Do you want your ‘Lobbyists’ washed down?
“The other day the old landlord came by for his rent; I told him no money I had.
Besides, t’wasn’t fair to ask me to pay; the times were so awfully bad.
He felt discontent at not getting his rent and he shook his big head with a frown.
Says he, “I’ll take half,” but says I with a laugh, “Do you want your (‘Lobbyists’) old lobby washed down?”
The traditional Irish folk-song “Do You Want Your Old Lobby Washed Down” appears to have first originated on the borders of counties Tipperary and Cork. Traditionally, ‘washing down a lobby’ was an alternative method of payment of your rent if money was scarce; the equivalent in later years of washing dishes at a restaurant, should you find yourself unable to afford your already consumed meal.
In the lyrics of this old song these words, depending on your particular mindset, are seen as perhaps being an intended double entendre. (‘Double Entendre’, meaning a figure of speech in which a phrase could be misunderstood to be somewhat risqué.)
New Recycling Regulation
Increased Recycling Charges
The Minister for Privatising Irish Water, Tipperary’s most ambitious Mr Alan Kelly, has signed off on plans to make people pay for every kilo of waste they produce; including the contents of our green bins. Most of us I suspect have been notified about this fact over the past seven days, with correspondence arriving from our waste disposal companies.
It would appear that not only is Mr Kelly looking for his own P45, but also seeking P45’s for his Fine Gael and other Labour Party colleagues in the forth coming general election.
Mr Kelly and his Labour / Fine Gael colleagues are being adamant on the doorsteps, that they never increased taxes on the Irish people during their soon to end term in office. Flat Taxes, introduced during a period of austerity, i.e. like Water Charges, Property Charges, Bin Charges and now the promised new Increased Recycling Charges, forced on people with no ability to pay, it seems are simply that, “Charges” not taxes. (Thank God the elderly got that €3 per week in their Old Age Pensions.)
Lobbyists or Government, who is to blame?
Was Mr Kelly advised to break this news before a general election by his loaned advisor Mr Cónán O’Broin or by his permanent adviser Mr Jim McGrath, latter reportedly earning jointly some €159,000, or did he just decide to ‘blab’ without their knowledge? So who is behind this new tax increase being imposed on the Irish people, including working people, families and communities? Was it ‘Lobbyists’ representing Waste Disposal Companies wearing a track in Mr Kelly’s plush carpeted office or was it our present coalition cabinet desperately seeking something that could take another tax hike? Lets face it, further taxing on the now essential motor vehicle would have been out of the question.
The plain answer to the above is “I don’t know”, but Mr Kelly does, so ask him yourself when he next appears on your doorstep canvassing. Tomorrow you will be told that this new increased Recycling Charge is a ruse to create long term rural employment.
One thing we do know down here in rural Ireland; where the buses no longer run and where rural doctors no longer wish to function; the black bags of household rubbish will soon begin to reappear, dumped smugly after dark once again on our rural mountainsides, our rural back lanes and in our uninhabited bog lands.
What has rural Ireland done that they have been neglected, abandoned and deserted by this Labour / Fine Gael Government? In the words of an old Irish curse / hex and addressed to Mr Kelly ; “Sir, May you find the bees but never the honey.”
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