Election Diary: Polling Day

Well it's been an awesome 14 months or so, but it had to come to an end sometime.

In six hours time, voters across Tallaght Central are going to the polls.

I am immensely proud of the campaign we have run. I have engaged dozens of young people in active politics, in what has been the most substantial youth-driven campaign in Ireland - in one of the largest LEA's. I have brought real Labour values and politics to thousands of residents in community campaigns and through our political messages. It is worthwhile and of itself to have put forward such a campaign, but its legacy will be stronger still with an electoral mandate tomorrow.

I am asking blog readers to do just 3 things.

1. Vote Dermot Looney #1 in Tallaght Central, and transfer to my Labour colleagues, then keep left against the government.

2. Please vote Proinsias de Rossa #1 for Europe and do likewise. If you are not living in Tallaght Central, please vote for your local Labour candidates to build the real alternative in Irish politics.

3. Choose the friends you have in Dublin 12, 6w and 24. Then text, email, call, tweet, or send messages on facebook or bebo to them asking them to vote Dermot Looney #1. Take those 5 minutes now to make the difference.

There were many events and moments on the canvass today which I would love to blog, but tiredness and the early start tomorrow mean they will have to wait. Hopefully, there may be some opportunities to post during the quiet times tomorrow. In the meantime keep your eye on www.irishelection.com - who tonight called our web campaign "ace" - for the latest news.

I'll leave you with this.

As a young child I was deeply touched and inspired by Nelson Mandela's long walk to freedom and the queues and queues of people in South Africa's first free election. Those votes were won by an incredible struggle against a racist apartheid regime that seemed untouchable. Our right to vote comes from equally noble and oft-bloody struggles, from the Suffragette movement and the campaign to extend the franchise to more than just men of property, to the independence movement in Ireland and the great democratic revolutions of trade unionism and the Land League. Building the future is most prominent in the politics I espouse, but remembering the past must provide the foundation. Be sure to vote - and use it well!

Guest Post - Paul Dillane : "Time to Go Looney and Labour"

Paul Dillane is Campaign Manager of the Looney for Tallaght Central campaign.

Time to Go Looney and Labour

The local election campaign of 2009 is now drawing to a close.

By far the most response on the doors has been “so long as you are not Fianna Fail.” It has been a dramatic fall from grace for a party that swept the board at the general election.

When the short, intensive run in to the local elections began, the Dermot Looney campaign turned itself from its focus of political activism on local issues to attempting to gather votes from involvement in these issues. Again and again, we argued with people on the doors that the time was right to elect a campaigner to the council who would continue in the best traditions of Labour in the area.

One of the most encouraging aspects of the campaign has been the opportunity to politically engage with people across the ward of Tallaght Central. There is huge anger at the government and a good deal of disillusionment abroad. Convincing people that a political alternative is available has been a real task.

Many voters who opted for FF in previous elections are willing now to stitch allegiance. But those voters are often very weary of a potential Fine Gael government. We have insisted that we are campaigning for a Labour led government that represents a real break from the past, a real possibility in the now much altered political landscape.

There has been plenty of craic on the campaign trail. Meeting the occasional political loyalist from opposition campaigns has lightened the load considerably. The political grilling is part of the course for canvassers, or knockers as we are known in the states - or bashers, as we are called in some traditional elements of Irish political activism. Almost every voter, however, has been courteous and welcoming and willing to engage.

If you are a voter in the Tallaght Central ward, and you haven’t made up your mind, but are thinking of going Looney, I have a lot to say to you. However, I am warned that the blogospherere won’t hold pages of argument so I have condensed my case into 2 points.

Dermot Looney is:

The Labour candidate.

- Voting Labour is the way to put up a signpost to a new society in Ireland that is genuinely Republican and Democratic.

- Don’t go toward Fine Gael. Look at their policies; they represent more of the same.

None of the smaller parties can lead an alternative government.

Dermot Looney is not:

A member a party whose councillors have nearly ruined Dublin with disastrous planning (we are looking at you FF and FG), or active in a party who continue the dishonourable relationship between wealthy interests and politics that caused the scandalous planning issues in Dublin (we are still looking at you FF and FG).

