Defence Forces refusing to participate in strike-breaking

national | worker & community struggles and protests | other press

Thursday February 05, 2009 03:52

by Blacbloc

A lot of people have probably wondered whether the government were planning to strong arm strikers and resort to dirty measures to intimidate workers. Looks like that option may not be available to them. Soldiers are saying they support the opposition to the pension levy.

Report in today's Irish Times that Pdfora are refusing to cooperate with any requests to get involved. It's not clear whether they had been asked or not - Willie O' Dea is equivocal so the answer is probably yes. If the soldiers hold good to their word then the government must surely be forced to reverse their management of the situation. We want to see the people responsible for this bearing the full brunt of it.

“It will be morally wrong for soldiers to be ordered to break strikes arising from the imposition of the pensions levy,” Mr Rooney said. Mr O’Dea described as a “hypothetical situation” the suggestion that soldiers would be used to break strikes. He said he did not comment on such situations.

However, in reply to a written Dáil question yesterday related to the issue, Mr O’Dea said: “As has been done in the past, the Defence Forces may be called on to contribute to maintaining vital services in times of industrial action.”

Mr Rooney said soldiers supported the opposition to the pension levy being expressed across the public sector. The pension levy was unfair and bitterly disappointing for soldiers, sailors and aircrew of the Defence Forces.“These personnel, many of whom have given long and dedicated service both at home and overseas, are now being unfairly used to address mistakes made in the management of the national economy in which they had no role,” Mr Rooney said."

Wonder how long it will take the government to realise that the only place they can look for the solution to this situation is where it lies: the rich. These people own most of the wealth this country possesses, they were the main beneficiaries of the greed years and they MUST now pay back what they wrongly took out of the economy.

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Comments (4 of 4)

Protecting the rich.

by Con Lee

Sat Feb 07, 2009 14:39

The purpose of the State is to protect the propertied from the 'lower classes'.

The state forces are mostly drawn not from the privileged but from the working class.

If the members of these forces refuse to defend the privileged and join in solidarity with their fellow workers this move is greatly to be welcomed.

It signals a serious blow to the power of the state to oppress.

Employers, the meeja, academics, politicians have all joined in a chorus of anti-working class rhetoric, blaming the workers for the current economic mess.

They have no solutions to the crisis. Just bombast and bamboozlement.

Solidarity of the army with the their fellow workers will cause real fear among the unproductive, oppressing stratum.

Read before you post

Fri Feb 06, 2009 02:21

The article NOWHERE defends or suggests the role of the army is anything other than what it is. The POINT is that if even the army are backing off defending this cut, and refusing to engage in coercing workers who protest by strikebreaking or scab labour, the government has nowhere to go.

Duh!

Defence Forces

by brigadier general lieutenant commander

Thu Feb 05, 2009 18:40

So doing un-military things like guarding prisons, providing security for banks, keep an eye on the plane spotters at Shannon, backing up the Shell security in Mayo, even entering beauty contests (see link) are all okay for the free state army, but when it comes to something that might hit them in their own pockets they suddenly get a conscience...

Yeah right.

Link to IT article

Thu Feb 05, 2009 03:53

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/0205/1....html

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Defence Forces refusing to participate in strike-breaking

Comments (4 of 4)