Ireland needs a new plan.

mumhaabu

We are heading into a whirlwind of a economic depression which will if action is not taken soon set the country back twenty years and leave us back to square one where we export people.

I believe the country problems are caused squarely by an inept government who refuses to accept what is happening.

My plan for to get Ireland back on track is basically interventionist with the eye to future prosperity.

I think the first issue that needs immediate tackling is our Credit Crisis. We must Nationalise all the banks and ensure credit lines are restored to Businesses and People.

Secondly I think we need to address the collapse of the Building sector and the associated bedlam it has caused.

I think we need to borrow heavily and invest in new infrastructural projects such as more Motorways, Rail lines in the Dublin Leinster Metro area similarly for Cork, Limerick and Galway. This should be done independently of CIE and Irish Rail.

We need to fast track the development of new hospitals, Fibre Optic Broadband to every home, and schools similarly for Garda Barracks and Prisons. These projects would enable a certain percentage of the construction sector to remain afloat while diversifying away from Construction. Similarly we need to gain Energy Independence and this can be achieved through investment in Alternative energies such as Peat, Inceneration, Solar, Wind, Tidal etc.

We need to restructure our Social model and begin cutbacks on the entire public sector and reduce it by at least half. Welfare needs reform as does Social Housing, I would favour Governement Intervention by buying large empty estates and selling them to those on Housing lists using low rate loans payable over x amount fo years with a minimum 50% deposit. I do not favour buying individual houses in estates alrealy occupied and planking Council Houses next to the middle classes stuck in negative equity.

We should reduce all taxes in the short term and reward those who gets Ireland moving again.

Then I realised I had an economic wet dream! Biffo will see Ireland down the swanny I am afraid unless the Knife is not taken to the Public Service and Unions soon.

Permabear

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mumhaabu

Where do we get the money to do that?

We don't need money an executive order is used to essentially rob the banks and take them under state control until Ireland emerges from the Crisis, similar to what the US Railroad commission did during both World Wars. It is in the National Interest and the only things of worth in the banks now are the buildings and the rest represents garbage debt which may ultimately never be repaid.

How? Isn't our national borrowing deficit already in breach of EU rules?

Ireland is a sovereign nation and what is best for Ireland is what matters, it is quite an easy matter to reintroduce the Irish Punt if necessary, handing away control to the ECB caused alot of this to begin with as Interest rates were artificially low to suit the bigger countries like Germany and France who were struggling to stay out of recession while the tiger was roaring ahead.

How is building motorways going to help us out of the recession?

It will create a modern high speed transportation network giving the national economy greater competitiveness. Transport costs are currently massive mostly due to decrepit roads. It would also create short term employment for unemployed construction workers and the increased tax revenue and spending as a result will benefit the economy and community in general.

And operated by whom?

Private companies on behalf of the state however all infrastructure must remain state owned. Motor Taxation, Fuel Duty, VRT etc. should be for the Road Network exclusively, not for welfare and solar panel grants etc. I also favour stripping all Councils and Town/Corporations of all responsibility for road maintenance as they clearly are incompetent. Multiple tenders should go to private road maintenance companies and pay them according to performance.

Similarly for the CIE Companies, Irish Rail/Bus Eireann/Dublin Bus etc. They are outdated and so are their working practices and the Unions involved are more interested in "jobs for the boys" than Customer Service or value for money. These closed Union shops need to be busted.

Why do we need fibre-optic broadband in prisons?

My mistake, What I meant to say was "We need to fast track the development of new hospitals, schools, Garda Barracks and Prisons and similarly Fibre Optic Broadband to every home, business etc. I added the broadband bit mid sentence!:rolleyes:. Broadband to prisons maybe necessary for the staff but I would not allow prisoners have access to the Internet unless it involved educational purposes and it should be heavily censored.

Why keep the construction sector afloat at all?

I don't want to keep it afloat I am more concerned about the mass unemployment that has emerged from its collapse. Now is the time to get things built when people are desperate for work and by creating civil engineering projects it will give the ultimate value for money to the taxpayer while softening the blow for that collapsing sector? Construction projects can be done for a lot less during a Recession than during a boom.

Where is the money for all this investment going to come from?

It will entail borrowing however the exchequer returns will rise exponentially if other cuts were made and by making these investments now you will be setting Ireland up for economic growth in future. Government's however never think beyond their 5 year term of office and are severely Myopic.

I agree with that part.

The Unions in Ireland have too much power and by breaking the public service rather than paying it to go away then eventually something good might happen. Just look at FAS rotten to the core and this sort of activity is endemic within unionised industry Public or Private.

How about proposing that the government not interfere in the housing market and let homes find their own value?

I agree but rather than having Developers defaulting on loans for empty houses buy them out at cost price and use them for the public good.

Why, because having council houses next door will bring down values even more?

