Archive for brian lenihan

Convert % of bank deposits into Bank Equity?

// March 22nd, 2010 // 1 Comment » // anglo-irish, bank bailout, bank of Ireland, brian lenihan, irish politics

Could we, overnight, convert a % of deposits into equity for the banks? Or is this simply a bonkers notion? Say 2.5% of all deposits under €20,000 which was the previous limit up to September 2008 and say 5% from €20,000 to €100,000 per depositor per institution and 8% of deposits over that level. If the banks were to commit to buying back the shares plus interest so issued as profits allow over a 10/20 year time frame, might this not be a better first port of call rather than all tax payers having to fund the bank bailout via state borrowings? After all those with the largest deposits have benefited most from the state bank guarantee without it they could have lost a lot more than 8%.

Or might we suggest that the banks do this themselves in September of this year by repaying the money given by the state when the guarantee runs out and could reasonably be expected to be modified? Of course the problem with such a notion is that any announcement of it would have to apply instantly or people with the most would withdraw their deposits.

Is Brian Lenihan off his game?

// March 11th, 2010 // 4 Comments » // Fianna Fail, brian lenihan, democracy

I suppose someone at some point has to ask the awful question but this incident whereby the government forgot to oppose a Labour party amendment to the Finance bill and following on from the manner of his defence of Willie O’Dea which struck many people as not being typical of Brian Lenihan and the fact that Martin Cullen has raised the issue publicly of the impact of certain types of medication on a person’s ability to perform their normal duties in the same way as before, is Brian Lenihan now showing signs of his performance being affected by his treatment?

We, the public are not privy to the form or the duration of his treatment, if it is the case that the worst of it is over and a minor slip here and there is going to be the extent of the impact then fair enough let him continue in office but if it has got some more months to run (in particular into the summer months when preparation of the budget will be underway) then we have to ask is the upcoming reshuffle the right opportunity to make a change. At the very least someone senior in the cabinet has to be designated as his 2nd.

I know people will say that’s I’m merely trying to score political points but I honestly can’t think of anyone more capable in FF than Brian Lenihan to be in the position of MoF at the moment. And while I don’t agree with much of the detail and some of the substance of what he is doing, he is, when playing at the top of his game, incredibly able. The question remains is he playing at the top of his game?

The Government Trio

// January 16th, 2009 // No Comments » // brian cowen, brian lenihan, mary couglan

Does anyone else think that the Trio at the top of government are like teenagers left in charge of the house while their parents are abroad? They know that mundane daily tasks like the washing has to be done and they’ve even seen their parents use that square looking white machine with the nice porthole thing that lives in the utility room but they don’t really know what buttons to push or where the magic dust that you feed it lives. So they look at all the rubbish and associated problems as they pile up, shrug their shoulders and tell each other that ‘it’s so unfair!.’

Even stranger is the fact that they remind me a bit of another Trio. These Trio were by far and away the weakest Big Bad ever that the Slayer had to deal with. Still there is a resemblance, Andrew the whiny one is Mary Coughlan, Jonathon as Brian Lenihan the little one that loads of people thought was going to turn out to be on the side of the angels, while Warren is Brian Cowen.

Above Mary Couglan is on the left, Brian Lenihan in the middle and Brian Cowen on the right.

Bumbling, incompetent, ineffective. Three really ain’t the magic number.

As Tony the Hotdog Vendor in Highlander might ask, “What does incompetent mean?”

What if McCreevy had continued to extend medical card threshold?

// October 23rd, 2008 // 1 Comment » // brian lenihan, budget 2009, charlie mccreevy, medical cards

I mentioned yesterday that I’d take a look at a counter factual where instead of abolishing income as a factor for the allocation of medical cards to those over 70 that the minister of finance had simply continued to aggressively extend the income threshold.

