private psychiatric hospitals include, amongst others, St. Patrick's hospital in Dublin, which caters for approximately 300 beds. The state of psychiatric service is a scandal.

The boom has been and gone without major improvement and no sign that real change is on the cards except moves towards privatisation!

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A mass campaign of non-payment was key to defeating water charges in the 1990s.

bills down. Metering has nothing to do with the environment - the purpose of the meter is to commodify the water so its use can be charged.

This will ultimately lead to privatisation which is the same process that has happened to waste management around the country.

Government ministers have said that had we not succeeded in forcing the abolition of water charges in the 1990s, households would now be paying €800 per annum. Talk of initial charges of €175 while meters

are being installed is only the start.

The harsh lessons of the bin tax should help expose the lies that the measure is to conserve water and that people will only be charged above a certain level. Remember the bin tax catch-call "You only pay for what you throw away" – not anymore. Once a charge is introduced, it will rise relentlessly – the same will happen with water charges.

The Socialist Party will be organising a mass campaign of opposition to these new charges. We will

be resisting the installation of meters throughout the country and advocating a mass non payment of the charge.

Joe Higgins MEP, former chairperson of the Federation of Dublin Anti-Water Charges Campaigns, has called an anti water charges forum on Saturday 13 February in the Teachers Club, Parnell Square at 12pm. This forum will outline ideas for the type of campaign that is necessary to beat this new double tax.

Management company debacle

By Councillor Clare Daly S EVERY day goes by, tens of thousands of householders continue to be the victim of unregulated management companies. These companies demand hundreds and indeed thousands of euro every year for services that in many cases are not provided and in many more are overpriced and should be provided as a public service without a direct charge as in established estates.

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It is generally those who are shackled to massive mortgages, for properties bought at the height of the boom, that are also tied up in these companies. Promises by the Greens in particular that they would enter no government, unless this extortion racket was sorted out, have long been forgotten as they sit in their comfortable jobs with their secure pensions.

Meanwhile, residents on the ground are suffering pay cuts and job losses. The level of non-payment of management fees is escalating sharply. Not a District Court session

takes place without these cases being listed. Increasingly, householders are being forced to make a stand. Even the judiciary is fed up that nothing has been done.

Before Christmas, residents from Ridgewood in Swords and Martello in Balbriggan had their cases struck out. Balbriggan’s Brackenwood residents are back up in court in February, the management company having failed to reach agreement with the residents, as ordered by the judge.

This entire situation is an utter debacle, which is putting ordinary

homeowners under huge and unwanted pressure. In many estates, residents have come together in order to try and take on these companies. But we need to link up beyond that.

Throughout the course of January and February, the Socialist Party is organising information forums in the areas most affected by this issue, in order to bring together those people from the different estates to exchange experiences and step up the pressure on this issue. For more information, contact Cllr. Clare Daly on 8408059.

Councils slash bin waiver

By Councillor Matt Waine N YET another attack on unemployed workers and pensioners, Dublin City Council and Fingal County Council have scrapped the automatic right to a waiver for the poorest households in Dublin. On top of a cut in the dole, the carbon tax and prescription charges, those worst affected by the draconian budget will now have to pay refuge charges.

This unfortunately confirms the predictions made by the Socialist Party and the Anti-Bin Tax Campaign that rather than being an environmental charge, the bin tax was an extra, double tax on working class people. We pointed out that the tax would rise relentlessly and that the waiver system would eventually be scrapped.

In Fingal, pensioners and the unemployed, while still receiving a

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waiver for the annual fixed charge, will now have to pay €8 each time they put out their black bin. In a cynical manoevre and as a "sop" to get the Labour Party to support the budget, the County manager announced that he would give former waiver recipients between eight and 12 "free" bin tags, "as a means to phase out the waiver and so those affected could factor the new tax into their budgets." The manager was in generous mood it seems, because he also announced what amounts to a 10.5% reduction in the total rates paid by businesses in Fingal!

