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

It is a fact. The problem is that if we do not recognise what people are feeling, they will look for nastier alternatives. If we state clearly, however, that the problems of inequality, poverty, deprivation and the growing gap between rich and poor need to be addressed and if we identify what policies created these problems in the first place, we can win over the allegiance of people who are alienated and disenfranchised and who, in desperation, look to far right forces.

Only 33% of the people who voted for the Alternative für Deutschland - the Nazis - said they supported AFD policies, with 66% stating their vote was a kick against the establishment. Why did these voters want to kick against the establishment? Was it because the establishment is serving their interests so well or was it because it is letting them down badly while pretending everything is fine and Germany is a rock of stability and sense? It is not the case that people are stirred up by populists, as the German Government would suggest, but that they are experiencing real problems of alienation, anger, deprivation and high levels of unemployment. Unless we recognise that Europe has failed to deal with these problems, the frightening growth of far right, nationalist and, God help us, openly neo-Nazi forces will continue.

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