In 1999 the income thresholds for medical cards even for the over 70s were much lower than they are now. Of course, governments had considerably less revenue in those days before the Celtic Tiger and also had more outgoings in respect of unemployment etc. The thresholds were subsequently increased as per a budgetary commitment by roughly 33% each year until March of 2001. In Budget 2000 McCreevy announced that the next and final step would be to remove the income threshold completely for those over 70. Yet what if he had persisted with his original measure?

Taking the lower of those over 70 figures for 1999 of £133.00 which equates to €168.87 as our base point we see the intended increase of 33% or €55.72 per year in the threshold would have been up to €337.74 in March 2001. Note this is more than the initial revised threshold from last week! And it’s the figure from 7 years ago. So had Charlie McCreevy continued with the same level of increase annually (not % wise but in flat cash terms) the threshold would have been

March 2001 €337.74 (this is double the initial 1999 figure)

March 2002 €393.46

March 2003 €449.18

March 2004 €504.90

March 2005 €560.62

March 2006 €616.34

March 2007 €672.06

March 2008 €727.78

So think about that for a moment, the income threshold would now be higher than that most recent ‘final proposal’ of €700 per week gross to come from the government on Tuesday of this week. Plus, it wouldn’t have involved any re-negotiation with the IMO and consequent explosion in the cuts of the scheme which apparently cost us €254 million last year. Just imagine for a moment what else we could have done with the billion plus Euros over the last 6/7 years? How many more children in lower income families we could have offered medical cards to in that time or funding for nursing home care?

What am I saying sure they didn’t know what to do with the billions for Euros they did have so given them more would have only have lead to throwing good money after bad.

*Figures as from a Cork/Irish Examiner (it’s TCM anyway) article in 1999

Medical card means test thresholds:
Up to 66, 66 to 69, 70 to 79*, Over 80*.
Single - living alone: £92.00, £100.00, £133.00, £140.00
Single - living with family: £81.50, £86.50, £115.00, £120.00.
Married couple: £133.00, £149.00, £198.50, £208.50.
Allowance for child under 16: £16.00.
Allowance for other dependants: £17.50.
Allowances for outgoings on house:
Excess over £16.00 a week
Reasonable expenses necessarily incurred in travelling to work
Excess over £14.50 a week
* These are the thresholds likely to apply from March 1, 1999.

What McCreevy hadn’t given the medical card to everyone?

// October 22nd, 2008 // 1 Comment » // brian lenihan, budget 2009, charlie mccreevy

Back in 2000 when Charlie McCreevy announced the plans for the extension of the medical card in Budget 2001 to all over 70s irrespective of income he was introducing it as the next step of a process by which the government had doubled the income threshold necessary to get the medical if you were over 70. The question we have to ask now is why didn’t he stick with that idea, extending coverage in a progressive indeed aggressive manner but all the while based on income and ability to pay.

Charile Dec 6 2000 - Medical Cards for Older People In my 1999 budget, I announced that the income limits for medical cards for people aged 70 years or over would be doubled over three years, commencing in 1999. That process will be completed next March, and it is now proposed to take the next step. I am pleased to announce that, from 1 July 2001, entitlement to the medical card is being extended to all those aged 70 years or over.

What was wrong with simply progressively extending the threshold for the card and the benefits associated with it year by year? Oh I forget we were due a general election and McCreevy reckoned the older members of our society could be bought off. And if you look at the raw polling data he was dead right. Later today, I’m going to try and extrapolate why we might be now in terms of thresholds if McCreevy has stuck to his guns.

There’s a hole in the budget, dear Brian. A hole!

// October 21st, 2008 // No Comments » // brian lenihan, budget 2009, imo, medical cards

So it seems the threshold for the over 70s medical card is to be raised again. And FF (or the cabinet at the very least) must be hoping that this will lower the temperature enough that they can get through the week without more people going overboard.

However, at first reading one has to ask if most of those receiving the benefit of the card will now retain that benefit then the government has close to 100 million of a hole in its budget calculations. To be added on to this is the possible/probably changes in the income levy, we’re told that about 800,000 people who work don’t pay income tax, but they would be paying the levy as it is on all income. So let’s at a minimum scenario and presume they’re all earning the minimum wage that means they could be paying €180 per year under the Lenny Levy. If all 800,000 were to be exempt from the levy that would be another €150 million missing from the budget. A hundred million here, a hundred and fifty million there and soon we’ll be talking about real money!

