Interested in maladministration. Estd. 2005
I see there’s talk of introducing a ‘cow tax’ to help meet new tough targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions laid out in the EU’s climate change strategy. Proposed levies for gas emissions are: €13 for each dairy cow, €7 for non dairy cow and €1 for sheep.
What about a levy on gas emissions from Leinster House, say €1,000 for each member? Such a levy would greatly reduce deadly gas emissions and make a significant contribution to improving the environment.
Former Secretary General of the Department of Foreign Affairs, Dermot Gallagher, has been appointed the new chairman of the Garda Siochana Ombudsman Commission (GSOC).
On ‘retirement’ from Foreign Affairs, Mr. Gallagher received an estimated gratuity of €400,000 and a pension of €126,000.
During the controversy surrounding his nomination last month Mr. Gallagher said he could yet decide to do the job at no cost to the taxpayer. At the time he said:
“I think everybody has to make a serious contribution in the current climate, I certainly would be prepared to do not just my bit, but significantly more than that.” and “Quite seriously, I am not interested in the money.”
(Has this man been talking to Mark Duffy?).
On reflection, (and after the controversy has died down) Mr. Gallagher has forgotten all about ‘doing his bit for his country’ and opted to take a salary of €90,000, the maximum allowed to him under pension abatement rules (About three times the average industrial wage).
There was no open and transparent recruitment process and the Opposition was not consulted. Finance Minister, Brian Lenihan said
“There was no constitutional convention or legal obligation on the Government to consult the Opposition.”
Here’s what a recent Transparency International report on how things are done in Ireland had to say about such Government decisions.
“Significantly however, Ireland is regarded by domestic and international observers as suffering high levels of ‘legal corruption’. While no laws may be broken, personal relationships, patronage, political favours, and political donations are believed to influence political decisions and policy to a considerable degree. The situation is compounded by a lack of transparency in political funding and lobbying.”
I have no doubt that Mr. Gallagher is a man of the highest integrity and will carry out his duties in a very professional and honest manner.
He is, however, human and given the very sensitive nature of his new job there will always be a cloud hanging over his work particularly if he finds himself dealing with a case involving a member of Fianna Fail, the party that has been so generous to him.
In other words, Mr. Gallagher begins his job tainted by the manner in which he was appointed and that is not in the best interests of the country.
Copy to:
Dermot Gallagher
Brian Lenihan
Green Party leader, John Gormley gave a good speech at his party’s convention last night and I have no doubt that he and all of his party colleagues are 100% genuine in their intentions.
Unfortunately, they’re still labouring under the illusion that Ireland is a normal functional democracy. So when Gormley tells the nation that white collar criminals will be pursued and face the full rigours of the law; that they will pay for what they have done to the country, he probably believes what he’s saying but it’s not going to happen.
Gormley finished his speech with the quote:
“We must do what we conceive to be the right thing and not bother our heads or burden our souls with whether we’ll be successful because if we don’t do the right thing, we’ll do the wrong thing and we’ll be part of the disease and not part of the cure.”
He seems to be completely unaware that by adopting a head in the sand policy (we look after our probity and our standards and ignore those of Fianna Fail) towards political and financial corruption his party has already become an active supporter of the diseased system.
His party is acting like a doctor determined to cure a patient of a skin rash while studiously ignoring a deadly disease eating away deep within the patient’s body.
“The most recent quarterly national household survey showed that, in 2008, while private sector employment fell by 110,000, public sector numbers were, amazingly, up by 10,000. As recently as Friday, one state agency was advertising jobs in the national newspapers.”
Could this boost in numbers be a ploy by the civil service so that they will have a surplus to offer when the Government come calling for sacrifices in the national interest?
“It’s inconceivable,” says one TD, “that you could have €4bn in tax increases and cuts in spending without having some grenades in the mix.”
I would like to formally welcome Sunday Independent columnist, Emer O’Kelly to the core philosophy of Public Inquiry. Her article is worth reproducing in full.
Haughey wasn’t the first, only the first to be caught
The shame is that we have no shame over the fact that we as a nation are legally corrupt, writes Emer O’Kelly
Sunday March 08 2009.About a week ago, I was talking to my friendly local grocer in the course of my weekly shop. We were discussing the scandalous financial revelation of the previous day (I can’t remember which one it happened to be; after all, they’ve been leaking out on a more or less daily basis) and he asked in disbelieving tones: “What’s happening to the country? Is it never going to stop?”
I said that I couldn’t see that it could ever stop because we were, and are, a corrupt people rather than the country being corrupt. In horrified tones, he said he didn’t want to believe that. Nobody does, and the honest among us turn away in distaste from the stench of the reigning culture in our society.
