Roll up! Roll up! On offer today we have for you all your needs, wants, and desires, neatly wrapped in this leaflet, which explains all our plans for you, our most valued citizen!
Let all your worries fade away as we promise you, the early risers, the sun, moon, and stars.
Friends, do not look back and dwell on the past: face forward, listen to what we have on offer for you today, as we continue to grow in our resolute belief that our country is the best little country in the world to do your business in!
For too long our job in running this country has been shackled and constrained by having to provide and pay for public services and other provisions that distract us from our real job of opening up the economy for the glorious entrepreneurs who are so eager to take on those industries.
Our freedom to govern as we want has been denied, the freedom of our entrepreneurs to excel has been constricted, the freedom of our international partners to invest has been limited. If we can’t offer these captains of industry the freedom that they cry out for, what type of democracy have we got?
Yes, we have overseen the worst housing crisis in the history of the country, and, yes, there are more than 10,000 people homeless, close to 4,000 of them children; but we say to you today, we will build those hotels!
We will also make public land freely available for investment funds and construction companies to build those houses for the trendy city-dweller, who would love nothing more than to live the “Friends” life, with their shared facilities. Or those families, eager for the country air: we have developers ready to build more housing estates on huge barren lands. Go on, just take that long, scenic commuter-belt drive to see what life you are missing.
You may say to us, What about the record half million people and more on hospital waiting-lists, which have been increasing year after year. We say to you: Exactly! That is exactly what you get with a public health service! So our goal, for your benefit, is to slash that cash—your hard-earned tax money—on a failing public health service and channel those much-needed subsidies to the private hospitals that see your ill-health as the key to their success. They want to take your sickness and turn it into their profits. It’s a no-brainer. They’ll make it so comfortable for you that you won’t want to get better!
Have we had to make cuts in a wide range of regional and community schemes, education budgets, council budgets, welfare budgets, to sell off, give away and privatise public lands, services, and utilities? We hold our hands up honestly and admit we have; but in our defence it was only because we actually have no say in the matter.
We had to bail out the European banking system by taking on 46 per cent of EU-wide banking debt. We were ordered to! So, yes, we do have to compensate, and will compensate, the wealthiest bankers, investors and industrialists here at home, in Europe and the United States for generations to come; because we’d rather have the Troika dictate policy from abroad than have it visible in the country.
However, we see this as an opportunity, as now they are fully invested in the country, and they want in on what we are giving away!
If you haven’t been convinced of what we have to offer, then we have three words for you: G! D! P! You see, we are all about growth—growth in flexible jobs, growth in consumption, growth in production, growth in foreign direct investment. We need a modern work force, available to work many jobs, any hours, at any time, for any amount of pay available.
Our industrial policy is the commonsense approach. Make our economy as attractive as possible to those who want to invest, so we don’t have to!
Don’t want to pay tax? No problem! Want to write off your expenses? Easy! Want to take control and ownership of our water, health, education, transport, postal, energy and emergency services? Done, and done. We will follow those EU rules to the letter. After all, it’s the law now!
So, let us all party once more, and ask not what your country can do for you but what foreign direct investment can do for your country!
Look at how successful we are, boasting number 5 in the world for number of billionaires. Without us, and those pursuing and implementing these policies, they wouldn’t be here. Don’t worry about Fianna Fáil or Labour saying or repeating more or less the same thing: remember, we are the safe pair of hands!
Don’t be taken in by the illusions of Sinn Féin, Social Democrats, Richie Boy Barrett, et al., proposing a fairer, better society, a fairer, better capitalism. Their answer to all the problems more or less boils down to taxing the rich and the transnational corporations, to get a fairer share of the wealth created. A noble gesture indeed, but ultimately a fruitless endeavour.
Folks, we are realists, and it’s the capitalists with their FDI and TNCs, EU treaties and laws, that are the bedrock of the Irish economy. They fuel our growth on the basis of our implementing the said policies, following their rules, and abiding by their laws. By interfering or meddling in their business, the next government risks being the next SYRIZA, leaving you and the whole country in a worse state!
Do these people think they can just step in and make these demands? It’s the equivalent of poking a tiger with a sharp stick and expecting it to dance. They would be laughed out and then eaten alive in Europe and in the boardrooms. We know these guys; we’ve worked with them, and they trust us to have their interests taken care of.
So beware of false promises; as was said of us, they are writing cheques that their party can’t cash! It is we who should be grateful that they supply us with so many flexible jobs for the modern family! Undermining them would undermine our whole economy and send us spiralling into another economic crisis. Don’t think for one second that any alternative party could implement their programmes; not in this system they won’t!
So we say to you, the good people of Ireland: Trust us to bring you forward into this decade, where we will ensure that our whole economy is run efficiently by the private market, where we can be left with administering the rule of corporate law given to us by our partners in Europe. We say: No more failing public services, only profitable companies! Let us help grow our transnational industries and financial services by making it as cheap as possible to set up here! Let us get that number 1 spot for billionaires! Let us be good Europeans and pay back all their debts! Let us open our democratic arms and welcome foreign capital—but restrict foreign nationals! We will win, and once we have all these other things in order we can then worry about the climate emergency, and our individual behaviour that has caused it.
That is our promise to you!
