Tough talk Hayes, but can you walk the walk, how about leading the way and taking a 40% pay-cut among you and your colleagues.

You have some damn nerve to treat the electorate like fools, by doing that, you only substantiate the notion that Government are out of touch with reality.

Enda said we were not to blame but you say we are 80% to blame, would love to know the truth that you and your party espoused to do during the election.

A lot of us are fighting Minister, we are fighting for our lives in some cases, how about you give us the tools to fight back in such a manner as you want.

Be grateful that your electorate have not turned into violent mobs like the Greeks, but speeches like the one you have just made, I personally find that offensive.

On the subject of victimisation, we have been sent down the swanny by prior administrations and their cronies and now we have to put up with yours. We do not owe you a living either Hayes because bear in mind, it’s our money that pays your way.

Our European ‘partners’ by the way have not really aided Ireland, we are paying through the nose for Government incompetence.

Fight back with what?Empty pockets and a government who yet again to seem to be fighting for the fat cats….give me strength….i’m not a victim…i’m a nurse…married to a truck driver…we work so hard and yet still seem to only just tread water at the minute and we’re the lucky ones…i’m well aware of the very unfortunate who have lost jobs and homes due to the ineptitude of the last government. Really really sick of being told to shut up and take my medicine…maybe we should fight back….against these idiots and their useless pep talks….And I’m a bloody optimist ffs!

So is he challenging the people to fight himself? Great Mr. Hayes.. outside now.. !

There are 2 problems, 1 Ireland is full of talkers who never stand together for anything only on live line & twitter.I put it to you all here now, if I said I was organising a protest next week would you all be there no matter what or would I be there on my own which is always the case.No one wants to lead.it’s much easier just to complain.
2 politicians don’t care what we say as they are just overpaid buffers between the citizens & the real people who run the country (senior bank officials & senior civil servants). It doesn’t matter how many politicians come & go if the these other guys stay the same.

Grand so, I won’t be a victim of the household charge. Thanks Brian.

God, does this not show how far removed Brian Hayes is from reality!
STOP lecturing the people that are out working paying our taxes and getting screwed left, right and centre.
START leading by example, cut the top salaries of TD’s, MInisters etc. Reform pensions where Ministers & co. cannot get pensions from when they were teachers and then get ministerial pensions also.
Bring in a higher rate of tax for the elite who are earning 6 figure salaries. Oh and maybe start bringing criminal charges against “white collar crime”!
This isn’t going to get the billions that we need – but it would certainly have a bit more weight when these arses come out and say “the people that have more will pay more”.

I do agree with his sentiment, in that no one owes anyone a living, however Brian, if the Irish people didn’t see lu las like Cardiff getting 6 figure payoffs to go earn more obscene money off the eu mugs, after “losing” near 4 billion, your words might be easier to swallow. What does this guy know about fighting on? I invite Brian to run a business in 2012! How dare this little smarmy git. I see Irish people, friends and family breaking their asses everyday, who never even let victim hood enter their heads, but when some mollycoddled little politician who has never worked a day in the real world in his life says rubbish like that, it truly is gauling beyond belief. Join Leo vradkar and Peter sutherland in the room of the arrogant misguided patronising morons!

Aw where’s Tom Neville when we need a good oul blueshirt to defend the indefensible. Jesus he uses the oldest tricks in the smarmy political book…tell the people they are too stupid to ‘understand’ and that it is all our own fault. Well I would like to demonstrate on him the fight I have left in me, the absolute ignorant arrogant excuse of a man.

Who paid for that dinner you’re at Brian?

Let’s do something to stand up to this government . Don’t pay the household charge people!! Enough is enough

the words pompous and arrogant spring to mind and are typical of this government and a lot of politicans in general. they know best as we the ordinary people are stupid. then again we did vote in the last shower for 14 years and we replaced them with another crowd of gombeens. maybe we are stupid!

“Nobody owes us a living” is correct but sadly the ineptitude of this government and the previous one has taken people’s livings away from them whether they were owed them or not!!

If we are ‘victims’ at all we are victims of his useless corrupt administration and the FF one before it. Pull the government down by refusing to register for the household charge and put Brian and his waster chums back on the street peddling their lies and deceit. Make victims of them, vote by reasoning and not by party, frighten the bejazus out of the fookers and let them see who b

I’ve never read such fury on this before. Even the FG heads haven’t shown their faces. Tell me if there was a protest march tomorrow would ye go. It might be cold, wet, windy??? Have ye had enough yet, or is there skin left on ye that hadn’t been bruised from the kicking??? Have we had enough of watching them laugh away at us on TV programmes??? I despair… Again!

