How many useless QUANGOs are there?

murphaph

I have a single residential property that I let out and like a good citizen i do it all above board, paying all my taxes in the process.

People here may or may not be familiar with the Private residential Tenancies Board (PRTB) which was set up auspiciously to "improve" the private residential rental sector. This QUANGO is (AFAIK) wholly funded by landlords who must pay a €90 "registration" fee with each and every commencing tenancy (unlucky landlords may have to fork this tax out multiple times a year).

The PRTB is supposed to provide dispute resolution in a timely manner to both landlords and tenants. In practice it is taking just shy of ONE YEAR for this organisation to get hearings to take place. They also introduced one of the worst online systems I have ever seen (regular crashes, extremely unintuitive and it looks like a 5 year old did it).

I registered my current tenancy like a good lad 4 years ago and believe it or not, even if my current tenants are happy there and the tenancy (from our points of view) is continuing, the PRTB requires that we "re-register" the tenancy (another €90).

I went to re-register this tenancy and to my disbelief, I couldn't find the EXISTING tenancy on their list for the county the property is located in. It is simply not there. I was sort of distressed to be honest because in order to claim the mortgage interest relief from Revenue, the tenancy MUST be registered with the PRTB. I have obviously been claiming this relief for the previous 4 years and was pretty concerned that I might be in some serious trouble!

I called the PRTB only to find out that I AM registered, but they had no explanation as to why my property does not appear in the official register. This organisation is a complete shambles which has done nothing but increase its fees and decrease its service. Of course, when you have a job for life, the incentive to get the finger out just isn't there.

There must be host of other literally useless QUANGOs like this out there that are making our economy total uncompetitive. It seems the PRTB at least only exists to pay the wages of its staff and little else. They contract out the actual ajudications (usual theme:nobody in the PS wants to take actual responsibility for any decisions, so some private sector solicitor is contracted in to do it!!)

ednwireland

honestly i'm not suprised (having a house that i receive several letters for from the board ) it is a hopeless system and ive not had a tenant yet that come to me and been registered before.

and dont get me started on why i have to register for household charge and second home (NPPR) charge (and septic tank and no doubt water and whatever else they think up next, create one database ffs) i got a bill for 2.5k for the nppr charge but it was paid in my OH name but the system cant cope with more than one name on the deeds - neither can the houshold charge honestly you wonder what these people get paid for.

murphaph

ednwireland wrote: »

honestly i'm not suprised (having a house that i receive several letters for from the board ) it is a hopeless system and ive not had a tenant yet that come to me and been registered before.

and dont get me started on why i have to register for household charge and second home (NPPR) charge (and septic tank and no doubt water and whatever else they think up next, create one database ffs) i got a bill for 2.5k for the nppr charge but it was paid in my OH name but the system cant cope with more than one name on the deeds - neither can the houshold charge honestly you wonder what these people get paid for.

Their (all of these LA/PRTB systems!) systems are a thundering disgrace tbh. I was (unsuccessfully) trying to print off a paper copy of an NPPR receipt for about half an hour today. The site sometimes doesn't even load all my payments (have paid 4 times: 2009-2012 inclusive). I mean, I work in web development and I can't really understand how the "payments" section sometimes shows all my payments and sometimes just 2 of the 4. Really poor stuff.

As you say: why so many disjointed databases all linked to the same property? Why not a single one, WITH REMINDERS! (the girl in the PRTB today said that "a reminder letter MAY have been sent out wrt. re-registering the tenancy but MAY not-I mean, wtf?)

I never got one single piece of post from the PRTB in 4 years but I have heard of some landlords getting fcuking xmas cards ffs? Unreal waste of money by largely incompetent imbeciles AFAIC.

ednwireland

i actually wrote to my local td's asking why money was been wasted in this way - only one replied (actually he rang me) thomas pringle (i also contacted the only local counciller i know as we dont have one for the area)

we actually write database software for companies that service and maintain large numbrs of properties in the uk no-one on their right minds would start like this in our business.

