Demand a referendum on the EU-IMF deal

By Philip Blenkinsop

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Belgium’s first general strike in almost two decades brought parts of the country to a halt on Monday in an anti-austerity protest aimed at the new government and at EU leaders meeting in Brussels.

The rail network closed, buses and trams sat in depots, schools and shops shut and production stopped at the factories of many companies including carmakers Audi (VOWG_p.DE: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Volvo, Coca Cola (KO.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and imaging group Agfa-Gevaert (AGFB.BR: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz).

Charleroi Airport, a hub for Ryanair (RYA.I: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and other low-cost carriers, was forced to cancel all flights due to union plans to block the access road.

However, at Brussels airport most flights were running.

“Some airlines cancelled services ahead of time … but overall I think only about 10 percent of flights will be hit,” an airport spokesman said.

High-speed international trains, such as the Eurostar from London and Thalys from Paris, were not running into or out of the country as of late on Sunday.

At Europe’s second busiest port, Antwerp, all container and some bulk cargo terminals were shut, with shipping traffic suffering delays due to suspended harbour services.

Congestion on the highways was less than usual, traffic body Touring-Mobilis said, suggesting that people who had decided to work had left earlier, shared cars or chosen to work from home.

The walkout coincides with the 17th EU summit in two years as the bloc battles to resolve its sovereign debt problems. The EU leaders are expected to sign off on a permanent rescue fund for the euro zone and agree on a German-driven pact for stricter budget discipline.

Belgian union chiefs, gathered outside the meeting, urged the EU to issue joint eurobonds to ease the interest pain for weaker nations and said the rich should shoulder more of the austerity burden.

“Europe must hand out eurobonds, it must help the strikers who have bailed out banks and it must take steps for long-term growth,” said Rudy De Leeuw, president of the ABVV union group.

Unions have called the general strike, Belgium’s first since 1993, over government plans to raise the effective retirement age along with other measures designed to save 11.3 billion euros.

“We are angry because they want to attack our pensions,” said Philippe Dubois, a railway union member outside Brussels’ Midi station. “We want to make some noise.”

BUDGET BATTLE AHEAD

Belgium has pledged to bring its public sector deficit below the EU limit of 3 percent of gross domestic product this year to avoid an EU fine and to reassure investors it has its finances under control.

The government knows growth this year will be below the 0.8 percent assumed for the budget drawn in December. A likely stagnation or contraction will force it to seek further savings when it revises the budget next month.

The battle lines are being drawn for that debate. The Socialists saying the rich should bear a greater burden, while the pro-business Liberals and centre-right Christian Democrats argue higher taxes would push the country into recession and government spending should be cut more.

Union leaders say they fear the government might be tempted to suspend its system of wage indexation, the linking of pay to inflation criticised by the European Commission and international economic organisations as driving up prices and undermining Belgium’s competitive position.

Economists say a single skipping of an automatic pay hike could save the government at least 1 billion euros.

For now, many Belgians appear to have accepted the need for austerity measures. According to an opinion poll in top-selling newspaper Het Laatste Nieuws last week, only 21 percent of Belgians supported the strike.

Union chiefs say they will decide after talks with the government over the next two weeks whether to strike again.

(Additional reporting by Ben Deighton and Claire Davenport; Editing by Alison Williams)

Adbusters Issues New Call to Action: Occupy Chicago for G8/NATO Summit

The Occupy Wall Street movement traces its origin to a call to action in the Vancouver-based magazine Adbusters.

Now, Adbusters has issued a Call to Action to Occupy Chicago for the G8/NATO summit this coming May:

Hey you redeemers, rebels and radicals out there,

Against the backdrop of a global uprising that is simmering in dozens of countries and thousands of cities and towns, the G8 and NATO will hold a rare simultaneous summit in Chicago this May. The world’s military and political elites, heads of state, 7,500 officials from 80 nations, and more than 2,500 journalists will be there.

And so will we.

On May 1, 50,000 people from all over the world will flock to Chicago, set up tents, kitchens, peaceful barricades and #OCCUPYCHICAGO for a month. With a bit of luck, we’ll pull off the biggest multinational occupation of a summit meeting the world has ever seen.

And this time around we’re not going to put up with the kind of police repression that happened during the Democratic National Convention protests in Chicago, 1968 … nor will we abide by any phony restrictions the City of Chicago may want to impose on our first amendment rights. We’ll go there with our heads held high and assemble for a month-long people’s summit … we’ll march and chant and sing and shout and exercise our right to tell our elected representatives what we want … the constitution will be our guide.

