Author: Anthony

A powerful 'nobody'

Janette Byrne describes herself as a nobody (Irish Independent) .

In fact she is more powerful than any politician or bureaucrat. If the power she holds could be instilled in even a significant minority of Irish citizens then this country would be rid of the likes of Harney, Ahern and their army of faceless, unaccountable bureaucrats. Here’s her letter (Emphasis mine).

I write to you in light of the recent uncertainty surrounding the exclusion of oncologist John Crown from ‘The Late Late Show’ panel.

I had the honour of being a ‘Late Late Show’ guest over a year ago (September 29, 2006). I was there, in part, to highlight my book, ‘If It Were Just Cancer’, but also as a founder member of the lobby group Patients Together. I am just an ordinary person, a cancer patient who suffered the indignity of A&E, a filthy ward, the fear and terror of not getting a bed and, as a consequence, being denied the right to avail of my urgently required chemotherapy.

From the day I was given the all clear, I vowed that, on behalf of the other girls, women, and men, not as blessed as me, that I would highlight our suffering. I wanted the nation to know, what it meant to be seriously ill in modern Ireland. I am not an academic. I am not a mover and shaker.

I grew up in a close, loving family of eight in Finglas in what was known as a “Corpo-bought” house. I left school at 15. I worked as a hairdresser, had a son at 19, worked in a tyre outlet and then as a rep. I eventually started my own business in 1994.

My new position in the spotlight on ‘The Late Late Show’, in the papers and on the radio was terrifying. I lost many hours of sleep with the worry of letting everybody down. My mother believes I survived at God’s will to do this work. I am inclined to believe I am driven by those gone before me, goading me to stand up and be heard.

Where am I going with all this?

The night I appeared on ‘The Late Late Show’ was one of the most privileged in my life. My family, friends and supporters were dotted around the country watching, my heart was bursting with pride and fear. I wanted to say something that would touch the Irish people; I wanted to make them understand how we, as patients, are being failed. I was sick with nerves, but I knew the girls on the ward were with me in spirit.

I made it through the show but fell into my son’s arms crying and shaking when it finished. It was just all too much for me. I remember one of the researchers hugging me, “Well done Janette, you were brilliant and you have caused such a fuss”.
I was surprised and worried. What had I done?

She explained that “certain people” had been screaming down the phone wanting to know: “Who made the decision to put her on the show? Why were we not told she would be on?” The researcher took delight in their annoyance given that they can find it hard to get any comments or even returned calls from these people.

And here they were, hopping mad, phoning more and more irritated as I continued speaking. What in God’s name could make these people so irate? Little old me rattling on about the indignity of our health service, what was I saying that incited such fear and upset? I have found the answer.

I was telling the truth.

I was an ordinary person telling how it is. I had nothing to gain and nothing to lose. Until that moment, I had never realised how powerful the ordinary person who is willing to stand up and be heard can be. I find it so sad that we have a section of our community who want to silence the truth.

Following the show and my naive decision to gate crash a HSE press gathering, I received texts from a renowned health correspondent saying he had received calls questioning who I was. Who was funding Patients Together? Who was yanking my chain? How many members do we have, etc?

I will save these scrutinisers any further time-wasting and stress worrying about me.

I am a nobody, a taxpayer, an Irish citizen, an honest and loyal person who whispered a promise to the dead that I would be their voice until our overcrowded, under-funded, diseased Health Service learns to treat us with dignity and care.

Really you have nothing to be afraid of.

Janette Byrne
Patients Together
Finglas Park
Dublin 11

Bertie's stupid challenge answered

Strapped Ahern needs ‘dig-out’

Irish Independent Letters

Friday November 16 2007

Having been reduced to tears by Mr Ahern’s Dobson interview last year, I pity poverty-stricken Bertie having to exist on a mere €310,000 (plus expenses, driver, jet, make-up, and so on).

I feel like organising a whip-around, a dig-out AND a soft loan for him.

And I will be rushing to accept his oh-so-credible advice on wage restraint. In response to Bertie’s invitation to put other leaders’ arrangements up front, here goes:

• €310,000 – Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern.
• €279,000 – US President George Bush.
• €270,000 – Irish Tanaiste Brian Cowen.
• €268,000 – UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
• €261,000 – German Prime Minister Angela Merkel.
• €240,000 – Irish Cabinet ministers.
• €240,000 – French Prime Minister Francois Fillon.
• €210,000 – Australian Prime Minister John Howard.
• €192,000 – Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt.
• €123,000 – Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende.
• €122,000 – Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg (Norway has the same population as Ireland).
• €49,500 – Polish Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski.

