Time for a New Ireland?

[muppet]

Without going into it too much, we know our current structure seems to be for the benefit of what David McWilliams calls the 'insiders'. The prospect of someday being an insider (an Irish equivalent of 'The American Dream'?) seems to be enough of an incentive to avoid social unrest for most of the population, but I do believe out there in the ether there is the will for serious reform.

Hypothetically if we could start from scratch again what changes would people like to see and what sort of political framework would be best for us? A solution that might be palatable for Unionists should also be considered as any reform may open the door to a 32 county solution.

For what it is worth here is, very basically, what I would like to see:

Divide the country into at least 5 Swiss style Cantons, each with a high level of autonomy, possibly Connacht, Ulster, Leinster, Munster and Greater Dublin. (A Greater Belfast would also be likely if the 6 counties came on board).

Each Canton would have its own single-level assembly responsible for Health, Welfare, Education, Law, Transport etc and would have the authority to raise taxes. This assembly would replace all current local government and regional boards for Health, Education etc and would have its own legal/court structure. Each Canton would have a 'capital' which would house the assembly and would also be the location of for example its own High Court.

Nationally we would have a Federal Government which would be funded by a limited national tax. This Federal Government would be responsible for the Central Bank and other financial issues, a court of appeal similar to the Supreme Court, Foreign Affairs, Defense and other issues. There would be a single level National Assembly which would vote to appoint professionals to head the various portfolios, rather than the current system of appointing from the Dail itself. This Federal Government would also be responsible for ensuring an agreed level of wealth distribution amongst Cantons while also monitoring the efficiency the governments of each Canton.

If the 6 counties were willing Ulster/Greater Belfast could be two Cantons otherwise Donegal, Cavan & Monaghan would either create their own regional government or would be included in Connacht or Leinster. However the level of autonomy a Canton would have, in addition to the limited power of a Dublin Federal Government, not to mention the possible departure from a Republic to something else, might be workable for Unionists.

The advantages of the above would be to remove the layers upon layers of local government that we currently have. For example we have local councillors sitting on County Councils, Health Boards, County VEC Boards, school boards etc and getting expenses to attend meetings for all of them. This structure exists in each county and rather than have 5 of each of those boards in Leitrim, Sligo, Roscommon, Mayo and Galway we could have one lean central Connacht local government running each area.

I realise this is a very shallow look at this subject and don't pretend to have anywhere near all of the answers but I would be interested to hear what posters here think.

[Billys Boots]

I like the French model of local democracy - where real decisions and real development happens locally, and is funded appropriately.  It's very different from our county councils; granted it's stacked with local employment and is probably expensive tax-wise (and paperwork is paramount).  But it seems to work, in France (he added). 

[Zapatista]

http://www.rsf.ie/eirenua.htm

[seafoid]

You would need to have local tax raising powers. Ireland is way over centralised. Local politicians should be made responsible for local decisions and have the money to back their decisions.

The cantons would need regional newspapers - again everything here is Dublin centric at the moment.

[muppet]

http://www.rsf.ie/eirenua.htm

I read that and tried to have an open mind rather than the easy default thinking.

My initial observations are that it is a long way left of what I personally would like. For example the Charter doesn't seem to guarantee the right to own property. But my main problem is that it creates many layers of Government such as Federal, Provincial, Regional Boards served by a Secretariat, District Councils and Community Councils. This looks very like the public service waste that I would hope to remove.

For example (I would love people who know more than I do about this to put me right) look at our Education structure. We have the Department of Education which is the national body. If we then just look at the VEC (I know there are many other aspects to education). They have county, regional and national structures. We pay for all of that. Then each school in the VEC has its own board AFAIK. All of this costs money to the taxpayer.

Under a Canton type system the VEC would be administered as part of the (say) Connacht Department of Education. This would remove the need for, and cost of, the national element of the VEC and it would reduce the requirement for the various provincial and county VEC committees. This type of improvement in efficiency could apply to the higher education bodies, adult education, all 2nd level, primary and all of the learning difficulty areas. And that would be just education.

I'd wager you could really improve the efficiency in Health in particular. The added benefit is that you would have a Connacht Assembly deciding what Connacht's priorities for Health are, rather than the Mary Harney model which seems to cater for Dublin based patients only.