Please support Dermot Looney tomorrow and thanks for reading the Looney Left during this campaign.

Press Release - Looney Demands Action as Tallaght Youth Unemployment Has Biggest Ever Rise

Dermot Looney, the Labour Party candidate for this year’s local election in Tallaght Central, has said that February’s live register figures display the biggest rise in youth unemployment in the Tallaght area in memory. Looney has slammed government inaction on the jobs crisis, saying that there have been no proposals or plans of any significance to curb the rise in youth unemployment, or to get people of any age back to work.

His comments come as the CSO’s live register figures show 7,974 signing on at the Tallaght Social Welfare Office – a jump of 713, or 10%, in the month of February.

Looney, who is based in Greenhills and works in Tallaght, noted that one of the most worrying figures was the youth unemployment rate, which has been spiralling in recent months.

Of the 7,974 out of work, a quarter – 1,974 – are under 25. Youth unemployment in Tallaght has jumped by an extraordinary 46% in the last four months, with February’s rise of 207, or more than 11%, the biggest rise on record. There is also a big gap in the proportion of under 25’s out of work in Tallaght – 25% - and the national figure of 21%.

Looney also noted the overall increase at the Bishop’s Square Welfare Office, used by people in the Dublin 12 and 6w parts of the Tallaght Central ward, which saw the number of those signing on increase from 6,342 in January to 6,916 in February – a jump of 574. There has an increase in those signing on in the last 12 months of almost 93%.

“Working people are the true victims of this crisis,” said Looney, “while the 33,000 millionaires and the undisclosed tax dodgers are hit very lightly indeed – if at all. There is a crisis both in the morality of a system which is punishing the most vulnerable the hardest, and in the policy vacuum at the heart of Government.”

“On the doorsteps, I have talked to countless young people and their families who are most at risk, hearing heartbreaking stories of despair. Even emigration is not an option for many young workers given the global jobs crisis. It is clear at this stage that we need action at three levels – local, national and international.”

“Internationally, my Labour colleague Proinsias de Rossa has proposed that we use the €14 billion in the European Social Fund for youth retraining, education and increasing mobility between sectors and access to the labour market for young people. Nationally, we need to implement new welfare to work initiatives and active labour market programmes as a matter of urgency, supported by decent provision of childcare and education places.”

“Locally, the INOU's call for an early warning system for redundancies will provide the time to attract other investment or retrain workers before they lose their jobs. Community Employment schemes, particularly for the long-term unemployed, must be maintained and developed, and talk of prioritising the high-tech sector can’t be allowed to exacerbate social exclusion in working class communities - meaning that no further cutbacks at any level of education are acceptable."

Gummy Spending Limits And the Need for Ethical Cash

After months of haranguing the Minister for Environment, John Gormley TD, eventually launched the much-vaunted local election spending limits today.

You'll find the details here.

The results, predictably, are a toothless whitewash, if that metaphorical mix is permitted.

For LEA's the size of Tallaght Central, a €15,000 spending limit will apply. For members of political parties, this is automatically reduced to €13,500 because a ten per cent levy (haven't we had enough of that word) is imposed on those getting support from party head offices.

Although our ward is one of the biggest in the country, the €15,000 doesn't bother me one bit. We simply haven't a hope of raising that amount of cash to spend. Nor do I intend traipsing along to a host of banks looking for loans that we may very well struggle to pay back.

We are more ambitious, perhaps, than any other campaign in Tallaght Central and I am sure our efforts will be noticeable in the final weeks of the campaign in particular. Regardless, our expenditure will be a fraction of that figure.

The figure is too high in the first place, but that's not likely to affect the heavy spenders anyway. The 'spending limits' apply only to the last 60 days of the campaign. Anyone in fear of going over the limit can simply front-end their spending to, say, 61 days before!

Not that it particularly matters. The proposals, as usual, are toothless. There is little on the way of resourcing of investigation of how accounts have been kept, their accuracy and what has been left off. Even if dodgy dealings were uncovered, there seems to be *no* punishment for those who lie or fraud their way in election accounts.

This is a typical Green governmental sop, simple as.

We will win our campaign here in Tallaght Central not on how much we spend, nor on how much we say we haven't spent - but on actual political engagement with voters, by the promotion of our message, and by the politics and values we put forward.

