FF/FG/Green Government - Part 3 - Threadbanned User List in OP

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121301580#Comment_121301580

we re still a very stable country, countries such as india can be very volatile, such companies need that stability, then of course we offer these companies access to european markets, we re of course are well educated, largely english speaking, and of course we ve clearly nailed our mast towards their needs, extremely supportive towards maintaining low taxation etc, then of course theres our long term relations with these industries, so, it all looks good for them to remain long term, no matter whos in government....

....covid has shaken many of these sectors, we ve realised how vulnerable such sectors can be, being exposed to more unstable regions, europe has shown to be a good place to run operations from, this is more than likely going to continue for a long time yet, i.e. we re fine!

...not much would change under a sf lead government, particularly in relation to these industries, sf know all of the above, theyre not stupid!

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121301534#Comment_121301534

Metrolink and DART plus, neither of which have even begun work, and have both been in "planning" for a decade+? Yeah FG's 12 years of governments have achieved a huge amount there alright.

SF's economic and foreign policy platform is essentially that of FF thirty years ago. They're a center left party, theyre not communist revolutionaries. Companies like Intel (who just spent €17bn on building new facilities in Kildare..) are going nowhere.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121301534#Comment_121301534

Those companies absolutely cannot leave in "5 minutes", particularly Intel.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121301686#Comment_121301686

Metrolink and DART plus, neither of which have even begun work, and have both been in "planning" for a decade+?

You think anyone else would get a similar project through planning quicker? The point is that they are soon ready to go.

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121301818#Comment_121301818

We have no evidence that they wouldn't get similar largescale projects through quicker. And I struggle to believe it would be slower, based on the evidence we have - its pretty hard to beat decades long delays. And almost literally unbelievable cost overruns of 300%+ in the case of things like the National Children's Hospital.

Any private sector organisation that managed projects that badly would have the entire leadership team removed and replaced, and rightly so. The same should apply to our government.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121302806#Comment_121302806

What decades long delays?

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121302845#Comment_121302845

"The almost 20km Dublin MetroLink was originally mooted in 2005, and when a public consultation finally started in 2018 the target was to have it built by 2027. It will now be 2035 before it is up and running. As of now it is expected to cost closer to €10 billion rather than the original €3 billion estimate."

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/2023/08/21/group-of-consultants-appointed-to-oversee-long-running-dublin-metrolink-project/

Its just one more example of complete and utterly incompetent largescale project management.

Podge_irl

Lots of things get "mooted". Pretty sure you could argue a metro was mooted far before that.

There is no decades long delay.

Galwayguy35

If it takes that long to get a metro for Dublin we will all be dead and gone before anyof the other cities see something like the Luas.

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121302891#Comment_121302891

The Irish Times article is using casual language, it did far more than "get mooted".

"On 22 March 2007, Transport Infrastructure Ireland began the procurement process for Metro North.

On 17 September 2008, the RPA applied for a railway order to An Bord Pleanála.[15] Oral hearings were heard during 2009 and 2010.[16]

On 5 October 2011, Metro North was granted planning permission by An Bord Pleanála.[17]

In September 2015, it was announced that Metro North was being relaunched, with a revised opening date of 2027.[19]

In September 2021, government representatives indicated that the 2027 target would not be met and "was never likely to be achievable",[6] with some reports projecting that construction would not commence before 2027.[2]

While included in the "National Development Plan 2021-2030", the plan included "no completion dates" for the proposed project.[3]"

etc

There is literally a decades long history of delays to this project, thats just a few selected highlights.

And in addition to the timeline issues €300mn has already been spent on it, and the projected cost has already over tripled from €3bn to €10bn, and construction has yet to begin! Its well on track to be another National Children's Hospital.

Its hilarious you're trying to defend it, and that blanch152 brought it up as something that FG in government has done well - anyone with any project management experience (or even just any general management experience) can see its an absolute planning disaster. Heads would have rolled, and jobs would have been lost, a long time ago if it was in the private sector.

Podge_irl

Metro North is a different project that was cancelled. Metro North was never "relaunched", that is sloppy journalism from the IT.

The delays from 2015 onwards are the only relevant ones, so we are talking about 2027 slipping to 2035, which is 8 years. Which I am not defending, they are not good and the current backlog is related to underfunding at ABP which is in the Govt's remit.

Also, obviously money has already been spent on it, they have been designing the route for years and holding shitloads of consultations to try and get everyone on board and make sure it is the best route possible.

blanch152

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121301686#Comment_121301686

Rubbish. Fianna Fail thirty years ago was a strong supporter of European integration, Sinn Fein has never supported a European referendum. Fianna Fail thirty years ago was cutting the top rate of tax by 10%, Sinn Fein want to penalise high earners and increase it. SF are nothing like FF of thirty years ago, probably more akin to FF 80 years ago, with their nutty economic policies.