If when talking about 80% being “our” fault Mr Hayes means Irish public representatives then I would say he was correct however we do not all bear the blame for the situation we are in. Yes it could be argued that some sections of the community were short sighted and acted as if the boom would last forever. It could also be argued that some sections of the community were guilty of hubris at best, arrogance at worst. It was not however Mr. Hayes, the Irish people who entered into a disastrous bank guarantee scheme which destroyed the Irish economy. It was not the Irish people who created, nurtured and encouraged a parochial mentality in the minds of its national politicians which was left to fester like a parasitic flower that found full bloom in the gombeen politics and mentality that led us to the situation we are in today. It was not the Irish people who had their hands in the greasy till so often.

The present situation is to a large extent due, Mr. Hayes to the actions, mindset and policies of your colleagues in Leinster House. It is due to the inaction on both sides of that house to create a system which serves the people instead of the interests of the members of that house. The present situation, Mr. Hayes is due to the lack of will of Irish politicians to represent the wishes of the Irish people above the wishes of their political “allies” in Europe. But in the end Mr. Hayes, the Irish people are 100% responsible for the present situation because they elected you and your colleagues in Dáil Éireann. Perhaps next time, before you release another soundbite like this you should remember that fact, the nation is not its government, it is its people, ALL of its people. Perhaps the people do feel like victims Mr. Hayes but if they do then who are the criminals?

Nobody owes us a living well we’ll see but that includes all in Leinster house nobody owes them anything, but they continue to bleed us dry and live like royalty looking down on us as they get huge salaries unvouched expenses and eat and drink like gluttons in the Dail bar and restaurants. Let no one be fooled by the idea that TD’s and Senators have taken pay cuts etc… What they claim in expenses annually would pay for 2 special care children’s nurses. F UCK off Mr Hayes but you do owe me a living that’s your “job” to find the 400,000 unemployed people in this country a job… You are being paid over 100,000 a year for just that…

“but now they’ll try to do it by force of verbiage….” They would do well to remember their roots.

What a loada tripe
Is he for real ?
People can hardly standup under the weight of fear ,
stress, debt, unemployment, pay cuts,bin/house charges, usc’s,
These guys are not fit to lick Michael Collins’ boots.

Did Enda and the lads in the labour party not promise to fight for us during the last election?
Is this not what we over pay you guys to do?
It might help us to fight back if you were batting for us instead of taking all the instructions and orders handed down from Frankfurt.
Step aside if you are not up to the fight.
Outrageous comment from Mr Hayes

Thanks Mr Hayes, now we know exactly how your Government think!!!

You show no understanding for the plight of the Irish people, most of whom had nothing to do with how this Country was recklessly ran into the ground.
It was Politicians, Developers, Bankers and others like them who caused this to happen and then your Party got elected by deceiving the Electorate with false promises, which you had never any intention of fulfilling!

How dare you try to tell us that ‘no one owes us a living’, when you are paid over E140,000 a year as a Junior Minister……..Do you or your colleagues ever feel guilt in taking that amount of money from the State and what does the State get back in return for it??
If this speech is anything to go by, then I would say precious little!

Are you going to be awake tonight worrying about where the money is going to come for to pay Bills or that your Job might gone, I don’t think so!

So spare us your arrogent lecturing and ‘engage your brain before opening your mouth’ the next time.
You Sir, have just insulted a lot of Irish people tonight and have alienated a lot of Government supporters!

and be careful what u wish for fool,
there might just be a bit of fight back in paddy yet.
time will tell…..

He says “fight back” -

I say YES, let’s fight back,

his talk certainly get’s me in the mode

and I know what the target is

A sickening speech. He will be ok on his fat pension when he looses his seat in the next election later in the year.

Hayes is a ghastly little quisling. His track record is littered with instances where he has hectored the disadvantaged and/or anyone “inferior” to him. I hope that the Irish fight do back. Against his masters

Nearly vomiting reading this article . ’80% of the crisis caused is all of our own making “. Cheeky, smarmy ,nasty little man. Bet he won’t go around the doors to his constituents in Tallaght and spout that because he’d be physically assaulted. Start at the top with your reform mr. Hayes with stopping pensions for sitting TDs until their 65, do it now. Real reform would stop multiple pensions for ex ministers and party colleagues like his ex td colleague Olwyn Enwright who ‘retired’ her seat in the last Dail term to cash in on a nest egg. The neck on this fella talking down to the very people who pay his over inflated salary and expenses

This is the same Brian Hayes who was compared a whipped dog on live television about three months ago

I think he’s right. The people should fight back.
We should retrieve this small country from the hands of puppets like him, who do the IMF-message-repacking for their own gain and self-interest. We should fight to get some level of democracy back.
However, with snivelling turds like him on the right following the Neo-Liberalist doctrine, and Trotskites like Richard Boyd Barrett on the left following a Socialist doctrine it’s hard to see much hope.

