Irish Left Review

EU ‘DoG’ Savages Poor, Say Protesters

Irish Left Review — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:19:48 +0000

Aggressive free market approach disastrous for development, demo warns In Brussels today campaigners warned that the European Union’s free market trade policies are savaging poor people and the environment in developing countries, and have staged an action outside a DG Trade conference in Brussels where senior EU figures were discussing the issue of trade with developing [...]

Death, Social democracy, Greece and the Euro

Michael Youlton — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:33:16 +0000

Irish, English, Scots and Welsh people are so reluctant to talk about death they often fail to tell their families what they want to happen to them when they die, or so a recent survey has found. 60% of people have not written a will, including a quarter of over-65 year olds. And of those [...]

Agent Orange

Justin Frewen — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 19:17:29 +0000

In 1975, the victorious Viet Minh entered Saigon, the capital of the South, following a 30 year struggle against a range of international forces. For the first time, since its occupation by France in the late 19th century, Viet Nam was independent and no longer subject to the dictates of foreign powers. However, while the lengthy [...]

Denying Parental Rights is a Big Mistake

Miriam Cotton — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 17:36:01 +0000

Reproduced by permission of the Irish Examiner. Ashley Balbirnie of the ISPCC is the latest in a line of people, including Jillian Van Turnhout of the Children’s Rights Alliance (CRA) and Fergus Finlay of Barnardos, who are effectively inverting the facts of the history of abuse in Ireland to secure increased power over our children for [...]

Hugh Green | Lost Boys And Girls

donagh — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 01:11:42 +0000

Hugh Green | Lost Boys And Girls Hugh Green’s excellent post on the Boys of St Columb’s documentary makes a couple of points that are worth highlighting. The now famous Northern Irish men featured - Hume, Heaney, Deane, McCann, Coulter etc, were the first generation to benefit from the 1947 British Act of Parliament which granted [...]

Beyond the Classroom - Communities Ep1: Kilbarrack

Irish Left Review — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 19:14:26 +0000

The first of four community stories which together provide an overview of Community Education in Dublin. Part of DCTV’s Beyond the Classroom project produced in partnership with the Aontas Community Education Network and funded by the BAI. These four case studies span the last 30 years and provide an insight into what community education is, how [...]

And the Poor Shall Inherit the Bill

Joanne Spain — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 12:33:29 +0000

Government lies and myths cloud attacks on social welfare Tune into Pat Kenny, Live at 5, or any other formulaic RTÉ current affairs programme these days and chances are you’ll come across a panel of ‘experts’ debating the social welfare dilemma. It’s no coincidence that, two years into a recession, with unemployment and a deficit still [...]

Cutting Public Sector Pay and Jobs - the High Cost of Irrelevance. The Recession Diaries - March 11

Michael Taft — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 00:38:00 +0000

In a previous post we saw that public sector labour costs are below-average by EU-15 standards. The argument that Irish public sector workers are ‘over-paid’ in relation to their European counterparts holds no water whatsoever. However, that doesn’t answer the charge that, regardless of comparative costs, we just have to cut public sector wages because [...]

NAMA: It’s All About What Values You Believe In

donagh — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 00:15:32 +0000

Ireland after NAMA has an interesting blog post which links to Ronan Lyons assumptions about whether those running NAMA have got their assumptions right with regard to the “fall from peak to time-of-tranfer, the yield, and how yields might correct”. The writer goes on to say that “given the drop in land values, the oversupply [...]

When Constantin Went Down the Rabbit Hole

donagh — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 00:10:33 +0000

The TASC open letter published in the Irish Times on Monday is still providing plenty of food for thought. Focusing on the section of the letter that discusses the prospect of ‘restructuring taxation and expenditure in a progressive and expansionary manner’ Michael Taft expands on what this might entail in terms of taxation. The phrase ‘fiscal [...]