The charge levied on businesses for waste collection and water was also reduced because the Council was "acutely aware of the very difficult circumstances the business sector is experiencing at the moment". But what about the even more precarious financial situation faced by thousands of families trying to survive on social welfare

The Socialist Party led the campaign against the bin tax.

payments? The budget was passed by the votes of all Labour Party councillors and two Fianna Fail members.

In Dublin City, pensioners and the unemployed will now have to pay €6 every time they put out their grey bin and €2 each time they put out their brown bin. This could mean the poorest having to pay over €180 a year. Add that to the €600 plus lost through the scrapping of the Christmas bonus and the 4.5%

cut in the dole and unemployed families are being hit hard.

Incredibly, Sinn Fein Councillor Killian Forde put forward and voted in favour of this budget.

Both Fingal and Dublin city are gearing up to scrap the waiver completely next year. This will be in the context of the re-introduction of water charges and must be met by a united and determined campaign of boycott and opposition in Dublin and throughout the country.

7

January 2010

THE SOCIALIST

By Paul Murphy HE POWER of the dictatorship in Iran has been threatened in recent weeks by mobilisations of millions in militant demonstrations. These were not simply minor demonstrations against an element of the establishment, but instead major militant mobilisations challenging the power of the entire regime.

This round of demonstrations started on "Student Day" on 7 December. This was then followed by a major demonstration on 21 December at the funeral of Grand Ayatollah Hussein-Ali Montazeri, a political opponent of the Supreme Leader, Al Khamenei and the President Ahmadinejad. The movement then reached its peak so far on 27 December, "Day of Ashura", a Shiite holy day and traditional day of protest. It is estimated that millions participated in these protests across the country.

Videos and pictures of these demonstrations have been distributed via YouTube and Twitter across the internet. The anger and militancy of protestors is striking. The repressive police force has been a particular target, with police vans turned over and burnt and at least one police station burnt down.

The police reportedly evacuated certain police stations to prevent the protestors from occupying them

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Severe repression has not stopped the masses from mobilising.

and seizing the guns within them.

There were also reports of police and soldiers refusing to fire on protestors, with one reported as having said: "I will never kill the people of my own country".

The state’s response was predictable – harsh repression and a crackdown on protest. Eight protestors were killed at the demonstration on the day of Ashura, including the nephew of Hossain Mousavi, the opposition Presidential candidate and one of the leaders of the opposition. More than 1,000 people were arrested at the protests and over 300 were injured.

The nature of the movement is contradictory. The leadership of the so-called "Green Revolution", including Mousavi (the defeated opposition Presidential candidate), Khatami (a former reformist President) and Rafsanjani (another former President and the current Chairman of the Assembly of Experts) come from inside the establishment in Iran. They represent the interests of a section of the ruling class who want to "improve" relations with the US and the West for the economic "benefits" and profits this would bring and have very limited demands, looking for only

moderate reform of the Islamic Republic. Despite the repression against his own followers and supporters Mousavi has spoken of the need for compromise and of a potential deal with Ahmadinejad.

However, with the movement taking to the street and feeling its own power, the people have shown they would be prepared to go far beyond the limited demands which the leadership want to constrain it to.

The slogan "Death to the Dictator" has been raised by many protestors and anger has been expressed not only against Ahmadinejad, but also against the Supreme Leader, Al

Khamenei, which in effect is a challenge to the entire structure of society. This is a motivating factor behind Mossavi’s talk of a deal as neither he nor Khatami want to see the religious oligarchy overthrown.

Parallel to these significant developments of protests are the sharpening of international tensions between Iran and the US. The immediate cause is the refusal by Ahmadinejad to agree to the proposed deal on nuclear power. This is an attempt to cling on to power by uniting the country against the outside enemy.

The threat of military action continues to hover over Iran but it is clear that sanctions or military action would hurt ordinary people and allow Ahmadinejad to portray the opposition as stooges of imperialism. Whether Ahmadinejad and Al Khamenei will be able to halt the development movement against them is not clear. The ruling class is divided and the working class has shown a commitment to militant struggle and has felt its own power.