In the immortal words of biffo
“you’d want to rein that one in”
Let us now here from the coalition partners about this speech but no doubt the lads are too busy filling out expenses sheets

Easy for Hayes to pontifacate he’s secure in his overpaid, puffed up and puffed out job for the next four years. Lets see him and his partners in crime take a thirty percent plus reduction in their obscene incomes.

What an idiot! As a tax payer with no debts my pay reduction is linked to the Government trading sovereignty to cover the bankers debt! I think Hayes is off the point here

And people tell Brian Hayes to F**k off

Survive on his pay maybe

“Nobody owes us a living”. I thought we lived in a society where social insurance was valued, where we work when/if we can and pay our taxes as insurance so that the State will help us by providing a living when/if we can’t. I hope the Minister never becomes disabled or witless and once again I ask the question: “So Minister, what job would you suggest for my daughter? ” How should my severely physically and mentally handicapped daughter earn her living, or would he throw her on the scrapheap?

Hayes has a point. No 24/7 protest in Kildare Street. No trade union protest. No mass refusal to repay debts. Conclusion. The Irish are sheep. Beat them about and they’ll still bleat for more.

If we are ‘victims’ at all we are victims of his useless corrupt administration and the FF one before it. Pull the government down by refusing to register for the household charge and put Brian and his waster chums back on the street peddling their lies and deceit. Make victims of THEM, vote by reasoning and not by party. Frighten the bejazus out of the fookers and let them see whose money they use to pay bank bonuses, senior civil servant sweet deals and of course their own wages and HIDDEN expenses.
NO MORE, we want a representative government to act for the citizen and not the cooperate party doners, cronies and spin merchants.

Someone should tell Hayes what his beloved leader told us in his pompous state of the nationed speech…..its not our fault the country s in the state its in! That alone was one of the most insulting and patronising comments I personally have ever heard from any politician. But to have this nobody tell us it is our fault and to moreorless stop whngng about it borders on defamatory. Again I will say it….FG have totally detached themselves from the people and that in itself is a huge impediment to recovery because unless a government brings its people along with it in its attempts to lift n economy it will essntially be at war with ts peope. That’s where FG/ Lab are..at war with us. Setting aside the broken promises made prior to the election which every conman politican makes anyway, it has gone further by not standing up for us against European technocrats and avorous bankers. It has shown itself to be spinless and worthless..it cowers to these forces and yet punishes its own under the most severe austerity programme ever inflicted on us. Hayes telling us to stop being the victim and to stand and fight is hypocrisy at its best. Let them stand to Merkel, Sarkozy, Rehn and co and to the unsecured bondholders that are raping this nation….lead by example Mr Hayes not by worthless, empty words.

He says “fight back”

I say , Sure YES fight back

and his talk gets me in the mode

to know what to fight against

leeching, self serving idiots like HIM

No Second Troy

WHY should I blame her that she filled my days
With misery, or that she would of late
Have taught to ignorant men most violent ways,
Or hurled the little streets upon the great,
Had they but courage equal to desire?

What could have made her peaceful with a mind
That nobleness made simple as a fire,
With beauty like a tightened bow, a kind
That is not natural in an age like this,
Being high and solitary and most stern?
Why, what could she have done, being what she is?
Was there another Troy for her to burn?

William Butler Yeats

That’s the thing most of the silly people voted for these assholes .. Most people could fight on his grossly overpaid salary little shit..

Trim Chamber of Commerce? Haven’t seen a job created in Trim in years!! Hayes is a fool – and pretty much anyone outside his party thinks pretty much today – a chanter who few listen too. Fight back? Watch when people don’t pay certain things. 3,500 people jailed last year for non-payment of fines. Yeah, the conditions are there for a fight back alright. Quit talking out of your arse Hayes and represent your nation properly and not the interests of criminal bankers – but no, you can’t. ‘Cause your hands are tied – at least that’s the party line. People like this stain what’s left of decent politics.

