Comments on: Courage and Conscience: O’Keefe and the Greens http://dublinopinion.com/2007/11/29/courage-and-conscience-okeefe-and-the-greens/ It's a group blog. What more do you need to know? Thu, 09 Feb 2012 13:28:27 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.2.1 By: All talk, no action? Seanad reform, the Green Party way? « Revenge of the Demented Rabbit http://dublinopinion.com/2007/11/29/courage-and-conscience-okeefe-and-the-greens/#comment-47973 All talk, no action? Seanad reform, the Green Party way? « Revenge of the Demented Rabbit Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:47:03 +0000 http://dublinopinion.com/2007/11/29/courage-and-conscience-okeefe-and-the-greens/#comment-47973 [...] as the bright boys over on Dublin Opinion suggest “But no one says how fast reforms need to be.” Indeed, and it would appear that [...] […] as the bright boys over on Dublin Opinion suggest “But no one says how fast reforms need to be.” Indeed, and it would appear that […]

]]> By: Donagh http://dublinopinion.com/2007/11/29/courage-and-conscience-okeefe-and-the-greens/#comment-47820 Donagh Thu, 29 Nov 2007 16:05:20 +0000 http://dublinopinion.com/2007/11/29/courage-and-conscience-okeefe-and-the-greens/#comment-47820 You know, it’s not very optimistic but I think you’re absolutely right Tomaltach. I know exactly why the Greens won’t challenge FF on Health. I was being conceited and also a bit frustrated at the fact that they, for their own ends, are going to let Fianna Fail continue on and on until the next General Election. An election no doubt which will be arranged perfectly to suit Fianna Fails needs. The fact is that coalition government is here to stay, and it’s always the smaller parties in a coalition who have to compromise. But there has to be a way of challenging the dominant party in a coalition, especially when you disagree fundamentally with one of their central policies. I tried to acknowledge that there is nothing they can do to change health – but there has to be someway they can challenge it, apart from letting it be known that exchanges around the cabinet table were quite ‘robust’. You know, it’s not very optimistic but I think you’re absolutely right Tomaltach. I know exactly why the Greens won’t challenge FF on Health. I was being conceited and also a bit frustrated at the fact that they, for their own ends, are going to let Fianna Fail continue on and on until the next General Election. An election no doubt which will be arranged perfectly to suit Fianna Fails needs. The fact is that coalition government is here to stay, and it’s always the smaller parties in a coalition who have to compromise. But there has to be a way of challenging the dominant party in a coalition, especially when you disagree fundamentally with one of their central policies. I tried to acknowledge that there is nothing they can do to change health – but there has to be someway they can challenge it, apart from letting it be known that exchanges around the cabinet table were quite ‘robust’.

]]> By: Tomaltach http://dublinopinion.com/2007/11/29/courage-and-conscience-okeefe-and-the-greens/#comment-47814 Tomaltach Thu, 29 Nov 2007 15:29:37 +0000 http://dublinopinion.com/2007/11/29/courage-and-conscience-okeefe-and-the-greens/#comment-47814 I think the Greens are gambling that it is better for them to stick to the areas where they think they can make real change ( admittedly a very limited number of areas, but that's all you can do when you have 6 TDs and aren't even necessary to make up a majority ). So apart from these few critical areas - environment, carbon taxes, or whatever - they are just going with the flow, however reluctantly. Whether that is the right decision or not remains to be seen, but frankly the greens have little to gain by surrendering their offices now, even on the issue of health. Recall - they can make no difference to health anyway and if there is one area where their constituency and others will be looking to for some successes during their term, it's environment. In that sense you could argue they are focussed on what is possible and not wasting time and energy on matters where they will be irrelevant. Regarding local government reform. Sigh. Here we are stuck between county managers who are not democratically elected and local elected representatives who are, but who, between them, haven't got a shred of integrity or even a faint notion of what civic responsibility means. In fact, at the moment, the county managers are one of the few bulwarks against complete, runaway clientelism. They don't need to keep vested interests on side electorally. True, this doesn't mean they are gaurdians of the public good - but sometimes they are the only voices opposing the most insane decisions. It is one thing to have beefed up ethics legislation and strict codes of conduct. But these are meaningless unless they are taken seriously. They have to be policed - litterally policed. The cops have to pull these guys up if they break ethics law. Sadly any hope of this happened rests on a "civic awakening" across the country. People need to be concerned about integrity. I discussed this with a friend at lunchtime - he said "<i>but if the councillors are in the pay of the developers, why don't the ordinary PAYE voters use their votes to oust corrupt councillors who are known to zone against planning advice or residents' wishes?</i>". The answer is the mentality of Irish people and their the view of democracy. Here lies the real rot. Even locals who have nothing to gain from zoning and precious little else to gain, will vote in the same councillors even when they know they have no integrity. The view is "he is our man" and sure he's a cute hoor. Until this vile infection can be scoured out of our collective mind, there isn't a hope, not the faintest chance, of any meaningful change. Green papers can pile up to the rafters, but nothing will change. I think the Greens are gambling that it is better for them to stick to the areas where they think they can make real change ( admittedly a very limited number of areas, but that’s all you can do when you have 6 TDs and aren’t even necessary to make up a majority ). So apart from these few critical areas - environment, carbon taxes, or whatever - they are just going with the flow, however reluctantly. Whether that is the right decision or not remains to be seen, but frankly the greens have little to gain by surrendering their offices now, even on the issue of health. Recall - they can make no difference to health anyway and if there is one area where their constituency and others will be looking to for some successes during their term, it’s environment. In that sense you could argue they are focussed on what is possible and not wasting time and energy on matters where they will be irrelevant.

Regarding local government reform. Sigh. Here we are stuck between county managers who are not democratically elected and local elected representatives who are, but who, between them, haven’t got a shred of integrity or even a faint notion of what civic responsibility means. In fact, at the moment, the county managers are one of the few bulwarks against complete, runaway clientelism. They don’t need to keep vested interests on side electorally. True, this doesn’t mean they are gaurdians of the public good - but sometimes they are the only voices opposing the most insane decisions.

It is one thing to have beefed up ethics legislation and strict codes of conduct. But these are meaningless unless they are taken seriously. They have to be policed - litterally policed. The cops have to pull these guys up if they break ethics law.

Sadly any hope of this happened rests on a “civic awakening” across the country. People need to be concerned about integrity. I discussed this with a friend at lunchtime - he said “but if the councillors are in the pay of the developers, why don’t the ordinary PAYE voters use their votes to oust corrupt councillors who are known to zone against planning advice or residents’ wishes?“. The answer is the mentality of Irish people and their the view of democracy. Here lies the real rot. Even locals who have nothing to gain from zoning and precious little else to gain, will vote in the same councillors even when they know they have no integrity. The view is “he is our man” and sure he’s a cute hoor. Until this vile infection can be scoured out of our collective mind, there isn’t a hope, not the faintest chance, of any meaningful change. Green papers can pile up to the rafters, but nothing will change.

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