However, the "leaders" of the opposition are opposed to the fundamental change that is needed in society, committed only to relatively modest reforms and themselves coming to power. What is needed to bring the struggle to a successful conclusion and a complete transformation of society, is the independent activity of the powerful working class and youth.

Iris Robinson - Corruption at the heart of the political establishment

United Socialist Party to contest Sri Lankan election

By Gary Mulcahy HE JAWDROPPING sequence of events surrounding Iris Robinson soliciting £50,000 from two millionaire property developers (the late Fred Fraser and Ken Campbell) has opened a Pandora’s Box of corruption, which goes right to the heart of the political establishment.

Iris Robinson’s refusal to declare any interest when present at the Castlereagh Council meeting which awarded the tenancy to establish a café at council-owned property to Kirk McCambley, whom Robinson was having an affair with, threatens to bring down the Robinson dynasty.

Many people were suspicious when Iris Robinson made a statement explaining her affair with McCambley and her attempted suicide last year and chose to mention the fact that she had "encouraged friends to assist him by providing financial support for a business venture."

The decision of Peter Robinson to invite senior political reporters to his home to make a statement on his wifes’ affair and attempted suicide was meant to distance himself from the scandal and present himself as a victim in this saga. But it has spectacularly backfired on him, after the allegations made on the BBC Spotlight programme that

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By Oisín Kelly

THE PRESIDENTIAL election comes at a crucial juncture for Sri Lanka. Following the brutal war last year President Mahinda Rajapaksa is seeking a new mandate on 26 January. The United Socialist Party (our CWI sister party) will be running Siritunga Jayasuriya (pictured) in this election. He will be putting forward a socialist opposition to the two main candidates’ sectarian politics. The USP stands for class unity between Sinhala and Tamil workers against the sectarian political establishment.

In May 2009 the 26-year-old civil war between the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tigers came to a bloody end.

Rajapaksa gained control of the north and east of the island using brutal measures against the minority Tamil people. The Tamil speaking people live in the north and east of the island and make up 17% of the population, while the Sinhala speaking people make up 74%. Last year 300,000 refugees were deliberately herded into so called "no fire zones" which were effectively cramped, unsanitary, prison camps. The military deliberately denied medical care to many camps. As many as 20,000 people were killed in the conflict in 2009.

Siritunga Jayasuriya, the USP candidate, is standing for a socialist alternative to sectarianism and political oppression.

Siritunga stood in the previous presidential election in 2005 and came third. He was an outspoken activist against the "anti-terror" laws in the past four years as chairman of the Civil Monitoring Commission. Many have been abducted, murdered and "disappeared" largely Tamils, trade unionists, journalists and other activists.

The USP is standing on a platform of opposition to the sectarianism of the main candidates and for working class unity between Sinhala and Tamil workers.

Iris and Peter Robinson.

the First Minister and DUP leader assisted his fellow MP and wife’s attempt to cover up the fact that she had accepted money from developers illegally. It is clear Mr Robinson made his statement on the eve of the Spotlight broadcast in order to throw suspicion on his wife and not himself. But the allegations made by Iris Robinson’s expolitical adviser, Selwyn Black, that Peter Robinson became involved in the consequent bid to give the money back to solicitors representing Fraser’s estate and Ken Campbell, has now raised the question of whether the First Minister has broken the ministerial code which obliges him to act in the public interest. His failure to report Iris Robinson’s actions could now lead to the First Minister stepping down in disgrace and

resigning as leader of the DUP after less than two years in power. A humiliating result for an ambitious politician who spent nearly 30 years serving as deputy leader under Paisley.

