Michael Healy-Rae vs The Number 13

tolosenc

http://www.thejournal.ie/michael-healy-rae-numberplates-reg-plate-cars-motoring-2013-345803-Feb2012/

The fact that anyone voted for this guy is a sad indictment on the country/people of south Kerry.

Mr. Rager

AN INDEPENDENT TD has urged the government to consider amending Ireland’s car registration plate system for next year – because some superstitious motorists do not want cars with ’13′ on the plates.
Michael Healy-Rae has called on finance minister Michael Noonan to examine the possibility of changing the registration plate system for next year, saying the move would benefit the motoring industry as a whole.
“There’s people now who, we’ll say, always change their cars every two, three or four years,” Healy-Rae told TheJournal.ie.
“Take you, for instance – you might be one of these men who change their car every three years, and 2013 is your year to change.
“People like you are after going to the garages and saying they’ll wait until the next year” before replacing their cars, he added, simply because they did not want to drive cars carrying a number which is often thought to be unlucky.
Healy-Rae said car deals had already approached him to raise their concerns, which in turn had been fuelled by remarks from prospective car buyers who felt it might be bad luck to drive cars with the number 13 on them.
Alan Nolan from the Society of the Irish Motor Industry (SIMI) said the possibility of a superstitious drop in sales would hurt a sector that is already struggling.
“You have to put this in the context of the market, which has fallen from around 180,000 new cars per year… this year we’re looking at 75,000 or so in new sales,” he said.
“Even if it was five per cent of people [who opted against buying a 2013 car], in a market of 75,000 it’s still something that would have a real problem.”
Nolan said his society had been campaigning for an overhaul of the licencing system because it meant that the car trade was seasonal, with the majority of cars sold in the first quarter of the year.
Ireland could follow the UK’s lead by adding a new identifier to numberplates on cars registered after July, he suggested, by simply putting an X on the numberplate to read ‘X12-D-123456′.
Rural divide

Car dealers in certain areas had also experienced difficulty in car sales given how the county name on a numberplate cannot be edited afterward.
Some Dublin-based dealers were reluctant to buy viable second-hand cars, Nolan suggested, because they carried a rural county – meaning they would be more difficult to sell to another buyer.
“For a fee, as a moneyspinner, a dealer should be able to pay to get the registration changed to their own county,” Nolan said. “Nobody would need to do it, but it would be voluntary, and would help to raise cash for the country.”
The Department of Finance currently has no plans to change the registration plates, but says it is willing to consider proposals in advance of next year’s Budget when such measures would be formally enacted by the Revenue Commissioners.
The fear of the number 13 – formally known as triskadekaphobia – is thought to originate from the Bible, as there were 13 people present at the Last Supper after which Jesus was crucified.
A similar fear exists in Norse mythology, where Loki – seen as something of a devious ‘trickster God’, and who is said to have murdered another god – is the 13th god.
Another theory suggests that 13 is a number suggesting chaos, and that the civilisations of Ancient Persia – who believed the twelve astrological constellations ruled the universe – feared the advent of a 13th constellation that would destroy humanity.
It is common in team sports – and particularly in motorsport – for teams or clubs not to assign the 13 shirt or car number. The last time a Formula One car raced with the number 13 was in 1976.

For mobile users.

Stripey Cat

I clicked on the link and look:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7022/6820221045_39a3e6d952_b.jpg

Updated 13 hours ago.

Seriously freaked out now.

DEFTLEFTHAND

I love our registration system, leave it alone you cloth capped sheep shagger.

charlemont

What a clown of a man.

seantorious

I feel we should organise a collection for those who change their cars every 3-4 years and don't want 13 on their licence plate.

EddyC15

I don't even... what? What an absolute muppet of a man.

Couldn't the superstitious amongst just hang on for another year?

seanybiker

He's a forking eegit. Hopefully now people should cop onto the fact he's a forking joke.

randylonghorn

Stupid and all as it is, he has a SIMI spokesperson trotting out to back him up! :rolleyes:

Chuck Stone

A master gombeen amongst gombeens.

Stripey Cat

I understand why we have the year on our reg plates, but why the county?

What possible advantage is there in knowing where the car was first registered?

Wouldn't it be better to have something useful, like the car driver's age?

eth0

After the sh1te they came up with giving imported (as in not by a dealer, we don't make cars here) cars a number greater than the amount of cars ever sold in the county it wouldn't surprise me if they went through with it.

For example if you're the first to bring a 2010 car in from some country and register in cork you will get 10-C-40000

In Dublin it would be 120,000 because they never sold that many cars in one year they decided to pick this. A different number was picked for each county, so in Leitrim its probably around 100.

Big thread about this in the motor forum, most speculate its to give imports a bad name. I think myself its to give people the false impression that way more cars were sold in a year then there actually were because they were very quiet about bringing this in

randylonghorn

Stripey Cat wrote: »

Wouldn't it be better to have something useful, like the car driver's age?

Would you have people change the reg plate then every time other drivers insured on the same car get into the driving seat?

And why is it useful to know what age the driver is, except to judge them on sight on the basis of either personal prejudices or the wild overblown stereotypes the media (and sometimes the RSA) put out there?

