David Begg Fruitcake Supremo

bauderline

Just listening to this dude on the radio... he seems to think that having a debt to GDP ratio to Italy (118%) is an acceptable option. This guy should be locked up in a mental hospital !!

optocynic

bauderline wrote: »

Just listening to this dude on the radio... he wants us to have the same debt to GDP ratio as Italy circa 118%...... This guy should be locked up in a mental hospital !!

This guy is a clown!. Actually no, I take it back. He is the voice of a deluded and selfish body of clowns!

deise blue

bauderline wrote: »

Just listening to this dude on the radio... he wants us to have the same debt to GDP ratio as Italy circa 118%...... This guy should be locked up in a mental hospital !!

You are totally misquoting David Begg.
Yes he said that Italy's debt to GDP ratio was 118% , he then went on to say that the similar ratio for Ireland was so far below that that there was sufficient headroom to spread any cuts over a longer period than that currently proposed ( 8 years instead of 4 )
At no stage did he aspire to matching Italy's ratio.
Do try to pay attention !

Seth Brundle

Mr Begg is a Director of the Central Bank (since 1995) and is chairperson of the bank's internal audit committee.URL="http://www.activecitizen.ie/index.asp?locID=4&docID=11"]source[/URL

This should speak volumes about how we view him!

<my view>
IMO he is on a number of boards, does lots of TV and media appearances (and presumably paid for!). In 2008 we heard that he was making 45k for his non executive directorship of Aer Lingus URL="http://www.finfacts.com/irishfinancenews/article_1014050.shtml"]source[/URL.
He is creaming it in. Sold out socialist!
</my view>

As Mick O'Leary said:

Since Mr Begg has his snout firmly buried in the directors fee trough at Aer Lingus, perhaps he should be included among the fat cat directors he’s so fond of criticising.

Bits_n_Bobs

deise blue wrote: »

You are totally misquoting David Begg.
Yes he said that Italy's debt to GDP ratio was 118% , he then went on to say that the similar ratio for Ireland was so far below that that there was sufficient headroom to spread any cuts over a longer period than that currently proposed ( 8 years instead of 4 )
At no stage did he aspire to matching Italy's ratio.
Do try to pay attention !

I paid attention. He implied that having a debt/GDP ratio similar to the Italians was acceptable.

Where are his numbers for what the ratio actually will be if we spread it over 8 years rather than 4? My assumption is that he has also costed the additional interest payments this will entail and helpfully shown a nice comparision between the payments we will need to make on these and (for example) PAYE Revenue take? If he has not published this data then I would respectfully suggest that he is indeed a fruitcake.

Our generation made a mess of things, for anyone to suggest that we can pass the buck to our children in the form of saddling them with debt is heinous, ridiculous & self-serving.

bauderline

deise blue wrote: »

You are totally misquoting David Begg.
Yes he said that Italy's debt to GDP ratio was 118% , he then went on to say that the similar ratio for Ireland was so far below that that there was sufficient headroom to spread any cuts over a longer period than that currently proposed ( 8 years instead of 4 )
At no stage did he aspire to matching Italy's ratio.
Do try to pay attention !

I was paying attention, and yes he did say Italy's ratio was 118% he also indicated that up to 90% would be perfectly ok for Ireland. I believe that he said Italy had a 118% ratio and that no one believed Italy was going to collapse and in that he was implying that there is nothing wrong with a 118% debt to GDP ratio.... completely banannas !

deise blue

What you said was that he wanted our debt to GDP ratio to be 118% ( the same as Italy's )
He NEVER said that , you totally misquoted him !
Of course he has the data , you really did'nt expect him to go the minutiae of the detail in a 5 minute interview did you ?
No matter whether or not you agree with David Begg's view of the best way to ensure fairness in ensuring the recovery of the country there is no need to misquote him on the basis that it suit's your argument !

Long Onion

An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday didn't happen today and so, we should listen to none of them.

bauderline

deise blue wrote: »

What you said was that he wanted our debt to GDP ratio to be 118% ( the same as Italy's )
He NEVER said that , you totally misquoted him !
Of course he has the data , you really did'nt expect him to go the minutiae of the detail in a 5 minute interview did you ?
No matter whether or not you agree with David Begg's view of the best way to ensure fairness in ensuring the recovery of the country there is no need to misquote him on the basis that it suit's your argument !

Well I have fixed that now.....

If nothing else he clearly gave the impression that he thought it was acceptable..... which of course to any sane person it isn't.