Fred Fraser was one of the wealthiest property developers in Northern Ireland and has been involved in many housing developments in Castlereagh, a council area politically dominated by the Robinsons for decades. Iris Robinson has also been involved in lobbying on behalf of Ken Campbell to secure him commercial developments in her constituency. How many other councillors, MLA’s and MPs have close corrupt links to wealthy business people? The parties in the Assembly Executive are responsible for procuring huge public contracts to private companies with a guaranteed profit. Their policies of privatisation reward the rich at the expense of ordinary working people. Instead, working class people are being told we must pay water charges, accept cuts to services jobs and wages and young people must accept mass unemployment. The capitalist system together with its political establishment is utterly corrupt. The case for the building of a mass working class party with representatives who live only on a workers wage and fully committed to fighting for the rights of working class people has never been stronger.

international & north

Iran – Mass movement threatens dictatorship

WHAT WE STAND FOR Workers’ rights

PAPER OF THE SOCIALIST PARTY

ISSUE 50

JANUARY 2010

Youth dole cuts help low pay agenda

By Manus Lenihan AST YEAR, 50% of the weekly dole payment was cut for under 20s. This trend continues. Since the latest budget, new dole applicants under 25 who sign

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on will get only €150 a week and those aged 20-21 will get €100 a week.

Clearly in the coming weeks and months, many more young people will lose their jobs or leave school into unemployment and onto such poverty dole payments.

These cuts are

blatant age discrimination but there’s more behind them, too.

Firstly, the "full" €196 will be paid to under-25s if they’re in training or education. Secondly, payments will be cut to €150 a week for everyone who refuses a job or training scheme. These measures have nothing to do with encouraging young people to

do training courses. (In fact, FAS training allowance itself has been cut by as much as €8 a week.) The government has longer-term goals in mind. If a young worker is to be punished for refusing a job offer, employers will have no reason to offer decent wages, hours or conditions. Their aim is to make us see ourselves as disposable, as second-class citizens when it comes to jobs. Young workers are to be cheap, "competitive" labour. Unable to live on €100 or €150 a week, young people can be forced into extremely low-paid jobs.

The government’s real agenda is to cut the minimum wage – young people will be the first to be forced onto such poverty wages.

That’s the role that IBEC and the government have in mind for our generation, and that’s all capitalism has to offer the youth of this country. The only alternative that young workers have is to defend the rights we have, and demand those due to us, through struggle for a society based on peoples‘ needs, not profit.

Underage Sex a Crime?

By Laura Fitzgerald RECENT case in which a judge jailed a 19 year old for having consensual sex with his girlfriend (16 and three-quarters years of age) has exposed the unjust and backward nature of laws governing young people and sexual activity.

The issue has come to the fore again as a young man, now 18, is being prosecuted for having sex with a 14 year old girl when he was 15.

Defence lawyers have correctly pointed to the gender bias inherent in the fact that only male teenagers under 17 can be prosecuted for

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underage sex. It ties into detrimental sexist ideas about gender, insinuating that women are weak and need to be protected and that men are always the sexual aggressors, even when sex is consensual.

According to Sheila Green, a professor in childhood research, there has been a major increase in consensual sex between under 17s (the legal age of consent is 17). The law is not acting as a deterrent against teenage sex and is unjustly prosecuting a tiny proportion of the many young men that engage in consensual sex with their peers. The 18 year old currently being prosecuted should be found “not guilty”. Minister for Children, Barry

Tutorials – €5 a go!

By Liam Cullinane, UCC Socialist Youth OR YEARS, first-year sociology students have been given weekly tutorials in addition to lectures. These tutorials are a vital aspect of college, providing an environment in which to discuss their coursework.

Since September, these tutorials have been postponed indefinitely, meaning that hundreds of sociology students spread across Arts, Social Care and other courses have been denied a important aspect of their education. In addition to first year students, this has affected lecturers, who have been forced to cut lecturing time to incorporate question and answer sessions and post-graduate students who rely on tutoring to finance their

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education. Incredibly, first-years were told that if they wanted tutorials they would have to pay €5 per session in order to receive them from a private company!

The blame lies not with the Sociology Department, but with government underfunding and with the college management who have instituted drastic funding cuts in the department and who support the privatisation agenda. Over the coming weeks UCC Socialist Youth will be actively campaigning against the cutting of sociology tutorials as well as against similar cutbacks in other departments. If they manage to implement this draconian measure, all tutorials will be under threat in UCC and across the country.