The same “independent” process that so deservedly rewarded our leaders also determined that the chief executive of the HSE, Brendan Drumm, was currently being overpaid to the tune of €57,000 per annum, when compared to an equivalent position in the private sector. (Luckily, that one isn’t mandatory.)

And those greedy foreign leaders have prolonged holidays, unlike Mr Ahern, who spends a massive 1.5 days in the Dail for almost 20 weeks per year. Most of the rest of the time he has to undertake onerous tasks like opening pubs, off-licenses and private hospitals.

Ray Corcoran
Ballymun
Dublin 11

Law enforcement in Ireland is a joke

The mosquito was focused, hungry and determined to get his fill of blood as he swooped towards the massive rump of the elephant’s rear end. Alas, all his ambitions, hopes and puffed up self importance were instantly snuffed out with one contemptuous flick of the elephant’s tail.

And so it was that Paul Appleby, Director of Corporate Enforcement, was summarily dismissed by the Supreme Court when he tried to obtain a disqualification order against certain personnel at DCC in relation to the recent insider dealing case.

The principal target of ODCE is Jim Flavin of DCC who was found guilty of insider trading by the Supreme Court last July (Sub. Re’q). One of the judges, Mr. Justice Fennelly, said;

“To trade on the use of inside information is recognised for what it is. It is a fraud on the market.”

Actually the judge is wrong. If insider trading in Ireland was recognised for the fraud it is there would have been immediate action from at least some of the many so called regulatory bodies involved.

Nobody has moved. All the so called enforcement and regulatory agencies of the state, the police, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Revenue, the Stock Exchange, The Association of Investment Mangers who allegedly oversee corporate governance in listed companies – all acting like frightened rabbits caught in the glare of a bright light.

The ODCE, in what can only be described as a laughable and pointless gesture, arrived unannounced in court to ask the judge to grant a disqualification order. The judge told him to take a hike.

Paul Appleby put a brave face on the humiliating dismissal (RTE News, 6th item).

“In dismissing my application, the issue of a potential disqualification in these proceedings is now open I have therefore achieved my primary objective in taking this application.”

I have no idea if Paul Appley lives his life under a constant state of delusion but if he thinks he is going to succeed in his aim of obtaining a disqualification order against Jim Flavin or any other dodgy character who may have been involved in this fraud, then in this regard at least, he is most certainly living a delusion.

For over three years Mr. Appleby has been trying to obtain a similar order against nine former National Irish Bank ‘characters’ who were in charge at a time when the bank robbed millions directly from customers accounts and indirectly from the State through the operation of major tax evasion scams.

Only one order has been successful and that’s because the man involved is retired, has no involvement in business and decided not to fight the case.

Mr. Appleby has also, to date, spectacularly failed (Sub. re’q) in his attempts to have the Bailey brothers disqualified. These fraudsters recently came to an ‘arrangement’ with Revenue for over €22 million.

The bottom line is that law enforcement in Ireland is a joke, a farce, especially when it comes to white collar crime.

I recently cited the case of P. Nacchio convicted in the US of insider trading. He was sentenced to six years in prison, fined $19 million and ordered to forfeit $52 he earned in illegal stock.

Now that’s law enforcement.

Still asleep

I think the letter below is the one you are referring to Haymoon.

I strongly agree with the views expressed but I wouldn’t be confident about the sleeping Irish electorate waking up, the bulk of them are, I think, still sound asleep.

ARE TOP POLITICIANS UP TO THE JOB?

Madam,

If large corporations in the private sector adopted the same approach to selecting senior executives as our political system employs they would be bankrupted and out of business in double quick time.

The lunacy of the process becomes obvious in the first instance at local level, when candidates for county council elections are chosen. The most important attributes include being “well in” with the party suits, being related to someone in politics, or being a publican, undertaker, county footballer, token female, etc.

When electing people to make decisions that seriously affect the lives of thousands we don’t look for qualifications, experience, education, competence, references, past achievements or even an accepted level of intelligence.

