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More PS-BS on Prime Time Tonight...
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TCP/IP_King wrote: »A road was built from the north side to the Liffey with EU money
A road was built from the south side to the Liffey with EU money
The government gave away the rights to charge extortinate amounts to cross a bridge to a private company.
SIPTU et al didn't have any opinion on that
And Darragh assumed that the unions would have an opinion on a public/private partnership project
QED
what affect did that public private partnership have on a public sector worker?0 -
PeakOutput wrote: »what affect did that public private partnership have on a public sector worker?
Thats the point - none
Darragh assumed there would be a union opinion on an public/private partnership project0 -
TCP/IP_King wrote: »Thats the point - none
Darragh assumed there would be a union opinion on an public/private partnership project
no he assumed the unions would have a problem with the goverment trying to get their members to work a different way0 -
TCP/IP_King wrote: »Thats the point - none
Darragh assumed there would be a union opinion on an public/private partnership project
Well there is one explanation for why they had no interest in the M50/Westlink toll bridge, because none of their members interests were threatened by the privatisation of the toll bridge. There was no bridge there beforehand ran by the public sector, it was something entirely new that didn't show up on their radar.
But this has nothing to do with why I started this thead on another PS apologist coming on national television tonight with her shoulders shrugged and eye brows raised in defiance at the notion that anywhere up to 10% of the state welfare budget is being lost to fraud and she hasn't a single postive contribution to make as to what can be done about it, where her place in contributing to the solution might be, just a blank face looking back at you, a shrug of the shoulders and two beligerent eyebrows...
Not a care in the world that the same money that is being wasted, is taxpayers money.0 -
when was the toll bridge privatised, don't you mean taken into public ownership.Well there is one explanation for why they had no interest in the M50/Westlink toll bridge, because none of their members interests were threatened by the privatisation of the toll bridge. There was no bridge there beforehand ran by the public sector, it was something entirely new that didn't show up on their radar.
But this has nothing to do with why I started this thead on another PS apologist coming on national television tonight with her shoulders shrugged and eye brows raised in defiance at the notion that anywhere up to 10% of the state welfare budget is being lost to fraud and she hasn't a single postive contribution to make as to what can be done about it, where her place in contributing to the solution might be, just a blank face looking back at you, a shrug of the shoulders and two beligerent eyebrows...
Not a care in the world that the same money that is being wasted, is taxpayers money.
I wonder why you use the term PS apologist a lot. Do you hate the PS. You use it in such a derogatory tone. What does it mean? It sounds like a term of abuse. It sounds like someone apologising for Hitler, in comparative terms, is that how you mean it.0 -
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PeakOutput wrote: »no he assumed the unions would have a problem with the goverment trying to get their members to work a different way
No he saidOn another matter, if I was Richard Branson or Denis O' Brien and went into the Minister for Social and family Affairs and said that I'd pay for the whole system to be designed and deployed and also pay for back up for five years, I'm sure the first words out of the minister's mouth would be, "sorry, the unions will never run with something like that, health and safety and all the rest of it"...
which is a description of a public/private partnership endeavour. No mention of staff in there - apart from the minister.0 -
TCP/IP_King wrote: »which is a description of a public/private partnership endeavour. No mention of staff in there - apart from the minister.
i think we have interpretted what he said differently0 -
when was the toll bridge privatised, don't you mean taken into public ownership.
I wonder why you use the term PS apologist a lot. Do you hate the PS. You use it in such a derogatory tone. What does it mean? It sounds like a term of abuse. It sounds like someone apologising for Hitler, in comparative terms, is that how you mean it.
I hate the casual indifference I see from the public sector, I hate the constant threat that is issued, as recently as today, that the kind of changes, inprovements and reforms that happen automatically in the private sector, are blatently and selfishly withheld as part of a greed fuelled collective effort to draw more money from the state.TCP/IP_King wrote: »Once again, mis-aimed invective.
Leinster House is the place to look for the wasting of tax payer's money, and don't be deflected by media controlled spin.
It isn't the people in Leinster House who were on the news yesterday evening with their beards saying they were refusing every and all cooperation with government reform of the public sector, for many years into the future because their members are upset that their pay is being cut this Wednesday. Are you honestly trying to tell me that the media manipuated peter Mc Loone to come on the news yesterday and suggested that riots in the street were now what we might be looking forward to since a decision was made to cut his members pay??? Your man PJ Stone from the GRA, also on the news yesterday saying he would openly flout the law and organise a Garda strike??? Was he also manipulated by the media to come out and say that???
