What ARE you willing to have cut?

Mr Trade In

Viva La Revolution time, if that is true.

kowloon

Sports grants and the likes should go first. Stupid things like the duplication of all state documents into Irish. A legion of smaller things that when added together will save a packet, you always hear about them but they get shrugged off with the whole' sure a million won't make a difference' argument.

El Guapo!

Cut TD's salaries and expenses.
Review social benefits and cut them.-social welfare for people out of work more than 5 or 6 years. Unmarried mothers, childrens allowance etc.
Slash RTE funding.
Sell percentages of state-owned assets while maintaining a majority share.
Slash pensions for people sitting on a pile of cash.
Shut down the Seanad.
Scrap the presidency.
Introduce a text message tax.
Introduce a higher tax band for people with incomes exceeding 90k.


The next 2 are somewhat controversial but should be considered in some detail but carefully regulated and monitored....
Legalize cannabis ( I don't smoke weed so this isn't for personal/selfish reasons.
Legalize prostitution. (This would have to be extensively regulated. I'm not 100% sure on this one myself but it could be considered.)

muckwarrior

Flood the country with poisoned heroin.

Stinicker

If I was minister for finance these are some of things I would do rectify the financial situation.

Hold a referendum to change the constitution permanently lowering the wages of all politicians to the average industrial wage currently somewhere around €28k, end all expenses and and add-ons, private sector people driving to work can't claim petrol money (while Public Sector workers can!)

After cutting the politicians wages now time to cut trim the excess fat.

All County Councils and Local Authorities to be scrapped and their staff laid off. These career dumping grounds for Fianna Failers should be got rid of.

No longer should there be council workers leaning on shovels all day, by getting rid of the local authorities you would save several billion, outsource all their functions saving money and delivering a far better quality product.

Privatize the HSE, end the era of staff getting 80 and 100k a year, make it work, national insurance PRSI to still insure the town idiot gets his Universal Healthcare but it can be delivered privately for alot less money to the exchequer.

Privatise Iarnrod Eireann, a state controlled board will set the fares, private trains can run at a far lower cost than the behemoth that currently exists, save the state money in rail subsides while lowering transport costs, no competition a private monoply who gets their profit from filling the trains with low cost seats and running them on time; run it efficent and cheaply while avoiding the disaster this turned into over in the UK.

Privatise RTE, abolish the TV Licence

Reform Welfare; increase welfare in the form of back to education and pay people to get educated and to make it worth their while, introduce effective wage subsidies on a sliding scale to help create new jobs and get people back to work.

100% tax on all banking profits permanetly as a part of the constitution, never again in Irish History can banks be allowed to operate unregulated or like they did.

Full public ownership of the banking sector, private competitors banned, banks to exist to make credit available to consumers and business, all profits to be returned to the exchequer and used to repay the debt and lower taxation. All wages within the banking sector set at the average industrial level. If you want to gamble and speculate widely then Ireland does not welcome you.

70% tax on all Oil and Gas drilled on Irish soil

New Motorways to be built with borrowed money, tolled until the debt is repaid and the toll then abolished, the users of the road can pay for its construction. End the current scheme of the state pays for 90% of the road cost, FFF* then gets to toll it for thirty years and keep all the profit,and get more state money if traffic falls below a set point.

Ban the Fianna Fail parliamentary party, a life time ban for all their members between 2000 - 2012 from politics.

Re-introduce the death penalty for premeditated murder and treason.

Bertie Ahern, Brian Cowen, and the entire former cabinet to be executed without trial for treason.

(*Friends of Fianna Fail)

Freddie59

harrythehat wrote: »

I'm getting somewhat bored of people's outrage over cuts that effect their particular position in society.

Let's start a new discussion. What WOULD you cut? Now before 100 posts go up about TD's salaries and pensions etc bear in mind that fun as it would be to make them work for minimum wage, it would have a negligible effect on our national debt.

So where would you start if it was really up to you? Education, health, social welfare, arts??

The old saying 'look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves' comes to mind.

You have to start at the seat of power and lead by example. Unfortunately this country is corrupt to the core (that same seat) and this is proven by the reneging of the pledge to abolish the Senate by the current Government.

The Civil Servants run this country - and have always done. They dictate to Government - not the other way round. A perpetual circuit of protectionism abounds. The ones responsible for reforming things are those responsible for enforcing it. So nothing will change.

My suggestions:

1. Cap all top Civil Servants and Government Ministers/TDs to €100k max.

2. Cap all consultants wages to €100k max. The maximum earned by a consultant in Europe's richest economies is of that nature - not the €500k they enjoy here - with rooms provided in hospitals for a return of 20% of time.

