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Trust issues – Is the Irish Police Force dodgy?

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Trust issues – Is the Irish Police Force dodgy?

The An Garda Siochana, the Irish Police Force, is – like every other police force in the democratic world – the one and only enforcer of right and wrong in the country. They are not the judge if it is REALLY right or wrong, that’s what we have the judiciary (the courts and judges) for, but the police has to enforce the laws.

If you enforce the laws, however, you should also be obliged to stick to the laws. It increases your credibility tremendously and you set an all important example. If the rules don’t apply to the enforcer of the laws, then people behave like the children of parents that don’t stick to the rules they spout out. They become unruly and break the rules.

A small example: It is wrong for the Gardai to be allowed to use/handle mobile phones when driving, as long as all of us are not allowed to use mobile phones. And I think that EVEN if the mobile phone use is exclusively in the pursuit of their job….because we all know that it is NOT only in the pursuit of their job when they use the phone.

This is however a really small example and the Irish Gardai do it better:

1) Over the last few years they claimed that they carried out 1.9mio roadside alcohol test, but the Medical Bureau of Road Safety only knows of 1mio. How can there be a discrepancy of nearly a million? (RTE Report)

2) 14,500 people were prosecuted for road traffic offences and will have their convictions quashed because the gardai screwed up. They were brought to court without getting a fixed charge notice first. Not ok! (How come it took so long to come out?) The people that now get their money back and points removed because they drove 3km/h too fast (I got 3 points for that. Grrr!) are ok in my eyes, but what about people that committed serious traffic offences and who will also go without any penalty now? (RTE Report)

3) The Sergeant Maurice McCabe saga that is also called the Garda Whistleblower Scandal where Maurice McCabe lifted the lid on Garda corruption around the penalty point system and was threatened within the police force and a cover up was attempted is still not completely sorted. 5 years after it started!

4) This week it emerged that there are financial irregularities at the Garda College in Templemore. They had 50 (!) bank accounts for the college and used money for entertainment and presents that should not have been used for that. (RTE Report)

5) And now the Garda Commissioner Noirin O’Sullivan indicates that this might not be the only falsifications there are.

Can we really trust our Police Force? I am sure (and know) there are many Gardai that can be trusted but if there are soo many problems, there seems to be a huge systemic problem and if you need LUCK to get to deal with a “good” Gardai then that doesn’t instill confidence in the enforcer of right and wrong in our country.

Dublin, Justice, Odd, Politics, , , ,

Are Irish Travellers are an ethnic minority? What about Cork people?

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Are Irish Travellers are an ethnic minority? What about Cork people?

On Wednesday the Taoiseach declared the Irish Travellers as a ethnic minority in Ireland. This was done after many years of refusal to do so by government after government and it begs the question why 01 March 2017 was seen as the perfect day for it because the discussion about it is going on for a long time.

And with that long delay and the repeated refusal, the next question has to be about the WHY travellers were recognised as an ethnic minority. There are just about 29,000 people in Ireland that declared themselves as travellers in the 2011 census. Some still have a nomadic lifestyle but many are now “settled travellers” (an interesting Oxymoron). They speak their own language or rather a dialect that is called De Gammon (by Irish Travellers) or Cant (by non-travellers) or Shelta (by linguists), a language that sees words that derive from Irish mixed with English.

The definition of an ethnic group requires some or all of the following features:
a shared history; a common cultural tradition; a common geographical origin; descent from common ancestors; a common language; a common religion; a distinct group within a larger community.

Looking at these 7 points, I’d say six out of seven are probably applicable (the seventh is the religion which is not different to the majority of people in Ireland). But is that enough to make a group an ethnic group and – if the group is small – to make it an ethnic minority?

Compare that to Cork people! The majority of people that live in Cork have a shared history because they have common ancestors. They definitely have a common geographical origin and have some common cultural tradition that are different from people in the rest of Ireland. They certainly have a common language, boy! …and they are a distinct group within a larger community. So the same six seem to apply to people from Cork as to Travellers. Should we now declare “People from Cork” as an ethnic minority?

