Are you happy to watch Ireland slide back towards the 80's??

[soc]

I was following a thread on bmw-driver.net about the proposed motor tax changes. It sort of morphed into a general "this country is gone to the dogs" thread and (Rightly so), there are some angry people over there

http://www.bmw-driver.net/forum/showthr ... #post32474

Long story short, it's clear Ireland is no longer the celtic tiger and there could be hard times ahead for a lot of people. But even that aside isn't it about time the government were made accountable for their actions?

Personally I think it's about time the general public made their feelings known through some form of very visible protest - what would people think about holding a taxi driver style protest in Dublin city center?

[Mustang]

First up, and just to get it out of the way, what are you doing on a BMW forum? You must be on more marque specific forums than the rest of us put together.

Similar discussions going on here and here

The papers are talking about a 10% hike in motor tax. My performance car bias aside, a 1.6 engine is NOT big or excessive. That particular (Irish) mindset really bugs me. Drive a car with >1.6L engine and you are deemed to be affluent and in need of a good tax raping.

If you look at the thread above there is talk of the creation of a two teared tax system, whereby all vehicles registered after 31/12/07 will be assesed for VRT and motor tax based on the new system, regardless of when the vehicle was first registered. So you potentially have a case where two identical cars -one Original Irish market car, and one used import from UK for example, paying different motor tax rates. I find it hard to believe that this will actually happen, but who knows.

A protest would be a nice idea, and I don't want to sound defeatist but it probably would not do any good.

The really annoying aspect of all this is that it is being done for supposedly environmentally friendly reasons. => the government are green champions of the planet, and we should just pay up, as more money will save the planet. If they were serious they would lead by example, all state cars, especially ministerial, to have engine sizes less than 1.6L.

[soc]

First up, and just to get it out of the way, what are you doing on a BMW forum? You must be on more marque specific forums than the rest of us put together.

I'm a forum whore

I can't help myself - if I have any sort of interest in a car I just have to get on the forum and see what the ownership experience is like. I was thinking about an M3 early next year, plan was to run it for a year and then move on.. not so sure now.

And you're probably right - a protest probably won't do any good but it pains me to watch the situation develop and feel powerless to do anything.

[Wildhound]

Just do what I plan to do and leave the country.

[mcgon1979]

I have an extensive (and colourful) history of penning letters of complaint to the government. Waste of time. Total waste of time. The reason? Well the reason is that 75% of the irish people just don't give a sh1te. Bertie gets a raise more than the industrial salary (raise of 38k) to take his salary to 310,000euro and then asks the trade unions to tighten up and stem pay increases. Any other country in the world you would expect riots/marches. nope. not here. His approval rating took a minor hit. If motor tax went up to 1000euro per year for 2litre cars, would you do anything? you say you would. you'd march, you'd call your local TD, you'd boycott, but would you really? People are lazy/helpless here. Lazy and lack the ability to question things.
One of the more recent issues I have been writing about is the startling rise in HIV in this country since about 1995. Now running at about 500 new cases per year. Of all of those 500 new cases, about 400 (on average. source NDSC) are in Africans. People who have come here seeking asylum via the Africa/UK. If you seek asylum you must seek it in the first country you land in outside your home nation. There are no direct flights from here to Africa, so we should not have the influx we have. The asylum seekers arrive off the boat with "no passport?" its lost? etc etc so we don't know where to deport them or who they are. The great thing about Ireland though is that people are mostly "non-questioning" (see above) and if you mention immigration policy you are a racist. full stop. RACIST! Even though I'm concerned because 75% of new HIV cases each year are in a 1% section of the demographic. Of course you cannot "health screen" people coming in, because that violates their human rights. Even though HIV is an incurable and terminal virus, we are being forced to "integrate" the "new irish" without any questions. Or your a racist. The truth is, we only have the data we have now because a blood test is mandatory during child birth, other than that we would not even know that 75% of the new HIV cases each year here are in Africans.
I wrote a few papers detailing the issue and my valid concerns for social health given the highly pushed 'integration' thats happening all over the country now. I backed up everything with data/facts from the National Centre for Disease Surveillance here in Ireland. Blanked. Still, your the ones paying for the cost of the HIV drugs in public hospitals. And the possible greater costs to social health. Nobody cares really. same with car tax. same principle, a general sense of apathy and impotence. "Sure what can I do?". Brain washed over centuries to go to mass and do as your told. The Govt/Church is right. Ok Im obviously exagerrating here, but its to emphasis the point. People don't complain or question authority in this country. They just turn round, and take it nice and deep.