Theboinkmaster

I was listening to this and he clearly thought Italy's ratio is acceptable

deise blue

bauderline wrote: »

Well I have fixed that now.....

If nothing else he clearly gave the impression that he thought it was acceptable..... which of course to any sane person it isn't.

Good to see that you have corrected the misquote.
The point he made was that despite Italy's debt to GDP ratio the country was quite stable and that in view of our current ratio that we had room to push out the time frame for cuts.

Bits_n_Bobs

deise blue wrote: »

What you said was that he wanted our debt to GDP ratio to be 118% ( the same as Italy's )
He NEVER said that , you totally misquoted him !
Of course he has the data , you really did'nt expect him to go the minutiae of the detail in a 5 minute interview did you ?
No matter whether or not you agree with David Begg's view of the best way to ensure fairness in ensuring the recovery of the country there is no need to misquote him on the basis that it suit's your argument !

If you are talking about what I said, it was that he implied that a similar debt/ratio to the Italians was acceptable - why else would he of brought it up?

And if he does indeed have the data, where is it?

I take exception to this whole fairness thing as well. The fairness malarky was attempted before (it was called communism). To the best of my memory it did not work too well. We have capitalism. Not saying its great and it certainly is not fair, but its the best we as a race have come up with so far.

There is nothing 'fair' about the bankers who lent the money still (by and large) remaining in employment. Similarly there is nothing 'fair' about the government muppets still being in employment. There is nothing 'fair' about being unemployed at the moment. There is nothing fair about the civil servants in the dept. of finance, central bank, financial regulator etc. still being in employment as it is patently clear that they have failed in their jobs.

And the least 'fair' thing of all? To pile up government debt (as Beggs wants to do) and dump it on our children. If you can tell me how else running up debt for 8 years rather than 4 is ultimately going to be paid for in a 'fair' manner I would be delighted.

deise blue

Bits_n_Bobs wrote: »

If you are talking about what I said, it was that he implied that a similar debt/ratio to the Italians was acceptable - why else would he of brought it up?

And if he does indeed have the data, where is it?

I take exception to this whole fairness thing as well. The fairness malarky was attempted before (it was called communism). To the best of my memory it did not work too well. We have capitalism. Not saying its great and it certainly is not fair, but its the best we as a race have come up with so far.

There is nothing 'fair' about the bankers who lent the money still (by and large) remaining in employment. Similarly there is nothing 'fair' about the government muppets still being in employment. There is nothing 'fair' about being unemployed at the moment. There is nothing fair about the civil servants in the dept. of finance, central bank, financial regulator etc. still being in employment as it is patently clear that they have failed in their jobs.

And the least 'fair' thing of all? To pile up government debt (as Beggs wants to do) and dump it on our children. If you can tell me how else running up debt for 8 years rather than 4 is ultimately going to be paid for in a 'fair' manner I would be delighted.

What he said that given our debt to GDP ratio was such that we have a greater time frame for cuts than the 4 years proposed , as a comparison he quoted the Italian ratio of 118%.
Of course he has the data , as to where he keeps it , well that's a matter for conjecture - the ICTU offices perhap's ?
The concept of fairness not only applies to our children but to everyone , did you see the march yesterday about proposed cuts to what I would describe as the carers sector and the effect that we have on the elderly,the handicapped , the addicted and the most vulnerable in our society.
Talking about children , what about class sizes , the huge reduction of special needs teachers and putative 3rd level fees and proposed cuts to children's allowances ?
It would appear to me that at the very least Mr. Begg's argumnet deserves an airing and to describe him as a fruitcake is quite frankly offensive.

bauderline

deise blue wrote: »

What he said that given our debt to GDP ratio was such that we have a greater time frame for cuts than the 4 years proposed , as a comparison he quoted the Italian ratio of 118%.
Of course he has the data , as to where he keeps it , well that's a matter for conjecture - the ICTU offices perhap's ?
The concept of fairness not only applies to our children but to everyone , did you see the march yesterday about proposed cuts to what I would describe as the carers sector and the effect that we have on the elderly,the handicapped , the addicted and the most vulnerable in our society.
Talking about children , what about class sizes , the huge reduction of special needs teachers and putative 3rd level fees and proposed cuts to children's allowances ?
It would appear to me that at the very least Mr. Begg's argumnet deserves an airing and to describe him as a fruitcake is quite frankly offensive.