Zulu

It's an UTTER disgrace. And my ar$e it for landlords.
My current tenant split up with her partner over a year ago. At the time they were 4 months into a year lease. I rang the PRTB for advice on how best to handle the situation. They could offer none.
I asked the PRTB what their guidelines or best practices where for such a situation. They offered none.
Finally I asked how other similar disputes were handled. They pointed me to the complete listing of settled disputes on their website. The search function didn't work.

In short, I got no guidance, no advice, and no support and was directed to read through their complete list of disputed for further help. Thankfully my tenant is still with me and it wasn't a problem in the end. But they are useless. Utterly utterly useless from the Landlords perspective.

Disgraceful waste of money.

murphaph

Another one I'd have knowldege of is http://www.earlychildhoodireland.ie/ which should be incorporated into the relevant government department and have its funding ceased. CEO in there would be on 100k+ as well. All taxpayers' money.

monkey8

murphaph wrote: »

in order to claim the mortgage interest relief from Revenue, the tenancy MUST be registered with the PRTB. I have obviously been claiming this relief for the previous 4 years and was pretty concerned that I might be in some serious trouble!

I was told by revenue that you cannot claim mortgage interest relief on a rented property.
Can someone clarify?

Geuze

monkey8 wrote: »

I was told by revenue that you cannot claim mortgage interest relief on a rented property.
Can someone clarify?

TRS relief is for owner-occupiers.

Landlords are allowed deduct 75% of the interest from the gross rental incomes, as well as the usual other deductions.

murphaph

Geuze wrote: »

TRS relief is for owner-occupiers.

Landlords are allowed deduct 75% of the interest from the gross rental incomes, as well as the usual other deductions.

Which is in itelsef ludicrous. It should never have been reduced from 100%. It's 100% in the UK and Germany and any other EU country I know of.

It's a business, or so we're constantly told by the left when they want to tax us more and more, so if it's a business like any other then mortgage interest is a fully legitimate business expense and should be deductible in it's entirety when calculating net profit.

As well as not allowing this, Revenue also disallows the deduction of the Household Charge (chargeable to property owner) and NPPR Charge (also chargeable to property owner). The government is always at pains to insist that these are not taxes but charges that pay for local services, so the occupiers should pay or the landlord should be able to deduct them (at the very least) when calculating net profit.

People think landlords pay little or no tax. They haven't a clue. I sent Revenu a cheque for 2 Grand this week for that single residential property that I let out. There are people in Ireland working in full time employment that don't pay that much tax. There are plenty more on welfare who pay zip, but we're the bad guys :rolleyes:

In Germany there is a property tax based on property value and this is passed straight on to the tenant, so not allowable as a deductible but when it goes up, the cost is passed straight on. The landlord is merely collecting the tax from the tenant and forwarding it to the tax office. Same goes for the charges by the local authority for the sewers, water, roads, parks etc. which are all allowed to be passed straight on to the tenant who uses them. In the UK the council tax is chargeable to the tenant.

Why are landlords in Ireland expected to pay for the services used by their tenants? as well as paying all their own income taxes (and if Burton gets here way then ALL rental income will be liable to PRSI, at present it's only liable to Income Tax and USC, assuming you are a PAYE employee, otherwise it is due for class S PRSI as is, so professional landlords already pay Income Tax, USC, Class S PRSI on their rental profit).

creedp

murphaph wrote: »

Which is in itelsef ludicrous. It should never have been reduced from 100%. It's 100% in the UK and Germany and any other EU country I know of.

It's a business, or so we're constantly told by the left when they want to tax us more and more, so if it's a business like any other then mortgage interest is a fully legitimate business expense and should be deductible in it's entirety when calculating net profit.

As well as not allowing this, Revenue also disallows the deduction of the Household Charge (chargeable to property owner) and NPPR Charge (also chargeable to property owner). The government is always at pains to insist that these are not taxes but charges that pay for local services, so the occupiers should pay or the landlord should be able to deduct them (at the very least) when calculating net profit.