Money is most certainly needed for a modern election campaign - that's why I launched a donation drive last week - but for us, donations are small and from ordinary people who support our campaign. We refuse point-blank the big business and speculator bribery which hurt our communities and corrupted the politics of this country, and continues to do so.

Fianna Fáil and their cronies will have you believing this was all in the distant past, a relic of a byegone era. But let's look at facts - as Elaine Byrne has in today's Times.

1. Treasury Holdings declared donations of €100,000 to Fianna Fáil between 1997 and 2007 - and a further €70,000 to the PD's.

2. In total, the Fianna Fáil party, including its parliamentary wing, declared donations of more than €3 million during those ten years - approaching 60% of all declared donations.

3. Of the €1.5 million donated directly to the Fianna Fáil party itself, €600,000 - about 40% - came straight from developers.

4. These are iceberg tips. As Byrne notes, "The 2008 standards commission report found that €8.8 million in political donations were not disclosed in the three-week period before the 2007 general election (never mind that spent in the previous two years!)."

It's entirely factual to say Fianna Fáil are the party most supported by, and supportive of, big developers and big bankers. It is political corruption of the highest order - whether in-your-face-blatant or only blatant (there's nothing subtle about it). And a huge part of the progressive task is to ensure that culture of closeness is purged from Irish politices in this generation.

Press Release - Recent Youth Unemployment Trends Most Worrying of All - Looney

Dermot Looney, the Labour Party candidate for this year’s local election in Tallaght Central, has blamed government inaction for spiralling unemployment figures, calling for measures targeting young workers and young unemployed people to be implemented immediately. His comments came as national live register figures showed 327,861 people signing on in January 2009, with local figures just as worrying.

Looney, who is based in Greenhills and works in Tallaght, noted that at the Tallaght Social Welfare Office, the signing on centre for people from Dublin 24, an unprecedented 7,261 signed on for jobseekers allowance and benefit in January. This was 745 higher than in December, yet again marking the biggest monthly increase in unemployment in Tallaght this decade. Extraordinarily, there has been an increase in the Tallaght office alone of over 3,000 in the last year.

Looney highlighted the increasing youth unemployment rate as a cause for particular concern. There were 1,767 under 25’s signing on in Tallaght in January – an increase of 171 in just a month.

Looney also noted the increase at the Bishop’s Square Welfare Office, used by people in the Dublin 12 and 6w parts of the ward, which saw the number of those signing on increase from 5,652 in December to 6,342 in January – a jump of 690. The figures for this office are almost 3,000 up from January 2008.

“The current employment crisis is threatening any social gains made across this area in recent years,” noted Looney, “and will hit working-class communities the hardest. I have talked to countless young people and their families who are most at risk, hearing heartbreaking stories of despair. Even emigration is not an option for many young workers given the global jobs crisis. ”

“Nobody needs reminding that during the 1980’s more than one in four young people were on the dole, that many had to emigrate, and that this part of Dublin became an economic blackspot. Now that those days have returned it’s time for urgent policies which stem the flow. Labour’s proposals for an economic stimulus package would put thousands of construction workers back to work on vital national projects such as a nationwide school buildings programme and environmental retrofitting schemes.”

"We should use the €14 billion in the European Social Fund for youth retraining, education and increasing mobility between sectors and access to the labour market for young people. Here at home, we need to implement new welfare to work initiatives and active labour market programmes as a matter of urgency, supported by decent provision of childcare and education places."

"For more established and older workers, the INOU's call for an early warning system for redundancies will provide the time to attract other investment or retrain workers before they lose their jobs. Community Employment schemes, particularly for the long-term unemployed, must be maintained and developed, and talk of prioritising the high-tech sector can’t be allowed to exacerbate social exclusion in working class communities - meaning that no further cutbacks at any level of education are acceptable."

Unemployment Figures

I've done a lot of analysis lately of local unemployment figures and it makes for some of the most depressing work I've had to do in this campaign. As some of you will know, I did a degree in Social Policy in UCD and have studied all the major texts on unemployment, increasing labour market access, active labour market programmes, etc. But to know that there is a personal story behind each number - a family who've lost their breadwinner, an early school-leaver now listless, an older worker facing the prospect of never being employed again - gives an emotive and heart-rendering bent to the stats that goes beyond the data.

