WHY AM I PERMANENTLY ANGRY WITH THE IRISH ESTABLISHMENT?

WHY AM I PERMANENTLY ANGRY WITH THE IRISH ESTABLISHMENT?

To put this into some context; In 1982, the deference to those in power and authority, from working class people was immense. Doctors, priests, teachers, elected public representatives, government ministers were held in such high esteem by the state, that it was virtually impossible for a working class person to access services from the state without endearing themselves to one of these people.

Note that, most normal people would believe that these people are all caring professionals, that have the interests of working class people at the very core of their education. These are widely understood to be the Caring Professionals.

In 1982, being working class, meant that, you were an under educated person, with little or no opportunities to ever secure a third level education. Even if you had the money to pay for third level, college entry was mostly restricted to members of the middle classes.

In 1982, I was a twenty-two-year-old father of two sons, aged two and three. My wife and I, both worked in the clothing industry. At this point in time, the clothing industry was in the process of ceasing all operations in Ireland. We found ourselves out of work, newly married, and newly parenting. Two children of 22 years of age, trying to rear two children. The future did not look to bright for any of us

We lived at the top of a tenement house in Gardiner Place, Dublin, Ireland. The only good thing about this flat was its proximity to one of the best children’s hospital in the country. Temple street hospital was only 100 meters away.

The flat itself was damp, hard to heat, and hard to live in. Little or no running water on a daily basis. The neighbours were good and helped each other, but, they also had no work and little or no money.

One good thing about being unemployed, and, with children, in the 80s,  meant that, we got a medical card from the state. This meant that we could access doctors and medical services in general for the children. The damp in the flat meant the children picked up all sorts of illnesses, and more frequently than somebody living in adequate housing.

From a very early stage, my wife and I were always going to do the best we could to ensure our children got the best education, that, we could get for them. We enrolled the eldest child in Saint Josephs School, Wellington Street. We had done some research and we found out that Saint Josephs was a feeder school for Saint Vincents Secondary school in Glasnevin. Saint Vincents was probably the best secondary school available to boys living on the Northside of Dublin. Automatic entry to Saint Viincents was available to children living in the parish, (we did not live in the parish), but, as I said earlier, Saint Josephs, Wellington Street, was a feeder school for Saint Vincents, and therefore, the boys from Saint Josephs could choose Saint Vincents as the secondary school. It was all informal and subject to the approval of the parish priest. I joined the Parents Committee of Saint Josephs and worked closely with the principal, a lovely woman, who took no guff off anybody. My wife and I felt that with Ms Coffey in charge of Saint Josephs, then, getting our eldest boy into Saint Vincents was always going to be a reality. Once he was in, then, it was automatic entry for his younger brother. The rest of that is another story.

The main characters in this story is the Doctors. The medical card meant you would ask a doctor to agree to provide you with their services. If they agreed to that, then, the state paid the doctor a sum of money to take you on as a patient. Quite close to where we lived, there was a large doctors practice.

They had a few doctors and they had an arrangement where they took on the person, and they provided a service. One drawback was, you had to accept whatever doctor was on duty when you presented yourself or your child. Depending on your personal preference you might get the doctor you liked and then again you might not. My wife preferred one particular doctor and we usually managed to get an appointment for them. Sometimes though, the emergency was such that we had to accept a different doctor. In this case, this doctor was regarded locally as being very capable and knew child illnesses better than most. The bedside manner was a bit gruff, though.

On one occasion we had to take an appointment with the doctor with the gruff bedside manner. My wife brought the oldest guy into the doctor, while I waited outside with the youngest guy. After a few minutes, my wife came out and was crying that the doctor had told her, that, as a mother she wasn’t doing a very good job. My wife has a much more detailed version of this, but, that, is for her to tell. We licked our wounds, and went about getting our son better. The doctor had prescribed medicine and that was our priority.

As described earlier, the deference towards doctors was such that they were almost regarded as royalty. If I had confronted the doctor, then no good would have come out of that. My masculinity was wounded mortally, but there was nothing I could do. I did vow that "No Doctor" would ever get the chance to say that to her again. She was twenty-two years old, with two young children and living in a strange locality. Her family and friends were all miles away. No mobile phones in them days. We needed helpful advice and guidance. We did not need criticism. Our parents did what they could to help, and that should not have to be said, but there, it’s said now, just for the record.


In this case, that caring professional, a doctor, a member of the Irish establishment, decided to put a loving, very young, mother, down. Boosting her self-esteem was not something this doctor was ever going to do.

I will never forgive or forget that, the Irish establishment went out of its way to make life harder for two working class children, who, were, rearing two children. I should point out that, despite obstacle after obstacle, being put in front of us, our sons both have master’s degrees in their chosen fields. We succeeded. The two child parents had, against all the odds, succeeded, in keeping our sons in education. They pay huge taxes and the state is very much the nett beneficiary of any investment (in them) made by the state, and that is despite the establishments attempts, to make sure, the opposite happened.

