Tuesday, April 26, 2005

* hating Harney

IF there is one person in the Irish Government whom I have no respect and no time for it has to be Mary Harney, the current Tanaiste and Minister for Health. I have never been much in favour of career politicians, ie those who have never ever lived in the real world choosing instead to live their life within the hallowed and protected halls of the Oireachtas (the Irish parliament). And top of that pile in my head is Harney.
Certainly I can give her the pat on the back for her many personal achievements, the first woman to lead a political party in Ireland, etc, etc, however, I could equally boot her up the arse for her blinkered, view..... which has been born out of the 'I'm alright Jack' school of thought. There is almost a view that if she can do it anyone can. Yeah right!
Let's put things in perspective, Harney was made a senator at the age of 24 having made all the right contacts whilst in Trinty College Dublin (where incidentially very few working class students attend). Dublin at that time in the mid 80s was a bleak place. And I mean bleak so to have a job with that salary at that time, certainly set a person aside from the thousands on the dole queues. Somewhere between then and now, Harney's head disappeared up her ample arse.
A few years back, she made the great suggestion of single parents returning home - whatever that means!!!! Being a single parent, living with my child in my own flat, I was already home... I found this incredibly insulting particularly as she has never had to 'want' for a better word. She may work hard and I won't deny that but she has been finanically well set up for life also. So to have some buck eejit who knows nothing of the life and struggles of a single parent, particularly one who has lived a life without want... What I want to hear from her is how lucky she has been to be in the situation she is in, not preaching mindlessly to me, or those like me, about what we should or shouldn't do.
Harney represents an area in Dublin which has some money as well as a lot of poverty with rife unemployment. There are or should I say were schemes in these areas called Jobs Initiative and Community Employment Schemes, where someone who had been on the dole for some time could earn a few extra pound on top of their benefit, while learning skills and providing a service which was lacking in the area, such as childcare provision, drug user support programmes, local media, environmental issues (such as cleaning up areas, etc) and Harney decimated them. This put people out of the work they had, it meant that those people benefiting from the schemes lost out and as a result, areas in Dublin which have little to begin with have also lost out.
Here's a funny cartoon from when the cabinet was reshuffled here, go back to the main home page for a couple of other funny snippets. Harney is the big woman with supersize written on her hat....

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