And when the G8 and NATO meet behind closed doors on May 19, we’ll be ready with our demands: a Robin Hood Tax … a ban on high frequency ‘flash’ trading … a binding climate change accord … a three strikes and you’re out law for corporate criminals … an all out initiative for a nuclear-free Middle East … whatever we decide in our general assemblies and in our global internet brainstorm – we the people will set the agenda for the next few years and demand our leaders carry it out.

And if they don’t listen … if they ignore us and put our demands on the back burner like they’ve done so many times before … then, with Gandhian ferocity, we’ll flashmob the streets, shut down stock exchanges, campuses, corporate headquarters and cities across the globe … we’ll make the price of doing business as usual too much to bear.

Jammers, pack your tents, muster up your courage and prepare for a big bang in Chicago this Spring. If we don’t stand up now and fight now for a different kind of future we may not have much of a future … so let’s live without dead time for a month in May and see what happens …

for the wild,
Culture Jammers HQ

http://www.adbusters.org/blogs/adbusters-blog/tactical-briefing-25.html

Strong case set out for debt relief by Finance Committee in Berlin, undermined by Taoiseach’s comments in Davos

In a statement, Richard Boyd Barrett, TD for the People Before Profit Alliance and Finance spokesperson for the United Left Alliance, has said that Taoiseach, Enda Kenny’s comments at last weeks Davos World Economic Forum and the government’s attempts to avoid a referendum on the proposed Eurocompac Treaty, had completely undermined the robust case for debt relief made by a cross-party delegation from the Dail Finance Committee during their visit to the German Bundestag in the same week.

Deputy Boyd Barrett, along with representatives of all the other party groups on the Dail Finance Committee, met with the Budgetary Committee of the Bundestag – the most powerful parliamentary committee in the German Parliament. The Bundestag Budgetary Committee has significant oversight over the German budget. It is also the body that had seen parts of the Irish budget before the Irish parliament saw it, and is the body which is currently involved in scrutinizing drafts of the proposed Eurocompac Treaty on behalf of the Bundestag.

The Finance Committee delegation made a strong case to the Bundestag that austerity was unjustly punishing ordinary Irish citizens, who bore no responsibility for the economic crisis, and was crippling the Irish economy.

Deputy Boyd Barrett said also that the Bundestag committee members were particularly interested in the question of whether there would be a referendum on the Eurocompac Treaty in Ireland and that it was clear from this that such a possibility strengthened Ireland’s hand in seeking debt relief.

Richard Boyd Barrett said:

“The Taoiseach’s comments in Davos presented a perspective on the Irish economic crisis almost diametrically the opposite of that presented by an all-party delegation from the Dail’s finance committee to the German parliament, and completely undermined the strong case that we made for debt relief. All of us, regardless of our political differences, put strong arguments to the Bundestag budgetary committee about the injustice of ordinary Irish citizens paying for the illegitimate debts of the financial institutions, and on that basis called for debt relief. The Taoiseach’s comments were, therefore, not simply insulting to ordinary Irish citizens, they did a grave disservice to the efforts, even members of his own coalition were making in Berlin, to seek debt relief for Ireland.

Despite the major political differences that exist between us, a cross section of the parties in the Dail made the case that in Ireland there is a huge sense of justified anger about having to pay debts generated by the irresponsible gambling of financial institutions across Europe and the incompetence of political leaders.

We explained that the austerity policies that resulted from this intolerable debt burden were causing immense suffering across Irish society and were seriously detrimental to efforts to restore growth and create jobs. Even government spokespeople were quite robust about the need to for relief or write-down of banking debt.

The social democrats and leftist groups in the Bundestag were extremely sympathetic to the case we were making, but even the governing Christian Democrats were willing to acknowledge that the austerity was unfairly hitting citizens who had no responsibility for the financial and economic crash.

The message across the board of the delegation was that it wasn’t ordinary citizens that caused the mess, it was the financial and political elites both at home and in Europe that had caused the crisis, and that steps should be taken to relieve people from an unjust debt burden and the resulting austerity.”

Our arguments – which were gaining a sympathetic hearing from across the German political spectrum – were totally undermined by Enda Kenny’s comments that the Irish people were to blame for the crisis in Ireland. His comments have done a major disservice to the Irish public and even to members of his own coalition.

