RTE People In Need Telethon - Why?

Re: good grief

Hi RD - Your solution is no solution. I'm not sure if you really were serious about proposing this as a solution to our social care problems.

You can't have well-intentioned amateurs mucking about to try to solve the many problems in our social care system. Do you expect untrained people to pop in to care for an Alzheimers patient or a severely handicapped child or a drug addict going cold turkey? Even with the best of attentions, attempts by volunteers to help out in such cases without adequete direction/control/supervision could be extremely dangerous. And these people deserve better than being dependent on charity from volunteers - they deserve an entitlement to a minimum level of service to be provided by the state.

It's artificial to pose a choice between political activity and volunteering. From my experience, those people who are politically active also tend to be those who are active in their communities in a range of volunteer roles. And of course, if the 'good guys' simply opt-out of political activity, that leaves the playing field clear for the 'bad guys' to take/keep control.

Yes, I sometimes get frustrated with the political system. Maybe for the next election I'll try harder to push my proposal for a no-postering pact or law. But I still haven't seen any sensible alternative to the current system.
 
If there was a building programme for the whole population of Ireland, houses would be a lot cheaper to buy...
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So housing is a responsibility of the state? Like roads and policing service? Honestly, that is an absurd proposal. This is what happens when the "gummit" gets involved in homebuilding -<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->
ballymun.jpg
<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->Ballymun
 
ballymun

More absurdity.

Ballymun is not the only council housing project in Dublin.
There's a lot of decent (council) houses out there. Some people cannot or will not be able to afford decent housing. It's only right that the state provide for them.
 
housing

MaxHopper

if roads and policing are public services, why shouldn't housing be too? Like health, sanitation, education?

More housing = more supply. Housing can come in all sorts of categories - luxury, 'normal', affordable, council...... Don't see why a massive building programme wuoldn't bring the overall price down. Especially for people starting out.
 
..

The original point of this thread, knocking the Telethon and Moya Doherty etc....

Gives me the same feeling as when I see Bono banging on about drop the debt when at their Slane concert the licensed vendors inside the ground were flogging you burgers for about a fiver a go. Combined with the fact that you were stopped from bringing anything at all in so you had to rebuy even plastic bottled soft drinks inside.
Makes me sick to hear him preaching when he has the audacity to be involved in such a blatant rip off.....
 
There's a lot of decent (council) houses out there.
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Really? Care to advise us of a council estate that is not 'down at the heel' and in which you would consider living? Face it, the great Socialist experiment of the 20th century failed. Miserably. And yet some will not learn from the past.<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->Private ownership (of anything) nurtures respect for the rule of law. As for the public services, well they are not so great, are they? We abuse the A&E services with injuries resulting from anti-social behaviour, education has over a 50% dropout rate in the first year of third level, council estates where you dare not venture into in the daytime, shall I continue? I am for privatisation of third level education, housing, intercity roads, health care, OAP priviledges, and so forth.<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->Consider this, reduce the social beneficence in Ireland, drop the 'effective' tax rate (direct + indirect = 60%+), and then you might have the dosh for a home in a few years.
 
Ah privatisation - the great panacea of the far-right. One would have to wonder why;

- the privatised power markets in the US have allowed the power suppliers to hold the public to ransom and trebled their prices
- the privatised telephone market in Ireland is still monopolised by Eircom for home phones and duopolised by O2/Vodafone for mobiles
- Thatcher's great efforts at privatising public services in the UK in the 80's were soundly rejected by the UK votes in the 90's and the naughties.

Privatisation is just a cop-out. There is no reason (other than failures of culture, processes & management) why effective public services can't be provided by an effective public service. Privatising such services creates a cat-and-mouse game where the regulators attempt to create metrics to measure the services provided and the providers play the system to meet the metrics without really providing any service at all.
 
social housing

Hey Max,

In reply to your posting, I would have to say that most (bar Ballymun and other high rise developments - thanks a million Neil Blaney TD) of the housing provided by the Corpo/public sector are actually finished to a better standard than the private sector equivalents and in the majority of cases they are well looked after by the tenants - in many cases there is a option to buy, which encourages the respect for the rule of law or even civic pride.

In any event I'd be happy enough to live in such a development - in fact I did so for 7 years. I do accept that there are anti-social elements in some of these developments - Of course there are also anti-social elements in the private housing market as well (My experience is that I found more problems in the private sector, but I accept that this could be an unlucky sample, so it's more reasonable to say that the percentage is more or less the same across sectors.

