NATIONAL STRIKE TO REVERSE THE CUTS – SACK THIS GOVERNMENT!

This government must be driven from office!

Cowen, Lenihan and Gormley want ordinary workers and the most vulnerable in Irish society pay the price for an economic crisis caused by the greed of bankers, developers and a super-wealthy elite.
The disgraceful attempt to scapegoat public sector workers and set them against workers in the private sector must be resisted.
Most public sector workers are on low or very modest incomes. They are not responsible for the property speculation, gambling and shady financial dealings that created the current crisis.
The attack on public sector workers is cynical attempt to deflect attention away from the real issue – the enormous gap between ordinary workers and a super-wealthy elite.
Many top bankers and corporate CEO’s are still receiving salaries of one €1-2 million a year. Government ministers and the very top civil servants earn over €200,000 per year. Brian Cowen gets paid more than Barack Obama!
We should not be fooled by politicians and millionaires who say: “we’re taking a 10% pay cut, so why can’t you? A ten per cent cut for a Minister on €200,000, or a bank boss on €2 million, won’t lead to suffering. For a worker on €30,000 a year it’s the difference between paying your mortgage and not.
The top 5% in Irish society have accumulated €41 billion in extra wealth over the last five years. We must claw back this wealth from the super-rich to fill the hole in the public finances.
All workers, pensioners and students must unite to say: “We are not paying for the greed of a super-wealthy elite – Tax the Rich to fund public services and save jobs.”
Today’s protest is only the first step. We must stay on the streets and take united strike action to reverse the attacks on workers and end the jobs slaughter.
Protests must continue until this government is driven from office. Opposition parties must also tell us clearly what policies they will implement to deal with the crisis.
Fine Gael, for example, has attacked the government because their cuts are not severe enough. Labour has not said clearly they will completely scrap the pension levy.
People Before Profit Alliance says:
Stop the bail out of private banks – Nationalise the banks to create one state bank.
Tax increases and levies on earnings over 100,000 and the assets of the super-rich.
Completely scrap the pension levy on public sector workers
No to cut-backs or job losses in Dublin Bus or public transport, and regulation to protect the earnings and working conditions of taxi drivers.
Public work programmes to employ unemployed workers building schools, hospitals and providing essential public services.
State guarantees for pensions of ordinary workers in the private sector.
If you want to see a real alternative to government’s and parties that only represent the super-rich get involved in the People Before Profit Alliance.

Come to our Public Meeting next Saturday March 28th at 2pm in Wynn’s Hotel, Abbey Street (See below).

(In Dublin North West) pbp.dnw@gmail.com

(National):- www.people-before-profit.org        info@people-before-profit.org

Text JOIN to 087-9090166

STOP THE CUTS, SAVE OUR SERVICES

Important Meeting Axis Centre Thursday 19^th February (tonight) at 8.00pm, hosted by the People Before Profit Alliance to start to bring people together for a broad-based local anti-cuts campaign

With the cut backs in the route 13/13A and other Dublin Bus routes as well as the sacking of up 300 workers on the buses, both our jobs and services are under attack.

The Public Sector Pension Levy means a wage cut of 7-10% for many workers who are in jobs that are not well paid.

Cuts in Education are trickling through and mean larger class sizes and the loss of extra needs provisions for our children.

And the writing is on the wall for Ballymun Regeneration, with the local community saddled with a broken-backed, half-completed project.

It seems that working class communities like ourselves are to be the fall guys for the financial; crisis. And while there’s billions for the bank bosses, bailing out our jobs and services is not on the agenda.

This means that local people must organise to oppose these attacks. Linking up with other communities facing similar problems can give the government a lesson in people power, just as people in Iceland forced their government to resign.

We believe a broad-based anti cuts campaign is the way to go. Not the property of any single group or individuals, but representative of all those who want to fight back against these draconian attacks upon us. All community groups, trade unionists local activists and interested residents are invited along. Come along if you would like to be part of this.

Details 862-2209 or email pbp.dnw@gmail.com or just come along at 8pm in the Axis Centre!