You might clear this up in my head for me because I'm confused... How can the media controlled spin as you put it, be causing me to see Peter Mc Loone and PJ Stone and a few other loo-laa's who are removed from reality, telling me on the television that they will be basically standing down two government Minster's and taking over responsibility for the Dept. of Finance and the Dept of Justice, and imposing upon the rest of us, their own particular flavour of economics???0 -
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You might clear this up in my head for me because I'm confused... How can the media controlled spin as you put it, be causing me to see Peter Mc Loone and PJ Stone and a few other loo-laa's who are removed from reality, telling me on the television that they will be basically standing down two government Minster's and taking over responsibility for the Dept. of Finance and the Dept of Justice, and imposing upon the rest of us, their own particular flavour of economics???
Because you are politically naive, like the union "negotiators", and unlike Fianna Fail who have minions to carry out that spin.
As for government takeover, they were only doing what any interest group would do in the absence of leadership - it's just that IBEC/ISME beat them to it.0 -
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Darragh, how would the system you describe help to catch people who defraud the system ? I can see how it might help in the case of someone applying for a second PPS number, but alot of the fraud is made up of people working cash in hand,abuse of the lone parent benefit, etc.
Even in the cases on TV tonight of people "renting" PPS numbers, they were using their real PPS numbers for claiming benefit and the rented one for work.
Do you have any ideas how it would work in practical terms, apart from the technicalities of setting up the system ?0 -
TCP/IP_King wrote: »Because you are politically naive, like the union "negotiators", and unlike Fianna Fail who have minions to carry out that spin.
As for government takeover, they were only doing what any interest group would do in the absence of leadership - it's just that IBEC/ISME beat them to it.
So I'm naive when I see with my own eyes and hear with my own ears, these guy on the news, who represent not 1.3 million people working in Ireland who are not in a union, not almost 500,000 people who are unemployed, a mere 100,000-200,000 thousand workers who happen to work in the public sector, with all the guarantees and assurances that come with their employment, who want to completely and entirely by-pass our democratic process, disregard the wishes of the majority of people in the country who appear to accept that we cannot keep spending half a billion a fortnight running the country...
I heard with my own ears, Peter Mc Loone yesterday on the news threatening that there could be riots on our streets after the government made the decision to cut PS pay. Within the same minute, I hear PJ Stone threatening us that gardai would walk off the job for the same reason.
Howver naive you might think I am, I heard these two guys with my own ears today threatening the entire country with anarchy if they do not get their own way on public policy. Then I heard Mc Loone threatening the entire country that ALL cooperation on current and future reform was now being collectively witheld.
If people in the private sector had the same attitude, these guys would be all out of jobs because there would be no taxes coming in to pay their wages.
Have you any idea how utterly infuriating and outrageous it is to hear someone coming on the television and threatening the whole country with anarchy and turoil if they do not get their way on a pay issue???
All these guys as missing is a pair of balaclava's, a few Kalashnikov's and a 747 full of terrified paassengers. That's the way they are acting, I've seen less menacing Al Qaeda leaders, and the more airtime they get, the more they threaten the rest of the country, it's unacceptable and it's outrageous...0 -
Darragh, how would the system you describe help to catch people who defraud the system ? I can see how it might help in the case of someone applying for a second PPS number, but alot of the fraud is made up of people working cash in hand,abuse of the lone parent benefit, etc.
Even in the cases on TV tonight of people "renting" PPS numbers, they were using their real PPS numbers for claiming benefit and the rented one for work.
Do you have any ideas how it would work in practical terms, apart from the technicalities of setting up the system ?
I'm not saying that what I proposed is the great big solution that will eliminate welfare fraud once and for all. But when you can go in, get a form, fill it out and get a second PPs number, there is something seriously wrong with the system.
The system I proposed would deal with people leaving the state and "renting out" their PPS number, if someone has to "sign on", you capture their thumbprint at the same time, so if someone is in another country, then they cannot validate themselves, then they fall off the system by design and that's the end of that...
Obviously you cannot use this to stop Joe Bloggs saying he is living with his parents and then moving in with his GF and child, different problem with a different solution, this one is particularly hard to tie down unless you go down the private detective/surveillance route...
But to see one of the highest people in the department on national TV and she hasn't the first or last idea what is going on with fraud, she hasn't a notion... Pathethic...0 -
The system I proposed would deal with people leaving the state and "renting out" their PPS number, if someone has to "sign on", you capture their thumbprint at the same time, so if someone is in another country, then they cannot validate themselves, then they fall off the system by design and that's the end of that...