I guess in short, I probably wouldn't bother turning out for a "protest" in town because all 500 or 1000 people will achieve is a couple of news snippets and thats it.

[Mustang]

Agree on the immigration issue.The racist trump card is used far too often, and as being a racist is not PC, you just have to go off with your tail between your legs and retract your argument.

Specifically on the car tax issue, what is lacking here is a voice a motorist representative body, a leader to rally support. The obvious choice would be the AA. Pity it's just a lame wishy washy business now, rather than an association to represent the motorist.

[Bernard]

I was going to write a lengthy response to your point about the Irish being lazy and just taking what they get but I fell asleep....

[mcgon1979]

I was going to write a lengthy response to your point about the Irish being lazy and just taking what they get but I fell asleep....

Exactly taking what you get. Then again they all voted Bertie in again. Statistically anyway, at least half of you lads did too. I cannot understand how anyone could do that. He is a crook. It beggers belief.

"Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve." George Bernard Shaw

[Myfeckin FTO]

I wouldn't know where to start with the slide this country seems to be on at the moment (but I'll try) - but as for this upcoming increase in road tax that looks like being tied to Co2 - its hard to see how they can realistically increase without it looking very lob sided.

For instance at the moment if you drive a small 3 door 1.2 hatch like a Fiesta/Punto/Corsa etc then you are currently paying €272 per year. These cars typically pump out 140-150 C02 g/km.
In comparison cars like my 3.5 litre Zed currently cost €1343 per year to tax and pumps out 280C02g/km.

The reason that the government say they are introducing this new tax is for "Green issues" - not just to further fleece the motorist. So if you put in a fair scale on C02 ( pay for the amount of C02 you pump out per vehicle) and base it on current rates I should be paying twice what a Fiesta driver pays in road tax or €584. Instead at the moment I am paying 5 times the small car rate and it looks like the government are going to be pushing this rate up considerably (they certainly won't make it any cheaper and loose money). What lobsided scale are they going to have to put in place to make it 6-8 times more expensive to tax a Zed over a fiesta etc - when the system is already completely unfairly lob sided.

This is the government just looking for a way to make more money on the pretence of green issues. We are a very soft touch and will just grin and bear it.Will these government ministers now give up their 3litre + fully expensed goverment cars and start driving hybrids?

Look at some of what has happened since we put these gobsh1tes back in power:
1) Shannon slots to Belfast (protected slots and one of the biggest reasons the government kept a part share in Aer Lingus was to protect our National interest - instead these slots now benefit a different economy)
2) BertieGate - Our Taoiseach making a mockery of the Mahon tribunal on the subject of the handouts he was receiving over the years - gives 30K to someone but doesn't remember who
3)L plate fiasco - yep its the transport minister again who come up with an absolutely bullshit and unworkable solution as to how we improve the number of L drivers on our roads.
4)HSE - overbudget and closing hospitals and hospital departments, pumping money in but not improving efficencies.
5) Spindoctors for Goverment ministers - costing taxpayer €4 million per annum
6) Bertie gets a 38K pay rise and promtly warns other departments to tighten their belts for the good of the economy - then defends his salary increase by saying other world leaders have "opaque tax arrangements" (as opposped to taking cash "loans" from friends and cash gifts from strangers) - other world leaders also get "prolonged holidays" (Bertie has to be in the Dail a whole 60 days per year and has an 82 day summer holiday).
7) Wage increases in the public sector will cost €1.7 billion. For what exactly?
8 ) Goverment makes a call to the state owned RTE to keep a prominent doctor off the late late show cause his views would likely be critical of Cancer services in Ireland and then to throw insult after injury - RTE announce a fee hike.

Would everybody please remember these last few months when the next General Election comes round and vote these idiots out of office.

[Wildhound]

Statistically anyway, at least half of you lads did too.

I doubt that very much since most of the FF vote came from pensioners, or indeed people who were old enough to be worried about becoming pensioners. I don't think too many FTO owners fall into that bracket.

Most students couldn't get out to vote (deliberately engineered by Bertie)
and a lot of younger people simply aren't arsed so you'd probably find more people on here didn't vote at all than voted FF.

I voted Labour and I was extremely pissed off with the result of the election. It was after that that I seriously started considering moving abroad. What goes on here is a joke.

Excpet instead of being funny, it's one of those jokes that makes you cringe as though you'd been kicked in the groin with a steel-toed boot.

[mcgon1979]

Would everybody please remember these last few months when the next General Election comes round and vote these idiots out of office.

Sadly, they won't remeber MFFTO. The spin will star about 6 - 12 months before the next election and everything will look good, and the media will help portray that we've never had it better. People will just go "eh..Ok, cool, Im rich now, this is great". Forgetting they cannot really afford to buy a house etc.