I became involved in active politics in 1982, and I have been fighting the establishment ever since. I have been involved in that many campaigns, I have forgotten most of them.

Stories like mine could be repeated by all young parents of the 80s, in working class Ireland. We had to fight for education rights, and access to education, housing, health, jobs, justice, equality. The working week, paid holidays, bank holidays, health and safety at work. Pick an issue, and we fought for them. None of these issues were ever fully resolved, and, today many of the hard won gains have been eroded.

In the 80s we fought, and the establishment fought back, but we eventually won. Since 2010 onwards the establishment fought back and we lost, and we are still losing. Our rights are being eroded week after week, month after month, year after year, and it does not look like it is stopping.

Millennials better wake up to that fact. The establishment has stopped listening to me and my peers.

If the establishment can hold out for a few more years, then, we, (the 80s parents) will all be dead, and there will be nobody to fight back.

Millennials seem to think the rights they have today, were always in existence. In 2017 I had a debate with a man who told me he “didn’t use public parks”, so, why should his taxes be used to pay for them? He actually claimed he didn’t use any public services. I asked him, who would pay for the paths he used when he walked around. I asked him would he refund the state for his education costs and if he was prepared to forego his paid holidays. If he was prepared to work an eighty-hour week, every week, with no overtime pay. Needless to say it, but, that conversation did not go so well.

The establishment would have us believe that all taxes are used to finance working class lifestyles that resemble that of the very highest paid people. The complete opposite is the truth. Taxes are used to finance all sorts of public services that millennials seem to take for granted. On an individual basis, most public services are consumed by middle class people.

Who pays for the roads. Answer: Road tax.

Who pays for the traffic lights Answer: Road tax.

Who pays for the paths. Answer: Road tax.

Who pays for, public schools, public parks, public policing, public hospitals, public nursing homes, public ambulances, public fire brigades, etc etc. The clue is in the question “The Public” that’s the answer, and, we are all members of the public and we all consume public services.

Millennials need to realise, they need to get involved to influence the future for them and their children, and their children’s children.

Taking things for granted has never worked in Ireland.

In relation to the above, there are many more instances of the establishment being obnoxious. Like I said, most of the issues above, apply to many people. One example that is widespread is, when you seek to transfer to more suitable housing. The standard reply was: Have more children and you get more points, and then you have a better chance to transfer. Then, there were the doctors that issued anti-biotics for children, almost regardless of the illness. We went once, and the examination of our child took about ten seconds. They asked for our medical card to write out the prescription for anti-biotics. When told we had no medical card because I was working and paying cash, the doctor insisted our child would have a full examination and he did not prescribe an anti-biotic. We never gave him any more of our money after that. We found a different doctor.

Why am I always angry at the establishment? The above is why I am always angry at the establishment. They tried to deny my children what is rightfully theirs, and I don’t take kindly to anybody trying to deny my children their rights.

I should also state that, my version of the establishment is; the rich, the people that manipulate things to enrich themselves at the expense of others. The middle management and upwards of the public services. They always seem to go out of their way to make things difficult for everybody, except themselves. The people in the highest offices in the land. They worship that wonderful Irish saying: “In the public interest” which, in reality means, “in the establishments interests”. The vast majority of the professions. The clergy. And on and on and on.

Those at the top have lost their moral compass, and, as such, they render the caring people ineffective.

The vast majority of public servants are genuinely committed to public service, and they must be applauded.

One particular part of my anger is reserved for people who are not part of the establishment, but then, by virtue of the work done by lots of other people, they make it into the establishment, and then, they turn out to be worse than the establishment members, that had gone before them.

An old Dublin saying describes it: The working Class can kiss me arse, I’ve got the foreman’s job at last.

Till the next time, thanks for reading this.

Finance committee meeting the Irish Central bank Friday 20th of October 2017

Official transcript is here: http://oireachtasdebates.oireachtas.ie/Debates%20Authoring/DebatesWebPack.nsf/committeetakes/FPJ2017101900002?opendocument#C00100

Banking Regulation in Ireland.

The Central bank of Ireland is the body of civil servants that are charged with responsibility for regulating the banking sector in Ireland.

There are two banking systems in Ireland, a domestic Irish banking system and an International banking system.

The Irish banking system is made up of Irish banks mainly trading Ireland with some trading outside the country. The activities outside Ireland are regulated by the body in that country.

The Irish trading is governed by the Irish Central Bank, and, this activity is part of the Irish banking system.

The Irish Central Bank had to attend a televised meeting with a group of parliamentarians on Friday 20^th of October 2017.

The civil servants spoke freely and as openly as they could. They didn’t betray any confidences they may have given to anybody. The governor of the Irish Central Bank even thanked the parliamentarians for the opportunity to speak to them and seemed to ask for more opportunities to do it again and even implied they would like to do it more often.

