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A SMALL MAJORITY of people believe that the law should not be changed to allow electric scooters to be used on Irish roads.
The latest Amárach/Claire Byrne Live poll for TheJournal.ie found that almost half of people (46%) believe that the law should not be changed, compared to just 41% of those who believe it should and 13% who say they don’t know.
Men (50%) were more likely to say the law should be changed than women (33%), while more Dubliners were said the law shouldn’t be changed (47%) than those that said it should (42%).
In contrast, more people from parts of Leinster, when Dublin was excluded, said they were supportive of having the law changed (47%) than those who weren’t (42%).
However, support for legalising electric scooters dropped in other parts of the country: only 39% of people in Munster and 32% of people in Connaught and Ulster were in favour of doing so.
Support for legalising the use of electric scooters on Irish roads was highest among those aged 55 and over (43%), with those aged 18-24 the most likely to be against changing the law (50%).
Those from well-off backgrounds were more reluctant to have the law changed (44%) than supportive of changing the law (42%).
But significantly more people from lower-income backgrounds were against changing the law (49%) than those who supported doing so (40%).
Last month, the Department of Transport launched a public consultation on whether so-called Powered Personal Transporters (PPTs) – including electric scooters – should be legalised.
A report from the Road Safety Authority (RSA) to carry out research into how other EU member states regulated the vehicles argued that legislation should be developed for their use here.
The RSA believes such laws would encourage the use of protective equipment for users of PPTs, allow for training and safety standards for them, as well as give guidance on where the vehicles can be used.
It also found that the use of such PPTs could help Ireland reach its climate emissions targets.
The Claire Byrne Live / Amarách Research Panel consists of over 1,000 Irish adults, all aged 18+. The poll was conducted earlier this week.
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NATO membership would cost us something like 7.8 billion a year, and the government are pushing for it at a time of crippling poverty and homelessness. But ask them to help our most vulnerable and they go on about not having a magic money tree. Election now please
@The Risen: I presume you would favour having two armies then. Which one would join NATO?
@The Risen:
Having a election will suddenly fix everything in Ireland according to you
@Just Some Guy: it’s a magic election tree
@The Risen: Absolute nonsense talk. You are, I presume, estimating a 2% of GDP spend on Defence as per the NATO member guideline. A) Most NATO members miss that target by 0.5 to 1% and B) We don’t use GDP to identify the wealth of the nation anyway, we use modified GNI, which strips out the FDI skew. On that basis 2% would be about 4 billion, but the Govt’s own Commission has suggested its upper ceiling for investment at 3 Billion, whereas the Govt, in a few weeks time, is *actually* going to announce a Defence spending increase from 0.9 Billion to 1.5 Billion. At least be honest with people. We don’t even have the capacity to increase defence spending by more than this for years to come, because we haven’t got the personnel to operate that much new gear!!
@The Risen: you have to defend yourself and it costs. We can no longer hide behind NATO militarily and geographically
@The Risen: a election now would not work,
We need experienced leaders and not on the job training.
Don’t get me wrong I do think a election will come but now is not the time for a apprenticeship government.
As for nato? I don’t know, we are basically giving up our sovereignty if we haven’t already. It’s a interesting subject to talk about regardless
@The Risen: What is source of the cost figure you cited for NATO membership?
@The Risen: Look at Iceland, they don’t contribute the same as other members but offer strategic locations for bases
@John Byrne: Who says we have to defend ourselves? People are surprisingly foolish in forgetting that no-one has attacked us in centuries.
@John Byrne: why?
@The Risen: maybe 7.8 billion is cheaper than death.
@The Risen: NATO member Iceland spends 0% of its GDP on defense.
“Military expenditure (% of GDP) in Iceland was reported at 0 % in 2019, according to the World Bank collection of development indicators, compiled from officially recognized sources.”
So Micheál Martin said Ireland would need a referendum to join a European Union defence pact if one was declared because there are provisions in the Constitution that would demand it, but if FF, the FG and the Greens decided to join NATO which included non-EU countries, such as the USA, Canada, Albania and a couple more, it would be fine. We would commit to defending any one of them if need be and no questions asked as it is a part of the deal. An attack on one is an attack on all.
One really has to look at the history of this Island and look at the number of times that it was invaded over the centuries and by whom? One also has to seriously look at why anybody would seriously consider invading us and why as well as how they would invade us. Many ships are needed to do this and not many countries have such capabilities, especially in our part of the north Atlantic.