Why? Because hard working people who invested their life savings (or borrowed) in private homes in estates deserve their exclusivity no matter how idiotic their decisions were. Why should the Council suddenly land in somebody to a neighbourhood where people worked for and bought their homes when these individuals are essentially sponging of everyone else in society.

I'm just curious as to how you intend to fund your model of low taxes, high spending, and rampant government intervention?

Through minor borrowing, major restructuring to the Public service and dramatic cuts in Social Welfare, plus there is several other income streams that could be looked at. However though the efficiency of the private sector delivering better value for money and reducing Welfare (including major restrictions to how EU citizens can claim). As people will see the benefits of this they will be more accepting and the economic recovery will take hold which will see an increase in tax revenues despite lower tax rates.

Our National psyche now is rather low and we have emerged into an Economic Depression and weathered essentially a 24month Winter as we have not seen summer sunshine since 2006 and one must remember that the awful summers have played havoc too with the economy. A lot of the sudden consumer confidence collapse lies at the door of the likes of George Lee and Eddie Hobbs who have helped talk Ireland into a recession. Our bubble burst as did Wall Street in 1929 however through the leadership of Hoover and Roosevelt America was back on track (helped in part by the war economy of the late 30's and 40's) and the American economy roared ahead until the mid 70's when the Oil Crisis slid it into recession.

The 80's was essentially a War Economy as the Cold War was at its zenith and the Nineties resembled the roaring twenties with renewed confidence with the death of communism and the opening of new markets plus the "new invention" the PC created the dot com boom towards the end of the decade. History is repeating itself well and we now had the 2008 Oil Crisis to help start a global depression which will make the 30's look meek although with modern technology and a more social global community it's effects on ordinary people in the developed West will be less harsh than that of the 30's. History dictates another War to follow in the aftermath of this which I hope very much against.

Ireland endured famine, war, occupation and we are an intelligent very hard working nation. It is sad to see Nero (Cowen) fiddle while Dublin literally burns. History could judge Cowen as either Ireland's greatest or worst ever leader depending on how they tackle this. Similarly in America Hoover is seen as one of the Worst while FDR and Lincoln are seen as the best. George W. Bush will take the Hoover ranking while Obama has it all to prove whether he can do another FDR remains to be seen.

ChocolateSauce

mumhaabu wrote: »

I believe the country problems are caused squarely by an inept government who refuses to accept what is happening.

You lost me here. The government isn't helping, but it isn't the cause. There are many causes, but the biggest one is the US sub-prime mortgage crisis.

seamus

mumhaabu wrote: »

I don't want to keep it afloat I am more concerned about the mass unemployment that has emerged from its collapse. Now is the time to get things built when people are desperate for work and by creating civil engineering projects it will give the ultimate value for money to the taxpayer while softening the blow for that collapsing sector? Construction projects can be done for a lot less during a Recession than during a boom.

There was a whole pile of conjecture when this started happening about civil projects taking up the slack of jobs lost in private construction. For the past five years we've all been going on about, "Jaysus isn't it mad - look, they're building everywhere", yet we seem to be in denial about the sheer volume of people who were employed directly and indirectly in this sector. Figures are hard to come by suprisingly, but from news report I've heard and what I can tell, out of 32,000 jobs lost since January, 27,000 of them were directly or indirectly linked to construction.

We have no hope of trying to "soften the blow" on the sector and neither should we. The quicker it stabilises itself, the quicker we can start getting back to normal. Yes, it's horrible for those who were employed in the sector, but like any other job in any other sector, you need to keep an eye on what's going on and be prepared for it to go down the ****ter.
When the dot-com bubble collapsed, there was no scramble to save the thousands of I.T. jobs that went with it, but within 2 or 3 years it had all stabilised and jobs in IT were no more difficult to come by than any other sector - though they had experienced a very sharp but very necessary collapse in wages.

It's all linked to the problem of credit, which needs to be dealt with separately. The construction sector though needs to be allowed to collapse and return to a state of normality - let people who were employed there go do other jobs or emigrate. This will take at least another year.

The "brain drain" of the eighties doesn't even look like it's close to returning as the vast majority of jobs being lost are unskilled or semi-skilled.

kmick

Cutting back on the civil service is likely to further weaken the economy. You dont cut back in a recession as it is proven to make things worse. Also nearly every person I know including myself has a partner, mother, father, sister, brother in the civil service so its deeply ingrained into Irish society. So instead of cutting back lets make targeted cuts, target the person who comes in 3 days a week instead of 5, target the HSE, target the people who WANT to retire, target the overgenerous pension. But dont target the civil servants who are needed like nurses, teachers etc.

Permabear

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djpbarry

kmick wrote: »

So instead of cutting back lets make targeted cuts, target the person who comes in 3 days a week instead of 5, target the HSE, target the people who WANT to retire, target the overgenerous pension.

I think that's precisely what most people would have in mind. It's very difficult to deny that we do not have a bloated public sector in this country, but nobody is proposing that we cut back on the essentials.

Oh dear; I've just opened a great big can of snake-sized worms there, haven't I?!?