As for Intel, the same was said about Dell among others. Watch this space, a Sinn Fein government, will, at the very minimum, see a significant downturn in FDI, with the possible exit of many others as well.

In relation to infrastructure, SF will pause all projects if they take office to "review" them, and will quietly cancel them a while later.

blanch152

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121301607#Comment_121301607

Except that a Sinn Fein led government will take a different road on foreign policy, more aligned with Russia, China and Iran. American FDI will be out the door quicker than anyone realises.

Cluedo Monopoly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121303553#Comment_121303553

We both know that isn't true and we both don't vote for SF.

The American MNCs are here because it makes financial sense. Not because they love what FG has done to the country since 2011. The MNCs are very unhappy about the housing crisis. You know, the basics for employees.

Cluedo Monopoly

New record by the coalition of chaos.

Number of homeless children in Ireland at record high (rte.ie)

Number of homeless children in Ireland reached record high in September

The number of children living in emergency accommodation in Ireland rose to a record high of 3,904 in September, rising by nine on the previous month, according to the latest figures from the Department of Housing.

The overall number of homeless people in the State rose by 136 to 12,827 last month, of which 8,923 were adults.

blanch152

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121303577#Comment_121303577

Which bit isn't true? Sinn Fein foreign policy? Multinationals leaving Ireland?

We saw what happened with Clown Paddy's party, the man who parrotted Sinn Fein foreign policy and lost all the major IT companies.

WishUWereHere

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121299229#Comment_121299229

This man along with Donnolly’ must be 2 of the most despised ‘politicians’ in Kildare Street.

WishUWereHere

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121301534#Comment_121301534

A lot of coulds in your post, which in my mind, are all hypothetical.

Who knows what will/not happen when a new government takes over. For me, anything is better than this lot.

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121303232#Comment_121303232

"On 22 March 2018, the National Transport Authority announced revised plans for the former Metro North railway line, now called 'MetroLink'"[1]

No, in reality you'll find Metro North was simply rebranded and alatered slightly as MetroLink to hide the delays. Its the same project.

[1]https://www.gov.ie/en/press-release/f1a15-minister-ryan-announces-transformative-metrolink-project/

Again, its frankly a hilarious example to use as an example of something FG have achieved since 2011 - a project delayed by decades, that has cost hundreds of millions of euros to date, has seen its budget balloon, and still hasn't even begun construction. It fits every definition of bad project management.

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121303546#Comment_121303546

SF's policy platform in 2023 is firmly center left, very much in-line with Social Democrat parties across Europe, and broadly in-line with where FF were before the 1990s. You've made it clear in the thread before that you have no academic training in (or even base knowledge of..) political science, so I'm sure you'll offer a completely illogical, emotional response denying this, but the facts of it are very well established.

SF offer no radical, remotely hard-left, positions like nationalising companies or even increasing the corporate tax rate. As such the idea that US MNCs that have tens of billions of euros invested in physical locations, thousands of employees, and who've spent decades here, will run simply because we have a center-left government in office is rather unlikely.

Economically eft-wing governments tax people more and spend more of this tax revenue on infrastructure than right wing governments. They're the ones who push for, and achieve, large scale infrastructure projects in European democracies generally. Right wing governments lower tax, lower government spending, and reduce infrastructure spending. The idea that an SF/SocDems/Lab government would spend less on infrastructure than a neoliberal FG one is absolutely insane - it goes against the very core of their competing political philosophies.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121304915#Comment_121304915

No, in reality you'll find Metro North was simply rebranded and alatered slightly as MetroLink to hide the delays. Its the same project.

It is not the same project. This is simply objectively incorrect. Your link doesn't mention the phrase "Metro North" once, I have no idea where you pulled that quote from.

Metro North wasn't delayed, it was cancelled because we had no money or access to debt. It was also a product of its time with utterly farcical ideas in it like the station below O'Connell Bridge.

blanch152

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121304997#Comment_121304997

What complete and utter nonsense, gibberish and ignorance, with an unhealthy dose of academic snobbery thrown in as well. I would love to know what sort of third-rate university gave you a political science degree if you are claiming that FF before the 1990s was the equivalent of Sinn Fein today.

First off, you claimed that the FF or thirty years ago was the same as SF today. I exposed that claim as completely false by linking to a copy of a FF election leaflet of 31 years ago that had FF boasting about reducing the top rate of income taxation, something that is the complete opposite of today's SF. FF made a virtue many times of reducing the top rate of taxation.

Secondly, in your most recent post you move the goalposts, where you refer to FF before the 1990s. Well let us go back to 1987.

https://irishelectionliterature.com/2009/09/24/fianna-fail-1987-get-things-going-programme-for-national-recovery-pamphlet/

Here we go, FF in 1987, promising to freeze government expenditure at 1986 levels. Contrast that with SF nowadays promising to increase expenditure on all sorts of stuff. And also promising to reduce taxes.