Or compare it to full-blooded programmers! They have a shared (recent) history and have common cultural traditions. (Don’t laugh, programmers would call it “cultural”. ;-) ) They fall short on the common ancestors, but share as much a geographical origin as Travellers. Programmers definitely have a common language and to a degree they have a common religion (not in the traditional sense of “religion” though). They are a distinct group within a larger community and you could even say that they have largely a common dress code and appearance. So should Programmers get recognised as an ethnic minority?

Sure, I am over exaggerating and not that serious (at least with the Programmers). But shouldn’t we question any categorisation in our society? I know, this article is not political correct. The right approach would have been to celebrate the Traveller’s new categorisation and say nothing else. But are we maybe much TOO politically correct?

Please note, that I don’t have any answers, but I do have a lot of questions!

Irish, Odd, Politics, Society, , ,

Does the Irish Government know what “Brexit” means? – Irish 10 year plan in response to Brexit

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Does the Irish Government know what “Brexit” means? – Irish 10 year plan in response to Brexit

On Wednesday (15 Feb) Newstalk reported that the Taoiseach will announce a 10 year plan in response to Brexit here. I expected to read about a plan that would talk about supporting the exploration of new markets for Irish companies selling currently into the UK; a plan for getting tourists from elsewhere to visit Ireland to make up for the short fall of tourists from the UK and a plan to deepen our relationships with the other EU countries (#WhoNeedsTheUKAnyway).

But I certainly didn’t expect to read about a plan that will “focus on areas such as investments in roads, public transport, and energy.” Something MAJOR went wrong here! One of us, either Enda Kenny or myself, has NO clue what “Brexit” means?!

My understanding is that “Brexit” means that once it happens, one of 27 countries, Britain, which is made up of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, will leave the EU. That country won’t pay any more money into the EU, but will also not get any money from the EU anymore. All contracts that currently regulate relationships with other countries in the EU will stop being valid for the exiting country and everything has to be arranged new with this country. Ireland does a lot of business with Britain, so there will be some impact, but the ONLY area Brexit will impact Ireland is in matters that have to do with borders and markets as fas as we currently know.

How does have focus on “investments in roads, public transport (!!!!!) and energy” have anything to do with a Brexit? Enda Kenny is quoted saying “That new Plan will show how we will invest in roads, in public transport, in energy, in water, in schools, in higher education and in hospitals and health facilities. It will include detailed, funded plans to complete the national road network, including links between Dublin and Derry and Donegal, and to accelerate delivery of critical public transport infrastructure.

“It will include substantial investment in the ports and airports that Ireland will need as a successful, global trading nation. And it will support the achievement of our international climate change obligations and our national objectives for sustainable development and environmental protection.”

I accept that streets to Derry (in Northern Ireland) could be affected by a Brexit, but how does Brexit affect public transport? Or education? Or hospitals? Or national objectives (the clue is in the word, Mr Kenny!!) for sustainable development and environmental protection?

Has Endy Kenny lost it completely? NOTHING of that plan will prepare Ireland better for a Brexit than doing nothing. Now having such a plan is a VERY good idea for a country and it is surprising that this was not considered anyway, but needed a Brexit as a trigger. Is it a matter of “…we only look after our own country if another country leaves the EU”?

Very very odd!

Economy, Odd, Politics, ,

Suicidal Cyclists? – Helmet: Check! Lights: Who cares?

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Suicidal Cyclists? – Helmet: Check! Lights: Who cares?

Let me start with the promise that this won’t be one of these many blanket rants about cyclists that we find in plenty of media outlets, but it is an odd observation that I made in the last two week.

I don’t know if this is a new trend or a test of courage or stupidity or suicidal tendency among cyclists?! But in the last two weeks I encountered four (!) cyclists that were perfectly equipped with helmets and a pretty bike and even with lycras, but they completely left out the lights when they cycled at around 19:00/20:00 in pitch dark.

How can this happen? If they think they can be seen without lights or if they think nobody has to see them, then they are idiots. If they were just badly equipped or not serious cyclists or caught out by sudden darkness, I could understand it. But this time of the year, it is more dark then bright and these four were serious cyclists (judging by their good and serious bikes) and they were people that seemingly were aware of the general risk, otherwise they wouldn’t wear a helmet. ALL four wore a helmet!!!

