Absolutely! As someone said to me today, we’ve already hit the ice-berg, there’s no point in wasting time in getting finances to re-wallpaper the ballroom. Time instead to get a viable strategy to safely carry the travellers to, if not the destination they expected, then maybe even somewhere better. Time to start seriously thinking about what sort of future we want. Consumerism is dead. Community, stylish self-sufficiency, focussing on what we have rather than stirring up fears about what we haven’t- that’s the beginning of the way forward. Happiness usurping anger and fear. The whole future is up for grabs. Let’s not make it a rat race!!

I know im not voting…they can do what they want with their YES vote…

If Irish people vote no, let’s respect that. No begging more cash from Europe. We’ll cutback social welfare, public spending etc. to live within our means for once and for all.

The Emmigrant

How many went away
Were any of them yours
They left our shores to find away
Were any of them yours.

No bankers, developers or politicians kin
Are queuing next to to yours
All you who trusted this elitist band
All those going away are yours

They go away hope to return
Are any of them yours
They stand alone to face the world
Are any of them yours.

The elitist gave away their land
Putting greed ahead of yours
Nowhere to run nowhere to stand
All those going away are yours.

Pj

I will be voting No

Paula one of the sadest things i’ve heard lately, is that a couple of our local GAA clubs won’t be able to feild teams this year because so many of their players have emigrated. I’m not a big GAA head but there is something in this far more human than Just figures on a survey.

The answer is NO..deal with it..

that patriotism is the reason why this country has faced being a bankrupt nation three times in the last 70 years

That doesn’t make sense. All the people responsible for bankrupting the country are urging us to vote yes.

The treaty would have zero impact on what you’re saying ;) which is why it’s a pointless exercise.

we are responsible, we allowed this to happen.

*some* of us are responsible, many tried to flag problems.

.. and were told to commit suicide

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfjGSfuSQpA

Heh heh.

Testify Diarmuid ……. :)

The Germans are also happy to lend us a huge pile of money. If they really wanted us to starve they’d give us nothing!

So you support Terrorism??? Either do what we say, or we will starve you ??

Dave take some time out, you’re all over the place, you need a rest. Something must be troubling you!

@david do you any history, yesterday was our national day to remember the famine, and during the famine the landlords lent lots of money to the starving at punitive rates that ensured that thoes who didn’t die we’re left broke for generations

Germany is lending us money at rates that are killing us, if the had our welfare at heart the would have an interest rate lower than the ECB rate, which would give us a fighting chance

David, my God you really don’t get it, it’s quite amazing. do loan sharks care about their victims? Do banks really care about the well being of their customers? They couldn’t care less about us, when are yo going to get that? The only reason they gave us money in the first place was so we wouldn’t default on what we owed them. The EU even confirmed this recently when they said they would loan enough money to a country to pay back debt but not to plug gaps between income and expenditure! My God David, I admire your persistence but for God sake use your noggin will ya!

Sadly David still believes in a europe where the big guys help the little guys just because it feels good to help. If they could they’d probably swap places with us and take the pain. Ahhh the sense of brotherly love and harmony is intoxicating……….
Reality check, watch the greek people get crucified and their remains held up as a warning to any other of the little guys who get ideas above their station.

Gotta love the way the FG youth are no better than their seniors. Mind you they seem a tad more out of touch with society than their forefathers.

They just keep reminding me why I will never vote for them and those that do need to read more.

Jay Funk: while the rates that Germany and the Troika are lending us money at are not as low as we would like them to be, they are still hugely lower than the rates available from any other source.

That is true, but remember that is supposed to be a “bailout” loan. It’s in the interest of our EU partners to help Ireland get back on it’s feet, so the extra interest does not make sense.

Enda and Eamonn were too busy combing over the film script of Dumb and Dumber for policy ideas.

To be fair Limofax, the banking crisis and Ireland’s subsequent cack-handed response came before Enda and Eamonn were in charge.

Nicely put!
The ESM is initially seeking €11bn from us to contribute to their €700bn fund. Now, it’s one thing asking where we will come up with that, but we could end up needing to contribute more. The ESM can call in more any time it seems necessary, without any question, and we must come up with it in 7 days or face fines and lose voting privileges. As Ann and yourself so eloquently pointed out, there’s several nations likely to be in need of the proposed ESMs help.. That €700bn could get gobbled up pretty fast..

The yes side like to frame the ESM as *our* safety net, as if in total ignorance to the wider EU. We won’t be the only ones accessing this fund, there’s bigger nations in trouble than us, and if they need a bailout, will we even get a look in? And if we do, at what cost?

well said Eileen !!

Eileen, sorry, but that’s just a set of meaningless slogans. Less soundbites and more thought-out reasoning please.

I’m not yet decided on what way to vote. This treaty does force us to reduce the deficit by 5% per year, which seems like a bad timing in a recession. It should have been done 10 years ago. And our country is smaller than the others, growth normally needs higher borrowing.

On the other side, voting in some sound economic rules for our government is tempting. I don’t trust governments to keep long term goals in sight. And our higher borrowing is not to fund growth at the moment, it is to fund our bloated public services and welfare system.

Spot on, P Wurple.

5% per year is nowhere near enough. Why borrow to keep people in welfare? We can’t afford it especially with an ageing population. Do the Math.

Vote no, break free, slash the spending,
and we’re there. Let’s live within our means.

Pwurple, Danny Grey, A recession is also the wrong time to attack over 400,000 people on social welfare, I’m sure the public servants/politicians earning 90k and over are a good target for cuts, if you want cuts then reductions in the cost of living in this country must go hand in hand with reductions in social welfare and public pay

In fairness, public servants have suffered a huge amount in the last 4 years. A huge amount of public servants who before the recession earned similar money to an average private sector worker are now struggling on substantially lower wages.

Good housekeeping rules seems like an excellent idea P Wurple. Had these rules been in place in a binding fashion before the recession, the recession would have been much harsher but would, in my opinion, have been much shorter. It would have been short term pain, but the outlook would have been brighter by now.

Ultain

they were in place – check out Mastricht. Both Germany and France broke the rules in the early naughties, while we were spending within the agreed limit. Neither Germany or France were held accountable which in turn opened the gates for smaller states to follow suit. It would appear that there was an outbreak of selective amnesia among EU leaders in the mid 2000s in matters pertaining to existing fiscal treay laws.

Sean all we can hope for is that enough people cop on to where the political establishment in ireland is leading us over a cliff.at this point this goverment is the biggest threat to democracy .all banks and major financial institutions in this country and europe and beyond are all broke . but they all have one thing in common there SILENCE .

United

We must also take into consideration that the draught legislation for the ESM treaty has been draw up yet Kenny & Co have made it very clear that they will NOT put it to the house until AFTER the Fiscal/austerity treaty. I have cosistently asked the Yes side on this site, where we will get the capital stock of 11 billion euros from and more urgently where will the 1.3 billion euros (amended from 1.6 billion) we must pay into this legally immune institution. I find Articals 9.3 & 10.1 of the ESM treay particularly alarming without mentioning fines of upto 200 million euros should we not manage to pay within 7 (4) days, whatever amounts they ask of us.

They only answer I was given, was that we would only be commitied to paying the 11 billion euro capital stock should another country need bailout money. Given the political and economical climate in Europe at the moment this scenario is looking more and more likely.

The following extract is taken from a letter to Dr Gavin Barrett from Anthony Coughlan director of the National Platform EU research and Information center –

” WHY IRELAND HAS A VETO ON THE ARTICLE 136 TFEU AMENDMENT TO THE EU TREATIES AND THE ESM TREATY WHICH THIS AMENDMENT AUTHORISES

Those on the No-side in our Fiscal Treaty referendum who know what they are talking about are saying that the ESM Treaty and the Article 136 TFEU amendment to the EU Treaties which authorises a “Stability Mechanism” should be put to referendum in Ireland before we can either ratify the ESM Treaty or approve this Article 136 TFEU amendment in accordance with the provisions of EU law and the terms of the Irish Constitution.

This is

(a) because a permanent commitment to the ESM as a new Eurozone Institution of which Ireland becomes a “Member”, together with its accompanying rules and its extraordinary legal and taxation immunities for its Board of Governors and personnel, entails a surrender of much of what is left of Irish State sovereignty;

and

(b) because if the amendment to Article 136 TFEU quoted above is lawfully to permit a Stability Mechanism for the Eurozone like that proposed in the ESM Treaty – which would effectively override a number of existing EU Treaty articles – then a different method of amendment of the EU Treaties needs to be adopted than that being used in the present instance.

It is therefore the No-side people who are seeking in effect to defend EU law and the integrity of the EU Treaties by pointing this out and calling for the Article 136 TFEU authorisation and the ESM Treaty which it purports to authorise to be ratified in the only manner which is lawful under the EU Treaties and constitutional in Ireland – namely, by way of referendum of the people.”

Makes for very interesting and insightful reading. For the full text
http://nationalplatform.org/2012/05/07/reply-to-dr-gavin-barretts-article-on-the-fiscal-treaty-referendum-in-last-fridays-irish-times/

Thats would be the same and wise thing to do.

…Then there is our government!

SANE…

Unlike my typing errors today – insane! LOL

Big business is the only source of jobs growth in this economy right now!!

Agreed David, because Austerity has stopped all home grown growth.

David, do you think for a moment that a yes vote won’t lead to a hike in our corporate tax rates and a loss of some of those big businesses? Granted, we might hang on to some in the IT sector like Intel and IBM, but Big Pharma and the other manufacturing industries (the ones which do more packaging and shipping than manufacturing here) will be out the door the moment you can’t pull a Double Irish or a Dutch Sandwich anymore…

That’s bull Dave. Fine Gael have been creating jobs for their friends as advisors with big, big wages.

@david last week you said SME’s not big business was the only hope for ireland, you change your mind with every article

Strange comments here? 1. We had recession long before we had austerity. 2. Pharmacies are pulling out of Ireland as patents expire and it becomes cheaper to produce these in lower cost countries. The recession began when inflation went ballistic and wages stopped rising. Then people got a rude awakening when they realised that peoples wages weren’t going to increase forever to pay for huge overpriced mortgages. People had to cut back their spending in order to maintain their debts, inflation continued, food, insurance and energy costs soared, the lower demand was the recession we are experiencing and jobs were lost as a result of the economic mismanagement. Austerity is a symptom, not a cause of the recession.

Nope. Austerity is the reason why the recession has continued so long.

Censored: Please explain why?

I’m probably lumping a lot of current policies under the blanket austerity title, including the apparent desire to make the South (and Ireland) pay for their feckless policies even if it makes no practical sense.

The Germans believe that austerity works, because it worked for them. Sortof. They’re ignoring all the external factors that helped lift their economy out of the doldrums. Austerity requires an external “miracle”.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/06/german-adjustment/

We should be thinking about the future, and how we can generate growth in our economy. That requires investment, but investment in the right areas.

For example, why did we cut all our capital projects (the easy cuts) and maintain the unsustainable spending in other areas. Why are we not protecting education and other essential services?

Also, this whole thing is just a con. The truth is that we’re being bribed with “cheap” loans to fund daily spending so that we don’t default on the bank debt. This works for politicians and others who are being funded out of the “cheap” loans, but it’s bad for the rest of us who will eventually have to pay.

And who pays for this?

people are going to say their voting no but when they pull that Curtin they will vote yes so arguments are pointless

You do what you do behind the curtain!?

And the rest of us will vote no!

I personally would rather be termed a ‘Shinner’ than a Traitor.

Ditto. Not a Sinn Fein supporter, but we’re fast running out of options as all the mainstream parties are letting us down.

everything is for a reason

The average working family isn’t represented by Fine Gael. Don’t think in terms of left and right. It’s a mix of both which is more realistic.

So Ed – people who are “on welfare” are not entitled to watch the television!!!! What – you think that we should all sit at home and turn into cabbages. Get real, with your free housing and car allowances – lol. The welfare myths that some people spin on this site are priceless.

The “experts” on Bloomberg and CNBC say a yes vote will be very bad for investment in Ireland.

limfofax: International economists don’t count, as they are not on the Irish Governments payroll.

Damn!

Igornance is a terrible thing mickey.

FFS Tony

That’s a good young Fine Gaeler. Bit obvious but you’ll learn.

So it was a bad idea to propose the fiscal compact in the first place. Since this has led to so much “uncertainty”. Or are you just trolling?

Adrian

Declan Ganley is NOT a politician, he is a buisness man. You say FianaGaeLab are spineless – I’m assuming that is because they are incapable of doing what is best for the people who elected them and for not standing up to Merkel and Dhragi. Then you say that Declan Ganley is spineless? How or why have you come tho that conclusion, he is more than happy to tell Europe that this treaty is not for us and a very bad deal for our country.

Totally agree, its the same with the majority of them politicos, all talk and no action.
Words are cheap.

amazing that so many people dislike this comment – it’s balanced and puts a portion of the blame where it lies in a democracy – with “the people” ! @ all you who dislike the comment: how many of you voted Fianna Fail over the years – now you’re afraid to take some of the blame ?

A rambling comment, that ends up with a call to vote yes for some bizarre reason. Vote yes and they’ll take your tuppence!

They are zombie followers who will do whatever their Zombie leader tells them to do.

Some people have principles. Nobody you know does David.

Voting No will protect jobs and encourage investment without surrendering sovereignty.
Vote No says Jim Keogh!

I’d imagine there is a few people in the Fine Gael whips office reaching for the old revolver and a bottle of whiskey.

That’s exactly what this should be used for, who knew ? A blueshirt with some spine.

So, david it’s not ok to use the traty as a poolitical weapon but ok for your party to use the ESM as a weapon to blackmail and threaten the Irish citizen?

By the way, love your examples. Peter Matthews (a member of your party), Karl Whelan (the economist who DIDN’T predict the crash) and Nick Leeson (Bad gambler of other peoples money, a poster boy for why our banking system was bankrupted in the first place).

Want to drop any other names who are telling you what you want to hear or suit your agenda as a member of young fine gael?

So a dodgy business man who scared the bejaysus out of the mainstream political parties in Ireland is advocating a no vote; and a trader who collapsed an entire bank and caused who knows how much human suffering from failed pensions, lost savings and so forth, is advocating a yes vote.

I’m thinking we’re now officially past the point where who’s supporting what option can be a factor in your decision making process on this one …

That would be Nick Leeson the convicted fraudster whose criminal behaviour caused the collapse of Barings Bank!!

I love the way this site has suddenly turned on people like Mathews, Whelan and Leeson.

Everyone here was praising all three of them when they were calling for bondholders not to be paid and for the pro-notes to take a write down.

Maybe you all think they were wrong about that too?

David, in truth, FFg/Labours approach to the fiscal treaty, reminds me of the ‘last charge of the light brigade’. They all knew they were doing the wrong thing, but their leader was adamant that it was the right way to go. He had similar experts telling him they could win glory for the brigade.
Its really time for the Yes side to wake up to whats going on… Look at Greece, how many austerity budgets have the average person in Greece endured at this stage. They have taxed the hell out of the population, sold off so much of the country’s national assets, and they have hardly made a dent in the fiscal deficit. Austerity does not work.
If we don’t make a stand on this issue right now, we are doomed to follow in their footsteps. He who does not learn from history is doomed to make the same mistakes again. We must regain control of our own destiny. France and German could not give two fiddlers about Ireland. If we pass this treaty, there is zero chance of a write down of the 70 billion euro private banking debt. You must wake up and realise, that if the country votes Yes, we will never come our of recession (and i use Greece as the example). We must vote No, take our chances, and Yes, i agree we must implement a very severe fiscal restrain policy on high earning wages in the public sector, starting with the Governments own wages. We must renegotiate (another term for default) on the banking debt, take our slaps as punishment (for a maximum of two years, but then we will be back in the markets again… With no 70 billion euro mill-stone around our necks. We can do it.. we must do it… the only other option is the Yes, and we will never break free from German/French fiscal control of our taxation system, and our corporate tax rate will rise to the level that will force the likes of Google, Intel etc out of Ireland.

David, I think you should look back to the announcement story run here saying that Leeson would be writing a regular column before you say that people have changed their minds about him. To call the comments on that story a love-in would require redefining a lot of english words…

FG MAYOR JIM KEOGH SAYS NO!!! that’s good enough for me.

Not at all David. I for one most certainly never praised any of them. Leeson is a criminal who served time for fraud, Whelan, as pointed out by TTL, failed to see the looming crash, and as for Mathews, well lets face it, he’s a bit of a spoofer who alluded that he would have front bench position on the VB show.

I don’t generally pay ANY attention to anything fg have to say but this time I make an exception. Vote NO.

Trying to move the goalposts Dave!!!

We have 2.3 trillion on total debt
That 2300.000.000.000 in hard numbers the 10th largest in the world and we expect Fr Enda or Gimp more or Martin to lead us out of this
Perhaps Morgan Kelly.Gurdiev McWilliams Lucy and the odd Nobel winning economist are all wrong and our elementary school teacher is right

Move over FG! We need a solid right wing party in this country to get public spending under control.

Voting no will force the government into the economic shock therapy the country needs. There will be pain for many welfare addicts but the gain will be long term.

Bring it on.

Who’s Peter Matthews again? Oh yeah I remember now. He’s the one who hasn’t been seen since he displayed some semblance of a mind of his own. I seem to remember he had a back round in banking/finance. Strange he’s not on the fronline for FG given that backround.

Yet another admission from the NO side that voting their way leads to MORE austerity.

Welfare addicts???

Most people in Ireland do not choose to be in welfare. That’s an awful comment to make.

An acceleration of austerity would hit everyone, including some of our most vulnerable. We need to make sure we have the borrowings to prevent that.

I think both sides can agree on that much.

David, your welfare addict comment is coming from an account that was only set up today… Pass no remarks on it. Its a false account set-up to give people like you ammunition. Everybody else is just laughing at this comment.

David H. See it’s not about party politics, when a FGr makes sense we agree with him.

Most economists/politicians (Stephen Donnelly for example) do not agree that the treaty is good for Ireland. They are doing what they call a reluctant YES solely because of the clause stopping us from getting money from the ESM. This is why our Taoiseach signed it in on the 2nd Feb. If this clause was not added in to the ESM (retrospectively) the vote would be very different. I believe that if people read the treaty in isolation to form an opinion and then look at the effects of the clause it would give them a more balanced view. It is/should be a separate issue where we would get funding from.

Why should the ESM and the treaty be separate issues? They are interrelated and as a result the effect of one on the other must be considered in reaching a balanced decision on which way to vote.

David Higgins. GO AWAY. Teacher Enda already knows you a good boy, now run along.

I’d vote Yes to this treaty if we were given a vote on the bank debt. We weren’t, and we never will. So I will use this referendum, and subsequent referendums, as a chance to put my boot in on those who have capitulated the sovereignty of this nation to nameless private banking gamblers.

The left-wing Greek leader said it all talking of potential pro-bailout parties, “they do not want us to be in partnership, they want us to be part of their criminal conspiracy”.