Labour MEPS join 100,000 march for jobs based recovery

Posted by Bronwen Maher on September 30, 2010 at 09:18 AM

Labour MEPs Nessa Childers and Alan Kelly joined a march of over 100,000 ordinary working people in Brussels today, as part of a Europe-wide day of action calling for a jobs based recovery against the excessive austerity measures being implemented across Europe.
 
Childers & Kelly joined their colleagues from the Labour group in the European Parliament in attending the march.
 
Nessa Childers explained, "This morning, my Labour colleague Joan Burton registered once again our anger at the extension of the Cowen government's bank guarantee while the jobs crisis has been allowed to flounder - a view which is shared by the majority of the Irish people. I am here today to express my solidarity with overwhelming majority of European workers who also support our position."  
 
Today's march in Brussels followed the implementation of new austerity measures in Spain, Portugal, Britain, Italy, Holland and France.
 
She added, "European workers do not believe in the efficacy of the excessive austerity packages that are akin to economic masochism. If the Irish government and their colleagues around Europe continue to plough this line in the face of all the evidence that shows their increasing ineffectiveness, the medicine may eventually kill the patient. Job creation is the only way out of this crisis.
 
"We must begin to invest in our workers and in our entrepreneurs, and trust that their initiative and commitment will see us through this crisis, instead of continuing to pull the rug from underneath their feet."
 
Labour MEP Alan Kelly described the march as evidence of the anger of many workers.
 
"Austerity without a concrete jobs strategy means we will be doing backwards. Given all that has happened to people in terms of pensions, wages and the undermining of personal wealth, people are entitled to be angry and I hope their voice will be heard throughout Europe and in all member states' governments,"

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