It was also clear from our meetings in Berlin that the German government is very concerned about the possibility of a referendum in Ireland on the Eurocompac treaty. It was obvious from this, that we have leverage in Europe when we call for debt relief. But again, Enda Kenny’s insistence that he won’t hold a referendum unless he is legally forced to amounts to giving away all our bargaining chips when it comes to seeking debt relief and better deal from Europe.

Enda Kenny simply could not be doing a worse job in representing the interests of ordinary Irish citizens than he has done over the last number of weeks. It gives a real insight into the disastrous bankruptcy of this government’s entire strategy when it comes to dealing with an unprecedented economic crisis.”

By David Cay Johnston

The World Economic Forum opened in Davos amid choruses of central bankers and economists calling for governments to cut spending.

This message of austerity is like the call of the ancient Sirens, whose music lured sailors to shipwreck.

We should take a lesson from Odysseus, who poured wax into the ears of his crew and had himself lashed to the mast of his ship to resist the Siren call.

Austerity supporters are selling the idea that governments, like families, must cut back when income shrinks. But economically, governments are not like families.

Firing teachers, cops and government clerks will, for sure, reduce public spending. But budgets, like the song of the Sirens, are only part of the story. Listen only to the alluring lyrics and, like the many voyagers before Odysseus, we will suffer disastrous consequences – in our case falling incomes and worsening economies.

The full economic story begins with this principle taught to every economics student: spending equals income and income equals spending. Cut spending and incomes must fall; cut incomes and spending must fall.

Those who disagree with this say that only private spending can create wealth and that government spending is inefficient. I think the first argument is wrong, but the second is often true, which is why citizens need to pay close attention to their government.

When private spending shrinks, then either government spending must grow to make up for it or the other side of the equation, income, must shrink.

If we increase spending today by borrowing, we create a claim on future income. Families with debt must divert part of their future income to interest and principal to service that debt or go bankrupt. Governments are different, provided they have monopoly control of their currency. By definition, no sovereign government can ever go broke in its own currency.

NO TO AUSTERITY

The United States government, which has a monopoly on its currency, is $15.2 trillion in debt, roughly the same as the entire output of the economy for a year.

That figure has been sung in a refrain about massive debt threatening to bring down the economy and cause inflation. Facts, however, show otherwise.

The country was much deeper in debt, relative to the size of the economy, in 1946 than it is today and yet what followed was decades of prosperity. The 1946 debt remains and, after six decades of growth, it is inconsequential.

In Japan, government debt is roughly twice annual economic output and yet the country continues to function because real interest rates are at or below zero.

To be sure, conditions can change and interest rates can rise sharply, though central banks have ways to limit that. But that is not the problem today. The problem today is shrinking incomes due to shrinking spending.

Austerity budgets, by reducing government spending, will only make incomes fall more. The only way to make incomes rise is to make spending rise, which in the short run means more borrowing by governments to enable more public sector spending.

After reading the news from Davos, ask yourself why we should listen to the Siren song of the financial elite. After all, the people who steered our financial ship into dangerous waters in the first place were at the very top of this group. We should listen more to those will suffer from austerity budgets: children who only get one chance at an education, the sick and disabled unable to support themselves and seniors too old to work.

If, like Odysseus, we wish to row past our current economic straits into a new sea of prosperity, the one thing we must not do is be driven to economic madness by the Siren call of austerity budgets.

http://blogs.reuters.com/david-cay-johnston/2012/01/27/the-siren-call-of-austerity/

