plundered welcome to worlds apart as the western world faces the political remarriages of social conservatives there is one state that's been steadily progressing in the opposite direction bartle and one of the most traditional nations in europe has just lifted its ban on abortions and repealed a blasphemy law is it now on course of becoming one of the most liberal countries in europe to discuss that i'm now joined by ruth carpenter irish politician and a member of the irish parliament ruth it's so good to talk to you thank you very much for coming over for the invitation now i know that both the repeal of the abortion ban and the repeal of the blasphemy law were major milestones for you personally for your party as well as for your country as

a whole but i think to many outsiders the main question is not so much how did arlen do it but how did it manage to hold out for so long how do you explain it. well it isn't unusual to. church had huge control in the country since independence almost a hundred years ago the church and state were interconnected i suppose because it was a very weak economy quite a backward country and it seems that the new independent routers to close connection with the catholic church for social control. the church control of health education and specks of life include including advising the government on passing. legislation. restricting the freedom of women working class people poor people and the it despite all of the control things seem to be moving very very fast in two thousand and fifteen our then became

a different country in the world to legalize same sex marriage by a popular load of both and from what i understand it was done by a fairly big margin and i think this is still a very contentious a very divisive issue in the most liberal constituencies and i find. this accession of things very interesting the fact that people would endure same sex marriage before they actually let's say did blasphemy provision or. abortion what is it about arlen it kind of takes things. in very different ration well. twenty fifty a referendum is put to the people but the country has been changing for about twenty years the catholic church has been in decline less and less people go to church and of course young people are much more progressive than advanced and so

the referendum. majority primarily by young people persuading older people and people showed solid. people wanted to affirm tolerance and people then said well the next. now let me ask you specifically about the blasphemy law i saw people characterize it as medieval but from what i understand it's still a fairly fresh legislation i mean it was passed less than a decade ago the did more detail definition of blasphemy what happened to your country between two thousand and nine and now to produce such a dramatic turnaround because you mentioned that the country has been changing for two decades but it seem to have changed in just the last couple of years. the political establishment have been very slow to change i mean the ordinary people on the ground have been way ahead on all issues in terms of blasphemy i mean blasphemy

has never actually been used nobody has been prosecuted but you are right it was only renewed ten years ago by your previous government and it really shows how out of step. in the last number of years there's been a huge movement of women and young people reflecting a global famine assists movement as well that we see in older countries have been pushing the political establishment you know relentlessly on the issue of the abortion rights because ten women a day leave the country and five others were taking abortion pills online illegally now you mention that nobody was prosecuted for blasphemy and yet there was an investigation opened into the british comedian stephen fry a couple of years ago for his questioning of the existence of god on public radio that case was later dropped if it weren't for that failed investigation do you

think the question would have been on the ballot this past weekend didn't that provide a necessary. for the social movement to galvanize. itself i think the government was concerned to be seen to be moving in a more progressive direction in terms of separation of church and state which still hasn't happened and they wanted to pick things that were very easy to get past so stephen fry incident you're absolutely correct. doc case was pushed by. a group the prosecution office called the iona institute and the place dropped out because there wasn't sufficient grounds the fact of it is there means it could be used on it could be used against people who are religious as well minority religions now arlen's current t. shirt prime minister. who incidentally comes from the same constituency. you do seems to be very fond of the word revolution he's used it after every

mark both and i know that you disagree with him on many issues i wonder though what term would you use to describe this avalanche of social changes taking place in your country. the word squiers revolution when you describe. but i think. issue here. i mean people have been campaigning on all these issues for many many years and we were you know bit on abortion rights me now groups have been fighting for forty years for marriage equality so what i would characterize it wasn't quite but certainly yes there was islands of revolutionary change below the surface because this involved. of people campaigning on the ground knocking on doors every nice to persuade people and it was truly an inspiring thing to be involved and now you previously accused the irish political elites of submitting too much to the catholic church and i think

