Paula Hynes: The fuel protest is for everyone in Ireland
The increased costs of producing food and distributing food will have to be passed on to the consumer. Picture Colin Keegan
It is impossible to avoid the fuel protest when I am writing this week, as it is bringing the country to a standstill.
The reality is these protests should have happened prior to the government support package which ministers are using as a big selling point this week and constantly remind people of the €250m support package announced a few weeks ago, it sounds like a lot of money but remember at the time diesel was climbing to €2.30 a litre, the government reduced white diesel by 20 cent a litre and agricultural diesel by 3 cent a litre but at the time the tax duties were about 60% on road diesel so in theory the government only only gave up their tax take on the increase in diesel prices. As for the 3 cent a litre reduction on agricultural diesel, that really only equates to an agricultural contractor being able to treat themselves to an ice cream on a warm sunny day due to the savings, thanks to the government support package. It may sound funny, but that is how dismal the support package is. The government have simply driven people to protest.
Some question the protests, but the reality is that the fuel protest is for everyone in Ireland. We already have a housing crisis, a cost-of-living crisis, and now the US and Israel have created an energy crisis that will only further exacerbate the housing and cost-of-living situation. Builders will either have to stop building or further increase the cost of building for the simple reason of the cost of diesel. The amount of diesel used in ground works, removal of subsoil, delivery of building materials right through the building process and of course, most of the tradespeople most likely drive a diesel van, so it goes without saying that they will pass on those costs in fuel. The same applies to food on the shelves of supermarkets, diesel is used to plant crops, harvest crops, spread fertiliser and slurry, harvest grass for winter fodder, and diesel is used again to feed that fodder to livestock. Yet again, trucks collect the milk from farms, take cattle to factories and vegetables for packing, once all that food is processed, the trucks take it to distribution centres and again from there to supermarkets. The increased costs of producing food and distributing food will have to be passed on to the consumer.
Excuse the pun, but all the Taoiseach as leader of this country has done since these protests began is pour petrol on the fire and further ignite the anger of protestors. FF and FG backbenchers also seem unhappy with the government's response, and rightly so, because we are all impeded now by road blockades and fuel shortages. It's ironic that when the IFA protested outside Bord Bia, the government called for dialogue, yet now the government are refusing any form of dialogue with fuel protestors and has chosen instead to deploy the army, with our own Taoiseach also stating that the police and Gardai are present at Whitegate refinery, surely as leader of our country he realises we only have Gardai. Access to the refinery in Whitegate has been restored, but the fuel protests do not seem to be going away, and diesel is now nearly as expensive as it was prior to any support package.
Far from being anti-government, I voted for this government in the last election, as did so many of the protestors whom I know, hard-working agricultural contractors and truck drivers who have only ever worked hard on a daily basis, but now they are left with no option but to protest or see their business disappear before their eyes. From a political point of view, as much as the government are making a mess of this current situation, opposition political parties are not holding them to account and seem weak. I have never been sucked in by the far right agenda, and I firmly believe the majority of the protestors are far more intelligent than to be sucked in by the far right, that said it is now abundantly clear that the government have left the door open for the far right to piggyback on these protests and drive their own agenda.
Representative organisations had not been seeking swift enough action to seek stronger support from the government, which is why protestors took to the roads, and it took four days of protests for Ministers to meet with those representative organisations, yet still locked out those who are protesting from any discussions. The feeling on the ground is that, since the beginning of this crisis, the Taoiseach has looked down on protestors and had a very arrogant attitude towards people who voted him into power. The Minister for Defence has further infuriated the situation by threatening protestors with the deployment of the army.
We as a nation have always prided ourselves on financially supporting other countries in times of war. It is crucial now in a time of war in the Middle East that our country supports its own people, and goodwill from the government earlier in the week could have gone a long way to easing this current situation, as we see protests across our cities again.
I am in agreement that the laws of our country must be upheld, but likewise I do not believe the government are right in branding the protests as mob rule. The Taoiseach recently stated, “The people of Iran have a fundamental right to peaceful protest and freedom of expression”. Ireland is a democracy, let's not edge it towards a dictatorship, and while the war in Iran may end soon, the political fallout over the handling of the fuel protests may well have far-lasting consequences for the government, as if the truth be told, this situation would have been handled a lot differently if a general election were looming.
