Eamon Ryan resigns before the General Election.

Agreed - that is indeed the way it goes.

I would have thought it would be a better idea for greens to attempt to understand why those "fair weather voters" desert them rather than a holier than thy attitude of "Father, forgive them,for they do not know what they do"

As far as I know the Irish Green Party has somewhere around 5,000 members and I would expect they could distinguish between the present retiring leader of the party holding the senior minister portfolio and determined to keep it until election day and the new leader of the party, but you are not going to win many seats with 5,000 votes nationally.

For the "fair weather voter" looking at it, especially where a deputy leader refused to step up, prefering to keep her powder dry and swan around waiting to decide if she will feast on the bones after the General Election and then take the leader out if it suits her, it could be a lot more confusing. As in WTF.

’soft left’ floating voters are notoriously fickle an have virtually the entire political menu to choose from, depending on how specifically they define their political position. Pretty much inevitable that labour/soc dems/greens will take a hammering at the polls after a spell in government.

They may be fickle, but shooting yourself in both feet is not going to encourage them to stay with you either.

Thought it wouldnt be recycled if we did that. Was a no no. It called a recycling bin. Maybe you never had one. Whats next paper cartons. Will we setup our own recycleing centres at home too. Hauling around rubbish in the back of the car smelling like a refuse lorry. Maybe food waste as well.

Ya can charge a deposit by weight or something. Return our waste or excess to get deposit

Yes. But you brought up the EP election, which is irrelevant as the EP had already passed this legislation last year.

The E.U. parliament passing that bill was the irrelevance in that it didn`t become law unless it recieved the majority support of the member states at council level. It was withdraw from the council agenda in March because it was not going to getting the support required. Ryan and Noonan knew after the hammering the greens got in the E.U. elections there would be even less support from member states under a new council so tried to get it passed with the old council.

It was passed because the Austrian green party quisling voted against the explicit wishes of her own citizens where Austria are now going to the ECJ to have it overturned. A discraceful disregard for the democratic process by greens and especially by Ryan and Noonan the two instigators. The E.U. for all their supposed checks and balances were no better. The chair of the council was also explicitly told by the Austrian Chancellor that his country did not support the motion, yet still went ahead and excepted a vote that he knew was against their wishes. But then he is a green himself, a member of the Belgian Ecolo party.

It`s do do with green politicians who spout about votes for the right being a danger to democracy happy to trample all over it if it will get them their way. If anything they are worse than their paint throwing tyre slashing "warriors"

Gewessler of the Austrian greens was explicitly told by the Austrian Chancellor Nehammer that Austria was not in favour of the motion, and for her to vote for it would be illegal. So no she was not authorised to vote in favour.

He also told the Belgian chair of the E.U. Council that she was not authorised to do so by Austria. Not only did she go against her own governments wishes, but her vote was accepted by the Chair of the Council, Alain Maron of the Belgian green Ecolo Party. Maron had earlier sidelined the proposal because he saw it was not going to get the approval required but due to our two greens of Ryan and Noonan it was back on the table hoping to sneak it through between the death of the old parliament and beginning of the new one.

Shoddy and reprehensible from all four greens.

As to Austria collapsing their government and calling an election. Austria is due to have an election in two months time in September. In the meantime their Chancellor Nehammer has said Gewessler`s act was "Blatant misconduct" and "That now would be the end of cooperation in this Government" which will only implement important projects as far as is still possible with this coalition partner" and that Austria will take a case to the European Court of Justice to have Gewessler`s vote nullified. Last week the EEP, the party at the helm of the Austrian government sent a legal document to their public prosecuter on why they believe Gewessler should be prosecuted for "knowingly misusing her authority" an offence that carries up to a ten year jail term.

Democracy isn't democratic when you don't get the result you want… Uhuh.

Ridiculous that you say an EP vote is irrelevant, it's a directly elected parliament and all legislation must be approved by the EP, that's not the only step in the process but it's a necessary one.

The fact we've just had an EP election is entirely irrelevant, the EP voted in favour of the legislation a year ago.

Everything Eamonn Ryan did in his political career shows complete and utter respect for democracy.

Perhaps you should start a thread on crisis in the Austrian government instead of clogging up this one.