The main problem I have with the RSF page is that I just see old inefficiencies being replaced with new ones but I do like their idea of taking power out of Dublin and into regional Governments..

[andoireabu]

the problem i can see is that if you split it up into 5 or 6 then there is always going to be the problem of who thinks they are the boss or who has more sway in a national argument.  Do the 5 counties in connaught have the same say as the 12 in leinster? with ulster i wouldn't see our boys agreeing to it as it is basically a united ireland with no connection to the UK so can't see it working.

What happens with the gardai?  would they be allowed to cross over canton lines and could people be "deported" so to speak if they acted the bolliix in leinster but were from galway?

If i had my way then there would only be one counciller per area.  each bit up here only needs one MP so why do they need 10 MLA's.  there are 108 (i think) MLA's for a population of 1.5ish million people which i think is stupid.  Plus all this balls of claiming expenses for their jobs would be banned and punishable with months of hard labour.  if i have to buy a pair of boots for my work or my lunch then i pay for it and i don't see why they can't also because they definately get paid more than me.  i pay for the fuel it takes to get me their but i doubt they do.

i admit my knowledge on politics and the running of a place is very limited but some of the stuff they have been caught at is outrageous.  thogh i do know they don't all be at it and some do hard work.  from my point of view i live in east derry but for the life of me i can't see what the boys elected here do for my area. 

[pintsofguinness]

It's a nice idea muppet but we cant find a handful of competent politicians to run the country what makes you think we'd find competent politicians to run several levels of government?

[Maguire01]

If i had my way then there would only be one counciller per area.  each bit up here only needs one MP so why do they need 10 MLA's.  there are 108 (i think) MLA's for a population of 1.5ish million people which i think is stupid.

108 MLAs might be a few too many, but to be represented by just one MP is hardly sufficient either. You're in East Derry - do you think Gregory Campbell is adequate representation for all of the people in your constituency? The same with North Belfast, North Antrim and South Antrim.

Plus all this balls of claiming expenses for their jobs would be banned and punishable with months of hard labour.  if i have to buy a pair of boots for my work or my lunch then i pay for it and i don't see why they can't also because they definately get paid more than me.  i pay for the fuel it takes to get me their but i doubt they do.

Time to put away your copy of The Sun. Do you expect an MP to run a constituency office, pay staff, travel to London, cover accommodation away from home - all genuine expense - out of their own salary?
Yes, some MPs clearly ripped the arse out of the system, but that doesn't mean that genuine expenses aren't a valid entitlement.

As for what MPs get paid, i'm sure plenty of them could be earning just as much putting in much fewer hours. £65k might seem like a lot of money, but plenty of accountants, solicitors and other professionals would earn that money by the time they're 45/50. Plenty of MPs are solicitors, barristers and doctors and could be earning more than £65k if they had stayed with their professions.

[muppet]

It's a nice idea muppet but we cant find a handful of competent politicians to run the country what makes you think we'd find competent politicians to run several levels of government?

I don't want politicians to run the country. I want a smaller national assembly to appoint professionals to run the (federal) country.

As for the extra layers, I believe it would get rid of layers.

I'm from Castlebar. We have an Urban District Council, Mayo County Council, School boards, County VEC Boards, for Health we have HSE + Dept of Health + Local Administration, TDs in the Dail, Senators, the various Departments, Quangos and Authorities.

I would prefer to merge all the relatively local stuff into one far more efficient 'local' authority. A Jackie Healy-Rae type would be irrelevant in the new Federal Assembly and it is hard to believe he would be able to build loads of swimming pools in south Kerry from inside a Munster Canton.

[Pangurban]

A proposal worthy of debate, needs a lot more work to flesh it out. How would address the inbalance in population,infrastructure, job and educational opportunities, which currently exist between the east coast and west of the Shannon/ in the North west of the Bann. Would the present party political structure be retained, or do you expect a rise in regional parties with their own narrow agendas.
Many more questions to follow, dont want to overload you at this early stage of your thinking

[stephenite]

It's a nice idea muppet but we cant find a handful of competent politicians to run the country what makes you think we'd find competent politicians to run several levels of government?

I don't want politicians to run the country. I want a smaller national assembly to appoint professionals to run the (federal) country.

As for the extra layers, I believe it would get rid of layers.

