THERE’S A RUMOUR GOING AROUND…

There’s a rumour going around

– You might have heard it –

That Ireland’s on the rebound.

That we’re stable

And we’re able,

As we face a future bright

Full of promise and delight.

The ship of state is in safe harbour,

All thanks to the behaviour

Of Fine Gael and Labour,

Their eminence

In governance.

But we know the truth.

We know

Interest rates are at lows never seen before,

Bond yields at rates that have hit the floor,

And yet, and yet…

Last year on our national debt

we paid €8bn interest. Eight billion!

When those rates rise, we sink.

Recovery? We’re on the brink.

We know

The exchange rate collapse against pound and dollar

Has seen our exports soar,

Our tourism roar,

But again, and as with the interest rate failure

NOTHING to do with Fine Gael /Labour.

Quantitative Easing;

Oil price squeezing –

You think these are controlled by Joan or Enda,

Are remotely related to our government’s agenda?

No, my friends.

Rather than steering the ship to safe haven

We are cast adrift in stormy seas,

At the mercy of the wind, the waves,

Weighed down with ballast of increased debt

And abandoned to our own fate

While the captain and his officer corps

Take the lifeboat to a sunny shore,

Their pension booty safe, secure.

Recovery? Stability? For who?

We know, because we know the truth.

There’s a rumour going around

– You might have heard it –

That jobs have been created,

Unemployment has abated

And the country’s back on track.

Jobs? Heading towards full employment?

What kind of jobs? What kind of employment?

We know the truth, the real numbers;

The part-time employed,

The under-employed,

The job-bridge scam-bridged;

And then, those who are made totally invisible,

Who can’t even get on the register. Risible. Totally risible.

And this isn’t to even mention emigration,

A nation stripped of a generation,

Our youth forced out by the anti-youth bias

Of a cold, short-sighted government.

‘We can’t afford ye - get ye gone

And we’ll call ye anon,

When we need ye!’

There’s a rumour going around

– You might have heard it –

That Enda took the hard decisions,

Made only necessary incisions

On the weakest of the weak,

On the poorest of the poor,

On the sickest of the sick,

On the most vulnerable of the vulnerable.

And – shamefully – on the venerable,

Their hard-won legacy

Inexorably undone.

Hard decisions? Hitting the softest targets again and again

While protecting the powerful from sharing the pain?

We know the truth of it.

There’s a rumour going around

– You might have heard it –

That the Promissory Notes were destroyed,

Great ingenuity deployed

And it saved us €20 billion.

There’s even a rumour going around

That on the new P Note deal

We’re making money

On destroying money.

I mean, is that for real?

We know the truth.

Trichet barked his threat

And ALL that private debt

Was transferred to us

In one fell, foul swoop.

Debt slaves for generations

To a new Empire of subjugators,

Betrayed by our own.

Yes, there’s a rumour going around

– You might have heard it –

Of Stability and Recovery.

They’ll promise the earth but ‘twill be no surprise

If all that we get is mud in our eyes.

Because we know the TRUE legacy

Of this Fine Gael/Labour confederacy.

The Irish Water debacle;

The Property Charge debacle;

The HSE debacle;

The homeless debacle;

The hunger and poverty debacle;

The flooding debacle;

The Siteserv debacle;

The IBRC wind-up debacle;

The hasty and costly NAMA fire-sale of assets debacle;

The Eircode debacle;

The Promissory Notes debacle;

The Banking Inquiry debacle;

The firing of the Garda Commissioner debacle;

And on and on and on.

Stability? Recovery?

In Ireland 2016

We struggle to make ends meet,

Ends this government has stretched beyond breaking point.

‘No cuts to welfare or pension’ they chant!

But that half-truth is exposed

As we daily deal with regressive charges imposed.

We know the truth

Because we LIVE the truth.

We bury our dead,

Those for whom life under your rule became so repressive,

So depressive,

That by their own hand, they end it;

Not because they want to die,

But because you have crushed their spirit.

We nurse our sick,

We care for our infirm,

For our venerable,

For our vulnerable,

Those whom this coward regime has brutalised

As you vandalised

Our social services.

Oh yes, we know the truth.

Our resources squandered,

National assets plundered,

Our oil, our gas, our fishing-grounds,

Given away for a song.

Sovereignty surrendered

Without even an argument.

It’s not just that Fianna Fáil

destroyed our economy,

Or Fine Gael/Labour

destroyed our society,

It’s that between them all,

By their craven submission to Trichet’s threats,

By their coward assumption of private debts,

They have bruised the soul of a noble nation,

A tale of betrayal

On an ignoble scale.

100 years after 1916,

We are slaves again,

New chains and a new empire.

We know the truth of it.

We’ve made our own discovery

Of this recovery

And we know;

We don’t just need to rearrange

The deck-chairs on this ship of state –

We need change, REAL change.

On Friday February 26^th 2016

100 years after Easter 1916,

Let there be a new Rising.

