How Fianna Fail spent your bin taxes -and 9 billion Euros more!

by John Wed Apr 28, 2004 12:50

Jeff, I dont have any particular disagreement with what you say about the need for rent control in Ireland similar to Holland. You could well be correct. I dont know as much about that specific subject as you do. All I'll say is that situation in that regard in UK, including Wales, is similar to Ireland and not Holland. I'll be first to admit that Ireland lags behind EU in certain areas of social legislation. I'm quite happy for many of these to be implemented in Ireland. When FF/PD first came to power in 1997, the Irish economy had been underperforming the rest of the developed world for 200 years, whether as part of UK or on its own. GDP per capita was far lower, unemployment was far higher, emigration was far higher, housing completions were far lower, numbers employed were far lower over the previous 200 years than in the rest of Europe or North America. It wasn't just due to distribution of wealth, but failure of economy to produce wealth over a long long period of time. Ireland was a poor country and considered a failure by most economists. It was laughed at by unionist population in Northern Ireland. This was due to a number of factors: initially misrule by the British, then successive Irish governments being more interested in nationalism, religion and even occasionally, when Labour were in government, socialism. The primary focus of the first few years of the FF/PD government was to fix that, get the engines of wealth creation running. That government was the first to put wealth creation in the economy ahead of nationalism, religion or socialism. Every thing they did in first few years was dedicated to that end. The results have been spectacular, as even parties on the Left agree. GDP, unemployment, migration, numbers employed all now better than EU average. And best of all, a 400% increase in number of new houses built to a level far higher than anywhere else in EU. Now that the wealth creation problem in Ireland has been solved, and Ireland is no longer a poor country, there could well be a need for more emphasis on social legislation of the type you suggest. I'd be quite happy with that. FF/PD are not averse to social legislation, despite what some say. In some areas they are now ahead of EU, in others still behind, as in case of rent control you mention. Look at the smoking ban. In that field Ireland is ahead of EU. Up until a year ago critics of FF used to say that FF was in pay of the licensed vintners. But, they went ahead with smoking ban regardless. Also, when considering some of the downsides in the Irish economy like price of accomodation, you have to bear in mind the huge increase in population that Ireland has experienced in recent years. Between 1997 and 2004 the population of Ireland increased by over 10%, due to high birth rate and 200,000 net immigration. The immigrants were about 2/3 returns of emigrants in earlier decades or their children and 1/3 new immigrants with no previous connection with Ireland. Dont get me wrong, I'm not racist, I'm completely in favour of this immigration. But, the result is population of Ireland increasing since 1997 far faster than elsewhere. In most EU countries population increase in that time was 2%. So, obviously such a large population increase affects demand for housing and its price. To put this in context: if the entire population of Ireland, both ROI and NI, every last man, woman and child, had moved from Ireland to mainland Britain since 1997, the percentage increase in the UK population in that time would still have been less than the percentage increase in population of Ireland in that time. If that had happened, I'm sure the number of unemployed and homeless in the UK would have skyrocketed. So, obviously such population growth creates difficulties in the short run at least, but the huge increase in number of jobs and new houses shows they are being dealt with. To answer your earlier points: (a) cant move to Ireland now, wife is Welsh, wont leave (b) I dont class myself or FF (maybe PD are) as conservative, but in the centre, slightly right of centre on some issues, slightly left of centre on others (e.g. smoking ban). For a real conservative, read the entries by Mr McDermott and his Remove Fianna Fail party, also some vituperative articles by likes of Sean Barrett, Colm McCarthy and Alan Ruddock in Irish Independent who are vituperative against FF for increasing health expenditure, building too much council housing, developing LUAS etc etc. Here is another example of why FF is not as right-wing as you think, which is related to comment on taxation by Mr McDermott in comment after yours. Average income tax paid in Ireland is about same as in UK, not higher as he suggests. Thats the average over all incomes I'm talking about. But, on lower paid its much less in Ireland. On higher incomes its more in Ireland. The rates are 20% and 42% in Ireland, 22% and 40% in UK. I pay the same percentage of my income in PAYE as similar person in Ireland
because I'm middle income. But, someone working in supermarket would pay a lot less in Ireland, while Pat Kenny would pay a lot more. I'm happy with it that way, although Mr McDermott is not.