Let’s not forget that it was NATO that went in to Libya to topple Ghaddafi, who was not a threat to Europe and it was also NATO that went into and ran out of Afghanistan after some 20 years of occupation and giving the country back to the Taliban.
No to NATO
What part of that do FFG not understand…
@Kerry Evans: the part where the RAF have to chase migs off our west coast coz we can’t
.. maybe you don’t get that
@Billybutcher: yes Billy because all of a sudden because we join NATO we are going to have dozens of mig catching aircraft. We don’t need to join NATO because 1. We are surrounded by NATO countries and anyone invading us would have to go through their airspace and territorial waters and 2. Britain would not allow a hostile country to invade Ireland unchallenged nothing to do with any romantic notion that England love us but their territorial security would be compromised badly. And 3. it would be political suicide in the US if they allowed any country invade Ireland unchallenged particularly Russia
@Michael McGrath: so your basically saying our defence policy should be to sponge of our neighbours without anything in return. We are part of Europe and we gain more than we put in. Its time we acknowledge our dependency on Europe and Nato to protect our territory.
Successive governments have threatened our defence forces as nothing more than an extention to every council in Ireland, underfunding and used for cheap labour.
Policy changes are needed, realistic funding for defence policy and an openness to aligning ourselves to a European defence grouping.
@Billybutcher: MIGs could easily evade any planes Ireland could realistically afford to buy. Let’s not make a joke of ourselves.
@Billybutcher: what were the big bad migs going to do over our skies? And how many planes would we need to stop Russian planes flying over our country? I’d expect a similar size airforce as the UK. Think about what your saying, there is no way we could afford or populate the size of army required to repel Russia. Ukraine has a huge army and couldn’t do it without massive support.
@A -AFC: I never said that did I. I pointed out reasons why we don’t need to join NATO as we don’t have any enemies within striking distance and that Britain out of self interest would never allow it to happen. The only country that ever invaded Ireland was England 900 years ago why would that change all of a sudden. This pumped narrative about the Ukraine that the same could happen to us is absolute nonsense. The Ukraine in Russias eyes has been disputed territory from the very formation of the state we do not have any similarities with it whatsoever
Should it not be ‘………. a referendum before APPLYING to join NATO.’?
@sean o’dhubhghaill: You’re absolutely right, but in the unlikely event we did apply, there’d be no question of a refusal. Our location is massively important strategically, we’re like an 85,000 sq. Km aircraft carrier in the Atlantic.
@Roy Dowling: You should probably read your history. ‘Plan W’ was negotiated between the British and Irish Governments and was a live possibility between 1940 and 42. Churchill was willing to tolerate Ireland being neutral, so long as it was secure. Had the Nazis invaded (which their Operation Green was drawn up to do), Ireland would have joined the conflict on the Allied side and British, American and Canadian forces would have operated in Ireland to repel the invasion and secure the island. In the end, the failure of Operation Sealion (Nazi land invasion of GB) meant the risk to Ireland faded, bit of course Allied forces were based in the six counties, including submarines, naval convoy escorts and coastal command patrol planes.
@Roy Dowling: you could save yourself a lot of energy by simply posting a short statement everyday to the effect that there are faults on both side (we know it), that there is lack of moral integrity on both sides (we know it) that both sides are exploiting the invasion for their own particular ends (we know it) that, thanks to relentless PR, neither the Russian people nor their ‘opponents’ have full awareness of what is happening (we know it). All your posts repeat these notions in different forms as if the readers here need education. They don’t. The NATO issue is simply another instance of the type of action you are routinely criticising, so no need to comment really if all you are doing is repeating yourself.
@Roy Dowling: I was just curious as to why you feel the need to repeat the same idea endlessly? A question you don’t have to answer of course.
@Roy Dowling: Being of strategic value has nothing to do with launching airstrikes, that would be tactical value. I used the Aircraft Carrier reference as a metaphor, but as you always treat things so black and white, it doesn’t surprise me that it went over your head. Ireland is a hub for major ocean resources, data and communications networks. Just a few months ago, a Chinese Navy electronic surveillance ship was detected by the Brits NW of Donegal. We’ve already seen what the Russians wanted to do off the S coast and continue to do with their Bombers all over Europe. Take a look at what China is doing in seas of Asia and in the Polynesian region, to assess what might some people regard as sleepy backwater islands, but that powers like China and Russia regard as strategic.
@Roy Dowling: we gave a lot of intelligence to the allies during ww2. Can I ask one thing if you Roy? Please review what you want to say instead of making it up as you go. You don’t have to know everything (I don’t certainly) but it would make you look like you did your homework and you understand what your talking about.