SAVE OUR BUS SERVICE: STOP THE CUTS ON THE 13/13A

Protest Friday 27^th February at 5.30pm at the Civic Offices, Ballymun

Our bus service is due to be slashed on March 1^st.

Click on poster to download PDF version, print out and display to spread the word!

The 13/13a route will lose a third of its journeys. In addition cuts in the 19, 40 and 128 are also planned. The 4/4a is being amalgamated which more than likely will mean it too will be cut back.

At a recent People Before Profit Alliance meeting in the Axis Centre addressed by bus drivers working on the 13/13A the issues were spelt out.

As a result we have called a protest for Friday evening 27^th February at 5.30pm at the Civic Offices in Ballymun to protest at the cuts.

Posters and leaflets have been produced and we could do with your help in distributing them to get the word out.

Details 862-2209 or email pbp.dnw@gmail.com or scroll down the page to read more. 

PUBLIC SECTOR PENSIONS LEVY IS A WAGE CUT ON WORKING PEOPLE

National Demonstration Saturday 21^st February, 2pm parnell Square Dublin (called by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions)

The pension levy on public sector workers is an outrage. Many low and middle income employees who have taken out large mortgages simply cannot afford to pay it.

The levy is another name for a pay cut:

• An employee on €35,000, will pay an extra €43 a week

• An employee on €45,000 will pay an extra €63 a week.

• Private sector executive/consultant on €200,000 will pay nothing extra!

• Wealthiest 1% with €87 billion in assets continue to pay nothing at all!

In addition to this pay cut the government has welshed on the Public Sector Pay Agreement, setting aside pay increases of 6% in total. Public Service Pay relative to good employment in private sector has been reduced by up to 15%.

Public Sector Employees Are Being Scapegoated!

If we do not succeed in resisting this pay, government will feel free to impose new cuts and changes in conditions into the future.

The effectiveness of trade unions will be seriously damaged generally as in UK after Thatcher.

The Irish Congress of trade Unions has called a National Demonstration on Saturday 21st February assembling 2pm Parnell Square.

People Before Profit is urging everyone to support this demonstration to start a mass campaign of opposition, including in our view, a one-day National Stoppage, as our brothers and sisters on the continent of Europe have taken on repeated occasions.

NEW PEOPLE BEFORE PROFIT BALLYMUN-FINGLAS NEWSLETTER OUT NOW

Today we have printed thousands of copies of a local PBP Newsletter explaining some of the issues above and other news of interest to the residents of these parts.

Can anyone help us distribute it locally (putting through letter boxes, etc)? We want to get them out quickly as they will help build for the upcoming protests. If you can please contact us:- 862-2209 or email pbp.dnw@gmail.com

Click on graphic to download PDF of Newsletter: Feel free to print it off and distribute it to friends, neighbours, workmates or anyone else.

GET INVOLVED

Can you spare a little time once in a while to help our campaigning work? The more people helping out, the more effective we can be. If you would like to know more contact us:- 862-2209 or email pbp.dnw@gmail.com or visit again soon the website: www.pbpdnw.wordpress.com

FOR LOCAL NEWS VISIT AGAIN SOON OUR REGULARLY UPDATED WEBSITE: www.pbpdnw.wordpress.com

For more background on the issues raised in this bulletin and for frequently updated news click on the Dublin North West People Before Profit Website:- pbpdnw.wordpress.com. If you have a story you would like to see put up on the site email us on pbp.dnw@gmail.com or ring 862-2209. Remember you can add a comment to any story on the website. Why not give us your opinion? Click on it today.

• SCROLL DOWN THIS PAGE TO SEE OTHER IMPORTANT RECENT STORIES

Ballymun people can now see what motivated the ill fated Regeneration. Our strategic location close to the city the airport the M50 made our land valuable.

