A year ago, they justified their strategy of wage cuts and public service reductions with the cry ’we have to get the public sector deficit down’.

Neoliberal economists were rolled out on the television networks to explain that we had to balance the books. They suggested that if we did not act, we would be paying huge rates of interest for years to come and this would be ‘unsustainable’.

Now, however, the interest rates on Irish government bonds have shot up to 6% - as the country has been designated high risk.

Every time the anonymous money lenders of high finance get nervous, they want their mouths stuffed with gold – so they push up interest rates.

As a result of this, Ireland will be paying one tenth of its budget in forthcoming years – just to pay off the interest rates. This huge fee will come on top of planned cutbacks .

All of this has occurred because the Irish government thought that it could be a trail blazer for right wing policies in Europe.

It presented itself as an advocate of slash and burn economics when others were looking to stimulate their markets.

It offered the most generous bank guarantee in Europe in order to keep the money markets happy.

For a period it won high praise from financial commentators in the corporate media and the recent idiotic inclusion of Brian Cowen in the list of the ten best world leaders was one indication of this sentiment.

On the home front, spin doctors worked hard to cultivate an image of Finance Minister, Brian Lenihan, as a brilliant genius who had mastered his brief. A drum beat about Ireland’s recovery was also built up in the state and corporate media.

Yet now this whole economic strategy is falling apart.

Recent figures show that 6,000 a month are joining the dole queues – and unemployment is set to rise to 14% of the workforce. This, however, is an underestimate as a deliberate policy is being enforced to discourage migrant workers from signing on and to discount others who are assigned to categories such as pre-retirement.

Despite this huge rise in unemployment , an estimated 70,000 to 80,000 are emigrating each year.

The government bank -bailout strategy is equally falling apart. It has deliberately held back information on the sheer scale of what is involved and only recently announced that Anglo-Irish Bank will cost €24 billion. (The rating agency Standards and Poor, however, think it might even go up to €35 billion)

To put the lower figure in context: That is more than the G8 leaders have pledged to the eradication of hunger for the 650 million people on the planet who are now starving.

To take a more parochicial comparison, the €24 billion would have provided everyone on the dole with €36,000 and still have money left over to repair the health service.

It is time to end this utter madness and Socialist Worker is urging you to focus on the following event that can help to get people onto the streets to remove this government.

Wednesday 29th of September now looks set to become a major day of protest action. This has been designated an all-Europe day of action against cuts by the European Congress of Trade Unions. Co-incidently, it is also the anniversary of the bank guarantee in Ireland. Already Community against Cuts, which brought together 15,000 people to protest last year, has called for mobilisation. Now the ICTU are also reported to be ’considering’ holding a demonstration to the Dail on that day. Trade unionists should pass resolutions to push support for this action – and if the ICTU is not willing to lead a mobilisation to look to other forces instead.

In the meantime, we also urge you to get active with the socialists. Now is the time for doing something about a system that brings chaos, misery and social suffering.

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