Your piece at the end about privatising everything is interesting - almost libertarian in its outlook - would you like to expound on it some more? Personally, I think this approach would be bonkers, but as we live in a democracy, troll on down bro! There is such a thing as society as well you know - your approach would end up in civil war within a very short timeframe. On the plus side shares in proviate security would be well up!

By the way, third level education does not have a 50% drop out level in first year. Where did you get that from?

Regards,

OpusnBill
 
re

You don't know Dublin very well do you Max?

Plenty of areas in Dublin that have nice council houses that are well looked after.

But, by your definition Dublin (& Ireland) is a kip anyway so I don't suppose it matters much.
 
One by one, we will dissect the following sweeping generalisations.
<!--EZCODE LIST START--><ul><li>- the privatised power markets in the US have allowed the power suppliers to hold the public to ransom and trebled their prices</li><li>- the privatised telephone market in Ireland is still monopolised by Eircom for home phones and duopolised by O2/Vodafone for mobiles</li><li>- Thatcher's great efforts at privatising public services in the UK in the 80's were soundly rejected by the UK votes in the 90's and the naughties.</li></ul><!--EZCODE LIST END-->
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Power markets in the US? California, actually is of what you refer to. And the people of California emasculated capitalism in the 80s by way of a referendum that capped energy prices. No-brainer here then. Private operators simply stopped building generating capacity in order to remain profitable (we all understand profit, do we not?) Come the 'energy crunch' of the naughties, someone had to stump-up for the new gear and the shareholders were not up for losing their dividends. Hence the rubberband snapped and prices increased to backfill the gap in capital funding.<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->'last mile syndrome' or the 'access network'. No one to blame here, either. Ireland is an admittedly small place. And like so many low population islands, pays more for most everything. There is no ROI in Eircom. Recall the exhortations of Harney and Kane prior to the first flotation. Did anyone honestly evaluate the profitability of a telcom operating in a confined market? No, the punters were looking at a takeover bid from a British or continental telco. Any imbecile could see that the value of Eircom was in the physical plant. O'Reilly and Soros, did. And now we reap what we have sown. Live small, pay big. There is no incentive (profit, remember that word) for another telcom competitor to invest in Ireland.<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->UK and privatisation. So? Some politicos get the heave-ho. Please identify the strongest economy in Europe (hint: it is the 4th largest in the world).<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->Any more questions?
 
Can't name any, can you? Just as well. You would most likely compromise your integrity by writing that you would live there. And I wish not to be responsible for your condemnation to hell for lying.
 
re

Kimmage for starters. I'd live there.
The outskirts of the city centre has plenty of both council owned and ex-council houses. Highly sought after housing. Very good quality too...having been in many of them.
Drimnagh has a lot of council houses too. My mother was brought up there and it has many very nice areas.

That's to name but a few areas.

Yawn...we're getting tired of your constant whining Max.
 
Here ya go, 'herring breath' : [broken link removed]. Non- and late-completing (left and returned) is ca. 50%. But you were busy reading comics instead of working the maths exercises.<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->NB.
...both council owned and ex-council houses.
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And in Kimmage? The public/private ratio would be? Serves to prove the point that private ownship creates a desirable environment.
 
re

>And in Kimmage? The public/private ratio would be? Serves to prove the point that private ownship creates a desirable environment.


But these are all ex council houses.
Serves to prove there is nothing wrong with council housing I think is what you meant to say.

Interesting isn't it how you think Ireland is such a crap place full of begrudgers and people who don't care about each other when you yourself begrudge council housing to the needy.
 
...

I see we have the second highest retention rate ahead of the US & UK & Germany. Interesting.
 
Vocabulary check on aisle 7! Aisle 7! Vocabulary check!<!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END--><!--EZCODE BR START--><!--EZCODE BR END-->[broken link removed]. And I am neither definition.
 
re

Interesting how you pull this vocabulary check out of your bottom whenever you're losing an argument.

Jsut becuse somone spills sumthin wrong doesn mean there argumint isn valad.


But then u r too bissy trollin to notice dat.
 
Good Sirs, it would be extremely ungentlemanly of me to engage you in a battle of wits as you are unarmed.
 
re

>Good Sirs, it would be extremely ungentlemanly of me to engage you in a battle of wits as you are unarmed.

I feel that your recent full frontal lobotomy might weigh in my favour and I never turn down an easy victory.

Perhaps then you'd rather turn your rather limited attention back to defending your poorly thought out point concerning council housing.
 
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