Rich man, poor man - Obscenities at either end of the scale
We saw our former Ceann Comhairle give what some thought a great speech though it was no more that a blinkered tirade defending the indefensible.
Days later, at the very same venue, the Government parties won a vote – 77 to 71 – to pass the first stages of the NAMA rescue package following assurances that the State’s new bad bank will, all going well, make a profit of €5.5 billion for the taxpayer.
No one explained why NAMA might make a profit when the banks involved could not and no one explained how developers, many of whom face insolvency, might repay even €62bn of the €77bn in shaky property loans transferred to NAMA.
We are assured by Government that NAMA is essential though others, at least as plausible and possibly more convincing, tell us that it is doomed and that it will be corrupt and corrupting.
It is not easy to be convinced that the 148 souls who endorsed launching the lifeboats, if they are even a vague reflection of the population they represent, have as deep an understanding of the all-or-nothing proposals as we might all like to have.
The complexities of NAMA and the consequences of failure are too immense to contemplate. Nevertheless NAMA will be passed because the powers that be tell us there is no alternative if we are to save our banks. However, that will do nothing to lift the stench clouding the whole project.
Just as our friends in the Dáil debated NAMA, hardly feeling it worthy to make a contribution dealing in mere millions, our fellow citizens are queuing in ever-increasing numbers, for food parcels. How they perceived the vast sums under consideration in the Dáil’s pre-ordained NAMA debate is hard to imagine.
It is impossible to imagine how they, or anyone else, can put the figures announced by Goldman Sachs yesterday in a framework that does not seem immoral.
The banking giant said it had set aside €11.2 billion in pay and bonuses as it revealed a 278% leap in profits. That’s an average of €350,000 for each of Goldman’s 31,700 staff. The group revealed a 46% hike in the compensation and benefits for the first nine months of the year.
So much for capitalism going bust.
Goldman made net earnings of €2.14bn in the weeks between July and September, up from €566 million in the third quarter of last year. Goldman earmarked €3.58 billion in pay and benefits – including redundancy costs – for the third quarter alone.
Even if a Goldman Sachs’ spokesperson was blessed with the self assurance and capacity for self-righteous indignation of John O’Donoghue they would find it impossible to justify this obscene level of reward.
So much for regulation and the promised crackdown on bonuses. So much for a crisis in banking, so much for economic meltdown. So much for failures of “systematic importance”.
In a coincidence that challenges us all Mary Robinson, former President and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights yesterday launched a book on world poverty. “Poverty is the world’s worst human rights crisis,” said Mrs Robinson, as she launched a book by Amnesty International’s secretary general, Irene Khan, The Unheard Truth: poverty and human rights.
Though the crisis is international it is local too.
Earlier this week Dublin charity Crosscare warned that cash-strapped parents are turning to soup kitchens to feed their families. In Ireland; in 2009.
Across the Liffey at the Capuchin Day Centre in Dublin’s north inner city, Brother Kevin Crowley said demand for free meals and food parcels had doubled in the past year.
This week too the great St Vincent de Paul organisation, despite an annual budget of €56 million in 2008, warned that it could not meet the demands being put on its services. Many of the organisation’s newest clients are victims of the recession. Many may see their homes repossessed by banks in the coming year.
Adding more grist to the mill, Achieving Food Security in Times of Crisis is the theme of the UN World Food Day Conference which will be hosted by Gorta today. Issues surrounding the global financial crisis and its negative impact on food security and hunger will be considered.
Socialism has failed, communism has failed too. Capitalism is, every hungry, homeless day, failing far too many of the world’s weakest people.
Lip service and good intentions are not enough anymore. Reform on an unimagined level is required.
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