Well that's my opinion of the man and I am more than entitled to express it, if you are offended, so be it.

The Italian economy or indeed it policitics is hardly a shining example for our country to aspire to. I would rather that we address our public sector cost issues now and not try to sweep them under the carpet and burden our coutry with even more debt in the process. Make no mistake about it, the main concern of David Begg et al is public sector pay, and there is plenty to scope to address this issue as far as I am concerned.

Is it just me or is there a whiff of irony about this whole thing.... Isn't borrowing large amounts of money over a longer period of time part of the reason we are in this mess in the first place ?



P.

conor_mc

deise blue wrote: »

What he said that given our debt to GDP ratio was such that we have a greater time frame for cuts than the 4 years proposed , as a comparison he quoted the Italian ratio of 118%.

I'm sure he's taken into account the relative indebtedness of the private sector who will pay extra tax to fund this plan vis a vis their Italian counterparts.

deise blue wrote: »

Of course he has the data , as to where he keeps it , well that's a matter for conjecture - the ICTU offices perhap's ?

I'm sure they have a website too, why doesn't he publish it instead of making nonsense utterings in a 5-minute radio interview!

Bits_n_Bobs

deise blue wrote: »

What he said that given our debt to GDP ratio was such that we have a greater time frame for cuts than the 4 years proposed , as a comparison he quoted the Italian ratio of 118%.
Of course he has the data , as to where he keeps it , well that's a matter for conjecture - the ICTU offices perhap's ?
The concept of fairness not only applies to our children but to everyone , did you see the march yesterday about proposed cuts to what I would describe as the carers sector and the effect that we have on the elderly,the handicapped , the addicted and the most vulnerable in our society.
Talking about children , what about class sizes , the huge reduction of special needs teachers and putative 3rd level fees and proposed cuts to children's allowances ?
It would appear to me that at the very least Mr. Begg's argumnet deserves an airing and to describe him as a fruitcake is quite frankly offensive.

Well unless he has costed this proposal he is a fruitcase. Only a fruitcase would propose such a course of action and not have costed it.

If he actually has costed it then why is it not open to public scrutiny? Only a fruitcase would have factual information to support his argument and choose not to publish it.

I did not see the march yesterday. Beggs is employed to represent his members. Beggs is making an argument that his members should not face pay cuts. That's his job, and does not make him a fruitcake, though his proposal and SPECIFICALLY the lack of any sort of corresponding financial projections regarding it does indeed make him a fruitcake.

Beggs has never represented anyone other than his members. Not the elderly, not drug addicts and not children. So these special interest groups have nothing at all to do with Beggs proposal. He is extraordinarily well paid to represent his members and that's what he does. Bringing the vulnerable into this conversation is facetious and is a distraction worthy of any trade union boss or even worse - politician.

I am more than willing to listen to Beggs proposal, provided he publishes the details.

What I am not willing to listen to is some fruitcake throwing shapes on the radio so that he can get some sort of sound bite about how there is no need for the Irish government to chop €4bn off its deficit this year.

I find it offensive that anyone can spout off such a proposal and not back it up with hard facts. So if Beggs is offended by being called a fruitcake, then so be it.

Naz_st

deise blue wrote: »

The point he made was that despite Italy's debt to GDP ratio the country was quite stable and that in view of our current ratio that we had room to push out the time frame for cuts.

That is not sensible reasoning. The longer we delay, the larger our national debt grows. The larger it grows, the larger the burden of the interest on that debt is to our expenditure. It's forecast that by 2012, the cost of furnishing our national debt will be 18% of the total tax take. That means that we would need to cut our expenditure by further billions to balance the books, let alone start to reduce that debt.

Pulling the plaster off in one swift move is the better option...

deise blue

Bits_n_Bobs wrote: »

Well unless he has costed this proposal he is a fruitcase. Only a fruitcase would propose such a course of action and not have costed it.

If he actually has costed it then why is it not open to public scrutiny? Only a fruitcase would have factual information to support his argument and choose not to publish it.

I did not see the march yesterday. Beggs is employed to represent his members. Beggs is making an argument that his members should not face pay cuts. That's his job, and does not make him a fruitcake, though his proposal and SPECIFICALLY the lack of any sort of corresponding financial projections regarding it does indeed make him a fruitcake.

Beggs has never represented anyone other than his members. Not the elderly, not drug addicts and not children. So these special interest groups have nothing at all to do with Beggs proposal. He is extraordinarily well paid to represent his members and that's what he does. Bringing the vulnerable into this conversation is facetious and is a distraction worthy of any trade union boss or even worse - politician.

