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THERE HAS BEEN a lot of talk about an early election in the last few weeks – but how many people actually want one?
According to a new poll the majority of people don’t want an election this year, while almost one in five don’t know.
The poll was carried out by Amárach Research for RTÉ’s Claire Byrne Live.
Last week Fianna Fáil Leader Micheál Martin said that his party was “fully determined” to avoid an election until at least the end of this year and perhaps early next year.
Martin said that he wants to honour the confidence and supply agreement which was signed in 2016 and committed his party to facilitating three Fine Gael budgets, the third of which is due later this year.
When the Claire Byrne Live show asked, “would you like to see a general election take place this year?”, it found that the majority of people didn’t want one.
The results of the poll are:
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Everyone keeps saying..oh look at whats happening to Greece aren’t we lucky.
Well, we are not Greece. But things could have been a lot better for the Irish people if our Government had at least tried to reduce the debt instead of agreeing to everything without objection.
Remember Greece got €100 billion written off in the first round……we got nothing, no write down and even paid bondholders the interest.
Not saying we should have gone down the road that Greece went but we could have gone some of the way and be much better off than we are now.
There was a middle road!
And Iceland are doing grand now having burnt and jailed.
Jaysis would ye all Bjork off to Iceland then, if it’s such a utopia.
Iceland and the icelandic people are nothing like the Greeks… and its like comparing whales and wales.
Turkey and turkeys?
Curry and Curry?
Not sure Iceland are doing any better than we are Paul. Their growth rate is lower for a start. Also their population is less than 400,000. Much smaller economy.
Hi Gabbi………What have you got against Democracy?? The Greek government are acting in the interest of the people that elected them. Why are they wrong to do that??
It is silly to compare Iceland and Greece. Just as silly comparing Ireland and Greece.
Solidarity Greece, apologies our government wants you in chains.
Oh FFS.
If every country that was in trouble behaved the way Greece is, we’d all be in big trouble, solidarity or no solidarity.
About time Greece took responsibility for massive and widespread tax evasion, hiding their debts, paying themselves ridiculous salaries with ‘turning up’ bonuses and general stupidity… the country has needed more bailouts then Anglo-Irish banks – why is this? not this time. Pay the boatman Greece.. or fcuk off to Russia.
Relax, Russia’s coming to us.
Greece defaulting on the IMF won’t bother them.
Why solidarity with Greece. They got themselves into this mess by completely mismanaging every aspect of their society for decades. Lol solidarity
They’ve took responsibility for all the above, we must remember that this government is only newly in power. I long for the day when a credible alternative to capitalism/neoliberal is that we experience in this country. Trickle down effect, no, DOB and the like cleaning up, yes
Read Krugmans article from this week. This is not about Greece taking responsibility. Its about the political and social failure of present day representative democracy to protect citizens across the EU from the ravaged of late capitalism and neoliberlism.
“How did we get to this point? Nothing fills me with quite as much despair as the persistence of the story line that it’s all about continuing Greek fecklessness, that the Greeks haven’t done anything. In fact, Greece has imposed almost inconceivable pain on itself. Here’s a comparison between Greece and Spain, the current favorite son of the austerity camp (although the Spaniards themselves aren’t impressed)
The problem has been that severe spending cuts in an economy with no independent monetary policy and no ability to devalue lead to severe economic contraction, which in turn means that a large part of what’s gained fiscally at the front end gets lost via reduced revenue. This isn’t the fault of the Greeks, it’s basically a design flaw in the euro itself.
So what about Grexit? At this point quite a few people on the creditor/Troika side of the negotiations seem almost to welcome the prospect. But this is bizarre in terms of their underlying interests. Yes, the lives of the officials would become easier, for a while, because they wouldn’t have to deal with Syriza. But from the point of view of the creditors, Grexit would be a pure negative. They would almost surely receive less in payments than they would under any deal that keeps Greece in, and the proof that the euro is in fact reversible would grease the rails for future crises, even if the ECB is able to contain this one.
And as Martin Wolf points out, Greece will still be there, and will still need dealing with.
