AAA candidate debates against new anti-immigrant party

The recent reported remarks of David Begg, when answering criticism of ICTU’s lack of a fighting lead throughout this economic crisis, are absolutely galling.

“Introducing a property tax will prove one of this Government’s most difficult challenges.  It may even prove intractable.” - Noel Whelan, Irish Times, 1 September. The Government’s new property tax will hit households many times harder than this year’s household tax. The International Monetary Fund have called on the Government to introduce the property tax at a “suitably high” rate.

"The European train will be leaving the station on January 1, 2013 and the Irish people should be on board." So declared Taoiseach Enda Kenny in the Dail on Wednesday morning in response to a question of mine relating to the Referendum on the EU Fiscal Compact which the government has been obliged to call. The Taoiseach was speaking in Irish as it was ‘Lá na Gaeilge’, with Leaders’ Questions in Irish. However, the impression he was trying to convey was false in any language, which is that rejecting the Fiscal Compact would somehow mean not continuing as a member of the European Union or indeed as part of the Eurozone.