VOTE!!

Vote Fine Gael Number 1 Today!!

Importance of Tomorrow

Tomorrow is YOUR chance to change the direction of this fine Country. For far too long the Irish people have been stuck with a Government who have not put the people’s interests 1st. This is a Great Country but we can still do so much better. We can still be so much better.

Our 5 Point Plan to Get Ireland Working takes on what we think are the major challenges facing the country; creating and protecting jobs, fixing our budget deficit, revolutionising the provision of health services, modernising our public service and transforming our political system. Fine Gael has spent the whole campaign talking to people about our plans and explaining how they can and will be implemented.

With so little time to go I know that every vote is vital. If you think our plan and our team offer the best and most credible route out of our current recession then please vote for Fine Gael. If you think it is the best plan then tell your friends and your family about the plan.

Ireland needs a strong Government with a clear mandate to make the changes that our country needs

The time has finally come to VOTE FINE GAEL NO.1 TOMORROW

Thanks for listening to my ramblings over the past few weeks, I promise no more bulk emails! (until the Presidential election in the autumn!)

NewERA Plan for Ireland's Infastructure

The infrastructure for industry is continuously lacking in Ireland. We are currently ranked second from last in Europe for Broadband connectivity. 50% of our domestic water is wasted through leaking pipes and we are wasting billions on our energy needs. Fine Gael would introduce NewERA an €18 billion stimulus package to invest in our industry infrastructure. This plan would last 4 years and help get up to 100’000 people back to work by retooling our economy.

NewERA has 3 key areas, Water distribution, Energy Usage and Broadband. We envisage that by 2020 50% of our energy needs should be produced by Renewables, this would help insulate us from rising oil prices in which we extremely vulnerable to at present due to 90% of our current energy requirements coming from oil. By 2025 50% of all cars in will run on electricity which would in turn continue to reduce or carbon footprint. A new company, Irish Water will be established to manage our water needs, currently 34 local authorities share that responsibility which doesn’t return value for the €700 million a year spent on water purification.

Fine Gael would initiate Broadband 21 to develop a network of high speed fibre optic cables throughout the country. Even though some areas in the country are covered by Broadband the bandwidth is so low it’s not going to be able to support the new Next Generation technologies. Ireland has the potential to be at the forefront of the ever growing IT sector. The country is already demonstrated as a successful central European Business hub with the example of Google setting up their European headquarters in Dublin.

Ireland has to capacity to lead the way in the IT sector and thus ensure more university graduates follow on into high skilled positions within the country. All of what’s in the NewERA plan are necessities for industry to grow in modern Ireland. Even though a significant undertaking it is essential to overcome the years of neglect under the present government.

Sustainable Development

I started a new module during week 1, Sustainable Development. And to be honest it is a part of the course I really do not know what to expect from it. My initial thoughts on ‘Sustainable Development’ were entirely about the buildings, construction and living within our means. But I learned that Sustainable Development is about much more. Indeed a definition for the phrase is difficult to nail down! Indeed for the class to gather the appropriate knowledge on the subject we will be having people from the fields of Economics, Science and Political Science or Society lecture to us during the 11 week programme. This isn’t a module that requires in-depth learning of facts but more to change our thinking, to stimulate a more responsible attitude.

Our first lecture was introductory in nature but it gave us the impression that we need to live our lives they way we should choose but with respect for the environment. The following lecture focused on our ecological self, how we as humans interact with the environment around us. There was a focus on action or doing, clearly there are problems we could be acting on but we need to empower ourselves to be able to deal with them. Technology which plays a big part in our lives will have to change, nowadays technology is designed around us, in being our tools but technology that’s beneficial to us must not infringe on or damage the environment around it, or at the least lesson the damage caused.

If I was it focus on an idea from the first week it is the Political change that is needed to make us to develop sustainably for the future. I wasn’t fully aware before of the continuing problem that politics causes. The basic idea for SD is “meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. But at present we are not doing this because we are living beyond our means. The amount of Oil we consume to continue our current standard of living is completely contradictory to the sentence above. Politics is not about representing the people who have elected you, that’s just democracy; it is about staying in the job you’re in or moving up the ladder of power. Cutting the standard of living now, to preserve the future standard is not politically viable. A politician is judged on items such as economic growth, how they improve the infrastructure (more roads is always better it seems) etc. But we don’t need a wholesale change of the political class; I’m not advocating any revolutions! but we need a change in our thinking, the ideas and desires of the general populous need changing. And to be honest, I cannot see that coming very easy. At present the challenges that face us because of poor sustainable development are not severe enough to facilitate a major change in our ways. But I believe that in 5 to 10 years time when the price of oil is a multiple of what is today then change will happen, but will it be too late?

Passing the Finance Bill

I find it very disheartening by Gerry Adams of Sinn Fein releasing a statement demanding that the Finance Bill here in Ireland be abandoned. The Bill is a key piece of legislation that needs to be finalised. We as a country have to show the economic world that we can behave rationally, work together and be able to determine our own affairs. If the Finance Bill was to be left to a new government then the upcoming election debates would be overrun by parties arguing over budgetary policy. A budget which is virtually set itself due to the four year plan. The election needs to be about who has the best policies to reinvent this country and return the country to a robust economic footing, all round growth and getting the thousands on the live register back working. It is democratically responsible for Fine Gael and Labour to hold back their Motions of No Confidence, they are doing the jobs given to them by the people and that is to deliberate, propose and implement laws while representing their constituents. It is not the job of our public representatives to blindly oppose any measures proposed by the government but to work with measures they seem necessary to pass and to recommend and demand amendments. An election regarding the budget would indeed be a benefit to Sinn Fein because as a party who proclaim to represent the working people, would oppose any measures of austerity that are unfortunately required in these unprecedented economic times. I along with the vast majority of the country did not want to see the IMF and the EU bailing our country out but because of the grave mismanagement by Fianna Fail we had no choice but to accept their help. It is now up to the representatives of the people of this country to show responsibility and confidence that we can work with the international bodies to enable a return to the money markets for Ireland and indeed argue for an interim reduction in the EU/IMF interest rate.