Story-time And A Few Ideas.

I wrote this a while ago. It's also written from an Irish point of view but the issues, I think, are fairly international.

I'd like to tell you a story.

In case you hadn't noticed, the country is in an awful mess. We've lost all our money by putting our finances in the hands of idiots.

I'd like to warn you now that this story may seem like I'm anti-immigration or I have some sort of 'Keep Ireland for the Irish' mentality, If you still feel like that at the end of the story---then you're either an idiot or you're part of the problem.

My dad has a couple of flats which he rents out. A few months ago, he had it rented out to a foreign national. We had very few problems with him. He did create a bit of noise during the day as he didn't work and was on the dole and he did drink quite a bit during the day also. But, if we asked him to keep it down, he would and he always paid his rent on time so we coped.

Then one day, a garda (police officer) appeared at our door wanting dad 's permission to enter the flat. He said he had reason to believe that there was a wanted man hiding out there. There was.

Yes, our tenant was essentially 'harbouring a fugitive'. I believe the man was guilty of assaulting a garda but I'm not 100%. Within days they were both out on the street.

I tell you this as a precurser to show you what WE know him to be like. We ordinary people can see that he is a lawbreaker.

So, a couple of weeks later, dad was talking to the manager of the local supermarket who tells him that he once caught the guy shoplifting. He said that, rather than the gardai coming to deal with him, our tenant went down to the social welfare office and came back with a cheque for the amount that he stole..........Yes, you read that right.

I'm just going to let that sink in for a bit

...

...

OUR GOVERNMENT PAID A FOREIGN NATIONAL TO SHOPLIFT.

Now, that I have that out of my system, I can move on.

Ideas

This country is in the shitter. Our leaders have driven the country into the ground and, as far as I can tell, are making no real moves to fix things. They're answer is to raise taxes and cut spending in all the wrong places. I'm sorry but this is idiotic, short-term thinking which will put more and more people out of work and in the dole queues.

As I mentioned before, I work in my dad's shop so I'm pretty much at ground zero if you will with customers coming in and telling us stories of people in dire straits. Shops closing and people losing their houses because they can't make payments on their stupidly expensive mortgages. I hear a lot of hindsight too. 'Oh, the government should have saved the surpluses they had at the end of the year', or 'The banks shouldn't have lent out so much money.' But ideas on how to move forward are thin on the ground.

The way this country is run needs to be properly looked at. Not just adding on new initiatives but a complete overhaul. Hit the reset button and start from scratch.

Here is my answer. I don't know the actual figures these ideas would involve or if indeed they could actually work in the real world but I'm sure you, dear reader, will allow me my two cents.

1. The dole card. I had an idea that instead of a person going to the post office and collecting a dole cheque, they get a card. Like a credit card. When you go shopping, you swipe it at the till. You still get the same amout you always get every week but instead of adding on to it every week, the amount on the card gets reset. The current jobseekers allowance amount is just under the €200 mark. So, let's say you have €35 at the end of the week. You go into the post office and that amount gets reset to the original amount you get paid every week.

2. Jobs for the jobseekers. This strategy has been implemented in France already to great effect. If you have been on jobseekers allowance for more than a year, you are automatically employed by the state and sent out to pick up litter or on roadworks or whatever for three days a week. You MUST do this if you want to keep recieveing the dole.

3. A more controversial notion, politicians wages. We had recently, as also happened in Britain, an expenses scandal. Our politicians, or TD's, were pretty much putting everything on expenses and, it seems, hoarding their wages. My idea; cancel TD's wages and let them put EVERYTHING on expenses. Then, make those records public. Politicians work so hard to show a clean image, so to prove it, show us all what you spend your/our money on.

4. I've heard of local TD's holding 'surgeries', where people can go and tell them what is wrong in their area and see if they can help. I propose that the Taoiseach (Prime Minister) hold one, maybe once a month or even less often. He could go onto the radio and let people call in with their opinions, relating to his political decisions, but most importantly, ideas on how to solve the country's problems.

I realise that last one is a bit of a stretch. It may be that the country's 'elite' have truly no clue, or no desire to have a clue of what it's like for us ordinary folk.

Again, these are just ideas. I have no notion if they are viable in the real world.

That was the point of this post. Ideas. I wanted to do some constructive thinking. Give the point of view of the layman. The man on the street. I don't write for a newspaper and I don't have any political agenda. I DO care about what happens to my parents, my family, my friends. My country.

And I have an idea that you do too.