This ludicrous system is replicated at government level. Take a close look at the most senior executives of our country – the Cabinet.

What qualifies them to run the largest corporation in the country, Ireland Inc? Does their training and expertise qualify them to run our lives?

How many of them would seriously be considered for an executive position in our top multinational companies?
As revealed in your edition of November 8th, the Minister of State for Education and Science, Sean Haughey, has more staff working in his constituency office (six) than he has to cover his ministerial duties (four). It is obvious where his priorities lie and this attitude is endemic across this wasteful Government.

Our chief executive, Bertie Ahern, lives in a parallel world where he is in charge of everything but responsible for nothing. He has distanced himself and his colleagues from all State responsibilities by setting up layer upon layer of insulating committees and authorities which can be conveniently blamed when things go wrong.

Here is a man who forgets about receiving extremely large sums of money while in office (strange accountant), gives contradictory testimony to a tribunal and brazenly expects us to have sympathy for his plight.

The leader of our State finds it difficult to construct even the simplest of sentences and constantly resorts to incoherent, senseless waffling – for example when speaking in the Dáil last week on hospital consultants: “The vast majority of them would form far more excessive than I would as a salary.”

Irish electors voted, with their eyes wide open, for this incompetent, arrogant, out-of-touch Government and so permitted it to continue to mismanage our affairs. The electorate must share the blame for the position we now find ourselves in. – Yours, etc,

AIDAN MULLINS, Foxcroft Street, Portarlington, Co Laois.

Nothing to do with me!!

Let’s cut through all the waffle surrounding the removal of John Crown from last Friday’s Late Late Show. (All emphasis mine)

It was censorship, at least by proxy.

The censorship originated from a Government source and was successful because, generally speaking, RTE does not have the courage to stand up to politicians.

State censorship of free speech is a serious threat to democracy so all those connected to this event will strongly deny any involvement, blame somebody else or put themselves in a neutral position.

Pat Kenny said.

“The decision was made at a higher level than the team of the Late Late Show production.”

So, Pat can say: Nothing to do with me.

Bertie Ahern said; “No phone calls were made to my knowledge”

So, Ahern can say: Nothing to do with me.

Mary Harney said she personally had no knowledge that Prof. Crown was to appear on the programme.

So, Harney can say: Nothing to do with me.

The Director General (Sub. Req’d) of RTE has emphatically denied that the panel change was made after a phone call to him by Ms Harney.

So, the DG can say: Nothing to do with me.

The Managing Director of RTÉ Television, Noel Curran said there was absolutely no political interference in the decision to change the panel of guests.

Mr. Curran said he made the decision to change the panel to achieve a more balanced range of views and said no-one had contacted him prior to his action.

So, we know who made the decision and most importantly, we know he made the decision on his own without contact with anyone.

Finally, the most unaccountable, the most important and certainly the most useful player in the whole episode – An anonymous Government spokesman – This is what he said;

He did tell the programme team that he was of the view that the proposed panel was unbalanced

(An anonymous, unaccountable civil servant can phone the national broadcaster and express his, apparently, personal views about who should or should not partake in a crucial television debate – and he’s taken seriously?).

He did not request that Prof. Crown be removed. (Why would he need to be so crude, the contact was the message not what was said)

So, while the anonymous and unaccountable Government spokesman, operating at a safe distance from Harney and Ahern, was telling the show’s production team that he thought the panel was unbalanced, the Director General of RTE was, coincidently and without contact with anybody, coming to the exact same conclusion.

Oh, by the way, politicians will be deciding today whether to approve an RTE application for a €2 licence fee increase.

The political world and the real world

Letter in today’s Irish Independent.

Tuesday November 13 2007

It was reported on the RTE current affairs programme ‘Drivetime‘ (3rd item, 2nd report) last Wednesday that Mary O’Rourke TD, finding herself bored during ministerial question time, decided to take a walk down to Brown Thomas. We were told how she met 11 women all with horror stories about friends and relations affected by cancer.

Nothing better illustrates the yawning gap between the comfortable world of our politicians and the brutal reality of many ordinary citizens.

Here’s a politician who has held several senior positions in government, who is a member of a party that has held power for more years than any other party, but who has become so removed from the lives of ordinary people that she only encounters reality when she wanders out of the rarefied world of our useless and “boring” parliament.

