Is Jim McDaid right?

M

michaelm

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Is Jim McDaid right when he says "In the interest of the citizens of this country, we should have the general election before the Budget"?

I'm am of the opinion that this Governments priority is to stay in government and that, despite their blather about getting on with the job and sorting out the banks and the economy and that they 'have the numbers', if they genuinely wanted to do what's best for the country they would call an election now.

Are there many on AAM who don't think that an election now would be the best course of action for the country?
 
We really, really need an election. However, it is too close to the budget to do it now.
If the government fell in the morning, there would be no government in place in time to have a budget for 2011.

If Jim McDaid really believed this, he would have resigned in September,

Jim McDaid openly said in the press a year ago that he was too busy being a full time GP with a young child to be doing any work as a TD, so he should have resigned then, he just kept the second job to grab more money from the tax payer.
 
I would not call for a general election for the sake of it, but I agree that at this stage a general election is needed. If this 4 year plan is as critical as is made out, it is essential that a government that is going to be in for the next 4 years makes the decisions.
The government could have called a general election at the beginning of October, hold it early November and have budget in early December.
Despite the rhetoric about FF putting the country first, they are hanging on for as long as possible for their own selfish needs.
 
[broken link removed] in the Business Post a couple of weeks ago suggested that November 25th (according to http://www.environ.ie/en/LocalGovernment/Voting/NationalElections/ (environ.ie) elections must be held between the 18th and 25th) was a possible date for an election. I don't see why it couldn't still happen then. We could have a new Government in place by the 1st of December and a budget shortly thereafter.
 
Just let them get this budget through and have the election after that. No sense in doing anything else.

I think it would be only fair to the next govt to let the current guys deliver a severe budget now and the new govt will have almost a year then to get to grips with the situation.

FG & Lab have not had a sniff of power in 13 years. It would be ridiclous to have an election and a new government try to put a budget together in a matter of just over a month.

Vote the budget through and turn up the heat afterwards.

By the way, McDaid should have hung around to vote against the govt out if he really thought it would help the country to get them out now
 
But it's not only the budget, its the 4-year plan also.
The current government is relying on the votes of independents so it is possible the budget will not even get through which may lead to an election anyway.
In the UK, the tories were out of power for 3 terms and introduced a budget pretty swifly when returned to power.
 
DerKaiser said:
Just let them get this budget through and have the election after that. No sense in doing anything else.
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That would be acceptable but they shouldn't provide the EU with the demanded 4 year plan as they can't stand over it. And they should get the election done before we go back cap-in-hand to the Markets.
 
I don't believe in taking advice from people who cut and run when the going get's tough.
 
michaelm said:
A noble sentiment :). But despite Jim McDaid, do think there should be an election?
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Yes. One should have been called a month ago. We have to have one sooner or later, we should have had one now and gotten it over with along with the 4 year budget before having to go back to the markets.
 
Good old Jim. Always with the country's best interests at heart. What's the bets that he runs in the next election as an independent? What's the point in an election. So labour can say no to a property tax, no to social welfare cuts, no to tax rises unless you are one of those evil people earning over 100k, no to education cuts etc etc. A FG and labour government would not last a year and we would be back at square one.
 
michaelm said:
That would be acceptable but they shouldn't provide the EU with the demanded 4 year plan as they can't stand over it. And they should get the election done before we go back cap-in-hand to the Markets.
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Look, it's one think to acknowledge that we rely on the markets, but you have to realise we're a democracy foremost.

What I mean by that is that we're in the common situation that the current democratically elected government will not necessarily be in power for the next 3 budgets after this one. That's democracy, we can't always have a government at any point in time that will deliver the next 4 budgets.

Another point is that the markets in January should be firstly concerned with whether we have made the required cuts in December. We can say what we like about the following 3 budgets with no guarantee we'll follow through. A tough budget in december and a new government willing to reduce the deficit thereafter is what we need to concede to the markets and no more, certainly not our democracy.

We might be able to postpone going back until Feb or March in any case, giving us time for a post christmas election
 
DerKaiser said:
Look, it's one think to acknowledge that we rely on the markets, but you have to realise we're a democracy foremost . . . A tough budget in december and a new government willing to reduce the deficit thereafter is what we need to concede to the markets and no more, certainly not our democracy.
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Absolutely agree. Although the way our political classes conspired to rerun Nice & Lisbon and prevent a Presidential election last time, and the way the current FF/Green government has avoided bye-elections and clung to power when they have no moral mandate, would not give me great confidence that they are overly interested in our democracy.
DerKaiser said:
We might be able to postpone going back until Feb or March in any case, giving us time for a post christmas election
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I could live with that either. I still think that now is opportune.
 
It's too bloody cold and wet to be out canvassing and leafleting in this weather. I've no holidays left in work to spend on a campaign now.

Leave it to April/May.
 
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