Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)

Is the truth not that the fiscal compact is a treaty for permanent austerity and therefore provides for permanent attacks on the living standards and public services of ordinary Europeans? Is the reality not that the obsession of the Government at the summit was to secure a wording for the austerity treaty that it hoped would avoid a referendum by having the initial German Government demand that austerity be enshrined in every constitution removed?

Why did the Government not use the lead-up to the summit to lay down demands about the disastrous consequences of the bailout of the European financial system on the backs of the Irish people? Why did the Taoiseach grossly undermine demands for getting rid of the Anglo promissory notes madness which will break the State when, in Davos and in front of the world's capitalist and media establishment, he carelessly blamed the Irish people's alleged greed for the financial crash instead of placing the responsibility with the crazed operations of the casino financial markets and their profiteering and speculation? Is it any wonder photographs have appeared in the media around the world today showing President Sarkozy patting the Taoiseach on the head? I noticed in some of the television shots that a number of other prime ministers also patted him on the head as they passed him.

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