Workers Solidarity Movement

Free Education for Everyone (FEE) has begun a peaceful protest at Anglo Irish Bank on Forster street, Galway, calling for an immediate General Election. FEE places the blame for Ireland’s current economic situation directly on the Fianna Fail politicians, who refused to regulate the financial system, and on the bankers, who took advantage of the lack of regulation to gamble on the markets. Once those bets fell through the Irish people were threatened: that failing to bail out the bankers would result in national ruin.

The bail out failed, yet now our government is taking on further debt to continue the bail out.We demand a general election before the budget. The recently announced austerity package attacks the most vulnerable while refusing to hold those who created the crisis accountable. The backlash against this government, at local and by- elections as well as the numbers who have come out onto the streets, proves that this government has no mandate.

Cutting the wages and social benefits of low earners, pensioners, and the young without pursuing higher earners or addressing unemployment sufficiently are acts of a government with no connection to the reality the people of this country are experiencing. We need an end to cronyism and corruption. The people of Ireland are the ones who will pay for this and the government is denying us our voice. The current government plan will halt access to education in the coming years and depreciate the countries greatest resource: its people. Assaults on public services and those who use them will not save the economy. A bankers’ government is not democracy. We demand democracy now.

Statement from FEE NUIG activist Áine Mannion;