I lived through that period, I actually know what I am talking about because I experienced. FF was always the party of promising to reduce taxation, nothing like the SF of today which is promising repeatedly to increase them.

Left-wing governments do not spend more on infrastructure than right-wing governments, I don't know where you learned that one from. You can bet your bottom dollar that SF will be rushing to cancel the major public transport projects so that they will have spare funding for their own favourites such as increasing handouts. Left-wing governments mismanage the public finances, that much is true.

P.S. On the academic issue, I never admitted to anything, you made a personal accusation that I never responded to at the time, now you are turning it into something I admitted to. What I will tell you now, which I didn't previously, if you did turn up at the academic course that I did lecture on previously, you would fail, because of the clear bias in all of your writing. "An inability to distinguish ideology from reality" would be the comment on your writing beside a big fail.

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121306173#Comment_121306173

Heres a description of Metro North: https://www.newstalk.com/news/metro-north-dublin-airport-capital-investment-plan-swords-map-stations-trams-passengers-construction-636866

And heres one of MetroLink: https://www.gov.ie/en/press-release/f1a15-minister-ryan-announces-transformative-metrolink-project/

Compare and contrast. Its the same project, rebranded and expanded. But the same core idea. The one that should have been completed decades ago.

For all our 1990s/early 2000s era FF government's problems they at least got large infrastructure projects built. This was the LUAS timeline:

"The Transport Act, 1996 created a legal framework for CIÉ to build a tram system and in May 1997 the company applied for a Light Railway Order to construct the first phase,

In May 1998 the government decided to build two lines, amending the plans.

Construction work began in March 2001

Construction finished in February 2004"

Thats a under a decade from start to finish. Compare and contrast that to the close to three decades for MetroLink by 2035. Its rank incompetence, even by Irish standards - nevermind better run countries. And the horrifying thing is its not even exceptional rank incompetence, look at the National Children's Hospital or any other major project in the last decade of FG government and you see the exact same project management issues.

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121306710#Comment_121306710

I do apologise if I triggered you by outing your complete lack of academic training in political science in this thread. You should probably redirect that anger into actually engaging in some study in the field rather than posting ignorantly at length on the internet angrily, though.

Reducing income tax doesn't mean a party isn't left-wing. SF's policy platform in 2020 included reducing income taxes, does that make them right wing?

FF in 1987 were promising to freeze government expenditure because the country was in economic crisis. Labour did the same thing in government here in 2011, does that mean they aren't a left wing party?

FF's leadership defined themselves for most of their history as being left of center economically, its not just me, or even just academic analysis, that says so. To use one famous example: "In 1967 Jack Lynch described the party as "left of centre" while suggesting it was to the left of Fine Gael and Labour.". I'm willing to bet Jack Lynch knew more about FF's policies than you do.

"left wing governments do not spend more on infrastructure than right-wing governments" - this (along with everything above) shows you apparently don't actually know what left-wing or right-wing economic policy setting means, if you think the opposite of what each economic ideology stands for is reality.

blanch152

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121309915#Comment_121309915

That you fail to understand the distinction between populism and left-wing politics is a clear demonstration of ignorance of political science theory. FF as a left-wing party was a running joke for the entirety of its history.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121309874#Comment_121309874

The first link is not a description of the cancelled Metro North. It is a story about Metrolink before the route and name were announced.

The Metro North that received planning permission was unbuildable when the FG/Lab government came into power. They literally had no option but to cancel it. They potentially could have deferred it and attempted to extend the planning permission, but much about the plan (from the vaunted FF govt you are lauding) was really not very good.

Would the original Metro North be better than nothing? Yeah sure. But Metrolink, beyond just happening to be a metro, is not the same project and talking about 30 years of delay is utterly silly. Metro North would have been built absent the Global Financial Crash. How much blame you want to apportion to FF at least for that is up to you, they certainly were not innocent in terms of the impact it had on Ireland.

titan18

I find it interesting that 3 ministers have gone to Seoul (not sure why 1 doesn't work), but outside of that a good 6/7 "journalists" seem to have followed them over (I can't imagine all those papers are funding it themselves). I get the trade mission but not sure why we seem to be paying for a FG pr opportunity and bribe.

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121299102#Comment_121299102

Seems unlikely as (a) there's no halo this year (b) tax changes, welfare increases etc. don't kick in until at least January.

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121313336#Comment_121313336

You "can't imagine" but immediately jump to the conclusion that the taxpayer is funding this with no evidence whatsoever?

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121313336#Comment_121313336

Why can't you imagine the papers are funding it themselves? Do you have any particular insight into how political journalism works that makes you confident to suggest such corruption?