Just How Corrupt Is Ireland?

[odie1kanobe]

I read this article last week and it fits perfectly into this discussion. It's an interview with Conor McEnrory - born in Wicklow, emigrated to London in the 1980's, got into banking, specialised in trouble-shooting at broken banks particularly in South America. He now own's his own bank in Paraguay and hopes to expand throughout the Continent.

In one section of the interview he defends South America saying the widely held perception of endemic corruption on the Continent was unfair and he says of Ireland "anytime I got off the plane at Dublin Airport I could smell the corruption in the air".


Wicklow man on a mission finds success in Paraguay's banking industry - The Irish Times - Fri, May 21, 2010

Now, that's just one man's opinion but I think there is a lot of truth in what he says.

Right so he learns his trade in London with Swiss Bankers and then Italy, then Lehman Brothers and ABN AMRO.

JHC ..........City of London is worlds biggest money launderer, banking in Italy and Mafiosa are so intertwined that nobody knows where one starts and the other ends and then he works with the Paragons of Virtue of Lehman Brothers, how are Lehman doing now as seem to have dropped from the news a bit and then he claims Ireland is corrupt.

[Jesus Wept]

We seem to be an open transparent democratic society whereas in reality we have quite a rigid caste system with political, legal, police, medical, criminal, etc., etc., etc., castes. As our high incest rates show, we like to keep things in the family.

[odie1kanobe]

In this case, Wikipedia is just using another organisation's map - that of Transparency International, who have been at this a long time, and are reputable.

The reason it's reported as a Corruption Perception Index is because it measures how much corruption impacts on daily lives - how often you're faced with a request for a bribe, how often you find you have to resort to the use of influence to get something that should be yours anyway, whether you have to schmooze, bribe, or influence to get government contracts, and so on.

Measured in those terms Ireland is extremely clean - you can spend years in business or employment here without ever using influence or bribes or seeing anyone else do so at the level of daily life. People grumble about the public service being slow, but you can't walk into the Passport Office with a little extra above your fee and jump the queue. If a Garda stops you for driving drunk, a little bit of folding stuff won't sort the matter out, and reference to your influential friends will likely make things worse, not better. People may believe their TD "gets things" for them, but 99 times out of a hundred all the TD does is get them what they could have got themselves with a little more patience and intelligence.

At the top level, yes, there's a golden circle, just as there is in every country, because there's a relatively much smaller number of senior and influential positions, and everybody gets to know each other. You'll find the same thing in any relatively small profession or industry - there's a circle of people at the top of Irish botany, for example, but nobody cares about that. And yes, the political parties look after their supporters, and make sure that legislation is friendly for those industries that are supportive of them - but that's what you might call "transparent corruption". You vote for FF, you know that FF will favour the builders - vote for Labour, you know that Labour will favour the Unions. We also know Ministers will try to steer grants towards their constituencies.

And then there's planning - but even there, it's not something that affects the ordinary member of the public directly. You apply for planning permissions, and by and large you'll get it according to the rules, or not. The corruption comes largely in the original zoning - and zoning corruption, plus corrupt permission for large projects, constitutes almost the whole of Irish corruption. Unfortunately, the results of planning corruption affect the whole of Irish life, because they breed waste, dysfunctional public services, impossible public transport problems, grotesque commuting times, overloaded schools - the list goes on, and the results are of such high visibility as to give the inaccurate impression of pervasive corruption throughout Irish life.

Good post

The idea that planning was only ever FF is a nonsense.

In Swords go down past Fingallians clubhouse and right on the estuary there was a house built in mid 1970's by a builder who supported Labour who when refused planning permission went to Jim Tully and it was obtained quickly.

One only has to look at UK election where 20 people were being registered to live in same flat just before election to influence a local election, quite a number of cases of it plus quit a few cases of deliberate election fraud at local level have occurred.

I remember Lady Shirley (Tesco) Porter and knew Peter Bradley who was deputy leader of Westminster council before becoming an MP who highlight the corruption within this council in selling off homes and the subsequent legal cases that followed.

One doesn't even need to go near the corrupt city of london to find corruption in UK.

[odie1kanobe]

We seem to be an open transparent democratic society whereas in reality we have quite a rigid caste system with political, legal, police, medical, criminal, etc., etc., etc., castes. As our high incest rates show, we like to keep things in the family.

Just because high rates are within your own family doesn't make it high in rest of the country.

Give HSE a call and they will assist you.

[consultant]

[QUOTE=odie1kanobe;2706529]Good post

The idea that planning was only ever FF is a nonsense.

In Swords go down past Fingallians clubhouse and right on the estuary there was a house built in mid 1970's by a builder who supported Labour who when refused planning permission went to Jim Tully and it was obtained quickly.

One only has to look at UK election where 20 people were being registered to live in same flat just before election to influence a local election, quite a number of cases of it plus quit a few cases of deliberate election fraud at local level have occurred.

I remember Lady Shirley (Tesco) Porter and knew Peter Bradley who was deputy leader of Westminster council before becoming an MP who highlight the corruption within this council in selling off homes and the subsequent legal cases that followed.