The Greeks, on the other hand, should feel conflicted. There would probably be a lot of financial chaos in the immediate aftermath of euro exit. And maybe the apocalyptic warning from the Bank of Greece that devaluation would push the nation back into the Third World is right, although I’d like to know about the model and historical examples that would justify this claim. But absent that kind of implosion, a devalued currency should eventually produce an export-led recovery — I understand the cynicism one hears, but demand curves do slope downwards even in Greece.
The point is that nobody should be casual or confident here. But the creditors should actually be even more worried than the Greeks about a potential exit that has no upside for the rest of Europe.”
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/06/18/thinking-about-the-all-too-thinkable/
Merkel’s empire is crumbling. The European Union seemed to work on paper but then so does time travel & teleportation.
Yez can bang on about capitalism all u like. We are stuck with it for at least 30 more years.
We’ve left capitalism as we know it Jim, it doesn’t take a genius to work out that FG are a party massively influenced by neoliberalism.
Rhetoric Gabby did you see the beer belly on our Minister for finance?
They do say that the ordinary Greek people will find their treasure at the bottom of a skip ,whilst they were looking for scraps to eat .
We’re stuck with capitalism for 30 years in the same way we are stuck with gravity for 30 years.
gravity is essential for our very existence, capitalism is one method to govern our existence. One of many systems most of which we’ve yet to try out
Other systems facism, socialism and communism … What could possibly go wrong with any of those?
Kevin what are you about 17?
Socialism, or elements of it seems to work in Venezuela, the Nordic countries and Japan. There’s certainly a case for adapting it’s best bits
You mean Venezula, a country heavily dependent on oil revenues, obscene rates of gang violence and bribery when it comes to getting basic needs such as toilet paper.
A utopia alright.
When did I mention a utopia? I said some elements are worth considering. And why is Venezuela using their own natural resources a problem? Do it the capitalist/imperialist way and just invade countries? Great alternative
Denmark a Nordic country are after electing a right wing crowd into govt who were opposition to left wing govt up until yesterday.
The Todd…….Who needs to use their own natural resources for the benefit of their people. Far better to give gas away for nothing and have no regulation to have the gas sold and used in Ireland.
Then…..not too far away you can build a biomass plant and have fuel for it shipped from North America rather than use the gas down the road. That way we can have a plant that produces electricity at twice the normal cost and lots of rich folk can make more money.
this rubbish has gone on long enough. they are talking about borrowing new debt to pay old debt!! its a ponzi scheme. you cannot fix a debt problem with more debt…………..it has never been done in history and never will be. even if a last minute deal is reached, the borrowed money will only last a few months before this crap starts all over again.
the euro itself is totally unsustainable, the low interest rates and monetary policy is totally unsuited to peripheral countries like greece. its not at all suited for the likes of italy…….the eurozones third biggest economy. europe has a massive debt problem besides greece.
the record low interest rates and easy money policies of the ecb has blown up bubbles all over the continent. this will not end well.
If Greece goes then the mess just moves to the next economy stuck in the Euro muck. Italy or Portugal most likely.
Ourselves and Germany are the only two with reasonable growth rates and that is because we both rely on exporting to outside the Euro block.
And although we are good little soldiers paying most of our debts – we remain the most indebted nation in europe per head of population….so when the clown Noonan says “…it’s a European issue rather than an Irish issue…” its quite obvious that this economically illiterate failed school teacher is as adept at handling his job as any or all of the former
FF economic illiterates that got us into this mess….Cowan, Lenihan, Neary, McCreevey, Ahern…the list of criminals goes on and on……oh, and add Allan Kelly to the list, greasy hair, but no brains or ideas to solve the housing crisis…that is except to warehouse thousands of children and their parents in state provided hotel rooms for years at a time and at several multiples in cost of providing decent temporary accommodation….duh!!…hey the taxpayer will cover the cost of torturing families trapped in hotel rooms for years at ta time…whatever, eh Allan?
That may be true John but we are very exposed in the event of a slowdown with our monumental (and ever growing) national debt. This will end very badly.
Summing up the situation….. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11687229/Greek-debt-crisis-is-the-Iraq-War-of-finance.html
Ya, we need real economic geniuses like gerry Adams and Paul Murphy to save us. Hahaha
I’d say the only thing Micheal Noonan is worried about is will his own bonds be paid!
