A constructive argument?

flurby

Had a knock on the door last night from FF. I have no party affiliations apart from that I trust no-one. One thing I'm sure of is that I have issues with the government of the last ten years. I brought up one of these issues...

The two men, middle aged, were gathering support for Minister Brian Lenihan.

When they called to the door, I brought up the housing crisis - the fact that I, a professional in a full time job, haven`t a hope in hell of buying a property. In my opinion, only one of many problems young Irish people face.

The two gentlemen, argued "Well, vote for Fine Gael and Labour and you`ll be on the boat like they were 20 years ago". Interesting argument gentlemen. Little do you know I don`t see FG/Labour as an alternative either.

I responded by saying I had travelled to Australia in the past year. Every city had good transport, excellent healthcare (I had experience of this) and (at least in Perth) a housing market in which, had I stayed, I`d already have a foot on the ladder. I told them I felt, given the state of this country, I might be better off "on the boat". I said "I should have stayed".

They responded... "Yeah, you should have".

Way to go Fianna Fáil - "the next step forward - tell the young people to leave".

Bottle_of_Smoke

Maybe they were giving their opinion on what was best for you rather than their country!

In what sort of manner did they put it?

flurby

They were completely indignant, disregarding me with a wave and the comment that I should have stayed abroad.

And, for that matter, if emigration is the best option for young professionals in Ireland, what does that say for the state of affairs in "their" country? Which, as it happens, is also "mine".

To be honest, their reaction reaked of a sense that they were somewhat "untouchable" when faced by opposition. They didn't even attempt to outline any policies or proposals their party was making to improve my situation - and that of thousands of others.

The Rooster

With all due respect to all the hard-working canvassers out there, the one thing that 99% of them have in common, no matter what their party affiliation, is they are thick-skinned, hard-necked, condescending ignoramuses.

DeepBlue

flurby wrote:

When they called to the door, I brought up the housing crisis - the fact that I, a professional in a full time job, haven`t a hope in hell of buying a property. In my opinion, only one of many problems young Irish people face.

The housing issue is nothing short of a scandal :mad: . The problem is that it only affects the small number of people trying to get on the housing ladder (a small number of people relative to the total number of voters).
Once one is actually on the housing ladder then one wants house prices to stay high to avoid the problem of negative equity.

Tbh I don't see any party even addressing this issue in any real way. There's a lot of guff about social/affordable housing and fiddling around with stamp duty but there's nothing to address the ridiculous price of houses in the first instance. When even couples in reasonably decent jobs cannot afford a house with two wages then it is beyond ridiculous.

Of course if you're Finance Minister you'll have no problem getting help buying your house :rolleyes: .

Unfortunately none of the alternatives seem too keen to sort out this mess. At least the Greens give some impression that they would tackle the planning mess but they're hardly going to be in a position to do much about it.

gandalf

Maybe you should put a call into Mr.Lenihan's office and warn him his canvesser's are putting people off voting for him

flurby

I've actually emailed Minister Lenihan, and given him a link to my blog documenting the event. Hopefully he'll respond.

As for a possible response to the housing issue - here's a crazy idea...

I've been hearing a lot about Estate Agents calling up hopeful bidders on a property and saying "You've been outbid". The bidder has no way of proving the estate agent's claim is genuine. One close friend dropped out of a bidding war, only to be called up a few weeks later and told the "other" bidder "fell through".

Agents are manufacturing bidding wars all over the country, ripping of buyers and raising their percentage take.

So why not regulate the whole process and introduce legally binding bids - you drop in, sign something, and the other bidder sees that document when they call by to outbid you. If it works on EBay, why not in real estate?

This might seem a minor change - but think how many people bid up to EUR30,000 more than the original asking price because of bidding wars? Then ask yourself how many of those might have been orchestrated by agents with nothing to lose.

Colonel Sanders

flurby wrote:

I've been hearing a lot about Estate Agents calling up hopeful bidders on a property and saying "You've been outbid". The bidder has no way of proving the estate agent's claim is genuine. One close friend dropped out of a bidding war, only to be called up a few weeks later and told the "other" bidder "fell through".

same thing happened to my girlfriend. she was told their were 'other parties' interested in the house she wanted to buy. She told the estate agent their was no way she was getting into a bidding war and he immediately responded that he didn't think the other so called interested parties wouls bid as it seemed likely to be out of their price range. what a load of bo llox.

I know very little about the process and regulations re. bidding etc. but surely there should be a process where all bids have to be made in writing and an interested party can ask to see any bids already made.

marco murphy

An FF canvasser offered mea job ''in a new FF office with **** pay, but ye might as well''. :rolleyes:

DeepBlue

Colonel Sanders wrote:

same thing happened to my girlfriend. she was told their were 'other parties' interested in the house she wanted to buy. She told the estate agent their was no way she was getting into a bidding war and he immediately responded that he didn't think the other so called interested parties wouls bid as it seemed likely to be out of their price range. what a load of bo llox.

It's a scam.
Prime Time investigates did a good report on it last December - http://dynamic.rte.ie/av/230-2200395.smil.

There seems to be hardly any regulations to protect the house buyer which is incredible when it's the biggest purchase most people will make.

