A Possible Solution To Irish Water Charges

Fortunate Son. (An extract from the original song written by John C. Fogerty.)

“Some folks are born; silver spoon in hand, Lord, don’t they help themselves,
But when the tax men come to the door, Lord, the house looks like a rummage sale.

Yeah, some folks inherit star-spangled eyes, they send you down to war,
And when you ask them, “How much should we give?” they only answer, more, more, more.“

A great friend of mine recently stated that most politicians in Ireland get elected on their ability to talk, few if any get elected on any real ability to achieve even the simplest of basic planning.
Politician’s massive salaries and their annual divvying of uncertified expenses to the tune of €7 million, have set each of our Irish politicians clearly apart from the basic unemployed and low-income family, now easily identified in all communities throughout this green nation.

Dáil Eireann, for the few elected Tipperary politicians who actually attend daily debates; is now observed as a house dedicated to a power struggle between individual party politicians, all anxious to carve up the largest slice of the cake for their respective Party of choice, in time for the next General Election early in the New Year.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny and Tánaiste Joan Bruton were both heckled and jeered by a female Irish Water protester last night in Dublin, latter calling them, amongst other words, traitors, as they attempted to launch this government’s latest plans to commemorate Dublin’s 1916 rising, amid a thunderous, continuous, onslaught of screaming and window-banging from mostly angry unemployed water protesters lined up outside.

Today, M/s Mary Lou McDonald has refused to leave the Dáil chamber, following a furious row with the Tánaiste over unanswered questions regarding water charges. (Latter unanswered questions now a daily happening in our parliament.)

In Dublin tonight, latter the only county this present Irish Government appears to promote and protect; an Orange weather alert remains in place with heavy rain and spot flooding forecast across the city. Motorists are being urged to take extra care as a number of the cities roads are flooded. They include: The M1 and the M50, The Old Swords Rd at Santry Ave, The right lane of the N4 Lucan Rd outbound before J4 Newcastle, River Rd is closed between Dunsink and Ashtown, Flooding is causing problems at the Ballyowen traffic lights in Lucan, The N7/ Naas Rd inbound between J4 Rathcoole and J3 Citywest, Outbound, there’s flooding at the Garter Lane junction, the Old Bawn Rd is flooded at Firhouse West Rd. junction, as is the Orchard Lane and Tower Rd in Clondalkin. Flooding is also expected in Wexford, Wicklow and Louth; no shortage of water there then.

Here in the forgotten rural outback of Tipperary our simple rural dwellers, who require development funding of any sort, normally hold an event; a Fashion Show (That reminds me – Do not forget Templetuohy National School next Friday night), a Cake Sale, sell Raffle Tickets, hold a Quiz Night, Shave of Beards etc..  People and businesses here give financial support according to their means and those who cannot, offer manual assistance in other ways.

Complain all you want but secretly yes we do need to find money to support our water infrastructure and in particular to ensure that those generations, yet to come, have fresh water to drink. Governments have grant aided corporate and other business sectors in the destruction of our natural Eco systems, e.g.  Sellafield Ltd, Farmers spreading slurry, Companies selling often useless unnecessary cleaning chemicals and weed killers, untreated raw sewage, all still allowed to flow, in many cases, unrestricted into our seas, streams, rivers and water tables.

However the setting up of the company Irish Water (Uisce Eireann) is testament to the typical aforementioned work of “all talk – no planning ability politicians” and their useless consultants and ‘Nod & a Wink’ board advisor’s.

A possible acceptable solution to Irish Water

What we now need is a Public Utility Lottery.  No please don’t run away; read on.

Our Irish National State Lottery was created when the Irish government passed the National Lottery Act of 1986. Its aim to help raise funds for eligible causes such as sport and recreation, health and welfare, national heritage and the arts, the Irish language, and yes the natural environment. It all began in March 1987 with Scratchcards, and the draw game ‘Lotto’ began in March 1988.  Today it operates three families of draws, e.g. Lotto, EuroMillions, and Daily Million, while funding televised bingo and game shows, sells a wide range of scratchcards and runs a number of Millionaire Raffles every year.

By the end of 2013, the National Lottery had achieved over €12 billion in cumulative sales, with over 64% of our adult population actively playing the game. In this same year our present Government sold our Irish National State Lottery together with most of the rest of our family silver, to a private operator, Premier Lotteries Ireland. Our present government is receiving €405 million from this sale, some of which will finance the construction of our long-awaited Dublin’s new National Children’s Hospital, which we now understand cannot be properly equipped.

Questions that need answering.

• Are we now banned from starting up a Public Utility Lottery on the basis of our recent National Lottery sale?
• Would a lottery not take into consideration a person’s ability to pay?
• Would it not put a stop to stupid expensive water administration procedures soon to be implemented by the Dept of Social Protection?
• Would it take unemployed struggling daily protesters off our streets?
• Best of all, would it not create even more jobs and manufacture new millionaires when it’s new offices are set up in Thurles, Co Tipperary, instead of Dublin?

Maybe Mr Alan Kelly, (whose office refuses to answer Emails from supportive constituents) could leak this plan to the Media in the Governments usual way, to test out the electorate’s mood, before this Government discovers that present plans to commemorate Dublin’s 1916 rising has arrived for real, one year earlier than expected.

Just the thoughts of a ‘Rural Simpleton’ – hope I haven’t offended anyone.