People think landlords pay little or no tax. They haven't a clue. I sent Revenu a cheque for 2 Grand this week for that single residential property that I let out. There are people in Ireland working in full time employment that don't pay that much tax. There are plenty more on welfare who pay zip, but we're the bad guys :rolleyes:

In Germany there is a property tax based on property value and this is passed straight on to the tenant, so not allowable as a deductible but when it goes up, the cost is passed straight on. The landlord is merely collecting the tax from the tenant and forwarding it to the tax office. Same goes for the charges by the local authority for the sewers, water, roads, parks etc. which are all allowed to be passed straight on to the tenant who uses them. In the UK the council tax is chargeable to the tenant.

Why are landlords in Ireland expected to pay for the services used by their tenants? as well as paying all their own income taxes (and if Burton gets here way then ALL rental income will be liable to PRSI, at present it's only liable to Income Tax and USC, assuming you are a PAYE employee, otherwise it is due for class S PRSI as is, so professional landlords already pay Income Tax, USC, Class S PRSI on their rental profit).

That argument is something I fully subscribe to. What I don't understand is why Irish people has such a negative attitude to landlords as if they are some kind or pariah in society. Listen lads the Brits have gone home and the absentee landlords of the 800 years of persecution are no more! Why is it a commercial property landlord runs a legitimate business but a residential property landlord is simply someone screwing the residential tenant and needs to be hammered from all sides in case s/he forgets it.

Dannyboy83

creedp wrote: »

That argument is something I fully subscribe to. What I don't understand is why Irish people has such a negative attitude to landlords as if they are some kind or pariah in society. Listen lads the Brits have gone home and the absentee landlords of the 800 years of persecution are no more! Why is it a commercial property landlord runs a legitimate business but a residential property landlord is simply someone screwing the residential tenant and needs to be hammered from all sides in case s/he forgets it.

Regardless of what you may think of the PRTB, I can only assume from your statement you've been born fortunate enough never to have actually had to rent from an Irish landlord in Ireland.

If you happen to be a good residential landlord, then it's unfortunate but you have to realise you're part of a broad group which is generally uncouth and unregulated.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/archives/2012/0822/ireland/students-get-advice-on-lodgings-and-banking-204900.html
Research has shown 40% of students have had their deposit unfairly withheld, while 75% of cases reported to the PRTB are in relation to the deposit retention.

Irish renters have been so badly abused by Irish Landlords in recent years, that Joe Costello among others were calling for an independent body to be established to hold rental deposits

http://www.labour.ie/press/listing/13214653738691272.html
The PRTB in their annual 2009 annual report stated "Deposit retention complaints have consistently been the single largest category of cases submitted to the PRTB for dispute resolution. Deposit cases increased from 43% to 51% of all cases between 2008 and 2009. Deposit retention cases represented 74% of Tenants' cases during 2009, an increase from approximately 61% over 2008. In 75% of such cases determined during 2009, it was determined that landlords should refund part or all of the deposits which they had retained from their tenant."

Moreover, Threshold in their 2010 Annual Report, report that illegal deposit retention is still one of the most common problems experienced by tenants in the private rented sector. In 2010 Threshold dealt with 3,224 deposit queries. They were successful in ensuring a full or partial refund of the deposit for 79% of these cases. While Threshold have had some success dealing with landlords on this issue, many cases do have to be referred on to the PRTB. This can be a lengthy and difficult process for the tenant, particularly where they need to have the funds for a deposit on another rented property.

And many landlords evade tax:

http://www.independent.ie/business/personal-finance/property-mortgages/revenue-targets-landlords-in-rental-income-crackdown-2839345.html
TAX officials are making door-to-door checks in estates across the country to see if landlords are paying all their taxes.

Revenue officials are focusing on estates where there is known to be a high level of rented properties in the new clampdown on landlords.

They are probing landlords who have buy-to-lets to see if they are making the correct tax claims on their rental returns and to see if they are registered with the State as landlords.

It is part of an overall investigation by Revenue Commissioner officials into the black economy, the Irish Independent understands.

There are fears that many buy-to-let landlords do not register with the Private Residential Tenancies Board (PRTB), accept cash in rent and do not make tax returns.

It recently emerged that the State paid more than €250m last year to thousands of unregistered landlords.

Half of the landlords who get rent supplement payments -- which can be as high as €1,100 a month -- from the Department of Social Protection do not have their properties registered with PRTB, despite being legally obliged to do so.

