Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)

One of the worst traditions in politics, which we seem to have a particular capacity for in this country, is saying one thing during an election campaign when one is looking for votes and then doing something very different as soon as the votes are in the ballot box. That is precisely what has happened with the new programme for Government.

Deputy Kenny said that the EU-IMF deal was a bad deal for Ireland and it was a bad deal for Europe. There was a clear implication that something would be done about that and that we would stand up to those institutions that were trying to unload the cost of a financial crisis created by bankers and speculators on to the backs of ordinary people. This deal will cause immense suffering for them and it will cripple our economy for years to come. The rhetoric about standing up and doing something about the IMF-EU deal has disappeared in the programme for Government, which sets out clearly the intention to continue the programme of austerity and cuts implemented by the previous Government in the interests of paying off the bankers and bondholders at the behest of the EU and the IMF.

Another promise emblazoned on almost every Fine Gael poster was to get Ireland working, yet the plan to get Ireland working is reflected in one of the few specific commitments in the programme for Government, which is to slash 25,000 public sector jobs. One does not have to be an economic expert to realise one will not get Ireland working by axing 25,000 jobs. That will mean an additional 25,000 people unemployed, less money being spent in the economy and more suffering.

It is particularly depressing that the Labour Party will support Deputy Kenny, the incoming Government and the programme for Government. Labour Party Members should be ashamed of themselves for signing up to a programme that will axe the jobs of 25,000 of the people who very particularly voted for them in the hope and expectation that their jobs would be safe. They should be ashamed that when asked about the issue of water charges on national television and in the national media, they made solemn promises that they would not introduce such charges and now they have signed up to a programme for Government that sets out to implement such charges. They should be ashamed to sign up to a programme that talks about selling off State assets to pay off the bankers, bondholders and speculators. It is shameful to sell the family silver and to strip the assets of this country in the name of paying off bankers and bondholders.

What about the promise to do something about the universal social charge, which has savaged the incomes of low and middle income families who have lost hundreds of euros, as a result of which many cannot meet their mortgage repayments or pay other bills? What about the promise that the Labour Party would recalibrate the taxation system so that those earning more than €100,000 per year would be subject to increases? That has also been abandoned and all we have been told is that there will be a review.

For all those reasons, it is impossible to support the incoming Government which has abandoned all its promises related to the desperate cry for change which the people expressed during the election campaign for a programme for Government, which is simply a plan to do more of the same and cause suffering to ordinary people and which will cripple our economy for years to come.

Last weekend, Deputy Gilmore said he feared he would see forests of placards as he and Labour Party Deputies-----

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