I am more than willing to listen to Beggs proposal, provided he publishes the details.

What I am not willing to listen to is some fruitcake throwing shapes on the radio so that he can get some sort of sound bite about how there is no need for the Irish government to chop €4bn off its deficit this year.

I find it offensive that anyone can spout off such a proposal and not back it up with hard facts. So if Beggs is offended by being called a fruitcake, then so be it.

For God's sake give the man a break , it was a 5 minute interview on RTE this morning and the detail of his argument could not be provided in such a short time.
I am sure David Begg/ICTU have costed the proposal , it is risible for to presume that Mr. Begg went on to Morning Ireland and merely ad libbed , perhaps you should contact ICTU and ask them to provide the facts to you and then consider the argument rather than take off an an immediate rant after listening to a 5 minute soundbite which you then admitted to misquoting !
I 'm sure you would agree that it is quite possible to not only represent your members but reflect on and agonise over the effects that the cuts will have not only on your members but on the vulnerable who they serve.

Diarmuid

I know someone who smoked 20 a day, drank every night, weighted 20 stone and lived to be 80. Everyone should do the same.

ixoy

deise blue wrote: »

I 'm sure you would agree that it is quite possible to not only represent your members but reflect on and agonise over the effects that the cuts will have not only on your members but on the vulnerable who they serve.

I agree it's possible and I equally think, long term, that he's not doing it.

Bits_n_Bobs

deise blue wrote: »

For God's sake give the man a break , it was a 5 minute interview on RTE this morning and the detail of his argument could not be provided in such a short time.
I am sure David Begg/ICTU have costed the proposal , it is risible for to presume that Mr. Begg went on to Morning Ireland and merely ad libbed , perhaps you should contact ICTU and ask them to provide the facts to you and then consider the argument rather than take off an an immediate rant after listening to a 5 minute soundbite which you then admitted to misquoting !
I 'm sure you would agree that it is quite possible to not only represent your members but reflect on and agonise over the effects that the cuts will have not only on your members but on the vulnerable who they serve.

I did not admit to misquoting him, I did not quote him one way or the other.

It is reasonable to expect ICTU to publish some sort of forecast to back up its proposal. It is not reasonable for me to accept their proposal as sensible without them doing so.

SIPTU do not 'serve' the vulnerable.

Some of its members provide services to the vulnerable, in return for this they get paid. This is called paid employment. You can argue the toss on whether they do this efficiently, but to say they 'serve' the vulnerable is wrong. Charities serve the vulnerable, not SIPTU members. Some SIPTU members (currently on strike) make nice sugary drinks - how is this 'serving' the vulnerable? Nurses successfully negotiated a reduction in the hours they work last year - and fair ****s to them says I - but I fail to see how this is serving the patients they care for? Seems to me that teachers have a handy enough oul work week, and plenty of holliers to boot in comparision to pretty much every other EU member, but again I don't see how this is helping educate our poor kids?

By all means Begg can agonise over the vulnerable in this society. And its even possible that he may believe that Ireland borrowing more money over a longer time in order to avoid pay cuts to his members will help the vulnerable in our society. In fairness to Beggs at least this morning he made no claim that it would help the vulnerable - apart from the usual waffle about 'fairness'. Think it was you that brought up the 'vulnerable'.

Personally until Beggs lets me know how borrowing more money over a longer period will work (in the form of a detailed set of data) I think the idea is one that could only be dreamt up by a fruitcake.

eoinbn

Wait, I am confused.

Aren't the unions saying no to ANY cuts? Now my maths isn't what it was a few year's ago, but doesn't €0(acceptable cuts)/8(number of years) = €0, which gives a very similiar result to the governments current timetable €0(acceptable cuts)/4(number of years)= €0.

jimmmy

kbannon wrote: »

Mr Begg is a Director of the Central Bank (since 1995) and is chairperson of the bank's internal audit committee.URL="http://www.activecitizen.ie/index.asp?locID=4&docID=11"]source[/URL

This should speak volumes about how we view him!

