Luke O'Connor

Immigration

I am advocating for net zero immigration into Ireland. We have a serious problem in this country with both legal and illegal immigration. I have no problem with people coming here to fill critical vacancies such as in our health sector. However, we must end the current situation where mass legal immigration from the EU is reducing working peoples’ wages due to saturation of the lower wage jobs market. And illegal immigration has become a rampant economic problem. Many people are coming here under the guise of refugee and asylum seeker status but in reality they are economic migrants, in some instances they are claiming a free room, free food and a free education if they are so inclined. Many Irish citizens are not claiming such things from the state, despite struggling a great deal. A large section of the so-called asylum seekers are coming under false identities so we do not know their personal history or criminal background. The asylum seeker hotels are destroying our biggest indigenous industry, which is tourism. 77,000 hotel rooms have become unavailable for tourism since 2020. For every 1 euro that a tourist spends on their accommodation, they spend 3 euro in local businesses and because of the asylum seeker hotels we are seeing a knock on effect to local businesses which are closing and leaving derelict shop fronts in our towns. Our previous Dáil has decided to hand over our ability to control immigration to Brussels. In order to take back control of this issue, I would ask that you give me your number 1 vote, so we can start to get a grip on an immigration problem which our government and our media have no interest in addressing. Ireland is Full and as your TD, I will act accordingly.


Housing

The government, Sinn Féin and the Central bank all agree that they need to build 52,000 houses every year for the next 25 years in order to keep up with housing demand. They are all lying to you. They all know that this is an impossible task. What we have to do is curb demand and make use of the many derelict buildings in this country. I would propose that we provide more tax relief incentives to ensure that owners of out of use buildings are encouraged to use these properties to house Irish citizens. We also need to tax vulture funds out of the housing market, they are buying up large swathes of properties and hiking up house prices. This is hurting anyone who is looking to own their own property. It is important that we prioritise local families for social housing in our communities. Immigration and Housing are two sides of the same coin, so if we reduce immigration, we will ease the demand on housing. I am also a proponent of building affordable housing on public land for those with average salaries. My housing policy is about reorienting priorities towards the average Irish citizen. We must house the Irish First.


Tackling Wasteful Government Spending

By electing me as an independent candidate to Dáil Eireann, your vote will be a vote for getting a grip on wasteful government spending which is doing nothing to help Irish citizens as they grapple with everyday problems. The government has recently spent 336,000 euro on a bike shelter. A previous government spent 1.3 million on a Dáil “Tuck shop” which is now used as a storage shed holding Virgin Media and RTÉ cameras. By all accounts it is the most expensive storage shed in the history of the country, which was paid for by you, the Irish taxpayer. The worst example of government waste is the unfinished National children’s hospital which has cost over 2 billion euro and is the most expensive building in Europe. This is all down to sheer incompetence. For example, a certain amount of work on the hospital which was priced at 25 million, was eventually carried out for 200,000 by another contractor. As a T.D. I will push for the re-establishment of An Bord Snip Nua. I will advocate for the defunding of Non Governmental Organisations who advocate on behalf of what I would call the “Anti Irish agenda”. i.e. They aim to pander to broader global interests at the expense of the Irish taxpayer.


Saving Rural Ireland

Rural Ireland is on its knees because of Government environmental policies which have been driven by the Green Party. I am opposed to the carbon tax as there is no international evidence that it works in reducing carbon emissions. It punishes ordinary people for everyday activities such as driving a car or heating their homes. It is an unjust and cruel tax. It disproportionately hits people in rural areas and workers in the haulage industry.The EU Green Deal has led to many disastrous implications for Irish farming. I would be in firm opposition to these climate targets which do nothing but make Ireland subsidise the world’s biggest polluters under the EU’s watch. I am against the re-wetting of lands. Farmers should not have to bare the brunt of the EU’s Nature restoration Act. I oppose the mandatory cull of the Irish herd which is being brought through by the current government. I would propose that carbon tax be removed on marked gas oil for agricultural contractors. I also support a farm retirement scheme where hundreds of millions of euro should be allocated in order to ensure farms are transferred to a new generation of farmers and we maintain our long tradition of farming in this country. I am completely against the importation of peat, turf and woodchips to Ireland under the guise of being environmentally friendly. We currently import peat from latvia, turf from poland and woodchips from Brazil rather than using the resources we have here in Ireland. We do this for no other reason than to placate EU bureaucrats and their climate targets. Having to import these products is actually worse for the environment than if we were producing these items here in Ireland.


Disability Funding

Instead of wasting vast sums of money on inefficient programmes outside of Ireland, it is imperative that we look after the most vulnerable in our society. According to the Disability Federation of Ireland approximately 22% of our constituency’s population have at least 1 disability. 15% of people with disabilities are in social housing compared to just over 10% of the general population. By cutting wasteful spending and prioritising local people for social housing as I’ve outlined earlier we will be able to do more for our citizens who have disabilities.


Healthcare

Unfortunately, because of the Irish government’s failure to provide a decent working environment/ quality of life for our newly trained doctors and nurses, many of the best and the brightest medical minds in this country have emigrated. In order to make Ireland a more attractive place for healthcare professionals to work, we must tackle inefficiency in the health sector and reduce faceless bureacracy which has made the HSE unfit for purpose. I believe that the recruitment of qualified staff in our health service is determined by the pay and conditions that our professionals work under. At the moment we are offering some of the best education in the world for trainee doctors and nurses only to see them leave because of the mess our healthcare system is in.


Education

Numerous parents have come to me over the last few years, complaining about our country's SPHE curriculum which promotes gender identity and the idea that young men can transition to become women and young women can transition to become men. The minister for Education Norma Foley, has hidden her own support for this behind a so called “public consultation” where dissenting voices were ignored and the Non Governmental Organisations and Unions pushed this far left agenda which the majority of Irish parents do not agree with. I will stand up to these people, your kids should be allowed to just be kids. I am also passionate in encouraging young people to go and do trades if that is their preference. Unfortunately, at the moment many of our secondary schools’ career guidance involves promoting useless arts degrees to young people who are skilled craftsmen. These young people have the ability to earn vast sums of money if they become a tradesman and that’s why I would be advocating for the department of education to spend a greater part of their budget on encouraging young people through speaker sessions and promotional events.