[mcgon1979]

Statistically anyway, at least half of you lads did too.

I doubt that very much since most of the FF vote came from pensioners, or indeed people who were old enough to be worried about becoming pensioners. I don't think too many FTO owners fall into that bracket.

Most students couldn't get out to vote (deliberately engineered by Bertie)
and a lot of younger people simply aren't arsed so you'd probably find more people on here didn't vote at all than voted FF.

I voted Labour and I was extremely pissed off with the result of the election. It was after that that I seriously started considering moving abroad. What goes on here is a joke.

Excpet instead of being funny, it's one of those jokes that makes you cringe as though you'd been kicked in the groin with a steel-toed boot.

I have to agree with you there. Young people are not arsed to vote. I work in IT, and my colleagues are all about 25 - 30 age. Only one is from Dublin, and he didn't vote. The others all said they couldn;t get home to vote in Cork, Galway, Limerick etc. hmmm.. They are all living here at least a year or 2 so why not transfer their vote? Too much hassle etc. not an excuse really. Sure its engineered by Bertie / co to make it difficult but thats why you should make the effort to "stick it to them".

[soc]

Some good valid points here. I think that as a nation we're comprised of a number of different demographics - to coin a few:

Our Real Millionaires - those who have the means to dramatically reduce their tax liability (or any other liability for that matter) and simply don't give a crap

Our Paper Millionaires - those who thanks to the property boom who have no mortgage worth talking about and the comfort of an asset which (no matter how bad the property slide is) will never be worth less than the initial purchase price so they simply don't give a crap

Our (ever expanding) Middle Class - those who work their ass off (in most cases) and are surviving relatively comfortably, complain regularly about the state of the country and in general are just too lazy to do anything

Our Working Class - those who also work their asses off in less skilled or less critical jobs, who have genuine reason to feel agrieved but are often stupid enough to be fooled by the FF spin machine

Our Social Welfare Whores - those who, no matter what the state of the economy will only ever scam just enough to get by and don't really give a crap about anything!



On a serius note though - Mcgon1979 is right - right now, we as a nation are too lazy to do anything but where I disagree is that a small number can make a difference - all it takes is 1 person to get the ball rolling. All you really need is a small group of committed individuals to force the issue and motivate the masses - don't ask me how this can be achieved cause I've no idea. But (FYI only) I am planning on talking to Eamon Gilmore to see if he has any sugestions on what can be done by people like us......

If anyone has the time or skills (Adrian ) it might be a start to get some sort of protest website up and running?

[Dragonheart]

They always engineer the voting some way or another. I work as an architecural technician, and every year most of the secondary schools in Ireland apply for works to be done to their schools, Summerworks Schemes, some of you prob know what I'm on about. This summer the amount of schemes that was approved was HUGE, a lot more than usual! So much in fact, that for next summer, they reckon a lot of them wont get the badly needed grants cause theres a shortage in funds.

[convert]

I do love these arguments. I'm a bit of a political animal...FF member. Education has brought us to the level of economic performance we have now and educaition is one place where FF has always had a consostent committment ot improving services.

Labour are to be applauded for introducing free 3rd level fees, but they didn't aim it at the right area. The irony of Labour is that it's mainly middle class upper income citizens who vote for them, and those are the people who were rewarded by the introduction of free fess. The increases in the (admittedly still underfunded) grant system have addressed this over the past 3-4 years, but we still need to pull more people from "working class areas" into further education.

The main thing I find on the doorsteps is that people won't complain to a cancvasser only the candidate. That person has 200-400 houses to get to between 7-9pm. If you(a citizen) really cared about the way things were going, then you would make an appointment to meet your TD/Councillor or go to a clinic.

As already stated, laziness is the main issue. Students had an entitlement to a postal vote in 2007, Ógra FF publicised this in Unis all over the country and along with FG and the Greens registered people for postal votes as well.

I'm a student, I'm thinking of buying an FTO and truth be told, FF HQ are attributing the strength of the party's performance stronly to the 25 and under age group who DID vote, and voted in large numbers as far as I'm concerned. We are the people who have never known anything but FF governance, we are the people who have more money in our pockets than anyone between 30-50 (exceptions apply) and we are the people who will benefit from a levelling housing market.

People know the extent of the cost of motoring and can't blame the government for levying it if they choose a car that's "expensive" to tax and run.

I don't necessarily agree with everything my government does, but I trust FF and Mary Harney a lot more to do what's right for the country than Enda Kenny and his front bench only 2 of whom ever sat around a cabinet table (which could be a good thing).

