Surely there must be light at the end of the tunnel after the crash
SIR,
What’s another year? We enter 2019 hoping for a good year, but for most it will be more of the same.
Politicians will still promise; they will announce elaborate plans. Billions are going to be spent – over a five- or ten-year period, of course. It sounds better that way.
They will tackle health, housing, homelessness, infrastructure, etc. The country is booming again. We have officially returned to full employment. We may not notice that in Kerry, but statistics don’t lie – or do they? Brexit will happen – or will it?
We will shorten hospital waiting lists and emergency waiting time. Nurses will be fairly paid and we will open hundreds of extra beds in hospitals to cater for overcrowding.
We will build thousands of social and affordable houses. We will stop the rip off of young couples hoping to rent or own a home in our capital city.
We will speed up assessment time for those in direct provision. It is a scandal and we are great at dealing with scandals in Ireland.
Yes, we have the promises and we are used to our elected representatives keeping theirs, so don’t lose hope.
The soundings from government are good early in the year. The thinking caps are firmly on, and even though Fine Gael may have failed to bring in a water tax, it appears that Leo our Taoiseach sees hope in the carbon tax.
Really there is no limit to what increase he could put on it. We will be properly educated on how to save the environment, but only if we feel the pain. After all, look how knowledgeable we are after the pain of bailing out private banks .
We understand how banking malfunctions now thanks to the harsh lesson imposed on us by the ECB. Possibly another harsh, expensive lesson on saving the planet is what the Irish nation needs.
The rich will get richer in 2019, but many workers will struggle get a wage rise. It will then be swallowed up by the increase in the cost of goods and services. We are Europe’s leaders in most areas – dearer houses, drugs, health care, fuel, car insurance and the weekly shopping basket.
Not alone are we unable to build reasonably priced homes, we can’t accurately cost the building of new hospitals either. The public purse is a bottomless pit for some projects.
I hope the picture I paint isn’t too rosy. After all, we are a great little country in which to do business, and our friends in Europe think very highly of us.
Eleven years after the crash, surely, this year, there must be light at the end of the tunnel.
Sincerely,
Gerry Cournane,
Tralee.