Roisin Shortall resigns as junior minister

While some of the posts here have been genuinely funny, lets try get things back on topic.

I do think a Brendan Grace/James O'Reilly themed thread would do very well in the Cafe though

Cheers

DrG

Well done Roisin Shorthall another Labour Minister with balls...

Side Show Bob wrote: »

No they won't, not now, it will take an election, she was sacrificed by her party for the price of power, just like the Greens did it,

Thats what I meant, next local elections and then the next General election Labour will realize that their desire for power and all the "trappings" will distance them from their true supporters.

They have bowed to Fine Gael and to the troika.

Look at your pay packet

Side Show Bob wrote: »

Local elections dont mean $hit!

Maybe so BUT they are a true reflection of the feeling of the public and will be monitored closely by all parties

Cuttlefish wrote: »

They have bowed to Fine Gael and to the troika.

So what's the alternative and how are we going to pay for it?

ninja900 wrote: »

So what's the alternative and how are we going to pay for it?

You tell me

Cuttlefish wrote: »

Don't forget people voted Fine Gael and Labour coz of stupid decisions and empty promises by FF and the GREENS.

Yeah but just voting for 'the other crowd' and expecting the state of the country to magically change overnight is unrealistic.

It's going to take years to get the country out of the hole.

to see nothing happening with regards to the "elephant in the room" that is Croke Part agreement

So now Labour voters want CPA done away with?!?

to see misery upon misery heaped upon the ordinary folk

That's like the 'tax the rich' blather RBB comes out with. It's a fantasy.

Let's say you want to raise a billion extra in taxes.

You could try and find 1000 millionaires, and hit them for a million each. Happy days, right? Except they'd either emigrate, or move their assets offshore, or just employ accountants to avoid their tax liability. It's like the 95% tax in the UK in the 1960s, only a fool would have paid it

Or, you could find 2 million middle income people and hit them for 500 a year each. They're on PAYE and can't evade it, have jobs and mortgages and kids here and can't swan off to Monaco.

It's not necessarily right, but that's the way it is.

ninja900 wrote: »

Yeah but just voting for 'the other crowd' and expecting the state of the country to magically change overnight is unrealistic.

It's going to take years to get the country out of the hole.



Or, you could find 2 million middle income people and hit them for 500 a year each. They're on PAYE and can't evade it, have jobs and mortgages and kids here and can't swan off to Monaco.

It's not necessarily right, but that's the way it is.

Will we ever get out of this "hole" - probably take a generation or two

And as you point out yourself make the PAYE worker pay for the sins of the property developers and politicians who can swan off to America to play golf and fund art galleries, Ouch my back is sore.

And to your first point...


football chant - "Are you Fianna Fail in disguise!!" Let's face it thats way Fine Gael are.

Fair play to her going
How could she stay under that clown !! Two hospitals in his own area and we still get branded drugs !!!
No self respecting person could stay under him

Rojomcdojo wrote: »

Was James Reilly right in what he did? I'm still unsure of this. Was Roisin simply overruled in the name of constituency politics or was her list simply a load of crap?

Few choice quotes from Colette Browne's excellent (I urge you all to read it straight away) piece in De Paper:

Minister of State at the Department of Health, Róisín Shortall, had drawn up the original list using the metric of economic deprivation to determine which areas were most in need of primary care teams, but the reason that she settled on this grading mechanism hasn’t yet been expounded on.

Instead, Mr Reilly preferred to rely on other, more nebulous, factors, like advice from the department, the HSE and his ministerial colleagues — although, how his colleagues are remotely qualified to assign health services to specific areas remains another baffling mystery.

One Fine Gael TD who did talk long and hard with the minister about the list was Frank Feighan whose own career was, sadly, looking pretty precarious after the party reneged on a pre-election promise to retain emergency services at Roscommon County Hospital.

One imagines he’s now feeling much more upbeat about his political future after the minister managed to include Boyle and Ballaghaderreen in the priority list — after both towns leapfrogged at least 200 other locations.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/colette-browne/ministers-should-be-exercised-about-reillys-perceived-bias-208782.html

Is anybody else finding it harder to spot the difference between FG and FF as time goes on? This kind of parochial, stroke pulling, abuse of ministerial power rather than governance in the interests of the people is what got us into this mess.

dvpower wrote: »

A higher rate of consequences for corruption you mean.

I never understood why Fine Gael were so proud of having "consequences" for corruption in their party. It's like the farmer being so proud of the new one way locking mechanism he just fitted to the stable door to prevent the horse getting back in but leaves it free to get out.