Im sure the ECB EU IMF all have their plans in place to ruthlessly protect the Euro.
Paul im sure they have and then they will use the Greek situation as a warning to everyone else to tow the line and its their way or the highway
Its all a game. People are making vast amounts of money from this game.
They will be saved at the last minute then its rinse and repeat
The EU will happily burn Europe to the ground to protect this disaster of a currency Union.
Even if Greece goes the Eurozone will still be beset by low growth and mass unemployment.
It always happens when currencies are set up for political reasons and ignore economics.
It’s like the family funeral, where everybody looks at the oldest and thinks, “You’re next”…
Reminds me of that story of going to a wedding single and be told by elderly relatives ‘you’ll be next’ – so you do the same to them when you meet them at funerals.
Who told you that story Gabbi, wasn’t the endless memes on social media sites was it?
No @thetodd it was your mother.
*yeah i went there.
Wouldn’t be like you to revert to generic rhetoric…
#rhetoric!
Pontius, what nobody is saying is if they default on the 1.6b, they have a grace period of 2 months to rectify/continue re-negotiations…it’s in the IMF rules! And, Finland, once the absolute fist-thumping ‘get Greece to pay fully’ is now alittle more subdued due to the utter economic catastrophe being experienced there at this moment. So a softening may occur, to allow further bailout money to be released, and keep Greece and its people fed but sadly under fiscal servitude for many generations to come!
Randle, IMF just changed the rules……… “One should have thought that the IMF would wish to lower the political temperature, given that its own credibility and long-term survival are at stake. But no, Christine Lagarde has upped the political ante by stating that Greece will fall into arrears immediately if it misses a €1.6bn payment to the Fund on June 30.
In my view, this is a discretionary escalation. The normal procedure is to notify the IMF Board after 30 days. This period is a de facto grace period, and in a number of past cases the arrears were cleared up quietly during the interval before the matter ever reached the Board.”
Michael Noonan is an ignorant bafoon, I wish we had Yanis Varoufakis as our finance minister.
@joseph
Off with you to Greece then. When you get there you will find unemployment rising as opposed to it falling here in Ireland. No country or lender of last resort is now willing to give Mr Varoufakis any money but Ireland can now raise money on the open market at reasonable rates. If Mr Varoufakis continues with his current policies it is only a matter of weeks until capital controls will be introduced and ordinary people will be unable to withdraw their money from Greek banks when and if they wish to. The value of their labour will decrease dramatically as they will probably be in the drachma. But hey you stick with Yannis.
Ireland unemployment 9.8%
Greek unemployment 24.5%
I’m sure you’ll find great succes over there Jospeh !!
I aggree with joseph. Our politicians are eejits. Thing will devalue in greece shortterm but in 3/4 years time, greeces economy will be free from debt and booming while we’ll still be stuck with austerity and high taxes. It’s artificially bad in greece now because of the euro. Our political morons when they were elected took the easy route, just caved in to the EUs demands, raised taxes saying they had no choice. Now they’re trying to give the impression here that things are better than they really are just to win the next election. There’s a lot of scaremongering going on by the EU and the irish gov and a lot of people are being fooled by it.
must be no job bridge in greece then
Are 3000 jobs a month, every month, being created on Ireland, Patrick, because that’s the number of people emigrating? And that’s just the 20-29 year olds.
@Gordon…..540,000 emigrated since the Banks took control of the country. Add them to the 209,000 currently unemployed and the thousands on Job’s bridge etc working for 50 euro a week for the likes of D O’Brien in petrol stations or Donald Trump in Donegal, and then what kind of comparison have we to the Greeks. The guys that are robbing the people also control the media, stop swallowing their lies.
Can somebody tell me will the euro value drop if this is the case??
I’m not an economist but ye I would think so, but nothing too dramatic like the drop after the quantitative easing that we seen in March.
Ye I reckon if Greece defaults it will hit the Euro temporarily but it will hopefully begin to improve again against the pound and dollar fairly quickly after that! One of the reasons the euro is so low at the minute is this ongoing issue!
It’s hard to say.
The Euro has been going up recently, possibly partly because the various parties have been taking a tougher line with Greece.
