A twisted set of priorities
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It is somewhat early for this Government to be embracing the 'kiss up, kick down' school of corporate psychology that was such a defining feature of their unlamented predecessors.
Last week, however, the FG wing of the current coalition left itself dangerously open to such a perception. The spectacle of Michael Noonan kissing both cheeks of the finance minister of our French tormentors was all too symptomatic of Ireland's excessively deferential relationship with Europe.
As Mr Noonan followed the kissing with a declaration that the obedient colonial Irish would be delighted if Ms Lagarde became the next president of the IMF, it appears that we now depend on others such as the British MEP Sharon Bowles to fight our battles for us. We are grateful to the chairperson of the EU Parliament's Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee for her attack on the 'outrageous' terms being imposed on Ireland by the so-called EU 'bail-out'. Taoiseach Enda Kenny, in contrast, told the Dail that Ireland would repay all of its debts. It is an odd state of affairs when an Irish Taoiseach undermines an attempt by a British MEP to reverse the Shylock's deal we have been signed up to.
Unlike Mr Kenny, or Mr Noonan for that matter, our Enterprise Minister Richard Bruton was in the mood for 'kicking down'. Mr Bruton's gauche solo run on the abolition of Sunday premiums for low-paid workers might have been commendable had the Duffy Walsh report suggested the move would generate more employment. The problem, however, is that it does not.
Ironically, Mr Bruton's ill-judged demarche meant the minister swiftly experienced his own kicking down. The excuse has been made that Ireland signed up to these reforms as part of the infamous ECB/IMF bailout, and heaven knows we now understand all too well what the IMF's attitude towards chambermaids is. However, though reform of our labour laws is necessary, there was more than a slight element of his brother's infamous tax on children's shoes surrounding the proposals.
The problem is not just that garnering the salaries of our hairdressers and stable-boys to pay off the gambling debts of Eugene Sheehy and Seanie FitzPatrick will hardly improve the prospects of our skeletal high street shops, whose survival is predicated upon the ability of low-paid workers to have any disposable income at all. Our Government should have enough political intelligence to understand that social solidarity is not enhanced by their apparent willingness to 'kick down' when it comes to stable-boys and hairdressers and to 'kiss up' when it comes to powerful vested interests such as civil service mandarins.
We may be mere subjects of an ECB who are quite happy to turn this country into a scorched earth whilst they indulge in their ill-founded Malthusian economic-competitiveness experiment.
But even under the rule of the ECB, politicians like Mr Bruton should still be working to secure a 'just society'. Hairdressers, stable-boys and chambermaids are not just mere economic units. They, more than any banker, lawyer or NAMA-funded builder, are entitled to some quality of life.
The current Government may for the moment be surfing a minor wave of popularity. If, however, it wishes to retain the support and, more importantly, the respect of the public, it should be far more circumspect about who it kisses and who it kicks.
Originally published in