If you would like to get involved contact: socialistyouth@uccsocieties.ie.

Andrews’ statement that he was personally in favour of lowering the age of consent for sex to 16 should be acted upon. Most importantly, it should be specified legally that no teenager should be criminalised for engaging in consensual sex with their peers.

The Law Reform Commission has recommended that young people from the age of 14 should be able to decide upon medical treatment once they understand the nature of their condition and treatment. This should also be speedily put into law. Under the current law, if a 15 year old presents him//herself to an STI clinic, medical staff may be legally obliged to contact their parents – a potential deterrent to many

n A guaranteed right to a job or training with decent wages and full workers’ rights. n For a minimum wage of €12 an hour tax free with no exemptions. n For a 35 hour week without loss of pay. n For a decent social welfare payment, linked to average earnings. n Free childcare for all.

Reclaim the trade unions n For democratic trade unions to fight in the interests of their members on pay, conditions and job security. n Full time union officials should be regularly elected and receive the average wage of those they represent. n Scrap the anti-union laws. An end to "social partnership".

Health n For a free public national health service. No to private health care.

Education n Free, quality education for all from primary to university, with a living grant.

Housing n For a massive public house building programme, funded by central government to eliminate the housing waiting lists.

Privatisation n No to privatisation, public private partnerships and private finance initiatives. n All publicly owned services and companies to be run under democratic working class control.

Equality n An end to discrimination on the grounds of race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, disability and to all forms of prejudice. n For the right to asylum and the scrapping of racist anti-asylum and immigration laws. For the right to work, with full protection, for immigrant workers.

Local taxation

teenagers seeking essential medical attention and indeed, contraception.

Young people are being treated with contempt by the government and the system. 1 in 5 under 25s are unemployed. The government is gearing up to cut the minimum wage. Low pay, the dole or emigration is not a choice or a decent life at all. With this in mind, the state is hardly in a position to present itself as a moral guardian and protector of the youth! Prosecutions of young men for consensual sex must stop.

Young people should fight for their rights – for the right to vote at 16, for the right to a decent education that includes quality sex education and for the right to a decent job and future.

Rage Against the X Factor Machine The race for the Christmas number one was a battle between the corporate might of Simon Cowell and the anti-establishment rock band Rage Against the Machine. In what many people saw as a victory for music and against all the odds it was the latter that came out on top.

In doing so they ended the four year domination of the XFactor over Christmas charts. "F*ck you I won’t do what you tell me" – music of the future for capitalist crisis?

WWW.SOCIALISTPARTY.NET

n Scrap the bin charges - no to double taxation in any form. Local authorities to receive proper funding from central government funds.

Waste management n For major investment into a publicly owned recycling service to combat the waste crisis. No to waste incinerators.

International n Oppose the big business dominated European Union. No to the militarisation of Europe and to a European Army. n For solidarity of the European working class. For a socialist Europe. n No to imperialist wars. End the occupation of Iraq. For a socialist Iraq.

Northern Ireland n Build a real peace process based on uniting the working class communities, not on bringing discredited sectarian politicians together. n Joint trade union and community action to counter all forms of sectarianism. n An end to all activity by all paramilitaries, loyalist and republican. Complete demilitarisation.

Socialism n Capitalism is the cause of poverty, inequality, environmental destruction and war. We need an international struggle against this system and its effects. The working class can build a socialist world in which the resources of the planet are used to satisfy the needs of the mass of the people not the thirst for profit of a tiny minority of super rich. n Take all major industry, banks and financial institutions into public ownership and place them under the democratic control and management of working class people. n For the working class to democratically plan the economy to provide for the needs of all, and to protect our environment. n For the building of a mass political party capable of uniting the working class in the struggle for socialism in Ireland. n For a socialist Ireland as part of a free and voluntary socialist federation of England and Wales, Scotland and Ireland.