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Arklow Comes Out Against Hogan’s Home & Water Taxes

24/03/12

At a packed public meeting in the Arklow Bay Hotel, residents from Arklow town joined together with activists from the County Wicklow Branch of the Campaign Against Household and Water Taxes to send a defiant rejection of these unjust taxes to the Twenty-Six County Minister of Environment Phil Hogan.

On Thursday evening [March 22] in the Bay Hotel, over 100 residents from Arklow attended a public meeting organised by community and political activists who are calling for a complete boycott of the household, water and sceptic tank taxes.

The packed hall heard speeches from Tony Hughes of socialist republican party éirígí, Michael O’Brien of the Socialist Party and guest speaker Joan Collins TD from People Before Profit, who all outlined their opposition to Minister Hogan’s harebrained tax schemes and urged all there to become organisers in their own estates, workplaces and sporting /social clubs. Following the speeches the audience then took centre stage where a strong and vocal anti-taxes Q & A session took place.

One of the main organisers of the evening’s event, éirígí activist Adrian O’Reilly, stated: “The campaign in Arklow has been going from strength to strength, the defiant nature in the room and the campaign of resistance being built against these immoral and unfair taxes is starting to buckle the Fine Gael / Labour government. People are standing up to be counted now as Hogan’s deadline of March 31st looms.

“The Irish people will not be taken for fools anymore and are now using this campaign as a referendum against this inept government and the IMF-EU-ECB Troika. When the last Fianna Fáil-led Government signed the Twenty-Six Counties up to the bank bailout scheme and then with a stroke of a pen and the help of the troika pushed all the debts of the bankers, developers and speculators on to the shoulders of the present and next generations of Irish people they committed the severe crime of economic treason.

“This Fine Gael / Labour Government have not only backed this up but now, under the direction of their IMF masters, are attempting to tax our homes, our domestic water and our sceptic tanks so as to squeeze more money out to feed and keep global corporate banks fatter. Our only option now is to boycott these taxes and begin to rise up and fight back.”

In conclusion Adrian stated, “The large turnout at the campaign meetings throughout Wicklow sends out one direct message to Minister Hogan and that is for him to listen to the angry voices of the Irish people and not the blood sucking vampires in the IMF and EU.”