All in all, it was a good meeting, and information passed freely.

The problem arises with what appeared to be a naivety on behalf of the civil servants.

During one exchange the Irish Central Bank revealed they could not regulate every bank in the country. They had no intention of investigating every incident, and in particular, they were not really paying any great attention to the international banks. Like good patriotic civil servants, they were concentrating on regulating the Irish banking system, because that’s the system that matters to Ireland.

The Irish Central Bank was only short of saying that the international banks could literally do whatever they want, and, only if they had a whistle-blower in their midst, would they be in any danger of being caught breaking the law, and even then, if the law breaking was intermittent and did not directly affect the Irish system, then, the most that would happen is, they would get a slap on the wrist.

The problem with this attitude is: People working in the international banking system in Ireland are governed by the Irish laws. These laws place a considerable onus on workers to inform the Irish Central Bank when their employer breaks the law. The possible consequences are fines, worldwide restrictions working in the financial industry and possibly five years in jail. When a worker tries to comply with the law, the Irish Central Bank is basically saying, “don’t tell us, ignore the law, and you will be alright” but, “if you do tell us, then you will most likely be hung out to dry”. Despite the fact that Ireland has whistle blower laws with supposedly built in protections, the reality is, the whistle blower will lose their job and will probably never work in the financial sector again. Not a good place for somebody who spent years studying to get qualifications that are rendered useless after they comply with the law.

Bigger picture stuff: The European Central bank supposedly relies on the Irish Central Bank to regulate banking companies that are based in Ireland. If the Irish Central Bank is not regulating the banking companies properly, then the companies in other countries are at a competitive disadvantage. No doubt after the meeting on Friday 20^th of October 2017, all European banking companies are examining the discussions with a view to suing the Irish government for not regulating their competitors operating in the Irish jurisdiction.

The repercussions of the historic meeting of the Irish Central Bank and Irish parliamentarians will indeed be a watershed for financial regulations in Europe.

Land hoarding makes more money than building houses.

How does hoarding land make more money than putting the money into a bank.

For this piece, we will say the investor has wealth of €50 million in cash, in a bank.

Actually, the money is in ten Irish banks. So ten banks with five million on deposit.

Its five million in each bank because, if one bank goes bust, then the investor loses just five million euro.

Banks do not offer a lot of interest. On average you get one percent interest, less charges and taxes etc.

So a fifty million stash, would earn the investor interest of about fifty thousand euro per year. That’s not a lot of money to someone who has fifty million in cash.

Rich people are looking for investment opportunities outside of the banking system, because the return from banking is not very good, and, its high risk, as banks can easily go bust and the investor, loses their money.

Rich people look for Art like, the Mona Lisa, to buy. If they could buy the Mona Lisa, they would pay for a secure place to store it, they would insure it, and they would enjoy the prestige of owning such a desirable artwork. Doubt if the French Government would ever sell the Mona Lisa though, so you need to remember this is just an example.

Really expensive works of art are rare and most are in private collections or owned by governments. This means they rarely come up for sale.

This causes a problem for rich people. What else can they buy to keep their money safe. Cars, yachts, islands even, but, most of these, have already been bought by other rich people.

Rich people look for other ways to invest their money. Building homes and offices has always been good for rich people.

A developer spots a bit of land somewhere, and thinks, I can build houses on that and people will buy them for exorbitant prices. Developers rarely put their own money into these projects. They will find an investor and convince them to back the project. At today’s rates, the return on investment would be about ten percent.

Our investor will make about five million euro on this project. The project will take five years to complete. So, our investor, stores their money in the project for five years safely, and makes about one million euro per year. Good money.

Normally the investor will buy the land in their own name or in the name of a company that they own and control. Let’s say the land purchase price for this project is ten million. The investor now owns the land and the process of drawing up a planning application begins. This can take a long time. In this case the planning process is going to take two years minimum.

While the planning process is being pursued, the investor discovers that the value of the land has increased to fifteen million euro. This means the investor has now made two and a half million euro, per year, by doing nothing with the land.

The money is very safe. It can’t be stolen, no need for any money to be spent securing the site, just let the wildlife run free and the money is safe. If the investor holds the land for another three years and the land values increase at the same rate, then the investor makes another seven and half million euro, basically for doing nothing. There is no more risk to their money, because they have still only committed the original ten million and their other forty million is still safe in the banks.

If the investor continued with the project, they would have to commit all their money, to finance builders on site working, and anything can happen during this process. Any glitches and the investors’ money is at risk, unnecessarily.

At this stage, the investor has already made more money than was originally intended, and, if they hold on to the land for a total of ten years, they can make more money than was ever envisaged from the project.

They have only put a fifth of the money at any risk, however that risk is offset by the fact that, no matter what happens, the money is safer and earning more than it would in a bank.