Friday the 13 th of January was indeed an ominous day for the ostrich-head-in-the-sand
“leaders” of the European Union, when the credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s
downgraded its rating of French sovereign debt, as well as that of eight other eurozone states. In response, the French Prime Minister spluttered that France did not
need to add further austerity measures to those already inflicted, while the German
Chancellor insisted that the downgrade only highlighted the need to act quickly and
consolidate austerity in the form of water tight constitutional commitments. Both of
them missed the point of the downgrade. So did the Irish media, as Manus O’Riordan
reports, with a failure even to mention – not to mind quote – the actual indictment of
austerity dogmatism voiced by Standard & Poor’s.
On the previous day, January 12th, I had participated in a meeting of a European
Economic & Social Committee Study Group that is drafting an opinion on the subject
of economic governance, sovereign debt and the restarting of growth in the EU. The
rapporteur is the Italian trade unionist, Carmelo Cedrone, while his expert is the
former British Labour Junior Minister Stuart Holland, subsequently an adviser to the
former European Commission President Jacques Delors. Holland’s advocacy of the need for Eurobonds to end the crippling interest rates being faced by individual
member states is a subject I have previously detailed in Liberty Online. The draft opinion argued: “In Europe, sovereign debt no longer is sovereign. The
limitations and mistakes of the EU and of individual countries have facilitated predatory behaviour by rating agencies which, exploiting the poor management of public finances, has usurped sovereignty for smaller Member States such as Greece,
Ireland, Spain and Portugal, and subsequently Italy, Belgium and even France… With
a strategy of austerity in response to rating agencies, the European Economic Recovery Programme has been displaced. Most electorates are not even aware of the
Union’s commitment to it, yet are well aware that they are being asked to accept
sacrifices for the rescue of banks and hedge funds.”
Recognising that there was a far more significant factor in the Irish crisis than the
poor management of public finances through over-reliance on revenues based on the
property bubble – namely, the irresponsible nurturing of the bubble itself – I proposed
the addition of the phrase “and the failure to adequately regulate banks and other
lending institutions”. This amendment was accepted and is all the more relevant in the
light of the sustained campaign currently being mounted by the President of IFSC
Ireland, former Taoiseach John Bruton, against what he pejoratively calls “regulatory
over-reaction”.
The draft opinion’s critique of credit rating agencies, however, came in for criticism
from two outside observers present at our meeting. A spokesman for the German permanent representation to the EU argued that the risk premia variations in interest
rates for different member states only reflected economic realities, while a spokesman
for the European Commission lauded the necessity for such day-by-day market tests. I responded that credit rating agency behaviour undoubtedly exacerbated the problem,
but I did not deny that a real economic problem remained. The credit rating agencies
anticipated failure. But what would be the cause of such failure? The free market
dogmatists argued that there was not enough austerity, but I argued that failure would
instead result from the crushing of economic recovery through excessive austerity,
coupled with impossible-to-service penal rates of interest. I drew attention to the
Berlin press conference of the previous day, where Italian Prime Minister Monti brushed off Chancellor Merkel’s praise for Italy’s austerity measures, saying Italy was
not looking for praise but recognition, through lower borrowing costs. Continuing my argument that the ultimate market test would be of either the ability or
the failure of European economies to resume growth, I proposed that the EESC should
advance its Eurobond growth strategy in such a way that would challenge the wholesale insistence on austerity that had hitherto determined the grades “awarded”
by the credit rating agencies. The draft opinion maintained: “The EESC believes that
the EU institutions should not fall into the trap of responding only to the rating
agencies, even though they sometimes pinpoint market weaknesses, but that they are
duty-bound to indicate an effective way out of the crisis to their own citizens which
provides at the same time a project for the future of the EU which can foster trust and
optimism, and strengthen a sense of belonging and involvement in making a shared
ideal reality.” The Study Group accepted my proposal that the following sentence
should be added: “The re-starting of growth that would follow would then enable the
EU to pass the market test of economic success.”
The next day, January 13th, saw the down grading by Standard & Poor’s of the sovereign debt of France and other eurozone states. Yet Ireland’s media failed to
report why. Standard & Poor’s had essentially argued that eurozone policymakers have not done enough to resolve the region’s “broadening and deepening financial
crisis”. It criticised the latest talks as failing to come up with “a breakthrough of
sufficient size and scope to fully address the eurozone’s financial problems”. The
following is the key paragraph in its assessment, hitherto unreported in the Irish
press:
“We also believe that the agreement is predicated on only a partial recognition of the
source of the crisis: that the current financial turmoil stems primarily from fiscal
profligacy at the periphery of the eurozone. In our view, however, the financial
problems facing the eurozone are as much a consequence of rising external imbalances and divergences in competitiveness between the eurozone’s core and the
so-called ‘periphery’. As such, we believe that a reform process based on a pillar
of fiscal austerity alone risks becoming self-defeating, as domestic demand falls
in line with consumers’ rising concerns about job security and disposable incomes, eroding national tax revenues.”
And yet, EU leaders continue to insist on sailing the Titanic towards the iceberg.

