Workers Solidarity Movement

Labour minister Joan Burtons proposed dole are cuts designed to force people into low wage jobs.  Wages are under attack in the lowest paid sections of the economy with the active support of the government, as a result people are far less inclined to take up employment in these areas.  To resolve this the government wish to compel people to take up these jobs by threatening their social welfare payments.  This is the strategy that was developed and enforced by Maggie Thatchers rightwing government in Britain in the eighties.

The government is working with the representatives of the capitalist class IBEC, ISME etc to drive down wages for workers and create a low wage economy. So when Minister Joan Burton suggested that people were on welfare as a "lifestyle choice" this is where she was coming from.

The Irish National Organisation for the Unemployed (INOU) said it disagreed with Ms Burton's description of people making lifestyle choices and said it was a lack of choice which had led so many people to sign on.

There are currently 440,000 people signing on in the Republic, in the last few weeks the government announced cuts in fuel allowance for welfare recipients, meaning some people will have to chose between food and heat this Winter.  The latest threat is again directed at this vunerable section of society.

WORDS: James McBarron