Tax officials are also checking that the money used to buy the rental property has had the tax paid on it.

The primary reason I am buying a house at the moment is because I simply couldn't face renting again.
I rented for 7 years. In those 7 years, I had one good landlord, who was excellent, and one who ok.

The rest were gangsters - one guy from Tower, Cork stole my €1k deposit.
That's the reason why the PRTB & Threshold were created.
They're a response to the government's complete failure to legislate/regulate.



I'm not saying the PRTB are wonderful, but to try excuse Irish residential landlords feels a bit like the story about the black man in Mississippi who was posioned, hung from a tree and shot 3 times, with the Sheriff claiming it was suicide.

ardmacha

I think this thread needs to distinguish between quangos that are useless and those are are not really needed. The former should be made do their job and the latter should be abolished.

murphaph

As a fully compliant landlord I am the most annoyed at the ones who evade tax tbh. We compliant landlords generally do things professionally. My current tenants are there 4 years now. We are both happy with the relationship that benefits us both.

I think there should be a deposit retention system in place as well. In fact any measure that drives out rogue landlords out of the "business" (note residential lettings are not considered businesses by Revenue in the normal sense, though should be) and that doesn't punish (a la the PRTB) compliant landlords would be a positive.

Parallel to this there should be some system in place to drive rogue tenants (and they can do a lot more financial harm than a single retained deposit, believe me) out of the sector and onto the streets. A rogue tenant who overholds (decides not to pay any rent) will take several months to get to hearing stage with the PRTB (typically 8 months I believe). Once it gets there, the PRTB will ajudicate and will order the overholder to leave. Of course the PRTB is not a court and the tenant can simply ignore the order and remain there. The landlord then has to go to the courts (depending on sum owed, may be District or Circuit) to get an order for possession which will allow him to call upon the County Sherrif to come round and forcibly evict. You are realistically looking at 18 months to 2 years from a tenant stopping paying to getting your own property back. A 3 bed semi in Dublin would imply a loss of over 20k in rent alone to the LL. The legal fees in the Circuit court would run to 10k or so (need barrister), so you'd be down 30k and God knows what malicious damage to the property.

You'd NEVER get any of this money back in 99% of cases. It would be enough to put most landlords under. I have been very lucky with my residential letting (my only one) so far but we weren't so lucky with an overholding commercial tenant which cost us tens of thousands and went to the Circuit Court before we got possession. we've never recovered a penny from the tenant who was running a successful business from the premises and continues to do so from somewhere else now. We have a lovely judgement against him, but it's not worth the paper it's written on. At least with commercial property you can bypass the farce that is the PRTB ajudication process and head straight to court to get an enforcable order for possession.

Our solicitor always says it to us: "landlords are seen as an easy mark because they have fixed assets to go after"

The system is broken. The PRTB is broken completely. They can't even handle the workload as it is, imagine if all landlords were compliant!

murphaph

ardmacha wrote: »

I think this thread needs to distinguish between quangos that are useless and those are are not really needed. The former should be made do their job and the latter should be abolished.

Why do we need any QUANGOs at all? Why do the PRTB exist? Couldn't their functions be taken over by either a relevant government department or contracted out completely to the private sector and run on a performance basis? (they already contract out the adjucicator roles anyway and this is the core function!)

The private sector driving testers were far more productive than the public sector counterparts. The PRTB functions could be contracted out completely tbh, no different to private driving tests or NCTs.

The QUANGOs that have no function should have their funding removed.

mikemac1

You've not seen waste of both time and money until you've dealt with the Dept of Agriculture, without doubt the most backward and least modern of all departments.

Nothing like ROS or PAYE online but nobody is asking for that, just a simple way of submitting stock numbers.