Manus O’Riordan
EESC Workers’ Group

Taken from Report for Liberty Online:
http://siptucommunicationsdepartment.newsweaver.ie/newsletter/wr8aeznzclc?rss=true

Nine days before Christmas 32 workers were made redundant by Vita Cortex. The workers have between them almost 900 years of service. The company stated that it would not be paying them any redundancy pay.

The workers decided they would not leave the Company’s Plant, until they received their agreed redundancy payments. Their sit-in has now entered its sixth week.

The Vita Cortex workers have demonstrated enormous courage. They are tolerating appalling conditions, sleeping on foam on the ground at night and living in in what can be described as a large shed but they are determined to stay until their employer pays them what he owes them.

The owner of Vita Cortex, Jack Ronan has considerable assets and businesses, but is resisting all attempts by anyone to facilitate an agreement which would allow them to go home to their families and try to get on with their lives.

After twelve hours of talks at the Labour Relations Commission (LRC) it emerged that Ronan had offered a substantial asset to NAMA but subsequently withdrew it when the agency refused to cut a deal with him on his wider property and other debts over which they have taken control.

It is now established that Ronan has extensive assets which remain outside the control of NAMA and which could be used to pay the €372,000 which he has accepted is owed by him to his long serving workforce.

In an unprecedented intervention the LRC chairman, Kieran Mulvey, has expressed his public view that it is in Ronan’s power to resolve the dispute which has left the workers with no choice but to continue their six week occupation of the plant on Kinsale Road in Cork.

It has also left them, and SIPTU, with no choice but to escalate the campaign for a just resolution to this important, and increasingly bitter, struggle for basic employment rights.

The struggle of the Vita Cortex workers to secure their agreed redundancy payments is a cause which should be supported by all those who believe in justice and worker’s rights.

The State should not be made pay for the commercial failures of wealthy businessmen.

The level of support which they have received from the community in Cork, nationally and indeed now internationally has been truly astounding but they need more. The financial pressures on them, are increasing their stress and a number of them are now suffering ill-health.

We would, therefore, request that you would seek to have some collections made in your workplace, sports clubs or community organisations you may be a member of, to enable us to provide some assistance to them.

We thank all those who already have done so.

Contributions can be sent to:

Account Name: Sean Kelleher, Jim Power (VC sit in)
Sort Code: 90 28 05
Account No: 93680761
Bank of Ireland, Wilton, Cork

Anne Egar, Organiser
SIPTU Manufacturing Division
aegar@siptu.ie

By Áilín Quinlan and Claire O’Sullivan

Up to 1,000 protesters will converge on Cork City next week as part of the bitter public opposition to the Government’s proposals to regulate septic tanks.
Groups opposed to the proposed Water Services (Amendment) Bill — which provides for a new inspection regime for septic tanks and a €50 charge for householders — will march from Daunt Square to Cork County Hall next Friday.

A march in Dublin is also being planned, according to Paul Walsh, chairman of the Knockavilla Anti-Septic Tank Charges Group. More than 300 people from across Cork attended the group’s public meeting in Bandon last Wednesday.

“This is a punishment tax,” said Mr Walsh, who added that it was being imposed on rural dwellers only and would create an urban /rural divide.

“If you live in an urban area and your sewage system had to be upgraded it would be covered by the taxpayer,” he said, adding €21 million and €12m respectively were spent on the recent upgrades of the sewage systems in Kinsale and Skibbereen.

It was feared that fault-finding by tank inspectors would be widespread. He said: “If you are paid to find something wrong you will find it.”

The Knockavilla group had already formed strong links with other anti-septic tank charges groups in Skibbereen, Ballinspittle and Farran, he said, and it was expected that up to 1,000 people from all over Co Cork would march next Friday.

Meanwhile, the Cork Environmental Forum (CEF) will hold an information meeting on the septic tank legislation at the Oriel House in Ballincollig.

Septic tank expert, Tim Clifford, CEF chairman, Michael Hobbs, David Best of Kingspan, Kevin Murray of Engineers Ireland and Michael Madden, a consulting engineer, will speak at the event on February 10.

Read more: http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/kfidkfgbeyau/rss2/#ixzz1kf9MomTi

By Lyndsey Telford and Seán McCárthaigh

Demonstrations outside government departments and the bank formally known as Anglo Irish took place yesterday to mark the controversial handover of €1.25 billion to unsecured bondholders.
Up to a dozen Occupy Dame St activists locked down the Department of Finance by chaining themselves together with special locking devices around the entrance of the department at Government Buildings.

