Irish Public Sector overpaid and Leprechauns DO have gold

It's a staple of the Irish media that public sector workers in Ireland are overpaid. So staple it's boring. The sun rises in the East, 1 plus 1 equals 2, public sector workers are overpaid, blah, blah, blah. Since I work in the public sector I could be accused of a bias? Perhaps. But since the Irish media is dominated by private sector interests (e.g. the Bean Baron) let's just say that we're all sinners. But as sinners we can still access the facts.
Fact 1: the current (allegedly bonanza) partnership deal provides for annual payrises of 4.4%.
Fact 2: the current inflation rate is 4.8% and has been in excess of 4.4% for most of the period covered by the deal.
Fact 3: over the period of of this below inflation pay deal the Irish economy has been one of the fastest growing in the world (reaching 8th position).

Let's put these facts together. In a period when Ireland was one of the fastest growing economies in the world, public sector workers have taken a pay cut in real terms.

Still a main story in the Irish media is the excessive generosity towards public sector workers!

Yep, and the leprechaun is at the end of the rainbow with the pot of gold ...

Health Service Utilitarians

According to the 'experts' the magic wand for the Irish health service is "centres of excellence". Brilliant really. Who could be against excellence? Except there's a catch. The downside of this miracle is that large numbers of existing critical health services (cancer, maternity, etc.) will be closed to be replaced a very small number of CoEs. Now according to the gurus we'll benefit overall as the new large top class centres will have much greater success rates ... when you get there. That's the 64m euro question that has been bugging this whole scheme. When asked (by our tame media) the gurus reply that the disadvantage of longer journeys for critical health care will be more than compensated by the greatly improved outcomes.

It's uncanny really. Utilitarianism 101. Overall utility maximised. Jeremy Bentham would be so happy. Except that there's one glitch that the gurus don't mention and our poodle journalists won't raise. This new system, if it is put in place as announced, should improve healthcare overall, but some citizens will gain and others will lose. The 1 million Irish citizens parked in and around Dublin will see a half dozen mediocre health services replaced by (say) three world-class facilities. Definitely a good deal. The 1/2 million citizens that live on the western seaboard away from a major city will see their one local (an hour's drive away) facility closed and will be facing 4 and 5 hour journeys to these new CoEs.

The current government and their buddies in the establishment are willing to let the peasants in the west of Ireland die so that the busy young workers of the Pale can improve their life expectancy.

So much for the Regional development strategy.

Incidentally (of course) replacing many small hospitals with a few giant facilities is a lot better for the career path of the pushy west-brit consultants that really control health ...

Irish media and Shannon

The treatment of the current Shannon fiasco by the Irish media is typical. The usual commentators in the private papers do what their masters have told them to do: worship the so-called 'free market' (funny how there is no complaint in the Business sections when the US and European central banks interfere in the financial markets to rescue the banks that caused the current financial disaster by making loans they knew could not be repaid). But the best example of the stupidity and lies in the Irish media is the way they frame the story. The problem in Shannon is the utter failure of the Regional development policies of the Irish government. Aer Lingus dumping Shannon is a symptom of a problem not a root cause. But of course the media zoom in on the micro details of what a particular company is doing and completely ignore the big picture. Last Sunday RTÉ had a huge interview with an Aer Lingus executive: but no interviews with the Minister of Transport!!! That's the way RTÉ covers every disaster: focus on some petty detail. It's like trying to understand world war two by following one platoon in the German army. By definition the Irish government policy to develop the West is an attempt to correct a market failure. Market failures cannot be understood or corrected by looking at one tiny element of the overall market.
But of course it suits the free market ideologues in the Irish media to ask the wrong questions; that way there is no danger of upsetting the status quo.

Irish Government and Shannon airport

The latest fiasco at Shannon airport is a fascinating case study in the hypocrisy of the Fianna Fail. In theory government policy (for years) has been to support development in the West which is totally underdeveloped, a policy which will also help the East which is suffering from uncontrolled over-development and a population explosion. However every time this alleged policy hits a chunk of reality it implodes. Aer Lingus dumping the only link from the West to the Heathrow uber-hub is in complete contravention of the policy. What are the government going to do about it? Nothing. To quote that clown Dempsey, Minister for (don't laugh) Transport, "Aer Lingus is a commercial company and the decision is theirs to make". Well fine so. If the government is to have nothing to do with commercial decisions in the West let's be honest and chuck out this bullshit about regional development policy. When the government privatised Aer Lingus they kept a 25% share. What are they going to do with this? Nothing. They refuse to call an egm to examine the issue and when other shareholders do call an egm the government are refusing to vote against aer lingus management. The free market ayatollahs are always lecturing us about the wonders of 'shareholder democracy'. What good is democracy if your refuse to vote? On top of that the government was warned before the privatisation to secure the Heathrow slots which were given free to Aer Lingus aeons ago on the basis that it was a national carrier. Speical rules were written into the articles of association to do this and guess what ... they don't cover this situation.

What kind of a name is that?

Talking to the radio. That's what I do, or so my wife says. Some people might think that pacing up and down in front of the kitchen radio denouncing dishonest politicians, obsequious journalists and the joke that is the Irish media is not fully encompassed by the verb 'to talk'. But there you go. I talk to the radio. So that is what this blog is for: a transcript of my side of the 'conversation'. It also allows me to let off the same steam in a more socially acceptable way.
Think about that; it is now considered perfectly normal to put a stream of consciousness rant onto the Internet but not to give out to the radio! Think about just 15 years ago and somebody suggesting that instead of shouting at the telly you should fire your thoughts into a fax machine set to 'send to all'; you'd have been locked up.