How can you leave the house and check if you have your helmet and your bike and your bike lock and if you have put your lycras on, but then leave the lights behind? How can you think that it is in any way safe to cycle anywhere if you don’t have strong front and back lights?

Sure it can happen that you forget something (even lights) or that you run out of batteries/charge, despite otherwise really good planning. But FOUR forgetful cyclists in two weeks? Do they maybe really not realise that they are virtually invisible in the night?

Odd!!

Dublin, Odd, Traffic,

Car Insurance Madness in Ireland! Are they all incompetent?

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Car Insurance Madness in Ireland! Are they all incompetent?

I needed to renew my car insurance and this is always a good bit of work. Since I made some significant savings a few years ago, I always compare as many as possible insurances every year to see if there is a better offer somewhere.

Last year I didn’t change the insurer, but this year it went a little different. My car is a Mazda with 1.8l and it is 9 years old. I have a full no claims bonus and have my drivers license since I was 18 so for quite a long time. I also am driving in Ireland for many many years, BUT I still have a German drivers license and annoyingly I was caught in last May speeding! Yes, I did drive 6km (!!) faster than allowed and got 3 very very annoying penalty points.

This is the framework and the points and the German license do make things a little less smooth.

The saga started with AIG (last year’s insurer sending me a renewal offer for EUR 780. Not too bad I thought. A few days later they rang me and asked me if I was interested in renewing, so I said I was but hadn’t decided yet. The guy suggested that he will check if there is anything better than EUR 780 he can do and off he went with all his questions. But suddenly we hit a hurdle: He asked me if I had an Irish drivers license and I said that I still (as for the last four years I was insured with them) had my German license. He claims that that was never on their system (which is rubbish) and he would have to recalculate the price. After a few moments he told me that instead of EUR 780, now the best offer was EUR 1040! Wow! Not having had any accident for many years but having a German insurance suddenly increased my risk by nearly EUR 300? How can that happen? He claimed it is because I got my license driving on the other side of the road. But the fact that I am driving nearly longer on the (wrong ;-) ) Irish side of the road than on the German side didn’t impress at all. Well, there was no going back! AIG was not to be my trusted partner in the future, so I started comparing in earnest and I found VERY interesting things.

I found, for example, that Liberty Insurance is TOTALLY incompetent (or alternatively very greedy OR all the other insurances are the incompetent ones). Why? Well, the insurance cost is meant to be calculated based on the risk that you pose to the insurance and you would expect more or less the same price from EVERY insurance, because it can’t be that you are VERY risky for one and not at all risky for the other insurance. But Liberty seems to live on a different planet then the others. They calculated the cost as EUR 1667 !! Wow! That is even more than AIG wanted after the “change”.

Well, since most others quoted around EUR 780-950, I new that AIG and certainly Liberty were completely mad. (HOW can Liberty get any customers with prices like that???)

I also found out that the insurance quote comparison sites are NOT much use. Chill and Sheridan and Compare Insurance all quoted higher prices than I could get elsewhere. So don’t rely on the quality of the comparisons.

AXA was also madly expensive at EUR 1263. Another outlier.

The lowest quotes I got at first from 123.ie and Aviva and I nearly had decided for 123.ie, but then I remembered that I had forgotten to check with Allianz directly. In the past Allianz was always too expensive and I had already received Allianz quotes this time through the price comparison sites. (Compare Insurance quote EUR 993 and Sheridan quoted 853 – How can there be such a difference for the same insurance for the same conditions??? 140 Euro!?)

But then I rang Allianz and I got SOME surprise! They only quoted EUR 604!! That was by FAR the lowest price (but how can it be so much lower than the Allianz price that Sheridan and Compare Insurance quoted???). And compare this to the mad Liberty Insurance once more?!

So, you can guess who I signed the contract with!?

Now, my parameters are different than yours and therefore you could have a completely different result. So I am not saying that you will get the lowest or the highest quote from the same insurances I mention here. But what I am saying is that the work that you have to put into comparing can easily be worth your time! EUR 400 less than the AIG quote? I am happy to compare prices for 2 or 3 hours for that.

So, COMPARE COMPARE COMPARE and do NOT trust ANYBODY in this business. I think they ALL have no clue!

Economy, Odd, Society, , , , ,
 
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