This investor has found a way to make money hoarding land (even if they became a land hoarder by accident). The money is safe for a very long time and can be left lying in the ground until the investor needs cash. We already know this investor has still got forty million in cash in banks and therefore they are not going to need cash to pay the Tesco weekly shopping bill. They will look for more land to buy, and hope they can make the same arrangements they made with the first land bank.

Building houses on this land will only bring the original investor a return of five percent and will require huge effort and commitment. By doing nothing, the investor can, in fact, make more money, than they can make, building, so, it is inevitable this investor, will in fact not do any building in the near future.

The money is safe and increasing at a higher rate than a bank would give. The police will mind the land free of charge. They do not need to worry about the investment being stolen.

To conclude, you now know why, it is financially unattractive for any rich people to build houses.

Have a nice day.

John

What is the difference between a Fraud and a Nixer?

Unemployed people getting the odd so called "nixer" and getting a few quid, are illegally claiming the dole, but, only for the days they are not available for work, as a result of the nixer. In reality if a person was to sign off for a day’s work, then, the system would penalise them severely. The social welfare would deny that, but the fact is, there would be all sorts of complications and their payment would be disrupted at minimum. For an unemployed person that is the ultimate nightmare. The cost of this for the state is minimal.

People working for an employer regularly, and claiming the dole at the same time, are very definitely breaking the law, but so too, is their employer, and that constitutes while collar crime, that crime that costs the state billions, but nobody ever goes to jail for.

If a person is prosecuted for working and claiming the dole, then, they would not be charged with fraud. I don’t know what the title of the charge would be, but, it would not be fraud.

Fraud happens when you pretend to be someone you are not, and then, claim state payments using the identity that you have manufactured or stolen.

Professionals nixer all the time, i.e. they do work outside of their normal paid work. We all know they are supposed to declare this income for tax purposes, but, we also know they ask for cash on the basis, that, they will have to add the VAT on to their fees if it’s not paid in cash. This is not fraud either. It is a crime to not report the earning to the revenue commissioners, but, it’s not fraud.

Somehow Leo managed to talk about fraudsters and social welfare cheats, and, somehow, he got people on their high horses, about unemployed people claiming social welfare. I know what he meant, he knows what he meant, but, he never came out and explained precisely who he was after. He let poor unemployed people be given the rap. He played to the gallery of FineGael voters, and never once considered how the public would react to unemployed people.

He ruthlessly and unscrupulously used some of the poorest people in Ireland as a stepping stone, so he could rise another rung on the ladder to success.

In some minds that is a sign of strength and decisiveness and is seen in a very positive light. In reality it is just seen as ruthlessness, and those that know it, will refuse to trust you and will never help you. Burning bridges is for dictators and rarely works out well for a democratically elected politician.

The high horses jockeys always look away from white collar crime? Why? It was white collar crime that caused the country to become bankrupted, and, it is white collar crime that is costing millions each year, way more than the working class are responsible for stealing.

How many high horse jockeys make mileage claims each month that do not honestly reflect the actual mileage driven? I could go on and on about those scams, but, the reality is, most hypocrites do not see that as a crime, but the fact is, it is a crime. The high horse jockeys might want to get themselves a new pair of glasses, the kind without the rose coloured tints, and take a long hard look at themselves, before they start throwing stones at other less fortunate people.

#Grenfelltower What is really going on with Official UK?

There is something very wrong at the #grenfelltower that Official UK is not telling us.

Official UK is no different to Official Ireland. 

They both believe they would have great jobs if it wasn’t for the pesky citizens. Citizens are a nuisance and only exist to provide taxes to pay their wages.

That being said, when a crisis comes along, they are usually very efficient, even if, it is, only as an arse covering exercise.

In the case of #grenfelltower though, the normal efficiency is missing. In this case there seems to be absolutely nothing happening in Officialdom

The council has a list of all the people that are registered as living in the Grenfell Tower. They should have compiled a list of those that are now homeless so that alternative homes (even temporarily) are made available.

No doubt if they established a list of those that are definitely alive and seeking housing and then compared that to the list of registered residents, a clear picture of how many people survived thus indicating how many are dead. Doubtless some people will be on holiday and some are injured and in hospital, all of which can be easily checked.

Where have the residents slept for the past few nights?

Where have they eaten?

Where have they showered?

What toilets have they used?

How have people who are prescribed medicine managed to get this medicine?

How have they managed for money? (Presumably many of them lost all their belongings including bank cards and cheque books, etc).

These are daily occurrences that need to be addressed daily,no matter what the circumstances are.

No organisation is coming forward with any of this information being answered and somehow, I think that’s not going to happen. Why not?

This is in London, per head of population, probably the richest city in the world.

The Queen has visited the site and the Prime Minister has visited (somewhere) and normally the normally efficient arse covering and glory seeking civil servants would be falling over themselves to present themselves, to, the Queen, and the Prime Minister. But no sign of anybody from OFFICIAL UK. Why not?

The BBC are present on the ground, Channel 4 also seem to have cameras there, and still no OFFICIAL UK suits in sight. Again, why not?

