Galway: household charge non-payment lead to reduction in services

antoobrien

This was sold in Galway as

an “unpalatable cut” to local services and communities, including the suspension of housing grants to older people and people with disabilities and the withholding of grants for community initiatives

It appears that the emotional blackmail has worked (good, I can't stand freeloading "protests" like this)

since receiving news of the cut to its budget in July, the council has collected more than 70,000 euros in additional payments

That would mean that in the week or so since this story broke 700 home owners came forward with money that they "can't afford".

Now it's time for the council to buck up and find "efficiencies"

BluntGuy

runawaybishop wrote: »

The level of service provided to rural users is far below that of urban dwellers.

Not to be facetious, but would you not reasonably expect this to be the case?

View

galway2007 wrote: »

Name some and i will tell u if i have them
private water
private sewerage
No broadband
Headges not cut ( we both pay motor tax)
Road need resurface not done in years
No footpaths or lights

It costs money for a local authority to provide all of these. If people aren't willing to pay towards them (as has been the case in the past never mind now), then the local authority will not be able to even consider providing them so either the services wouldn't be provided at all (the roads aren't resurfaced) or private companies will have to be needed to provide the services.

People have (and are), in effect, "voted" with their wallets for the above level of services.

galway2007

Head The Wall wrote: »

If you paid 6k then could you clarify if that is within the city or county boundary?

as i said i live in county galway

galway2007

n97 mini wrote: »

The property bubble forced you to buy a site and build a one-off?

It offered me the choice to pay 315k + in the city or build my own house
There were a number of reason i built outside city but my point is i am paying for all my services
I paid €800 euro to connect water and i am on a meter and had to put in a water filter
I paid thosands for a sewerage system
In a city or town both of the above are free
so what service are provided to the people in the country side?
Roads are paid for by the car tax system???

dvpower

galway2007 wrote: »

so what service are provided to the people in the country side?

There are a whole range of services listed here.
I don't understand why people have to ask this question on Boards.ie

n97 mini

galway2007 wrote: »

It offered me the choice to pay 315k + in the city or build my own house

I find it hard to believe you couldn't get a property in the city for less than 315k, or was it you didn't want to compromise on the size/type of house?

not yet

howamidifferent wrote: »

I'm sure those who havent paid the household charge will be furious they wont be recieving "Housing Maintenance" from the local authority this year or next

Those in receipt of housing maintenance will be in council housing, so will be exempt from the ''tax'' so as usual the home owner..and I say the loosely will pay.

On a side note, I have a 240k mortgage, my apartment is worth 90k so they can stick their tax up their b0llocks.

djpbarry

not yet wrote: »

On a side note, I have a 240k mortgage, my apartment is worth 90k so they can stick their tax up their b0llocks.

You want other taxpayers to subsidise your local services because your flat has depreciated in value?

Care to explain the logic behind that?

Private Joker

hmmm wrote: »

No cutbacks in staffing or pay of course.

any sources to back this up? or have you read it from the Irish Independent.
Staff have been reduced by non renewal of contracts and retirements. i'll try and find the figures, which are floating around somewhere, but staffing has been reduced by over 25% in galway county council. and wages have been reduced in line with budgetary measures introduced( not even mentioning pension levies ).

murphaph

km79 wrote: »

I got no letter yet to pay up

Does the govt. send you a letter when they amend or introduce other laws?

enricoh

my local authority managed to increase spending last year - due to staff returning from career breaks the county manager explained.
rates for commercial businesses are unchanged since the tiger and it was made out that it was a major achievement not to increase them! and people wonder why the main street is to let signs n pound shops

not yet

djpbarry wrote: »

You want other taxpayers to subsidise your local services because your flat has depreciated in value?

Care to explain the logic behind that?

No, No I dont, what I want is the burden shared fairly amongst all. And as unpalatable as that sounds that includes people in receipt of SW. My logic as you put it, includes the likes of Dessie Ellis or ming whats he's face paying it. But they are exempt because they are in council housing but earn 100k a year from my tax.

Gumbo

hmmm wrote: »

No cutbacks in staffing or pay of course.

the local government sector has responded more quickly and efficiently to the State’s financial crisis than any other public sector organisation in Ireland.