3. Cut the dole. It cannot be morally right for someone to be paid as much in net payments on the dole as the basic gross pay of some workers. It is ridiculous.

4. Investigate those on 'disability/invalidity:rolleyes:' payments. Yes there are the disabled and the invalided who genuinely need the payment, but there are thousands on it who appear to be Lourdes cases.

5. Which brings us to Bus Eireann. Many of the thousands mentioned above are eligible for free travel, costing the State millions per year in subvention to Bus Eireann.

6. Bring Public Sector pay into line with the Private Sector. This country is bankrupt and the money is not there. But the government has not - and never will have - the balls to face down the PS unions, particularly with their lackey Gilmore in power.

7. Gut the HSE. The level of incompetence, wastage, and mismanagement is truly monumental and incomprehensible.

Until we face down these stark facts we will never dig ourselves out of what we are in - and will continue to 'borrow' €400m per week (€200Bn EVERY TEN YEARS) to fund day-to-day 'expenses.

Sadly, none of the above will happen - because of political agendas, lobby groups, and the fraud which is now endemic in Irish Society. God knows where it is all leading us.

languagenerd

Cut the number of TDs - why do we have 1 per 27000 people when the Uk have 1 per 92000 and France have 1 per 114,000??

Cut TDs expenses/allowances etc. Give them their salary and leave it at that. Also, make them start their pension at 65 like everyone else and stop them holding onto teaching positions.

Don't build this new children's hospital at the Mater and focus on improving the ones we have instead.

Restructure social welfare - don't automatically grant housing to single mothers etc. who already have somewhere to live - and cut any fraud that they find.

Re education: any student who doesn't show up to more than 80% of their lectures (excluding due to illness etc.) or hand in the assignments should have their funding cut (fees and grants). Also stop paying so much to the university heads.

No public servant should earn over €150,000 a year (and that's pushing it as it is!)

And then there's loads of little things that won't generate billions but would eventually add up, for example:
- pay less expenses to public buildings, the amount those electricity bills must cost with lights being left on all night etc.!
- all the drug addicts who get free transport passes should only get 1 free return journey a day (it's app so they can get to their methadone clinic -so why are there so many of them on the last Luas after midnight?!) and make them pay for any other journeys they want to take.
- get rid of the extra money GPs get for writing sick-notes or prescriptions
etc.

Edit: Oh, and no more monuments to be built!

mattjack

WindSock wrote: »

I see punctuation is over-rated too :P

Damn you to hell , WindSock......:)

Lord TSC

I wouldn't cut the dole. The problem isn't the dole itself; it's with the added benefits people can get. People shouldn't be rewarded for having a load of kids they can't afford, moving out of home early, etc. There should be a basic dole and it should be the extras which are examined.

I also think saying "Cut the dole of those who are unemployed long term; the problem with that is the jobs just aren't out there at the moment. It's too late to start punishing people so harshly. Cut it a bit but you can't completly cut people off when you're setting unrealistic criteria....



I'd, personally, cut alot of our overseas aid budget; we can barely afford to keep our country going so its not fair to expect us to fork out millions to other countries.

Zebra3

No politicans' pensions paid til they are 70.

Make all civil servants payslips only avalable online-this will save 2.2M euro a year.

Merge loads of the local authorities around the country.

Dublin has four? Wtf? There should be one local authority covering the GDA (Dublin and its commuter belt).

John Doe1

Pay for grumpy middle aged office workers

My foreskin

Crann na Beatha

This post has been deleted.

El Guapo!

Veles wrote: »

Is that an EU directive about paying out children's allowance to children living in an another EU state if their parent is working here?

Yes.
Earlier this year Joan Burton said she was going to review the situation and speak to the EU about it.
I haven't heard anything else about it since then though.

Edit; Here's a short article about that. http://www.thejournal.ie/should-ireland-pay-child-benefit-for-children-living-abroad-2011-03/

It says Ireland paid €15.4m to children who don't live in this state last year.

Freddie59

Veles wrote: »

Is that an EU directive about paying out children's allowance to children living in an another EU state if their parent is working here?

Another example of the craziness abounding and the madness that is the EU.

Freddie59

Dean09 wrote: »

Yes.
Earlier this year Joan Burton said she was going to review the situation and speak to the EU about it.
I haven't heard anything else about it since then though.

You won't either.

theg81der

I would stop paying people to have children, the incentives for people to particularly be single parents is pure nuts!

