The Trib (6 page)

31 October 2010

T
here was a moment of déjà vu on the
Nine O'Clock News
last Monday evening. The cabinet was meeting in Farmleigh House to devise a budgetary plan. As the ministers were chauffeured in the gates, it brought to mind another gathering earlier this year.

Last February, the Irish bishops met in Rome to discuss with the Pope the problem of child abuse. There was something surreal, bordering on the ridiculous, about the pictures that were relayed from the Vatican.

The bishops, some of them togged out in cassocks, lined up to kiss the ring of Pope Benedict, resplendent in his white robes. From there, they retreated into conclave to discuss the damage wreaked by clerical sex abuse, and how best to address the issue into the future. The notion that these elderly men, their moral authority shot, could have anything to do with the protection of children in this day and age was absurd.

Yet once upon a time, their writ ran right across society. Power was wielded to great effect and had been abused with devastating consequences. Now they no longer matter. Even those who retain their faith and maintain connection through clerics on the ground, pay scant regard to the musings of an out-of-touch élite, clinging to an out-of-date notion of power.

So it goes with the current government or, principally, the Fianna Fáil element of it. Once, they considered themselves capable of walking on water. They had parented the imposter, which was then known as the Celtic Tiger. Regularly, media from other countries requested an audience in search of the secret of their success. How had they done it? Were they really men and women, or actually giants?

They lapped it up, buying into their own hype. Naturally, their remuneration, the mark of their greatness, had to be raised to levels commensurate with their amazing ability. Weren't they entitled to it?

The disconnect from the citizenry, which they forged through the bubble economy, should have become apparent to them three years ago. In September 2007, a government-appointed quango ruled that the Taoiseach should be paid another €38,000 on top of his then salary of €272,000, to make him the best paid leader in the developed world. Despite the gathering storm, Bertie Ahern saw the hike as his due for the great job he was still doing.

The optics were all wrong. People were already being thrust onto the dole. Ahern was accused of being out of touch. Let's give him the benefit of the doubt and suggest he was already ensconced in the bubble of delusion where he has since made his home.

That, however, is no excuse for the rest of them. The optics on Monday spoke volumes. As the country teeters on the brink of insolvency, highly experienced politicians saw nothing wrong in arriving in a cavalcade of state cars at Farmleigh, symbol of the old ascendancy, en route to determine the fate of the great unwashed. A couple of them stopped to toss out a few soundbites to the peasant media, before proceeding inside to determine who must suffer, whose lives are to be thrust into turmoil, and who gets off lightest. Are they really that out of touch, or is it that they are beyond caring?

Like the Church hierarchy, they remain in office, but no longer command any real power. That has been ceded to the German moneylenders.

Like the Church, Fianna Fáil has forfeited its moral authority. A party long possessed of a populist touch abused power to such a shocking extent that it mortgaged the State's future for electoral success.

The ranks of the faithful have also been greatly depleted. Last week's opinion poll puts Fianna Fáil at 18 per cent, the lowest point it has plumbed since de Valera's party was a pup.

The founder would not recognise what they have done to his self-styled national movement. Dev saw austerity as an example he, as leader, could give to the citizens, conveying that he was their elected servant. He knew better than to get notions above his station in a country struggling to maintain economic independence.

Somewhere along the line, his austerity by example was replaced with a sense of entitlement. Charlie Haughey had his personal delusions of grandeur. The other right Charlie – McCreevy – raised the sense of entitlement onto a higher plane. Salaries, the Mercs, the perks, the pension set-up, all were bumped up to what might be expected in an oil-rich kingdom, divided between rulers and serfs. And now the sense of entitlement is so ingrained that it has blinded them to the most basic political instinct.

Neither is the disconnect confined to the Dáil. Fianna Fáil leader in the Seanad, Donie Cassidy, last week opined that senators were struggling to live on the €65,000 they are paid for a part-time gig. He apologised when the peasants reacted in kind, but his mindset was exposed.

It would be reassuring to conclude that the disconnect, the sense of entitlement, is confined solely to Fianna Fáil. But a suspicion arises that senior figures in the main opposition parties are just waiting in the wings to take their turn with the Mercs and perks. They may not suffer the same disconnect, but there is precious little to suggest they are equipped with what is required at a time of national peril.

Where are the signs of leadership on the most basic level? For example, what senior opposition figure has the guts to say something like, ‘No member of the next executive should be paid more than €100,000 at this time of great upheaval'? Who is willing to declare that public office now more than ever must be about what can be put in, rather than what can be extracted as a sense of entitlement?

