What are your views on Multiculturalism in Ireland? - Threadbanned User List in OP

Worry not, they will probably get housing in those 2 new estates being built on Condell Road. Ahead of everyone else of course, because them being refugees from literally across the world makes them so much more worthy and deserving. As for honest working people, fk them.

We are caught between a rock and a hard place. The National Party are too extreme and no one I can relate to. It's a shame. If you remember the Presidential elections when Peter Casey spoke up and said what a lot of us think about travellers a lot of the general public went hold on he has a point and got a vote off that. The NGO's and Government at the time went mad.

A party that just said enough is enough we have a cap of who we are taking in. Failed asylum seekers get fast tracked and deported.

Tougher sentacing on crime and proper jail sentances. Judges who have poor track records removed from the bench.

End to long term unemployment benefit.

All NGO funding cut and save the exchequer nearly 6Billion per annum

But alas we won't see any of the above with the cowards in Government and opposition.

I will be telling them when they call to my door and probably vote for an independent

I've been very much in favor of spoiled votes, and not just spoiled, but " None of them" written on the ballot. And if all of those who say " I'm not going to vote for any of them, if they instead voted, and spoiled their votes , it would send the msg that the people want change, But most likely, we wont see any kind of meaning full change until people take to the streets, for sure that will happen, its a question of when.

Klaz,

Unfortunately, I have to disagree with you here. The only thing that politicians fear is losing their seat and place on the gravy train. That's why they fear their own party colleagues running in the same constituencies more than political opponents as they're more likely to eat into their vote and put their seats at risk. As has been said previously, spoilt votes and low turnout and low political engagement are nothing for them to fear. Their core vote will always turn out and vote for them no matter what. What they will fear more is votes that previously they could have counted on going elsewhere, to what were fringe candidates. They will see that and adjust their policies and actions to help them keep their seats.

High minded thoughts about spoiling votes to make a statement are all good and well, and who knows if enough votes were spoiled then there might be an article in the Times from Fintan O'Toole about low political engagement, and how this is bad for democracy.

You may even get something on RTE where they'll roll out an academic from Trinity or somewhere who will have a 5 minute segment to say that disengagement is a sign of something more wrong with society and that more research is needed to find out the exact causes. Then a discussion with the usual talking heads that they have on every week, someone from FF FG saying that it's bad but we have a robust democracy. Someone from the Greens saying that it's due to inaction on climate change, Richard Boyd Barrett saying that the working class are being left behind and this is why they have disengaged, but that when they vote for him and his colleagues then everything will be fine. Who knows they might even bring on someone like Ebun saying that it's because of systemic racism, and that everybody should be allowed to vote whether they are citizens or not, and that quotas for People of Colour should be put into law. Note that all of them will avoid the elephant in the room and push their own hobby horses instead. I think that this is a reasonable scenario of the establishment's reaction to a lot of spoiled votes as a statement. Then they will wait for it all to blow over and it'll be back to business as usual.

You alluded to this in your post where you said politicians will probably attempt to ignore the statement anyway and say that it's a basis for national discussion. The establishment doesn't want national discussion, they want to be able to continue on as they have. Remember Peter Casey talking about travellers and social housing? One throwaway remark hit a nerve and he got a lot of previously hidden support. That was definitely a case for national discussion, but can you actually remember one, or one that wasn't heavily curated to skew towards allowed opinions only?

You say it might be easier for politicians to simply ignore voters of fringe candidates, and they do because they know that they have negligible core support. But one thing they cannot ignore is voters that previously voted for them now shifting to support the fringe. Unpalatable as it may be, Irish voters may be better off holding their nose going into the ballot box to send a message that can't be ignored or wilfully misconstrued.

Did they run this past the people? Seeing as Coveney and Varadkar are such great democratic leaders like.

And no, fundamentally changing a country's demographic makeup and character is not just another piece of legislation. So if the people are to be respected this level of change does deserve debate and plebiscites.

It is not a tax rate change or a traffic law. And attempts to present it as such show up disrespect and a lack of appreciation for the gravity of the matter. It's a dead give away.

It's this kind of attitude that drove Brexit.

We all want to keep the CTA, but the way Ireland is behaving, the UK may have to cut it loose. While a majority so desperately wants to seal the borders everywhere else.

Can't be handcuffed to a corpse like.