44leto

I would cut across the board by 10% that is everything.

I know that is still not enough, so I would increase duties and lay off 30 thousand public servants.

That is still not enough.............I don't know after that.

Eric Cartman

sell off RTE, shut down TG4 , get rid of the army reserve , farm out the HSE's duties to a private company , sack most of the people working for co. councils, get rid of gosafe and all the speed vans , cut off all dole for those whove been on it long term and refuse to look for jobs , no dole if you live with your parents, no dole for immigrants , send all the immigrants on social welfare home, get rid of the PSA , privatize all waste collection services, stop paying farmers grants for no reason. temporarily stop giving money to the arts council and those other un-necissary organisations, abolish the seanad, temporarily cut off all child benefit or any other children based payments for any child born 9 months from now or later , give no more money to any banks, property developers etc...

SeaFields

Quangos.

Lots of em.

Crann na Beatha

This post has been deleted.

El Guapo!

Veles wrote: »

In that case why cant Ireland pay the Childrens allowance rates applicable to the countries were these children are living? rather than paying out Irish rates?

Because that would make sense.

Childrens allowance should be looked at without a doubt.

Capt'n Midnight

gifted wrote: »

If you join the army at 17 and leave after 21 years you get a pension for life from the age of 38 onwards, crazy that is. Pay them for the amount of years they do

No everyone gets to leave the army

Ronin247

Childrens allowance means tested
No childrens allowance after 4 children.
No automatic single mother accomodation
No extra childrens allowance for twins/multiples after 18 months
No more allowances for 3rd child of "single" parents.
Remove half HSE staff/pencil pushers and replace with doctors and nurses.
Politicians all the cuts mentioned by others.
Prison service cut in half,and Prison to be "prison" not a f*cking holiday camp.
No dole for anyone who has never worked up to the age of 35.
Public service salaries brought in line with European averages.
Public salaries capped at 120,000.~If you deserve more than that go to the private sector and earn it.
All gas or oil in Irish territorial waters taxed at 50% before costs are taken out.

What is the chances of any of that happening........0

Cill Dara Abu

Pensioners need to take a huge cut in this budget, they have gotten away without been touched for too long now, let them whinge all they want.

Pension: €220 p/w
Free electricity units
Medical card
Free fuel
Free travel
Free household upgrades.
And lots of other little things like free passports, driving licenses, TV licence etc.

Zebra3

If you can afford to travel, you can afford to pay the full whack for passports like the rest of us.

Bloody scroungers. :mad:

Stinicker

Cill Dara Abu wrote: »

Pensioners need to take a huge cut in this budget, they have gotten away without been touched for too long now, let them whinge all they want.

Pension: €220 p/w
Free electricity units
Free fuel
Free travel
Free household upgrades.
And lots of other little things like free passports, driving licenses, etc.

They paid taxes all their life, if a young person is having trouble with employment or money there are option when you are old you are vulnerable it is not like you can high tail it out of here to Australia or whatever. Have some bloody respect for the elders, they didn't cause this crisis and I'd rather see the dole cut to €50 a week before seeing old people reduced to the bread line.

Freddie59

Stinicker wrote: »

They paid taxes all their life, if a young person is having trouble with employment or money there are option when you are old you are vulnerable it is not like you can high tail it out of here to Australia or whatever. Have some bloody respect for the elders, they didn't cause this crisis and I'd rather see the dole cut to €50 a week before seeing old people reduced to the bread line.

In fairness when you read the above list you really begin to see how well pensioners are looked after in this country. But EVERYONE has to share the cuts.

Stinicker

Freddie59 wrote: »

In fairness when you read the above list you really begin to see how well pensioners are looked after in this country. But EVERYONE has to share the cuts.

I don't agree and besides Cill Dara was calling for a huge cut to Pensioners. I beleive in targeting those who caused the mess and Developers and Banks should be hit hardest as should people connected to Fianna Fail.

Helix

cut rte

get rid of the whole thing. then people have the choice to piggy back on the uk channels or pay for sky/cable

Freddie59

Stinicker wrote: »

I don't agree and besides Cill Dara was calling for a huge cut to Pensioners. I beleive in targeting those who caused the mess and Developers and Banks should be hit hardest as should people connected to Fianna Fail.

The problem is that there is only a certain amount of money. The pensioners are a part of the reason we, as a country, are borrowing €400m a week. Who would these "people connected to Fianna Fail" be?

