Mass street protests needed before further health and social welfare cuts and property tax pushes people over the edge

In a statement, Richard Boyd Barrett TD of the People Before Profit Alliance/ULA has said that public anger and suffering in the face of further planned austerity measures in the forthcoming budget is reaching“tipping point”.

Deputy Boyd Barrett said that flagged budget cuts in health and social welfare and the proposed property tax would push huge swathes of the population “over the edge,” and he said it was now an urgent necessity for all those sectors of society who are the targets of existing or planned austerity to unite and take to the streets in protest.

Richard Boyd Barrett said: “Quite simply, huge numbers of people in this country cannot take any more of this cruel and unjust austerity. Vast numbers of unemployed, low and middle income families, the disabled and the elderly have already been pushed to the very edge. We are fast approaching the tipping point in terms of public anger and suffering. A million and half people in this country are hanging on by their finger-tips at the moment. They simply cannot afford to take any further hits. If the government press ahead with the planned further cuts to the health and social welfare budgets, to pensions, or attempts to impose a property tax on ordinary households, they will push huge swathes of our population over the edge.

The only answer to the economic and social madness now being pursued by the government and the Troika, is for the victims of this austerity to unite and take to the streets. The government are doing their best to play a divide and rule game in order to push through their austerity attacks – playing old off against young, abled versus disabled, public sector worker against private sector worker, urban dweller versus rural dweller, employed against unemployed. We have to resist these nasty and cynical government tactics and unite all those on low and middle incomes, workers and the unemployed, and all the vulnerable sectors of our society into a major movement of popular resistance on the streets. We need to get out and protest in the largest possible numbers in advance of the budget or the next wave of austerity will simply crush our society and our economy.

As the Dáil reconvenes, there is a lot of blather from the government and the main opposition parties, but the reality is that nothing is going to change for the better unless the people demonstrate their resistance to unjust austerity on the streets over the coming weeks and months.

In People Before Profit and the United Left Alliance our main priority will be to use the platform of the Dáil to mobilise resistance out on the streets against this disastrous austerity agenda.

Article source: http://richardboydbarrett.ie/2012/09/17/publics-anger-and-suffering-in-the-face-of-austerity-is-reaching-tipping-point/