Ireland's 'Iron Lady' blasts handout moochers
Posted on Monday, July 18, 2011 at 10:37 PM
Larger Text
Print
E-mail
11 Comments
RSS 
Recent Posts
- National hero Donal Walsh loses battle with cancer - teen's optimism and courage inspired thousands
- Irish professor with multiple sclerosis Marie Fleming loses landmark right-to-die case in Irish Supreme Court
- Irish government cracks down on scam motorists - stamp out loopholes to scrub penalty points
- Terminally ill Irish teen Donal Walsh makes emotional plea to end youth suicide - VIDEO
- Drunk Irish teen charged with threatening to kill Guyanan president - 17-year-old told bodyguards he'd like to shoot Donald Ramotar
Archives
Ireland's 'Social Protection' Minister Joan Burton has today prompted comparisons to Britain's infamously tough Iron Lady Margaret Thatcher after choosing to hit out at what she termed a social welfare 'culture' in Ireland.
The Minister's misguided remarks have already drawn criticism from Opposition parliament members and unemployment support groups alike and reflect an attitude obviously still prevalent in Government that it's those out of work, rather than those overseeing the running of the economy, who are to blame for the disquieting numbers 'signing on' to social welfare in order to make ends meet.
It's true that there are some who take State handouts for the 'wrong' reason. When the difference between the average weekly Dole (social welfare) payment and a poorly paid four day workweek is often negligible who could blame some easy-going souls for choosing the easier path, at least temporarily? But by and large personal experience living here would indicate that the majority of those signing on are doing so for the 'right' reason, namely providing themselves with a basic weekly income at a time when they wouldn't otherwise be able to get by.
Those drawing the Dole for no good reason bar laziness can sometimes seem like an attractive bunch to follow, of course (the free-money-no-work lifestyle certainly has its selling points!) but most people will make at least some genuine attempt to find paid employment before having recourse to the State's welfare system.
What's disappointing is that the unduly harsh comments - which have been roundly criticized - were made by Ireland's supposed 'Social Protection' Minister, and a Labour Party one no less, who seems to have a doubtful grasp on both the remit of her portfolio - protecting those in society most in need - and the core ethos of the traditionally working-class part that as Deputy Leader she prominently represents.
Mostly, though, it just seems like another display of an aptitude for dodging responsibility that the current government seems to have so easily inherited from the previous one. Is it trite to point out that were it not for these politicians' disastrous economic planning there wouldn't be such heavy reliance upon the social welfare system to begin with?
Whatever about the crux of the Minister's comments, though, whether there is widespread abuse of the social welfare system or not, it's certainly a disheartening example of the kind of chasm that has emerged between Ireland's public representatives and the people they so often underwhelmingly manage to 'represent'.
Burton is an otherwise intelligent, thoughtful, and astute politician, but she could definitely have found better things to say during a recession than criticize those on social welfare.
11 comments
Page 1 of 1 pages
seanomelbourne | Jul 20, 2011, 07:18 PM EDT
THat's right blame the poor and unemployed for the dismal failures of irish bankers and their foreign bond holders. The "social protection" minister lives off the fatted calf of taxpayers money and who knows what other income she receives.Who's the biggest bludger one might ask.
Report abuse
GeorgeDillon | Jul 19, 2011, 02:52 PM EDT
Antoman: Are you on welfare?
Report abuse
Towngate | Jul 19, 2011, 01:17 PM EDT
Yeah, Anto, , I agree Salaries etc are far too high, but they won't always be! A good breakdown too,but the difference is: she has to get up in the morning, go out and run a Government Department,(and not the one she wanted, either, but hasn't complained, fair play to her!) and all the 'choicers' have to do for their money is to lie in bed waiting for the pubs to open and wonder which bit of themselves to start scratching first. 100 a week for doing nothing? Give me strength! ~ Send them all down to the quarry! - after an hour they'd wish they'd never been born! "Oh Mammy! - look at the blisters on me lovely soft hands! Kiss them better for me Mammy!" ...
Report abuse
Reilleyfam | Jul 19, 2011, 01:08 PM EDT
Burn the witch!
Report abuse
LoyalCitizen | Jul 19, 2011, 09:06 AM EDT
Do as I say not as I do from the traitors of Ireland.
Report abuse
antoman | Jul 19, 2011, 06:38 AM EDT
Let's out this into context -
Burton is claiming that people receiving €100 a week are making a 'lifestyle' choice.
Now this corresponds to a total of €5200 per yer.