JOAN COLLINS TD - PROMISSORY NOTE SUPREME COURT CHALLENGE

THE FOUR COURTS – HISTORY REPEATING

During the Easter Rising of 1916, some of the most intense battles were fought out at the Four Courts, the rebels there under the command of Limerick’s Ned Daly, then all of 25 years old (he was the youngest of those executed after the Rising).

100 years later the Four Courts is again the scene of an intense battle.

On Thursday last the Supreme Court began its hearing of the appeal by Joan Collins TD on the constitutionality of the now infamous €31bn Promissory Note debt.

By any measure and regardless of outcome, given a) that €31bn was several billion more than the sum of the entire take in Ireland in 2010 from Income Tax, Corporate Tax and Capital Tax combined, and given b) that one person – the then Finance Minister Brian Lenihan – made the decision to gift that enormous amount to a financial institution without recourse to the Dáil, this is an issue of major significance for the nation.

If Joan Collins wins her case, it makes that decision not just illegal, but unconstitutional.

If she loses, it means that any future Finance Minister can make a similar commitment on behalf of the people – nay, it would go even further; given that this isn’t about the amount so much as the principle, it means any future Finance Minister can commit the people to a debt without limit.

BALLYHEA SAYS NO JOINS THE BATTLE

To show our support for Joan, and because she has been such a consistent supporter of our own campaign, a group of us from Ballyhea Says No and from Charleville Says No went up for the day to the Supreme Court. It was a day well spent.

Arguing the case on behalf of Joan is former Attorney General John Rogers SC (Senior Counsel). Four hours John spent on his feet on Thursday last, four intense hours during which he laid out his arguments to the seven Supreme Court Judges, four hours of sharp and very pointed questions, four hours of presenting, defending, arguing, rebutting, four hours of considering every syllable of every word uttered. One slip, and it could be game over.

A STUDY IN CONTRADICTION

Watching John in action and listening to John in action are two entirely different experiences. 

He stands to his considerable height, hands gripping the sides of the lectern on which are placed the copious case files, gazes at the Judges from under his considerable brows and as he readies to speak, inside his head you can imagine the whirring of the cogs of a precise, finely-tuned, super-charged mind accelerating smoothly and powerfully through the gears, then into overdrive as the implications of each and every question are considered. High revs but no smoke, no oil burned because this engine is as finely-tuned as you’ll get. That’s what you see.

Then there’s what you hear. Or what you don’t hear. Pauses… long pauses… … … … many, many long pauses… … … … … …

John Rogers SC doesn’t speak, he allows words their freedom only after every letter has been strip-searched for potential explosives.

And he’s right.

DIVERSIONS DIVERTED

One by one, through their questions, the Judges invited John to take a stroll down side-streets, up an adjacent boreen, across to this lovely parallel avenue but no; John was on one road and one road only, would not be diverted from that path.

His argument as to why the Promissory Note deal as signed by Brian Lenihan is considerable but can be summed up in a sentence: Brian Lenihan assumed a debt of €31bn for the State without a Dáil vote; this is in breach of Article 11 of the Constitution. Period.

The fact that the €3.1bn per year that was scheduled to be borrowed and destroyed from 2011 onwards under the original schedule, did actually appear in the Budget estimates for 2011? Irrelevant – the commitment to pay the full €31bn was already made, this was merely the payment schedule, presented to the Dáil only as an FYI (for your information) line item.

Imagine it as taking out your mortgage for €200,000, or whatever; that’s the loan agreement finalised, you don’t then go back to the bank to agree every monthly payment when it comes due.

An emergency situation, the country and its banks on the brink? Irrelevant – Mr Lenihan should still have gone to the Dáil for its approval.

Precedents, other situations in which a Dáil vote hadn’t been sought or given? Again, irrelevant. Two wrongs don’t make a right kind of thing, precedent can be wrong as easily as being right.

I don’t know about the seven Judges but certainly all of us from the Ballyhea group were firmly convinced by John Rogers. But it’s a funny old game, this Supreme Court appeal system. 

WE’RE WINNING, BUT…

It’s very much a game of two halves and our side, in the person of John Rogers, had the ball for all of the first half.

On Monday, we’re back in the Four Courts again and this time, apart from the first ten minutes when John Rogers gets to complete his arguments, Michael McDowell will have the ball. Yes, THAT Michael McDowell, former Attorney General himself, former Minister for Justice also, and grandson of Eoin McNeill, Chief-of-Staff of the Irish Volunteers and one of those who countermanded Pearce’s orders for the Easter Rising, thus reducing the number of Volunteers engaged.

Ah, history, and wheels within wheels!

Like John Rogers, Michael McDowell is a man of considerable intellect and with the ball now in his court (pun very much intended), all we can do is sit back and again, bear witness.

Fascinating times, critical times.

Stay tunes, we’ll keep ye posted.

Regards, Diarmuid O'Flynn.