What is really going on that nobody in OFFICIAL UK wants to take their slices of their fifteen minutes of fame?

Something is very much not right.

UPC broadband gets a big thumbs up.

Broadband speeds of almost 30mbs as indicated by an independent speedtest (see pic). A 50mb video only took 3 minutes to upload to Youtube, as opposed to 3 days using my old service provider Eircom.

Very impressed with the broadband service from UPC. Now hopefully I can get this level of service all the time, but who knows, only time will tell.

Good riddance to Eircom

Goodbye Eircom.

In the current economic climate it is not unreasonable for people to expect to be treated with a little more decency / common sense / reverence by companies providing goods and services. In particular big companies that had previously operated as monopoly providers that are now faced with the most aggressive competition they ever will face at a time when this company is clearly struggling to emerge from its monopolistic working attitudes towards its customers. eircom previously enjoyed civil service status for all its staff and management, and now with the telecoms market deregulated the new service providers are providing better value for money, better services, and certainly a better attitude towards their customers.

Despite being aggressively pursued by these companies I resisted all offers from these companies and stuck with eircom as my telecoms service provider. For twenty five years eircom was my telephone provider and when they ventured into the mobile phone market I got my first mobile phone from them and when the service providers arrived I stuck with them on the basis that they were the wholly Irish owned company providing good working conditions and salaries for their staff.

Basically I stuck with the company through thick and thin, good and bad, whatever the guff I got from them, when I was paying through the nose for their services. In the recent past I have not had much contact with them other than the lack of speed on my broadband service. I have never received the right speeds and even when I complained I never got what I was paying for, however I still resisted changing through some twisted logic that I used to stay with this company on the basis that it was still providing Irish employment. Even when they moved their call centre out of Ireland I was a bit peeved but I still stayed with them on the basis that they were still the dominant played in the country and I think I still believed that they would come into the real world of consumer service providers, the world where the customer is king. I subscribed to that theory a long time ago although I refined it slightly to mean that the customer is not always right, but that they are always the customer, and somehow as a service provider I need to get them to buy my goods and services, and thus I would get their money from them in the most efficient most profitable way.

Anyway I have been treated in my opinion very badly by Eircom and this is the straw that has broken the camels back. Last week my service was cut off by Eircom for non payment of a one hundred and fifty six euro bill. This was just one bill for a two monthly period and I have regularly gone over into a second and I,m sure even into a third billing period. Anyway when my wife called them to query why we had no service she came up against a very rude person, and got no sympathy what so ever. This lady insisted the bill must be paid and if we wanted the service turned back on then we would also have to pay a twenty five euro reconnection fee. What annoyed me about this bill is that we have a standing monthly charge of sixty five euro per month, and therefore the calls value on this bill is twenty six euro for a two month period, which indicates that we do not use the landline very much, and the biggest portion of the bill is for broadband which as I said before we have never got a satisfactory level of speed that we have paid for.

The upshot of the issue is we are moving to a different service provider. My wife decided to move her company (which uses a substantial amount of phone calls each month) to a different service provider.

Eircom is now losing at least two customers, my home and my wife's business land lines business. They are also most likely going to lose family and friends accounts as we now no longer have any reason to be part of phone deals that allow each other to call Eircom lines. They are also going to lose our mobile business which involves at least twenty mobile phones that are tied up in various deals usually allowing each other to call as part of a package deal.

Apart from choosing to give our business to a rival company it makes good financial sense to change to UPC because we are going to save twenty five euro per month while getting a speed of 30mbs on our broadband service.

I estimate that Eircoms action last week are going to cost the company about fifty thusand euro per year. We will get some personal pleasure in exercising our prerogative in moving our business to a company that treat us with respect and dignity, (and anyway) if they do not treat us right, then we will just move again.

The age of consumer awareness is upon us all and companies better get to grips with the fact that consumers are choosing to exercise the right to decide who their money goes to, and I believe that those companies that put the customer as king will be the winners in the end.

From the reports today about the ESB and Gas companies cutting off supply to customers and then charging a reconnection fee of two hundred euro, the cynic in me now thinks that these large companies have turned to disconnections as a source of revenue.

So goodbye Eircom it has not been nice knowing you, now if only I could do the same with the electricity and gas suppliers.

Ireland exporting = Emigration.

Since the formation of the Irish Republic, my family comes from 5 generations of north and south inner city Dublin, over 1000 true blue dubs came from these unions. I lived in the wonderful suburb of Ballymun were my children were raised. My second son was the first person in these 5 generations to get a degree. We proudly attended his conferral of a degree in structural engineering in St Patricks Cathedral, and to be honest we all believed his future was extremely rosy. Little did we know what was coming?

He can not find work in this country and is now emigrating FOR WORK, nothing else. He did the travelling bit after university and tried to establish a career in Ireland, but he can not do it, it’s proving impossible.