I'm from Castlebar. We have an Urban District Council, Mayo County Council, School boards, County VEC Boards, for Health we have HSE + Dept of Health + Local Administration, TDs in the Dail, Senators, the various Departments, Quangos and Authorities.

I would prefer to merge all the relatively local stuff into one far more efficient 'local' authority. A Jackie Healy-Rae type would be irrelevant in the new Federal Assembly and it is hard to believe he would be able to build loads of swimming pools in south Kerry from inside a Munster Canton.

All well and good, but if I'm elected how I am going to get my mates onto the local boards that no longer exist - it all seems to make any of the worthwhile self serving stuff that I am entitled to after you voted me in, much more difficult.

Our present political system allows worthwhile community representatives such as teachers and publicans and former politicians children have more lucrative financially secure careers. If we were to go with your hair brained idea who knows what class of politician we'd end up with - people who have to work for your vote are the most dangerous of all political animals, they actually might get something done.

Done with this sort of thing

[Zapatista]

We could start over here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Ireland_(island)

[muppet]

A proposal worthy of debate, needs a lot more work to flesh it out. How would address the inbalance in population,infrastructure, job and educational opportunities, which currently exist between the east coast and west of the Shannon/ in the North west of the Bann. Would the present party political structure be retained, or do you expect a rise in regional parties with their own narrow agendas.
Many more questions to follow, dont want to overload you at this early stage of your thinking

This is where I think the real problems would start.

At the moment we have migration from, for example, the west/north to the east. There are many reasons for this but they are almost all economic. With a completely centralised government, co-located with the economic centre such as we have, it is natural for most of the opportunities and growth to happen in and around Dublin. The McCreevy version of decentralisation was to simply move a few departments out of the city. It never happened and it was never going to work properly anyway as the Government was to remain in Dublin.

Each Canton would obviously not start on a level playing field so there would have to be some 'equalisation'. This usually means money and I would be concerned that in Ireland money usually means waste and/or corruption. If there was no start-up money (from the EU or wherever) we could start with a short-term penalty (say a couple of percent in tax or Vat) on those Cantons that start solvent to help those that don't (this happens now anyway). However this would expire eventuality and the responsibility would be on each one to ensure their public finances were in order within a few years.

Allowing a Connacht Canton to charge for say its natural resources might be a start while there are likely to be future gas fields producing off Sligo and Donegal that could help with finances in areas that would seem most likely to struggle for revenue, i.e. the Connacht and Ulster Cantons ( I would appreciate if someone would come up with another more Irish word). 

[dec]

( I would appreciate if someone would come up with another more Irish word). 

cúige

[Lone Shark]

I could spend forever on a thread like this, even though ultimately I think all we'd be doing is teasing ourselves with how good things could be, if only!

There are two ways to look at a discussion like this - there is the slightly practical and then there is the entirely theoretical. I think the idea of creating "regions" is impractical for a few reasons, the first and foremost being that in order to make them equitable and practical, you'd have to draw them along non-traditional lines - and thus any sense of identity with that region would be lost. Five regions in the Republic would mean populations of around three quarters of a million in each - in that regard Connacht and Ulster would probably have to be all the one, and I'm guessing there would be little or no shared identity between the people of Belmullet and the people of Belturbet. God knows I feel little enough in common with Laois or Westmeath sometimes and I certainly would have no vested interest in their prosperity over and above any other Irish people.

Secondly, the reason for doing this would have to be to create more efficient regions that are better able to stand on their own two feet - but you knock that on the head with the notion that there would have to be "equalisation". The idea of each area getting rewarded for their own resources is of course fine, but to start by saying that there should be some sort of Dublin tax to compensate everyone else for the fact that the City is where all the roads are would utterly defeat the purpose of such regions. A Federal tax to pay for things like justice, defence and possibly things like third level education would be needed and that could be on income, but ultimately if Connacht or wherever was to be autonomous they and everyone else would have to pay their own way.

A crucial point of this too is that if the poorer areas are constantly bailed out, they have no incentive to improve. If Connacht is constantlyt being "equalised", they have no incentive to put good people in charge since the incompetence of sleveens never really comes home to roost to those who put them in power.

Being honest I think that Ireland is not so big that it needs to be separated into regions. If anything, I believe it needs more and more people who are blind to the whole geography of the country and who look at what the country needs rather than what each area needs when making decisions.