Workers Solidarity Movement

Young Fine Gael just can't get away from their Blueshirt roots. Trinity College YFG vice-chair, Thomas Broe, has called for everyone between the ages 18-25 who has been unemployed for a year to be conscripted into the army.

When Brian Lenihan announced his budget last October, two of the measures in particular were met with howls of outrage and his government was forced to back down post haste. The first of these - and the one most people remember because of the dramatic pictures of the Age Action meeting in Westland Row church where Minister of State John Moloney was booed off the stage – was the attempt to take away the automatic entitlement of over-70s to medical cards.

A bully is strolling across a schoolyard in Clara. He steals from, humiliates and hits the other kids. Whatever you decide is the best way to deal with him, there is one thing you probably won’t do. You won’t sit down with him over tea and biscuits and try to hammer out an agreement about how to convince everyone else that bullying is inevitable and might even be good for them.

The Visteon occupations show that we are far from apathetic when it comes to defending our jobs, wages and standard of living. Workers began occupying the Finaghy plant on March 31st, after administrators announced the loss of around 600 jobs at Visteon/Ford plants at Belfast, Basildon and Enfield in England. Davy McMurray, from the Unite trade union, said the way the job cuts were announced was "brutal." Workers were given six minutes notice of their sackings, being treated like mere commodities to be bought and sold, then discarded by our bosses when necessary.

If waged employees today do practically all real work, then the capitalist has no role other than collecting dividends, living the high life, and gambling on the Stock Exchange. The big banks, all of which are now kept afloat with our tax money, and most of which are now majority state-owned, are still paying massive “bonuses” to their top people.

March - April 2009 Edition of the Workers Solidarity freesheet.

The recent publishing of the report by the Consultative Group on the Past demonstrates the simmering sectarian tensions and hostility beneath the surface. 

The 190 page report by the group, chaired by ex-Church of Ireland primate Lord Eames and former Policing Board vice chairman Dennis Bradley marked 18 months of consultation with victim groups and others that have been bereaved through the conflict.



The national strike called by ICTU should be just the first day of action in what must become a strike wave across every sector until all pay cuts are withdrawn. The super-rich can shoulder the costs of their crisis themselves.The bosses have spent months using the media to try and divide one set of workers form another and to set those still in jobs against the unemployed. They know that divided we are weak. March 30th is the moment we can throw that back in their face, a huge demonstration of class unity that can force them to back down or face the consequences.

Private, fee-paying schools for the wealthy received more than €100 million from the 26 county taxpayer last year. €99 million was spent on paying teachers’ salaries, and a further €2.1 million on building works in 17 fee-paying schools in 2008. Blackrock College in Dublin tops the list, receiving €3.9 million. Other schools receiving more than €3 million in annual support include Kilkenny College (€3.5 million), St Andrew’s College (€3.4 million), Belvedere College (€3.3 million) and Wesley College (€3.1 million). Most of the schools in receipt of this free taxpayers’ cash charge fees of about €5,000 per year.

“People who got mortgages they can’t afford to pay back were greedy and foolish and should suffer the consequences…They signed a free contract, they’re adults and they have to take responsibility for their actions”. This is the kind of thing that gets thrown around a lot in recessions. It conveniently ignores a few things.