But none of what we have been dealing with in the past three months could have happened unless we were a corrupt people. Unless the criminally dishonest elements in our society felt that nods, winks, dishonesty, cronyism, and shady dealings in general could be the norm, tolerated by those in power as well as made possible by our laws, laws endorsed by the Constitution which is so often spoken of in reverential tones.
If laws which don’t demand and enforce basic honesty, much less integrity of the highest order, in commercial and political dealings are not inimical to the Constitution, what does that say about that document?
From where I sit, it points to its having been drafted by people whose own standards of integrity and honesty left a lot to be desired, and who didn’t want to hog-tie their fellow citizens into rigorous standards of integrity. After all, weren’t we victims of colonial oppression, and wasn’t it our right to get our own back by exercising a bit of skulduggery where we could?
Don’t explain; don’t accept responsibility; don’t apologise. Above all, don’t ever be shamed into resigning. It’s only honour that’s at stake.
I’ve been expressing that opinion for a long time. (The first time was the weekend Charles J Haughey was told by a tribunal judge to go home and reflect on the situation that was emerging. I remember thinking with a certain amount of distress that he might kill himself through shame. I didn’t realise then that he had no shame).
And the shamelessness is with us to this day.
Haughey wasn’t the first: he was only the first to be caught. He was also completely representative of our innate tendency for corruption. There are no markers, no lines in the sand. Then becomes now, and the pattern repeats endlessly, honour and duty joke-words to be sneered at.
An organisation called Transparency International, which is an international anti-corruption watchdog, has been surveying us for three years. It has found that we are “legally corrupt”. It’s manifested, according to Transparency International, by “cronyism, political patronage and favours, donations and other contacts that influence political decisions and behaviour.”
The report of its Irish Chapter (it operates in 100 countries) criticises our lack of whistleblowers’ legislation. By that it means legislation that protects whistleblowers rather than as now, frowning on them as sneaky boat-rockers and informers deserving of having their heads shaved.
It savages our complete lack of regulation for political lobbyists and condemns the secrecy surrounding political funding. It finds a whole body of evidence on the prevalent role in Ireland of patronage and clientelism, and its chief executive here says, “it’s a reasonable assumption to make that there are high levels of legal corruption”. It doesn’t mean that our law is corrupt, but that corrupt behaviour and attitudes are legal.
The report also criticises the media for a lack of safeguards against bribery and corruption. It probably has a point. I’ve never been offered a bribe, but I would welcome legislation which stopped journalists from appointing themselves as unofficial and unacknowledged lobbyists, even unpaid ones.
And as for corruption, the only personal corruption that has affected me has been the various threats to force me out of employment, into prostitution (where I belong!) or into the bowels of hell by means of a knife or an IRA beating. Such threats of course, are not corrupt, but made with the noblest motives, and have God and Mother Ireland on their side.
The report also criticises the lack of a disciplinary framework for the judiciary, and that finding reminds me of listening to a lecture from a young Catholic activist lawyer when I was still at school (he was also a card-carrying member of Fianna Fail, and went on to become a Supreme Court judge.)
He told us fifth-formers with absolute certainty that the Irish legal system was the finest and most honourable in the world, and its judiciary the most detached and politically unaligned. In an aside, he said that the same could not be said of our nearest neighbour.
It rang alarm bells in my head, even then. It still does: after all, the disgraced head of the Royal Bank of Scotland is facing calls for his knighthood to be removed, and there are moves to introduce legislation to strip him of the scandalously high pension put in place for him before he was fired for destroying the bank.
The odd head has rolled here; but there have been no penalties. Not merely are the corrupt wrongdoers hanging on for grim life, but our own State servants, the board of the Regulatory Authority who so grossly failed in the duty they accepted on our behalf, seem not to see any reason, separately or collectively, why they should resign. Nor does our government see any reason to replace them.
Is that a definition of a corrupt people? I know what I think.
Green Party Leader and Minister for the Environment; John Gormley had the following to say when asked about being a watchdog in government (RTE News, including audio and visual at bottom of page).
“We never assigned ourselves that role because it’s a role which you cannot fulfill properly and do your work as well. We’re not the moral watchdog of any political party…we look after our probity and our standards…we cannot be responsible for events that took place before our entry into government.”
This principle is still as bizarre as it was when first adopted by the Green Party as an excuse not to act against the chancer Bertie Ahern. Challenging and bringing to account those suspected of corruption is a crucial role for all members of a real democratic government.
Sticking your head in the sand and saying, ‘we’re just going to look after our probity and standards’ is mealy mouthed and cowardly and is a betrayal of basic democratic principles.
Green Party chairman, Dan Boyle, warned that Ireland cannot progress as a nation until those responsible for recent events are imprisoned – So, that’s it, no more progression.