by John McDermott Wed Apr 28, 2004 00:56 Ashtown Dublin

‘Dunaree 2000’ is spot on! I agree with all of his points-except the statement that ‘Fianna Fail has no plans to increase the bin taxes’
Now all of the evidence from countrywide experience is to the contrary.
Dublin has been left until last due to their stalwart anti-water tax campaign,.. as Fianna Fail strategists have seen our capital city as the last bastion of resistance.
(A bit like beleagured Barcelona…,when General Franco and the Falangists had mopped up the rest of the countryside?)
But perhaps Dunaree(oh to be..) is speaking ‘ex-cathedral’ on this matter and has the ear of the great Bertie himself...If so …Joe Higgins, among others, will be greatly relieved and feel his time spent in Mountjoy has not been wasted.
Nevertheless one has to ask oneself,…of Bertie ..as of C.J.H….Would you buy a used car from either of these men??.

Fianna Fail reduced the tax bands because the P.D.s throttled them into doing so(made it conditional on their retaining power)
However as a result of inflationary pay increases, resulting from inflationary taxation by Bertie’s Boys,in recent years,and the doubling of house prices etc etc-Bertie now has most of the population in the 42% tax band which has never been adjusted in recent budgets.
Nice one Bertie!

As for capital gains taxes the fact is –at 40%-nobody ever paid them.!!
Charlie McCreevey recently said that since they were halved,the Exchequer has received more money from newly compliant taxpayers than ever before.!
This is perfectly understandable.
If Mr Dunaree was a businessman and sold out for say 20 million Euros…would he write out a cheque for 8 million Euros for Bertie?-even if he were a stalwart member of the Fianna Fail Party- like Pee Flynn?
Of course he would’nt.
He would be off to Jersey, or the Isle-Of-Man,…as fast as a scalded cat.!

As for reducing corporate tax rates to a lowly 12% every dog in the street knows that only American Multinationals had this wonderful carrot to attract them to our shores until our jealous E.E.U.partners outlawed the practice of a two-tier tax rate,favouring foreign investment in Ireland at the expense of our generous neighbours,in Germany etc who had felt badly repaid for their kindness to poor Ireland in the past(peripheral funds and so forth) by this act of perfidy-of which the Financial Center in Docklands is just another example.

Brass plate companies robbing Deutschland of hundreds of millions of Euros in revenue every year. ‘Tut tut Ireland …you ungrateful wretch’!
Now Bertie has spent so much money on our wonderful health service,…our new ‘Loos’,our new Highways across Ancient Tara,Carrickmines,etc,…benchmarking to buy votes…he is a bit short of CASH.
Expect more TAXES of every conceivable kind –after the next election.!
Oh- to- be- in- Dunaree! How lucky you are to live in John Bull’s Country.Even if you pay 1200 Euros a year for your rubbish,your income tax bands are the envy of every poor slob that works his butt off, for a living in the Emerald Island for Bertie Ahern.

by jeff Tue Apr 27, 2004 19:46

Thanks again for the hard work.

My main gripe, as you guessed, is the price of accomadation, etc, etc.

While your figures do indeed show Holland to have a roughly similar rate of homelessness as Ireland, the diference in rights and standards between Netherlands and Ireland cannot be stressed enough.

Landlords are not allowed to rent out accomadation that contains damp, etc, wheras in Ireland, this type of behaviour seems to be the norm. The fact that basic flats in Ireland are tiny, in comparision to Holland, and the maximum in Holland ( 400 euro a month) seems to be the minimum rate.

Holland has rent control, something Ireland badly needs!

