“A great many thorny issues are at play, among them how the Government might safeguard the pension entitlements of private sector employees in defined benefit schemes (with particular reference to the SR Technics case) and protect from repossession people who fall into arrears with their mortgages.

 A proposal that has achieved a fair amount of traction is the Ictu/ Ibec one – that the Government introduce a major job subsidy scheme at a cost of €1 billion. This has elicited some sympathy from the official side”.Jim O’Leary: Irish Times 19/6/09

The point here is that social partnership is one thing in a boom and something utterly different is a slump. In fact with 400,000 on the live register and a 24% fall in tax revenue the bosses and the government are going to be very reluctant to commit to anything. The situation is going to get worse too, as the Fianna Fáil and the Greens start to sharpen their knives to attack the public sector.

How far the crisis is foisted directly on the public sector workers and how much it is aimed at attacking the unemployed, the old and the sick is open to debate. That debate takes place under the guise of ‘public sector reform’, reform that is of the Newspeak variety. Reform means counter reform, over the water in Britain, Blair championed this type of reform, the continuation of Thatcherism by other means.

“It is possible that Ireland’s severe fiscal crisis will be resolved without cutting public sector basic rates of pay and pensions if the economic environment develops as expected over the next few years, albeit at a cost in terms of cuts in the social welfare budget, cuts in capital spending and/or increases in tax greater than would otherwise be necessary – a cost that a great many people may not regard as acceptable.

“Moreover, the economic and financial background may pan out along worse-than-expected lines: economic activity may remain depressed and/or borrowing costs may remain higher for longer than is commonly supposed, with obvious implications for the scale of fiscal adjustment required.

“Faced with such risks, the last thing a government should be contemplating is handcuffing itself on pay and pensions.”  Jim O’Leary: Irish Times 19/6/09

Whichever path that Cowen and Lenihan adopt, workers and their families will be the ones to suffer. Meanwhile, Labour leader Eamon Gilmore has condemned union “recalcitrance” on public sector reform at the IMPACT conference. Labour have a clear choice to make; stand up for working class people and work to defeat Cowen’s programme, or play second fiddle in a Fine Gael led coalition after the next general election. The county council and Euro elections showed a shift to the left among workers, especially in the Dublin area. With a clear socialist programme Labour could continue to make gains. Instead we see the shenanigans of a FF/Labour/SF coalition being formed in Donegal county council. Irish workers deserve better than that.

While many of the trade union leaders and the Labour leaders will continue to strive to find some sort of common ground with the bosses in this crisis, many active trade unionists, Labour Party members and Labour Youth members understand the reality of the situation. They are the people who will begin to look for a political and industrial solution to the current crisis. The trade unions and even the Irish Labour Party will be transformed again and again over time. The genuine ideas of Marxism will begin to play a role in that process.

The demise of the Celtic Tiger illustrates the madness and the limits of capitalism. Only nationalisation of the banks and the major industries under democratic workers’ control and management can ultimately break the bosses’ power. Only a democratically drawn up socialist plan for the economy can permanently transform the Island of Ireland economically and socially.

•     Make the bosses pay
•   No wage or job cuts
•   No coalitions with FF and FG; the bosses parties
•   For a socialist programme for Labour.