And, of course, no-one would complain about the Irish government taking fingerprints for anything other then criminal records, would they?
After all, when the Americans suggested doing it for entry to their country, all posters here nodded sagely and murmered their quiet appreciation for a well-thought-out, balanced, considerate idea.0 -
And, of course, no-one would complain about the Irish government taking fingerprints for anything other then criminal records, would they?
After all, when the Americans suggested doing it for entry to their country, all posters here nodded sagely and murmered their quiet appreciation for a well-thought-out, balanced, considerate idea.
Well if people want to start getting all animated about civil rights on an issue like this, then they can't but accept that we will have substantially more welfare fraud, which means there is even less taxpayers money left to run hospitals and schools and Garda stations.
You can't have both, either you decide to eliminate fraud and commit yourself to that objective and put aside petty whims about providing civil rights for scam artists who are stealing your money, or else you accept that the system cannot be smartened up to cope with theft and you stop complaining about the fact that your kid is getting taught in a leaking pre-fab and you have to queue for 18 hours to get seen in A & E, because you've allowed welfare scam artists to steal your taxpayers money because in your view, their right to their civil liberties and to not be minimally inconvenienced by being asked to validate themselves beyond question when applying for valuable state benefits, has a clear priority over your right to have your taxes spent in a reasonable and efficient manner.0 -
I personally know two people who are at present defrauding SW. Both on benefit and are working. One actually has a van and has the name of his tiling company on it and he drives it down to Nutgrove SW office to sign on once a month. I reported both several months ago in writing to SW and know for a fact they are both still claiming. :mad: That's my tax money they are robbing.Go figurejarecki1976 wrote: »OMG....One of the guys defrauded SW by 39k and he was given 2k fine+5 months suspended sentence...WTF:eek:0 -
The banks don't seem to have managed to tackle this whole fraud issue either.
How much credit-card fraud occurs each year ?
How much Direct Debit fraud ?
How much valuation of assets fraud ?0 -
I can speak to this. The program quoted the department of social welfare when discussing fraud, and PrimeTime said '1 in 10 PPS numbers has been obtained fraudulently.'The banks don't seem to have managed to tackle this whole fraud issue either.
How much credit-card fraud occurs each year ?
How much Direct Debit fraud ?
How much valuation of assets fraud ?
Credit card fraud, debit card fraud, direct debit fraud, banking fraud in general, none of these things have fraud levels at or near 10% (and that's just in PPS numbers, not what people using their own PPS are defrauding us for. AKA people in the North claiming twice. Etc.)
When referring to fraud, we talk in terms of 'basis points', aka 0.1%, and a half a basis point change in fraud to a particular segment is cause for alarm and action.
So, a lot less per capita.
People say 'the government' when talking about solutions to this problem. The department of social welfare and its employees are the people on the ground tasked with running the state day by day, in this case relating to social welfare. The buck stops with government to hold them accountable... But they are the people advising the government (you've seen Yes, Minister ?) and carrying out the job. They are responsible for what goes on, and the government is responsible for holding them to account for it. It's delegation.0 -
Well if people want to start getting all animated about civil rights on an issue like this, then they can't but accept that we will have substantially more welfare fraud, which means there is even less taxpayers money left to run hospitals and schools and Garda stations.
I'm not sure how you arrive at the conclusion that the only way to limit fraud is to infringe on civil rights.
This idea that privacy and security are a zero-sum game is a common fallacy. Improving one does not necessarily mean sacrificing the other. Even where it might, the question still arises as to how one can maximise the gain in security (i.e. minimise fraud) at the lowest cost to civil rights.You can't have both, either you decide to eliminate fraud and commit yourself to that objective and put aside petty whims about providing civil rights for scam artists who are stealing your money, or else you accept that the system cannot be smartened up to cope with theft and you stop complaining about the fact that your kid is getting taught in a leaking pre-fab and you have to queue for 18 hours to get seen in A & E, because you've allowed welfare scam artists to steal your taxpayers money because in your view, their right to their civil liberties and to not be minimally inconvenienced by being asked to validate themselves beyond question when applying for valuable state benefits, has a clear priority over your right to have your taxes spent in a reasonable and efficient manner.
While I applaud you on your emotive argument, I would suggest that you're guilty of some gross simplifications and assumptions there.