On the plus side for the Greens. Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Trevor Sargent, is travelling to Paris for St. Patrick’s Day. He’s flying Aer Lingus, not using any (road) transport at taxpayer’s expense and saving on an expensive hotel room by staying at the embassy.
Obviously, his Excellency, Martin Cullen couldn’t be expected to endure such deprivation but other ministers should be encouraged to follow Sargent’s good example.
Copy to:
Green Party
Every time corruption rears its ugly head in Ireland we automatically switch on the talk machine. We talk, discuss, waffle, argue, accuse but we never, ever act. Here’s a sample of quotes I took from some recent taped radio discussions.
“We need something quicker than the ODCE, NIB took ten years.”
“As I understand it the OCDE can order a High Court inspector to go in.”
“I’m surprised it hasn’t happened before now, before Christmas to be honest.”
“I think it’s a cynical political ploy to please the masses.”
“I can’t understand how the toxic ten will be allowed to walk away. It’s absolutely criminal, we will end up paying. Look at the education cuts, these guys are going to walk away.”
“What I find fascinating is the people who owe €300 million to Anglo Irish and can’t be named.”
“There are so many things about this that are so complacent. Take the 7 billion, Brian Lenihan said that was referred to in the note of the PWC report in October and that he didn’t really read it and he didn’t get the full detail of it until January. Why then was it only when the Sunday Business Post broke the story which said these deposits were under investigation and RTE said it actually related to Irish Life and Permanent and 7 billion that he was then suddenly interested in calling Gillian Bowler in and asking ‘what’s going on’?
“That’s one of the things that’s perplexed me. If it was worth their resignations in February, surely it was worth their resignations in January?”
“And this feeds into Ireland’s international reputation. It’s closer to Bogotá than Berlin without the coke.”
“A colleague of mine was on the phone to a London stockbroker and in the background he could hear another dealer shouting – No Irish, no Irish.”
“We’ve just been abandoned by the international community.”
“The Irish banks have been running a cartel; it will have to be investigated.”
“The auditor’s must have known.”
“I’m staggered, I’m shocked.”
“I’m terribly disappointed that the company did not have the high standards that I thought it had.”
“It’s fraudulent financial reporting.”
“That’s why I’m baffled why the Financial Regulator could say there was nothing illegal about the Fitzpatrick loans.”
“It’s like the way the Catholic Church deals with all sorts of abuse. They deny it, change the story, and protect the system at all costs. Protect the system and don’t apply the law.”
“We have made mistakes.”
“In defence of Irish Life and Permanent, they were open; they reported it to the Regulator.”
“We have taken a reputational hit and there’s a huge job to try and restore that reputation.”
“Irish Life and Permanent were trying to make Anglo Irish books look better.”
“Cosy Irish capitalism.”
“Well, the truth of it is that every country in the world is trying to grapple. Every country across the world has had regulatory failure so Ireland is not alone in this.”
“We were all caught up in the exuberance of the Celtic Tiger. This is only clear in hindsight. It was the same across the globe. We are where we are.”
“Remuneration has to change; the Government is committed to look at this. We’re in different times; the structures of the past didn’t serve us well.”
“This seems to have been an attempt, legal or otherwise, to rig the Anglo share price.”
“It beggars belief. I’ve never seen more apathy towards such a staggering piece of news (Anglo Irish scandal) from the London investment community and that’s key because it’s come to a stage now where the credibility of the Irish financial system, the Irish economy as a sensible place to do business is actually starting to be questioned and I find that quite horrifying.”
“It’s an absolute outrageous abuse, I mean if your looking at those accounts and trying to get a picture of how safe that bank is and they present it like that, that’s a fraudulent presentation, there’s no other explanation for what it is…it’s absolutely outrageous that we didn’t know until now, that’s a huge amount of money, seven thousand million euro of a fraudulent presentation.”
“Exposing a culture that existed all through those boom years that we’re now paying for and the Michael Lynn interview, it too deals with that culture, he says we were all part of a mythical illusion. There was rules for some and other rules for others.”
“The law will be followed justice will be done. That’s what has to be done because our international reputation has been damaged.”
“What I don’t understand in all of this. He (Brian Lenihan Anglo Irish report) receives this information in January, he doesn’t even tell the Taoiseach about it but then when it’s the headline on the 9 o’clock news and on the front page of all the newspapers he decides that heads have to roll. Surely if it’s right that people have to resign it was right for them to resign in January not just when it’s on the 9 o’clock news?”
“What about the Regulator, what about the Central Bank, what were they doing in relation to all of this.”
“Whatever action is taken, it has to be taken immediately.”
