The Solution for Ireland is Independence!
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
Here we are in a crisis with a very simple solution: there is a very clear and simple way out of this: it’s called Independence: energy independence, agricultural independence and economic independence. We can choose as our single overriding objective to make Ireland self-sufficient: it makes financial, moral
Ireland’s independence was brief: no sooner had we become a sovereign state than we deferred to Rome, and now as the influence of the Church collapses we depend on Brussels for our legal system and multi-nationals for our economy. Both of these dependencies are as unhealthy as the word suggests.
As an island nation with an abundance of natural resources, any other priority than self-sufficiency is madness. I firmly believe that once we become self-sufficient our exports will actually increase, but depending on exports and foreign investment weakens our economy and our society and keeps us firmly rooted as colonial servants, at the mercy of forces we can never control. Right now, Enterprise Ireland has declared as its purpose the generation of jobs through exports, and the IDA is dedicated to attracting foreign direct investment. Do we really think we can compete with China, India and Eastern Europe and maintain anything like our current standard of living? Both of these policies are dead-end streets that have led to our current disaster.
Here are the 12 steps towards a new, Independent Ireland:
1) Energy: our goal must be energy self-sufficiency in 10 years: all infrastructural investment to be dedicated to wind, water and other environmental means of harnessing energy, with a view to exporting energy instead of importing it.
2) Agriculture: we must re-dedicate our fertile lands and skilled farmers towards providing for the needs of this country, and including sharp tax rises on all products imported from abroad that can be grown here. No more Israeli parsley and Chinese garlic. The agricultural sector will review the requirements of the Irish public in relation to food requirements; products sourced from outside the EU will be heavily taxed on an air-miles basis. Indigenous retailers and distributors will receive preferential tax breaks. Many of these initiatives will violate EU law and in such cases Irish interests will take precedence over EU legalities. Irish products to be half the price of anything imported: prices to reflect distance traveled from source.
3) Health: processed, sugary and fatty foods should be taxed to the level where they become more expensive than the unprocessed alternatives. Crisps must be more expensive than apples, and the revenue from these new taxes will underpin a health-care system predicated on prevention and diet, then cure.
4) Social structures: paying people not to work is immoral and crippling. Everyone in receipt of state funds under the age of 65 will be required to work 6 hours a day to earn these wages. People with dependents under school-age will be evaluated based on their appropriate skill levels and six months after birth they will have to work 3 hours a day. Enforced idleness is demoralising and inhumane. Prisoners are to be included in this structure, and each prison will have to generate its own food and power, becoming in effect prison-farms where prisoners will inevitably learn valuable skills.
5) Employment: continuing from the above point, the creation of a National Volunteer Network for those individuals who cannot find employment will be deployed as free labour to qualifying businesses, institutions and organizations (including farms). “Right to Work” scheme rolled out nationally with potential for employees to switch from dole to pay depending on employers evaluation.
6) Education: the national school system will be divorced from the Church and will remain an exclusively secular organization. The curriculum will discard the current Victorian model in favour of a skills-based programme: by the age of 16 students should be guaranteed to have acquired: verbal and mathematical literacy; fluency in Irish and a choice of another language; how to grow and harvest fruit and vegetables; how to operate and repair a computer, car and bicycle; how to prepare and cook nutritious food; how to use a bank account; the stock market system; how to run for office, vote and become politically active; and possess a working knowledge of current affairs and modern history. Third level education will remain free to all users, with an emphasis on resurrecting a vibrant apprenticeship structure for trades.
6) Children’s rights: the current care system to be redesigned with a boarding school model where children in care live on farms that produce their own food and power.
7) Government: The number of elected representatives, boards, and government organisations will be slashed to create greater direct democracy in which fewer public servants serve a larger number of constituents. The Seanad will become an honorary organization whose members will be unpaid. An external evaluation of all payments made to serving and former public officials and examination of fairness and transparency in all aspects of renumeration.
8) Development: All natural resources to be the property of the people of Ireland and not multi-national companies. The system in Alaska (oil) and some Danish islands (wind) offers a model of cooperative ownership of resources: in these cases, each citizen gets an annual wage from these communal profits. All new building to happen in urban brownfield sites.
9) The Financial System: All those homeowners with mortgage arrears to be granted a suspension of repayments for as long as they are unemployed. All banks who cannot survive fail, with one remaining nationalized government approved bank run on a non-profit basis with low credit and high interest rates for users. The institution of a .05% tax on all financial services transactions.
10) Transport: Incentives for carpooling, rideshare and other combinations of shared transport in the form of decreased motor tax and toll fees (among others) for bone fide carpoolers. Meanwhile, biodiesel, methane and wave-generated electricity should be where are resources are targeted.
11) The Arts: the arts are one of Ireland’s greatest resources and a major factor in our tourism economy. Rather than being dependencies on government subsidy, a dedicated box office and download levy of one cent per purchase should be imposed and dedicated to sustaining the vibrancy of the arts in Ireland.
12) All you need is…? Let’s remember that we live in a society, not an economy; that our government is entrusted with creating the best quality of life for its people, not just prosperity or profit; and that Ireland’s great traditions of self-reliance, compassion and community are at least as precious as our currency.
What do you think?