Staff numbers in the local government service have reduced
from 37,243 in 2008 to 29,000 at the end of February 2012, a reduction of over 8,000 staff (21.52 per cent). This reduction is in excess of targets set and is considerably more than staff reductions in other parts of the public sector.

The local government sector has delivered savings in revenue spend of €548. million in the three year period from 31 December 2008 to 31 December 2011, and further savings of €187.2 million are projected for 2012. Additional capital payroll savings of €94.5 million for the period from 2008 to 2012 were achieved.

not yet

kceire wrote: »

the local government sector has responded more quickly and efficiently to the State’s financial crisis than any other public sector organisation in Ireland.

Staff numbers in the local government service have reduced
from 37,243 in 2008 to 29,000 at the end of February 2012, a reduction of over 8,000 staff (21.52 per cent). This reduction is in excess of targets set and is considerably more than staff reductions in other parts of the public sector.

The local government sector has delivered savings in revenue spend of €548. million in the three year period from 31 December 2008 to 31 December 2011, and further savings of €187.2 million are projected for 2012. Additional capital payroll savings of €94.5 million for the period from 2008 to 2012 were achieved.

Ah but the IBEC'S and selfish greedy business people who want to maximise profits by getting workers for 6e an hour will still want more.

At what point will people except that the savings made in the past 3 years on PS pay and levies is somewhere in the region of 3 billion. No, not for IBEC they wan tblood and PS workers paid a bowl of rice.

Head The Wall

kceire wrote: »

the local government sector has responded more quickly and efficiently to the State’s financial crisis than any other public sector organisation in Ireland.

Staff numbers in the local government service have reduced
from 37,243 in 2008 to 29,000 at the end of February 2012, a reduction of over 8,000 staff (21.52 per cent). This reduction is in excess of targets set and is considerably more than staff reductions in other parts of the public sector.

The local government sector has delivered savings in revenue spend of €548. million in the three year period from 31 December 2008 to 31 December 2011, and further savings of €187.2 million are projected for 2012. Additional capital payroll savings of €94.5 million for the period from 2008 to 2012 were achieved.

It sounds to me like they had a lot of contract workers that they could just cast aside regardless of the importance or validity of the tasks they were doing.

In my home area there's supposedly no money for cutting grass, etc but they have to pay the staff that should be doing these jobs to sit around instead, this is where the CPA fails and they are just looking at the bottom line and pretending all is fine.

The CPA is a fudge and not a solution

Lumbo

Head The Wall wrote: »

It sounds to me like they had a lot of contract workers that they could just cast aside regardless of the importance or validity of the tasks they were doing.

In my home area there's supposedly no money for cutting grass, etc but they have to pay the staff that should be doing these jobs to sit around instead, this is where the CPA fails and they are just looking at the bottom line and pretending all is fine.

The CPA is a fudge and not a solution

Why don't you have a read of the report and stop talking bitter nonsense.

http://www.environ.ie/en/LocalGovernment/LocalGovernmentEfficiencyReviewGroup/PublicationsDocuments/

Gumbo

Head The Wall wrote: »

In my home area there's supposedly no money for cutting grass

they dont cut the grass in London?

Head The Wall

Lumbo wrote: »

Why don't you have a read of the report and stop talking bitter nonsense.

http://www.environ.ie/en/LocalGovernment/LocalGovernmentEfficiencyReviewGroup/PublicationsDocuments/

Yes I'll believe a report from the same PS that tried to claim that teachers working an extra hour saved the govt 43 million, or the same report that counted 300 million saved in payroll but didn't mention the 220 million increase in PS pensions.

kceire wrote: »

they dont cut the grass in London?

Is this the level of intelligence I'm dealing with? You are aware that there are telephones with enables me to speak to people in Ireland and other countries also. They also have planes which I utilised to fly home a few weekends ago.


Maybe you just have some issue because I don't pay your wages now and you don't like what I and others have to say about the beloved Local Authorities that do no wrong in your eyes.

Lumbo

Head The Wall wrote: »

Yes I'll believe a report from the same PS that tried to claim that teachers working an extra hour saved the govt 43 million, or the same report that counted 300 million saved in payroll but didn't mention the 220 million increase in PS pensions.

Like I said. Bitter nonsense.

Head The Wall

Lumbo wrote: »

Like I said. Bitter nonsense.