Update: It does sound from the statement that the government has adopted the idea from Fine Gael that savings could be made in the drugs area by more use of generics. I wonder if the media will even notice or acknowledge this. Also it now appears the government is modifying the competition act in order to make it possible for it to negotiate with the IMO in future, that might work locally but what about European competition law. They really are making it up as they go along.

Possibly solution to the over 70s Medical Card mess

// October 18th, 2008 // 1 Comment » // Fianna Fail, brian cowen, brian lenihan, mary harney, medical cards, over 70s

I’m talking out of turn here, but if anyone is interested in a practical solution to the over 70s medical card fiasco, there’s my tuppence worth.

I might be asking a rather obvious question here but if the GPs charge the state €640 (the figure itself isn’t really relevant at the moment) for giving people over 70 a level of card consistent with a medical card then shouldn’t it be possible to set a number of bands of support and tailor the subvention from the state towards that 640 annualised figure that would relate to your income (we could look to factor in assets too but that would be really messy to administrate).

So let everyone under 17K (or whatever the annualised figure for the minimum wage is) per annum get 100% of that GP yearly charge paid by the state,
those between 17K and the average industry wage gets 75% of the figure paid by the state and pays 25% themselves (which at 100 odd quid for as many visits as you like isn’t very bad value.)
Those at the 130% of the average industry wage pay 50%
those at 150% of the AIW pay 75% and
those on pensions over twice the AIW can pay the full whack or pay per visit.

I wonder if anyone will take the idea up, I’ve also no idea how much it would save. But this is the sort of pragmatic idea that our politics lacks. I believe that the government has acted in bad faith by removing the cover, but it also acted badly by providing the cover in such a profligate manner by giving the cover to all and sundry irrespective of income or wealth. I’ve long believed that the all or nothing status of the medical card is just plain wrong.

Perhaps someone from the department of finance might look to run the numbers…

Live Blogging of Budget 2009

// October 14th, 2008 // 2 Comments » // bank of Ireland, brian lenihan, budget 2009, live blogging

I know there’s a good few others having a crack at this, but the more the merrier I say. You can do a sort of speed read of the previous budgets here as homework if you like.

NB: This is a kind of test run for me for other events. Feel free to add comments as I go along. Next time I will try and add other folks into the live feed itself using the panellists feature

Alternative budget proposals

// October 13th, 2008 // 5 Comments » // brian lenihan, budget 2009

With all the talking down of the budget prospects, I’ve been thinking about a few silver bullets of my own.

a) create an immediate slave caste from those under 5′ 6″ tall.

b) designate 1 in 40 taxpayers as ‘the unfortunate b’stard’, and impose a tax rate of 80% on all their earnings past and future.

c) create a new currency local to each county.

d) make the amount of spam you receive indicative of your ‘net profile and tax accordingly.

e) tax people based on their site traffic. You know they must be making money somehow from it all even if they say it’s not for profit.

f) a time based entry charge for those travelling south from the north while in possession of a GAA county jersey.

g) a charge for the temporary export of silverware. Might make those bearded lads think again about going for 2 in a row.

h) make language a revenue producer by rationing terms like ‘property bubble’, stagflation, resurgence.

i) nationalise 4×4s to be used to bring feral children to school.

j) charge those under 40 ‘an old geezer’ levy to be written off by spending time listening to someone over 65 regale them with tales of the misery of the old days.

k) require licenses of people under 65 to complain about how the youngsters won’t know what hit them.

Feel free to add your own suggestions.

Battlestar - Irish Government cross over episode

// July 11th, 2008 // No Comments » // Fianna Fail, battlestar, brian cowen, brian lenihan

It’s not hilarious I admit but it’s more a test of what might be possible once the telly card comes out of the plastic wrapping and into the maw of the machine.