The BRL Management was prepared to stoop to any depths to clear as much land as possible. They blamed the Ballymun people themselves for the way that Dublin City Council allowed the flats public areas become a haven for drug and alcohol abusers. A former financial controller for the BRL stated at a meeting of the Breaking Ground Arts project that the community activists and volunteers had failed Ballymun and its people were lacking in initiative and enterprise and that consequently they were no longer a community that could be invested in and would be replaced by a new vibrant population. This message was circulated throughout the whole country so that they could be justified in segregating the people from the flats in substandard over crowded houses without sports and recreational facilities. They built them on the football pitches and local greens. They even closed their public swimming pool and built a leisure centre focused on profit rather than service. They allied themselves with some investors who were able to access big money and they have built some of the many luxurious private apartments and hotels to attract this new population but like the whole story of the Regeneration without any success. The Controller and Auditor General’s Report’s call for a risk assessment on the future of the whole project after pointing out that that the project should have been completed 2 years ago and that even though it was only half way there all the money was gone. This call has obviously been overtaken by the national financial crises and the Ballymun people are facing an appalling vista.

An immediate evidence of this appalling vista is that more than 1000 families will now be left in the flats for years to come and will have an enormous increase in the cost of heating and hot water. Each block of flats are to be given their own new heating system.

Youth clubs will have to vacate their basements and pay high rents for new accommodation.

Of course Dublin Bus has always left Ballymun at the end of the queue when it came to providing a public bus service. The 36, 36A and 36B provided a reasonable, even if not too reliable a service but they latched onto the Regeneration game when they introduced the 13 and 13A instead. The 13A couldn’t get down to Coultry due to the new narrow roads and the same has happened to Silloge now. In the new era of an bord snip (cutback committee) we are now going to lose over a third of our existing services.

The Department of Education also in this BRL era decided to take out the one bright beacon of light of Ballymun our Comprehensive School system of two single sex Junior Schools and a co-ed Senior School and form one co-educational school. They are like “wrong way Corrigan”. In Europe and America the numbers of single sex schools are growing annually. Co-education causes a frightening decline in the educational fortunes of boys. It is no accident that the Dept.of Education ‘Whole-School Evaluation Report’ last May on our Comprehensive School was far from complimentary.

We have seen the total disregard of BRL for the sacred memories of our patriots who signed the 1916 Proclamation and of our dead community activists, in their preference for English street names and the horse of a British Field Marshall.

The people of Ballymun cannot continue to be treated in the disrespectful way they have been and continue to be at present. The people who are elected to represent the people of Ballymun will have to become more conscious of their responsibilities to the people of Ballymun.

BALLYMUN ANTI CUTS CAMPAIGN
THURDAY 19TH FEB 8.00PM AXIS CENTRE BALLYMUN

Working class people in the area are being targeted by the government to pay the price of the economic crisis.

Public Sector workers–many among the lowest paid in the country–are facing a Pensions Levy that will see their wages hit to the tune of 7-10%.
On March 1st Dublin Bus plan to sack 160 drivers and slash bus service (including cuts of up to a third on the 13/13A route)
Ballymun Regeneration has now run out of money and the project will grind to a halt, leaving our community broken-backed witha half completed scheme.
Parents with young families face the additional burden of cuts in the under-five allowance.
Meanwhile the bank executives are being thrown billions of public money.
We need a community response that links up with bus drivers, nurses and other public sector workers to fight these unfair attacks.
We invite all community activists, representatives from community groups and the voluntary sector, trade unionists and others from the area to come to this meeting to launch a broad-based Ballymun Anti Cuts Campaign.
Come along on Thursday 19th February at 8.00pm in the Axis Centre and lets pull together to reverse the cuts.
Details 01-862-2209

Tel 862-2209 for details

The pension levy on public sector workers is an outrage. Many low and middle income employees who have taken out large mortgages simply cannot afford to pay it.

The levy is another name for a pay cut:

• An employee on €35,000, will pay an extra €43 a week
• An employee on €45,000 will pay an extra €63 a week.
• Private sector executive/consultant on €200,000 will pay nothing extra!
• Wealthiest 1% with €87 billion in assets continue to pay nothing at all!

