Bin Trucks Grounded in Fingal
dublin |
bin tax / household tax / water tax |
news report 
Wednesday September 10, 2003 12:25
by No Bin Tax
Anti-bin tax protesters ground trucks in North and West Dublin
Fingal County Council have escalated the bin tax struggle by refusing to collect the bins of non-payers.
The anti-bin tax campaign has moved onto a new level in Fingal. For years, a campaign of mass non-payment of this unjust double tax has been going on across Dublin.
Today Fingal Council refused to collect the bins of non-payers. In response, residents in Fingal have taken to the streets and grounded at least five of the Council's bin collection trucks in housing estates.
The Gardai are trying to intimidate protestors by taking names. Joe Higgins, Socialist Party TD, has just been on the Pat Kenny show defending the protests.
Comments (17 of 17)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17they're going to do the same in Inchicore as of next week.
RTE now reporting that Fingal are admitting that 6 out of then 10 bin trucks are 'effected'.
North Dublin
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087-2400331
8321884
West Dublin
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087-6273581
See their website also
Pat Kenny: "Have the Gardai taken your name Joe?"
Joe Higgins: "I think the Gardai already know who I am, Pat."
http://www.socialistparty.net/pub/news/noncollectionday1.htm
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Also, for more updates, see:
http://tinyurl.com/mwgw
Aren't these binmen just "workers in uniform" as the SP would claim? Jaysus, though, how are we going to get improved social and community services if the Left continues to focus on Luddite anti-tax campaigns? No taxes, no services. Yes, make the rich pay more, but everybody STILL has to pay something for these services.
the bin men were in my gaff havin cups of tea, laffin at the whole situation.
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People already pay for their bins in their PAYE tax, so why should they pay again? The fact is that the general public only equate to causing 1.5% of the wastage in Dublin. Why then should they pay for it?
Listen Mr Tiocfaidh, I'm well aware that industry and business should stump up for the disposal of their waste but to suggest that income tax covers everything is, ahem, rubbish. Thanks to our neo-liberal government, particularly Harney and McCreevey, Ireland pays very little compared to other European countries - and the taxes we do pay are misused quite often. Prior to the 'Celtic Tiger' we had among the worst social infrastructure in Europe; post-the aul mog, we still have very poor health and public services. Why? Well, part of the reason is that Harney and her neo-liberal mates place little emphasis on such things and spend all their time extolling the virtues of 'low taxes'.
Unless taxes are INCREASED (particularly taxes on industry and business), we will never see a proper social infrastructure in this country. Obviously, those on low incomes should get exceptions from things like bin taxes and tv licenses but those on reasonsable pay should stump up. The 'can't pay' bit is fine; the 'won't pay' slogan is infantile. We live in a low-tax economy and that is a problem rather than a positive thing. Populism and neo-liberalism seem to be setting the agenda on this issue if you ask me.
Is it not about time that those on the lowest incomes stopped having to pay for the rich.
Irish capitalism stinks of corruption, sleaze and tax avoidance. The attempt to introduce one local tax after another is an effort to further direct the balance of payment on to the working class. This tactic has been use by the Irish capitalist class not to develop decent services but to ensure that their profits remain high.
No more unjust tax. Fight the bin tax
Local taxes exist everywhere. At least with the bin charges we know where our money is being spent - with our income tax it's harder to spot how they're fucking us about because it goes through loops before ending up on stupid projects like Knock international airport. Lookit, the question is not whether the rich should pay more (of course they should!) but lowering general taxation would be idiotic. And, by the way, bin charges are paid by everyone not just the working class.
Seriously, while I completely agree that the tax system needs to focus on the fatcats, the idea that we (the ordinary guy and gal in the street) should pay less is incredibly shortsighted. Taxes should be INCREASED!
You don't get it, do you? We already pay for this service through our income tax. There is no reason why we should have to pay twice.
I get it alright my friend. But you obviously aren't getting what I'm saying: taxation levels should be INCREASED not reduced. And what do you mean it's covered by your income tax? Most other parts of the country pay bin charges! So, should people in Wicklow, Cork, and elsewhere pay both bin charges AND have their income tax contribute to paying for Dublin's rubbish collections??
Why don't you raise similar objections to telephone and electricity bills? Shouldn't they be covered by your income tax? Actually, why pay any service charges at all?
"Shouldn't they be covered by your income tax?".
There's no should or shouldn't about it. According to the literature of the Anti-Bin Tax campaign, there was a levy added to PAYE tax a number of years ago to pay for services. This was never removed so we do already pay for our bin collection through our income tax.
It is obvious that if you apply a flat charge to any service, that it is the poorest (or the ones just above the waiver limit) who are hardest hit. You could argue that this is fair enough when it comes to "luxury" goods but when it relates to necessary public services it is blatant robbery.
Perhaps a more equitable solution, with an eye on the polluter pays, would be to give everybody in a household a reasonable weight allowance per year with a stiff penalty (could be sliding according to income) for going over the weight limit and some form of bonus (tax exemption or something) for not using your full allowance.
Remember, this tax has little to do with recouping the costs of waste collection. Our waste collection has been paid by the levy for years. This is about transferring the costs to the poor so that taxes can be further reduced for the rich. Hand in hand with this is the privatisation of the service which will become more expensive whilst the workers conditions deteriorate. This is not something fancy tale that might happen. This is happening all over the world as countries are bullied/bribed into selling off their public services to private companies (look up water charges in Bolivia or the great rail disaster in Britain to mention a couple).
That the real cost to domestic users would be a fraction of what it is now if the industries paid their fair share and reduced crap packaging.
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