during this interview you suggested that they may have been doing that for political reasons for self-serving reasons as well this society. pushback that you know and how much of it is driven by the opposition to the church and its role within the society and how much of it is political people against the old ways of doing politics. while i think it's both there's definitely people feel these oppressions very it's very real like if a woman becomes pregnant and has to save money or to go abroad and stigma secrecy and shame that's a serious thing and people women were told to be silent about these things for so long so there's been a about these issues young people in particular have led the way in saying no we will not accept this a park recy any longer and they've pushed the political establishment at every turn

i mean we have to participate and marches we have to break the law in terms of peaceful but civil disobedience. for example importing abortion and spreading awareness about them just to make the law seem completely redundant and ridiculous so all of those things push the political establishment until they've no choice whatsoever well and yet i think they still tried to maneuver that way out of it. talking now about the abortion issue because i thought it was a very interesting case study in both people's participation but also political tactics from what i understand the government didn't have enough conviction she initiated changes itself so it kind of outsourced it to citizens assembly was that a case of democracy in action or of the country democratic more functioning because supposedly we all elect our leaders you be the conduit of the changes that we want to see rather than outsourcing them no you're exactly right it was very interesting

the government hadn't got the girl on the courage themselves to make the change so they outsourced that decision to a ninety nine citizens on it george. actually this turned out to be a rebound in their faces because it proves that ordinary people when they listen to the arguments they decided that actually yes they should we change and they actually proposed change they actually proposed much more than is in the current legislation for example up to twenty two weeks for socio economic reasons twelve weeks from to give no reason whatsoever so this rebound on the government on it made it very difficult for the parliament there was a committee established which i was on to go back to most so we really have to time the citizens assembly and we also obviously the case of survey data which is six years ago yesterday woman who. is being unable to help her

they realize from what i understand. her case could only. result in the in the death of this woman was actually having a miscarriage and then couldn't get an abortion and she ended up dying of septicemia so that the whole country on a reignited the whole abortion rights movement galvanized which can happen. in a process of six years in some respects russia is the very opposite of our land in this regard because the historic ties between the church and the society of were broken here very violently by the bolsheviks the soviet union was the first state in the world to legalize abortion russia now has the world's second highest abortion rate. in my opinion is not something to be particular proud of and you concerned something like that would happen in our land that abortion will be treated way too casually as almost another form of contraception i think russia has

been a bit exceptional though if you compare the figures in other countries where abortion has been made legal that's a company bari. you know fully free contraception that's very accessible for people well then the abortion race remains very well. if you take for example greenland which if i'm not mistaken has the highest level of our bush and the contraception there is free but the women is still not using them so per capita they still have a pretty high incidence of ok but if you take for example the netherlands which has the lowest abortion rates in the world they have really liberal abortion rights but women don't record to us in art and we have a severe problem because we don't have proper sex education in school so young people don't get access to full information because of the council of churches ethos they can prevent these issues being learnt in school or to school in school

and i think it's really important that changes as well well i think we're both with agreed abortion is a woman. my contention would be that relying it. comes from a significant personal and public health risks and what i want to ask you is whether you believe that the state while permitting abortion should also do anything to. minimise the incidence of abortion out of public health considerations well abortion is a painful thing so nobody should want to have an abortion or does want to so the government needs to look women wouldn't be using contraception at the point you made about russia being the first country to legalize abortion one hundred years ago is really interesting and it's been something that i've been discussing with people since i came here because they've raised very similar questions here south and is going this way is going that way maybe all the countries as well and i think it is quite incredible that things can go backwards and you know the right to an

abortion company i think is under severe trash in some sense is. that the. decades before. well to be honest with the i don't think there is any risk to abortion rights here in russia first and foremost because the government understands very well that once you outlaw abortion you will have to deal with all those major public health implications stemming from illegal abortions in sanitary conditions a doesn't want to deal with any of that i would agree with you though the productive. big here in russia primarily because of the concerns that giving women all the control over human reproduction may have profound implications for as a whole it does change the institution of family has been no if there is

