THE DIRTY DOZEN w/e Feb 17th 2013

As Michael Noonan crowed over the debt with which he had saddled future generations of his own people, he tossed out a couple of his little anecdotes. 

The first concerned his own personal home mortgage, how little the cost seemed in the final month of the 25-yr loan; the second was a suggestion for Sinn Féin finance spokesperson Pearse Doherty, how quickly he felt Pearse would snap up an offer to accept a loan of €1000 today from Michael but repay only the same €1000 in 40 years.

Two answers to those little anecdotes Michael.

In the first instance, at least at the end of the 25 years you have a house, and had it for the full duration of the mortgage; thanks to you and your betrayal last week of the Irish people, we're now committed to paying a mortgage on a house we never owned, and will never own.

In the second instance, at least Pearse would have got that €1000, which he was then free to invest for his own benefit; again thanks to you and your betrayal last week of the Irish people, we have now been saddled with an additional sovereign debt of €31bn (I include the 2011 payment) on a loan we never took out, not a cent of which was ever for our benefit.

Additionally Michael, and a critical detail you neglected to mention in that little anecdote, there is the little matter of the interest on that notional €1000 loan to Pearse. Then again you're not fond of detail, are you Michael, going by your advice in the Dáil 'debate' that we should just ignore the details of the unfortunately not-so-notional deal you had just concluded.

I have two little analogies of my own for you Michael.

1) We were stitched up for a crime we didn't commit, found guilty, sentenced to 20 years hard labour. The very expensive lawyers we've hired from the firm of Kenny, Noonan, Gilmore & Rabbitte didn't bother to appeal the verdict but instead got us a reduction on the hard labour for the first few years, but this relief is coupled with an extension of the sentence to 40 years, with the bonus that our kids and grandkids (depending on our age) will now have to share the cells with us. You, and your media cheerleaders, expect us to be happy with that?

2) We're a family of four, our local bank manager calls us, informs us that someone with whom we do business has reneged on a loan of €60,800 (our 'per capita' bank bailout cost is €15,200). He has opened a loan account in our name, set the terms, conditions and payment schedule, the money to be deducted automatically from our account every month. We hire those same expensive lawyers from that same firm, they don't bother to appeal the odious debt but sign us up to an interest-only 40-yr mortgage, the final sum to be paid by our kids and grandkids. Again, you and your media cheerleaders expect us to be happy with that?

How anyone can see this as a good deal for the Irish people is beyond me. Permanently saddled with a €69.7bn bank bailout debt is accepted as being 'the best we can do'; not sharing the bank debt burden with those who caused this crisis but accepting that we can burden-share that same debt with our kids and grandkids; a negotiating tactic of conceding the main issue even without argument (not looking for debt writedown); that anyone can accept any of this is beyond me.

This is debt slavery for generations of Irish people, payment for 40 years on loans we never took out. Again and again I repeat, this was private bank debt, financial for-profit agreements between consenting adults in private financial institutions. For the years when those bond agreements were generating profits, those lender financial institutions were more than happy to take those profits; they should also have takes their losses. Forcing those losses on the Irish people is wrong, period, and any subsequent debt associated with that act is odious.

In Ballyhea and Charleville the fight against that crime continues but we're no longer alone, with groups now starting in various centres across the country. On March 3rd we will be entering our third year of weekly protest. If you even the merest sense of what's right and wrong, you will resist this latest betrayal of your own interests, you will join us.

The bank bonds? No, they haven't gone away.