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

Everybody should pay something. USC is buttons on those low incomes you describe.

Why do you think someone on say 80k needs it least? On 80k it would be around €3200 USC per year as well as paying income tax of over 20k versus the person on 40k paying around 4.5k.

Added to that people on lower income are assisted in many other ways for example with HAP, free GP care\ medical cards, working family payments etc.

The person on 80k might also have a mortgage, childcare costs etc.

This just sums up the FG led governments since 2011. Their out-of-control Childrens Hospital project is directly impacting other areas of our health service. It is beyond a joke at this point. 5 times over budget at least (nobody knows!) and already 6 years late.

HSE says children's hospital costs may impact projects (rte.ie)

HSE says children's hospital costs may impact other projects.

The Health Service Executive has said that fluctuation in spending on the new National Paediatric Hospital at the St James's Hospital campus in Dublin will have a significant impact on the remainder of its capital programme for this year.

The plan allocates over €1 billion for a variety of projects around the country, including 260 extra beds and more buildings.

It includes spending of €324m on the new children's hospital.

The hospital is due to open in 2025 at a provisional cost of €1.4 billion. The original estimated cost was €450m in 2017.

After building and then commissioning costs, there is concern that the final cost of the project could be significantly over €2bn.

Further costs on the project could delay other projects this year.

These include 36 critical care beds at Cork University Hospital, building work on the planned new major trauma centre in Cork, a radiation oncology facility at Limerick University Hospital, restoration work after the recent fire at Wexford University Hospital, progress on the new National Maternity Hospital and more primary care centres.

It said that the main contractor's programme is under constant review and that an updated programme was due from builders BAM in February but has not yet been received.

The chair of the Public Accounts Committee said it "has been hamstrung in its work" because it has been given "minuscule information", and "denied the type of information" it needs to do proper scrutiny on the children's hospital project.

Mr Stanley said that he hopes the Taoiseach has "at least a ballpark figure" as the department officials have not been able to give him the figure.

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FG TDs should hang their heads in shame at this disaster. Do they get anything right?

Someone on 25k-40k, working full time, is above the income thresholds for most state support schemes. They're not the people getting council houses and medical cards these days. They're literally the people you're talking about getting screwed.

The median household income in this country is 45k. A household earning 100k is more than double that, so yes, statistically, they are very much in the "well off" part of society. It might not feel that way, because they're suffering with high housing costs, high healthcare costs, inflation etc - but thats down to government failures. The majority of households in the country are struggling on far lower income than that.

Not ONLY FG - all 3 parties in this joke if a government.

Heard on the radio today that there is NO car parking spaces at Dublin Airport this weekend, while at the same time, DAA are talking about a third terminal. I also heard this government’ is blocking DAA from running the Q-PRk spaces which I believe number 6,000, all because the government’ do not want DAA to control all the park spaces.

There is also Roderick O’Gorman a few weeks ago trying to shift 200 Ukranian refugees out of a hotel in Caherciveen to make way for others. These Ukranian refugees have been in the hotel for 12 months, some are working in Caherciveen ( thus contributing taxes to bolster that surplus ) while their Children have integrated with the locals and apparently one is on the fringe of playing GAA for Kerry. This wasn’t his first attempt at trying this stunt, but it seems He either won’t learn or hasn’t a clue.

I was in Celbridge this morning & noticed at the junction on the Clane Road ( just before Educate Together ) both filter lanes have been eradicated, thus causing more cars to idle at traffic lights. I see this replicated all around, EG look outside The Brazen Head coming off the quays, for example.

It is being reported that there is friction between the parties over the upcoming budget.

They think they are smarter than the experts, yet the homeless figure has broken records over the last 2 months, & is now over 12,000.

Then there is debacle of the Children’s Hospital which is well highlighted above.

These clowns have no interest in being progressive- they are not proactive ONLY reactive.

I never thought I would even consider voting for the shinners, but in all honesty, they surely cannot be any worse than this bunch.

The Children's hospital scandal is something that needs to be investigated. Obviously O'Reilly was up to no good at the start when it came to location but I do wonder whether FG have connections to BAM who are creaming the taxpayer. The fact that other vital projects are blocked by the never ending spend on the long overdue hospital is simply disgusting.

I agree, but meanwhile what is to happen? Just listen to the same spiel every weekend that the car parks are full?

Has the inflationary impact of the government decision to increase excise duties on fuel been assessed?

https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2023/0531/1386582-fuel-prices-to-rise/

Huge difference between an individual earning 45k and a household income of 45k...

They might think they can get 25% of the vote by focusing their efforts on the wealthiest segment of the electorate, but its a very risky bet. Lots of people earning €50k+ a year vote Green because they're very concerned about the environment. Or vote FF/IND for historical, cultural, or local reasons. Or vote Lab/SocDems/PBP for ideological reasons.

And on top of all that a very large number of younger people earning very good money won't vote for FG solely because of the shambles that is the housing crisis. FG support in under 40s, even high earning ones, is shockingly low now and very unlikely to change by giving a few hundred euro back.

The biggest problems for this strategy really are 1) the fact only 10% of Irish households have income of more than €90k a year - we just don't have as many high earning households as in some other countries and 2) in the Irish political system FG are far from the only home for our limited number of high earners, and its unlikely they'll become it in the two remaining budgets before our next election.

And in the meantime by pursuing this strategy they're bleeding out support from the rest of the population, which is what they need to stay above an actual core vote of 10-15% or so.

If you work in the PS you can't exactly negotiate much. In the private sector it's easy to jump jobs and get a 20,30 or even 40% pay rise.

I moved jobs during covid and got a 51% pay rise. I wouldn't get that if I was a teacher or a guard. Not a hope in hell

When the Government published their Climate Action Plan to much fanfare, there was criticism from many quarters that there were no details behind the "plan" and we all knew immediately that it was another plan destined to fail. It is already failing spectacularly and it will only get worse. There was no plan. Aspirations and targets and sound bytes maybe but no plan or commitment.

Ireland is on course to miss climate targets, says EPA (rte.ie)

Ireland is on course to miss 2030 climate targets, says EPA

Ireland is on course to miss its 2030 climate targets by a large margin unless all sectors, including agriculture, electricity and transport rapidly deliver further emission reductions and sustain this delivery into the future, according to the latest report from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

The EPA has analysed how far emissions would fall if the very challenging policy measures already approved and included in our national Climate Action Plan were fully implemented and delivered on time.

Its latest projections show that if all climate policies and measures currently planned are fully implemented, Ireland will achieve only a 29% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, well short of the legally binding 51% reduction target.

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Why do the government bother with this nonsense? Why do they lie to us continually? Just admit that you cannot be arsed.

They put Senator Malcolm Byrne on Drivetime yesterday to defend their "plan" (no TDs available it seems) and it was absolutely embarrassing. Obviously FFG politicians don't usually answer straight questions but he was disgraceful. He insisted on talking absolute shite for the whole interview. It was beyond stupid. Shameful stuff.

Latest Sindo/Ireland Thinks poll. SF up. Sindo down. :)

MoE +/- 3.3% and 1,1356 sample size. SocDems up 1% to 6%. Labour down 25% to 3%. Between RedC (15%) and Ireland Thinks (20%) FF is as stagnant as ditchwater.

Regards...jmcc