Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)

Will the Taoiseach admit that the Croke Park agreement is nothing more than a cover for crudely cutting thousands of jobs in the public sector despite an OECD report which shows the Irish public sector to be far more modest than those in many more successful countries in Europe? The end result is now being felt in the drastic cuts being proposed in education, in terms of schools, the health services and so on.

Can we have the truth rather than fine words about values which do not mean anything in the face of what has happened here? At the conference of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions the Taoiseach promised more privatisation and cuts. Yet, apparently some congress leaders are hankering after partnership again.

Why should ordinary workers be fooled again when for 20 years partnership was used as a cover under which bankers and developers profiteered outrageously on the backs of ordinary people, but when the crisis blew up the trade union leaders were unceremoniously kicked out in the rain by the Taoiseach's predecessor? The price of that criminal greed was placed entirely on the shoulders of working people. That is the net result of partnership. Why should workers have any illusions about this fraudulent process, given the circumstances in which we find ourselves?

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