That applies to me also and anyone reading this comment!
@Roy Dowling: You are an piece of work aren’t you boy…My way or the high way kinda guy. Clown!
Emmmm…who said we wanted to join NATO?! You’re asking the wrong question here forcing your opinion. Sad!
@Damien Leen: Nothing in the article says that. It is a legal exploration. What’s sad is, that you obviously haven’t even read it before climbing the high horse.
@Eoin Roche: so…an article about a possible referendum before being able to join NATO isn’t really about joining NATO…Let me join up the dots for you…can’t be bothered actually!
@Damien Leen: That’s not gone well for you at all.
@Damien Leen: actually the article has led me to look more into the facts about how NATO come to their decisions so I think it’s a good piece; what struck me is this isn’t done by a vote and this is the reason why its actually difficult to find case law for it, in fact the case law in the article above may not even be that relevent to how decisions are met in NATO. Why is that relevent? Because that determines whether or not it warrants a referendum or not.
Martin is under the impression he is a war time Taoiseach, Churchill is certainly isn’t…Not much of a peace time Taoiseach either when all is said and done. Don’t recall when the invasion of Iraq ,Afghanistan happened Martin, Varadkar, Coveney were as vocal as they are now. Hypocrisy at it’s best.
@Donal Desmond: He is slightly
Churchill, the nodding dog from the TV
@Alan Biddulph: Oh, yes.
MM does not speak for me. This needs to go to the people. Arrogance at its highest.
@Dave Barrett: then vote no if and when that happens. That is your right and nobody will think less of you if you decided to go down that route
@Dave Barrett: Every decision made should go to referendum, it’s unfortunate that it needs to be connected to the constitution, we could get so much done with monthly public votes.
Well their getting very used to getting their own way and dodging the constitutional rights lately under the guise of emergency powers so nothing would surprise me with this lot. All arselicking the EU to get cushy jobs because a fair whack of them will be out of work come next election
One thing is certainly clear which is that the Taoiseach stupidly made this claim without knowing the exact legal standing.
It was also a very unintelligent remark given the trend in current public opinion which he should have known the media would highlight.
If he or his party is in favour then they need to firstly convince the majority of the population of any possible major benefits compared to a capable well equipped DF but with neutrality or the more integrated role in EU defence.
For example would we see any major foreign investment in ports, bases etc would military equipment for the DF be forthcoming at a minimum cost. Would Ireland have any opt out clauses for certain instances.
@Mentis Green: he gets swept up in it all when he’s in Europe, they all do. Kenny was awful for it. He’d go over for a standard meet n greet and come back and he’d have given half our resources away, then just tell us to pipe down. Martins exactly the same in that regard. They get awestruck at the big table and end up showing how little they value the Irish public, and let things like this slip. Literally sayin “don’t mind them we can push that thru and leave them out of it altogether” .. showing no respect to us at all, just gleefully saying he can give them all the canon fodder we can give them. Ursula has been pushing for this for a while, and they’re using the war to try scare the public into agreeing.
We even had a clause in the Lisbon treaty to guarantee our neutrality and that was for a EU defence force not even NATO, why would we sign up to them?
Ha ha ha
Martin was a silly boy to get in the weeds with this one. Yes, technically, he is correct that the post-Lisbon Constitutional clause only prevents Ireland joining an EU common defence apparatus without a referendum and not NATO, but any Government would be very foolish not to hold one all the same. It’s not like the Government have any notion of joining NATO anyway, so I don’t know why he got himself mired in it. All the same, it’s long past time Ireland’s defence capability and neutrality and the European and Global security situation were openly and honestly debated in this Country. Regardless of joining any defence alliances, the time of relying on the charity of other nations for our security and defence has passed.
We are already in NATO – Partnership for Peace Program
We were/are Non-Aligned (Not Neutral) – that allowed the USSR Aeroflot to land in Shannon to refuel on their way to Cuba
It also allows now the US Airforce to land in Shannon on their way to where they go now.
Just because you are joining NATO does not mean you have to pay billions.
Look at Iceland as an example – they are in NATO yet they do not have any army.
They lease out the Keflavik Air Force base to the US Air Force and get paid for that – AND they are then under the NATO umbrella.
If we were truly thinking outside the box we could get Hospital Ships and/or Hospital Aircraft to assist in any warzone.
No fan of NATO, but we need to hitch or wagon to something given the way the world is going, might aswell be NATO.
have your say