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Arklow Gives Ruairí Quinn a Loud ‘No Home Tax’ Message

30/04/12

This afternoon [Monday, April 30] campaigners from the Wicklow branch of the Campaign Against Household and Water Taxes staged a picket on the gates of Páirc na bPiarsach in Arklow, County Wicklow. The picket was called to show 26-County Labour Party minister Ruairí Quinn that the campaign against his government’s stealth taxes is very much active and that campaign activists will continue to remind all the present Fine Gael and Labour Party ministers that hundreds of thousands of households still defy their austerity budget and their attacks on the Irish people.

Minister Quinn was met at the gates of Páirc na bPiarsach by a number of angry protestors who held posters and banners which read ‘Boycott the Household Tax’ and ‘No to Water Taxes’. The gathering also chanted slogans like “No way – we won’t pay!” and “Wicklow says No!”

Commenting at the demonstration éirígí activist and organiser of the picket Tony Hughes stated, “These government ministers need to realise that nowhere is safe for them while they are on their jolly day’s outings from Leinster House, whether they are holding constituency clinics or like today opening a 5-year-old Gaelcholáiste here in Arklow. We will meet them face to face and protest against these savage taxes that are been implemented on behalf of their political overlords in the Troika of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the European Commission (EC) and the European Central Bank (ECB).”

Speaking to the assembled protestors, Sean Doyle, who is a spokesperson from the County Wicklow branch of the CAHWT said, “We are here today to protest against the economic war that’s been waged against the ordinary people of Ireland by the coalition government comprising of Fine Gael and the Labour Party, and the law they passed of enforcement in an attempt to break the will of the people by the 31st of March 2012 to register their home.

“Upwards of 1 million people in the greatest act of civil disobedience since the foundation of the state refused to register. People stood together in solidarity against this 26-County governments attempt to impoverish the families they have decimated with austerity to make the poor pay the debts of bankers, bondholders and speculators.”

Sean also said, “This is Government policy to make you pay; they cut the fuel allowance for the elderly, cut the home care, respite care almost nonexistent, A&E closures, cuts to special needs education. Their merciless pursuit of the poor and vulnerable is well documented. So much for Labour’s way or Frankfurt’s way; Labour you are a disgrace to the memory of James Connolly.”

At the end of the protest, éirígí’s Tony Hughes called for more people to get involved in the campaign and to take to the streets to fight-back against the household and water taxes and the government’s policy of austerity.