In addition to this pay cut the government has welshed on the Public Sector Pay Agreement, setting aside pay increases of 6% in total. Public Service Pay relative to good employment in private sector has been reduced by up to 15%.

Public Sector Employees Are Being Scapegoated!
If we do not succeed in resisting this pay, government will feel free to impose new cuts and changes in conditions into the future.
The effectiveness of trade unions will be seriously damaged generally as in UK after Thatcher.
Let us insist on a real campaign next Saturday !!!
Paddy Healy 086-4183732

Public sector workers did not cause the economic mess. Those who did are being asked to pay nothing!
Nor is the Irish public service the ‘bloated’ over-paid sector portrayed by the media. According to the OECD, Ireland has the third lowest rate of public expenditure compared to Gross Domestic Product, just ahead of Korea and Mexico.
While sector workers are being attacked, the government is putting up €8 billion to ‘re-capitalise’ the banks. Despite all the talk of a ‘national effort’ to solve the crisis, no extra taxes have been imposed on the super-wealthy.
Siptu President Jack O’Connor, says that the public sector pay cut is a prelude to an attack on private sector workers pay. IBEC have already sought deferral of the National Pay agreement in the private sector.
It looks like workers are once again being asked to carry the can.

A NATIONAL ONE-DAY SHUT DOWN
This is entirely unacceptable. Our unions need to organise serious action to resist these pay cuts. Talking and complaining and lobbying is not enough when the very future of our movement is at stake.
We need a one-day national shut-down of all the public sector to show our combined strength and determination as part of a planned campaign If this action is not organised by union leaders, it will have to come from the grassroots.
The over-70s showed how ‘people power’ could bring about some measure of social justice. Now is the time for public sector workers to do the same.
Many low and middle income earners, are paying 1% income levy and now a further large amount of money. The 6% pay rise under the national pay round have been set aside though these are rightly being paid in much of the private sector Some people have got mortgages on the basis of the pay they were earning and the expected future increments, others have rented properties that they felt they could just about afford at the time. With this reduction in salary + the 1% levy, there will be barely enough money left for some people to pay the bills (if that).
Government has promised to increase taxes at the end of the year again. At this rate many will be living on the bread line or below it.
Many people have taken out mortgages with their partner. If both are in the Public Sector, they are both facing a combined income reduction of possibly €500 per month.
This is intolerable and must be reversed!

Timetable goes up in smoke

Despite the snow and sub-zero temperatures, People Before Profit had a lively, informative and successful meeting on Thursday 5th in Ballymun.

Eugene and Rory, two NBRU reps from nearby Harristown who work the 13/13A route, filled us in on the some of the implications of the cuts that the Dublin Bus management are planning to implement from 1st March.

Well-known is the scandalous fact that 160 drivers will be sacked on that date across the city and cuts in routes will be implemented. What it will mean for those in Ballymun and its estates of Poppintree, Sillogue, Coultry and Shangan makes your hair stand on end.

Dublin Bus plans to cut three buses from the 13/13A. But this is not just three journeys. Each bus is on the road most of the day. It represents three duties (or days work by drivers). Each driver will do three round trips each working day or six scheduled departures (three there and three back). So a bit of maths:- 3 buses times 3 drivers times 6 scheduled departures equals 54 trips from Harristown to Merrion Square or from Merrion Square to Harristown taken away. The current published Dublin Bus timetable for the 13/13A shows a total of 160 odd departures. So we are losing fully one-third of our service! If you don’t believe me look up the 13 timetable on http://www.dublinbus.ie/your_journey/viewer.asp?route=13  and subtract 54 from the current published timetable.

But that is not all. The routes 4 and 4A will be amalgamated. This sounds not very important at first glance but, as Rory and Eugene explained, Dublin Bus nearly routinely cut journeys when routes are amalgamated. Again the loss of a further 54 scheduled departures on these routes is a likely scenario.