You're ignoring the cost of implementing a new system, which means - by your logic - that I have to be willing to put up with less money for my kid's leaky pre-fab, and be willing to queue maybe 24 hours in A&E, as we divert monies to develop a new system, while the fraud continues. At some indeterminate point in the future, if all works according to plan, the government will start having money available to tackle these problems, where they will first have to claw back the damage that diverting monies to develop the new system
You're also making the assumption that the monies are being diverted from health or education. Ireland has just come out of the most lucrative stretch in its entire history...and yet it was during this time that those leaky pre-fabs and 18 hour queues sprang up. I'm confident that social welfare fraud was by no means the largest drain on our government's monies in that period, which led to these problems...especially considering that one seems unable to have any thread on any aspect of the Irish Economy at present without the civil service and semi-state employees being blamed for any and all evils. So, if we consider that when the money was rolling in, the government's priorities and competencies resulted in these problems, I would argue that it is disingenuous to suggest that solving social welfare fraud in the midst of a financial crisis will somehow solve the issues you mention.
Fraud should absolutely be tackled, I agree. The question, however, is not a simple one of "throw money at it, it will go away, and then we're in gravy and all our other problems will be solved too". The heavy-handed approach of "ignore issues of civil liberties if the solution even looks like it might have a chance of working" is also not a good route to success. If we look at where this approach has been used to tackle other problems around the globe, we see a litany of failures, massive cost-overruns, eroded civil liberties, and precious few gains.
Given that one of the basic criticisms lying behind this thread is that our government are too incompetent to have solved the problem already, what reason do we have to believe or trust that they can solve it at the cost of civil liberties, that they can do so cost-effectively, and that they would use the resultant savings in a manner we approve of?0 -
Are you aware of a particular instance or particular instances where this happened, greedy PS workers set out to draw more money from the state by being casually indifferent, feckless, and yet ant the same time issuing threats.I hate the casual indifference I see from the public sector, I hate the constant threat that is issued, as recently as today, that the kind of changes, inprovements and reforms that happen automatically in the private sector, are blatently and selfishly withheld as part of a greed fuelled collective effort to draw more money from the state.
Are you aware of reforms/improvements that were opposed by PS workers.0 -
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A thought occurs to me, regarding welfare fraud. TV License Fraud. I have several friends living here who come from Europe and the States, and they're amazed at our TV License Fraud ads on the TV - 'We're coming to get you!' undertones.
We can police TV license fraud effectively, can't we? Pretty much?
If handscanners are a bit much... Why not have applying for a PPS be a more involved process? Why don't we have inspectors to do random statistical checks? If the fraud is as high as it is, they'll begin weeding out people exceptionally fast. Give them real punishment for it, and with the knowledge of active inspection and tough penalties, welfare fraud will subside.
Personally, I have no problem with using biometric data to receive services. Indeed, for me, it takes much of the hassle out of a lot of things - I use my fingerprint to access several things daily, and it beats knowing several passwords. I have to use biometric data to travel all the time.
But, if people won't wear it... There remain other solutions.0 -
Well done for shopping them in. I can only hope someone is acting on your information and investigating them for evidence as we speak. If they are not, it is another sign of incompetence from the Dept of Social Welfare staff.I personally know two people who are at present defrauding SW. Both on benefit and are working. One actually has a van and has the name of his tiling company on it and he drives it down to Nutgrove SW office to sign on once a month. I reported both several months ago in writing to SW and know for a fact they are both still claiming. :mad: That's my tax money they are robbing.Go figure0 -
Just looking at Prime Time Investigates here...
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Now the only reason I can see, why a simple enough technological solution to a simple enough problem, cannot be decided upon and deployed without delay, is because staff are refusing to work with the technology, as is typically the case in the public sector where you have to agree every change with a unon before you can put something in place at work.
The problem again here is obvious, in 2009, we see ANTIQUATED systems of work in place with the absolute MINIMAL use of technology.
Darragh,
for God's sake don't you get it yet ?
Did you listen to monring ireland where Hanafin defended fact that they brough into legislation pictures for the PPS card in 1998 and it is only going to start being rolled out next year.
That is 12 years, at least 10 of which were in the great cleitc and bubble economies when social welfare takeup was lower and there was loads of revenue for state, and yet they couldn't oimplement something that simple.
Remember PPARS and how long that took and how much.
Look at rollout of Garda systems.
It would take the state and the public service at least 10 years to even bring this to tender and then there would have to be compensation for retraining of staff.masteroftherealm wrote: »Ah yes all those public sector employees refusing to use technology that's not there how dare they refuse to use the imaginary technology that doesn't exist.
Its not a simple tech solutions its a huge massive one that would take years to implement on a technical level before any emplyees of the state even got to consider training/using it.
