Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)

In a short vote a majority in Dáil Éireann has disposed of the right of workers to opt for retirement after a lifetime of work at 65 years of age. It is a shameful decision. I regret that more of the Deputies who came into the Chamber to vote for that, and who will probably come back to vote again to increase the pension age to 67 and 68, did not remain to engage in the debate. I would like to hear their rationale for supporting this reactionary and regressive measure. In particular, I would like to hear the Deputies of the Labour Party, many of whom were supported by trade unions and received trade union subscriptions, and have grotesquely betrayed the membership of the trade union movement whose funds supported them in the general election on 25 February. The least the Labour Party Deputies could do is come to the Chamber and justify themselves before the working class here, and as members of a party set up by the great socialists, James Connolly and Jim Larkin, who struggled all their lives to improve the welfare of workers and against backsliding by employers and the system itself. The Labour Party they set up is unrecognisable from the Labour Party today but some of those Deputies still claim the mantle of Connolly and Larkin. They should come and explain themselves to the working class people.

The Minister did not engage with the arguments in opposition to the demographic debate nor the idea that not enough wealth could be created if we continue to allow people to retire at 65 or 66, or earlier which should be the case. As I pointed out, the demographics show that in each of the years 2007, 2008 and 2009 a total of 18,000, 23,000 and 23,000 more people were born than in the 1997 to 1999 period. People live longer but the number living longer was only 3,000 in the three years of 2007, 2008 and 2009 compared to, for example, 1997, 1998 and 1999. We have a potential 20,000 extra workers compared to only an extra 3,000 more people living longer. Therefore, that is not an argument the Government can use, unless it has accommodated itself to the idea that the scandal of tens of thousands of young people being forced out of this country every year in enforced emigration will continue. I presume the Government would say that its policies will reverse that trend. The Minister must engage more acutely with us on the demographic argument as it applies to the Republic of Ireland.

The Minister correctly mentioned the difficulties of private sector workers who have paid all their lives into private pension schemes. One must ask why there is such a monumental crisis for so many workers, and why workers have seen their lifetime contributions, or expectations in any case, wiped out. It is because we are dominated by a financial system that is more like a casino in Monte Carlo than a rational way of organising society. It beggars belief that we believe we live in a civilised society when the contributions workers make from their sweat and lifelong contribution are rolling around on stock exchanges and financial markets as if they were on roulette tables. What an absolutely crazy way to set out to allegedly provide for workers in their retirement? Rather than going along with that system and taking it as read, which the establishment of the European Union and of this society does, it should be challenged. Instead of questioning the insanity, injustice and immorality of the system, what we have is hedge fund operators - faceless, unaccountable, unelected individuals in banks and boardrooms - gambling with funds. Rather than allowing that to dictate the ability of workers to retire with a decent pension, let us call for and work towards a different kind of system.

During the two years I spent in the European Parliament, I was lectured almost weekly by the President of the Commission and the president of this, that and the other - there are a lot of presidents in the European Union - about what a great zone of democracy it was. This is the same establishment that routinely falls on its face in front of what I call the dictatorship of the financial markets. The Government is no different. It is time we called upon the media, especially publicly-owned media such as RTE, to challenge and question this. Instead of listening to the question "Will this satisfy the markets?" being asked of economists and others on "Morning Ireland" after every new Government cut or attack on workers, we should hear the question "Who are these markets, and who elected them to this pre-eminent, god-like position in our society?" Working people's lives and their ability to retire at a decent age are now dependent on gamblers in the financial system in Europe. This is the debate that should be engaged in. We should not just roll over and accept the status quo, hitting the living standards, pensions and retirement age of workers.

We should consider what could be achieved by our society using technology if it was organised in a different way. Of course we all welcome labour-saving devices; unfortunately, however, many elements of modern technology are used by employers to increase pressure and stress in the working lives of employees. However, released from the strictures of the financial markets, technology could be used to create - with the workers, who are the source of added value - sufficient wealth to allow our people to retire at a reasonable age and in reasonable comfort.

Another point that has not been mentioned by the Minister is the effect, on a human level, of workers being forced to stay in employment until they are 68. Life expectancy is not the same as fitness to work, particularly, as I mentioned earlier, in an arduous job. It is one thing for a Teachta Dála to come in here and work until an advanced age, although I am not saying Teachtaí Dála do not work hard, but it is a different kind of employment. What about a nurse or teacher, not to mention even more strenuous manual jobs? The nurse of the future, according to the Government, will be forced to stay at the coalface for 47 years. What about teachers? Anybody who has stood in a classroom for decades, especially in a difficult area, knows exactly the toll it takes. This is regressive and reactionary through and through. The Government should acknowledge the regressive nature of this provision. I call on the Minister to recognise it for the regressive and reactionary measure it is, from both an economic and a human point of view, and to withdraw it, even at this stage.

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