Helix

pensioners should be means tested. plenty of them dont need any of the free crap theyre getting

theg81der

Well I think the state is obliged to look after the older women who they didn`t allow to work or get educated just a personal opinion since most female pensioners seem to have been housewives.

Cill Dara Abu

theg81der wrote: »

Well I think the state is obliged to look after the older women who they didn`t allow to work or get educated just a personal opinion since most female pensioners seem to have been housewives.

And never paid a penny in tax

jam_mac_jam

Childrens allowance should be scrapped and means testing for old age pensions. I dont care if you have paid PRSI if you have a load of money you can pay for yourself.

jam_mac_jam

theg81der wrote: »

Well I think the state is obliged to look after the older women who they didn`t allow to work or get educated just a personal opinion since most female pensioners seem to have been housewives.

Not if they have money they shouldnt. Why should I be paying for somebody with the means because they didnt work, fair enough if they dont have money now but if they do then they shouldnt be getting money just for being old.

theg81der

Sorry yea should have said they should be means tested of course! I see what your saying about them not paying tax - but my point is the state didn`t give them the option at the time.

Freddie59

jam_mac_jam wrote: »

Childrens allowance should be scrapped and means testing for old age pensions. I dont care if you have paid PRSI if you have a load of money you can pay for yourself.

But you cannot expect to push that through while there is widespread conniving and deceit going on within Government. And while you have several former Taoisigh in receipt of several pensions before pensionable age. It would be grossly unfair.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2060899/As-Ireland-braces-budget-cuts-politicians-cut-secret-deal-3million-euro-year-pay-rise.html

LH Pathe

Nasty hairs that just go haywire

jam_mac_jam

theg81der wrote: »

Sorry yea should have said they should be means tested of course! I see what your saying about them not paying tax - but my point is the state didn`t give them the option at the time.

ah ok, I agree with you so.

DualFrontDiscs

First:

All state incomes should be removed from the tax net.

Public/ civil servants don't really pay income tax. For example, let's say you're paid €30K per annum and pay €10k in tax. Well you're paying the €10k back to the people who gave you the €30k in the first place.

So let's just give public/ civil servants the €20k and that stops the argument straightaway that they pay tax like the private sector.

For sure, there are other taxes, VAT, other incomes, etc, but public and civil servants don't really pay income tax. So let's stop pretending they do.

This is absolutely not a criticism of the public/ civil servant sector, it's just the way I see it.

Secondly, all public/ civil servants with a mortgage should have an option to 'migrate' their mortgage to a state held mortgage entity, with a v. low interest rate, extended terms, etc. As a state employee, you have favorable employment terms, etc.....

Finally, cut all public/ civil servant salaries by 20%. If you've a mortgage, you've benefited from point two above. If you don't have a mortgage, well done!

Moral hazard should be addressed such that in the main, the % reduction in salary is equal or greater to the benefit of the mortgage restructure.

20% reduction in the salary of the public/ civil servant sector would presumably help

DFD.

Ace2007

Cill Dara Abu wrote: »

Pensioners need to take a huge cut in this budget, they have gotten away without been touched for too long now, let them whinge all they want.

Pension: €220 p/w
Free electricity units
Free fuel
Free travel
Free household upgrades.
And lots of other little things like free passports, driving licenses, etc.

i know for a fact not all get the same amount,
secondly it's a certain about of gas or electricity, not both,

you say that get free driving licenses, an OAP with 20+ years expericne will probably be paying alot more in car insurance than someone with 5 years experience in their 30's.

if you want to make huge cuts, you have to have a level playing field. childrens' allowance is the biggest joke, most children never see it, it should be either

a) scrapped or
b) paid out in vouchers

oppenheimer1

I have to laugh at some of the acceptable cuts being proposed here. For example reducing politicians pay and allowance is very small beer compared with what needs to be saved. I'm not saying that their pay and allowances shouldn't be looked at, but the budget adjustment is in the order of billions not millions. Cutting politicians pay leads to two things btw. It reduces the quality of candidates and it aids corruption.

In order to save billions and make a stab at genuine reform, we need to cut pay in the public service. The reason our health service is the way it is is not because we don't spend enough on it but that we give the existing staff far too much money. Nurses and in particular consultants need to have their pay brought back into line with the real world. A small reform also would be to force medical students as part of the Irish medical degree programme to work in Irish hospitals after they graduate. The state currently spends the guts of €125k on each medical student over the course of their time in Uni, then they feck off to other countries despite being needed here.


Education too is in need of serious reform. If I was education minister, the first thing to go would be the holidays. Literacy and numeracy rates are slipping and its clear children need more time in the classroom. I would introduce computer programming and summer schools also. Teachers at the moment have very generous pay and allowances and quite frankly they don't earn or deserve them.