At the moment the service on the 13/13A in the evening is twenty minutes, alternating a 13 and a 13A. So for someone in say Sillogue waiting on a 13 at this time, they could expect a bus every 40 minutes if everything goes well with no breakdowns, late running, etc. But with the cuts and the policy of Dublin Bus to concentrate these cuts on off-peak journeys, the scheduled frequency is likely to be an hour or more and if any bus is missing for any reason the gap could be double that.

It is no better for people going to and from work at peak times. Cuts in service will mean full buses passing you by and leaving you on the side of the road. Services to Finglas will also be hit in a similar way, so it seems Dublin Bus is willing to let working class communities go to hell.

Some of the raw information can be gleaned from this list click here (pdf) There is far more to be said and I will write more up for later posts, so as they say: stay tuned.

The People Before Profit meeting sent a message of support to the bus workers, currently balloting for industrial action over the sackings and cuts, and pledged to help out with solidarity. We also discussed Ballymun Regeneration’s collapse (of which more in a later post) and the terrible Public Sector Pension Levy which will mean pay cuts of 7-10% for Public Sector workers in order to bail out the crooked bankers.

We are inviting all community groups, local activists and trade unionists in the area to meeting on Thursday 19th February in the Axis Centre to launch a broad-based Ballymun Anti Cuts Campaign. We are also calling a demonstration to Save Our Buses and Support the Busworkers at 5.30pm on Friday 27th February in Ballymun. Posters and leaflets will be available soon. We are producing a Newsletter for distribution throughout Ballymun dealing with the issues discussed above.

If you would like to help out please contact us at 862-2209 or email pbp.dnw@gmail.com

POSTSCRIPT ON SMARTER TRAVEL

Noel Dempsey: Let them walk!

Ironically on the same day a “Smarter Travel” policy document was launched by Fianna Fail transport minister Noel Dempsey.

The aim is to shift half a million commuters from using their cars.He didn’t seem to see the irony of slashing public transport and at the same time urging people to get out of cars.

In fact the transport ministry is doing everything in its power to hobble Dublin Bus.

Fianna Fail’s friends in the private bus business are being given all the breaks and CIE is being prevented from providing a service by being refused licences to run new routes.

All this to further the privatisation agenda.

Eamonn Ryan: On yer Bike!

At Dempsey’s side, basking in the photo-call, was Green Party Energy minister Eamonn Ryan.
You’ve got to hand it to the Green Party, their TDs do a good line in talking through their backsides. Prior to his appointment as Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, he was the Green Party spokesperson for Transport.
Global warming: Encourage people out of cars–something we can all agree with. So how is cutting public transport going to achieve this: His answer is walk. Children should walk to school he reckons. Failing that we all get a bike and cycle or walk.
You can understand his enthusiasm for bikes. Before he was elected to the Dáil he set up and ran two businesses, Irish Cycling Safaris and Belfield Bike shop.

As well as that, from 1995 to 2002 he served on the Advisory Committee of the Dublin Transport Office but for all that he is happy to hang on to his ministerial salary and watch public transport decimated
And his blithe lack of concern for those unable to afford to run a car, or whose work is not on a convenient bus route to their home, or are too old or too young to be cycling or walking everywhere, really demolishes any claim the Greens might once have had to radicalism and fresh thinking.

• An employee on €35,000, €43 a week
• An employee on €45,000 will pay an extra €63 a week.

This pay cut is on top of a 1 percent levy on gross income and the deferment of all wage rises due under the current partnership deal.
Public sector workers did not cause the economic mess.
Nor are the ‘bloated’ over-paid sector portrayed by the media. According to the OECD, Ireland has the third lowest rate of public expenditure compared to Gross Domestic Product, just ahead of Korea and Mexico.
While sector workers are being attacked, the government is putting up €8 billion to ‘re-capitalise’ the banks.
Despite all the talk of a ‘national effort’ to solve the crisis, no extra taxes have been imposed on the super-wealthy.
It looks like workers are once again being asked to carry the can.

