Readers Blog: Time to get rid of parties to achieve just society
To favour any vested interest, be it the in-profit hospitality sector, construction, or rental sectors, with special Vat rates, concessions, or tax breaks while the healthcare and homeless waiting lists are fast approaching the incredible one million mark is obscene, insulting to the people, and breaches those multiple articles in our Constitution which include the words ‘the common good’.
This confirms Fine Gael as the most right-wing party since the foundation of the State, closely followed by their like-minded ‘coalition’ partner Fianna Fáil, who, through self-preservation and lack of courage and vision, continue to deny the electorate the opportunity to make some badly needed changes in the governance of this two-tier nation.
Labour, having ensured a bleak future for the party when they went in to prop up that same right-wing party, have well and truly left their core principles far behind when a strong party for the people was never more vital to maintain a healthy balance in government.
The Corrib gas field, with a conservatively estimated one thousand billion cubic feet of natural gas, is now completely under foreign control begging the question:
What of securing Ireland’s future energy requirements? Placing energy resources on this scale into the complete control of foreign companies is nothing short of criminal and you can bet your bottom euro that when the next budget is set, Corrib gas will escape the tax or royalty net despite the crises in health and housing.
The housing and homelessness crises will not improve until the construction industry and rental sector lobbyists are held at arm’s length, if not a moratorium on lobbying.
This Government must cut the rhetoric and get on with securing the land and creating a team to design low-cost, well-built modern housing units using departments already in the employment of the State.
Unfortunately, this approach is not in the DNA of Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil. For too long these parties have kow-towed to vested interests while neglecting health, housing, policing, and justice amongst other vital arms of the State.
With an election not too far away the people must shake off that complacency embedded in the Irish psyche and vote with an opposition coalition in mind to have the strongest possible say in governance.
All of the opposition parties are clear and unambiguous in their convincingly sincere Dáil demands for social justice. A united front is necessary if a just society for all is to be achieved.