He has been used as an example of how young people can achieve a successful education to his younger cousins.

Now it is not such a good example to give these younger children this example as it now appears that if you get an education, then you have to emigrate to get work.

As a father I feel extremely annoyed over this. My whole family are broken hearted and worried that he will never come back. His mother and aunties and uncles are worried sick about him emigrating and all I can do is sit back, watch and let it happen.

What is particularly annoying is the government is making no effort what so ever to help graduates just like him in all spheres of subjects. Architects, Engineers, Solicitors, the list is endless are all looking to emigrate for work, and the government sits idly by and watches like I do. However I am not a player in the whole game and as an experienced voluntary community development worker, I can clearly see that a significant player i.e. the government is not even in the game.

There is no logic in Ireland Inc (bankrupt as we are) in continuing to educate young people so that they can be employed in other countries. We should be creating employment opportunities here for these people, and at this point in time the main source of investment in employment has to be the government. Never mind investing in banks, they are not going to create any more jobs other than their own. The government should invest in Ireland Inc to provide the infrastructure that every modern business needs, fast broadband easily accessed and reasonable priced, cheaper electricity / gas and fuel. Better roads, better sewage, etc etc etc, to allow business people to invest their money in their business, and thus create employment, and ultimately increased taxes for the exchequer.

It is a simple concept really.

When I consider the amount of corruption that has emanated from the higher echelons of Irish society over the past 3 decades, I can not help thinking that maybe I should not have encouraged him to get an education, maybe then he could stay here, join a political party that wields a lot of power, and hey presto he would have all his needs looked after by his political friends. I could have taught him to be a gangster, then not only would he stay in Ireland, but if he got caught all he needs to do is give the government half his money and voila the other half is legitimate. The level of hypocrisy that goes on in Ireland never ceases to amaze me. The scenario above is presented as a pragmatic way to deal with gangsters. The government has created more ways to launder illegal money, than anybody can keep up with, its a joke really for any government to be condoning this type of activity, even if it is for pragmatic reasons. The financial scandals are showing that the more money you have (no matter how you got it) the less likely you are to be prosecuted or most importantly, you are highly unlikely to give up your money, no matter what happens.

Today the government announced that old age pensioners are to be targeted in an effort to cut back the cost of providing them with a meagre amount of money to live on. All public service are being curtailed. Frontline public servants are losing their jobs. A huge number of senior people are being allowed to retire early with fancy lump sums and pension arrangements, while they know full well they will be rehired as consultants. The little people on the bottom do not get any such luxury. Contracts are not renewed, staff out sick find there is no position to return to work etc, and the public finds access to services more difficult, education cutbacks all over the country, teachers on the dole, employed teachers expected to better with less, etc etc. I do not need to go on anymore about this, we all know the issues.

And what does the government do. It’s busy saving the Euro. The deputy prime minister says it’s good for graduates to emigrate. For the last 30 years her party said it was immoral for Britain to be offering our graduates jobs and thus creating a brain drain on Ireland, NOW EMIGRATION IS A GOOD THING, what planet are these people on?

Either way the helplessness that I feel at the moment is reflective of the people as a whole, and it appears by the time we get to an election, it will be far too late to salvage anything. The government may think they can go back to Europe with the begging bowl out, but that will not yield any worthwhile results. The Euro is in freefall and I doubt if the German people still feel obligated to prop up the currency anymore. The political attempt to unite Europe has fallen flatly on its face and its political handlers will be written in history as failures.

What is absolutely amazing about this is the people of all European nations were quite willing to co-operate and make the unification a success, but the actions of a very small minority of very powerful people has brought down the whole house of cards. History will not be kind to those people and they will be vilified in movies, and song, and art and literature.

I hope they can look in the mirror and like what is looking back, because they are not fooling anybody but themselves.

Ireland sacks all senior public servants.

I can not help wondering about the provision of public services, by public and civil servants. As I understand it, public services are supplied by state employees to members of the public. They also provide various services to the tax payers in a community perspective which as individuals we could never afford to purchase, and therefore as a community we pay taxes that are used to provide these public services, like a big worker co-operative. We co-operate and pay taxes, and then public servants work to provide us with services, and then they get paid money, from our taxes. It’s a simple system really, and what is really good about this system, is, it works. At least it works in principle.

In Ireland at this point in time May 2010, the senior managers in local authorities (well over paid public servants in my humble opinion) are constantly making an argument for contracting out public services. Their main argument is they can not make a profit for providing these services. They are prepared to sacrifice their colleague’s jobs at the coal face of these services, because they can not manage the provision of the services efficiently.

Below is the text from a report in today’s RTE news section here is the link:

http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/1003/waste.html

Council to pull out of bin collections

Friday, 3 October 2008 17:12

One of Dublin's four local authorities has announced plans to discontinue its waste collection service.

Dún Laoghaire/Rathdown County Council is to appoint a contractor for its black and brown bins.

