Fine Gael turns Sharp Right - Party Meeting Rages Against Unemployed and Single Mothers

[C. Flower]

For anyone who thinks that Fine Gael Labour is some kind of liberal and more effective alternative to Fine Fail, this is a timely reminder of the Blue Shirt history and base of the party. Labour should drag its sorry ass out of this relationship and leave now, as no one is going to be convinced by phony acting out of opposition to wage and social welfare cuts. Of course, they will not.

http://www.independent.ie/opinion/co...s-2672697.html

THE dependency culture of "deadbeat dads" who father children and then expect the social welfare system to support them has been attacked by Fine Gael backbenchers as frustrated elements of the party move sharply to the right...

A new, tough approach to social welfare entitlements is gaining ground within Fine Gael with many backbenchers saying action is required now -- and not just in the area of stamping out fraud, which has been the main policy of the Minister for Social Protection so far.

In 2005, when the economy was booming, sickness payouts amounted to €540m. Last year illness benefits cost the taxpayer €943m.

A recent Fine Gael party meeting heard a number of radical proposals to fundamentally change the social welfare system.

The proposals included a call from one Dublin TD for "a cap on the amount of social welfare funding any one house or family can receive''...

One proposed solution to this issue, which was warmly received, was to limit payments to single mothers to two children and that any further children would not be the State's responsibility.

A number of TDs complained about a new "culture of entitlement'' among claimants. One TD noted that "in the past constituents would have asked: 'What are my entitlements?' Now they march into the office with a list of them and tell me to get them sorted".

Afterwards one senior party figure expressed reservations about the strident right-wing tone of the meeting.

He said: "It was astonishing stuff in there, the mood would not have been out of place at a convention of the Tea Party movement in America. There's a lot of young and not-so-young Turks in here. Poor Frances Fitzgerald (the liberal Minister for Children and Youth Affairs) was nearly crying and the jaws of a few more dropped too.

"These fellows won't be dictated to by Labour."

One of the strongest speeches was made by Ms Mulherin, who warned against a "culture of entitlement'' where people believe "if you are not working you are entitled to the same lifestyle as those who are employed".

Ms Mulherin also claimed that the newly unemployed were "finding themselves being lost and abused" when they enter the social welfare system. .

Ms Mulherin also said that to create a new ethos of citizenship "all young men and not just the unemployed should have a year of military service''.

It is believed an increasingly "agitated" top table attempted to calm the situation by suggesting that the current Social Protection Minister Joan Burton be brought along to address the party. This, however, received a cool response from TDs.

Labour backbenchers were reluctant to comment on the apparent shift to the right on social welfare policy by a number of Fine Gael TDs.

That reticence may have been influenced by a leadership crackdown on perceived indiscipline in Labour's ranks. Concern was in particular expressed by the Tanaiste Eamon Gilmore, who sardonically thanked the party's TDs for their speed in ensuring the minutes of its meetings were available in the printed media so swiftly.

It was, however, also made clear to the erring representatives that the leadership would have difficulties "saying anything at party meetings" if a verbatim transcript of sensitive issues continue to appear in the newspapers the following day.

Not a word about the devastation to peoples' lives from the economic crash, and about "New Era" and the jobs plan - instead, scapegoating of single parents, the sick and unemployed people.

Many battles ahead.

Meanwhile, Eamon Gilmore is in Tanzania chatting to Hilary Clinton ...

[barrym]

Agreed on the assumptions (or lack of them) nobody with a titter of with would see FG as liberal, we didn't have a choice in the last GE, after all voting Lab is still considered by many as an anti- Catholic vote....

However, it is the Indo, interesting thread over on the other politics board on the irony of their ceaseless slagging of the gov.

Inda will calm some of it down, the (Lab) Minsiter of austerity will find a fudge. The result? the answer lies in my recent post on European Economy.....take yerr pick, The Deutsche Bank's view or Michael Noonan's ? Wasn't it Gilmore who said Frankfurt's way??

[Griska]

limit payments to single mothers to two children and that any further children would not be the State's responsibility.

