Week in Politics - the Green Party Convention in Wexford

What is wrong with firing half the public service and cutting the pay of whoever is left by 50%. What part of bankrupt do they not understand. Get a job in the private sector. They think that somebody else owes them a living.

They refuse to accept reality.

There are many jobs in the Public Sector that need to go. With less economic activity do we need so many planners, Building Control officers, tax collectors?

Was up in North East last week with some Architects for a preliminary meeting with some planning officers. Firstly it was hard to arrange the meeting, secondly these people don't seem to realise that I and those like me do not have to invest anything at all in their city. So they neatly made up my mind on that proposal. I would have thought simple question how high can we build? Lack of simple answer shows that they are not on top of their jobs.

I don't mind reasonable conditions but I do dislike indecisive, subjective twaddle, it wastes everyone's time and costs money.

Squire wrote:

There are many jobs in the Public Sector that need to go. With less economic activity do we need so many planners, Building Control officers, tax collectors?

Was up in North East last week with some Architects for a preliminary meeting with some planning officers. Firstly it was hard to arrange the meeting, secondly these people don't seem to realise that I and those like me do not have to invest anything at all in their city. So they neatly made up my mind on that proposal. I would have thought simple question how high can we build? Lack of simple answer shows that they are not on top of their jobs.

I don't mind reasonable conditions but I do dislike indecisive, subjective twaddle, it wastes everyone's time and costs money.

On the Week in Politics last night there was a snippet of Shane Ross quizzing one of the Anglo officials in a Dáil committee on how many people knew of Seán's Fitzpatrick's loans ... (these people should be fined for time wasting if they don't answer straight). He was suddenly a banker turned politician that fella.

I agree with evercloserunion that there are plenty of people in the private sector who remain wealthy and secure. This is in spite of massive losses in property and the markets. The people who are secure are not dependent on being wage earners but people who have aquired substantial wealth and are holding it in diverse forms of assets. These are the people who stand to gain by buying up more assets as prices collapse, credit disappears and few people have spare cash to buy.

Government has created a privileged minority in the public service though, and now in the is prepared to throw them to the lions of public anger, imo as a distraction for Government culpability in the present situation.

If the IMF come into Ireland, they will likely require cutting public service jobs. There is no such thing as 100% secure jobs anywhere in the world today, and Ireland is now the most vulnerable economy in Europe.

The real division is between people who have gathered, often with the aid of Government tax incentive (avoidance) schemes, very substantial private wealth and those who have paid taxes and are now insecure about their jobs, homes, livelihoods and pensions.

This at the same time as it is ignoring an EU Directive that requires it takes steps to safeguard private sector pensions.

I don't know who these wealthy and secure people are.

All the wealthy and secure professionals I know have lost on their investments and pensions and their incomes have been decimated, particularly if they are self employed.

All the retailers, restarateurs, publicans, hoteliers and so forth are taking a hiding too and I assume their investments and pensions are screwed too.

Manufacturing and agriculture have been getting destroyed for a long time.

Who are these wealthy secure people? Where do they hang out? I'd like to meet them because I need the business.

There was a very interesting article in the SBP saying that something like 50% of the income tax take comes from the top 6% of earners and something like 20% of income tax take comes from the top 1%. I reckon there will be huge drops in these figures.

Ironically, cuts in the pay of top executives will cost the state dearly. Maybe corporate blood suckers are the secure private sector people the unions are referring to? We should be able to tax them without them moving jobs? Or would this act as a bar to multinationals locating here? Maybe we could limit it to executives in Semi-state and statutory bodies ?

Auditor #9 wrote:

Squire wrote:

There are many jobs in the Public Sector that need to go. With less economic activity do we need so many planners, Building Control officers, tax collectors?

Was up in North East last week with some Architects for a preliminary meeting with some planning officers. Firstly it was hard to arrange the meeting, secondly these people don't seem to realise that I and those like me do not have to invest anything at all in their city. So they neatly made up my mind on that proposal. I would have thought simple question how high can we build? Lack of simple answer shows that they are not on top of their jobs.

I don't mind reasonable conditions but I do dislike indecisive, subjective twaddle, it wastes everyone's time and costs money.