We should means test politicians so when they try motivate the people with a ridiculous pep talk it won’t sound so resolutely hollow! Irish people are protesting! With their feet! More working holiday visas granted last year than ever before to Australia! I’ll never be able to come home to work, we don’t realise how bad it is until we leave and get some perspective! All we ever get from the leader ship are excuses and hot air!

Quote from Franklin P Adams, ‘ There are too many politicians who believe, with a conviction based on experience, that you can fool all of the people all of the time.’
– just look at all those who’ve already paid the household charge. while still paying for the bins, soon the emergency services, and water charges on the way too . .

Let’s have a popularity contest for politicians in government. This guy would be in the bottom 5. Most people hate him which is very strong language but probably irritating is more apt. How about a contest?

So it’s Hayes this week it was hogan last week and varadkar the week before. So the rest of the ministers want to make sure they are in the public eye while still keeping the public out of there bubble. This bunch of incompetent idiots are plodding along to the match of the banking elites drum. With downgrades and bullshit where is the regulation that was promised oh that’s right they still have to bail out the banks further so where is all the money/bonds going? Paying off debt that has been compounded with sovereign debt then the people are taxed for “causing” the problem. This country may have bit off more than it can chew but it certainly didn’t cause a global financial meltdown. The only way out of this mess is to clean up the markets they are the ones out of control not the people. But no one has the inclination of taking out the piper who is playing the tune as we continue to pay.

It is alight to make that statement. But where are all those responsible for the state we are in. People would not have to fight back if the country was run right. History will not be king to the last Government. They left us in this mess. P. S. The Irish are fighters as the Government will soon find out when the Austerity Measures really kick in.

try liviing on 188 euros a week for a year then come back to us Brian

Send Mr.Hayes and his cronies a simple message – Don’t register for the household charge!
And in March when they spin some shite about most of the country being paid up, treat that spin for what it is and let this government learn that this well is dry and the sooner they start earning their keep the better

Bridget
Well said . You have spoken for an awful lot
of people in what you have said here . We are
all at the end of our tether.Nothing left to give,
and we are the lucky ones !

Worm

I really can’t believe what I’m reading…what an asshole this guy is. You know I really do hope the Irish people do fight back and remove these guys from power and I’m not talking about an election.

All well and good folks to be venting like this. But 3 in 4 voters essentially voted in GE11 for the policies that Hayes is espousing. If you want change, that’s the link right there that must be smashed. Its up you.

Good man, Brian. Always has one eye on the bigger picture.

It is a country of victims, oh germany owns us now, the country is screwed blah blah blah. Sick listening to these people. Its the mindset of this country is driving me nuts. Roll on the victims red thumbs.

The Irish people will stop seeing themselves as victims when the political class of Europe, of whom Hayes is a member, and its financial paymasters stop victimising us.

He must be one of the most annoying politicians. Always comes across as patronising.

What is this little SOB smoking? 80% our own doing? 80% due to Hayes and his ilk maybe. I doubt this po faced twerp has had to suffer in the slightest over the last few years. The nerve of him.

It would be remiss of me if I didn’t say, ‘what an asshole’. His arrogance is breathtaking. If we are playing the victim it because we are the victims. And our children will be the victims.

Funny i fought back about an issue in a housing estate in tallaght and he stabbed me, very publicly i might add, in the back when i thought he was on side. Very fortuetly I had documentation that left him and a management company very red faced. No time for him after that incident.

Brian hayes is, ……….like many of his party colleagues,………..a male hen….

Troika are robbing us blind you eejit!!

Wake UP!

What a smug arrogant dick! He says “…get into fight-back mode”. Right then people start by rescuing the country from the loutish likes of him and throw them all out of power.

Jesus! Where is our new Oliver Cromwell when you need him?

Keep doing what you’re doing Brian. Good job. “To hell or to the left”! Keep it coming Hayes. Never heard such anger from the sheep. They need a good kicking on a daily basis though so don’t stop yet…

‘Nobody is owed a living.’ He says.
Is mr Hayes prepared to put his principles where his mouth has run off to, and advocate immediate euthanasia for everyone too sick, too old, too disabled, too undereducated, too unemployed, too cheated (priory hall, vita cortex, senza), or simply too poor to have a living by their own efforts? Only logical conclusion.

Brian, think on. We might all start asking if we, who are paying for it, happen to owe you a living, as an overpaid, non-performing, parasite undermining our democracy with your government’s bought and sold policies?

remember there is only 166 of these f**king clowns like hayes there is 4and a half million of us, at anytime the people want we could crush these maggots, so really at the end of the day we get what we put up with!