Frances needs to get her finger out and put the referendum on children's rights to the people.
That aside, though, it's plain there are people in government who advocate the state abdicating regarding it's role in providing for the vulnerable.
"You should work to pay for your kids so we're gonna let them starve to encourage you back to work"

[Justin Casey]

The Republic... declares its resolve to pursue the happiness and prosperity of the whole nation and all of its parts, cherishing all of the children of the nation equally and oblivious of the differences carefully fostered by an alien government.

limit payments to single mothers to two children and that any further children would not be the State's responsibility

"In June 1933, five months after Hitler came to power, his Minister of the Interior, Wilhelm Frick, gave a programmatic and frequently quoted speech on "population and race policy"... Frick unrolled a "dismal picture". He pointed to the "cultural and ethical decline" demonstrated by over a million people with "hereditary physical and mental diseases", "feeble-minded and inferior" people from whom "progeny is no longer desired" especially where they show "above-average procreation". He went on to estimate that 20 per cent of the German population, i.e. another 11 million, were undesirable as mothers or fathers. He concluded that "in order to increase the number of hereditarily healthy progeny, we have first of all the duty to prevent the procreation of the hereditarily unfit". This project of state-run birth control became law on 14 July 1933, introducing compulsory sterilization"
Nazism and German society, 1933-1945 by David F. Crew



A recent Fine Gael cumann engaged in historical re-enactment

[Sam Lord]

Ms Mulherin also said that to create a new ethos of citizenship "all young men and not just the unemployed should have a year of military service''.

That should give a big boost to government expenditure. The ECB will be delighted.

Or is she proposing not to pay them? A year in the army unpaid for all young men, That will go a long way way to creating "a new ethos of citizenship".

And what about youg women? Are they already imbued with this "new ethos of citizenship?"

[bormotello]

Fine Gael are populists and they see that public opinion turned against professional welfare recipients
From article referenced in OP, but some reason missed in quote

New Fine Gael TD Michelle Mulherin, who stressed she was speaking in a personal capacity, wants to introduce national military service for all young men.

She warned against the unrealistic "culture of entitlement'' where people believe "if you are not working you are entitled to the same lifestyle as those who are employed".

i.e. FG wants to make professional parasitism unprofitable

[Griska]

Fine Gael are populists and they see that public opinion turned against professional welfare recipients
From article referenced in OP, but some reason missed in quote

i.e. FG wants to make professional parasitism unprofitable

Well, I'm unaware of many workers who are living lavish lifestyles at the moment.

Presumably they want to make living on welfare impossible and humiliating.

[bormotello]

Well, I'm unaware of many workers who are living lavish lifestyles at the moment.

Presumably they want to make living on welfare impossible and humiliating.

Workers and professional welfare recipients are completely different things and only left wingers don't want to see difference between them
You are correct that majority workers are not living "lavish lifestyles at the moment", and very soon after tax increases living on wage will become "impossible and humiliating" while "most vulnerable members of society" will continue to enjoy from their "culture of entitlement''

[Sam Lord]

Workers and professional welfare recipients are completely different things and only left wingers don't want to see difference between them
You are correct that majority workers are not living "lavish lifestyles at the moment", and very soon after tax increases living on wage will become "impossible and humiliating" while "most vulnerable members of society" will continue to enjoy from their "culture of entitlement''

How can you talk about professional welfare recipients when there are no jobs in Ireland today?

[bormotello]

How can you talk about professional welfare recipients when there are no jobs in Ireland today?

There are no well paid jobs for low qualified workforce and never will be

[Holly]

The middle class and those most privileged in Irish society are disproportionately represented in the Finne Gael party. It is no surprise that it is jam-packed with reactionary right-wing ideology.
It is to the mockery of working class voters and those who are socialists that Labour has gone into coalition with them as a junior partner.

[Stephanie]

These kind of articles put huge fear into my. I am *shock horror* a single mother on benefits! I am raise 3 kids (with some financial and physical help from their father). However for the most part I am solely reliant on benefits since 2009.

Before that I had a good job and was totally self sufficient, I paid taxes on all my earnings and spendings. I also employed a child minder and a cleaner so was contributing to other families.

So articles like these make me sick. The time to put in social welfare cuts was when the country had almost full employment. Not now when there are so many unemployed and reliant on trying hard to stretch any monies that they receive from welfare.

[antiestablishmentarian]

It's typical right-wing agitprop, blame the unemployed for unemployment. We've heard this alot since the crisis began, nothing about criminal bankers or the crash being an inevitable result of capitalism's boom-bust cycle, no the 'dolers' as we're called are to blame for everything.

[bormotello]

It's typical right-wing agitprop, blame the unemployed for unemployment. We've heard this alot since the crisis began, nothing about criminal bankers or the crash being an inevitable result of capitalism's boom-bust cycle, no the 'dolers' as we're called are to blame for everything.

So why unemployed didn't protest against bankers?
Beer festival as 12-09-09 in Phoenix park attracted more of them then anti-NAMA protest in city center

[antiestablishmentarian]

So why unemployed didn't protest against bankers?
Beer festival as 12-09-09 in Phoenix park attracted more of them then anti-NAMA protest in city center

I would say they felt powerless to change anything by protesting. Interesting to hear that there were more of 'them' at the beer festival in Phoenix Park, where did you find the survey that proved more unemployed were there absolutely or as a percentage of the crowd?