Questions and Answers Heckle - The Crash

Have to say I agree with Auditor - letting the audience at him was a better policy.

johnfás wrote:

Have to say I agree with Auditor - letting the audience at him was a better policy.

The schoolteachers and the health sector have been stirred up. I hear they cut the Gards overtime budget. The Government (and us with them) are in deep, deep trouble, but still they had the time and forethought to exempt the private jets from the 10 euro charge.

Edo wrote:

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

How do I send a text to QandA

I want to remind people that class sizes of 20 for upto 9 year olds was also a 2002 FF promise

On the same topic - any chance that the permanent pensionable teachers would go back to the ATM and make a deposit back in order to save the jobs of their younger and non permanent colleagues- or which there are thousands given the mental way in which you have to go about securing a permanent position in a school - a system fully endorsed by the unions? - yeah thought not.

Don't get me started on unions Edo. I have an instinctive mistrust of them and probably smashed any chance of having a decent manufacturing industry in this country. Coupled with the minimum wage thing, it's a complete disaster..

Edo wrote:

The country is going broke folks - all the raging begrudgery against the bankers, property developers and everybody who was successful by playing the same rules etc etc will nothing to stem the tide - maybe its time for some of greying generation to cash in the 2 houses in Ireland and the other in tuscany/spain (And I know a hell of lot of these people) in order to fund their own health costs.

Yeh, but allow me one more week of evil bile spewing (as tonys calls it ), then I'll return to pragmatism. Evil bile spewing never fixed a god damned thing. I know that.

But by jesus it is hard to see election after election go by, to get blatently lied to while knowing it's a lie, and then to get royally screwed.

Still, next week it's shoulder to the wheel.

How do you feel the Unions destroyed the chance of a manufacturing sector here ? Do you mean home-grown or otherwise ?

I'd like to hear a bit about that someday.

Trade Unions are a necessary evil, but they can certainly do more harm than good in certain situations when they usurp too much power.

johnfás wrote:

Trade Unions are a necessary evil, but they can certainly do more harm than good in certain situations when they usurp too much power.

The necessity of unions is debatable imo. There is plenty of employee protection legislation these days that did not exist way back when. Employees can safely and confidently stand on their own two feet.
They possibly only exist these days to organise actions for more pay. And to allow unproductive people keep their jobs.

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

johnfás wrote:

Trade Unions are a necessary evil, but they can certainly do more harm than good in certain situations when they usurp too much power.

The necessity of unions is debatable imo. There is plenty of employee protection legislation these days that did not exist way back when. Employees can safely and confidently stand on their own two feet.
They possibly only exist these days to organise actions for more pay. And to allow unproductive people keep their jobs.

Chinese factories give a good glimpse of life without Unions. Free dormitory accommodation and two days off a year. Things were like that in the west in the 19th century, and it was in good part Trade Unions that changed that, and that built Labour Parties that went into government and created health and education services that working people could use. Trade Unions, the presence of the Soviet Union and extraction of minerals from colonies gave a completely different standard of living to employees. The battering of the TUs in America by Reagan was part and by Thatcher in the UK was an essential part of the whole shift to a Friedmanite form of capitalism, in which a few people have most of the wealth. This is not working out well.

I can see that it looks very different to that in Ireland, because Unions here have acted like medieval craft guilds, and take advantage of the political balance of power to get advantages for their members that are a real disadvantage for the rest of the population. There was never much indigenous industry and the FDIs were let away with non union plants, so they tend to be dominated by the white collar end.

The leadership has enjoyed the last ten years. They are still strong enough to have held Cowen off from cuts in public budgets for a few more months. By the nature of the beast, they are limited to bothering about wages, and didn't bother their heads about the budget and services cuts. I'd still rather have them than not have them, but they certainly don't have any solutions to what we are facing into now.

cactus flower wrote:

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

johnfás wrote:

Trade Unions are a necessary evil, but they can certainly do more harm than good in certain situations when they usurp too much power.

The necessity of unions is debatable imo. There is plenty of employee protection legislation these days that did not exist way back when. Employees can safely and confidently stand on their own two feet.
They possibly only exist these days to organise actions for more pay. And to allow unproductive people keep their jobs.

Chinese factories give a good glimpse of life without Unions. Free dormitory accommodation and two days off a year. Things were like that in the west in the 19th century, and it was in good part Trade Unions that changed that, and that built Labour Parties that went into government and created health and education services that working people could use. Trade Unions, the presence of the Soviet Union and extraction of minerals from colonies gave a completely different standard of living to employees. The battering of the TUs in America by Reagan was part and by Thatcher in the UK was an essential part of the whole shift to a Friedmanite form of capitalism, in which a few people have most of the wealth. This is not working out well.

I don't deny TUs their role in history, especially in the early days when what they were dealing with was effectively slavery. But this phase is over in Europe imo.

Quote :

I can see that it looks very different to that in Ireland, because Unions here have acted like medieval craft guilds, and take advantage of the political balance of power to get advantages for their members that are a real disadvantage for the rest of the population. There was never much indigenous industry and the FDIs were let away with non union plants, so they tend to be dominated by the white collar end.

Not just look different - is different. And if I were an entrant FDI I would insist on closed shop.

Quote :

The leadership has enjoyed the last ten years. They are still strong enough to have held Cowen off from cuts in public budgets for a few more months. By the nature of the beast, they are limited to bothering about wages, and didn't bother their heads about the budget and services cuts. I'd still rather have them than not have them, but they certainly don't have any solutions to what we are facing into now.

Well, someone is going to have to take them on and pretty pronto. And they can take that benchmarking fiasco and shove it up their arses. All that did was postpone industrial unrest - for the private sector.