Dublin Fine Gael Councillor Therese Ridge : 'Do a door-to-door collection for money if you want your kids with learning disabilities educated in school...'(UPDATE - photo of article and more comment here.)
'Flying a kite' for her Fine Gael party bosses ? Or genuinely out of touch with the 'man on the street'?
In an interview with the 'Clondalkin Echo' newspaper (entitled 'Collection For Child Services' , issue dated 25 February 2009) local Fine Gael Councillor and State Senator Therese Ridge declared that she had "read with horror" the news that her fellow career politicians in Leinster House had cut special teaching posts in the 'Budget Extra' - " If they don't get the support now these children will need even more help and care when they get older . This is just anti-child and anti-family ," she said . And rightly so , we feel . "The Minister must be mad to take this away," the good Councillor and State Senator added. Right again , we feel.
When asked what could be done about it , Therese replied that if this cutback is not reversed then something would have to be done about it - " Could there be some sort of national* collection ? Surely we could do something about this ? I don't think anyone would mind giving to something like that ? " Now that's not right , we feel. A "collection" (on-going, as it happens) is already taking place - it's called 'income tax' and 'VAT' and , in a good few cases , a 'Pension Levy' . The parents of those children are paying tax and/or VAT and/or an increased 'pension levy' every day/week/month into State coffers , out of which a portion is supposed to be removed to pay for the educational requirements of children . Most people resent paying these taxes (not least because they are squandered by those who collect them as it appears that this money is diverted to keep them in the fine lifestyles to which they believe they are entitled) but they have no choice but to pay up as this 'collection' is stopped at source. Wealthy politicians like Therese Ridge see nothing wrong in being part of a corrupt system which takes this money out of your pocket , and which will grab even more from you if it can , whilst giving you little or nothing in return for it, and then knocking on your door with a collection bucket and , whilst practically filling their back pockets and brown envelopes with your money , telling you that if you want your kids educated at school then you'd better put even more of your money in their bucket! Unbelievable.
We find it impossible to believe that this lady sees nothing wrong in her 'plan' , which leads us back to the two questions we asked at the beginning of this post - is she 'flying a kite' for her Fine Gael party bosses on this issue , in the hope of obtaining Party brownie points for herself or is she genuinely out of touch with the 'man on the street'? Either way , such a remark shows the contempt which those wealthy political leeches hold the rest of us in. They should all be stripped of their ill-gotten wealth and deported to a small island and left there. Their greed and short-sightedness is more than we can afford.
(*"National" - by which this Fine Gael representative would mean the 26 Counties,as per her party's website.)
Sharon.