You can't do it online and you can't send them an excel spreadsheet, no no no.
You must get your biro and your forms, complete the couple of hundred numbers, check them, post them in and some poor soul will type them into the system.
Offer to type it so they can copy and paste and you'll be told to fetch your paper and biro, the old fashioned way

I'm going offtopic, back to quangos

Food Safety Authority of Ireland
Food Safety Consultative Council
Food Safety Promotion Board

Time for a merger!
No doubt each of them have a highly paid CEO


While I'm here I think Citizens Information should be kept.
The cost isn't huge, they use a lot of volunteers for their offices with paid senior staff.
Give superb service, their website and helpline is excellent and there are offices in towns around Ireland.

steph1

Whats that quango with the adverts on radio telling you to change your dishcloth every two days??? FFS

mike65

QUANGO list here, duuno how accurate it is.

http://quangos-ireland.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Irish_Quangos

murphaph

mike65 wrote: »

QUANGO list here, duuno how accurate it is.

http://quangos-ireland.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Irish_Quangos

Cheers Mike. Looks at best incomplete to me but what a list regardless!

How many of these cout be axed tomorrow without much notice? I'd say in many cases the core functionality could be merged into some government department and the "fluff" binned, along with the well paid CEO's and boards of management.

The CPA can be put to work and the superfluous staff in the HSE can be FORCED to work in the new roles. Time to get serious about our deficit really.

Farmer Pudsey

mike65 wrote: »

QUANGO list here, duuno how accurate it is.

http://quangos-ireland.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Irish_Quangos

I do not think it is fully accurate here is another one assocaite with the dept of agri and it is another waste of money
http://new.farmplastics.ie/Home/tabid/907/Default.aspx

ednwireland

murphaph wrote: »

Why do we need any QUANGOs at all? Why do the PRTB exist? Couldn't their functions be taken over by either a relevant government department or contracted out completely to the private sector and run on a performance basis?

this, i've always wondered why quangoes exist most of the functions look like they should be what the gov department does (i could put my cynics hat on and say its to give their mates highly paid jobs.....)

Cookie_Monster

ardmacha wrote: »

I think this thread needs to distinguish between quangos that are useless and those are are not really needed. The former should be made do their job and the latter should be abolished.

The real question is are there any that are functional AND useful, I doubt there are many and those that do exist are really generally only doing what a specific department should be doing but duplicating staff and other costs outside of it for very little reason.

the culture of deference

mike65 wrote: »

QUANGO list here, duuno how accurate it is.

http://quangos-ireland.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Irish_Quangos

Fcukin hell, i counted over 360 in that list.

How many Quango's are you allowed to be in as an individual.

No wonder why the state employs 300,000 people. Serving members should be volunteers.

the culture of deference

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

The real question is are there any that are functional AND useful, I doubt there are many and those that do exist are really generally only doing what a specific department should be doing but duplicating staff and other costs outside of it for very little reason.

This happens all over the government.

The courts service and gardai duplicate each others information.

A garda will hand type and print charge sheets and physically bring them to court. A court services person will take the charge sheet and input on to the courts system. The court staff will input the results from court, then the gardai will do it again. In 2002 we had over 100,000 charge sheets in dublin.

Bits_n_Bobs

steph1 wrote: »

Whats that quango with the adverts on radio telling you to change your dishcloth every two days??? FFS

Argh - the most useless crazy stupidest ad ever. Seriously - wtf?? Does anyone fling a dishcloth out after two days?? Middle of a recession, Holan scrabbling around like the donkey he is to save his 3.5m in allowances and these numpties think its reasonable to spend taxpayers money telling us to throw stuff out??

sliabh

murphaph wrote: »

The PRTB is broken completely. They can't even handle the workload as it is, imagine if all landlords were compliant!

This is an important point Pols asking for them to manage Deposits overlook. They are so slow if you gave them a rental deposit to hold it would take 12-18 months to get it back when you leave the place. Far better to take your chances with a landlord.

Now, as a landlord (who declares for tax, gives written leases to his tenants, and registers each tenancy promptly with the PRTB) I can tell you that the PRTB did not work when as intended when I had to go to them.

I had tenants who damaged my property before them moved out, but it only became apparent after they left. We brought a claim to the PRTB and after a 12 month wait we had a hearing. Another few months passed before we heard we had won and were awarded a judgement of over €1000 against the tenants. They refused to pay, and refused to answer any further communication from the PRTB. So after 6 months the PRTB said they were closing the case and the tenants got off scott free.