How about you actually deal with the facts in my post instead a generic childish response

I can prove it for you but you probably don't want to hear about it, let me state it again - There have been no staff let go from the PS other than people on contracts or people that availed of the early retirement scheme.

southsiderosie

MOD NOTE:

Please stop with the sniping - some of these comments are getting way too personal.

Scofflaw

Thread is descending into petty bickering courtesy of entrenched attitudes. If this continues along the current path, the thread will be closed, and there will be a competition, judged by the mods, to see who wins red and yellow stars - or even a short holiday!

moderately,
Scofflaw

plasmaguy

Ghandee wrote: »

Don't register, don't pay!

Well done Galway, don't let the bastards get you down!

You do understand that budgets have to be balanced though?

If people don't pay tax, which of course is their right, although legally isn't really, there has to be cutbacks somewhere else.

If people don't pay a household charge or council tax or whatever, then councils will be forced to cutback.

plasmaguy

Galwayguy35 wrote: »

If you live in the coutryside or like me in a small village we see no services anyway.
We pay a private company to take away our rubbish, we are on a private water scheme which we fund ourselves and during the big freeze in 2010 the roads were never gritted around here.
Maybe for the citydwellers there will be a reduction in services but paying it would make no difference to us around here.

You can take this attitude to most forms of tax.

I hardly ever watch RTE - why should I pay the licence fee?
I don't use the bins as often as others, why should I pay the same as everyone else?
My children don't go to university, why should I pay for others to go?
I'm hardly ever in hospital, so my taxes should be less.

In any case, who fixes the potholes and tars the roads around where you live? And please don't say it isn't the council or they never get fixed.

Sand

I'm sure the local authority could manage to maintain efficient delivery of services if they looked at staff salaries, "benefits in kind" and actual management of staff.

When they have squeezed every last efficiency out of the system ( as promised under Croke Park) then they can come back and talk about needing extra funding. Last I heard, the public sector in Ireland think buying an iPad for all TDs (all paid tens of thousands of euros) is defensible for a government apparently in recession.

Our TDs can get iPads. Our citizens dont get basic services.

Welcome to Official Ireland.

n97 mini

Sand wrote: »

Last I heard, the public sector in Ireland think buying an iPad for all TDs (all paid tens of thousands of euros) is defensible for a government apparently in recession.

I know of one govt dept that recently bought 24 iPads that were officially described as being for "research purposes". I believe this practice is occurring elsewhere aswell.

View

Galway county council has no control over whether the State buys iPADs or not for (the central governments') TDs and/or public servants.

It doesn't - like every other council in the state - even have control over how much, if anything, central government gives it as part of its budget (and the grants from central government are by far and away the primary source or sources of the council's income).

It can't even compensate for a decision to cut funding to it by deciding on its own to raise, let's say, motor tax to make up the shortfall since the rates for that "local tax" are, like the household charge, controlled by central government.

It is in other words hugely hamstrung in its ability to deliver services to its citizens.

Right now, central government has decided, it will cut the funding to the local councils, and it will be more a case that "local" taxes will fund local services.

A shortfall in payment of such local taxes is a problem for the people of the county (or city) therefore not for central government. That means cut-backs locally and just to set that in context, in the case of Galway county, its number one spending area is "Roads" (followed by "Water").

Of that "Roads" spending most is being spent on the "National" motorway, primary or secondary roads (70 million) of which 68 million is for road improvement and the balance for maintenance. 20 million is being spent on regional and local roads (which make up 93% of the road network). Roughly 3/4 of that is for improvements, the remainder is for maintenance.

Start applying cut-backs to the road budget, due to a budgetary shortfall as a result of the non-payment of local taxes, over a few years and those locals roads of today are going to be impassable for "the locals" in a few years time.

Sand

Galway county council has no control over whether the State buys iPADs or not for (the central governments') TDs and/or public servants.

Of course it doesn't - shure, nobody is responsible for anything and everything is nothing to do with anything else. As always.

But its indicative of the common paradigm of Official Ireland that services are cut long before entitlements are. That is the thread that links a government that wont fund basic services for citizens, but can somehow fund iPads for public representatives. Official Ireland will cut cancer test for young girls, fire classroom assistants for disabled children and shut down hospital services long before it will breach the Croke Park agreement. It was only last week that the HSE cost cutting plans were denounced by auditors as endangering the lives of citizens by unnecessarily reducing services before seeking efficiencies from staff.