If you're going to have a constantly changing reg. plate, maybe one with the number of points the current driver has acquired would be more useful?

christ on a bike!

Omg, he's dead right, see the bigger picture, he is protecting sales and thereby protecting jobs, this is such a good example of racism against country people

smellslikeshoes

There is some sense in what he is saying though, there are a lot of superstitious people even in this day and age who might not buy a car with 13 on it. Changing the numberplate system because of it is unrealistic as hell though.

Leeg17

It's a fúcking number.

Words cannot describe..!

Lapin

Because the number 13 is obviously at the top of all our concerns right now.
We as a nation have little or fukall else to worry about.

What a fúcking prize muppet.

joe stodge

i really hate the healy-rae's and their local politics bull**** but this is a huge pointless waste of time when the country is in the ****ter. people from kerry should be ashamed they voted for this clown.

Aenaes

tolosenc wrote: »

The fact that anyone voted for this guy is a sad indictment on the country/people of south Kerry.

They voted for his Dad/his cap.

mikom

Michael Healy-Rae has called on finance minister Michael Noonan to examine the possibility of changing the registration plate system for next year, saying the move would benefit the motoring industry as a whole.

Let's have a phone poll on it.............. oh wait....

matrim

How about we vote to skip 2013 altogether and move straight to 2014. We'd create jobs updating computer systems to disregard 2013 and it would being us closer to the magical year 2015 when austrity is supposed to end

Coriolanus

What the fsck are they going to do instead of putting 13 on the car?
Anyway, retarded reg system is retarded. Much prefer the Uk/continental/Us system of seemingly random alphanumerics. Now I know some of them do have a corresponding code for year, but most people don't know them.

Kojak

Michael healy-Rae for Taoiseach!!!

He's got his finger on the burning issues of the day.......

eth0

Nevore wrote: »

What the fsck are they going to do instead of putting 13 on the car?
Anyway, retarded reg system is retarded. Much prefer the Uk/continental/Us system of seemingly random alphanumerics. Now I know some of them do have a corresponding code for year, but most people don't know them.

I think they should have a number in hexadecimal for extra nerdiness. Lowest available number allocated and if you get rid of the reg it gets recycled. I also like the system where if you get different car you keep the reg.

The current system promotes reg snobbery, too many people driving the number plate and not the car.

WoollyRedHat

Nevore wrote: »

What the fsck are they going to do instead of putting 13 on the car?

12 +1

So for example:

12 +1-D-9999


See, that doesn't look silly at all
I say you go for it Michael Healy-Rae, a inspiration and great en visionary of our day

Stripey Cat

randylonghorn wrote: »

Would you have people change the reg plate then every time other drivers insured on the same car get into the driving seat?

Clearly not, that would be crazy. I reckon most cars have one regular driver, and one owner. What do you think?

randylonghorn wrote: »

And why is it useful to know what age the driver is, except to judge them on sight on the basis of either personal prejudices or the wild overblown stereotypes the media (and sometimes the RSA) put out there?

I never said anything about judging anyone. Calm down. It wold be more useful than knowing what county the car was first registered in, wouldn't it?

randylonghorn wrote: »

If you're going to have a constantly changing reg. plate, maybe one with the number of points the current driver has acquired would be more useful?

That's not a bad idea.

Jesus Wept

This is the LAST straw. I thought Kenny making a tit of the entire country to the world last week was the last straw, but I was obviously wrong as this is definitely the last bit of straw left in the thing. Basically what I'm saying is... there's no more straw left!


STOP THE COUNTRY, I WANT TO GET OFF.

On second thoughts, we should have a special application people can fill out if they don't want a 13 reg plate, that we can identify all the mongs (of which there are many) and ship them all off to a small Island never to be seen again.

suicide_circus

All '13 cars should simply be sold with padre pio stickers and infant of prague figurines as standard to ward off and neutralise the bad luck of the number 13.

Morlar

What a fcuking tool. Anyone who voted for this retarded douchebag should be ashamed of themselves.

Jesus Wept

suicide_circus wrote: »

All '13 cars should simply be sold with padre pio stickers and infant of prague figurines as standard to ward off and neutralise the bad luck of the number 13.

One of the car makers could re-brand.

Introducing the Opel Padre Pio, the safest car on the road.

randylonghorn

Stripey Cat wrote: »

Clearly not, that would be crazy. I reckon most cars have one regular driver, and one owner. What do you think?

I think most cars have one owner, certainly, but a lot of cars have more than one regular driver.

Stripey Cat wrote: »

I never said anything about judging anyone. Calm down. It wold be more useful than knowing what county the car was first registered in, wouldn't it?

How?

And I'm completely calm, thanks.

I just don't see how putting the age of the driver on the reg. plate would have any usefulness whatsoever, unless, as I say, you're going to pre-judge the driver based on that information.

What usefulness did you envisage for it?

At least, the points idea, while it would be pretty impossible to either implement or police, would have a certain logic behind it.

The-Rigger wrote: »

Basically what I'm saying is... there's no more straw left!

You're just worried about your Shetland ponies, aren't you?

The-Rigger wrote: »

Introducing the Opel Padre Pio, the safest car on the road.

Guaranteed to make your hands bleed?