So the process provides no protection for landlords.

Newaglish

Safefood is (I think) the crowd responsible for those discloth ads. They have also been the proponents of some pretty backwards campaigns (their adherence to the food pyramid has been soundly criticised on boards).

Interestingly, Safefood originated from the Good Friday Agreement, set up by the Food Safety Promotion Board. Not to be confused of course with the Irish Food Safety Authority. I don't see how food safety really ties into the Good Friday Agreement except to the extent that it screams political favour to me.

Lantus

I have never found an up to date list of every quango. At the last count it was believed there were around 700+ in Ireland. Wiki says this about Ireland and Quango's: -

Ireland in 2006 had more than 800 quangos, 482 at national and 350 at local level, with a total of 5,784 individual appointees and a combined annual budget of €13 billion.

I find it hard to believe that the government has a fully up to date list.

Many could be easily combined and others done away with. They were during the boom times created by FF and Bertie as a very savvy way of getting friends into positions of wealth and power.

Quangos are as always a method of allowing TDs to distance themselves from the day to day running of these institutions and focus on the legislation and law making which as we all know solves all of our problems. (sarcasm....)

Belfast

Question I would like to know is how many useful Quangos are there?
or are any Quangos useful?

Cookie_Monster

Newaglish wrote: »

Safefood is (I think) the crowd responsible for those discloth ads. They have also been the proponents of some pretty backwards campaigns (their adherence to the food pyramid has been soundly criticised on boards).

those food pyramid threads are epically good. Once they even came on boards as verified reps, launched some silly campaign, got totally blasted apart and left within a week

here we go:
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056301558

have a read of that to see the mentality we have to deal with in quangos like these

murphaph

Mad. People talk about Ireland being up sh!t creek without a paddle but tbh unless most/all of these QUANGOs are abolished, amalgamated or have had their core functions absorbed into a government department (so a minister and his civil servants can take actual responsibility), then we are nowhere near sh!t creek stage. We still can, apparently, afford to burn money on these organisations.

[Jackass]

murphaph wrote: »

It seems the PRTB at least only exists to pay the wages of its staff and little else.

I enjoyed your post as it made me laugh, in the way you laugh at the fact that you're not in disbelief at hearing stories like this, because this literally is happening all over the country.

I just highlighted the last line as it's very relevant. You're right in saying that it simply exists just to pay the staff who work for it, but then, these are more people into the civil service who are not in any way required, serve no function and over the lifetime of their career, will take 10's of millions from the tax payer for zero return.

I would be amazed in fact if this operation wasn't running at a loss as it's too inefficient to be able to achieve doing nothing within its given budget constraints.

It's just another relic of the Boom time Government who decided to make up departments, make up roles in the civil service, do whatever it takes to get full employment, once in employment, jack up their wages to completely unsustainable levels and be sure they'll keep voting for us, and the second we see the tide has turned, get out of office and leave the next fella to explain it.

My favorite Bertie Ahern quote of all time, when asked if he felt he had any responsibility for the complete Economic meltdown of the country, he replied "Well it was functioning perfectly well when I was in it".

goose2005

It is bizarre how many there are. For fish alone, there's the Central Fisheries Board, Eastern Regional Fisheries Board, Fisheries Co-Op Societies, Marine Institute, National Salmon Commission, North Western Regional Fisheries Board, Northern Regional Fisheries Board, Shannon Regional Fisheries Board, South Regional Fisheries Board, South Western Regional Fisheries Board, Western Regional Fisheries Board, Sea-Fisheries Protection Authority and Inland Fisheries Ireland, Sea Fisheries Protection Authority and Bord Iascaigh Mhara.

Farmer Pudsey

goose2005 wrote: »

It is bizarre how many there are. For fish alone, there's the Central Fisheries Board, Eastern Regional Fisheries Board, Fisheries Co-Op Societies, Marine Institute, National Salmon Commission, North Western Regional Fisheries Board, Northern Regional Fisheries Board, Shannon Regional Fisheries Board, South Regional Fisheries Board, South Western Regional Fisheries Board, Western Regional Fisheries Board, Sea-Fisheries Protection Authority and Inland Fisheries Ireland, Sea Fisheries Protection Authority and Bord Iascaigh Mhara.