But despite this disparity in apparent wealth at one level, and outright recession at another, its the common citizen to blame. The common citizen, the taxpayer, they always have to pay more to get basic services. The most vulnerable in society, the heavily unionised public sector complain and moan about laughable "rights" like half days to cash non-existent cheques being removed...so average taxpayer has to pay more.

Ah right, of course. They can always vote in another political party, right? The problem is that no matter who you vote for, Official Ireland is always in government.

It is in other words hugely hamstrung in its ability to deliver services to its citizens.

Only on the funding side - not on the delivery of services. When you have a public service so fat and lazy as Ireland's, where entitlement is so embedded in the psyche that its no longer even recognized then they are not hamstrung at all in their ability to deliver services to citizens. They simply choose to prioritize delivery of salaries and benefits to themselves, with whatever is left over being used for services to citizens.

Priorities are priorities afterall.

View

Sand wrote: »

Of course it doesn't - shure, nobody is responsible for anything and everything is nothing to do with anything else. As always.

Galway county council is responsible for the delivery of its services and associated expenditure. Our State's government for its services and expenditures.

Sand wrote: »

But its indicative of the common paradigm of Official Ireland that services are cut long before entitlements are. That is the thread that links a government that wont fund basic services for citizens, but can somehow fund iPads for public representatives. Official Ireland will cut cancer test for young girls, fire classroom assistants for disabled children and shut down hospital services long before it will breach the Croke Park agreement. It was only last week that the HSE cost cutting plans were denounced by auditors as endangering the lives of citizens by unnecessarily reducing services before seeking efficiencies from staff.

All central government issues - unless you can show us the legal mechanisms that Galway council has to effect these issues, that is...

Sand wrote: »

Ah right, of course. They can always vote in another political party, right? The problem is that no matter who you vote for, Official Ireland is always in government.

We - yes, even you! - can form another political party to change the system anytime we want. Based on our voting record, I am not sure if we really want to change it though.

Sand wrote: »

Only on the funding side - not on the delivery of services. When you have a public service so fat and lazy as Ireland's, where entitlement is so embedded in the psyche that its no longer even recognized then they are not hamstrung at all in their ability to deliver services to citizens. They simply choose to prioritize delivery of salaries and benefits to themselves, with whatever is left over being used for services to citizens.

Priorities are priorities afterall.

Again, you seem to be confusing Galway county council with the State's government. Galway County's budget amounts to €136 million per annum - 0.38% of the State's annual budget! That budget has been reduced by 15% since 2008 and staff numbers are down by 25% over that time period.

Even abolishing it together with its associated services isn't going to make a dent in the problems we face (much less upset central government enough to change its ways).

The citizens of Galway county might be upset though when the effects of such an ultimate cutback (i.e. abolition) result in them not receiving the services the council provides. And, since the complaints here tend to be the services they provide don't go far enough (My pothole hasn't been fixed!), that presumably is not what the citizens really want.

Maura74

Government and local governments are suppose to be serving the public and not self serving, after all it is us the public that is paying their wages.

As soon as they are voted in they look at what benefits for themselves and not how they can serve the public. We all know these people are serving themselves and not the people that's paying their over inflated salaries and whatever benefits they can get away with.

Sleepy

Pay your taxes or quit whinging. You got your vote, if you don't like the result, tough: that's democracy.

No representation without taxation. All those not paying should be removed from the electoral register imo.

Good loser

Sleepy wrote: »

Pay your taxes or quit whinging. You got your vote, if you don't like the result, tough: that's democracy.

No representation without taxation. All those not paying should be removed from the electoral register imo.

Good post Sleepy.

Was reading there in 'The Economist' that in Scranton, Pennsylvania mayor proposed reducing the wages of all staff, including his own, to the minimum wage -wasn't carried through (yet), but city (pop 76,000) may file for bankruptcy to get out of labour contracts. He also proposed increasing property taxes by 78% over three years.

Three Californian cities have filed for bankruptcy in the last month.

