Partisan • Patriotic • Internationalist
A route to privatisation?
As pointed out in Socialist Voice in August 2018, Bus Connects appears to have a much higher frequency from the suburbs into the city centre; but in fact the frequency is often reduced, or citizens…
A militant trade union campaign launched A WELL ATTENDED meeting organised by Unite in the Community, in conjunction with Communities Against Low Pay, was held in Dublin recently.
DAN TARAGHAN: THE BUDGET for next year was presented to the Dáil on 8 October. In his speech the minister for finance, Paschal Donohoe, made much of the threat from a no-deal Brexit. This would have dire consequences for Ireland, as Britain is our main trading partner in the EU.
THE CONSTANT NARRATIVE in the Brexit debate, be it in Ireland or Britain, from politicians, especially those elected who are supposedly of a progressive slant, is how they are opposed to Brexit because “the EU protects workers’ rights.” These views are also expressed by leading figures in the NGO sector.
NOT THAT IT should come as a surprise, but the political establishment, north and south, is offering us still further evidence of its mendacious venality. A few recent examples will illustrate the point. Let’s begin with shady behaviour being practised by the folk in Leinster House.
THE “BRITISH REBATE” is known: the reduction in British contributions to the EU budget that Margaret Thatcher pushed through in 1984. She pointed out at the time that a large part of the EU funds had gone into agriculture, and that the United Kingdom had a comparatively small
HARRY HOUDINI, probably the world’s most famous illusionist, when performing his acts would mesmerise his audience with feats that defied all logic or reason. He would make the impossible possible. Audiences would be left speechless at his escape routines, and he toured the world displaying his death-defying acts.
“The gift that keeps on giving” reported on the closure of Clery’s department store in Dublin in June 2015 with the loss of 130 jobs and about 300 operators of franchises. The background is as follows. Gordon Brothers had bought the store in 2012 when it had bank debt of €20 million. They got a write-down on the debt to €12 million. The company was also…
A NUMBER OF misconceptions are perpetuated when it comes to the dismantling of the inner-German border as the first step to the annexation of the German Democratic Republic by the Federal Republic of Germany. It has been deceptively described as a “peaceful revolution.” True, the GDR state did not oppress the protesters, and it carried out one of the demands, which was to open the border between East and West. However, the West German state began to campaign aggressively
LAST MONTH a talk was given in Berlin and other European cities by Grassroots Al-Quds, a Palestinian group that is organising civil-society resistance to Israeli occupation. It aims to build an economic base within East Jerusalem to try to liberate occupied Palestinians from their dependence on NGOs and settler-colonialism.
SINCE THE 1970s the mainstream media, led by the Irish Times, have been using the term “island of Ireland,” and such variations as “this island,” when they need to refer to the whole of Ireland.
DESPITE A last-ditch attempt by unionist parties to reconvene the Assembly at Stormont in order to stop abortion law changes in Northern Ireland, the long-awaited legislation came into effect at midnight on 21 October
RECENT RESEARCH on the profits declared in Ireland, and the subsequent taxes paid on those profits, should surprise no-one. It has exposed the fact that American transnational corporations made $83 billion (€74 billion) in profits here
Veterans for Peace: Let them home for Christmas!
Sebastian Patrick Stroie (2002–2019)
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Two bastions of unionist domination of employment in the North, Harland and Wolff and Wrightbus, are threatened with closure. The demise of the shipyard is a direct result of the geopolitical struggle to control the price of oil, in which the present owners, Dolphin Drilling, have been heavily exposed. Workers […]
When the latest phase of the global crisis of capitalism manifested itself through the financial markets in 2007–09, the “Celtic Tiger” collapsed. The Irish establishment, under direct pressure from the European Union, took responsibility for 42 per cent of the total of European banking debt. We bailed out German, French […]
Monagear, Co. Wexford7 September 2019Address by Gearóid Ó Machail, Peadar O’Donnell Socialist Republican Forum A chomrádaithe, I dtús báire, ba mhaith liom buíochas a gabháil le Cumann Pheadair Uí Dhálaigh as an chuireadh labhairt libh anseo i Móin na gCaor, Contae Loch Garman, inniu mar ionadaí d’Fhóram Pheadair Uí Dhónaill […]
The National Executive Committee of the Communist Party of Ireland at its regular meeting in late September discussed and evaluated both the national and the international situation. There are growing signs of a deepening global economic slowdown. The system may be facing into a new recession, with a combination of […]
Thanks, capitalism. You started off all right and all, but I’m afraid you have to leave! You’ve eaten, binned or hidden all the food, you’ve drunk all the drink or poured it down the sink, you’ve blocked all the toilets and used up all the paper. You’ve left the taps […]
Supermarkets are steadily installing more and more self-service check-outs (and even boasting about it), at the same time getting rid of workers, or at least not replacing those who leave. In some branches an assistant is given the job of collaring shoppers in the queue for the check-out and persuading […]
The party of law and order “Mussolini—incomparably the greatest of living statesmen …”—Desmond Fitzgerald TD, Irish Independent, 8 July 1927 On the Wearing of Uniform Bill (intended to ban the paramilitary uniform of the Blueshirts, passed in March 1934 but defeated in the Seanad): “… the Blackshirts were victorious in […]
Following the Bolsonaro regime’s fascist assault on the Amazon, Macron and his loyal mimic Varadkar had to look like they were being tough on the Brazilian strongman. The mechanism they chose to use to show their new-found environmental conscience was to threaten to withhold the Mercosur trade deal unless it […]
On the night of the census in 2016 there were 429 homeless students in Ireland, making up over 8 per cent of the total homeless numbers. When the Government’s student accommodation strategy was launched in July 2017 there was an excess demand in purpose-built student accommodation (PBSA) of over 23,000 […]
The November 2015 issue of Socialist Voice reported on the closure of Clery’s department store in Dublin in June 2015 with the loss of 130 jobs and about 300 operators of franchises. The background is as follows. Gordon Brothers had bought the store in 2012, when it had bank debt […]
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn was one of the greatest Enlightenment painters. He died 350 years ago this month at the age of sixty-three. In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries the Flemish cloth trade had developed into the strongest competitor of Florentine cloth-makers and traders, giving rise to a growing Dutch […]
After the victory of the right wing in the elections of 1990, the Sandinistas began a period of what they called “governing from below.” The new neo-liberal government increased the already massive foreign debt, cut wages, privatised industries, and slashed funds for health and education. In 2003 the former president […]
