Free cheese and Dáil vegetables

SOMETIMES, the simplest things sum up the state of a country.

This Christmas, when so many people will be short of cash, jobless and struggling to make ends meet, are we to be cheered up by a Fianna Fáil announcement of free cheese?

Sure, some people will be hungry, but those unlucky enough to be in need will also remember how things got this bad. We will remember that, in theory, these ‘public servants’ are our employees, but we can’t fire them, fine them or cut their wages, no matter how bad they are. They get to finish out their contracts and live on our taxes.

In recent times they have offered us cuts of €6bn and 53,000 kilos of cheese. Not much of a trade, considering it would work out at €113,000 /kg.

Personally, I’m becoming lactose intolerant at the thought of it. I’m already allergic to the vegetables in the Dáil who were either colluding or negligent in allowing a few to enrich themselves by drowning the rest in lies and debt based on a property bubble, blind-eye regulation and tax breaks for speculators. The ‘hard decisions’ would have been to upset their friends and let a zombie bank fail. It was neither tough nor out of character to have the great unwashed give a dig-out to the golden circle. It’s only the sheer scale of it that is shocking. Bailouts so big the rest of us will pay through the nose.

It will be easy to see the contrast, as we read about millionaire bankers telling us to tighten our belts, while they celebrate in their mansions.

Will they be worried about whether Santa visits their kids? No, Santa came early, as he is taxpayer-funded for a select few. If this Government of Fianna Fáil and its Green mudguard had a shred of morality and courage they would face the public and allow democracy to take its course.

By clinging to power while dragging the country deeper into debt, and cutting the legs from under more and more of us, they are making the people of this country angrier and angrier. They should pick up their P45s at the door, rather than risk serious violence in the streets.

Tim Hourigan

Cedar Court

Kennedy Park

Limerick