Teknovis

Yesterday the Irish Government announced the second part of the budget – the tax increases. See Budget focuses on jobs, property or Noonan unveils measures to raise extra €1 billion in tax for details.

Overall, I am very disappointed. I think that this Government has a significant majority, so it it had wanted to, it could have proposed a really radical budget. Instead we got the usual mix of minor adjustments without any real goal or vision. I think that this is because career politicians find it difficult to see or think beyond their immediate environments.

So what would I have done differently over the last two days? I would have reduced our deficit significantly more by imposing far greater spending cuts. The obvious way to achieve these spending cuts would be to look at the civil service costs. I believe that the Croke Park Agreement was a bad deal for tax payers in this country, and I believe that it will inevitably need to be abandoned in its current form.

The other aspect of the budget that is really amazing me is how everybody in this country who is on the State’s payroll (civil service and social welfare) seems to believe that they have a divine right to their incomes! This is probably due to a combination of laziness and arrogance, perhaps due to the Celtic Tiger.

I would love these people to realise how serious our financial predicament is, and although it was not their fault (mostly), they cannot expect future generations to be subjected to more and more borrowing just so that they can remain immune from the cuts that the majority of the people in Ireland are experiencing!

Tags: Ireland