Cuts affecting most vulnerable must be avoided in review

In last February's general election, the voters, realising the disastrous state the country was in, gave the clearest of signals that they wanted change. The Fine Gael-Labour coalition was given the clearest of mandates - go in and do something about the mess we are in. If we are reading the results of the election correctly, it would seem that the electorate was fully informed about the state of our finances and had judged the political parties and independents and their candidates on their policies. In large part, missing from that election was the usual concentration on personalities and the distractions which traditionally allowed us to focus on the political 'battles' among individual candidates and parties rather than on real policies which might shape the future of our country. The recent election, perhaps more than any other in the last couple of decades, allowed us to pass a definitive judgement on the attractiveness or otherwise of the 'boom/bust' cycles in our economy. Those who can remember with any clarity the heady days of the 1977 general election, with its promises to the electorate to wipe out rates on domestic dwellings and car tax with one sweep, leading to a landslide victory for the Jack Lynch Government, will also recall the terrible reckoning for the individual voter within a few short years. This was characterised by the mass exodus from our country of thousands of young people who saw no hope of employment by staying at home. We are now back in the same position. We have seen the awful consequences of a mishandling of the economy and we know that there is nothing but hardship and an uncertain future ahead of us. It seemed that Irish voters allowed their politicians to trivialise the real issues out of existence. In 2007, for instance, the 'big issue on the doorstep' was the availability of rural transport and the rescue of poor little old fellows in rural pubs. More recently, in 2011, we were assured that "the vulnerable will not suffer". We will see. There are two issues which should engage our attention as we head into the economy's 'corrective period' as set down by the IMF/ECB - the needs of the increasing numbers of those suffering mental health problems, and the needs of those with an intellectual disability and children with special needs. The signs so far don't augur well for these groupings. According to the Mental Health Commission a few days ago, the moratorium on public sector recruitment will have a major effect on mental health services. Its annual report said that the shortages will undermine efforts to reform how people with mental illnesses will be treated at a time when demand for services will increase because of the recession. Twenty per cent of nurses have left the mental health area over the past two years and have not been replaced. This, in turn, is hampering efforts to move from institutional care towards more community-based mental health services. A report published by the HSE last year suggested that staffing levels in these services were running at 70 per cent of the level recommended in the government's Vision for Change strategy. Equally ominously for those with special needs, the government has embarked on a review of public spending and, at the end of that process, should know the 'scale of the priority' it can give to these people. The Taoiseach has said the government would focus on special needs and intellectual disability "as a priority" and when "the analysis of the comprehensive spending review is completed, we will know the truth of the scale of the priority that can be accorded to any of these sectors". In the inevitable heated debate leading up to the budget later this year, the incontrovertible needs of these two groups in our society should stand out. Meanwhile, there is an outstanding need for the government as a whole to speak clearly and honestly with the electorate. They are ready for the hard truths and may accept tough measures if they are seen to be fair. If we are listening correctly to what we are hearing from the same voters who gave this government its huge mandate, they want the concentration in cuts to fall on the better-off and would prefer to hear a lot less about cuts in pay for those in jobs which don't pay very much in the first place, and about cuts in services for the very vulnerable.