CPI on right2water

Need to build the widest possible opposition to water charges

Speaking at a meeting of CPI activists after the massive Right2Water street protest on Saturday 11 October, under trade union leadership, against the imposition of water charges, Eoin McDonnell, Dublin District chairperson, CPI, called on more trade unions to join the Right2Water coalition to ensure that the widest opposition is built against this unjust charge on the people.

      We need to build opposition in every community, in every work-place, linking the organised labour movement with communities. This is the only way to prevent it being turned into another beauty contest between contending political groups intent on gaining short-term electoral advantage over each other, as well as to block the divide-and-rule tactics being developed by the Government.

      Eoin McDonnell stated that this campaign can be developed into a broadly based popular struggle not only against this anti-people policy but also to raise the whole question of the odious and unjust bank debt imposed on our people by the European Union and its Irish lackeys.

      Access to water is a basic human right. There is no escaping the clear links between the bank debt and water charges, which can only lead to one conclusion: the privatisation of water, with access based on ability to pay.

      We need to move beyond anger and mobilise a conscious risen people, to build the people’s resistance. A politicised conscious people will not be fooled by short-term political opportunism, nor by the gimmicks of this Government.

      Eoin McDonnell also pointed out that after the next general election the greater Dublin area will be a Labour Party-free zone, with the other two major establishment parties reduced to their bases in the well-heeled suburbs.

      It is clear from the politically orchestrated leaks that they are already attempting to divide and rule, to control the people’s anger. We must build the people’s resistance.