I put out a shortened press release on this yesterday - it's available here. But when I was doing it up I ended up with too much information for a standard press release. The papers just wouldn't pick it up. So here it is in all it's glory. It forms the basis of my policy on unemployment and the analysis which will inform me as a Councillor.

Dermot Looney, the Labour Party candidate for this year’s local election in Tallaght Central, has called for the strong-arming of youth employment initiatives in light of the latest local increase in local unemployment figures. The release of live register statistics for December saw the national unemployment level creep up towards the 300,000 mark, the highest figure since 1993.

Looney noted that the current employment crisis is threatening the social gains made across South West Dublin in recent years, and will hit working-class communities the hardest.

At the Tallaght Social Welfare Office, the signing on centre for people across the local community, an unprecedented 6,516 signed on for jobseekers allowance and benefit in December. This was 561 higher than in November, which is the biggest monthly increase in unemployment in Tallaght this decade. Extraordinarily, there has been an increase in the Tallaght office alone of more than 2,500 in just 12 months, due in part to the closure of major companies such as Jacobs (February), Microprint (March) and Tesco’s (April).

Looney highlighted the increasing youth unemployment rate as a cause for particular concern. Youth unemployment is defined internationally as those under the age of 25 who are active in the labour force but without a job. There are 1,596 under 25’s signing on in Tallaght in December – a jump of 160 in just a month, and an increase of more than 2/3 on the figure just 12 months before.

“The CSO’s most recent statistics on the proportion of young people out of work, last August’s Quarterly National Household Survey, showed a national youth unemployment rate of 16%,” said Looney.

“A more recent European study showing a youth unemployment rate of 17.7% in Ireland. Given the huge jump in general unemployment since then, it is likely that this rate is now approaching, or indeed beyond, 20% - meaning more than one in five young people who are looking for work can’t get it.”

“Nobody needs reminding that during the 1980’s more than one in four young people were on the dole, that many had to emigrate, and that this part of Dublin became an economic blackspot. Now that those days have returned it’s time for urgent policies which stem the flow.”

“My Labour colleague Proinsias de Rossa has proposed a Europe-wide Youth Employment Pact by using the €14 billion in the European Social Fund for youth retraining, education and increasing mobility between sectors and access to the labour market for young people. Here at home, we need to implement as a matter of urgency the ”

“For more established and older workers, the INOU’s call for an early warning system for redundancies will provide the time to attract other investment or retrain workers before they lose their jobs. Welfare to work initiatives and active labour market programmes must be supported by decent provision of childcare and education places, and Community Employment schemes, particularly for the long-term unemployed, must be maintained. The much-vaunted Government talk about prioritising high-tech cannot be allowed to exacerbate social exclusion in working class communities, meaning that no further cutbacks at any level of education are acceptable.”

“What makes matters worse is that these figures coincide with the introduction of new restrictions to Jobseeker's Benefit as a result of the October Budget. Anyone qualifying for Jobseekers' Benefit will receive payment for three months less than before the Budget cutbacks. In some cases, depending on credits, this will mean a maximum duration of 9 months on the benefit and in others it will mean 12 months. It will also mean that less people will now meet the criteria for Back to Education Allowance and for Community Employment schemes because qualification depends on the length of time a person is receiving a social welfare payment. These qualification periods affect young and temporary workers and their families hardest, and this supposed ‘unintended consequence’ of the Budget, which is already causing great pain for those struggling hardest, should be reversed by the Minister for Social & Family Affairs.”

Press Release - Local Labour Candidate Calls for Twinning of Tallaght and Gaza

This was picked up in today's Metro - full speech to follow.

Dermot Looney, a Labour Party election candidate for South Dublin County Council, has called for the twinning of Tallaght and Gaza City in a speech to Tuesday’s Irish Anti War Movement Demonstration against the Israeli attacks in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Looney (26) has a track record of involvement in Palestinian solidarity, particularly within Labour Youth, and has advocated the boycott of Israeli products and services as a campaigning tactic against Israeli state aggression.