Could it happen here?

galway2007

n97 mini wrote: »

I find it hard to believe you couldn't get a property in the city for less than 315k, or was it you didn't want to compromise on the size/type of house?

Yes I would have got an apartment or a 3 bed semi, but that would be in anarea that I would not dream of bring my 3 kids up in.

I have no problem living in the country, but I am not paying a servicecharge to supply street lights, water, sewerage, cycling lanes and footpaths topeople living in Galway city while Galway County gets nothing

When are city people going to pay for their sewerage??

Sleepy

Why should the government spend more per capita on citizens who choose to live in the country than those who live in the city?

Urban areas are far, far cheaper for government (or private sector companies) to provide services to due to higher population densities. The easiest place to spot this is in the private sector: NTL's broadband service is far and away the best offering in the country yet it's only available in urban areas. Why? Because it's simply uneconomic to provide it in rural areas at the moment.

You don't get to have the best of both worlds I'm afraid. Most of us with families would love to raise them in a nice 4 bed detached house on half an acre in the country with all the services of an urban area but that's simply not realistic: you can have the big house in the country with limited access to public services or you can have the more modest dwelling in an urban area where the government can afford to provide you with public services.

Should you be paying a service charge for the fact it's more expensive to provide you with a phone line, electricity, to school your children, to deliver your post, maintain your roads than it is to provide this to your fellow taxpayers in the city? Your argument is akin to a single person refusing to pay a portion of their taxes because they shouldn't have to shoulder the cost of educating your children: laughable.

Good loser

galway2007 wrote: »

Yes I would have got an apartment or a 3 bed semi, but that would be in anarea that I would not dream of bring my 3 kids up in.

I have no problem living in the country, but I am not paying a servicecharge to supply street lights, water, sewerage, cycling lanes and footpaths topeople living in Galway city while Galway County gets nothing

When are city people going to pay for their sewerage??

On that logic, as I haven't any children, I shouldn't have to pay for any childrens' services.

The whole point of Government - local or national - is that it is about spreading burdens. By democratic vote the decisions are made.

n97 mini

galway2007 wrote: »

Yes I would have got an apartment or a 3 bed semi, but that would be in anarea that I would not dream of bring my 3 kids up in.

I have no problem living in the country, but I am not paying a servicecharge to supply street lights, water, sewerage, cycling lanes and footpaths topeople living in Galway city while Galway County gets nothing

When are city people going to pay for their sewerage??

How many students and how many staff are in your kids' school? How much road frontage do you have? You receive post, electricity and a telephone service? Despite being in the country you have access to ambulance and fire services from the nearest big town? All of these are being subsidised by other people for you, and you ask them when are they going to pay for services they use?

View

Just to point out again, the OP refers to Galway COUNTY, not Galway City.

Non-payment of the charge by residents in Galway county seems like it will result in services to Galway COUNTY.

It will not effect Galway city services, those are dealt with by the city after all.

View

Just to point out again, the OP refers to Galway COUNTY, not Galway City.

Non-payment of the charge by residents in Galway county seems like it will result in services to Galway COUNTY residents being cut. The money just won't be there to pay for them...

PS It will not effect Galway city services, those are dealt with by the city after all.

golfwallah

galway2007 wrote: »

Yes I would have got an apartment or a 3 bed semi, but that would be in anarea that I would not dream of bring my 3 kids up in.

I have no problem living in the country, but I am not paying a servicecharge to supply street lights, water, sewerage, cycling lanes and footpaths topeople living in Galway city while Galway County gets nothing

When are city people going to pay for their sewerage??

You may well ask why does everyone have to pay the same taxes when they receive no direct benefit for the taxes paid. It’s not fair, is it, that you have to pay for your own sewerage when those in towns get it “for free”?

Well, actually, if you think it through, it is fair because decisions to levy these taxes were made by our elected representatives under our democratic processes. Plus we have a strong tradition of Social Solidarity, that our political leaders have continuously enforced with legislation.

Granted, this means that country dwellers have to pay for services they don’t get.

But, the other side of this Social Solidarity coin is that people living in rural areas benefit from services they couldn’t otherwise afford and that are funded by taxes and charges borne disproportionately by people living in built up areas.

Examples are:

Expensive services like road networks, policing, ambulance services, long lines for telephone services, etc. that would not be affordable if the low numbers in rural areas had to pay for them themselves.