Is that 13 or 14 quangos. It is confusing when you see them all togeather.
I wonder how many they employ at what cost and if any of them do anything. How many Chiefs and how many Indians

TheChizler

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

Newaglish wrote: »

Safefood is (I think) the crowd responsible for those discloth ads. They have also been the proponents of some pretty backwards campaigns (their adherence to the food pyramid has been soundly criticised on boards).

those food pyramid threads are epically good. Once they even came on boards as verified reps, launched some silly campaign, got totally blasted apart and left within a week

here we go:
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056301558

have a read of that to see the mentality we have to deal with in quangos like these

In fairness those high up in Safefood are critical of the food pyramid themselves (personal knowledge, can't back it up, sorry!), its the official line of the HSE unfortunately so their hands are tied.

They have a relatively small budget though and their Weigh to Live campaign and Operation Transformation have gone a (relatively) long way towards reducing the > €1bn spent by the HSE on diseases directly attributable to being overweight. Even a 1% decrease in these would compensate for their budget if my memory serves me correctly.

My point is you would have a job to describe them as useless. There might be a case for merging them with the Food Safety Authority all right.

Cookie_Monster

TheChizler wrote: »

My point is you would have a job to describe them as useless. There might be a case for merging them with the Food Safety Authority all right.

You're right I wouldn't class Safefood as useless, just down right dangerous. We'd be far better off without them and the misinformation they peddle.

TheChizler

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

TheChizler wrote: »

My point is you would have a job to describe them as useless. There might be a case for merging them with the Food Safety Authority all right.

You're right I wouldn't class Safefood as useless, just down right dangerous. We'd be far better off without them and the misinformation they peddle.

Example?...

TheChizler

TheChizler wrote: »

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

TheChizler wrote: »

My point is you would have a job to describe them as useless. There might be a case for merging them with the Food Safety Authority all right.

You're right I wouldn't class Safefood as useless, just down right dangerous. We'd be far better off without them and the misinformation they peddle.

Example?...

Actually ignore my request for an example, this isn't the forum/thread for this type of discussion.

SupaNova2

Do the FSAI even have to do anything to justify their existence? Has food become any safer?

The only interesting statistics I could find in their 2011 report was that from 2007-2011, total complaints received rose from 211 to 396, which could be due to their advertisements encouraging complaints. Apart from dealing with more complaints over the period, the only other thing of note they did regarding food safety incidents was to issue alerts following outbreaks of E.coli in France and Germany. I mean is that such an essential service? I was instantly alerted to the outbreaks by watching the news on tv not by the FSAI.

Cookie_Monster

TheChizler wrote: »

Example?...

already in this thread
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056301558

Farmer Pudsey

SupaNova2 wrote: »

Do the FSAI even have to do anything to justify their existence? Has food become any safer?

The only interesting statistics I could find in their 2011 report was that from 2007-2011, total complaints received rose from 211 to 396, which could be due to their advertisements encouraging complaints. Apart from dealing with more complaints over the period, the only other thing of note they did regarding food safety incidents was to issue alerts following outbreaks of E.coli in France and Germany. I mean is that such an essential service? I was instantly alerted to the outbreaks by watching the news on tv not by the FSAI.

This is another example of a service that should be done within the PS proper rather that setting up a Quango with a board, CEO, management structure etc. Just like the example of the 12 Fisheries bodies that could be merged into 2 or three and probally pick up othere function from other quango's which could be split up and dissolved.

The example of the the quango for farm plastics which should either have been contracted out or been part of repak

boiledsweets

Fas and job bridge are useless quangos on the state pay roll eating up money and not producing jobs..

Think of it,what employer will hire with fas and job bridge freebie workers in the way..

Its a job blocker,and it robs jobs from the community...So much for attracting jobs to ireland,maybe thats why there are 87,000 per annum irish emigrating..

TheChizler

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

TheChizler wrote: »

Example?...

already in this thread
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056301558

Oh I've been through it! Lots of misinformation and misunderstandings in there, and not on Safefood's part.