More from me later, John, thanks again,
jeff

by John Tue Apr 27, 2004 10:41

Because FF's 'profligacy' is main reason so many houses are built in Ireland compared with other countries and why homelessness is 1/4 that of Scotland, with its Labour government and Labour councils. Its perfectly relevant.

There are no plans to bring bin tax up to UK council tax levels. If you add up all taxes, FF have reduced them. Look at income tax. Rates were 35% and 65% in 1987, today 20% and 42%. Likewise capital gains tax (reduced from 40% to 20%), and corporation tax, which was 58% in 1970s, today 12.5%. Ireland is lowest-taxed country in EU, which even CORI complained of in a report last week. It was FF that got rid of household rates which even in 1970s were more than 120 euros per annum.

Your complaint about verbal abuse is daft considering what you write about FF.

by john mcdermott - Remove Fianna Fail Party Tue Apr 27, 2004 00:22 Ashtown Dublin

What has Fianna fail's venality and profligacy to do with the Simon Community and the homeless.?
Christ said;
'The poor will always be with us"

Please don't sit for your O Levels/Leaving Cert english just yet....
(1)No marks are awarded for verbal abuse.

(2)The 'comprehension 'section paper requires answers based on the subject topic.

You will be happy to know that we have plans to bring the bin stealth tax up to the level you are happy with (1200Euros?).
But not just yet.
We have to be re-elected first ,....before we shaft you .!
Signed ,
your friend and phalangist,
John McD.

by John Mon Apr 26, 2004 20:38

Excellent contribution, Jeff, unlike the idiot who started off this thread. I haven't time to answer your questions tonight on the general
economy, on house prices, rent control, or why I don't move to Ireland, but I'll do that tomorrow, if you are still interested. However, I have been looking thru the internet for figures on homelessness, as this seems of special interest to you. Here is what I found. I'm only taking figures from the web sites of organisations that are involved in helping the homeless, not government figures, apart from one figure which is from a BBC Scotland web site, although I do believe it is simply reporting figures given in the web sites of Scottish organisations involved in helping the homeless there. I don't find anything to indicate that homelessness is worse in Ireland than in other countries, the reverse in fact. I'm taking the figures verbatim from the web sites of these organisations, so I can't vouchsafe for their accuracy, and also the definition of 'homeless' may vary from country to country, so these figures should only be taken as a rough guide. The verbatim extracts from the web sites are indicated by quote marks. The comments outside the quote marks are my own. Here are the figures
:

Ireland
----------

The Simon Community website gives two figures for homelessness in Ireland:

(a) 5,234 were homeless throughout the country in March 1999
(b) the Simon Community itself estimates that about 10,000 experienced homelessness in Ireland each year.

The difference between the two is that (a) is the number of homeless at a given point in time (March 1999) while (b) is the number who came and went as homeless during the course of the year. Obviously the 'homeless' is not a fixed group. People join the ranks of the homeless, but people also leave it when they are allocated houses. So, the number experiencing homelessness during the course of a year is greater than the number homeless at a given point in time. When comparing these figures with other countries, it is important to know whether the other country's figure should be compared with (a) or (b) for Ireland.

So, how do these figures compare with elsewhere? In all cases comparison with Ireland is made after adjustment for population size. Also, in doing the comparisons below, I have tried to judge whether the other countries homelessness figures are calculated on the same basis as (a) or (b) for Ireland. I cant guarantee to have got it right in all cases, although I think I have. However, in most cases it makes little difference.

Scotland
------------

The BBC Scotland News website of 9 Sep 2003 has the following entry:

'Glasgow's homeless tops Ireland'

'There are more homeless in Glasgow alone than in the whole of Ireland, latest figures have revealed.'

'The actual number of those homeless in Glasgow alone is currently recorded at around 10,000, meaning that they are equal to whole countries like Finland, Ireland and Austria'

note: population of Glasgow is about 1/4 that of whole of Ireland

'The homeless per inhabitants for Glasgow is about 2 per thousand, against well under the 0.5 in the other countries'

'In the whole of Scotland the figure for the number homeless is put at 40,000'

So, the figures for Scotland are far higher than for Ireland.

