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

No, but he could play the game on Paschal.

Yeah but what benefit do we, the people, see in our day-to-day lives? Last I checked we have spiraling inflation in Ireland and throughout the EU. Perhaps somebody more competent than Paschal would be able to change the direction?

Worth remembering also that the presidency only lasts 2.5 years

Any negotiation involves gaming a situation.

I'd rather monkeys and computers do it tbh.

They certainly know how to waste money and corruption is widespread.

Council chamber secrets: Misconduct, falsehoods & waste (rte.ie)

Council chamber secrets: Misconduct, falsehoods and waste

A new era of accountability in local government was promised ten years ago, but has yet to be delivered.

Local government was a key focus of the Mahon Tribunal's work. The public was promised that political reform in this sector would be swift and emphatic.

The then-Minister for Housing and Planning, Jan O'Sullivan, said that the report's recommendations would be implemented "to ensure such behaviour can never, ever happen again".

Her government colleague, Phil Hogan, the then-Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, said he would examine the report and "take whatever further steps are necessary to restore and underpin confidence and transparency in the local government system".

The Mahon Report recommended various changes to legislation concerning local authorities, including the tightening up of rules about conflicts of interests, enhanced reporting requirements for councillors and public officials, and increased powers of investigation for the Standards of Public Office Commission.

Our investigation details failures in the local government sector, including allegations of employee fraud, false accounting, the misleading of other public bodies in grant applications, and the shocking waste of taxpayers' money.

In our analysis, two predominant themes persist in the local government sector.

One is the lack of accountability. Another is the persistent absence of real transparency.

In 2015, the prospect of ethics law reform was on the political agenda when a proposed piece of legislation, the Public Sector Standards Bill, was presented to the Dáil.

Under this legislation, a new Office of Public Sector Standards Commissioner was proposed, in addition to various other reforms that had been initially recommended in the Mahon Tribunal.

The commissioner would have the power to initiate investigations, even in the absence of a complaint. (Currently, the Standards in Public Office Commission can only initiate inquiries upon receiving a complaint.) It would also have powers to impose fines.

"For the first time, a uniform framework of ethical regulations will apply at national and local level in Ireland," said Brendan Howlin, the then-Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, in a Dáil debate in January 2016.

"There will now be a consistency of approach to ethical obligations across the public sector and, in a new departure, overarching integrity principles for public officials will be enshrined in legislation."

Of course, all of this sounded promising. But progress on the legislation later ground to a halt.

In August 2017, Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe wrote to the Oireachtas Finance Committee to warn that it was "essential that the Committee now quickly moves" to schedule the completion of thecommittee stage of the proposed legislation.

Mr Donohoe said that this was necessary because of the "public interest in implementing the recommendations" of the Mahon Tribunal.

But this request had little impact.

When asked for an update on the legislation in June 2019, an Oireachtas official replied that the Dáil term was due to finish the following month and that "All our remaining meetings are fully accounted for, and there are no plans to deal with this Bill in the remaining time".

The delays continued, and once the 2020 General Election was called, the bill died.

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The FFG governments completely to blame for lack of reform and accountability.

New Politics.

Limerick has the Civil War parties in power jacking on an extra 15% to the base LPT rate, yet the same crisis exists in Limerick as it does in Dublin... Can you explain that with your logic?

Admittedly, it is the Indo and Hugh O'Connell but the story is quite mind boggling.

I suppose that after having Troy standing beside him for the think-in photos, Martin doesn't see anything wrong with Ahern rejoining FF.

Regards...jmcc

It's a more common spectacle to see councils reduce LPT every chance they get to the point that the CEO has to warn them not to because it will screw up the budget. Now, if councils would actually collect all the commercial rates and rent owed they might find their finances on a more even keel.

You might think so if you just read the headline and stopped there. However, reading further down and into the details of what he said, your conclusion is over the top.

The local government fund or LGF is part of what many councils largely use to fund themselves. They have no direct access to the Exchequer billions and the LPT Revenue collects is paid into the LGF.

80% of LPT is retained locally in 2015 and 2016 to fund vital public services. The remaining 20% is re-distributed to provide additional funding to certain local authorities that have lower property tax bases due to the variance in property values across the State. Councillors can agree to reduce the LPT by up to 15% so you can easily see where funding issues arise.

You can see the LA funding breakdown on this page.

The reason Revenue got to collect LPT is because it was blindingly obvious that LAs were incapable of it. Rent is only one example, parking fines are haphazardly collected, at barely 50% in some places, and 30% of commercial rates can remain uncollected in some councils. TBH on rent we'd nearly be better off with private HA as they have very clear rules on non-payment!

As for the staff, most have not been exposed to that concept of KPI and how work matters and there is little sign that it will change any time soon in some councils. I disagree on the government input, apart from general policies, and unless a county proposes to turn out enough housing for a new Tallaght they are free to plan as they wish, they just haven't. They may have had funding complaints in the post-Troika days but there is absolutely no excuse now.

And another gentle reminder that councils are run day to day by an executive and CEO/County Manager. Councillors from the various parties just do other "important" things like rejecting permission for some housing and they seem more keen on defunding a council!

It is Martin and he had Troy standing beside him for those photo-ops at that FF think-in. This is a few magnitudes higher in terms of cluelessness. While Ahern might still have some support among a small group of FF supporters, this could be another stage of rehabilitating Ahern to be FF's candidate in the presidential election.

Regards...jmcc