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FIANNA FÁIL TD Seán Ó Feargháil has been re-elected Ceann Comhairle of Dáil Éireann.
The Kildare South TD – who first took up the role in 2016 – defeated Independent TD Denis Naughten in a vote today.
Ó Feargháil received 130 votes with Naughten receiving 28 votes.
The Ceann Comhairle is the chair of the Dáil and is expected to observe strict impartiality and keep order in the house.
Whoever is elected to the role is automatically re-elected to the next Dáil.
Ó Feargháil was Ceann Comhairle of the 32nd Dáil and was the first to be elected by secret ballot in 2016. Previously, the government of the day would simply choose who would take up the role.
He was the first Fianna Fáil Ceann Comhairle to be elected since Seámus Kirk who held the post in the 30th Dáil between 2009 and 2011.
I often wonder if politicans have some sort of disfunction that goes with the job and they feel compelled to lie and exaggerate? €21 billion of EU money is literally peanuts in the circumstance and is about as much a stimulant to the EU wide economy as an anadin would be to a heroin addict. The guy then gets on his feet to announce that this paultry sum, like the loaves and fishes miracle, becomes €300+ billion if the private and banking sector invests and lends into the economies of europe on the back of this €21 billion.
What a load of rubbish. Tommy Cooper dping his three card trick would have more credibility.
Someone needs to give this fool a lesson in basic economics. The thing that either stimulates or slows an economy most is…….TAXES! The austerity policy of taxing the ass off citizens is killing investement and growth. Ask the Japanese who have first hand knowledge of how this works.
In fairness Jack I’d guess that Kevin Cardiff was doing the sums for Mr Juncker so you can expect the figures to drift a little bit….
Kerry, you are probably right! I forgot about that idiot. Didn’t he miscalculate part of our debt before being rewarded for his incompetance by being promoted by this government? The entire mess is shocking.
He did Jack. He was only out by €3.6 billion chicken feed really. Joining the EU has given him room to expand his sums.
Coddler is being strangely quiet.
“The austerity policy of taxing the ass off citizens is killing investement and growth. Ask the Japanese who have first hand knowledge of how this works.”
So does that mean you would have preferred larger cuts in public spending Jack? Or would you have preferred we borrow more cash indefinitely so as not to have to increase taxes or cut spending?
I’m just curious.
“The money is chicken feed and it won’t do anything to kick-start growth,” said Professor Charles Wyplosz, from Geneva University. “It is unbelievable they are doing this rather than real fiscal expansion. The private sector will just take governments to the cleaners.
“This is really an excuse to pretend they are they doing something while the austerity is still going on. It will take too long to work and there will be a big fight over the projects as every country tries to get a share of the cake.”
No one in Europe is willing to commit to a substantial prog. of investment, even though the economic depression/long recession has one on longer than the one in 30′s.
It is now economically structural in most of Europe.
Germany, Holland, Finland etc will not agree to Eurobonds, even though that is what is needed in a currency zone.
No one wants to are to fiscal transfers from richer areas to poorer ones, even though that is a bedrock of every single currency zone and sound state in the world.
Germany refuses to even stimulate domestic demand at home, to improve infrastructure at home, never mind supporting meaningful stimulus in wider Eurozone.
No one in Europe is willing to agree or allow even barest steps towards solving this crisis.
Time to wrap up the Euro.
315 billion is chicken feed he says . That 6 times what Ireland spends on its public services in a yr . It’s half of what the UK spends on its public services for a population of 70 million people .
It is chicken feed given the scale of the crisis and the size of the Eurozone.
Tommy, read the article. It’s 21 Billion. Juncker has projected that if private companies invest/spend it right it would provide 315Bn worth of value in years to come.
So 315 Bn is pure fantasy speculation. 21 Bn is the actual figure. And how many countries are in the EU?
Hmmm so if we can divide that by 28, or 18 if you go by EMU countries. Doesn’t leave much really, although it would cover our water bill for a year ;)
I’ve over simplified it to bits, but basically reiterating the fact that is it works out at a square 750mil per country in the EU or 1.166 Bil per EMU nation when split evenly
I’m a cyclist and I love going for a walk in the country, but I can’t see walkways and greenways kickstarting the European economy, beyond a small local tourist boost.