Darragh, see what I said above :rolleyes:
And one wonders why e-voting was such a success :rolleyes:
And we all know how long it takes to retrain some of the employees of the state.The banks don't seem to have managed to tackle this whole fraud issue either.
How much credit-card fraud occurs each year ?
How much Direct Debit fraud ?
How much valuation of assets fraud ?
Ehh credit card fraud is usually highly technical involving theift of card numbers/details, or illegal swiping of the data form the card.
BTW just because the banks are not able to fully remove creit card fraud which is global problem, does that mean it is ok for Dept of Social Welfare to sit on their hands ?
Isn't that excuse a bit like little Johnny complaining he shouldn't go to bed since little Frankie down the road doesn't go to bed till much later ?
PS actually using banks and their failure to dela with credit card fraud is not the best example to use. Think of the banks and their failure to deal with dodgy lending and interbank transfers.
Oh wiat wasn't it other arms of the state that were meant to be overseeing that, IFRSA and Central Bank AFAIK ?I am not allowed discuss …
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To be fair in the medium term the cost to implement some sort of biometric data integrated with PPS numbers\cards would be way higher than the amount it would save and that completely ignores the costs and time involved in getting the required legislation drafted and approved.
Add to that the public reaction to anything involving biometric data being stored on your PPS card and you have a very large headache. Personally I actually think the majority of people wouldn't mind but there is a rightly vocal community that see the potential for misuse of that data.
I actually own a software company that writes Time and Attendance software and we use a number of various bio-metric clocks so I know only too well that the technology is definitely there and that there are huge misconceptions about it (for example most unions drag out an argument that there is nothing to stop the employer giving a copy of their employees fingerprint to the gardai despite the fact that there are no actual fingerprints stored but that's a whole other story) but you do have to weigh that against the scale of a national biometric database for all adults in the country, the costs that would run up and the political issues it would raise..0 -
To be fair in the medium term the cost to implement some sort of biometric data integrated with PPS numbers\cards would be way higher than the amount it would save and that completely ignores the costs and time involved in getting the required legislation drafted and approved.
Add to that the public reaction to anything involving biometric data being stored on your PPS card and you have a very large headache. Personally I actually think the majority of people wouldn't mind but there is a rightly vocal community that see the potential for misuse of that data.
I actually own a software company that writes Time and Attendance software and we use a number of various bio-metric clocks so I know only too well that the technology is definitely there and that there are huge misconceptions about it (for example most unions drag out an argument that there is nothing to stop the employer giving a copy of their employees fingerprint to the gardai despite the fact that there are no actual fingerprints stored but that's a whole other story) but you do have to weigh that against the scale of a national biometric database for all adults in the country, the costs that would run up and the political issues it would raise..
Thank you, someone with direct experience here. Please tell this man that he is also wrong.0 -
masteroftherealm wrote: »Thank you, someone with direct experience here. Please tell this man that he is also wrong.
the green GNIB immigration cards are already biometric, and their computer system is quite good
now the problem is that ofcourse its not tied to welfare or revenue
that would have stopped some of the fraud seemed yesterday on primetime0 -
the green GNIB immigration cards are already biometric, and their computer system is quite good
now the problem is that ofcourse its not tied to welfare or revenue
that would have stopped some of the fraud seemed yesterday on primetime
Yes the problem is tying together a distributed architecture into a single entity.
I am not saying its not possible just its a long term expensive plan not a short term solution to welfare fraud.
And this is regardless of the civil liberties issues.0 -
theres a very simple solution
cut the salaries of welfare workers by the % of fraud in system (lets say 10%)
and if they cut the fraud to 9% their salary cut goes down to 9% hence more money for them
that will make em work
theres no incentives in the system hence why its so utterly inefficient0 -
Heard something very interesting on the radio a few weeks back. It was in relation to travellers now, but still.....
In France, everyone has an Identity card.So when travellers or gypsies (or whatever the French equivalent is !), show up to a town and set up camp, the police descend on them, take all their cards and copy them. When they leave, if they've left a mess that's got to be cleaned by public services, the money to pay for the cleaning gets stopped out of the welfare payment the travellers get from the state, until the bill is paid - which can be done because all the necessary info is on their cards.
Now that's efficient! And as a system, hard to argue with.0 -
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talking of biometric databasesThe Israeli Knesset approved a bill that will require every Israeli citizen to submit a visual scan of their face and a biometric scan of their fingerprints to a national database
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3816629,00.html
im split on these databases, in right hand they can be used for good (antifraud etc) in wrong incompetent hands its a ****up waiting to happen, since i think the government are incompetent biometric databases would be a bad idea in this country0
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