Dear Editor,

They’ve started singing it already, the new ‘Coalition Chorus’ – Ireland is about to successfully exit the bailout! It’s a lie, a false front being presented to the world; here at home however, we’re only too familiar with the truth. Far from exiting a bailout we’re entering the fourth year of Ireland’s bail-in, the fourth year of at least 40 years of debt-slavery to Europe.

There is a perception abroad that Ireland Inc. went crazy during what became known as the Celtic Tiger, that the country borrowed its way into trouble and we have now been ‘bailed out’ by the Troika.

A few facts:

• Entering 2008 – Gross Government Debt €47bn; National Pension Reserve Fund €20bn;

• Mar 2013 – Gross Government Debt €204bn; National Pension Reserve Fund €6bn;

• Troika ‘bailout’ loans €62.5bn; bank bailout contribution €69.7bn;

• Debt writeoff €0.

Begs a question then, doesn’t it – who bailed out who? The world is being duped and with this bank-debt burden on top of the crushing national debt on top of the mortgage crisis, with depression, emigration and suicide rising in every community, we’re the fall-guys. This is our reality, as opposed to the Irish ‘success’ fantasy as told and sold worldwide by Enda Kenny.

The most odious part of the entire Irish bank-debt is the Promissory Note element, €31bn gifted by the ECB to two zombie banks (Anglo Irish and INBS) through its branch office in Dublin, the Central Bank of Ireland.

Despite the fact this was done to save the Eurozone, Europe’s bigger banks, even the Euro itself, the Irish people have been landed with that entire bill, €31bn plus interest. The ECB ‘allowed’ the Irish Central Bank print that €31bn for those two banks, now they want that same €31bn taken back out of circulation. We borrow it, billion by billion; we burn it, billion by billion, til all €31bn is destroyed. In the meantime we’re paying the interest on all those borrowed billions and then, we pay the capital.

In February of this year, to great fanfare, Finance Minister Michael Noonan announced a deal and since then every government spokesperson on every media outlet has attempted to give the impression that the remaining €25bn Promissory Notes are gone, finished, ended (we had already destroyed €6bn).

They are not. They have a new name, new home – they are now Sovereign Bonds, are held in the Central Bank and about to be sold to possibly the very same bondholders who were bailed out by the original Promissory Notes €31bn in the first place – ah, irony. The one major difference? As though he wasn’t hammering the young hard enough, Minister Noonan has so arranged the Promissory Notes bonds payment schedule such that the bulk of it falls on future generations.

At 9pm next Wed, Nov 27th, the Dáil will vote on a Motion that will be proposed by the Technical Group (16 TDs, Independents and smaller parties, calling for the full and final destruction of those Promissory Note bonds.

In Ballyhea we’ve been marching every week for 142 weeks with that as one of our prime goals. We’re asking now that (a) people ask their local TD – regardless of Party – to support this motion and (b) stand with us for just four hours on that evening, November 27th from 6pm to 10pm, at the Dáil, add your voice outside to those arguing our case inside.

Burn the Bonds, not the Billions!

Regards,

Diarmuid O’Flynn,

Ballyhea.