<my view>
IMO he is on a number of boards, does lots of TV and media appearances (and presumably paid for!). In 2008 we heard that he was making 45k for his non executive directorship of Aer Lingus URL="http://www.finfacts.com/irishfinancenews/article_1014050.shtml"]source[/URL.
He is creaming it in. Sold out socialist!
</my view>

As Mick O'Leary said:

With people like that on the board of the Central Bank, no wonder the country is in the mess it is in. Does he not know that the role of the central bank was to avoid overheating / bubbles in the economy ? Why was something not done to avoid the property bubble that happened ?

eoinbn

deise blue wrote: »

For God's sake give the man a break , it was a 5 minute interview on RTE this morning and the detail of his argument could not be provided in such a short time.
I am sure David Begg/ICTU have costed the proposal , it is risible for to presume that Mr. Begg went on to Morning Ireland and merely ad libbed , perhaps you should contact ICTU and ask them to provide the facts to you and then consider the argument rather than take off an an immediate rant after listening to a 5 minute soundbite which you then admitted to misquoting !
I 'm sure you would agree that it is quite possible to not only represent your members but reflect on and agonise over the effects that the cuts will have not only on your members but on the vulnerable who they serve.

Let's say we manage it, we agree to reduce the deficit by €15b over the next 8 years- note we still have a €5b deficit as that is what we agreed to have in 4 years with the EU(~3.5% of GDP). That means we add another ~€110b on our national debt, over 8 years, which is currently €70b. I won't even include the cost of NAMA/Bank bailouts etc and we will have a €180b national debt, which will be, give or take a few %, 120% of our GDP at that time. At that time we will be paying about €9-10b annually in INTEREST ALONE just to service our national debt!

Of course the flaw here is that with all that extra interest our deficit will be much higher than 3.5% of GDP so we will probably still be borrowing €10b a year meaning that our national debt would be much higher than my figures, which means higher much higher interest etc etc... Hence why people like McCarty say cut now or nobody will loan us money in a few years.

kbannon

kbannon wrote: »

Mr Begg is a Director of the Central Bank (since 1995) and is chairperson of the bank's internal audit committee.URL="http://www.activecitizen.ie/index.asp?locID=4&docID=11"]source[/URL

This should speak volumes about how we view him!

<my view>
IMO he is on a number of boards, does lots of TV and media appearances (and presumably paid for!). In 2008 we heard that he was making 45k for his non executive directorship of Aer Lingus URL="http://www.finfacts.com/irishfinancenews/article_1014050.shtml"]source[/URL.
He is creaming it in. Sold out socialist!
</my view>

yeap Begg is up to his neck in it along with the rest of them.
Champagne Socialist

eoinbn

Deleted User wrote: »

yeap Begg is up to his neck in it along with the rest of them.
Champagne Socialist

To be fair he comes across as the most sensible and honest of the trade union leaders, but given that includes jack o'conner and liam doran that 'praise' doesn't mean much!

irish_bob

eoinbn wrote: »

To be fair he comes across as the most sensible and honest of the trade union leaders, but given that includes jack o'conner and liam doran that 'praise' doesn't mean much!

begg is the most pr savy and sophisticated among the bretheren of the beard , he dresses smartly ,he thinks carefully before he says something , he is the kind of union head who doesnt frighten the middle class with talk of the inherient flaws of capitalism , baschically he isnt a far left , old style duffle coat wearing marxist like o connor

that said , he is still a dishonest self serving charlatan who would bleed the majority of working stiffs dry

bauderline

irish_bob wrote: »

begg is the most pr savy and sophisticated among the bretheren of the beard , he dresses smartly ,he thinks carefully before he says something

Maybe, but his performance this morning was anything but the above, the RTE interviewer didn't press him too hard on it either... shame....

irish_bob

bauderline wrote: »

Maybe, but his performance this morning was anything but the above, the RTE interviewer didn't press him too hard on it either... shame....

rte gives softball interview to public sector union head :eek:

jackcee

bauderline wrote: »

Maybe, but his performance this morning was anything but the above, the RTE interviewer didn't press him too hard on it either... shame....

It was a shame all right - but was it a surprise????
Always remember that when listening to RTE - you are listening to Public Servants.

jackcee

irish_bob wrote: »

rte gives softball interview to public sector union head :eek:

RTE are great at doing "ambush" interviews - when it suits them.

No question of Beggs, during his NUMEROUS interviews, being ambushed and asked about his role as Director of the Central Bank.

Or any question of ambushing him about his role as Director of Aer Lingus - and asking him how many first class flights he has availed of, as part of his perks in Aer Lingus.

Now, he is as "entitled" as any of the other Directors to his little perk - my point is that Beggs will not be ambushed by RTE.