Steven Bennett, Occupy Dame St spokesman, warned it could take the Government and gardaí hours to cut through the locks.

He said the building could be shut down all day.

“We have been here since 6.30am this morning and we have a crowd of about 40 protesters.

“We’ve used special locks that are kind of half-bells filled with concrete and other additives so it’s going to take hours and hours, and special cutters, to get through them.”

Meanwhile, opponents of new property and water charges including a group of opposition TDs, protested outside the former headquarters of Anglo Irish Bank in Dublin to mark the payment to the bondholders.

Members of the Campaign Against Household and Water Taxes, which is calling for the non-payment of the new €100 property tax by
householders, described the payments to Anglo’s bondholders as a national scandal.

“The Government threatens householders hoping to collect €160m in a year, but meekly transfers over eight times that amount in one payment in one day to Anglo,” said a spokesperson.

“Ordinary people are being asked to accept penury to enrich anonymous bondholders in this and other banks.”

The TDs present were Luke Flanagan, Richard Boyd-Barrett, Clare Daly, Joan Costello, Séamus Healy, John Halligan, Tom Pringle, Mick Wallace, and Joe Higgins.

Mr Boyd-Barrett said he understood that fewer than 5% of householders had so far registered to pay the €100 household charge by the March 31 deadline.

“We’re confident, judging from the response of the public, that the campaign commands huge support across the country,” said Mr
Boyd-Barrett.

Read more: http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/kfidkfeyqlgb/rss2/#ixzz1kZEBhIRZ

- Investors who bought Anglo bonds on secondary markets set to make massive profits at the tax payer’s expense
- Bondholder payout equivalent to a third of all 2012 Budget cuts and austerity measures.
- ULA Finance spokesperson to challenge Bundestag budgetary committee over European narrative on Irish crisis.

In a statement, Richard Boyd Barrett, TD and Finance spokesperson for the United Left Alliance, condemned the handover of €1.25 billion to the ECB today which will go to wealthy speculators who had capitalised on the demise of Anglo and bought up discounted bonds in the secondary market. Most of the trading on those bonds took place in closed, proprietary bond-trading systems by professional stockbrokers. Mr. Boyd Barrett pointed out that the final recipients of today’s payment are investors who bought Irish bonds in the secondary markets at vastly reduced cost. The ULA TD emphasized that the money to make these payments is coming straight out of public services, to the detriment of the ordinary citizens.

Deputy Boyd Barrett will be speaking at 8.10pm in the Dail tonight during the debate on the United Left Alliance motion calling on the government not to pay over the €1.25 billion Anglo-Irish bond due for payment today, and the Anglo-Irish promissory note due to be paid in March.

After the debate Deputy Boyd Barrett will be travelling to Berlin to join the Dail Finance Committee delegation, which is due to meet the German Bundestag Budgetary Committee tomorrow morning.

Richard Boyd Barrett said:

“Although we do not know who the bondholders are – because
transparency provisions are lacking at EU level – we do know that many of the bonds which this payment is going to service are with investors who snatched up bank bonds at steep discounts after Anglo Irish went down. This means that the new bondholders, which in the secondary market tend to be predatory investment firms, are going to make massive profits on their investment at the expense of the Irish taxpayer.”

“It beggars belief that not only are we going to pay unsecured bondholders but we are also going to lavish them with profits that are rumoured to be anywhere between 30 and 50% – a profit they made over the course of just one year.”

“After this €1.25 billion payment, the government is dead set on making another payment of €3.1 billion in March. These figures may seem too vast to conceptualise, but imagine if, for example, we spent these billions to invest in renewable energy, job creation measures or in our health system, how much better off we would be. The €3.1 billion promissory note payment on March 31 2012 would be sufficient to fund the total cost of running Ireland’s entire primary school system for a whole year.”

“The Irish government should repudiate these debts because, quite simply, they are not our debts and the ordinary citizens of this country, and our economy cannot afford to pay them. This is a point I will also be making strongly to the Bundestag budgetary committee, who seem to be accepting a narrative that suggests, somehow, ordinary Irish, Greek or Portugese citizens are responsible for the economic crisis in this country and across the Eurozone. The reality is that this crisis results from the greed and speculation of German, French and British banks, as well as the failings of a greedy financial elite in this country.