These services are funded by taxes like Income Tax, the Universal Social Charge, VAT, Commercial Rates and, latterly, the Household Charge plus the likes of “Universal Service Obligation” charges on our telephone bills.

antoobrien

golfwallah wrote: »

YExamples are:

Expensive services like road networks, policing, ambulance services, long lines for telephone services, etc. that would not be affordable if the low numbers in rural areas had to pay for them themselves.

These services are funded by taxes like Income Tax, the Universal Social Charge, VAT, Commercial Rates and, latterly, the Household Charge plus the likes of “Universal Service Obligation” charges on our telephone bills.

That both misleading and disingenuous. Country people pay more in development fees, connection fees and capital costs to get any services. Then there's the motor tax (which is used to fund local services) and excise that they pay, which will naturally be higher than most city based people (especially considering half of Dublin City apparently doesn't own a car).

The only service that is flat rate (last time I heard) is the phone line. For services like the electricity connection and water there is some subsidy but the homeowner is usually paying at least half the fees for getting the services out, if not the full cost (e.g. the case where a well has to be dug).

In towns the "contribution" paid is far lower - if any is paid at all. E.g. I can't find a published cost to connect a dwelling to the sewage systems in Dublin or Galway, however if one was to build a septic tank the cost would be in the thousands.

Sleepy

Aye, and given the differences in property prices, urban dwellers would pay more in stamp duty for an equivalent house, as will most likely be the case with any equitable property tax.

You're sort of missing the point RE connection fees for electricity, telephony and water. If it weren't for social solidarity these connections simply wouldn't be available for rural dwellers as, high and all as the connection fees are, no private company would be able to provide them at a commercially viable level due to the higher maintenance costs for the supply lines per customer, higher initial investment in infrastructure etc. The point in case here, as I mentioned higher up, is NTL/UPC. It's never been commercially viable for them to roll out their services to rural Ireland so their services remain unavailable outside of urban centres.

Then you have the factors that are realistically unquantifiable: the reduced noise, light and air pollution one benefits from living in a rural area, the increased social problems one faces in a city etc.

Urban v Rural living is swings and roundabouts and you don't get to simply opt-out of taxes because you don't agree with them. You do your civic duty and pay them and, if you want to see them changed: do your best to elect a representative who agrees with your estimation of those taxes as unfair (though, to be fair, given the whip system, this really means finding a representative of a party who disagree with the tax).

murphaph

antoobrien wrote: »

In towns the "contribution" paid is far lower - if any is paid at all. E.g. I can't find a published cost to connect a dwelling to the sewage systems in Dublin or Galway, however if one was to build a septic tank the cost would be in the thousands.

The developer of the estate has to pay a substantial charge for connection to the public system. This forms part of the cost of almost every urban dwelling.

An urban dweller has perhaps 5m of road per capita to maintain. A rural dweller perhaps several kilometres.

ESB is not just more expensive to install in rural areas, it is also much more expensive to maintain as undergrounding of supplies is not practical, so they are far more susceptible to the elements. The extra cost of maintaining rural ESB supplies is not borne by the rural dweller in reality. It is spread amongst us all.

galway2007

n97 mini wrote: »

How many students and how many staff are in your kids' school? How much road frontage do you have? You receive post, electricity and a telephone service? Despite being in the country you have access to ambulance and fire services from the nearest big town? All of these are being subsidised by other people for you, and you ask them when are they going to pay for services they use?

Hold on now let’s go through them
In the school there are about 200 children (we both pay income tax)
Stamps are put on the post
Electricity there is a rural charge
Don’t have a phone and can't get broadband (15 miles from Galway city)
MY insurance will pay for fire service
My health insurance will pay for ambulance
Now who pays for city water, sewerage ect ???

galway2007

Sleepy wrote: »

Aye, and given the differences in property prices, urban dwellers would pay more in stamp duty for an equivalent house, as will most likely be the case with any equitable property tax.

You're sort of missing the point RE connection fees for electricity, telephony and water. If it weren't for social solidarity these connections simply wouldn't be available for rural dwellers as, high and all as the connection fees are, no private company would be able to provide them at a commercially viable level due to the higher maintenance costs for the supply lines per customer, higher initial investment in infrastructure etc. The point in case here, as I mentioned higher up, is NTL/UPC. It's never been commercially viable for them to roll out their services to rural Ireland so their services remain unavailable outside of urban centres.

