Government Budget Shaft Pre-Empts Value for Money Review of Equality Agency

Equality & Rights Alliance (ERA) today (15 October) revealed that some of its members have been invited to participate in a value for money review of the Equality Authority.  However, the Government has slashed the agency’s budget by a massive 43% before the review is even complete.

The cuts to the equality and rights bodies are up to 21 times harsher than cuts to other bodies within the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform.

The budget of the Irish Human Rights Commission was also been reduced by nearly a quarter (24%).  Joanna McMinn, Chair of ERA said that the cuts, which effectively render the agencies inoperable, were a calculated and overt form of censorship.

McMinn will speak this evening at an event to commemorate civil rights in Ireland since the civil rights marches of 1968.

Consultants Deloitte Touche, at the behest of the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform, state the review is to “analyse what has been achieved by the provision of public funding to the Equality Authority; and to determine whether the Equality Authority is meeting the Departments and Government current and future requirements in an economic and effective manner.”

“The fact that the Government has pre-empted the review and disregarded the opinions of those who work with older people, lone parents, low-paid workers and people with disabilities, questions the sincerity of the Government’s promises to protect the most vulnerable and to seek rationalization based on specific and uniform criteria,” McMinn said.

“Make no mistake about it.  This is a deliberate and overt targeting of agencies which have done nothing but a good job in tackling ongoing social and institutional inequalities and discrimination in Ireland.  It is unacceptable that an economic down turn can be the front for culling bodies which continue to question the unequal underbelly of post Celtic Tiger Ireland.”

She said that Equality & Rights Alliance, which formed to oppose the merger of equality and rights bodies, would continue to campaign against the deliberate shafting.

For more information contact: Edel Hackett, Tel: 087-2935207

Eight Broken Promises to the Vulnerable

- A Response to the Deliberate Targeting of Equality and Rights Bodies

The Minister for Finance, Brian Lenihan T.D. spoke about protecting the vulnerable no less than eight times in his budget speech.   Here are eight ways in which the Government has made a mockery of that rhetoric by deliberately targeting and decimating the very agencies put in place to champion equality and human rights for the most vulnerable

1. It slashed the budget of the Equality Authority by 43% bringing it from an already under resourced position of €5.89m to €3.3m.  This effectively means that it has lost all its non-pay budget and cannot carry out its key functions.

1. The Government is fast-tracking the decentralization of the Equality Authority to Roscrea when decentralization has been effectively halted.  Fifteen staff will be moved within a few weeks but none have applied for Roscrea.  This will throw the agency into further chaos.
2. The role of an equality and rights architecture must, by necessity, sometimes be critical of the State’s relationship with its citizens.  The sign of a mature democracy is when this criticism can be taken on board, not used as vehicle for threat or silence.  Silence does not serve the vulnerable well.
3. The halving of the Equality Authority’s budget has been announced in advance of a Value for Money Review being carried out by Deloitte Consulting.
4. The Irish Human Rights Commission budget has been reduced by nearly a quarter, bringing it from €2.09m to €1.59m.  This completely undermines the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement.  The Northern Ireland body has a budget of €1.8m to service a population of 1.75 million.  The IHRC now has far less to service a population of 4.5 million.  How can mandates remain equivalent, as set out under the Agreement, with such disparity in funding?

1. The overall equality budget of the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform has been slashed by 30%.

1. The equality budget cuts have hit women and particularly the country’s most vulnerable women, including victims of violence, hardest. COSC, the national office for the prevention of domestic, sexual and gender based violence has been cut by 18%.  Gender mainstreaming and positive action for women, including the national women’s strategy has been cut by 45%.

1. The message the Government is sending is that equality and rights can be shafted.  This message is lost on women who are afraid to tell their bosses they are pregnant, people with disabilities who cannot access buildings, older people who can’t get a car loan, or gay and lesbian couples who are asked to leave hotels, for example.

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Tags: Budget, Equality Authority
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