“People are angry and upset. There are people who have children losing employment and income. I think people feel the Government has totally lost the plot.”
“The question is what are we doing in relation to the damage to our reputation. I believe we’re taking the appropriate action and I think that further action is required in relation to the banking sector which needs to be taken immediately.”
“I think we’re faced with the perception of a lack of poor governance in the country. Just two things: On Bloomberg television – Ireland another day, another scandal. Then on Friday – The Irish bailout, one message of this bailout is that the Irish bank executive’s self-preservation society has scored another success”
“Can’t there be an element of sniffiness here in particular when it comes to the British media? It not as though they don’t have enough problems of their own. There’s a lot of enthusiasm in parts of the British media for dumping all over Ireland.”
“We don’t rank much more on a given day in any trading room around the world. Ireland pops up; it’s about a 30 second session and onto the bigger areas in the financial markets.”
“It’s been a culture of greed and avarice in Ireland over the last 25 years or more. It only opened up to the public because we’re a secret society in this country in most things. It only opened up when the tribunals came along and we did get an insight there into how big business works in Ireland. We saw that some of the top politicians were corrupt and this seems to have spread into the banking system.”
“We’re all to blame.”
For so long as the corrupt system remains in place no banker will be arrested, charged or put in jail. The only thing we can be sure of is – the talk will go on and on and on and on………
Alan McQuaid of Bloxham Stockbrokers has said the Irish economy is now in severe crisis mode and the labour market, excluding the public sector, is heading for meltdown.
Meanwhile, Minister for Tourism Martin Cullen continues to defend his use of helicopters as a mode of transport. When challenged he said:
“If you would consider spending nine hours in a car to do one function, or doing what I did to cover 10 functions, that’s the choice.”
Mr. Cullen’s visit to his new decentralised headquarters in Killarney on Monday cost €8,130 so when he formally takes up residence the cost to taxpayer’s is going to be big as Mr. Cullen will, no doubt, have to attend many important meetings in Dublin.
Mr. Cullen is unlikely to lower his by now very expensive standards. He and three officials spent €67, 000 at the Olympics last summer and he has insisted that he will be flying either first or business class for his St. Patrick’s Day junket.
When asked would he be travelling Ryanair he said that although he doesn’t yet know his destination he does know that Ryanair doesn’t travel there. Defending his Paddy’s day outing Cullen said the trip was “an opportunity that is the envy of everyone” all over the world.
Mr. Cullen is one of those ministers who seems very well briefed on so called international envy but completely unaware of national anger.
The Government announced an emergency budget for the end of this month as the economy continues to go down the tubes. Significant tax increases and ruthless government spending cuts will mean an even greater burden for most citizens. Brian Cowen said, again, that everybody must pull together, everybody must feel the pain if we’re to survive this deep crisis.
Meanwhile, the people of Ireland and the world came close to an even bigger crisis when the door of a helicopter carrying Tourism Minister Martin Cullen fell off 500ft over Killarney National Park. Some commentators expressed relief that the minister didn’t fall out as a result of the accident.
The incident developed into a full scale international crisis when officials realised that the minister’s Mercedes would not get him back to Dublin in time for a very important meeting.
A meeting in Washington between Barack Obama and Gordon Brown was interrupted to discuss the crisis. The UK Prime Minister, boarding a standard British Airways flight home, said that Obama was in the process of ordering Air Force One to pick up Minister Cullen when news came that another helicopter had been found in Cork.
An ordinary citizen who has just lost his job and is trying to feed his family and pay a massive mortgage on social welfare payments said that he was greatly relieved the Minister made it back in time for his very important meeting.
He also said that the €8,130 cost of the first helicopter trip and whatever the cost of the second aircraft was well worth it to get this very important Minister to his very important meeting.
It’s touching to witness the childish hope demonstrated by Marc Coleman in today’s Sunday Independent. Writing about the visit last week of EU Commissioner for Enterprise and Competitiveness, Guenther Verheugen and European Central Bank President, Jean Claude Trichet, Coleman gushed:
“Both were listened by an eager, if not scared, audience that was hungry for inspiration. That audience wasn’t disappointed. And neither was I. I discovered that in this time of crisis Ireland does, thank God, still have friends on the European stage.”
Coleman has completely missed the point. These men were in Ireland on a public relations exercise to convince the world that the situation in Ireland is not as critical as it actually is. They were also here to encourage Irish authorities to make decisions, get off their collective butts and deal with the crisis. The last thing the EU wants is for one of its members to go the way of Iceland.
But Coleman and the Government are much more comfortable in the land of denial. Trichet and Verheugen told them that Red tape for small businesses is going to be cut and the European car industry is to receive encouragement.
Well, that’s it, all is well, the crisis is over. No decisions required.