Tax Payers Money

wideband

Hi all,

Is this breaking news or common knowledge, i'd say the later. We pay our taxes, tighten our belts, pay for healthcare and childcare while at the same time Ministers and S/Servants continue to ignore the facts.

http://home.eircom.net/content/irelandcom/breaking/5457097?view=Eircomnet

NewDubliner

wideband wrote:

Hi all,

Is this breaking news or common knowledge, i'd say the later. We pay our taxes, tighten our belts, pay for healthcare and childcare while at the same time Ministers and S/Servants continue to ignore the facts.

http://home.eircom.net/content/irelandcom/breaking/5457097?view=Eircomnet

There are two factors at play here. The first is that civil service HR policy is discourage expertese by only promoting 'generic' skills. This means that when contracts are being negotiated, the civil servants can easily be out-witted by the private sector contractors.

The other is that there can be political pressure to hide the true cost of projects favoured by powerful interests. For example, you're seeing this at the moment with the 'decentralisation' project. The official cost is €900m but this has been arrived at by hiding other major costs in departmental budgets.

Gurgle

NewDubliner wrote:

There are two factors at play here. The first is that civil service HR policy is discourage expertese by only promoting 'generic' skills.

IMO, the problem is not with the quality of people in the civil service, its the sheer numbers of them. There are entire departments dedicated to generating paperwork for other departments, commitees who spend hundreds of hours deciding how best to spend a €10k grant :rolleyes:

sceptre

Gurgle wrote:

entire departments dedicated to generating paperwork for other departments, commitees who spend hundreds of hours deciding how best to spend a €10k grant :rolleyes:

All with their own Yes Minister collections at home for training purposes, I suspect:)

dent

Its sickening to read but I have little confidence that anything is going to change. I have a friend that works for a minster and sits idle for 3 months of the year. She asked around to see if any other departments needed help with any work but was flatly turned down. She stated the reason they didn't want her help was becasue they are overly protective of there own departments budgets.
It bogels the mind.

Popperised

Gurgle wrote:

IMO, the problem is not with the quality of people in the civil service, its the sheer numbers of them. There are entire departments dedicated to generating paperwork for other departments, commitees who spend hundreds of hours deciding how best to spend a €10k grant :rolleyes:

Yes , there is a surplus of them but then could the market economy support the workforce without it now ?

It seems the structure of the economy has been set in plastic with a heavy dependence on FDI, a huge civil service who will support the Government who supports them (like FF's benchmarking policy) and a private sector which is left to the market whims and an effective open door on immigration to infinate supply low-skilled labour with whole tracks of ,what is effectively, the developing world e.g Eastern Europe etc

The real losers will be the native Irish who fall into none-of-the-above categories.

One may expect a growth of support in the 'extreme right' in the not-too-distant future from particuarly from that section( but not just) of society .

MadsL

effective open door on immigration to infinate supply low-skilled labour with whole tracks of ,what is effectively, the developing world e.g Eastern Europe etc

The real losers will be the native Irish who fall into none-of-the-above categories.

I predict a minority of one representing a 'popularist' stance by the use of multiple accounts to drag each and every politics thread offtopic into the world of 'the sky is falling' as a result of immigration.

I predict it will end in tears.

davidoco

Talk about wasting money Minster Michael "I don't give a *" Martin has two car kits in his Volvo along with an in dash phone which was, on list price from Volvo site, an extra 1275 euro. Is that the dearest non mobile gsm phone you can buy?