Her contribution during the special Dail debate on the latest cancer treatment scandal only served to confirm her ignorance of what is happening in the real world.

She started by congratulating Minister for Health, Mary Harney, for apologising to the women who were misdiagnosed, as if this empty gesture had any meaning.

This was followed by high praise for all politicians who put themselves out by agreeing actually to meet and discuss the scandal.

She then viciously attacked Prof Drumm as if it was he and not incompetent politicians who landed us with a Third World health service.

After telling the nation that she didn’t think we would ever have a proper health service, Mrs O’Rourke apologised in advance for her absence from the next day’s briefing of politicians by Prof Drumm.

Apparently she had a more pressing engagement — another trip to Brown Thomas, perhaps?

ANTHONY SHERIDAN

COBH, CO CORK

Shocked solicitor

I see in the today’s Irish Times that I have shocked a solicitor. That’s one to note in the calendar.

The core issue for solicitors is simple.

They can opt to remain within their unassailable legal fortress where they can do pretty much as they like with the single drawback of being rightfully seen as a largely disreputable profession.

Or

They can come out into the open and submit themselves to regulation by the law just like everybody else.

They will benefit greatly if the decide on the latter. The unacceptable number of dodgy solicitors will be quickly rooted out and the profession will begin to regain public trust and respect.

Here’s my ‘shocking’ letter and the solicitor’s reply.

Madam,

Several solicitors have expressed concerns (November 2nd, 3rd, 6th) arising from the activities of two of their colleagues, Michael Lynn and Thomas Byrne.

Some blame the situation on the intense pressure solicitors are under, the exploitation of solicitors by the banks and the greed of some clients who are prepared to risk paying peanuts for monkeys.

Also, in mitigation of their profession, they trot out the old canard that only a few rotten apples are involved – thus suggesting that, by and large, the legal profession has its house in order.

The reality is different. In recent years it has become obvious that solicitors, operating under the privileged protection of self-regulation, are among the least accountable groups in society. It is ridiculous and unacceptable that the Law Society should regulate and at the same time represent its members.

This scandal is just the latest in a series that have brought the profession into disrepute. The disgraceful rip-off by solicitors of abuse victims appearing before the Residential Institution Redress Board has yet to be resolved more than two years after the victims were assured by the Law Society that their cases would be dealt with immediately and transparently through a fast-track system.

In his letter of November 2nd, Muredach Doherty is highly critical of the banks, claiming they are at least morally deserving of the difficulties they find themselves in as a result of the activities of Byrne and Lynn.

He and his colleagues would be well advised to examine the quality of morality in their own profession in order to preserve a rapidly dwindling level of public trust. – Yours, etc,

ANTHONY SHERIDAN,

Madam, – I am shocked by Anthony Sheridan’s conclusion that, because of the recent controversies, we solicitors are now morally suspect (November 7th).

It presupposes that as a profession we are some sort of moral supermen and superwomen who are not subject to human failing.
I, at least, claim no moral superiority or insight and am a human being subject to the same failings as everyone else.
He and other commentators are correct, however, in concluding that The Law Society cannot be both a representative body and a regulatory body.

It has now become oppressive to practising solicitors in its attempt to assure the public of its regulatory role. It no longer functions as an effective representative body for solicitors.

It is only right that when solicitors fail legally and morally, an effective regulatory body should hold them to account. It is also right that when solicitors fail they have a representative body to speak for them. The present system is satisfactory for neither solicitors nor clients.

I do not care who regulates me. If they do not do their job the public will let them know. I do care who represents me.

Yours, etc,

RODERICK TYRRELL, Solicitor, Haddington Road, Dublin 4.

What?

Bertie Ahern on RTEs News at One today (First item)

“Sometimes I feel I have some power, most of the time I feel that I have limited power but I can tell you one thing that I’ve never had is the ability to direct anything in RTE. I’ve never had that in 30 years, if I had things would be very different but I can assure I don’t have it.”

If he had the power to direct things in RTE – “Things would be very different????”

What does that mean?

Well, of course, we belive you, Pat

Pat Kenny made a robust defence of his boss Cathal Goan, Director General of RTE, over the controversy surrounding the axing of Prof John Crown from last Friday’s Late Late Show. (Pat’s emphasis)

“The Director General Cathal Goan did not get any calls from the minister or the minister’s representatives or PR companies or anything.