On the Week in Politics last night there was a snippet of Shane Ross quizzing one of the Anglo officials in a Dáil committee on how many people knew of Seán's Fitzpatrick's loans ... (these people should be fined for time wasting if they don't answer straight). He was suddenly a banker turned politician that fella.

I saw that. A Sir Humphrey moment if ever there was one.

youngdan wrote:

What is wrong with firing half the public service and cutting the pay of whoever is left by 50%. What part of bankrupt do they not understand. Get a job in the private sector. They think that somebody else owes them a living.

They refuse to accept reality.

All workers think that somebody else owes them a living, and somebody else generally does, because after all they have worked for it. Public sector workers have worked hard to keep this country running and now like all workers they are owed a living by their employers. Yet many are having this living strangled out of them.

I ask again, why hit those who can't afford it when there are those up top wo can afford it, both in th private sector and in the public sector.

Quote :

There is already an income
levy going up to 3% for those on very substantial incomes. This is not
an income levy, it's a contribution to a very valuable pension,
something the public service should have been asked to make years ago.
Maybe if anyone has a real problem with this payment they could be
given the option of opting out of the pension entirely.

It is an income levy, insofar as it is a deduction from the income of public sector workers, on top of the other income levy, to be paid into the coffers of the state to assist state spending.

Maybe private sector workers should be asked to pay contributions from their incomes which will be repaid in a few years when we are in better times.

Quote :

It is true at the moment, but
you will be right if they don't wise up and realise that they cannot
hold on to all of the advantage they have enjoyed up to now.

This is simply not true. Many public sector workers are going to be put under serious strain by this recession. A lot moreso than many private sector workers.

Quote :

Of course this will cause
problems for some, but they at least are holding on to their job and
can therefore make adjustments to their life style, unlike the 10% of
private sector workers who have already lost their job and with it up
to 70% of their income. What percentage of public sector workers have
lost their job & 70% of their income so far? 0% is the answer
there. This public sector pain is relatively small compared to the hit
the private sector has taken up to now and with a lot more expected.

You mean the hit that up to 10% of the private sector has taken. You are speaking as if the entire private sector has been laid off. Many private sector employees, as I say, still live considerably more comfortably than many public sector workers. Should these people not be expected to pay a bit extra for their country instead of the struggling public sector workers?

ECU - who are these cosseted private sector workers with loadza money and secure jobs??

Zhou_Enlai wrote:

There was a very interesting article in the SBP saying that something like 50% of the income tax take comes from the top 6% of earners and something like 20% of income tax take comes from the top 1%. I reckon there will be huge drops in these figures.

Ironically, cuts in the pay of top executives will cost the state dearly. Maybe corporate blood suckers are the secure private sector people the unions are referring to? We should be able to tax them without them moving jobs? Or would this act as a bar to multinationals locating here? Maybe we could limit it to executives in Semi-state and statutory bodies ?

Link: Sunday Business Post -Tax is ‘too dependent’ on very high earners

Another thought - we keep talking about attracting top R&D personnel yet people want to tax high earners more.

That time of the week again: to spit hiss boo middlefinger applaud rejoice cheer jeer or vomit at your cathode ray tube

The lack of Mariettas is indeed a severe crisis. The digestives have also gone soggy *sigh*


Enter tonys stage left *there will be Kimberleys for everyone tomorrow*

Brian Goggin = 2million packets of mariettas next year

Pat neary = 600k pkts of mariettas into the hand and 150k each year til debt do us part

Zhou_Enlai wrote:

... we keep talking about attracting top R&D personnel yet people want to tax high earners more.

That depends on how you define R&D. Engineers and other 'techies' are rather poorly paid when compared to bankers, lawyers & politicians. I don't know that I've ever met an engineer earning more than a lawyer. So tax the shit out of any fucker who made millions on the tribunals I say. Goggins, Sheehy, Fitzcraptrick, Fingers and Neary should be taxed to within an inch of their sorry lives. Where else are they going to go?

Tax the shit out of every has-been sitting on fat state pensions. Haughey's wife is presumably still drawing that bollox's pension. Why haven't we taxed Abbeyville into public ownership? Same for Lawlor. Ray Burke is still quenching his insatiable thirst at the bosom of the state.

