SLICING THROUGH THE SPIN EVERY MONDAY Politicians treading same stagnant water
DRASTIC CHANGE IS NEEDED OR WE’RE DOOMED
LAST week’s seismic events prove beyond any doubt that we desperately need a dramatic political upheaval in this country.
Otherwise we’ll be doomed yet again to forever tread the hamster wheel of depressing Irish politics where perfectly predictable disasters follow one another as if their inevitability’s carved in granite.
And the same deadbeat plodding politicians keep resorting to the same deadbeat policies without a hint of imagination, vision, common sense or creativity.
Apology
Last week Taoiseach Simon Harris issued an apology to the families of the Stardust victims for the inaction of successive governments over the past 43 years.
It was a stunning achievement for the heartbroken families who’d campaigned long and hard for justice for their loved ones.
But they’d still be campaigning if it wasn’t for Attorney General Seamus Wolfe who green-lit a new inquest in 2019 into the deaths of the 48 victims.
There had been no mass movement among our elected politicians in favour of fresh inquests. No urgency to right wrongs. In fact, you might suspect there was some kind of cover-up going on for all those years.
But the real problem that led to so many decades of glaring injustice was the stranglehold that FF and FG has on power.
In the last 100 years we’ve had 22 FF justice ministers, eighteen FG, one Labour and one PD.
Stagnation piled on stagnation while justice withered, crime thrived and the guards despaired.
Last week also we heard how Aoife Johnston died in University Hospital Limerick, which was so overcrowded one doctor was looking after 191 patients.
Aoife’s despairing family screamed out for help but no help arrived, and as her brave mother said, she “died a horrible death and she suffered all night”.
But overcrowding in Irish hospitals isn’t new — and it’s been particularly bad in Limerick.
In July 2019, the hospital told people to stay away from the emergency department due to overcrowding. But despite all the political spinning, we’re still stuck with chronic overcrowding to the extent that it should now really be classified as a separate disease.
In Limerick the frontline medical staff have been crying out for help for years with their cries falling on deaf ears.
Failure
Aoife’s excruciating death was totally preventable if there’d been the political will to fix UHL. In the last 100 years there have been 18 FF Health minsters, eight FG, and three Labour. Failure following failure. Last week we also learnt that the homelessness records have been broken again.
In March 13,886 people had no home — including 4,147 children.
In the last year there’s been an increase of 1,878 people.
Taoiseach Simon Harris has vowed to build 250,000 houses over the next five years — which just goes to show the horrendous neglect over the years.
This isn’t an overnight emergency. Homelessness has been rising for years.
But the FF/FG stranglehold on appropriate action has yet again prevailed.
In the past 100 years, there have been 26 FF Housing ministers, nine FG and eight Labour.
And look what we have now — institutionalised homelessness, outrageously expensive houses, rocketing rents, ruthless vulture funds, mental illness, gross inequality and a lost generation.
Thank you FF and FG.