The minister who is making this claim currently receives €191,417 per year or equilvant to the same payment for 37 people making a 'lifestyle' choice to live off the dole
Assuming this same minister is unceremoniously sacked by the electorate at the next election (which is not stretching the imagination too far) she will receive approximately a pension of €100,000 or roughly the same payment for 20 people making a 'lifestyle' choice to live off the dole.
Furthermore the same minister will receive a lump sum of approximately €275,000 or roughly the same payment for 53 people making a 'lifestyle' choice to live off the dole for a year.
It is easy to claim that someone getting €100 a week on the dole is making a 'lifestyle choice' when you can be assured of the type of money that Burton is/will be pocketing over the next few years.
Report abuse
Towngate | Jul 19, 2011, 05:49 AM EDT
the rest of us from those who choose to sponge. ~ If these payments were made with money that Ireland owned or that Ireland earned, all well and good: but this is somebody elses money! Time to pull back the begging claw, man up, work hard,stand up square and honest and and build a Nation to be proud of - before it's too late! ~ ~ ~
Btw: meant 'Shepherds of the Steeple Sheeple' for the 'Priest-ridden Irish' who surely can't take much more of Romes insults and arrogance! If Ireland was brave enough to expel the Papal Nuncio and refuse the Popes visit, it would send a resounding signal from 'Little Holy Ireland' that the world and the church couldn't fail to hear! ~ ~ ~ Even if it only prevented the hopeless agonised screams of one little child as its poor innocent body was being brutally violated, surely the destruction of the entire church would be worth it!
Report abuse
Towngate | Jul 19, 2011, 05:20 AM EDT
Danny: You seem determined to shoot the messenger here. Many might say the number of prosecutions of Benefit Cheats is pitifully low - given the reality which even 'the dogs on the streets' know; that Dossing,Dodging and the black market (nixer) culture is rife in Ireland. If she is compared to Thatcher thet may be unfair as I percieve no 'class war' basis for her words. But she should curb the Unions who protect inflated wages, then go on to the Public Sectors obscene Salaries and Pensions, if she has the fight for it! I am encouraged by the kind of 'Fighting Talk' heard recently from Gilmore on the Pope/Nuncio nonsence. Straight plain to the point. Game over,for the 'shepherds of the Steeple Sceeple'. So Burton should say 'Game over' to the scrounging hob-hatching Mammy-clinging dossers who whinge "...what kind of a welfare lifestyle am I supposed to have on E188.00 a week!". Danny, I suspect you know for a fact there is a huge section of Irish citizenry openly mocking the dilligent hardworking ones, and it has to stop. Burton's job in Social Protection' - that also means propecting
Report abuse
GeorgeDillon | Jul 19, 2011, 02:43 AM EDT
In my other note, I should have pointed out one further element of the stupidity of the Irish paying welfare for children in Latvia, Estonia etc. etc. As we know, the Latvian can claim for children, real or spurious, in Latvia. This regardless of how long he has lived in Ireland, or much he has contributed in Ireland. Contrast that with an Irish couple who, because of the mismanagement of their country by the corrupt and incompetent Irish ruling class, are forced to emigrate. They LOSE all entitlements to Irish child welfare the moment they leave Irish air space on the emigrant plane! They may have paid taxes for twenty years, their parents and ancestors may have been in Ireland for the past 1000 years, but once they leave Ireland the contemptible ingrate Irish state says Good Riddance. It's very hard not to despise the failed state that is Ireland.
Report abuse
GeorgeDillon | Jul 19, 2011, 01:49 AM EDT
I don't know much about this lady, but she appears to be an improvement on the corrupt and incompetent Fianna Fail. I did notice that she is trying to stop the crazy practice of the Irish taxpayer paying taxes in order to paying benefits for Polish, Latvian, Romanian etc. children. Who live in Poland, Latvia, Romania. Or then again, maybe they don't live. After all, the Irish only have the word of Poles, Latvians, Romanians etc. as to the existence of these children--they've never been seen in Ireland. As to the above article, no one healthy should be on welfare in Ireland. There are jobs galore. The problem is that the foreign migrants are doing them. A quick & easy solution to Irish "unemployment"? Send the migrant workers home, and make the Irish do the work they've taken. Slash welfare for all healthy adults. I've read somewhere that a guy with a couple of children can make up to $50k a year in benefits and welfare in Ireland. That's lunacy.
Report abuse
Page 1 of 1 pages
Report abuse