Putting money into R&D and infrastructural improvements that reduce costs of transport and energy would probably be more effective.
Wasn’t there some group in Ireland a few tears back with a major project to the island self sufficient in energy production using hydro electric / wind wave electricity generating amazeballs thing ? Sounds ideal for funding , would be great never to import any energy again , self sufficient to power all electric cars and homes on the island and turn into a self sufficient green i
Powered island would be big but worth while
Build a generating station in Belmullet !
That sounds like communist talk?
Gord it could be national socialism which was one of the ism’s that the Fine Gael party is based on. But sure that’s very off topic altogether. Anyway if we do get our hands on some money the wind/hydro project isn’t a bad investment IMO. Especially for future energy issues which are in the lack of oil in the pipeline.
@Dave Hammond That’s Spirit of Ireland: http://www.energyco-ops.ie/services/spirit-of-ireland/
Not sure where they’re at these days.
Gee how did they get so rich – charging us 9,000 a head and only paying a few hundred themselves maybe …Bye bye Europe you’ve had enough cheap fish dinners -
Cameron was right. This guy is dangerous.
This is actually positive direction stuff, the problem is that it is not many multiples of this, it will be years before any benefit hits.
315bn over a few years is nothing to a crisis riddled and stagnating economic block of 14 trillion a year economy.
Cameron is just as dangerous.
Rock – how so?
He’s only interested in building an economy that’s predicated on increasing the wealth of the rich. Himself and Boris spend the majority of their time satisfying the needs of the big corporations instead of looking after the needs and interests of the general population. I live in London and the distribution of wealth here is disgusting.
I’m no fan of Juncker but to quote Cameron is like quoting Sepp Blatter in a discussion on anti corruption.
The last time Xmas came early was with James Bond in
The world is not enough …..
Unlike Bond however, Santa only comes one a year when he empties his sack under my tree :)
Forty years in and it needs a kickstrart – that just about sums it up !
It’s the magic money that was down the back of the European collectives sofa’s. Little did we know €315 billion was hidden away oh that sneaky scamp Jean Claude juncker. Very clever so we can magic up money now but five years ago they got the people to pay up.
Propping up the failed entity monster joke called EU.
Bring on the broadband, badly needed at this stage.
Why the thumbs down? In my view totally national, reliable broadband is the single biggest kick-start to the economy we could ever have
It is incredible that people red thumb that.
Good Broadband nationally is now the same as having Electricity or a modern road network.
A country is going nowhere without it.
Seanie we’re an island – we aint going anywhere anyways …
pulled it outta nowhere. it’s all a fugazi.. they’ll just keep creating more and more ‘wealth’ but all the money stays in that top .5% . fu*ked up world we live it!!
Spot on MUFC, they are not creating anything. Today what the EU did was guarantee the markets that it would pay back 21 thousand million in imaginary monopoly money at some time in the future. And guess who is gona have to pay that back? The shareholders in this fraudulent company called the European investment bank i.e. us, the citizens of Europe. You couldn’t design a better pyramid scheme if you had 100 years to plan it!
so true John Boy. Wealth is so horrifically unevenly distributed it’s demoralizing at times…
Funny, Ireland needs money the European Commission demands we call it a Bailout and call in the IMF. The rest of Europe (i.e. France and Germany) needs money the European Commission calls it an investment.
Investment = Privitisation.
Those bankers hiding behind their wealth fund entities plunder nations for their true valuable assets.
The handing over of valuable assets from the trust of a nations citizens to corporate wealth management agencies for their banker clients.
Profit becomes the primary objective, service is not important.
Privitisation is fomented by encouraging grossly unrealistic union demands to collapse a public body.
CORRECT !
Loans to improve infrastructure are not privitisation.
NTR …We all know how religiously they mind their pennies …
So after years of austerity in Ireland which has caused untold suffering, our hard earned cash is being used to bail Germany out.
Europe can go to hell.
Great. More debt. They can use the our share of the money to pay off what they forced us to borrow then pis* off…..
The United States of IMF
they can start with fixing our water pipes
Pay us back.
Badly needed, shure the roads are in shite!
Only really 15 billion, the rest to beg investment from private sources for a return..
I’ve always said we should of applied to the strategic investment fund to fix our water network. . As would be normal.
All we were told was where would we get the money.