Speaking on behalf of the Labour Party at the demonstration, Looney, a Tallaght-based teacher who is seeking election in the new Tallaght Central Ward, proposed the twinning of the two towns as a display “not just of symbolic solidarity, but of material and infrastructural support from the people of Tallaght and South Dublin Council in the time ahead.”

“I am asking local people and their representatives on the Council to stand in solidarity with the terrorised people of Gaza by making this link,” Looney noted. “The Council already have arrangements with Ethiopian, English and German local authorities, but this would be a real and lasting message of hope for Palestinians from the people of Tallaght.”

“On behalf of the Labour Party I unreservedly condemn and oppose the attacks on Gaza and call for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire. Such a ceasefire can’t merely be a lull to allow the Israeli war machine pause for breath. Nor can it be a substitute for meaningful talks to resolve the wider issues of which there are too many to name.”

“This latest attack on the people of Gaza has already led to the slaughter of more than 500 people. It is just the most recent in years of savage attacks on Palestine, be they bombs from the sky, invasions on foot, the blocking of food, cash and fuel, or any other of the series of Israeli interventions to deprive the Palestinian people of their basic human rights.”

“Here at home, we must pressurise our Government, who talk much about Palestine but do little, to impose sanctions on Israel and to act within the EU to that same goal. As long as Israelis continue to build settlements in the occupied territories and carry out the most heinous military and socioeconomic attacks, no one here can stand idly by or spout the same old platitudes.”

“My solidarity, and that of the Labour Party, is entirely on the side of the suffering Palestinian people, entirely on the side of those Israelis who oppose their government’s slaughter, and entirely on the side of a just peace.”

An Athbhliain Faoi Mhaise

Happy New Year to all the Looney Left readers. I took a few days break from the hard grind but for the next 6 months it's nonstop campaigning to win in Tallaght Central. More complete posts to follow in the coming days...

Press Release - Tallaght’s Youth Saying “Yes We Can” to Change: Labour candidate Looney

Tallaght's Youth Saying "Yes We Can" to Change: Labour candidate Looney

Dermot Looney, the Labour Party candidate in Tallaght Central for next year's local election, has said that Barack Obama's victory in the US Presidential election has given a huge boost to local young people who are demanding real political change. Looney, who worked on the Obama campaign in Virginia, was speaking after accepting a donation from Labour Youth at their annual conference in Limerick on November 8th.

Looney, the youngest candidate in the county yet declared at 26, has been a leading light in various student and youth campaigns over a number of years and has led the rejuvenation of Labour Youth in Dublin South West since joining the party in 2003.

A former Development Officer of UCD Students' Union, Looney is now working with students in Tallaght IT and young people across Tallaght, Greenhills and Templeogue in building a local Labour Youth organisation to campaign for what he has termed 'the real alternative' for the local area.

One of the key tools in their campaign is the use of social networking sites such as Facebook, a method used to great success in the recent US election, which has already attracted 250 local people to Looney's campaign group.

"I was lucky enough to spend a few days working on the Obama campaign in Virginia just prior to the election," Looney told the conference. "The inspiration and ideas generated by that campaign have resonated across the world, including the huge support and goodwill shown towards Obama by young people here at home."

"The model promoted by the Obama campaign can't be copied in an entirely different political landscape. But young people across Ireland who are desperate for real change have been inspired by the message of hope shining through in dark times."

"As well as being fired up by the idealism within the Obama campaign, young people are also looking for the change we need here at home – the change we need to break the politics of a long-gone Civil War, and the change we need in the issues which matter most to young people – jobs, education, health and housing."

Looney received a donation of €1,000 towards his campaign from Labour Youth's fundraising efforts at the Limerick conference, and asked the delegates to be positive about the change Labour's new generation can affect across Ireland. "Yes we can change Ireland and change the world. But the change we need begins here at home, and here in Tallaght Central we want to build on our success as the youngest election campaign in Ireland by growing our organisation and winning for ordinary people across the generations."

Looney, who will speak at an anti-fees meeting organised by IT Tallaght Labour in early December, has encouraged secondary school and college students, young workers and all local people under 26 to join with Labour Youth, which has seen its numbers boosted considerably in the recent economic and political tumult.