Apparently 2007 was the "election to lose" and we put our all into winning it and came back with 10 more seats than even the most optimistic TD imagined at the start of the campaign. Personally I always knew there was a win to be had and when the ballot boxes were opened, phone calls were flying all over the country with talk of "a '77" and overall majority.

Ireland is heading into a recession, but Ireland is never going back to the 80s. less than 5% of the workforce are employed in large multi-nationals and Enterprise Ireland is available to give support to people who've been made redundant and no matter how bad it gets; the worst it'll get is that Mary and Pat won't be able to change their '10 Focus of an '11 plate and they'll have to wait til 2012 or 2013.

As a society the Celtic Tiger has changed us for the better and for the worse. But no government sets out to shaft anyone.

Jaysus....that's some rant.

Sorreweeeeeeeee

[pergau]

I agree with most of the points raised so far but I do think that the car tax hikes are intended to try to persuade people to use more efficient (and smaller) engines. Consequently the tax will be much higher for larger engines. I.E. it won't be a linear scale but it will be weighted to ecnourage use of lower emissions cars and discourage use of performance cars, 4X4s and monster engines.

At some stage we will have to accept that owning a car like ours is a hobby and a choice we have made and that we have to take responsibility for our actions. I love my FTO but I accept that I could do all my driving in a more fuel/emissions efficient car and there is a cost - to my wallet and the environment associated with this choice.

Can I suggest that you take a look at this lecture called "The most important video you'll ever see" Its very simple and brilliantly presented.

[/url]http://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2007/12/23/the-most-important-video-youll-ever-see-videos-parts-1-4/[url]

If you don't want to watch it, the three main messages are:

We have reached Peak Oil
Don't believe predictions unless you have verified the calculations yourself (this only requires a bit of long division!)
The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function!

Don't be put off, watch the video and you'll realise the mess that we are in.

I just hope that the Green ministers make sure that the new tax rates genuinely encourage efficient cars and don't use this as an excuse to raise extra tax revenue.

[Myfeckin FTO]

Thank you for your reply Convert - though its exactly the response I'd except from the vast majority of FF polititians. Would they be able to answer effectively any of my concerns raised in my above reply though? I think not!

..........
People know the extent of the cost of motoring and can't blame the government for levying it if they choose a car that's "expensive" to tax and run......

Just to pick you up on this point alone (as we're on a motoring forum) - Is this meant to be a defence of recent changes to VRT and Road tax? How does a jump of almost €1500 (to €2000 per annum) in road tax on an FTO sound fair (imported after July 08)? I wouldn't mind paying my share of Road Tax etc if it was applied in a fair and equal manner. Instead we have a very lob sided system where someone driving their 08 diesel BMW a total of 40K miles per year burns the same CO2 as an FTO that drives 25K miles per year yet only has to pay €430 tax.

[convert]

Well I do accept that it's unfair, but the cost of overhauling the road tax system would outweigh the benefits. If a car is registered under 1 tax system and then taxed under another, to put it palinly it'll end up in a massive cock-up.

I agree on the exponential function. sat in on a conference on the surface temperature and it starts to look scary aroud 2040. I still don't understand the exponential thing...maths was by far my worst school subject, though I manages to scrape the honours leaving

The Green ministers or the Dept. of Finance for that matter will have no influence on whether the carbon and VRT changes are a cash cow or not; that's entirely a matter for consumers! Simple truth, though the public won't see it that way!

[soc]

You have to love the art of political debate - as MfFTO said - this is exactly the kind of defence I'd expect any staunch FF'er to present and tbh there's no harm as we need to see all sides to get a good balance.

Education has brought us to the level of economic performance we have now and educaition is one place where FF has always had a consostent committment ot improving services.

I think the individual wealth a sector of society have made from our overheated property market gives a false impression of the wealth of the country. Sure we're better off than in the 80's but I suspect this is as much to do with the fact credit is easy to come by these days - I'd love to see the statistics on how many people have re-mortgaged properties bought in the 80's to fund they're spending

On another point the statement is flawed becase I think you'll find that in reality an educated workforce we won't see much economic return unless this educated workforce has the opportunity to use it's skills to generate a revenue stream - such opportunities are generally created through a number of factors such as internal tax incentives to bring in business, strong eurozone economy and low eurozone interest rates (which ultimately stem from Germany).

The main thing I find on the doorsteps is that people won't complain to a cancvasser only the candidate.

I find this funny purely because we didn't have one canvesser call to the house during the last election. Plenty of leaflets promising things that I know will never happen (I know this because they are the same things that were promised at the last election and they still haven't happened)

If you(a citizen) really cared about the way things were going, then you would make an appointment to meet your TD/Councillor or go to a clinic.