County Manager Owen Keegan is also to decide whether the council should continue to participate in the regional waste management strategy.

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Waste company Panda began operating in Dún Laoghaire in 2007 and householders have since abandoned the council in droves.

With subsequent union-council rationalising talks failing, officials now project their waste service will lose €10m this year.

Mr Keegan wants a procurement process to appoint a contractor for the council's black bins and pending brown bins for organic waste.

He is also engaging a consultant to assess if the council should participate any longer in the regional waste management strategy.

He has declined to comment, but a withdrawal could mean any new council waste contractor not being obliged to bring rubbish to the planned Ringsend incinerator.

This raises another cloud over the controversial plant, but Dublin City Council said last night there were no implications for infrastructure that would cause it problems.

Reacting to the news, Panda Director John Dunne said the company was not surprised by the council's decision to withdraw from the market.

'With every second home already served by Panda, and with prices 20% lower than the Council frozen until at least 2010, we look forward to welcoming even more new customers in the coming week,' Mr Dunne said.

Michael Sanfey, Head of Sales & Marketing with Greenstar said: 'The news reflects the changing role of local authorities in waste management.

'It has become increasingly commonplace for local authorities to effectively opt out of direct kerbside waste collection for financial and efficiency reasons.'

TEXT ENDS.

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The question I would like to ask in this matter is: If we are to contract out public services like rubbish collection, and closing derelict public swimming pools on the basis that they can not make a profit from them, then why would we need the senior public servants? We could just stop paying taxes and allow the private sector to provide us with whatever services we want to purchase.

Voila no more civil or public servants, no more taxes, no more police services, no more jails, no more schools or hospitals or sewage services or public parks or public roads management services, etc etc etc.

I have news for the senior public servants making these arguments. If you continue to make these stupid arguments because you do not have the management skills to manage these services efficiently, then ultimately your job is surplus to requirements, Bye Bye and no redundancy compensation will be paid to you.

I might be idealistic on this issue, but in my world, if the private sector can make money from providing alternatives to public services in a normal market driven system, they find a way to do it from their own resources. They do not need public servants to make the arguments on their behalf.

I want to tell all civil and public servants that are making noises about profits. You should concentrate on doing your own job efficiently, because from now on I am going to make the argument that we should do away with all public services and allow what you call the efficient private sector to do their jobs. I may not get my wishes, but I will make it very difficult for you to justify your position as an inefficient manager of the provision of public services.

Hard working Irish parliamentarians.

Hard working TDs.

Over the year’s arguments have been put forward by politicians trying to justify their extremely high salaries, and very generous expenses, long holidays etc, as to how hard they work. The general argument that they work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week on behalf of their constituents is the standard mantra they use.

In the past few weeks a debate has opened on their entitlements to pensions even though they are still employed by the same employer i.e. the Irish state. One argument I heard was when an elected member of the Irish parliament likened his pension entitlements to one that would be accumulated by those elected parliamentarians that also ran private commercial companies. In the issue of a privately funded pension, it is dependent on how much you pay and on what terms you sign up to, that decides when the private pension is actually paid (but realistically it will only be paid on retirement), as opposed to the public funded pensions that are ridiculously paid when you are still in work and capable of working, even if you lose your seat, IMHO if you are young and fit enough to work then your pension should not be paid until you reach pension age. If needs be, you can sign on the dole (like everybody else) in the event that you become unemployed.

On the other hand my thoughts turned to their arguments about how hard they work for their constituents. Clearly any parliamentarian that is also working in the private sector is not totally immersed in their constituents needs. You cannot work in a private business and devote 24 hours a day to your civic duties, it’s impossible. Therefore I can only conclude that they are not actually working 24 hours per day, 7 days per week on behalf of their constituents, and on that basis they should refund the portion of their salary on a pro rata basis to those parliamentarians that have no outside private commercial interests.

I could debate the complex revenue scenarios that could arise as to the issue of parliamentarians operating private commercial companies, but I will leave that for another day.

On the other hand I wonder how the normal scenario where if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys, implying a certain level of competence. We do not pay peanuts and yet we still ended up with monkeys, with no competence what so ever. How did that happen? So that’s the peanuts theory debunked.

Fianna Fail member Jim McDaid ranting and raving.

A couple of weeks ago Jim McDaid Fianna Fail TD was interviewed by Eamon Keane on Newstalk106. During the interview McDaid wondered had Fianna Fail given any thought to the fact that a Fine Gael Taoiseach might be in charge in 2016 which would mean that Fianna Fail would not run the centenary celebrations of the 1916 Rising. Today McDaid was again interviewed widely because of his refusal to give back his pension. His justification for this was he thinks the media are running the country. I think he is right in that issue, however if he really wants to have a go at the government, why does he not clearly call for the resignation of the government (after all he is a party member). Personally I want an election (like millions of others) ASAP, and not when Fianna Fail get around to it, however I do not think that who is in charge of the 1916 centenary really matters as they will have to toe a totally diplomatic line that will not offend any side of the civil war, as we are all, and always have been Irish, and no politician will ever change that, no matter what side they are on, but clearly McDaid is an example of Fianna Fail thinking as to how they play with the Irish state. They seem to believe they are the kings of Ireland, and the subjects will accept anything they hand down. Well I have news for Fianna Fail, those days are gone and you will never dominate this country again like you have in the past.