A NATIONAL SHUT DOWN

This is entirely unacceptable. Our union need to organise serious action to resist these pay cuts. Talking and complaining is not enough when the very future of our movement is at stake.
We need a one national shut-down of all the public sector – and French style protests to demonstrates our opposition.
If this such action is not organised by union leaders, it will have to come from the grassroots.
The over-70s showed how ‘people power’ could bring about some measure of social justice. Now is the time for public sector workers to do the same.

We need to gather all those—local community groups, trade unionists, and activists—together to form abroad-based, open, Anti Cuts Campaign here in Dublin North West that can link up locally and nationally with others fighting these cuts in jobs, wages and services. Contact People Before Profit locally at pbp.dnw@gmail.com or telephone 862 2209.

Let's organise to fight the cuts!

Dublin Bus plans to slash services and jobs on March 1st

Dublin Bus have announced to the trade unions that will sack 160 bus drivers and slash services on routes throughout the city from that date. In addition workers in other grades including maintenance, cleaning, shunting and clerical will be sacked. In total 290 Dublin Bus workers are set to lose their jobs.

In North West Dublin, the impact on our bus service will be dramatic.

Around a quarter of the scheduled services on the 13/13A route will be scrapped along with similar cuts on the 19/19A route.

The Finglas 40/A route will also be cut-back along with the 3 route serving Larkhill. In addition to the sackings and cut backs, Dublin Bus workers will not be paid the rises due to them under partnership in April and October this year. Working practices like overtime and travelling time are to be abolished.

This will mean fewer buses, more crowding and buses being too full to pick up passengers, longer waits and more traffic congestion as more people are forced to use their cars because of the wrecked bus service. People in the estates of Dublin North West, particularly Finglas and Ballymun, Silloge, Coultry, Shangan and Poppintree already face an unreliable and inadequate bus service.

Many people in these areas cannot afford to run a car and are totally dependent on the buses to get them to and from work, shopping, etc.

This is a scandal.

Six months ago the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport recommended that there should be an increase of 350 buses to ease traffic congestion in Dublin. If this were done there would be an important reduction in greenhouse gases which are leading to environmental crisis and life would be a little bit easier for the harassed inhabitants of Dublin. The Greens commitment to cleaning up the environment did not survive long.

Fewer buses on our routes

Instead the Fianna Fail-Green Party government is more concerned to bail out the crooked bankers of Anglo-Irish and other banks than maintain jobs and services for working class people. If Fianna Fail’s rich friends and the Corporations were taxed equitably there would be plenty of money to ensure the Dublin Bus service was improved rather than slashed and jobs could be saved.

Dublin North West People Before Profit Alliance is calling on all Residents Groups , Community Associations, local activists and trade unionists to come together in alliance with the Dublin Bus workers to fight these cuts. Together we can stop the government in its tracks. The People Before Profit Alliance in Dublin North West like its colleagues across the city, will be organising with others a broad based campaign of meetings and protests to urgently fight Dublin Bus’s plans.

As a start, a protest meeting will be held on Thursday 5th February in the Axis Centre Ballymun at 8.00pm. Details of speakers, etc to follow.

Cathy Bent, Tony Greene, Kevin Wingfield, on behalf of Dublin North West People Before Profit Alliance. Contact us on (01) 872 2682; 086-3074060, pbp.dnw@gmail.com or visit www.pbpdnw.wordpress.com

SIPTU and the Dublin Inner City Providers Network are uniting workers, employers, parents and children by calling for an end to the Community Childcare Subvention Scheme.

Childcare for the most vulnerable children across Ireland is under threat because of the recently introduced government funding scheme according to new research. In addition some families who struggle the hardest to get themselves out of poverty and into employment are very likely to lose this support. The report of the research (click to view) ‘A study of the effects of the Community Childcare Subvention Scheme’ (3.92MB) was launched on Monday (20/10/2008) by Inner City Community Childcare Providers Network (ICCCPN) in conjunction with the Dublin Inner City Partnership (DICP) who commissioned the research. For further information visit http://dublininnercity.blogspot.com