European family not the real friend we need

We believe that we have a lot of friends around the world and we like to think that we are a valued and popular member of the European family. But when you look at what happened in Scotland and within Ireland during the economic crash, does it not make you think a little deeper about what makes a friend?

During the banking and other national woes, how did our friends react? We were threatened and intimidated by our so called friends who used various means to force Brian Lenihan into action that he may not have wanted to take with respect to bank guarantees and other actions. Our friends’ only concern was to ensure that the effects of the downturn did not affect them and that their banks, who greedily fed the Irish market with cheap money, did not suffer the same fate as our banks. As a friendly gesture they bailed us out with a hefty loan at a hefty interest rate. Now they are back on the corporation tax rate tack and are trying to pressure us into having a uniform tax code with the mainland. Now let me ask you, Joe Soap, the following questions: Would you set up a business on a small island if there were not tax incentives to do so,and then add to the cost of your tax bill, the shipping costs, shipping insurance costs, handling and distribution costs? Or would you set up your business on the mainland of Europe and avoid all the additional handling, shipping, distribution and insurance costs which would not be affected by the risk of bad weather at sea, etc? I would be setting my business up in Europe somewhere and enjoying the same tax that the federal system wants to install, avoiding all the additional risks and costs.

With this in mind, Ireland would become a backwater fed by the crumbs off the European table, and we would not get fat on those crumbs.

We saw another example of the type of coercion which Ireland and others bow down to last week with the Scottish situation. They were threatened with: if you leave now it will be forever, the money will go south and your position in Europe will be in jeopardy and the future will be uncertain and the cost of living will rise.

It would seem that our so-called friends and big business will use all tools at their disposal to coerce us into behaving the way they want.

This is not friendship or democracy. When a friend wants to try something else, a real friend would say: go for it, try it out and if it does not work out we will try to assist in so far as we can.

Rudolf Neff

Pike Hill

Lissivigeen

Killarney

Co Kerry