If Greece got a soft deal, it could mean a bigger fall than if they fall out altogether. What the currency markets really want is for Greece to agree to a tough deal.
The Euro is low for more reasons than just Greece.
Greece is tiny. Its 2% economy is not the reason that Europe is now 7 years in to a slump while the rest of the world moved on.
You should ask the minister for finance who has been busy off loading his euro exposed assets for months .
The euro is low at the moment because of the effects of the QE measures implemented by the ECB
and QE is was implemented because he Eurozone was the only part of the world still at 2007 levels and stuck in recession.
Even with years of near zero interest rates the Eurozone was always flirting with recession.
They have had to resort to flooding the system with QE money which has driven the borrowing rate for some countries in to negative yields, paid to borrow you could say.
It still may not be enough to get Europe on a sustained economic path for years to come.
Greece already defaulted. There is absolutely no chance – none in the world – that greece will be let out – none zero nada! This is all just a big stunt. There will b a deal at the very last minute and the robbery and slavery of eu citizens will continue for another few years until they i.e. the terrorist IMF, are ready to orchestrate a well planned well executed structured failure of the euro
why have sf stopped their high profile lauding of the syriza party? maybe pearse can let us know. thanks pearse
Syriza are the first Govt. in Greece in decades that is willing to reform the state.
Unfortunately for political reasons others do not want them to succeed in that because it will encourage others.
The EU doesn’t want to solve the problem because it will show what a currency Union is all about and most Europeans never wanted that, they thought it would be convenient travelling and shopping abroad etc.
If the Northern Europeans dislike Syriza then they are going to be livid when they hear what being in a grown up currency zone entails and it has to be implemented if the Euro is to survive.
Syriza got into power promising to end nepotism and cronyism. First order of business for Syriza was to appoint in a few dozen organisers and old buddies into various committees and boards.
Imagine the Shinners got into government here. Plenty of convicted criminals to be rewarded for the struggles!
@Gordon: Just like FG & Lab got in on the promise to end nepotism & cronyism? Pot calling the kettle?
Pearse has gotten to Chapter 2 of his economics book. His eyes are wide open.
Sinn Fein will be modifying their support of Greece pretty soon when they realise how hard the IRA were on their neighbourhood debtors. Knees or cash was the usual approach for late payment.
@OTV Its about time Noonan opened that same economic book so because himself and Enda are living in dream land regarding our economic future, bragging about our GDP to the world seemingly unaware that the massive profits the multi nationals are booking through Ireland is really what’s responsible for our exaggerated GDP, The same multinationals that employ less than 9% of the population and pay little or no tax. Unemployment has sank to 10% but where would it be if he 540,000 who emigrated returned in the morning and joined the 209,000 currently on the dole not to mention the 600,000 people living in poverty which is not a surprise giving that we were 47 Billion in Debt when this all stared but now under FG we are 220 Billion in debt only an idiot like Noonan would believe that is turning a corner. The only thing this autocratic government is in control of in this country is the Media.!!
given the facts that net outward migration in the year to April 2014 is estimated to have fallen to 21,400, you might want to check all your numbers before trying to make a point.
it is looney tin hats like yourself that scare yourself into living with your head up your own ar$e and then wonder why you can’t pay your bills.
OTV your childish little retort symbolise the average buffoon that support this delusional government .” Looney tin hat” you say…… They are not my numbers try the OCD and the government themselves. I’m not surprised a government fan would dispute well know facts, you guys are starting to believe your own medias lies.
How many people have paid Irish Water?? Try and get those numbers see how far you get.
Trust me. This scenario was never in the script. They haven’t a notion.
Syriza were nothing but snake oil salesmen. Their snake oil didn’t fix the seriously ill patient. Made it worse . Greece is now terminally ill.
Syriza / AAA / Socialist Party have only one real objective – to get their face on the TV or in the newspapers
Absolute codswallop jones, Syrzia has only been in control for 5 months, and have been given a mandate by their people, who still stand behind them. At least they are trying to do what they were elected for.They are being fought with every financial tool, bullying and threats the EU and IMF can muster.
The snake oil salesmen were the ones before syrzia, a bit like the snake oil salesmen we have at the moment, you know, the ones that lied through their teeth to get into power.