One doesn't even need to go near the corrupt city of london to find corruption in UK.[/QUOTE]

One doesn't need to to go too far away from FF to find corruption in Ireland.

AND there were many instances in other parties too, granted. But the FF guys did themselves proud because they availed of the opportunity provided by the electorate better than any of their predecessors.

[Biffomania]

Ireland is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Tom gilmartin said that the mafia were monks in comparison to f.f. I know of a situation with an extended family who supported a local t.d, they received millions from the state purse. Just look at the tribunals. Bertie, c.j, lawlor, burke, the flynnstones, all these so-called patriots were found out. They all wanted handy money by whatever means. The g.r.a. Were spot on and fair play to them. Not a word out of the justice minister since.

In fairness to Michael Lowry's distinguished efforts in this regard he too deserves to be included in your Hall of Fame. And he's also to be commended for being such a notable come-back-kid, kicked out of FG in disgrace he's now 'independently' propping up the most despised FF government in the history of the State. Is there no beginning to his ethics & conscience?

[SideysGhost]

You gotta love the drivel from the sniveling corruption apologists on this thread, all of them spineless grovelers in awe and fear of the masterful stroke merchant and the powerful juju of the local medicine-man gombeen.

Corruption....here maybe, or here or here or here.....it's a corrupt country but we get away with pretending it isn't by redefining the meaning of the word "corruption" into something so convoluted and opaque that pretty much nothing is "corrupt".

I mean FFS, can you seriously imagine any other country outside of some hellhole in Africa where the (elected!) leader's "explanation" of hundreds of thousands in multiple currencies sloshing through his tangled web of bank accounts was "I won it on the horses". And he's still walking the streets a free man.

Can you imagine any other country where people who gave the Dear Leader cash "gifts" were later appointed to extremely lucrative positions on State boards, and some of these boards then racked up billions in debt for taxpayers in dodgy dealings (see: the DDDA), and the Dear Leaders "explanation" is "I appointed them cos they were me mates, not cos they gave me money" and every single one of the people involved is still walking the streets a free man?

Can you imagine another country where tens of thousands of children were raped and Government Ministers fall over themselves in their hurry to cut the organised paedophile rapist ring a sweet deal and get them off the hook at taxpayers expense, and nobody even has to apologise?

Can you imagine another country that would force the citizens to take on €60bn in debt to bail out the gambling losses of a small clique of 100 or so highly-connected individuals, and nobody goes to jail?

Can you imagine a country that will slash vaccines for teenage girls, special needs classroom assistants, payments to the blind and carers, savagely attack the most poor and vulnerable in society yet balks at even talking about maybe possibly making some teensy savings in €13bn or so corruptly diverted into the pockets of the vast army of political hacks and croneys on lucrative salaries for non-jobs in quangoes?

Not corrupt? Don't make me f***ing puke.

[LDF]

Right so he learns his trade in London with Swiss Bankers and then Italy, then Lehman Brothers and ABN AMRO.

JHC ..........City of London is worlds biggest money launderer, banking in Italy and Mafiosa are so intertwined that nobody knows where one starts and the other ends and then he works with the Paragons of Virtue of Lehman Brothers, how are Lehman doing now as seem to have dropped from the news a bit and then he claims Ireland is corrupt.

Oldie, I won't ask you where you work or have worked in the past. The level of moral indignation contained in your post would only be appropriate if you are typing your musings from the slums of Calcutta or taking a break from digging water holes in sub-saharan Africa.

Are you really denying that corruption is a problem in Ireland? I do believe that corruption is a serious problem in this country and we haven't even begun to take it seriously.

Our current government refuses to tackle corruption by introducing whistle-blower legislation, refuses to introduce legislation to compel witnesses to appear before Oireachtas committees, curtailed FOI legislation, sets up Tribunals of inquiry and then goes to the Courts to prevent those Tribunals operating effectively, bails out banks and then promotes insiders to the boards of those banks, pays off public servants with questions to answer with inflated pensions, defends to the bitter end proven liars like Bertie Ahern in the name of "political loyalty" and refuses to disclose vital information about how taxpayer money is being spent in the name of "commercial sensitivity". That's just a snap shot. Then again, no member of government ever worked for Lehman's so they must be okay.

[myksav]

You mentioned Italy - Well it’s said the mafia never came to Ireland because they knew they wouldn’t have a look in

That was true in the past. But it wasn't because of any Irish mafia-like criminal organisation, it was because of the IRA. The two had run-in's in the US. The local mafia gipped some IRA scam to get weapons or money and a couple of IRA went on a wee spree on them. Very effectively, too.

And now it's not the Italian mafia we get, but the Russian 'mafia'.

On topic. Ireland is not the most corrupt country in the world (as much as we would like to think we are). That TI list is fairly accurate.

[myksav]

+ 1, add in benchmarking (bribes for votes) and FF favourite - planning permission

Are you claiming that FF held the dominant position in all county and urban councils over the past 13 years?