Thread by @ReadaCronin

Thread. The news of a Kildare lockdown is extremely disappointing news for citizens and to all the small businesses who have followed the health regulations and restrictions in #Kildare.

The high #Covid19 numbers in Kildare are exposing the fault lines in society.../

Clearly, some of the meat factory workers involved in these high-infection rates live in difficult physical circumstances. Workers are people. They are not statistics. We cannot go on exploiting people like this in the name of profit... /

The devaluing of the unions by the mé féin culture of Fianna Fáil/Fine Gael is having a serious, negative impact on worker safety and conditions in the industries affected.

We must pay ppl a decent wage for decent day’s work. We must encourage the collegiate, the co-operative../

We must allow workers time off when they are unwell especially in this global crisis. Instead, we have people saying they are going to work sick and infected for fear of losing a day’s pay. It is unconscionable that people cannot rely on sick-pay in these circumstances... /

#Covid19 in #Kildare is a classic case of ‘nobody is safe until everybody is safe’.

These are conditions people protested against in the time of the Lock Out, and here we are over 100 years later tolerating similar situations where workers feel pressurised and exploited... /

How can we call ourselves a modern, progressive republic if ppl are going to work sick and infected in a global crisis because they are simply afraid? It’s the kind of fear you’d associate with working in historical times. Not in a country with a seat on UN Security Council.../

Fine Gael has overseen a landlordism in housing and an old-fashioned, aren’t-you-lucky-to-have-a-job mentality when it comes to our workers. Fianna Fáil and the Greens show themselves to be no better!