England
------------

The web site of Share International has the following:

'In 1997 the number of people homeless in England was 360,000'

The web site of The Socialist Worker, London
gives the following:

'Number of people homeless in England in 2002 was 201,550'

Again, both these figures far higher than for Ireland (after adjustment for population). The lower one by the Socialist Worker is more than twice per capita the higher of the two figures given by the Simon Community for Ireland.

Netherlands
-----------------

The web site of FEANTSA (described as a 'one-stop resource on homelessness in Europe' produced by the European Federation of National Organisations Working with the Homeless) has the following:

'In the Netherlands the number of homeless people is estimated to be around 30,000, which is a relatively low 0.2% of the population'

So, the figure for the Netherlands is roughly the same as for Ireland (after adjustment for population) - it is either slightly higher than for Ireland or slightly lower, depending on whether it should be compared with figure (a) or figure (b) for Ireland, about which I have no information. Note that the Netherlands figure is described as 'relatively low', so that description would also apply to Ireland.

Finland
----------

The FEANTSA web site gives the following:

'According to the figures presented by the municipalities in the yearly housing market surveyed for the Housing Fund of Finland, there were around 10,000 single homeless persons and around 800 homeless families with more than one person in November 2001.'

So, this is clearly higher than for Ireland, as it is certainly Ireland figure (a) it should be compared with.

Denmark
-------------

The web site www.formidlingscentred.dk gives the following:

'During 2002 16,399 were admitted to housing arrangements for the homeless'

So, this is slightly higher than for Ireland, as it is certainly figure (b) for Ireland that it should be compared with.

France
----------

The Share International web site gives the following:

'The estimated homeless population in France is estimated at 1 million.'

This would be 5 to 10 times as high as in Ireland (after adjustment for population). However, I'm a bit sceptical about this figure for France. It seems a bit excessive.

Germany
-------------

The Share International web site gives the following:

'Estimates indicate that there are approximately 591,00 homeless in Germany, if you add the number of homeless immigrants, the total adds up to 860,000 people.'

This would be 4 to 8 times as high as in Ireland, but again the figures may be excessive.

America
-----------

The web site of the USA National Coalition for Homeless Sep 2002 gives the following:

'The best approximation is from an Urban Institute study which states that 3.5 million people are likely to experience homelessness in a given year'

So, this is 5 times higher than for Ireland, as it is certainly figure (b) for Ireland that it should be compared with.

Canada
-----------

The web site of the North Bay Network for Social Action gives the following:

'More than 1/4 million Canadians will experience homelessness this year 2001'

So, this is 3 times higher than for Ireland, as it is certainly figure (b) for Ireland that it should be compared with.

Well, Jeff, I hope these figures will be of some interest to you.

by jeff Mon Apr 26, 2004 15:59

John,

It is refreshing to have an intelligent conservative on board for a change, as oppossed to the usual trolling we hear from Likudniks, Bushites, and people who think intellectual inspiration is to be found in the scribblings of Eoghan Harris...

John, I am not being sarcastic, I mean it.

However, I really wanted you to answer this. On another thread, you pointed out the fact that under FF/PDs, Ireland had performed an economic miracle. Aside from the fact that the figures covered the period 1997-2001, ( ie; just before the current world recession, which does not, in my view, seem to be much of one, in the West, anyway) you negated to mention that, in that period, homelessness actually rose, along with house prices, etc.

What, in your opinion, should be done both about the chronic level of homelessness, and the crazy price of houses?

PS; I remember the Simon community ran an advert once that pointed to the fact that there were more homeless people in Dublin than a number of English cities combined.

John, I'd probably be FF/PD myself, if it were not for
1) the rise in homelessness

2) the fact that many hovels are going for top rate

3) unlike in the rest of the E.U., there is no body, or even legislation to deal with scum landlors that are "unable" to deal with things like damp, etc . In Holland, a person would be imprisoned for renting out hovels like that.