The sooner the whole EU experiment is consigned to the bin, the better.
Well said Pearse
They were given a mandate by the Greek electorate to continue spending German money while demanding that the last loan not be repaid. Apparently, they didn’t see any problem with this cunning plan.
Lagarde earlier urged that they “restore the dialogue with adults in the room.” This from a french bully attempting to secure the gambling debt of Franco/German bankers and speculators!
Lagarde and the Strauss Kahn changed the IMF from being hard nose economists to being a political cover organization.
The solution at the time for Greece was for it to leave the Euro and devalue.
Instead to save the Euro as a political construct Greece was loaded up with second and third bailouts that went to a very large French and German bank to clear debts, both of whom were among the most leveraged banks in the world at the time.
The IMF became a political tool of the EU rather than a means of reforming a troubled state.
Or, in the real world, the EU continued to pay the salaries and pensions in Greece while the numbskull Greek politicians pontificated on their imaginary economic solution and danced around fantastical arguments like ‘what is money anyway?’ ‘Are we really here?’ ‘.
Now Europe has had enough of their B.S. and is asking them to step up to the plate.
The EU never faced up to their flawed policies on the need for Greek debt relief. This would of course cost political support for the European Governments because they are afraid of other countries that will follow like Spain, Ireland and Portugal.
Planning ahead eh. Whatever will they think of next?
turning corners and green shoots me thinks
In a way, you could say that merkel is the modern hitler. She’s got way too much control over the other eu leaders. David cameron sees this and is trying to do something about it. If she has her way, she’ll have a whole host of euro countries paying money to germany for decades to come in the form of debt, but germany never paid back their colossal WW2 debt, so someone needs to give her a reality check. Kenny and noonan are clueless, have no balls and are only concerned about winning the next election, the fools!
to qoute the mighty noonan ” there’s only so much fete cheese you can eat”
Our govt will prob offer to pay the Greek debt for them, sure what’s a few more hundred million onto the Irish taxpayer…
I wouldn`t reckon your dad Micko would say anything like that Kath, sure he can only put his hands in other peoples pockets
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/28/syriza-merkel-economic-greece-europe
An experts view by Owen Jones who knows possibly a bit more about economics than Neal Ireland Hello & Co
@Setrakian
An expert at what?????????????
At least try and be reasonable. Owen Jones is “is a left-wing British columnist, author, commentator and political activist” according to his bio who writes for the The Guardian and the New Stateman
How on earth does that make him an expert on the Greek crisis? Indeed how does it make him an expert on anything?
This what Noonan and Kenny think
“We don’t think there will be a contagion effect if there was a Greek exit but we’ve had conversations at a high level with the NTMA and with the Central Bank and we’re watching the situation and we’re taking advice from the ECB in Frankfurt and from elsewhere, but it’s a European issue rather than an Irish issue.”
No one knows for sure what will happen in the event of Grexit but it would be foolish to say that there will be no contagion. Of course, there will be contagion, likely substantial contagion and it will be highly damaging. The structural flaws in the euro are now well identified. The market will over react.
Ireland is still an over borrowed and highly compromised economy. The shockwaves of Grexit will hit Ireland and Portugal first and most severely. The EU and ECB will not want Ireland to flounder due to erogenous problems and because Ireland has burdened its present population and the next two generations to repayments. A live slave is better than a dead or dying slave.
One thing is certain. We can now all fully understand the realpolitik of the European Union It is the vanquishing and debt enslaving of the weaker economies by the stronger economies.
The grand vision of a United Europe is replaced with economic dominance and the German hegemony over the smaller and weaker economies.
It is futile complaining about Ireland’s abject surrender. We surrendered and we must now live with the consequences. We have no economic autonomy or control. We are an economic vassal and that is that.
well what none of the right wing supporters are talking about is that it has been right wing Govts across Europe who have brought us to where we now are not Left Wing Loonies which you continually say on this site , so who are the real loonies ?
“Ireland is now really thinking” brrrrrr
For those that don’t fully understand how crazy this all is, if you had 10k credit card debt, and your minimum monthly payment was 200e. Its equivalent to increasing your credit to 11k, so you could afford to make the minimum monthly payment for 5 more months.
