Our Leaving Cert students deserve better – Mythen

Cllr Johnny Mythen has congratulated County Wexford students who received their leaving cert results last week and has condemned the government for failing to honour pre election promises to provide a realistic job creation programme. The Sinn Féin councillor has said that the Government must invest in a jobs creation package to stimulate the economy and to give our young people a future in their own country.

Cllr Mythen said;
“Thousands of leaving cert students have received their results but due to the economic situation many cannot afford or do not wish to go onto college and are left with the stark reality of emigration. Despite what some conservative commentators have claimed, jobs for the majority of these students do not exist. It amounts to a failure of successive governments to invest in a proper economic stimulus and job creation package.”

“Fine Gael promised an investment of €7 billion to create 100,000 jobs. Labour promised a jobs fund of €500 million and a Strategic Investment Bank with funds of €2 billion. Instead we got a miserable jobs initiative with only €29 million of expenditure on capital projects and €11 million on additional training places. Unfortunately the numbers of Irish people out of work continues to rise.”

“Sinn Fein believes that the government must invest €2 billion from the National Pension Reserve Fund to fast track labour intensive infrastructure projects and to assist small and medium sized businesses to save and create jobs. The quango system must be massively reformed with many of the ‘jobs for the boys’ being axed immediately. Unjustified tax breaks for the wealthy elite must be terminated. 82% of Irish people are in favour of a wealth tax according to research conducted by the community platform in 2010. “

“There are many ways to raise revenue for a real job creation programme that will not include inflicting further suffering on ordinary people through unfair austerity measures. The government should stop using taxpayers’ money to bailout unguaranteed bondholders. Rather they should be using this money to stimulate Ireland’s domestic economy.”