Not to mention some desperate songs in the Eurovision down the years.

not to mention starting two world wars!

Patrick
It appears as if you don’t particularly like Germans then. However apart from that particularly irrelevant comment is there anything else you might like to add either of relevance of even more intellectual than your first go!

WIR GEHORCHEN!

The IMF, the OECD, the world bank, in fact everyone, are all saying austerity is not working

… all except Frau Merkel, that is – she who must be obeyed.

We spent 800 years wanting independence and the minute we get it, we hand it all over to Germany and the German controlled faceless unelected ECB

sorry she appear to have one hell of any ally among TDs in our Dail who have not yet raised Art 29 5 2 of Bunreacht na H’Eireann to say – we do not approve the agreemnt between minister and Commissioner O Rehn that we will merege Anglo Irish and INBS until it suit u and u consent to it s liquidation

U can see memornadu of understanding on dept of finance webiste. No TD ever asked me in 11 that this merger and approval of EU to liquidation is a platform – did they ask u.

And now it banks back on agenda and the bondholders while credit union looisng 15 million – small deposit and people complaing about preotection of deposit in cyprus.

Grow up . And te your local TD that Govt needed his /her vote to breach that agreement when under consitution his apporval and dail needed for it to be legally binding in the first palce – no ecb gagging the coutnry then for no agreement still in negotiaiton,

For the thousands who have emigrated to England, 7.4% or 7.5% mean nothing

Higgins what?

Closing the deficit is a vital step in lowering unemployment. It’s very difficult for an economy to create jobs when no one has confidence in the public finances.

Rodrigo
You’ve lost the run of yourself with that comment. Just to be a little bit pedantic may I point out that our current emigration figures aren’t remotely near the numbers that left these shores in the eighties. Suggesting that the current economic situation is similar to genocide is completely and totally ludicrous and merely devalues your arguments on any fiscal matters. Much more important is the effect such misrepresentation can have on the minds and emotions of people who are struggling to survive this entrenched period of austerity which would in many respects be worse if the current Programme was not being implemented. In such circumstances we would have no lenders of last resort to the State which would simply collapse to a far greater extent than even that of Greece.
Economic success is as much about sentiment as it is about fiscal performance and the negativity you spew helps to prolong the misery so maybe you will reflect on what is being said before you try to drown me in abuse and inaccuracies.

And how can anyone have confidence in the Dept of Finance when they baldly state …”a deterioration of the debt GDP ratio does not represent a worsening of the fiscal position….” What else does it mean, if not that?

The extra money borrowed this year was borrowed to test our re-entry to the financial markets. Most of it was short term debt that is re-paid in a number of months. The ratio is currently 123% but by year’s end that will be 110%. It’s the difference between the gross and net figures.

Their point is that the money wasn’t borrowed to be spent, it was borrowed just to prove that Ireland can borrow successfully.

What?

O yes and Higgins you never got back to me about what you said earlier about this government being responsible for creating 5000 jobs. as i said 100000 people have emigrated since this government started so if i was to ad that to the live register it be over half a million . So there be a lot more out off work if they did not leave the country . Were is the hundred thousand jobs promised . Now get back to your dog

@ Kevin,

You should really consider joining the greens. There more of an opportunity for you there. Rotor Heads and Flat heads

Quentin. I absolutely stand over my genocide comment. This government are trying everything they possibly can to get rid of the less well off. ( the ordinary people) We are deemed a burden on society, and a hindrance to the elite. They’ve proved this over and over by their policies which take from the poor in order to benefit the rich. They won’t rest until they’ve completely Wiped us out.

@rodrigo you’re spouting empty rhetoric. Go to Rwanda and tell them Ireland is undergoing a genocide and see what they think.

It’s a little known fact that the less well off in society are the ones who use the most public services. Fixing the public finances is the only way to ensure they continue to have this money spent on them.

Dude. Genocide? Seriously? I think you need some more Bacofoil…

It means that the cash difference between what the State spends and the amount it raises in taxation hasn’t got worse even if the debt to GDP ratio has.
Nirvana for the Government is when GDP grows at a much faster rate than the fiscal deficit. That would mean our debt to GDP ratio improves with actually changing anything.

No, read the article. By year end debt to gdp will be 123% not 110% as you claim.

the deficit thats looming on pensions is what is going to finish us off est.130 billion in 4 years time but also the unemployed figures are totally false if you include all that have emegrated and all who have been knocked off the list because their stamps ran out the self employed not allowed claim and the startling figure of 80,000 extra people claiming disabilty you start to get to the true figure of unemployment nearer to 25%

Oh Higgins the blind man can’t see

David. You’re right, our deficit is closing faster than predicted. However, for that to mean anything to ordinary people, it needs to translate into economic growth and money in peoples’ pockets. Austerity does not allow growth and only succeeds in putting money from ordinary peoples’ pockets into the pockets of a minority.

Because GDP is not a true measure of national income

Higgins thinks its just the deficit closing.

For the middle to lower class citizens of Ireland it feel like a noose around our neck thats closing.

@Higgins. I won’t expect any reply from you or your idiots. “the deficit has been reduced” at what cost? The impending sale of bord gais at a knockdown price? How about the destruction of your economy? Oh or the great give away of oilfields? What about the landing of private banking debt on mine and my children’s shoulders?
Wake up and see what’s happening you foolish easily manipulated morons.

Economic growth and prosperity is proceeded by the closing of the deficit. The deficit must be closed or on a certain course to be closed before strong growth can take place in the economy.

@ Kevin,

Page 7 of the dickh*ads Manual ?

Does that include the selling of profitable state assets, and the giveaway of natural resources? Does that make sense Higgins? Or do you just have to agree with whatever that easily wooed fool enda dictates to you?

I beleibe u are f gael man. So wsas I.
Do u forget sir that another term of agreement by Cowen that Irleand will capitalsie banks and downsize them. But that memorandum certainly not working – is it.

We will follow the UK anyway, they bailed out their banks, so did we, they hammered the poor, so did we, and now that they are starting to change tack on austerity, so are we.
We are not independent, we are in thrall to the brits and in hock to the huns.

GDP in Ireland includes MNC profits, which are repatriated out of the country.