Been there and done that - I rang and wrote letters to a few politicians in the last government both local to me as well as from other constituencies and only person to reply EVER was Eamon Gilmore.

I'm a student, I'm thinking of buying an FTO and truth be told

Not sure what this has to do with anything tbh

FF HQ are attributing the strength of the party's performance stronly to the 25 and under age group who DID vote, and voted in large numbers as far as I'm concerned.

All this does for me is confirm what I already believe - FF are the masters of the election and know what it takes to win - this has nothing to do with their ability to govern.

We are the people who have never known anything but FF governance, we are the people who have more money in our pockets than anyone between 30-50 (exceptions apply) and we are the people who will benefit from a levelling housing market.

Personally I think this is a very naiive statement - students really have more money in their pocket?? Maybe when compared to a young couple who have recently bought a new house and have a young child in a creche

Sure "students" will benefit from a cooling property market but in reality how much can we "afford" to let the market cool? If prices were to drop to "really affordable levels" then this would likely mean many people in this country will be in trouble already as we would see a serious slow down in building, large lay offs in construction, more repossessions, reduced tax take for the government, negative equity for many, reduction in available credit (on which over 60% of the population rely heavily) and all this in an environment of increasing costs....

People know the extent of the cost of motoring and can't blame the government for levying it if they choose a car that's "expensive" to tax and run.

Another sweeping statement - how does this justify the new VRT and Tax system - everyone except our wonderful politicians know that the way to "make the polluter pay" is to increase tax on petrol - that way it's a properly fair system. But of couse this would probably reduce the governments tax take and I'm sure we'd be hit somewhere else - so as MfFTO mentioned - this is just a government cash cow!

I don't necessarily agree with everything my government does, but I trust FF and Mary Harney a lot more to do what's right for the country

I find the use of the word trust here somewhat humourous given the financial scandals that surround the FF party -

Apparently 2007 was the "election to lose" and we put our all into winning it and came back with 10 more seats than even the most optimistic TD imagined at the start of the campaign. Personally I always knew there was a win to be had and when the ballot boxes were opened, phone calls were flying all over the country with talk of "a '77" and overall majority.

Just another example of the FF electioneering skills and nothing to do with their ability to govern - but that said, I have to admit there's no flies on FF when if comes to convince the undecided..... they are very good at manipulation - far better than Labour or FG.

Ireland is heading into a recession, but Ireland is never going back to the 80s. less than 5% of the workforce are employed in large multi-nationals and Enterprise Ireland is available to give support to people who've been made redundant and no matter how bad it gets; the worst it'll get is that Mary and Pat won't be able to change their '10 Focus of an '11 plate and they'll have to wait til 2012 or 2013.

While I agree we won't have an 80's Ireland I do think you are completely under-estimating the impact we could be facing - Mary and Pat's Ford Focus is not the issue here unfortunately. How many people are currently in negative equity? How many first-time buyers are already struggling to pay their mortgage? What happens to these when they start a family? And this is without taking into account the external factors which we cannot control and which WILL influence our economic prosperity? Rising eurozone interest rates (believe me, they will start to rise again), the further expected impact of the subprime issues, rising oil prices leading to reduced exports higher cost imports due to increased manufacturing costs, rising cost of living (home heat, petrol, groceries, dept repayment, etc), potentially multinationals relocating to lower cost base and construction industry shedding jobs, immigrant workers returning home to their developping countries taking their skills and their money which would further reduce our economy.

Multinationals may only account for a direct 5% of our workforce (not sure if this is accurate) but they were responsible for approx 90% of our exports on which they paid a lot of taxes. In addition there are a lot of irish industries that rely on these multinationals for work - cleaning companies, maintenance companies, etc.

Also constructions is responsible for over 19% direct employment not even mentioning all the industries indirectly tied into construction.

So right there you have 24% of our workforce in 2 industries that are likely to see rough times over the coming years..... who can really predict what will happen!

As a society the Celtic Tiger has changed us for the better and for the worse.

Never a truer statement spokend

But no government sets out to shaft anyone.

Maybe not but they definitely set out to benefit some more than others.....


Personally I believe FF were in the right place at the right time but even with all the available resources of the past 10 years they still haven't managed to deliver - sure we've seen improvements but the reality is that the past 10 years have been poorly managed and if this country was a private company the chief execeutive would have been sacked a long time ago. My one overriding question is how we can be in a position where we will have to borrow to fund public spending when we have just had 10 years of unprecendented wealth?