“The scaremongering about the ECB cutting off funding to our pillar banks if we refuse to pay the bondholders is fallacious. The ECB has been desperately protecting the European banking system and therefore would not take such retaliation.”

“The other scare tactic that the government consistently peddles, is that the markets would lose confidence in Irish bonds. But since we are not in the international market, and are instead heading in a direction that will make the markets lose more confidence in this country, that justification is also bogus.”

“There is absolutely no reason why the government cannot repudiate this bond repayment instead of merrily handing out massive profits to speculators.”

Richard Boyd Barrett also said:

“The proposed payment is equivalent to one third of the cuts introduced in the 2012 Budget. If the money were kept in the country instead of being sprinkled away like confetti, we could reverse all the cuts on the child benefit, the job seeker’s benefit, the single parent family payment, the rent supplement, the mortgage interest supplement, the fuel allowance, the Back to Education schemes, the state pension, the reductions to staff in the Health service, the cuts to disability, the cuts to Community Training and the capitation grants to primary schools. We could reverse all those cuts and still have a few million euros left to spend on other essential services.”

“We believe that all debts run-up by private banks and financial institutions should be repudiated, but at the very least, the government should suspend the current payment to the bondholders of a defunct bank that seems to exist solely to enrich investors who bought them at greatly reduced cost.”

Dr. Mohamed Elmasry

Achievements of a revolution can be measured in two ways: (1) by a real time scale – in the case of Egypt’s Revolution the achievements during its first year are all miracles – or (2) by a scale of unrealistic expectations where people end up disappointed. As a senior scientist, an academic and a participant in Egypt’s Revolution for the last year, I favour the first measuring scale.

On the political change towards a true democracy (by the people for the people; the 99%) a mass participation in free elections is a miracle in itself when over 60% of the eligible voters (over 30 millions) participated in the recent parliamentary elections; young and old, men and women, Muslims and Christians, PhDs and uneducated. Many voted for the first time in their lives and scores waited in lines for over 8 hours to cast their vote. Not a single incident of violence occurred. Very few irregularities were recorded.

Despite the extreme rhetoric by some political parties during the election campaign, all winning political parties are now speaking a different language of reconciliation, moderation, cooperation and collaboration. Another miracle considering that most political parties in Egypt were banned for the last 60 years.

Al-Azhar, the world top Muslim institution and Egypt’s Christian Church along with Egypt’s political leaders issued a joint declaration last week to insist on Islam’s moderate approach to governance and to defend “human rights and freedoms including freedom of faith, freedom of artistic and literary creativity”. And this is another miracle.

The Grand Imam of Al-Azhar said, “Egyptians pin hopes that the scholars of Al-Azhar (rather than politicians) define the relation between the forgiving Law of Islam and the fundamentals rights of citizens. This must be done in ways that turn the spiritual force of the nation into a force for progress.”

The political time line includes the Upper House elections in about two weeks, followed by writing a new constitution and voting for its acceptance and then electing a new president – all to be completed by July 1st; i.e. within the first 18 months of the revolution.

Also by then the top 1% of the corrupt regime in their unholy trinity; in politics, media and business will be sentenced in a court of law with full transparency and due process. This is another miracle considering the top 1% in the so-called democracies of the West get away with oppressing the 99% and even get away with murder (note for example the millions got killed, maimed and displaced in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Palestine in the last 10 years alone).

The miracles of the Egyptian revolution are achieved with a cost; the lives of young people – a great loss to their families and to the country – but a small cost of about 10 people for each one million of the population. Another miracle in the history of any revolution.

Egypt’s Revolution which has started with demonstrations and sit-ins by mostly young people on the 25th of January, 2011 turned into a people revolution only 3 days later – another miracle. And within 18 days one of the world’s most corrupt regimes, which were fully supported by the West via Israel, was gone.

Indeed one year into the revolution New Egypt is politically new and has a bright future.

Top positions in the country, for example university presidents, are now elected by the stakeholders rather than appointed by government or by the president.

A few bold steps were taken towards achieving social justice; for the first time a minimum and a maximum wage were implemented. An increase in wages and in pension of the lower 10% was also implemented.

Towards development, national projects which were installed for political reasons were put back on track again. Tourism is also back to normal rates. Small and mid-size industry got tax breaks. Government spending was reduced by eliminating waste.

New Egypt has a great future, I am sure. Happy first anniversary everyone; Egyptians and their friends.