Sinn Fein Poll Surge

Looks as if we should take a look in more detail at their pamphlet on workers cooperatives mentioned in the thread on that. So here’s some extracts:

“In order for Irish society to have a fair, functioning economy which works for workers and our communities, ownership must be shared. Sinn Féin is serious about addressing inequality in our society, and we are therefore serious about dealing with the inequality of ownership which exists in our economy. That is why Sinn Féin is committed to developing an economy in which workers have a greater share of ownership through Worker Co-operatives (WCOP’s). These are businesses in which the workers of the enterprise own at least 51% of the shares.  (…)

An economy that works for workers

Today, Ireland has an economy which does not work for its workers. Despite experiencing high levels of GDP growth  (World Economic Forum, 2018) as well as increased levels of productivity  (WEF, 2018), gross levels of inequality continue to rise (CSO 2016, TASC, 2019, Social Justice, 2019). (….)

Sinn Féin believes that this wealth inequality is a result of our economy being detrimentally ‘short-termist’ in its outlook – with private firms, through financial intermediaries, weighing near-term profit outcomes too heavily at the expense of longer-term sustainability. This has become the hegemonic strategy for private enterprise. The reality is that ownership shapes purpose. If we allow our economy to be owned and controlled by a small group of elites whose objective is that of profit, then that will be the purpose of our economy. If, however, we agree as a society that our preference is to establish an economy based upon productivity, sustainability and equality then ownership of our economy must be equitably spread across society. This new economy can be achieved through alternative models of business ownership. Sinn Féin believes that the Worker Co-operative Model offers an exciting and innovative alternative.”

Empty electoralist promises or self-delusion? To be fair probably the latter, but it doesn’t matter as it wouldn’t work and won’t even be tried on any large scale.

In any event, the increased support for SF would seem to be more a vote against the previously established parties (which also have names derived from the Irish Civil War, i.e Tribe of the Gaels and Soldiers of Destiny) than for what it says it stands for.

“Irish PR” , ie the single transferable vote, also applies for local elections in Scotland. I don’t think the party has contested an election under this system as when we contested elections in Northern Ireland that was before the system was introduced there. It would be interesting— but might turnout to be embarrassing — to see to which other parties our second, third and other preference votes would go since I wouldn’t have thought many would strictly follow our advice to just “plump” for our candidate.