Engineers who are still academics don't make a huge amount but then again academic anythings tend not to make huge money. When you broaden the term "engineer" and "techies" to the guys who set up major construction and design companies or to those who have created spin off companies from academic work such as Iona then you find some seriously wealthy people.

Most lawyers aren't working in corporate firms, most lawyers aren't earning a fortune, most lawyers were incredibly dependent on work from personal injuries most of which has now been replaced by the PIAB and on conveyancing which is now also in the doldrums. Most lawyers are under serious pressure to make ends meat at the moment, like alot of professions.

Joan Burton, Simon Coveney and Eamon Ryan on tonight and will at some stage, between other policy concerns get around to discussing Anglo's recent reports...

The Greens saw this coming for years says Eamon Ryan.

Eamon hasn't read the PwC report either. Does everyone have to read these things ?

He's right about sustainable planning is necessary now ... unless we've already built too much.

Joan going for the Crony Capitalism angle.

I think the Anglo thing will die off for a while now, unless one of the 'Maple' names is found in bed with a senior FFer (suggestion that 'Maple' refers to a popular drinkery/eatery in Drumcondra?). People will get bored and Kenny will back off now that actual names have been named (easier when they're mere shadows). AIB's profit-warning last week points to a possible next focus of attention, or perhaps Fingleton's fiefdom. Without a clear link to FF or to a particular Minister, the Anglo thing will recede...

There's always a fatigue point to be reached in these things - you're no doubt very right on that one.

It'll never be forgotten that David Drumm earned 40k a week though ..

Indeed, and the sheer concentration and level of debt in such a small pool, 15 people, half a billion each, will serve as a useful chapter in future textbooks for budding regulators, 'Why your job needs to be done properly'...

McWilliams is saying that the AIB profit warning last week points to a mess that might yet dwarf Anglo (and BofI are in it too). If I remember correctly, he predicted in December that both AIB and BofI might end up nationalised by March. Now I know he has foppish ginger hair, but he might still be on to something. And the SBP today also highlight the potential problems with Nationwide, asking how it could possibly be expected to have succeeded with the same business model that caused Anglo to end up in the state it is in. From personal knowledge of Fingleton's m.o. years ago, if debt exposure is Nationwide's only problem it'll be a miracle of Wedding at Cana proportions...

How bad can these problems be though? At one side there is a big hole and at the other side there is no money going in and that hole will only start closing really when business takes off again.

It might not be as bad as it seems with the loans though and might seem a lot better once the worst eases off ... Whatever that means. I think Squire referred to riding out a storm until the autumn when the worst will be over - doesn't sound too wrong but I think we'll see a lot of redundancies in the banking sector before that.

Where the hell will business start to come back from though ??? And all the loan repayments that are being made now and the lack of borrowing must be good for the reserves of the banks now. Why the hell do we have six banks ?? We only need at most two and the Credit Union now. And mostly run by computers which cannot be hacked into to make big mistakes and which do not exact high salaries to the order of about 5 grand per day (Drumm's salary)

I have a horrible feeling that we aren't anywhere near solid ground yet, and wont be for years. I remember the recession in Britain in the early 90s, and the early performances of John Bird and John Fortune taking the piddle out of the 'green shoots of recovery' merchants. One joke was about advice to people wanting to run a small business. 'Start out with a large one'. It must have been a matter of years by then that the economy had been on the slide, and that one was nothing compared to this...

What I'd like to see is the big two to survive (even if only as a merged entity), plus a influx of foreign banks to ensure the kind of competitiveness (including an end to rip-off charges and the like) that has been lacking. I'd be happy to see ethical banking be offered as a practical alternative (or at least sensible banking), thus I am hoping that the British Nationwide follows through on its promise to enter the Irish market (and the Co-op Bank would be good too). The British building society ethos would be a welcome change...

Surely by the Autumn this current Banking nonsense will be over and whatever has to fall will have done so be it country or bank. Can you see the Banks surviving the year with this background?

That is not to say that we will have recovery in the Autumn, far from it, but by then hopefully we will be through this very political phase and should be able to gauge opportunies.

Also if there is any sense at all we may start to see some progress on proper regulation across the West. I live in hope.