When he says it is of our making he means the Irish nation as opposed to Europe, not the Irish people. We spent like there was no tomorrow and with no absolutely no foresight both Joe Bloggs with his €700,000 house in Cavan a short 90 minute commute from work and the government with more social welfare pay outs. Every commenter on this story is proving his point, with that us against them mentality and sense of victimhood so rife its no wonder the media pushes story after story of misery and hardship. We’re lapping it up and it’s going to negatively effect recovery, investment and innovation if it continues. Yes the government have made and will continue to make savage budget cuts. Why? The previous government bankrupted the country and signed us up to a bailout which legally requires the nation to make these cuts in order to survive or we take the alternative and default and the few euros left in our pockets become worth an awful lot less. So instead of politician bashing and sulking think about how you might improve your own situation and if you don’t want to that go comment on a YouTube video of a kitten playing with string, you’ll feel better about life.

The permanent govt needs to be brought down to planet earth. Max salary for any public servant should be less than 100k, if they don’t want to work for that let them get a job in the private sector. No way should they be able to draw pensions until they reach 68 same as private sector workers. They Should also pay the pension levy, amazing that public sector pensions were not touched, wonder who thought up the rules?

Hayes as point man for a fresh FG-Lab assault on workers. This is just the start.

Never in my life I thought I’d ever say this but……it’s getting very close to a sine fein led government!! Next election….

Fair play to Brian Hayes . poor us having to pay back all the money we borrowed , tough s*** . We borrowed , we spent , now let’s get on with it . and no we are not “entitled” to a 50 billion a year lifestyle as long as we make turnover around 30 .

mmmm its seems the KGB of Mother Ireland are deleting comments again, app its ok for Hayes to slag me and the Irish population but if i call him a P%%k its out of bounds. Kim Jong Il would be proud.

Good on Brian Hayes – somebody telling it like it is for once. Heard him yesterday calling the public service inefficient which is what needs to be said. Telling people to stop whinging is no bad thing either – everybody wants debts expunged, bondholders burned, the bankers strung up and to not have to pay for making rubbish decisions and taking on mortgages they couldn’t pay. Tough.

Take my debt off me give €100k & ill create 15 jobs & 1 for me & ill stop being a victim. I will vote ff next election. At least we know where we stand with them. These guys are clowns no idea of the pain in being a citizen/slave in this country

Give us hell Quimby!

Your right Michelle…Joe Higgins would be just the same as all the rest….he’s only been fighting for the working class his entire life and living on our wages for the craic?

Cut the dole . 100 euros is enough. There bring hard working people down

The people voted these clowns in but not one politician will be any different not even the left if they got in!

Minister Hayes has a most valid point in saying that… stop being victims.
I have no insight as to his motivation to come out with this most significant comment but if the Irish continue to endure the intimidation and financial milking by present policies then one can only observe a disturbing subservience by the taxpaying individual.
We have fiscal commitments toward the EU.
There is no way around that but expenditure on the side of the government has to be much more severe,genuine and immediate.

I feel the title is misleading. It suggests that Hayes thinks ALL Irish people are being victims at present and that’s what most of the comments are picking up on.

Reading the article, he’s only said he wants Irish people to resist the temptation of victimhood.

Two very different things.

do they owe us a living?
of course they fucking do

…..and he’s not even wearing a blue shirt!

Rommel, agreed! I did not sign up, two reasons. 1. I don’t have EUR100 to put into Mr. Hayes and the rest of the others expenses/salaries and 2, if I did sign, it would mean that I agree that I was/am taken for a ..uking egit! Signing up for it is saying that you agree to it and will pay for it, be it EUR100 this year or EUR500 next year.

Do your best Hayes/Fine Gael. I have fought many battles in my life, ones I did not start. I have won them and the wars! Bring it on ……

I think most of the commentors here have cometely misinterpreted what Hayes is saying and who he is saying it to.

It’s very much a speech directed at the ULA element in our society who genuinely believe the government is there to give them goodies and that they pay no tax in the process.

Hayes doesn’t appear to be saying that we are playing the victim in this but it’s a warning that we may be slowly heading that way.

Personally I don’t think his words have added anything of value and the ULA element in our society couldn’t possible hate him more anyway :P

He’s a bollix but he’s right. Pay the household charge but insist that it, and all taxes, are spent in our interest and not the interests if big business

The man’s a scumbag. They’re really scraping the bottom of the barrel with this scheisster.