Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

First, I would like to express my deepest appreciation to the people of Dublin South-West who voted for the Anti-Austerity Alliance and sent me into the Dáil to deliver their message.

The great socialist and trade unionist Jim Larkin said, "The great appear great because we are on our knees. Let us rise." On Saturday, workers, unemployed people, pensioners and young people did just that. They rose in their hundreds of thousands, flooding onto the streets of Dublin with a demand to scrap water charges. They did the same with the same message the day before at the ballot box. They rose because many people simply cannot afford to pay €500 plus per year for an average family, because they have had enough of austerity in order to pay the bondholders and because they know that this is a prelude to privatisation. They rose because they are fed up with six years of non-stop austerity and they rose because, despite the talk about recovery, they are not feeling it. The recovery exists for the rich and the super-rich, while working-class people face a horrific crisis of homelessness, JobBridge, Gateway, low wages and worsening public services. Having risen, to them the great do not appear so great anymore.

The cynical, panic-driven concessions offered by this Government today will not quell the revolt on the water charges. The crumbs of tax relief will not affect the 800,000 people so low-paid that they would not be able to avail of it - 40% of the workforce. People understand well that today's concessions will be taken back tomorrow given half a chance. The Government is now decisively on the back foot on this issue and can be beaten by a mass movement. That is the message that will go out to people right across the country. Today, under the banner of the end of an era of budgetary austerity, the austerity unfortunately continues, because the savage €30 billion worth of extra cuts and taxes imposed by this Government and the previous one over the past six years remain, and the vast majority recur this year and represent continuing attacks on ordinary people. Despite all the repetitive talk about maintaining the progressive nature of our taxation system, the reality is that the taxation changes, in terms of the reduction in the highest rate of income tax and the changing of bands, will benefit a relatively small minority of income tax payers. A section of higher earners will benefit from this budget. For most, anything given today with one hand will be more than taken back with the other in the form of the water charges.

The other group that continues to see the recovery is the bondholders. We have a primary surplus. Next year, the State will take in more in tax revenue than it spends in public services, but the austerity continues. Why? Because for every €5 taken in tax next year, €1 will go to pay the bondholders.

The response to the housing crisis is completely inadequate. There are almost 100,000 people on housing waiting lists, 8,000 of which are on the South Dublin County Council list. With six people being made homeless every day, the Government is talking about 10,000 homes by the end of 2018. In the 1970s, almost that many would have been built in a single year. For €7 billion, the Government is choosing to pay down the principal on the debt this year to the tune of €7 billion. That could have built 40,000 homes and created 70,000 jobs. It could go a serious way towards tackling the housing crisis instead of just pretending to do something about it.

Having risen, people should not kneel down again. They should mobilise for the nationwide protests organised by Right2Water on 1 November. They should build effective mass protests to prevent metering in the estates. People should join the We Won't Pay campaign and prepare for a huge country-wide boycott of these charges from January. If people refuse to pay, refuse to be bullied and stand together, we can beat these charges. In fighting these charges, we can build the most powerful movement from below seen in this State in decades. Such a movement can not only challenge the water charges but can demand massive investment in the building of homes for those who need it and in real, decent job creation. It could challenge the rule of bankers, bondholders and big business.

The hapless Labour Party is being fatally undermined for its collaboration in rescuing capitalism on the backs of working-class people. Any other grouping, be they Independents or Sinn Féin, that takes a similar road will face the same fate. We need a challenge to this rotten system and to fight for radical and socialist change that can deliver sustainable economic and social recovery for the majority. I encourage people outside this Chamber to join the Anti-Austerity Alliance and help build a new mass political force in this country to represent working-class people, who are the vast majority in society, based on the ideas, struggles and tradition of James Connolly and Jim Larkin.

See this speech in context