Ireland's finance minister secures deal to pass austerity bill

[alp227]

Source: The Guardian

Irish opposition parties said tonight that the Republic's general election will be held on 25 February.

This followed successful negotiations this evening in Dublin between Ireland's finance minister Brian Lenihan and the finance spokespersons of the opposition parties to pass the finance bill by Saturday.

They agreed to a timetable to pass the crucial finance bill that will implement harsh austerity measures outlined in last December's budget.

The European commission said it was crucial that the Irish finance bill should pass to ensure confidence and stability.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/jan/24/ireland-finance-minister-austerity-bill

[virgogal]

1. Begorra !

[bemildred]

2. Now can they get the votes. nt

[mackerel]

3. All b.s. and this general election coming in March.

I've just been trying to explain the current Irish political situation to a couple of American friends. It's like this: in Ireland our country is run by something called a government. It governs things. The government is run by somebody called the Taoiseach (prime minister).

The current Taoiseach has governed things so badly that he has ruined our country, and he no longer has the support of his own party, despite winning a confidence vote last week, after making yet another gaffe and trying to do a cabinet reshuffle. So he can't appoint new faces to his cabinet, and on Saturday he stepped down as party leader. But he's still Taoiseach and still governs. Go figure.

A new party leader will be chosen next Wednesday. But he/she won't be Taoiseach and won't govern anything really, or at least not until the government doesn't govern any more (if you know what I mean).

Meanwhile the party's other partner in the governing coalition, the Green Party, pulled out of government this afternoon because it doesn't have any confidence in the government. So they are in the Opposition, and the Cabinet only has seven Ministers (the constitutional minimum) to govern.

And this man, the Taoiseach man, is in charge of a one-party minority government, the said party of which he no longer leads and which is having a leadership battle because he is not in charge of it. But he's in charge of the government and the country. This is not dictatorship. It's called democracy, the good of the nation etc etc blah dee blah.

Meanwhile two of the four main opposition parties say they will call for a vote of no confidence in the government on Tuesday or Wednesday unless a particular piece of legislation is passed by Go figure. Friday. One of the opposition parties (the Greens) used to say that it wanted an election by this week, but now it says it wants the legislation passed and it has no confidence in the government but it won't vote against the government if it takes a little bit more time to pass the legislation as long as it passes it sometime soon, so this party might or might not vote against the government in the no confidence motion this week.

And everybody apart from Sinn Fein wants the legislation passed, so at least almost everyone's in agreement about one thing. However, if the legislation isn't passed and they have an election, this will mean that the sky will collapse, the EU will invade and it run the country (or something), and we will be ungovernable, and in a terrible state of chassis. Go figure.

[CountAllVotes]

4. it makes no sense

Seems to me the batch of criminals about to pack up and run are being chased out *almost*.

Will they too be selling window shades on television when their jobs are gone? As for the Taoiseach, nothing to see here - just some fat guy up there blowing out a few words of Gaelic now and then to appease the masses. :sarcasm: ... sorta ...

:dem:

[JNelson6563]

6. Thanks for the info.

It will be interesting to see this play out.

Julie

[JDPriestly]

5. Can someone please explain to me why seemingly every developed

country is now having to impose austerity measures that hurt its social services and its poor.

How is this possible.? Aren't any countries winning in what appears to be a currency and trade war? What is going on? This makes no sense.