a statistical correlation between abortion rights. abortion rates and the number of single parent usually single mother households. up damaging the women's quest for equality in other areas because it's much more difficult to pursue a high powered political or business career if you have to raise a child all by yourself by giving women all the controls over human and. production don't you think that. undercutting them in other areas for example equality and well. paying for would be. to do most of the things that you raised there in terms of child care of course it's very difficult single. mother too. expensive

but that doesn't have to be the case we could have free childcare the problem is that the. well we have to take a break. in just a few moments stay tuned. you know world of big partisan group lot and conspiracy it's time to wake up to dig deeper to hit the stories that mainstream media refuses to tell more than ever we need to be smart or we need to stop slamming the door on the back and shouting past each other it's time for critical thinking it's time to fight for the middle for the truth the time is now for watching closely watching the

hawks. to sleep. on the. welcome back to well the party's base truth comp injury irish politician and a member of the irish parliament. just before the break we've been talking about

all those social changes that's happening in your country and what i find interesting is that there's a lot there's a lot of conversation about not. both in ireland but i know even more so in europe and the united states people rediscover a national identity when they are faced with the changing world around them the irish national identity is very pronounced both domestically and internationally it's represented in culture it's represented in other countries do you have any concerns that they irish national identity as we know it will change beyond recognition because of all those social changes or perhaps this is something you would actually welcome yeah i don't have any fear that you know our culture such as music. and exports in terms of its artistic life in fact hopefully will improve. it will be more representative maybe of men and

women. no i don't have i think the culture that you're talking about. we're talking about when the church was in control in the comparable but i'm not sure you can parse this out because i think when people think about our land they also think about family values they think about the work catholics think about many of the immigrants for example in the united states of the irish sound so those things tend to be kind of. very close to. what was swept under the carpet was the negative side. that if you didn't conform. we have history of poor women in particular were pushed away into. homes where there are institutions. all of this which is one of the reasons that people have moved away from the catholic church in droves in the last decades. before i left

the country there were talking about excavation of bodies are buried not accounted for in one of these homes and institutions where single mothers people were married to report people against reality where you know the catholic church i mean the pope recently. there was massive indifference to his business so. the image the reality was a lot different you made the point in one of. only because of the more youthful more liberally minded to rising up against the older more conservative establishment. that we have in other parts of the world with middle aged citizens more conservative. rebelling against the liberal political elites what do you make of the political and social changes are

allowed for example in the united states or in europe. i think there is a feature now if you look at the us where we would have seen the election of. for example bernie sanders who was the democratic candidate that was ousted if you like in favor of hillary clinton but there is a huge interest. in america because people say that the system isn't working for the majority of people. similarly in art and there is. as well where i know the conservatives are in power book by a thread. there is an interest among young people in the left ideas and the reason is that they're getting really rodale from the housing crisis certainly an art and it's the biggest biggest problem that we have. young people are paying the price of an old soldier in the bank bailouts of the last ten years there was

a two tier pay system introduced teachers younger nurses aren't getting paid the same as older people and i think that feeds into what we saw with the referendum where young people are much more inclined to challenge the you know what's been handed to them now you are a member of a socialist party with a very telling and name solidarity people before profit and you are committed in your own boards to you being an economic system where one percent control both political power do you find it realistic though you can alter that economic system let alone both within your country more broadly what we now have a system whereby it's never been more equal. it's now men and they are men of five of the richest people control the saying wealth is three point five billion people i mean that's completely and utterly untenable on most of the wealth that's a mosque or the one percent is horrid it's not invested productively in society you

know they use tax shelters tax havens. or what. morty can't even spend that so we've reached a. dangerous situation on the plumbers whereby all of the well that's been created i think something like eighty percent is just soaked up to the top it means you know things that were taken in you know advanced copland's contracts like europe like our lands like the us normal like housing are no longer things that anybody can expect to have exactly so what makes you believe that you can actually change that because it is one thing to abandon a now dated blasphemy law but changing anything where money is involved i would suppose takes much more effort well obviously that's what i'm fighting for i think we have to make it impossible i think the people who create use the world. are ordinary working people they have we have the talent we have the ingenuity to these

things for ourselves with this parasitic. it's quite interesting visiting moscow and seeing these designers stores what i'm hearing about is the income of people most people. they can never attain to buy these products well that's for sure but the same time in defense of moscow i think has also seen a lot of public areas everyone regardless of their income can enjoy benefit from there are lots of sporting opportunities there also lots of employment opportunities for the people so i'm not sure i would draw the. comparison but i want to ask you specifically about the ability of changing the system because arlen gave a name. a large tax avoidance tool in history of the irish double the double irish rather which still allows u.s. multinationals to avoid corporate taxation on the u.s.