I would merge most of the departments and bring them all under the one umbrella organisation. Certain moves have been made in this direction, but it is crazy the amount of duplication that goes on, human resources and payroll for example.

Social welfare entitlements also need to be examined, with the likes of the free travel passes and rent allowance being two I would see as being ripe for the chop.

Most of my proposals are not politically possible, and the chances of getting cuts like these through are slim to non-existant. Genuine reform is needed in all these areas and this crisis should not be wasted. The government has a real chance to take on the vested interests because it should be able to get the people on-side

galwayrush

I'll cut my poneytail for 1 million cash.

Cill Dara Abu

Ace2007 wrote: »

i know for a fact not all get the same amount,
secondly it's a certain about of gas or electricity, not both,

you say that get free driving licenses, an OAP with 20+ years expericne will probably be paying alot more in car insurance than someone with 5 years experience in their 30's.

if you want to make huge cuts, you have to have a level playing field. childrens' allowance is the biggest joke, most children never see it, it should be either

a) scrapped or
b) paid out in vouchers

They get free electricity units and fuel allowance i.e money for briquettes, coal, etc.

Well when I was 17 and starting driving I was paying €2,200 per year for insurance, why wasn't I given a free driving licence?

Level playing field??? Were you around for the last budget where OAP's were not touched yet every other member of society was! So don't talk bull!

Lets give OAP's vouchers aswell if you are going down that route?

A couple in their 70s up the road from me just last week had brand spanking new double glazed windows installed at the expense of the tax-payer.

Absolute madness!

galwayrush

Cill Dara Abu wrote: »

They get free electricity units and fuel allowance i.e money for briquettes, coal, etc.

Well when I was 17 and starting driving I was paying €2,200 per year for insurance, why wasn't I given a free driving licence?

Level playing field??? Were you around for the last budget where OAP's were not touched yet every other member of society was! So don't talk bull!

Lets give OAP's vouchers aswell if you are going down that route?

A couple in their 70s up the road from me just last week had brand spanking new double glazed windows installed at the expense of the tax-payer.

Absolute madness!

Many OAP's spent a long working life paying taxes, they ****ing deserve anything they can get. We'll all be there someday, if we live long enough, i'm sure you'll appreciate the 'madness' then.

noodler

Cill Dara Abu wrote: »

They get free electricity units and fuel allowance i.e money for briquettes, coal, etc.

Well when I was 17 and starting driving I was paying €2,200 per year for insurance, why wasn't I given a free driving licence?

Level playing field??? Were you around for the last budget where OAP's were not touched yet every other member of society was! So don't talk bull!

Lets give OAP's vouchers aswell if you are going down that route?

A couple in their 70s up the road from me just last week had brand spanking new double glazed windows installed at the expense of the tax-payer.

Absolute madness!

You are coming across really badly in your last few posts about pensioners.

Are you a teenager with some sort of a grudge?

oppenheimer1

galwayrush wrote: »

Many OAP's spent a long working life paying taxes, they ****ing deserve anything they can get. We'll all be there someday, if we live long enough, i'm sure you'll appreciate the 'madness' then.

With an ageing population, many of the entitlements that OAPs get now will be long gone by the time the thirty-somethings retire.

OAPs shouldn't get state assistance for things they can afford. Many OAPs have pensions larger than my salary yet they get a free tv licence and a free travel pass and free healthcare. Those that have to work pay for all of the above.

When someone has been working they are paying for expenditure at that time. Old people who paid tax in their working life were paying for pensioners at that time. It isn't and shouldn't be seen as some sort of saving scheme, that they paid in so much in tax over they years, then they are entitled to the same back. It doesn't work like that.

TimTim

oppenheimer1 wrote: »

I have to laugh at some of the acceptable cuts being proposed here. For example reducing politicians pay and allowance is very small beer compared with what needs to be saved. I'm not saying that their pay and allowances shouldn't be looked at, but the budget adjustment is in the order of billions not millions. Cutting politicians pay leads to two things btw. It reduces the quality of candidates and it aids corruption.

Look at what we have today. I think we're already scraping the bottom of the barrel here.

Cill Dara Abu

noodler wrote: »

You are coming across really badly in your last few posts about pensioners.

Are you a teenager with some sort of a grudge?

No, I'm not a teenager. People whinge about fairness when it comes to cuts in Budget 2011 yet when it comes to the little old dear down the road they can't be touched.:rolleyes: