@Andy K: no we didn’t have to bail them out. we didn’t want to bail them out. FG and Noonan and others forced it through more than anything. there were many times when we could’ve not paid but our elected representatives decided to ignore their election pledges and just survive long enough for a decent pension or cushy number.

@Living The Laws:

The elected representatives had already survived long enough to get a cushy pension so not really an argument as to why they made the decisions they made. Believe it or not, on top of the many and significant disadvantages of the bail out there are also many advantages too.

@Nick Allen: lol

advantages that outweigh the damage to people’s health and savings and pensions?

or maybe you have other types of advantages in mind such as every employee in the banking sector getting away with the sort of negligence that the rest of us would go to jail for.

the comment on pensions was throwaway.

@Andy K: Wake up Andy…. Jesus fkin Christ you’re either incredibly naive or completely stupid.

@Nick Allen: so paying back the top 1% partying bad debts of 2010 is a good thing? and next year when the next crash happens we can bail them out all over again and shrink and privatise more of our public services and infrastructure Sell off retire all the HSE Gardai and emergency services its great to be a neo liberal, 5.5 billion that wont be going into our public services and economy

@Living The Laws:

If we had not bailed out the banks:
1. our credit rating would have tanked.
2. Cost of borrowing (if at all possible) would have sky rocketed
3. Ireland did not have the liquidity for operational cash flow therefore couldn’t pay all civil service wages or health and education costs etc. Severe cutback would have had to be made
4. People would have lost their savings / deposits in the banks
5. Businesses would have lost confidence and invested elsewhere
6. Pension funds which are managed by Irish banks and insurance companies would have taken an even bigger hit
7. Recession and employment levels would more than likely have been much greater than we experienced.

Yes the bailout is hard to stomach but people arguing that there was not financial benefits to it and that it was only done by politicians to secure their personal pensions is simply demonstrating that they have no idea as to the complexity nor the implications of the bail out decision.

@Matthew O’Kane:

You and many others need to look beyond the fact that we bailout the bank and to enable them to honour their bondholder debt. The more important aspect is what were the implications if we did not bailout the banks. As we can’t go back in time and change our decision we will never know for sure which was the correct decision but that doesn’t mean you can ignore the likely scenarios if the government did not bailout the banks. Its BS to say all would be rosy and we would be a about 100Bn better off.

@Nick Allen:

1. our credit rating would have tanked.
- it did tank as did the personal credit rating of a massive percentage of the people. the stress levels that Irish people had to take on were terrible.

2. Cost of borrowing (if at all possible) would have sky rocketed
– whats your point? National borrowing or individual borrowings? The impact on the people would be individual whereby the banks stopped lending (thats no borrowing) and drive people to use their remaining resources and massive amounts of people and businesses and pensions got wiped out anyway.

3. Ireland did not have the liquidity for operational cash flow therefore couldn’t pay all civil service wages or health and education costs etc. Severe cutback would have had to be made
– that would’ve been a positive for a short period of pain given how ineffective most of those services. It is the public sector workers that kept these goons in power for so long because of the sweet native of the deals they were given when self employed and SMEs were decimated. The only people I know that came through this more or less unscathed are the people who don’t generate any business in this country anyway. and do little to help business prosper.

4. People would have lost their savings / deposits in the banks
-they did. massively.

5. Businesses would have lost confidence and invested elsewhere
- with our corporate tax rate. get a drip. they were never going anywhere.

6. Pension funds which are managed by Irish banks and insurance companies would have taken an even bigger hit
- couldn’t take much bigger than being wiped out totally. whats you point?

7. Recession and employment levels would more than likely have been much greater than we experienced.
- couldn’t have been much worse in the private and self employed sector. only civil servants avoided the total loss.

@Nick Allen: very well articulated. Great points.

@Michael Geraghty: not really, mostly hypothetical and didn’t address the fact that our banks that if money could have easily gone under while protecting the savings of the personal banks. The knock on effect would have been ECB liquidity. We took these loans to protect the ECB from having to face up to its corporate banks being over stretched beyond their own rules and private EU banks in Germany, Italy and other countries having to cover their own costs in loaning to Mickey mouse banks based in the ifsc. To be clear, we have got absolutely nothing from these loans that have ruined our country apart from a part on the back.

@Living The Laws:

Our credit rating would have been far worse if we had defaulted and our cost of borrowing would have been much higher. It would also have been difficult to borrow money. Although you may think it would be a good thing to have very severe cut backs in public spending and civil service I personally disagree but nothing wrong with a difference in opinion, People did NOT lose their saving or deposits in banks, they were honoured by that government albeit people lost money on investments. insurance company and bank pension funds were not wiped out, you are just making stuff up with that. And yes the unemployment levels could have been higher.

I get you are against the bailout but trying to deny any its benefits is just stupid.

@Gulliver Foyle:

How would not bailing out our banks impact ECB liquidity. They could easily cover the 85Bn without having a material impact on their liquidity.

@Living The Laws:
We should have printed more money…..

@Nick Allen: Well said Nick. I dont have the strength anymore to argue these old points

@Nick Allen: i am not denying the benefits. there were apparent as soon as we signed up. But I do not accept that the benefits were for everyone. the irish people lost massively, many wiped out entirely, including forced into situations where their only apparent choice was to end their own lives, and many will carry the scars forever.

meanwhile, the anonymous bondholders, the big ones and little ones, lost nothing. they entrusted their money to the irish banking system and when their bet failed, the good old citizens through their elected politicians of Ireland said “don’t worry about it, we know you lost but we’ll look after you”.

feels like the treatment of Apple is just a continuation of this. These politicians have a lot to answer for and that is clearly why they don’t want an election, and clearly why apologists like you are wheeled out to disgustingly and insultingly generalise that there are benefits in the bailout for the Irish people when they really should never have needed one if government and civic servants had done their job properly.

the bigger issue for farmer gael is that it is clear they could’ve done more to help the Irish people in a post bail out world. But they were so busy looking after their mates that they forgot who put them in office in the first place. I hope the whole lot get run out of town. not that they are any better than whats left, but at least it will a fewer number of gobdaws pretending to know how to govern.

@Living The Laws: you don’t know ANY civil servants if you think they weren’t hit hard by the crisis

@Joe Bloggs: Not a debt of the Irish people no, but certainly an Irish banking debt. The inclusion of Anglo in the bail out should not be forgotten, least of all by those who persistently vote FF.

@Living The Laws: I’ll think you’ll find FF were in power when our ankles were chained to that particular financial breeze block.

@Ian Walsh: Can we have FACTS backing your opinion please? Otherwise you yourself might sound incredibly naive.

@Living The Laws: I don’t find your answers very convincing, but you’re arguing an academic point now anyway.

@Nick Allen:
I’ve a one word response to that: Iceland.

@Danny Rafferty: we haven’t borrowed most of the Anglo money yet. About 18 billion to be added as yet

@P.J. Nolan:

You would miss Wally

@Living The Laws:

@Living The Laws:

At the start of you post you say you are not denying there were benefits from the bailout. You then proceed to say I am wheeled out to claim there are benefits of the bailout.

Are you getting yourself a little confused?

Then your argument switched to say we shouldn’t have had a problem if we had proper governance of our banking sector. Although I agree the impact would have been an awful lot less with proper governance we would still have had some impact from the global economic meltdown.

It’s not quite clear what you are trying to argue other than the (very understandable) fact that you are angry that this happened and you personally feel you did not contribute to it yet you are paying off the debt. You are not the only person that feels wronged

@Nick Allen: yep, Nick – you are entirely right, the ECB could have covered the 85b easily, but it would have a knock-on effect to individual banks liquidity in the core EU countries. An easier solution would be to mitigate that risk to the core banks by loading a single, non strategic, countries national debt where regulation, and checks and balances are not present or enforced – hence Ireland became the anti-Iceland.

@Max Krzyzanowski:

If you understand how Iceland handled their economic collapse you would also understand that the choices they made were not available to Ireland.

@Gulliver Foyle:

I think a big part of the problem was that it wasn’t just Ireland. The ECB could see Portugal, Spain, Italy and Greece in the queue behind us. They couldn’t simply cover the debt from the 5 counties. None of these had the counties had the flexibility Iceland enjoyed with their currency, small population and an economy based on the export of a natural resource.

It could be argued that Ireland was left on their own to manage the debt but equally, if you were a French or a Dutch or a Polish tax payer would you feel it fair that your tax dollar was paying off debt incurred by Irish Banks?

@Matthew O’Kane: He’s on here regularly railing against ordinary people getting anything back from the government. Last week he was telling the farmers they should have made provision for a fodder crisis, or go out of business, that for the sake of a few million. A Crisis caused by one of the worst years ever, not criminal activity
Doesn’t realise our food supply is more important than a bunch of chancers sitting in front of a screen gambling with other people’s money and losing it.

@Nick Allen: ‘ If you were a French or Dutch or Polish tax payer would you feel it fair paying off debt incurred by Irish Banks’. Lucky but for them their representatives aren’t so craven as ours.
You seem to think though that Irish people should be happy paying for the massive mistakes of French and German bankers. Delighted ro get a tiny discount on a bill that was never theirs.

@Nick Allen: What did I tell you Nick when a foreigner reminds an Irish citizen that they bailed out the Irish banks then they can reply that no, we bailed out theirs. Strip away all the layers and at the centre of it is that private debt became public debt and that is remarkable in any era and for any nation.

@Jointheclubtoo:

Funny how you manage to get he salient point wrong. I said that if farmers cannot manage the risks in their business then they should get out of the business. This is very different to your suggestion that I said they should go out of business. And I will repeat, if they do not have the skills to manage the business of farming they should not be in that business. You are also spouting rubbish about me being against the ordinary people. I am simply discussing the facts of our current situation, if they go above your head and you don’t understand them it is probably better not to comment

@P.J. Nolan: I should have borrowed and spent more money. Then I could have a say.

@Nick Allen: again im not answering this for your benefit but those reading this because you are smart enough to know better and write better but choose to toe the line, back in the crash merkel and her CDU where furious with Ireland fianna fail /greens when they jumped the gun and guaranteed the banks private bad debts out of the Irish pension fund it lead to the CDU having to guarantee all the dodgy greek top 1% 100s of billions in debt with german pensioners funds. Merkel handed over 500 billions to refloat the private greek european debt its why the CDUs support is collapsing..

You think that was a model follow for the next crash, it sounds like the worst bit of leadership in europe since the decisions that lead to the rise of the nazis and world war 2. More importantly the banks are bigger than ever in ireland and europe deutsche bank practically runs germany in the CDU place leaving european savers and mortgage holders even more at the mercy of banks than ever. Irish/european banks should be broken up into the 1000s and savings banks should be set aside from vulture bubble gambling speculation investment bank running scams such as our current housing bubble.

@Andy K: We may be a bit hasty in paying back ? loans, as we might have to look for more loans when the next downturn comes, interest rates rise and the printing of fiat money out of thin air stops. We are living in a financial fools paradise. Too much Government and private debt in the system its fingers crossed time again hoping things will not go wrong in the Global economy.

@James Doyle: hehe and trumps deregulated everything in the USA I mean its trump your crossing you finger for hahaha trump tis a dark comedy when you hope a man who has gone bankrupt 6 times doesnt bankrupt the world

@Nick Allen: I’ll tell you what you miss out, the wider picture in most of what you post, as Mr Kelleher gives one instance of above. You’ve become confined by one narrow right wing theoretical view of the world.
We do understand about the banks importance to economy. The difference we have is how it was dealt with. We are not brainwashed by the ‘there is no alternative’ propaganda.
It is just Childish to suggest that farmers should get out of the business, not any type of reality there. The wet conditions being experienced nowadays, probably due to climate are unprecedented.

@James Doyle:

Absolutely agree

@Matthew O’Kane:

Matt, agree it is Trump and agree with your previous post too

@Living The Laws: You haven’t a clue. Interest rates would have been 15% plus.

@Fiona deFreyne: would like to see my kids and grandkids not paying for our generations recklessness

@iohanx: our generations recklessness? The people of this country did not put this debt on us. Our politicians under pressure from the EU did.

@Andy K: governments building houses would be more socialist than communist! I think there should be a house provided for everyone that needs one by the government on a rent to buy scheme.

@Cathal S Byrne: What generation voted for these corrupt politicians?

@Andy K: it is for none irish

@Cathal S Byrne: thats a stretch considering where all the money we spent actually came from

the people of this country did nothing about the burden illegally imposed on them on behalf of bondholders and debt holders……would be a more accurate

@Nick Allen: housing? really? how so?

@Cathal S Byrne:

The banks created the debt and the government made a decision to honour the debt. At this stage whether that was a good or a bad decision is irrelevant.

@Living The Laws:

1.8 Bn has been allocated to housing expenditure in 2018.

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/economy/budget-2018-increases-in-housing-health-and-social-welfare-1.3250578

@Nick Allen:

You don’t get how loans or economics work, do you?

We owe this money. It has to be paid back. If we dump €5.5b into healthcare and social housing now, that money will not be available when it needs to be repaid. That means other services will have to take a €5.5b hit plus the €150m in interest that needs to be paid.

By paying the €5.5b now, we have €150m more to invest in services later this year.

@Thought for Food:

Was that meant for me? I am arguing that it is a good thing to pay back the loan early. Where have I said contrary to that?

@Thought for Food:
Also, the 150m is saved over the term of the loan and not available to us to spend this year. However, by repaying our loan early we are helping our credit rating and as such we are helping to push down the cost of future borrowings

@Andy K: “Also, it is not the government who should build houses. This is not a communist society, thank god.”

Are you effing mad? You think a government shouldn’t provide housing for the very people whom it represents? People like you are what’s wrong with the world. FREE housing should be a top priority for governments. Homelessness shouldn’t be an issue in this day and age.

@Nick Allen: stop being ridiculous and stop intentionally confusing and fusging things for others that might read it.

it is 3800 housing units that wouldn’t hardly cover the actual homeless. farmer gael are a disgrace in the treatment of the everyday citizens in this country. they will get slaughtered at the polls.

@Nick Allen: our cost of borrowings are low anyway.

@Living The Laws:

How am I being ridiculous? I am just quoting the amount committed in the budget for spend on housing in 2018. The point of argument is whether we are spending money on housing or not. Our ineffectiveness at delivering is a different argument and is a combination of weak government, weak councils and a screwed up building market. The homeless problem is a long broader than simply the supply of housing, it is also linked to our social welfare and immigration policies and the government are making a complete mess of trying to resolve these.

@Andy K: it absolutely is the government who should be building houses seeing as the free market has failed.

@Cathal S Byrne: Our generation was reckless….Have you looked at the % of mortgages that are not being paid. It is failed loans that created the debts for the banks which then became our debt. The debt was caused by those who did not repay the debt.

@Andy K: I’m not advocating communism but when you leave housing to the private sector alone it becomes far more about profit for developers and investors (along with brown envelopes for politicians) than about building quality, affordable housing for the average person. This is why young working couples can’t afford houses, but wealthy people own lots of properties and rent them out at extortionate prices. If the government had a rent to buy scheme (although outsource the building as I wouldn’t trust them to get it done) for working people they could turn themselves a small profit, while providing good housing for working people.

@Mary Murphy: true Mary but the banks played a big role in forcing prices upwards. Most families now need two workers and kids are being reared by young girls in crèches for a similar lifestyle to previous generation.

@Andy K:

If you have 5.5 billion, and you give away 5.5 billion, then you have approx -5.5 billion (MINUS). So no, your not saving money, your losing it. Basic adding and subtracting.

Its no wonder Ireland fails at being a country with the likes of you and your ilk running the place. Bitching and moaning about the perils communism. It wasn’t the CPOI who ran the gulags and filled mass graves with infants.

@Ger O’Donnell: if you have €5.5 billion and give it all away, you have zero. If you have €5.5 billion and give away €11 billion, you have -€5.5 billion. Basic maths.

@Hurt Stoogie: 5.5 billion less than we had before, is what I ment ;P.

@Andy K: obviously, neither you or your near and dear are in need of housing…typical “I’m alright Jack f@#k you” disgusting!

@Andy K: stupid comment, were we living in a communist country when the government with very little money tackled the housing crisis in the 40s 50s 60s, houses which have well paid for themselves since, and are now assets to the councils, the government should be tackling the housing crisis on all fronts,

@Ger O’Donnell:

I love the innocence of your comment. If you have 5.5Bn and you give it away. Oh if the world was so simply we would all be happier

@cortisola: We had thousands of houses remember, we seized the assets of all the developers in the country. What you’re forgetting is that Noonan/Nama sold them all for a song to American investors and all the land to American speculators. How clever was that?

@Franklin Roosevelt:

i think its ~ € 211 billion

Source: https://www.nationaldebtclocks.org/debtclock/ireland

@Nick Allen: This is in truth a debt swap, not an early repayment.
We are retiring debt to the IMF, Sweden and Denmark by borrowing on the markets at a lower rate.
Our debt won’t decline but our interest costs will.

@B9xiRspG: I didn’t say it was bad, but it doesn’t reduce the debt…. As for moving your mortgage around. There are many people in this country crippled by high interest rates and tied into extortionate terms and conditions which won’t allow them to switch lender. I’m sure they would welcome a facility like the one used by Pascal the magician to reduce their debt.

@Paul Linehan: High interest rates? We have some of the lowest that we ever had. I’m old enough to remember when it was in double digits.

@B9xiRspG: Good man yourself Jim. But for the record, I too paid double digit interest rates…. But the reality is, by todays standards we have one of the highest interest rates in Europe, while having a huge percentage of ownership of our banks. We also have had banks pulling strokes on it’s mortgage customers, which resulted in terrible distress and sometimes worse outcomes for them and their loved ones. And instead of helping these people and making good use of our resources. We have politicians playing mind games with the soon to be electorate by trying to convince us that they’re on top of the crisis…. They can’t even sort out there own party mess for fear of upsetting a faithful, let alone sort out our country.

@Paul Linehan: if you are not in neg eq, a restructure or in arrears you are free to switch your mortgage. More than likely you will need 80% or less LTV but to say that as part of some T&C’s that you are ‘locked into your mortgage provider’ is just a lie.

Stop talking silly.

@Fabio Dillon: You pay penalties for redeeming your mortgage before the end date….

@Joseph Dempsey: you mean the profits it’s made in the EU so as soon as we claim I’m 27 countries will be claiming their share of it, you’ll find that their profits made in Ireland are minuscule in the 13bn,

@John Meade: Here’s a mad idea! Stop putting countries into to so much debt. If you can’t afford it then don’t buy it. Stop bailing out banks and let them crash. It’ll be a lesson to the rest of them. They’re ideals though that will never translate into practice unfortunately.