The old order is rapidly changing. Fianna Fáil and the Catholic Church, as we knew them both, are bound for the knacker's yard. The worrying thing is nothing has yet been found to replace them. Give us a shout if you hear anything.

22 February 2009

T
he flyer came through the door a couple of weeks ago. ‘Are you looking for someone to paint your house? You have found the right people! We are a team of Professional Polish Workers who can cheaply and solidly paint.' It went on: ‘We also provide high quality tiling services.'

The phrase ‘Professional Polish Workers' was highlighted in bold typeface. There are two reasons why tradespeople would highlight their Polish nationality. In the first instance, over the last five years, Polish tradespeople have gained an excellent reputation in the workplace. They are not afraid of work and the combination of enthusiasm and skills generally provide a very satisfactory service. Like generations of Irish exiles before them, they use the hunger of the immigrant to push themselves on.

There is nothing unique about Poles. Immigrants from other eastern European states within the EU are similarly commended, but Poles are identified by sheer force of numbers. The other reason is cost. Through the bubble years, when the home-improvement market went through the roof, workers from the new EU states provided their trades at very competitive prices.

Work was plentiful. Many Irish tradespeople sniffed a market in which they could charge exorbitantly, and did so. Canny immigrants realised they could do the job profitably at lesser prices and exploited the fertile territory abandoned by the native boys. Everybody got a slice of the action.

Not any more. The work has dried up. Prices have come down, and everybody is flailing around in the same shrinking pool. In such an environment, tensions are going to rise and the grind of history has taught us that these tensions will inevitably be wrapped up in race. All the indications are that large numbers who came here when work was plentiful are now staying on. As of last December, 44,600 of those signing on were immigrants, representing about one-fifth of the total unemployed. A report in the
Irish Times
last Monday from a Polish church in Dublin confirmed that many have decided to stay on and see out the bad times.

Immigration is a highly mobile business these days with cheap air travel, but at the moment there is nowhere else to go. In any event, many who came here liked what they saw and have decided to nest. For parents of young children, or those at the foothills of family life, moving abroad again to the next job has added complications.

Handling this new reality is going to be no easy task. If our friends the Polish painters hoover up scarce work on the basis of cheaper pricing, their unemployed Irish counterparts will locate a vent in which to pour frustrations. The plight of PAYE workers is another concern. Through the boom years, employers sang loudly about the benefits immigrants were bringing to the country, principally cheap labour. There were cases of gross exploitation, ranging from mushroom pickers to construction workers. Now the market has turned and the employers hold all the aces. Inevitably, some will see the current economic distress as an opportunity. If the few jobs on offer end up being filled by immigrants, suspicions about pay levels and conditions will immediately arise. This sort of thing has already become a feature of the recession in the UK. Italian and Portugese unskilled workers have been imported to construct a power station in Lindsey Oil Refinery in Lincolnshire, prompting a series of wildcat strikes. The GMB trade union in the UK is claiming that two energy plants and an oil refinery are refusing to employ British workers.

Scarcity of resources is another area that will provide a flashpoint of tension. Currently there is talk of cuts to social welfare payments. If such a horrendous vista comes to pass, those at the receiving end will look around for somebody to blame.

It would be nice to believe that dear old Ireland will be able to keep tensions under wraps. However, if recent events have shown anything, it is that history keeps coming back to haunt just when you thought it had been dispatched once and for all. Leadership and tolerance are going to be at a premium to deal with what is coming down the line. Employers' groups and trade unions need to provide direction and vision. Both have been to the fore in usurping the job of governing through the partnership process, but this is an issue in which they could make a real contribution to society.

Leadership in the political sphere will also be vital, but don't hold your breath. With Fianna Fáil plunging in the polls, expect some of the more nervous nellies to exploit rather than attempt to defuse racial tensions. Noel O'Flynn has already been fast out of the blocks, publishing parliamentary questions he set down on permits for foreign workers. He's letting the frustrated element in his constituency know where he stands on the matter of Johnny Foreigner.

Some on the wilder shores of Fine Gael have a habit of drawing a few kicks at Travellers, and these politicians also can be expected to make hay on the back of racial vulnerabilities.

It's not going to be pretty, but in the coming years we're going to find out a lot about ourselves, and our capacity for tolerance when the chips are down.