A child can see that this is not gong to work. Either the debt needs to be written off of Greece will leave.
Also, we are not far from this above analogy in Ireland.
The analogy doesn’t take into account that this hypothetical person has a drug problem that everyone knows about but he insists he’s off the drugs.
The analogy cannot blackmail democracy. The Greeks have given Mr. Tsipras a mandate and he’s still the most supported party there. Samaras is about to be ousted by his own party members who want him to step down given that Greeks didn’t benefit under him.
Let them default to fk… did Iceland no harm
We’re next
Yanis knows a lot more about money than noonan and Yanis can say million and 2015 and not 2,15 as Noonan says it???
It’s ok the bond holders will still be payed
the bondholders trusted Greece with their money in the first place – why shouldn’t they be paid?
Or are you the sort of person who lets off anyone who owes you money?
In which case, can I borrow a grand? I probably won’t pay you back after I’ve pi$$ed it away because I’m a socialist and it goes against my principles.
Awh well if the Greeks default the German’s are gonna loose €56 billion. What they gonna do invade? People seem to think it be easy process for Greece to leave the Eurozone, it won’t be, it was never thought feasible for anyone to leave Eurozone. As a result if the greeks are forced out given the level of damage to major European banks/countries ye probably looking at the Euro collasping over the next 5-7 years.
Either way Putin is gonna be a happy camper.
A game of backgammon that’s going to backfire on the Greeks
And if it does, it will be a huge blow to the European project which is supposedly “irreversible”. The Eurocrats experiment will pop up in their face. Other countries will follow.
If Greece leave it will be a huge victory for the powers trying to hold Europe together. The Euro will leap up to 1.30 and the sloppy economies who thought it was all just a joke will realise you can’t run your country like a dodgy restaurant.
One True Voice the exact opposite could happen it might start a slow break up of the Euro where individual Countries will re evaluate their benefit of remaining in the Euro starting with Britain
Not a chance BJ. 99% likely the Greeks get booted out through their own dishonesty and feeble attempts at tricking the EU to handover another couple of billion before they prostitute themselves to the Russians.
Europe will be a lot stronger when they’ve left and at least we have some semblance of firmhanded direction.
You’ll be wishing for a return to early 20th century politics next as it might give the blond Socialists a few votes.
OTV the Greeks wont be booted out it was the Euro Financial Advisors who allowed Greece into the Euro knowing that their books were false I wont be wishing for anything , you are afraid that Greece will get a better deal and it will show up this Govt for their poor negotiating skills . If i went into the bookies in the morning and put a fifty euro bet on a horse to win and it lost i wouldnt go back into the bookies and demand my fifty euro back .So the bondholders took a gamble and lost and they are been paid in full because they were mostly German and French .By the way i gave one of the Govt parties a first preference vote in the last General Election but i wont be doing the same again
You should explore how bonds work. They are basically loans.
Some people seem to think a bondholder just comes into existence out of thin air.
A million euro bond means someone gave someone else a million euro, and expected to get it paid back.
What is so wrong with wanting your money back? Can you imagine a functioning world where that sort of commitment to repay money you borrow is easy to walk away from? Could any business operate that way?
@OTV…Whats your opinion on selling Government bonds at €500 million a few times a year and immediately destroying the money we get for them as if it never existed…then having to borrow €500 million plus interest from another Bond sale to pay back those first Bondholders?
Sinn Fein will be proven right: Tsipras is doing the right thing.
Gerry and his advisors are fully behind them and would gladly take Ireland on the same journey if they have the chance.
No bother to them bucks. Wouldn’t be the first time that they damaged our country.
Whats the point in being in a club when some members want other members to suffer?
And Greece is the E.U’s whipping boy…
Can you really believe the news and what they say???
http://rt.com/news/268303-greek-journalists-imf-bias/
somebody give them alone ffs
The IMF threatens to pull the plug over previous Greek govt. mismanagement. Hasn’t stopped the IMF from promising to pump $17 billion into an ever worse, basket case economy in Ukraine? Seems to me the IMF has become another extension of US foreign policy.
@ Antony a voice of reason in a fog of misinformation however you are not alone!
reality bites for greece
have your say