Slump Coalition’s greatest myths; Part 2 “We’ve all got to share the pain”

Equality of opportunity is something in short supply in our country but to be fair to our government when it comes to equality in misery we‘re sparing the rod. The latest mantra is that we've all got to share the pain. According to FF & The Greens there’s plenty of pain to pass around but the real problem is that for some people their sensory receptors are so overloaded with grief that they cannot see what is going on around them.
The 2010 budget certainly stuck it into anyone who is blind, needs a carer, wants to return to further education to upskill, has children, is on social welfare, works in the civil or public service or someone who relies on coal to heat their house. To numb the pain a small one has been made cheaper. The media, international bankers and business organisations generally welcomed the budget saying it was a dose of reality. The spin was that everyone was taking a hit, except in reality some were taking a greater hit than others.
First to fireproof themselves were cabinet ministers who took the same 5% pay cut as their cleaners. Next were the higher public servants who claimed bonuses as income foregone and hey presto their pay cut was reduced to 3%. When inflation is taken into account it’s a pay rise! After that the tax write offs for developments that are now surplus to requirements were shored up. This means that tax payers will continue to subsidise developments that there may not either be built or that there is no demand for. This type of development has been blamed by the hotel industry for surplus beds that are destabilising the hotel industry and causing job losses. The fig leaf suggestion from the 2010 budget that the wealthy who live outside the jurisdiction should pay tax on their incomes has floundered on the question of how can the state establish what part of their earnings was made in Ireland and what part abroad?

In Wexford we’ve another example of the double talk by the business sector. Fees for many Doctors, Solicitors, Dentists and other professionals have remained the same as before. Time was that doctors fees chased the A&E charge endlessly upwards. this seems to have plateaued out since the 2009 budget which sent the A&E charge skywards. For many public servants who do not qualify for either the doctor only medical card or for those who can pass a means test for a full medical card the trip to the doctor or dentist is now one that is increasingly putting a strain on pockets. Parents are thinking twice before they bring thier kids to the doctor and that is not what care should be about. The experts who should help reduce the pain are in fact adding to the pain rather than sharing pain there.
It pains me to say it but taxes and pay cuts are for suckers.

Drink! Feck! Arse! Budgets!

It’s a budget that Fr Jack would be proud of. If Carlsberg could do budgets they’d do this one! Drink prices hit the floor, the millionaire’s G&T drop in price as VAT & excise duty are reduced. The bill is picked up by the public servants and those on social welfare.
I debated the budget in South East Radio with Michael Wall (SIPTU), Michael O’Leary (a local financial services expert) & Cllr Michael Sheehan of Fianna Fail just hours after the speech. Dan Walsh did the needful and chaired the debate. Every year South East Radio has a budget debate and this is the second time I’ve done it. It’s an example of public service broadcasting that you don’t often hear in local radio. The response from the listeners was hugely critical of the budget, and I’m not surprised. As a budget, I must say that I’m still in shock. I’m shocked that Fianna Fail could walk all over vast swathes of people to appease the bankers, builders & IBEC so blatantly. If Labour tried a fraction of what FF & the greens pushed through there would be a schism.!

Lets punch through the noise and set Budget 10 in context. All the money saved last year has been channelled into the banks by the back door off balance sheet and not a cent of it was mentioned today. Its not as though we’re through the worse, the worse hasn’t started yet. There’s no stimulus here, SME’s are looking for credit, they won’t get it today and it won’t happen because the CEO of the Bank of Ireland gave away the game when he said that capitalisation will only lead improving the balance sheet of the banks, no mortgage holders or businesses need apply. Employment is the only way out of the slump.

We’ll soon be out of recession but we’ll be in depression then! By then anincreasing number of families relying on social welfare will be paying prescription charges per item, carbon taxes to heat their way out of fuel poverty, struggling to meet mortgages. against a backdrop of the ending of the embargo on repossessions.
How can you expect people who get less to spend more in an economy? The sub-text to the agenda is emigration, cut jobseekers assistance for young people and that will act to drive young people out. The other subtext from FF & the greens is that there is no alternative to cuts and that the rich should keep their heads down and let ordinary people carry the can.
On the way home I must confess I only stopped to fill the tank with petrol At home I saw Eamon Ryan on “Prime Time” tonight. I couldn’t help wonder if he regretted not running in the 2004 presidential election. Surely his chance of the park is now as real as Kenmare Hospital. The Green Party’s endless spin on the green or knowledge economy is running the risk of getting the word knowledge a bad name. The only green jobs created are for green senators counting frogs. That’s why the budget will get through. It won’t revive the economy it’ll knock it out. Once that happens emigration will start. In the end, Craggy Island may well seem more populous than John Bull’s other one