Jonny Arson

flurby wrote:

The two gentlemen, argued "Well, vote for Fine Gael and Labour and you`ll be on the boat like they were 20 years ago".

Due to FF/PDs failing to manage our economy anyway competently over the past 10 years many of us will be on that boat. FF know what is around the corner after the election for our construction dependent economy and they are putting faith this type of scaremongering as their ''we told you so'' trump card while in opposition. Sadly most people will fall for their crap.

flurby

Wow!

Firstly, I hadn't seen the RTE investigation - wonder why no-one has copped it in amongst the parties and made it an issue (do I hear a lobby group somewhere?).

Second... why do "most" people ALWAYS fall for it!?!

When it comes to housing, the point has been made that first-time buyers don't form a large enough part of the electorate to matter... but what about their parent's and relatives etc. If enough first time buyers i.e. young people just wanting a place of their own clubbed together there'd be a serious lobby group right there.

The nurses have done it - why not everyone in the country between the ages of 23 and 30. That'd make for some pretty fun trouble making!

"We will not only use our vote in the next election but we'll all stop drinking for six months. Since our demographic drinks the most that'll put the vintners up in arms too... so cop on to yourselves or you'll have a serious fight on your hands!"

:-)

brianthebard

Stop drinking? are ya mad??? :shock:

Anyways my da is canvassing for FF, I hope he's doing a better job than the first example.

flurby

Interesting... might this have been your Da?

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055093035

Are they all just a bunch of arrogant twits? Anyone up for joining the:

Young People Who Just Want a Gaff of Their Own Party ??

(Working title) ;-)

brianthebard

Roffles he's in Sligo/North Leitrim. I'll keep an eye out for threads though!

I've always felt that there needs to be a party policies for the young, instead of paying lip service with their fecking YFG and ÓFF etc. They are either party members or they're not dammit!

nesf

brianthebard wrote:

I've always felt that there needs to be a party policies for the young, instead of paying lip service with their fecking YFG and ÓFF etc. They are either party members or they're not dammit!

I completely agree. Though I don't really draw much of a distinction between them other than FG proper don't spam my college email with electioneering crap. I'm seriously annoyed that the YFG society in UCC is actually abusing the allstudents list in this way. None of them should be allowed use such free channels to distribute political information, I hope they get a hard wrap on the knuckles over it from the society's guild.

/rant

brianthebard

I've heard people say that Labour youth are more militant that Labour (wtf that means in a Labour party context I don't know) but I don't think that's justification for having youth groups seperate from the main parties. And spamming the allstudents list of a college is baaaaad man, a surefire way of losing my vote. What are UCC like for getting strict with societies?

nesf

brianthebard wrote:

What are UCC like for getting strict with societies?

Funding being cut completely has happened a few times in the days I was involved with societies. They take it fairly damn seriously though YFG probably won't have anything too bad happen to them since it'll probably open the floodgates and I'll have YPD, Ógra etc emails in the morning. I was still a bit shocked to see the email though, they've short memories, there were moves to try and ban political societies a few years back, well 5 or 6 but it came to nothing but stunts like this just stoke those kinds of fires.

Victor Meldrew

flurby wrote:

Are they all just a bunch of arrogant twits? Anyone up for joining the:

Young People Who Just Want a Gaff of Their Own Party ??

(Working title) ;-)

I had a similar experience in 2002, Charlie O connor (FF TD) canvassed me as i pulled into the driveway after 2 hours in traffic and told me that i owed my job to Bertie and that i'd never had it so good. I tore him a new one and pointed out that what i have I have due to my own efforts, and if no decent schools, public transport, or hospitals (not to even menton the housing issue) represents "never having it so good" then he can keep it.

5 years on and things are worse, all services above have got worse etc...

We are being told that the country is awash with money for the last 8 years at least yet the greater dublin area is a dump to live in and outside it there are no secure jobs, So I'd suggest that we rename the party "Decent quality of life and a house worth living in" party.

flurby

Good call on the party name... but perhaps we should get something snappier. All further suggestions welcome :-)

In response to the youth politics thing. I spoke to a passionate young labour member, and personal friend a few months ago and he got me interested. We were in the pub, so naturally - I was enthusiastic about finding a weakness in his new found passion in order to extract the urine somewhat...

... I asked him how it works and he said that they have meetings, elections, policies, just like their more senior counterparts. Thing is, their senior counterparts aren't bound to listen to the younglings at all.

So it's kindof like when you were young and your primary school teacher had a fake election to teach you how it worked. Or when you used to pick a team for a footbal match and say "We're Liverpool". Basically, it's a big fun game of "Let's pretend".

J.

jmayo

Jonny Arson wrote:

Due to FF/PDs failing to manage our economy anyway competently over the past 10 years many of us will be on that boat. FF know what is around the corner after the election for our construction dependent economy and they are putting faith this type of scaremongering as their ''we told you so'' trump card while in opposition. Sadly most people will fall for their crap.

Actually this is only reaosn I would like to see FF back in power, because I would like to see them carry the can for the cock up they have made of the economy.
You cannot base an economy on construction, it has no future.