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Does the Irish Government know what “Brexit” means? – Irish 10 year plan in response to Brexit

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Does the Irish Government know what “Brexit” means? – Irish 10 year plan in response to Brexit

On Wednesday (15 Feb) Newstalk reported that the Taoiseach will announce a 10 year plan in response to Brexit here. I expected to read about a plan that would talk about supporting the exploration of new markets for Irish companies selling currently into the UK; a plan for getting tourists from elsewhere to visit Ireland to make up for the short fall of tourists from the UK and a plan to deepen our relationships with the other EU countries (#WhoNeedsTheUKAnyway).

But I certainly didn’t expect to read about a plan that will “focus on areas such as investments in roads, public transport, and energy.” Something MAJOR went wrong here! One of us, either Enda Kenny or myself, has NO clue what “Brexit” means?!

My understanding is that “Brexit” means that once it happens, one of 27 countries, Britain, which is made up of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, will leave the EU. That country won’t pay any more money into the EU, but will also not get any money from the EU anymore. All contracts that currently regulate relationships with other countries in the EU will stop being valid for the exiting country and everything has to be arranged new with this country. Ireland does a lot of business with Britain, so there will be some impact, but the ONLY area Brexit will impact Ireland is in matters that have to do with borders and markets as fas as we currently know.

How does have focus on “investments in roads, public transport (!!!!!) and energy” have anything to do with a Brexit? Enda Kenny is quoted saying “That new Plan will show how we will invest in roads, in public transport, in energy, in water, in schools, in higher education and in hospitals and health facilities. It will include detailed, funded plans to complete the national road network, including links between Dublin and Derry and Donegal, and to accelerate delivery of critical public transport infrastructure.

“It will include substantial investment in the ports and airports that Ireland will need as a successful, global trading nation. And it will support the achievement of our international climate change obligations and our national objectives for sustainable development and environmental protection.”

I accept that streets to Derry (in Northern Ireland) could be affected by a Brexit, but how does Brexit affect public transport? Or education? Or hospitals? Or national objectives (the clue is in the word, Mr Kenny!!) for sustainable development and environmental protection?

Has Endy Kenny lost it completely? NOTHING of that plan will prepare Ireland better for a Brexit than doing nothing. Now having such a plan is a VERY good idea for a country and it is surprising that this was not considered anyway, but needed a Brexit as a trigger. Is it a matter of “…we only look after our own country if another country leaves the EU”?

Very very odd!

Economy, Odd, Politics, ,

Car Insurance Madness in Ireland! Are they all incompetent?

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Car Insurance Madness in Ireland! Are they all incompetent?

I needed to renew my car insurance and this is always a good bit of work. Since I made some significant savings a few years ago, I always compare as many as possible insurances every year to see if there is a better offer somewhere.

Last year I didn’t change the insurer, but this year it went a little different. My car is a Mazda with 1.8l and it is 9 years old. I have a full no claims bonus and have my drivers license since I was 18 so for quite a long time. I also am driving in Ireland for many many years, BUT I still have a German drivers license and annoyingly I was caught in last May speeding! Yes, I did drive 6km (!!) faster than allowed and got 3 very very annoying penalty points.

This is the framework and the points and the German license do make things a little less smooth.

The saga started with AIG (last year’s insurer sending me a renewal offer for EUR 780. Not too bad I thought. A few days later they rang me and asked me if I was interested in renewing, so I said I was but hadn’t decided yet. The guy suggested that he will check if there is anything better than EUR 780 he can do and off he went with all his questions. But suddenly we hit a hurdle: He asked me if I had an Irish drivers license and I said that I still (as for the last four years I was insured with them) had my German license. He claims that that was never on their system (which is rubbish) and he would have to recalculate the price. After a few moments he told me that instead of EUR 780, now the best offer was EUR 1040! Wow! Not having had any accident for many years but having a German insurance suddenly increased my risk by nearly EUR 300? How can that happen? He claimed it is because I got my license driving on the other side of the road. But the fact that I am driving nearly longer on the (wrong ;-) ) Irish side of the road than on the German side didn’t impress at all. Well, there was no going back! AIG was not to be my trusted partner in the future, so I started comparing in earnest and I found VERY interesting things.

I found, for example, that Liberty Insurance is TOTALLY incompetent (or alternatively very greedy OR all the other insurances are the incompetent ones). Why? Well, the insurance cost is meant to be calculated based on the risk that you pose to the insurance and you would expect more or less the same price from EVERY insurance, because it can’t be that you are VERY risky for one and not at all risky for the other insurance. But Liberty seems to live on a different planet then the others. They calculated the cost as EUR 1667 !! Wow! That is even more than AIG wanted after the “change”.

Well, since most others quoted around EUR 780-950, I new that AIG and certainly Liberty were completely mad. (HOW can Liberty get any customers with prices like that???)

I also found out that the insurance quote comparison sites are NOT much use. Chill and Sheridan and Compare Insurance all quoted higher prices than I could get elsewhere. So don’t rely on the quality of the comparisons.

AXA was also madly expensive at EUR 1263. Another outlier.

The lowest quotes I got at first from 123.ie and Aviva and I nearly had decided for 123.ie, but then I remembered that I had forgotten to check with Allianz directly. In the past Allianz was always too expensive and I had already received Allianz quotes this time through the price comparison sites. (Compare Insurance quote EUR 993 and Sheridan quoted 853 – How can there be such a difference for the same insurance for the same conditions??? 140 Euro!?)