profits and that is supposed to come to an end in january of two thousand and twenty and i would guess. as a global citizen a year with probably. indorsed closing that loophole but as an artist do you think that's a good development for for your country i don't think it's rice. multinationals of all kinds of but obviously particularly american multinationals are is the basis of our policy i don't think that's a good idea at all. what our government previous governments have done is corporation tax down to twelve percent but these companies don't even pay twelve percent many of them we've discovered pay nothing at all the bigger they are the less they seem to pay so we have companies who you know do pay corporation tax we've got the likes of aapl google facebook who are using art and to pretend that they generate revenues in aren't and to avoid tax the people who pay

the price for us are the people all around the world to you know in some of the poorest countries who have been deprived of the benefits of taxation i would disagree with you that they do not pay any taxes in fact i came across the statistic just the other day dead they pay over eighty percent of all irish corporate taxes and they directly employed twenty five percent of the irish labor force can your country afford to lose them because i want to pose that it would come with major detriments to the very same people that you just put it in context i didn't say they pay no tax i said some of them pay no so obviously there are companies you know supermarket giants after they pay corporation tax on day to day out to those figures there are behind the scenes deals being dormant so we know when we've discovered to and we discovered it through british and american parliamentary commission it's not true aren't the likes of pain virtually on the

average that's been worked out by economists isn't anything from three to eight percent is what they're paying they rarely pay. twelve and a half the recently had to pay back thirteen and a half billion to the country on our government didn't want to take. the message very interesting. because as you just mentioned in two thousand and sixteen the european commission for competition concluded that apple received illegal state aid from the irish government now owns the government. the range of thirteen billion euros plus interest in unpaid back taxes and yet the irish government is very strong. presumably because it wants to keep their business. where do you find yourself and are you more strongly with the european commission or well i mean the european commission did offer a reason there's a competition between different countries and they don't like the fact that our.

knocked down rates which jeopardizes all the trees in europe so they're making a stand for that reason i think the key point is this. we have a housing crisis and aren't like they are not they. are affordable housing that money could be used to solve our housing crisis but we have a government that's saying no because they don't want to send a message there aren't is an open for business but i've also seen some analysts suggest that the cost of u.s. multinationals leaving. would be much higher than those billion euro's isn't i mean you can criticize the government all you want but i suppose they're not doing about out of their own private considerations they perhaps believe that the role of those multinational companies are so huge the country simply. changed yes and i represent a constituency where there are

a lot of multinationals. i mean we have our welcome. the point is it isn't the case that for example if corporation tax was raised to the level that germany charged it will be double. leave i don't think so because they're in our in for a reason speaking many of the reasons you know proximity to the e.u. marcus so tax isn't the only reason we have to look at is it is it a safe thing to base your whole industrial policy on having low corporation tax not in my view because we're close to breaks that now where the british may leave the e.u. and quote their corporation tax lower than ours trump in america is talking about of course in corporation tax as well so arden's policy isn't sustainable well we have to leave it there i really appreciate your coming over and sharing some of your insights thank you very much thank you encourage our viewers to keep this conversation going in our social media pages and hope to see you again same place

same time here in the wilds of party. kind of financial for one john that it was all about money laundering first to visit this confession to three different. oh good this is a good start well we have our three banks all set up here maybe something in your something in america something overseas in the cayman islands or do we do all these banks are complicit in their tough talk or suit a softer deal with oh it's a them bernie to do some serious mood ok let's see how we did while we've got home

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