Good example of EU only acting when Germany has needs.
So, basically a ‘too little, too late ‘ pile of ordure, designed to send a ‘feel good ‘ message but signifying nothing.
As part of a tech startup in the supposed target space, we don’t see any opportunity for this funding to help us achieve what Europe wants to achieve, i.e. create new sustainable jobs and foster entrepreneurship. This money will end up with the “Usual suspects”…
Ireland should request funding for DART Underground. Considering its potential to transform rail transport in Dublin and Ireland, it’s a no-brainer.
Nero fiddled while Rome burned… another going nowhere EU policy riddled with bureaucracy and no action. On one hand they have raised the capital requirements for banks by some 50% thus reducing lending to people and SME and then try to fabricate “inflation” by a round the houses method. It is simple, turn on the printing presses and drive QE, you can’t just wait for the US to recocer and ride the coat tails… we will be a long time waiting. As for politicians talking about “walkways” as funded projects I doubt the cost versus return makes commercial sense, create a fund that SME and people can approach directly and create a level playing field in Europe to accessing capital….rather than just the top 5%.
Why would they give this country anything with such a wasteful government in power
I must have taken this the wrong way.
This is a 300 Billion Investment in Europe, Junket wants International Investors, to invest in Privatisation of Energy,Education, etc. in E.U. countries. Irish Water, comes to my mind! That they will try to privatise that! eventually, then call for Investors. Investors will have choices of all the countries. Germany economy is already doing well,but Claude want investors to invest also in countries, that are not doing so favorably, at the moment, like Ireland. To me, Junket is trying to privatise Europe, we the little people, loose out, we will have Nothing Left for the people of this country to call their own. Am I wrong?
This money will be borrowed, and interest will have to be paid on it… Socialism doesn’t work…
Ireland could take itself out of an unemployment crisis if they worked on a national programme of prividibg broadband, social and affordable housing and a new water network.
This could work, hitler did it… And it worked well for German workers, but he paid them in government bonds which could be exchanged for German goods and services, effectively we could by pass the euro with a second internal currency
Chris, I think all of that stuff is actually happening.
€21bn? It would be challenging to kickstart Luxembourg’s economy with that, let alone the entire EU
Do people think any of this will come to ireland? They would be happy to cripple us and any recovery that may be happening if it saved France and Germany. Feck it they’d happily cripple Britain if it meant saving France and Germany. The only way we’ll see any of this is if irish water can apply for funding from it for infrastructure investment which means we as a public won’t have quite as much water charges for the first few years as they repair the networks. The upshot being if junker gets what he wants, the balance would have to be paid by “private investors”. Basicly it’ll mean the privatisation of Irish water or at least a big chunk of it. The ESB might get some but we’ll end up having to sell that too. Bord Gáis is already gone but whatever stake we have left in that will have to go, same with Aer Lingus, then they might give Enterprise Ireland some money to drive some investments. Next thing Enterprise Ireland is sold to a private venture capitalist fund. The only way to truly protect the country and the citizens is to nationalise all national infrastructure and split providers/producers from them. It’s been done with the ESB and electric Ireland, do the same with irish water when it’s finished doing upgrades, take back the telecom network, nationalise the mobile communications towers and split off CIÉ from the rail network just in case the E.U come gunning for that too. They didn’t succeed in carving up the country enough during the bailout. This is take two.
A monorail!!!!!
This will be Dublin’s best chance for generations to get the DART extension built. I’m fearful these anti-Dublin pinkos will take the €750 ml earmarked for DART and waste it just to avoid spending on Dublin..
Exactly. If they spend that much on transport for Dublin, Tralee will want it too! DART underground has the capacity to revolutionise transport and commuting in Dublin for tens of thousands of people and really change the city. Although it does have to be said that transport in the major cities outside of Dublin is severely lacking.
Does this mean we can get a go ahead for the metro at last?
So, 21 billion is actually available – one billion more than used to be in our National Pension Reserve fund, now sucked dry. Herr Juncker thinks this will generate 315 billion. How?
Only postponing the inevitable collapse of the German..oooops….European Superstate, sooner we jump ship the better
Wouldnt it be a more of a boost to the real economy if they tackled the variable interest rates?..paying 4.5% on a base rate of .15% is insane..about 2% over european rates…crazy..
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