But then I rang Allianz and I got SOME surprise! They only quoted EUR 604!! That was by FAR the lowest price (but how can it be so much lower than the Allianz price that Sheridan and Compare Insurance quoted???). And compare this to the mad Liberty Insurance once more?!

So, you can guess who I signed the contract with!?

Now, my parameters are different than yours and therefore you could have a completely different result. So I am not saying that you will get the lowest or the highest quote from the same insurances I mention here. But what I am saying is that the work that you have to put into comparing can easily be worth your time! EUR 400 less than the AIG quote? I am happy to compare prices for 2 or 3 hours for that.

So, COMPARE COMPARE COMPARE and do NOT trust ANYBODY in this business. I think they ALL have no clue!

Economy, Odd, Society, , , , ,

Snobbery in Dublin stops people from getting lower priced groceries!

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Snobbery in Dublin stops people from getting lower priced groceries!

Once upon a time I was forced to buy my groceries in Superquinn. That was even before Tesco was in Ireland and before Aldi and Lidl arrived. Then I remember the week the first Aldi in Parnell Street opened. There were queues outside the shop and inside you couldn’t use a trolley because we had to walk through the shops like ducks in a row because there were soooo many people inside.

Nearly every Aldi and Lidl in Dublin (and there are MANY now) is busy and the market share of the two shop chains keeps growing, but there are some people who still think that they are too good to shop in Aldi and Lidl. But this snobbery is crumbling when you experience the high quality goods for SIGNIFICANTLY lower prices than others charge.

Oddly, though, when it comes to setting up new shops, some parts of Dublin are still totally against an Aldi or Lidl in their neighbourhood and I don’t believe for a minute that this is because of the dying village centres (they are already dead since Centra, Spar and Starbucks took over) or because of the REAL traffic increase. Maybe the PERCEIVED increase and this always reminds me of the stupid idea that Fingal County had when they limited the opening hours if Ikea near Ballymun and tried to force the shop to charge for parking during peak hours to avoid that looming traffic chaos that would bring the M50 to a stand still. Nothing like that ever happened and Ikea luckily was able to change the Fingal County rules.

So it is either a total misjudgement regarding traffic OR it is snobbery and I think ultimately it is the snobbery that is the reason for the NOs in Castleknock and Clonsilla that is described in this article www.thejournal.ie/lidl-2-3201010-Jan2017/

By the way, both Aldi and Lidl have managed to create pretty and very well integrated shops in some areas, so the look of the shops is not a good enough reason anymore to reject them.

 

Dublin, Economy, Odd, Society, , , , ,

Dundrum Town Centre Parking – Daylight Robbery

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Dundrum Town Centre Parking – Daylight Robbery

There are many out-of-town shopping centres around Dublin. There is Liffey Valley, Blanchardstown, a little further away Kildare Village and there is the Dundrum Town Centre.

Dundrum always wanted to be something different, something better. Posher, more expensive, “better” shops. But in the end it is just a shopping centre … and not a lifestyle choice.

The newest idea to be different seems to be to charge outrageous parking charges. Well, that is one day of being different, but definitely not a way to be better.

Currently NONE of the other out of town shopping centres charge a cent for parking, but Dundrum always did. However the charges were moderate-ish. Now Dundrum is owned by new owners because they went through Nama and were sold in the middle of last year and the new owners seemingly want to get their money back through a huge increase in parking charges. No free parking, no discounts for people that shop for longer, nothing. They want a EUR 3 rate per hour.

But customers are slowly getting together to declare their opposition. There is a new Facebook Group now and you can find the “NO to EUR 3” Facebook Page here: goo.gl/eMP1IK . Support the Page if you think EUR 3 is too much and if you don’t want other shopping centres to get crazy ideas!

Dublin, Economy, , ,

Pay Demands – The start of an unstable and damaging period?

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Pay Demands – The start of an unstable and damaging period?

It started all with the LUAS Drivers who demanded a crazy increase in their salaries. They didn’t get what they wanted, but they got an increase. Next were the Dublin Bus Drivers, then the Gardai and in the meantime the TDs got also a nice increase of about 9,000 per year. Then the teachers. And they will all get less than they want, but importantly, they will get SOME increase.

With all this, is it a surprise that suddenly EVERYONE in the public sector wants more money? But is it justified? Or justifiable?On Friday FIVE (!!!) more unions announced that they will be looking for pay increases as the Irish Times reported here.

Many think that some of the pay increase demands are totally out of control, but in other areas it might make more sense. The problem however is that once the unions smell “blood” they will go after pay increases like a bloodhound. Justified or not!

Keep in mind that NOBODY needs a union unless there is a dispute, so it is very much in their interest to create a dispute! It justifies their existence and keep the union bosses in a very well paid job.

Any type of unrest is bad for the competitiveness of a country and damages the reputation. So it is in the interest of Ireland to sort out all unrest as fast as possible. An unstable period would be severely damaging in the context of attracting new investment from abroad. But it also doesn’t make sense to give in all cases. Where the salaries are too low, they should be increased, but where unions demand unjustifiable increases, the government should have the courage to refuse ANY increase.

Economy, Politics, Society, Unions, ,
 
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