I have known Cathal Goan for more years than the two of us care to remember, I worked with him originally on Today at Five, he was one of the creators of that programme and worked with him many times over the years and I know him to be a man of the highest integrity.

I cannot stress that more, he’s a man of the highest integrity and if such a phone call had been made to him, which it wasn’t, he would have no hesitation in telling that caller, politely generally or otherwise if necessary where to get off, that’s the kind of man you’re dealing with.”

Well, of course, we believe you, Pat. However, your finishing comments didn’t do much for your credibility.

“The rest of this matter is obviously internal RTE business and it will be dissected and parsed and hopefully will not embarrass us again in any manner as we’ve seen over the last couple of days.”

Avoid embarrassment? Was that not the very reason the Government allegedly acted to have Prof. Crown silenced?

Brute censorship

This article/letter/editorial? (The online version of the Irish Independent is a disaster) in Sunday’s Irish Independent sums up well the controversy surrounding the banning of Prof. John Crown from last Friday’s Late Late Show.

It was a case of brute censorship only possible in a democracy that has become so weak that it barely warrants the name.

Sunday November 11 2007

Censorship comes in many forms, some subtle and some blunt. RTE’s decision to ban John Crown, a hospital consultant, from last Friday night’s Late Late Show was censorship of the bluntest kind. Crown, like many of his colleagues, has strong views on the health service and on the performance of Health Minister Mary Harney.

Unlike many of his colleagues, Crown is willing to engage in public debate. RTE, however, decided that his views could not be accommodated on the Late Late Show. According to a statement from the national broadcaster, a “decision was taken to reconfigure (the) panel to represent as broad a spectrum of positions and opinions as possible”, and so Crown was dropped.

Instead of a debate that might have shed some light on the problems afflicting the health service, RTE served up a bland and discordant concoction that was neither informative nor entertaining.

What was RTE afraid of? That the views of one panellist among four would so distort the national debate on health care that some unknown peril would unfold? That Pat Kenny, the station’s most experienced and highly-paid broadcaster, would not be able to do his job when faced with the might of Dr Crown?

In its statement, RTE also said that it “would like to strongly state that this decision was taken internally within RTE”. That, we assume, is meant to be reassuring: the state broadcaster feels it necessary to tell the people that it did not take instructions from the Government before taking a decision that, quite possibly, spared the Government embarrassment.

We do not need to be reminded that RTE belongs to the people and not to the Government of the day, but clearly RTE needs to remind itself from time to time. By stating “strongly” that this decision was taken internally, RTE leaves open the question of what other editorial decisions have not been taken internally.

The broadcaster has a duty to the public to provide high quality news and entertainment and in return it receives a substantial hand-out from the people — €182.8m last year, collected as a tax on anyone who owns a television. It has a duty to provide balance, but not to the point that it denudes debate. It should also trust the editorial judgment and broadcast skill of Pat Kenny and his team.

The decision to exclude Crown cannot be justified on editorial grounds, and to argue that balance must be introduced into every debate is deeply flawed. If balance requires that both sides be represented, then it only requires one side to refuse to participate for debate to be silenced.

On Friday night, both the minister and the Health Service Executive refused to participate on the show. That is their choice to make, but it must not mean that the views of a respected and vocal consultant cannot be heard because of their refusal. Should all debate on politics cease if the Government decides to boycott the airwaves? Does RTE feel the need to balance a comedian with a straight man? It is an arid argument, and it is one that puts RTE in a very poor light.

RTE’s must never be allowed to forget that its duty is to the people of this Republic. It has no remit to protect the interests of Government or to spare the blushes of a minister. The Late Late Show has a venerable place in Irish television history and is renowned for its controversy as much as it is for its blandness. It can be awful and it can be very, very good, but it must not be censored on spurious grounds of political balance.

The RTE statement claimed that it wanted as broad a spectrum as possible, and yet it does not believe that John Crown has a valid voice on that spectrum. Its decision to exclude him was wrong and smacks of panic.

The result is censorship, applied on the broadcaster by the broadcaster. Cathal Goan, the director general of RTE, should apologise publicly and to John Crown personally.