In Ireland, it seems every Guard, Judge, and politician are, in some way, involved in the renting of flats.etc.

This is the main reason I turned left. For all their pontificating, the media and political establishment just do not seem to give a shit about the homeless . The lates cutbacks in Rent Allowance seem to only confirm that to me.

Hope you can answer me on that vital point.


pps; if Ireland under FF/PD is so good, why do you live in the UK? ;0)

All the best, and thanks again for REAL debate. Take care,
jeff

by Realist Mon Apr 26, 2004 14:38

9 billion in bin taxes ????????
What a load of rubbish!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

by John Mon Apr 26, 2004 13:29

I misjudged this guy McDermott and his Remove Fianna Fail Party. I always thought from his previous contributions that he was a left-wing nutter. I was WRONG! He's a right-wing-nutter. I apologise to all leftists, unreservedly for associating you with this clown.

This is what he's whining about FF/PD doing:

(1) increasing public expenditure on health to above any major EU country
(2) increasing number of nurses by 17%
(3) paying health professionals too much
(4) employing more nurses per capita than in the UK and USA

Big deal! I'm sure people in Tallaght will be horrified to hear of this. Interested to know if Labour, Green Party, SF, SP, SWP share his critcisms of FF/PD on this issue. Those on the left who thought this guy was an ally must be confused now. If you've invited him to any MayDay demos, I suggest you withdraw invitation, otherwise his speech is likely to be a diatribe against FF/PD for spending too much on health and employing too many nurses. Not likely to go down too well with left-wing audience. Indeed, could well result in McDermott himself needing treatment in the health service he so despises.

He quotes from Sean Barrett of TCD. Barrett is the sort of right-wing fruitcake who thinks that CharlieMcCreevey is a communist. Barrett is and always has been opposed to all public expenditure and that all public services from health to fire brigade should be privatised. He has an ideological hatred of all public services and every report he has ever done has been filled with junk statistics to 'show' that the public expenditure is a waste of money. Here are a couple from his latest offerring:

(1) The birth rate in Ireland isn't falling, its rising. In 1990 51,000 births. In 2002 60,000 births. Also population is rising faster than in any OECD country, so public expenditure has to rise just to stand still. Of course, under the FF/PD government, it has more than stood still (and a GOOD thing too), something which obviously horrifies both Barrett and McDermott.
(2) Some of the claims could be refuted by a 4-year old. So absurd they make me think McDermott and Barrett can't count. Take the claim that only 6% of health service staff are medical personnel. Claptrap! There are approximately 100,000 working in the Irish health service. On McDermott's and Barrett's own figures there are 31,000 nurses alone. That's 31% of health service staff are nurses. That's before considering doctors, surgeons, anaesthitists and all the other categories of medical personnel.
(3) Number of nurses in UK is about 360,000. Yes, more nurses in Ireland per capita (and a GOOD thing too), but 25% more, not 400% more. If there were 4 times as many nurses in Ireland per capita as in UK, every woman you know in Ireland would be a nurse.

As for bed-nights in hospital. the criticisms made simply indicate ignorance of modern health care treatment. The same trend is happening in every developed country in the world. Go check the figures in any EU health statistics book. Its not cuts. Its modern health care. For example, in 1985 if you had a kidney stone, you would spend 14 days in hospital, a week prior to an operation and a week recuperating. I know that, because it happened me. In 2004, with same kidney stone, you mightn't even need to spend a single night, at most a couple of nights, in hospital, as they now have laser machines that can crack them. I suggest one be used to crack the stones in McDermott's brain. The objective of modern health care isn't simply to cure, its to cure as QUICKLY as possible, so you can be out of hospital asap and back on your feet again. So, of course the number of hospital bed-nights is falling. Its falling in every developed country.

As for the bin tax. In Ireland bin tax is around 120 euros per annum. In UK, council tax is around 1250 euros per annum. I know that, because I pay it.