There is a strong argument that the Government should not introduce a house-property tax next year: the economy and hundreds of thousands of households simply cannot absorb it. By Michael Taft.

Let’s assume the Government comes up with the best house-property tax ever devised – truly progressive, taking into account all the social factors such as unemployment, low-income, arrears, and mortgage equity (or lack of). Yes, it’s a big assumption but let’s try it anyway. If this occurred there is still a strong argument that the Government should not introduce such a tax next year or even the following. And that is because the economy and hundreds of thousands of households cannot absorb it. Let’s run through some of the arguments.

First, the domestic-demand recession is expected to continue next year – the sixth year in a row.

That the family featured in an Irish Times article by Kathy Sheridan last week is going through seriously difficult times is, unfortunately, becoming ever more ordinary for hundreds of thousands of households. So why is Eilis O’Hanlon having such a go at them in the Sunday Independent? By Michael Taft.

Is there no limit to the extent to which poverty deniers will twist and misrepresent facts to fit their agenda? If Eilis O’Hanlon’s piece in the Sunday Independent is anything to go by, probably not. I usually don’t write about Sindo pieces – the day is too short; if the day were a thousand hours long, it would still be too short. I let Garibaldy do the heavy lifting in responding to Sindo nonsense (he does it with far greater patience than I could). But O’Hanlon’s piece – mocking people who are experiencing deprivation, labelling them pawns and refusing to face up to the elephant-fact in the room: that austerity is driving people into despair - this kind of thing should not go unchallenged.

The story of St Patrick's Institution is one which we, as a nation, should be horrified to hear in in 2012. By Yvonne Daly.

The Inspector of Prisons’ Report into St. Patrick’s Institution makes for harrowing reading. His use, throughout, of the word “child” is poignant and dramatic. He does not speak in technical or legal terms about “juveniles” or “young offenders”; he does not list complicated Articles of the Constitution or the European Convention on Human Rights; he does not pontificate. He simply tells the story of St. Patrick’s Institution, of the children imprisoned there, of the adults imprisoned there, and the dismaying culture that has festered there. It is a sad, sad story, and one which we, as a nation, should be horrified to hear in Ireland in 2012.

Rather than just wishing unemployment would go away, we should use the current crisis to rethink employment and unemployment completely. By Tom Boland.

Unemployment peaked at around 17% in the 1980s, and including the numbers currently on schemes, the current figure is also that high. But with the current debt burdens on households and the State, it may take longer for Ireland to recover. One consistent part of our thinking is that the solution to unemployment is a job. Sure enough, but only from an individual point of view. Unemployment in double figures will be back again. There is no reason to imagine the future will be a utopia of comfortable stability. So beyond just wishing that unemployment would go away, like a disease to which a cure might be found, it is better to use the current crisis to rethink unemployment as a whole.

How unemployment is dealt with changes historically. Sometimes it is treated more kindly, like Roosevelt’s New Deal, sometimes less so, like in Work to Welfare schemes in America, which are unpalatable but hardly unthinkable in Ireland. How we deal with unemployment reflects how we think about society as a whole: Is it an extended family in which we help each other out, or a club in which those who don’t pull their weight suffer the consequences? Generally, we are ambivalent – believing a bit of both, despite the contradictions.

Today, on International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, the Equality Budgeting Campaign has called on the Government to introduce measures “to put a halt to the growing inequality and poverty seen in Ireland since the beginning of the economic crisis”. The campaign coalition, which includes lone parent groups, disability organisations, migrant organisations, trade unions and women’s groups, among others, says that it is possible for the Government to reverse the current trend toward increased hardship for the poorest people living in Ireland.

“The introduction of equality budgeting in Ireland would give government the necessary information to make critical decisions concerning people’s well-being, and put an end to widening inequalities in Ireland,” says Dr. Clara Fischer, a spokesperson for the campaign.

“An equality impact assessment of the budgets and equality audits would ensure that economic policies are assessed in terms of their effects on different sections of society so that they do not disproportionately impact on people experiencing poverty and inequality. Currently, there appears to be little regard for the disproportionate impact cuts and tax increases are having, which means that the same people are continuously disadvantaged. The resultant exacerbation of poverty and inequality is not only morally indefensible, but it is also counterproductive to economic recovery. The government must now intervene to ensure a more equitable and prosperous Ireland.”

That we can’t, that we don’t, ensure that nobody in our society goes without food says something about the kind of society that is being created for us. By Michael Taft.

A new report is out - Constructing a Food Poverty Indicator for Ireland. It estimates that one in ten people experienced ‘food poverty’ in 2010. In other words, hunger. I know the phrase ‘must-read’ is sometimes over-used, but this is truly a must-read report. The very idea that one-in-ten of our neighbours suffer from food poverty is truly frightening. Maybe you won’t be guaranteed a job, maybe you won’t be guaranteed free medical care regardless of your need, but surely in a civilised society we can ensure that no one goes without food. That we can’t, that we don’t, says something about the kind of society that is being created for us.

This estimate produced by Caroline Carney (General Council of the Bar of England and Wales) and Bertrand Maître (ESRI) is based on a careful methodology. It uses deprivation indicators that relate to food in the EU’s Survey of Income and Living Conditions:

While in Iceland the left-leaning Icelandic government chose to focus the impact of the adjustments necessitated by the crisis on the richest sectors of Icelandic society, in Ireland the poorest have been made to bear the brunt. By Vincent Browne.

At a conference in Dublin last week, an academic from Iceland, Thora Kristin Thorsdottir, showed a chart contrasting the impact of the crisis measures adopted by governments in Iceland and Ireland on real disposable earnings of couples by income deciles (that is the poorest tenth of earners, the next poorest tenth, through to the richest tenth).

It showed that the poorest tenth of earners in Iceland suffered a drop of 9%, whereas in Ireland the drop was 26% (the data for Ireland was for the period 2008-2009 and for Iceland 2008-2010).

For the second-poorest 10% of earners, the drop in Ireland was 14%, in Iceland, 9%. For the second-richest tenth in Iceland the drop was 17%, in Ireland it was just 2%. But, the most revealing figure of all, for the richest 10% in both countries, in Iceland the richest had a drop in earnings of 38%, in Ireland the top 10% showed an increase of 8%.

Minister for Health James Reilly’s addition of two towns in his own constituency – Balbriggan and Swords – to a list of primary care centres is still causing controversy, two weeks after this story broke. Despite rounds of questioning in the Dáil and long media outings by Minister Reilly, we are no clearer now on how they got on the list and what criteria were used to compile the list. By Sara Burke.

There is a government commitment to develop primary care centres (PCCs). There are three ways of funding those centres –

1. The State pays and builds the centres itself
2. Through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs)
3. Through leasing

The previous government’s preference was leasing sites. Some are already being built and paid for in full by the State, especially in areas of urban and rural deprivation. In July 2012, as part of the Government’s stimulus package, a list of 35 locations – out of which 20 PCCs were to be developed through PPPs - was published by James Reilly.