Political statement
1 September 2012
The National Executive Committee of the Communist Party
of Ireland at its meeting on 1 September discussed the difficult economic
conditions and the hardship being imposed by the ruling class as they attempt
to make the people pay for the deepening crisis of the system.
The trade
union movement in the South has shown little energy or political drive in
resisting both the commercialisation of services and the privatisation of
public companies, still fixated, as it is, on the belief that the system is
recoverable and, with the Labour Party in government, that they can have some
say—through “social partnership” by the back door—in government policy and
decision-making or in ameliorating the worst aspects of Blueshirt policies.
The statement
by the minister for health, James Reilly, that the wages of workers employed in
the health service and under the Croke Park Agreement must now be cut in order
to make greater savings in the health service is a clear challenge to the trade
union movement, which will not be stopped by the flawed hope that the Labour
Party will protect workers’ interests at the government table. Experience has
shown that the Labour Party will wring its hands in righteous indignation but
carry on cutting services. Reilly's comments are just the opening shots in what
will clearly be renewed attacks from this coalition government.
The discussion
now under way within the ICTU in regard to the commission on the future of the
trade union movement will only be relevant to or have any meaning for the tens
of thousands of organised workers if it honestly looks at the effect that the
dead hand of class collaboration has had on the movement. The debate about the
future of the trade union movement cannot be confined to the top echelons but
must engage with the grass roots of the movement. The problems facing our
labour movement are not solely structural but are, at their very roots,
political. To continue with the same approach and political ideas and values of
the past and expect a different result is the road to oblivion. The workers’
movement needs to become more radical in its defence of workers’ interests or
it will become redundant for the future of Irish workers.
Without a
rejuvenated and revitalised trade union movement, broken free of the dead hand
of social democracy, resistance will be scattered and ineffective.
The crisis of
the system continues to affect the daily lives of all working people, north and
south. Our people are experiencing almost daily announcements of company
closures, cuts in spending on education, and the closing of wards and beds in
hospitals. Community resources are slashed. The “Programme for Ireland” imposed
by the external troika and eagerly implemented by the internal troika is laying
waste the economic and social development that took decades of struggle by
working people to build.
The system
continues to make the people pay for this crisis, which is merely the current
phase of the general crisis of capitalism as an economic system. It now has all
the hallmarks of a crisis that can only get deeper as the major global
capitalist economies slip back further into recession and depression without a
discernible period of development in between.
Workers, not
only in Ireland but throughout the European Union, are experiencing an outright
assault on their rights and working conditions, but they have not yet realised
that the post-war settlement has been ruled null and void by monopoly
capitalism.
The recent
declaration from the European Union that lays out the path for the Republic to
follow in the forthcoming budget and future budgets confirms its reactionary
nature and its role as guardian of the interests of European monopoly
capitalism. It has called for deeper cuts in social welfare and pensions; in
particular, it has singled out unemployment benefit, especially for the long-term
unemployed, and reinforces the priority given to debt repayment
The British
government’s policies are directed at a similar approach, which will also have
a significant impact on working people in Northern Ireland. This will further
expose the dependence relationship and show where real power lies. This can
provide opportunities for continuing to challenge the political ideology that
only adds to and reinforces this dependence and marginalisation, which the
people of Northern Ireland experience daily from the centres of power that
wreak havoc on their families and their communities.
The continued
use of repression and preventive detention must be condemned and rejected as a
return to old, failed methods of control. The release of Marian Price and
others who are subject to preventive detention should take place now.
Nor is a
continuation or a return to armed violence by small groups a solution to the
people’s problems. This also is a return to a failed strategy, one that will
inevitably lead to further suffering, imprisonment, death and destruction as
well as to its manipulation by the forces of the state and imperialism to serve
their ends. In the South the government continues to follow the failed
strategies imposed by its predecessor, under directions from the EU-ECB-IMF
troika, giving priority to the repayment of debt over economic and social
development. The commercialisation of public services and the privatisation of
public companies continues apace. The government is now stepping up the push to
privatise more state companies, which will be bought up by foreign capital
interests, further tightening their grip on the country and the dependence
relationship that flows from that intervention. The greater part of the capital
deriving from the sale of these people’s assets will go to pay off debt.
The CPI reaffirms
its belief that there are no solutions to the people’s problems within the
system of capitalism. The need to build the people’s resistance grows daily.
The essential elements of that resistance must be:
(1)
repudiation of the socialised corporate debt;
(2) active and
public opposition to the privatisation of public companies;
(3) opposition
to the commercialisation of public services;
(4) public
ownership of all natural resources;
(5) the
development of an all-Ireland economic and social strategy.
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