IMHO A few powerful people in Fianna Fail have destroyed this country, but you will never do it again. Your stranglehold on the institutes of the Irish state will be broken after the next election, and the gravy train will no longer roll into the Fianna Fail bandwagon. New checks and balances will be established to ensure proper account of transparency that will not facilitate any form of hiding information from the citizens. We will find out what has gone on, who gets what, and how much they get, and what for, and where rules have been broken appropriate actions will be taken. The citizens sovereignty will be established like it has never existed before, and the citizens will be the ultimate deciders of just and fair process.

Social partnership Irish style.

Social Partnership the Irish version.

It’s been quite an eye opener to see the amount of money being paid to trade union members of state boards, http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/shane-ross/shane-ross-union-boss-takes-euro100k-fees-from-housing-quango-2151667.html. Membership of these boards (such as Fas, etc) are mirror images of the partnership processes, i.e. they include places for the social partners (ICTU and IBEC) the relevant state agencies, and where relevant the community sector.

In my former role as a community director of a Partnership company I had to meet all expenses that I incurred as a result of representing my community. I was never given any fees to participate, and as my nominating community group was completely unfunded I had to pay the costs of participation and it was substantial. http://www.shane-ross.ie/archives/584/mistress-of-inaction-on-fas/ Extract from this webpage “Headed by trade union leader Peter McLoone, they decided to tough it out. Peter was one of the many lucky luxury travellers to sample the joys of Florida. He also draws €25,000 a year as chairman of the board.

A second trade union representative, Owen Wills of the crafts union, was another to hitch hike on a €7,000 return ticket to Florida.

He is still drawing €14,000 from Fas as a nice little part-time gig.

Des Geraghty, the former Labour MEP and Siptu boss, remains perched at the top of this rotten agency.

None of these boys are budging. Nor is Danny McCoy, the big employers (Ibec) boss, drawing €14,000 a year from his sideline. Danny and Ibec are fond of lecturing us about the need for good corporate governance, national discipline and sacrifice. These noble principles obviously do not apply to any board adorned by Danny.

Danny is joined on the board by three other Ibec staff enjoying the spoils of Fas office.

None of them could have held on without political support. Both social partners — unions and employers — have their snouts in the Fas trough. “

In thinking about the fees being paid to trade union members of these boards I find it galling that they were being paid, while the community sector was not even receiving their genuine expenses.

I did make representations to both the Department of Community Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs (i.e. the relevant department) and also to the nominated state agency (Pobal), however I was not successful in having anything changed. As far as I know nothing has changed in the meantime and I can guarantee one thing that has not changed and that is, community directors are still not receiving fees like the directors of Fas and the other state agencies.

Since its inception Social Partnership always treated the community sector as the poor relation, but when these fees are revealed it is quite clear we are very definitely the poor relations, and we should be grateful that we are allowed to sit at the table with these very important people. They must be very important to justify the level of fees they receive.

One of the really annoying things about this issue is the community sector always seen itself as closest to the trade union sector, however it appears the trade union sector, and in particular those at the top were receiving payments while the community sector was not even getting proper expenses, but the trade union sector never told us they were getting money from the state.

I suspect most of the ordinary trade union members that were participating in various boards were not getting any payments either. This money was only available to the players at the top of the pile, I’ll bet.

Dochas Female prison governor resigns.

Brian Purcell director of the Irish prison services was on RTEs Pat Kenny show trying to defend his organisations decisions in the female prison in Dublin. The governor of the prison has resigned citing various (unacceptable to her) decisions that she says are detrimental to the health and safety of the prisoners.

In defence of his position Mr Purcell stated a number of times, that he was not in control of the number of prisoners in the prison implying that it is judges that are responsible for sending prisoners to jail.

However it is his organisation that decides who gets early release, and therefore he is very much in control of how many prisoners are actually in the prison at any given time, and thus he has every control over the prisoners and their lives.

His arguments clearly show he has a very different philosophy on how prisoners should be dealt with, than the philosophy employed by the governor, an experienced professional of 32 years working in the prison services.

IMHO it is a case of a quango head with legal powers over a state agency, exercising those powers in a manner that says to the governor, if you do not agree with my decision then tough, you will legally abide by it, or go, and unfortunately, she decided to go.

Another interesting point in the debate was how Pat Kenny referred to her retiring as opposed to resigning. You can dress it up in whatever politically correct language you want to, but it is an unhappy resignation to me, not a happy retirement.