Closures target bodies that promote equality

How much longer can we, the plain people, put up with continued attacks on equality in Ireland?

In the last number of years, we have witnessed the closure or merger of bodies that were set up to nurture equality. Yet the Labour Party, to which I have given my vote numerous times, has stood by while the following has happened: The Women’s Health Council was closed in 2009; the Crisis Pregnancy Agency was merged with the HSE; Gender Equality Desk — Department of Education — closed; Higher Education Equality Unit, – UCC, closed and merged into HEA, National Women’s Council of Ireland; Rape Crisis Network Ireland, core Health Authority Funding removed 2011; National Consultative Committee on Racism and Interculturalism, closed since 2009 and not re-opened by Labour; Equality for Women Measure, co-funded by EU Operational Programme Budget, partly transferred out of this area and now under Department of Enterprise.

The attacks on the old and the young are also serious equality issues. A nation should be judged on the level of equality in its society and yet this Government has clearly set out to attack equality.