Then you have the factors that are realistically unquantifiable: the reduced noise, light and air pollution one benefits from living in a rural area, the increased social problems one faces in a city etc.

Urban v Rural living is swings and roundabouts and you don't get to simply opt-out of taxes because you don't agree with them. You do your civic duty and pay them and, if you want to see them changed: do your best to elect a representative who agrees with your estimation of those taxes as unfair (though, to be fair, given the whip system, this really means finding a representative of a party who disagree with the tax).

look the realiity is that billion's of euro is used to look after urban S**t and to supply them with water
It flush and go with them just like they think Milk comes from a bottle
For god sake some of them still think there wheele bin should be free

galway2007

n97 mini wrote: »

How many students and how many staff are in your kids' school? How much road frontage do you have? You receive post, electricity and a telephone service? Despite being in the country you have access to ambulance and fire services from the nearest big town? All of these are being subsidised by other people for you, and you ask them when are they going to pay for services they use?

Also in relation to the school we all were asked to pay €150 a year for 3 years to build on a extra room to the school
The state did not even supply that service

runawaybishop

galway2007 wrote: »

Also in relation to the school we all were asked to pay €150 a year for 3 years to build on a extra room to the school
The state did not even supply that service

In fairness that's not limited to country schools.

John_Rambo

galway2007 wrote: »

look the realiity is that billion's of euro is used to look after urban S**t and to supply them with water
It flush and go with them just like they think Milk comes from a bottle
For god sake some of them still think there wheele bin should be free

It's actually the other way around Galway2007, look at the graph in the opening post. The urban centres are working their asses off making the money, paying the taxes. The rural county councils are sucking up the money.

Good to see areas being punished for non tax payments... I don't really like to see people avoiding taxes when I work my ass off and pay very high taxes. It's the same as refusing work and staying on the dole. Cheating.

n97 mini

galway2007 wrote: »

Now who pays for city water, sewerage ect ???

Look at the grants vs taxes in the chart above.

Sleepy

galway2007 wrote: »

Hold on now let’s go through them
In the school there are about 200 children (we both pay income tax)
Stamps are put on the post
Electricity there is a rural charge
Don’t have a phone and can't get broadband (15 miles from Galway city)
MY insurance will pay for fire service
My health insurance will pay for ambulance
Now who pays for city water, sewerage ect ???

So a school is being operated for a much smaller number of students than an urban school would have. Now, unless you're arguing against the principle of economies of scale, you have to admit that this will result in a higher cost per student than an urban school?

And the same value of stamp is put on a letter I send to someone in an urban area where each postal operative can cover far more houses. Ergo, my cheaper to deliver mail subsidises the cost of your more expensive to deliver mail.

You can get broadband: Qsat and others specialise in providing broadband to rural dwellers. It's not as good as what I get from UPC in Dublin and is probably more expensive but that perfectly illustrates my argument: it's more expensive to provide services to rural dwellers than urban ones.

Your insurance will pay for a call-out charge if you have to call upon the fire service so unless you're unlucky, you're not having to pay for the fact the service is available to you (i.e. the fire officers retainers, maintaining the equipment etc.) and, afair, the call-out charge is a flat fee regardless of whether your home is 500 yards or 50 miles from the station.. Even if you called them out the total call out charges collected do not fully cover the cost of providing the fire service.

Who pays for city water, sewerage etc? The local authority providing it. What finances those local authorities? Local business rates, water rates and funding from central government. I'm unsure of the basis, the allocation of that central funding is based on, however looking at the chart provided by JohnRambo above, it'd be fairly clear that whatever the basis, the councils in rural areas receive far more funding per capita than the urban ones (in fact Galway County would appear to receive 3 times the funding per capita that the City Council gets).

So, let me ask you: why should your decision to live in a rural area entitle you to equal services as those provided to those who live in rural areas when as it stands, it costs the state more to provide you with the (admittedly lower) levels of service you currently receive?

What do you think entitles you to pay less taxes than someone who has the same income as you but lives in an urban setting when you're already enjoying a larger share of government expenditure than they are?