Monday, Mar 15th 2010
The following recordings are from the final session in the dayschool organised by Irish Socialist Network and Fourthwrite.
The session was held today, Saturday 7 November 2009, in the Central Hotel, Dublin.
The title of the session was: Building a 21st Century Left
Chair: Mick O’Reilly
Speakers: Murray Smith (New Anti-Capitalist Party, France), Ciaran Perry (independent councillor [...]
Income is not a determinator of class, and to think of class in such terms is to miss the point that class is a social relation, not a category. Income, however, can be used as an indicator of class relations, as wage levels are usually, although not always, related to the types of positions people [...]
I admire people who have absolutely no shame about going public with their proposals, no matter how weird, strange and utterly nonsensical those proposals might be. Such people don’t care whether they appear foolish; they are in too much of a hurry to get their little pearls into print. They must feel enormous [...]
It must be great to be a spokesperson for employers. You can just plonk yourself in front of a microphone and say anything that comes into your head, no matter how outrageous or unsubstantiated. On Thursday’s Morning Ireland Mark Fielding of ISME was being interviewed together with UNITE’s Jerry Shanan. Mr. Fielding [...]
You know its recession time - the unemployed are getting hammered. Mary Hanafin, straight from slashing the education system in her previous portfolio, is now getting her hooks into those who have been thrown out of work. Why? To save money. Apparently, there are queues of people ripping off the social welfare system. Let’s go [...]
Our man from Ongar, Leo Varadkar, TD, is in madness mode. At a debate on the Future of Social Partnership at the Young Fine Gael Summer School he demanded:
‘ . . . a moderate pay deal that taxpayers can afford. . . This must include major concessions by the unions on business competition.’
Now, [...]