Being part of the problem

I’ve just got an email in relation to a protest next week about the reduction in SNA posts. It’s an issue I put a motion to Wexford Borough Council last October asking that SNA’s be retained. Despite the motion the 2011 budget cut the funding and when Ruairi Quinn became Education Minister he accepted the FF Green plans. When schools closed for Summer some SNA’s were let go. A circular letter from the Department said that schools would get 90% of their SNA allocation before the Summer and the 10% balance would be re-assessed in September. In the intervening period there exists the uncertainty for an SNA as to whether they will ever get a job again doing what they love. On the other hand there is the cap of 10,575 full time equivalent posts, a reduction of 200 posts on 2010.

Why is it so that so many parents are exercised? Not so much that all the parents believe that they will lose a SNA completely, they clearly won’t. More because we have a record in the country of not providing for children with learning difficulties. More because many parents have learnt that the only way to get something is to fight for it. There is a fear there among parents. The reality of that fear bonds these parents together and ironically for the Department of Education makes them a greater lobby than if the department had funded the SNA and learning intervention historically. The National School system was founded on a premise in 1832 of “If it can’t be efficient make it cheap, and if it can’t be cheap make it efficient”. Any minister in the department needs Dr Who’s tardis to understand this department’s century old policy. It was the original social department of the state, predating social welfare, health and outlasting Lands and the Gaeltacht. Inspectors for the department visited children in the care of religious orders at residential homes and some were concerned at what they knew but the department turned a blind eye. I always suspect being a member of the Knights of Columbanus was central to getting on in some government departments like Education.

It seems to me that Wexford is worse affected by the reduction in SNA hours comparatively more than anywhere else. Why? The matter was raised at a VEC meeting where we were given the Departmental press release that blamed the increase on numbers qualifying for SNA’s on pressure by parents on professionals to produce reports that would result in the child getting an SNA. Professionals buckling at the prospect of parent power? That’s a new one on me, one that I find hard to swallow as it conflicts with what parents in Wexford told me when I visited a school here last year. Parents were concerned that there child was been given a 10 minute assessment in a classroom situation after which a decision was made on the application for an SNA. Questions were asked about the consistency on a national level of decisions on similar applications and the inconsistency of qualifications of those deciding on who got an SNA. Rather than parental pressure being the cause of the upsurge it strikes me that the pressure was downward from the department on those deciding on applications for SNA’s.

The department has seen it all before and will see it again, The department will survive and endure. That’s the problem. Education come’s pretty far down the department’s list of priorities. Time moves on and the world is a different place. That proves true for everywhere except in Marlboro St. For parents of children relying on SNA’s challenging the economic orthodoxy is one thing but taking on the mandarins at the Department of Education may well be a step into the unknown. In the past they’ve pursued a sex abuse victim of the principal convicted of these offences as she had the temerity to seek compensation from the Department. Cutting striking teachers pay in Christmas week didn’t cost this Department a second thought.

As a department it’s dysfunctional but can’t be abolished, how else would we provide for education? Ruairi Quinn has a job of work to make the department human. I wish him well and I hope that when the remaining SNA hour4s are reviewed in September that the matter that affects Wexford is resolved.

VEC axing? The thin end of the wedge

Since I was elected in 2004 I’ve served on Co Wexford Vocational Education Committee. This committee runs 6 second level schools in the county and alos nominates board members to some community schools that it iholds joint trustee status with other patrons. The VEC also provides adult education, traveller education, literacy programs and PLC courses that are accepted by third level colleges as a valid entry route.

That was until today. Last year that great supporter of vocational education Colm McCarthy made the case for just 22 VEC’s. This year the minister has said there should be just 16. Just 4 will remain in place, City of Dublin as you would expect in the largest single local authority in the country and the other 3 just happen to be located in the constituency of the present minister and her immediate predecessor!

Good old Fianna Fail and the Greens! If they are delivering a new standard of service to all of us why then are they not allowing their own constituents to benefit from the claimed improved service delivery? Minister Coughlan tells us that the remaining VECs "will be organisations of sufficient scale to support the evolution of local education service delivery and to meet future challenges So what hen is the actual saving? I’ve been on the audit committee of our own VEC for those 6 years and I’ve yet to see a report n either our own or any other VEC that suggests there’s a huge amount to be saved. I reckon whatever savings are made will probably last the state about 30 minutes.

So the Greens & Fianna Fail know the price of everything and the value of nothing! Wexford is going to be amalgamated with Wicklow and it seems it’s a done deal as the governing body of vocational committees the IVEA has reluctantly accepted the minister’s plan. I’m surprised that there has been no consultation on this with individual VEC’s. As Co Wexford VEC Vice Chairperson I’d expect better. Should I wish to remain on the merged VEC, where will the new HQ be located? For instance we moved 4 years ago to a new HQ that we’ve leased. Will the new HQ be in Wexford or Wicklow town? Will I be paid expenses to go to Wicklow town for meetings? At present I claim only the attendance expense for meetings that mean my absence from home of more than 3 hours and no mileage, about €40 per month usually only clocked up after a main monthly committee meeting . I’m also on audit committee and the Outdoor Education Centre committee. I believe mileage claims will take off as members have to travel further to meetings.

I suppose it’s only coincidental that there remains just a handful of government supporters on the VEC’s. In Wexford’s case just 4 VEC members support the government while Labour alone has 5 members! I’ve yet to make my mind up if I want to serve on any amalgamated body and it may be sometime before the government brings in the legislation. Last year I indicated to the committee that I didn’t want to serve on any VEC board that managed schools where my name wouldn’t appear on a ballot paper, meaning I didn’t want to serve outside the county. It would probably be better for any new VEC to have new and different members to bed down any new ethos.
New legislation is promised so what’s the bet that the membership of councillors will be significantly cut back with board size reduced? An Board Snip Nua will see less local authorities and less local democracy. Soon we’ll see that the axing of harbour boards was the start of the thin end of wedge. The chaos caused by the economic slump is being used to recast the social fabric of this country. An unrivalled unaccountable bureaucracy will be the real triumph of Cowen, Coughlan and Gormley!

FF target all the single ladies

I remember canvassing a house once in North Dublin during the 1987 General Election. It was a long and cold campaign that started on the day of a snow shower. One house in particular stood out then and still does. I had an argument with a woman who told me that Ballymun should be sterilised and that all the single teenage mothers who were living in sin at our expense should be forced to give up their childrens allowance and welfare. They were getting pregnant simply as to fund their life style and where were the fathers?
Of course we’ve moved on from those dark days of 80’s when the single mother no one knew about Ann Lovett died, or the Kerry Babies tribunal inquired into how Irish values were different then, or were they? Or have we moved on at all?

Yesterdays announcement that Fianna Fail and the Greens are now going to end payments to single mothers payment once the child has turned 13 as opposed to 18 or indeed 22 if they are in continuing education at present gives the right wing moral majority who want to use the state apparatus to endorse or punish values that they disapprove a fillip.
So why are they doing this? Lets remind ourselves of what the constitution says”The State shall, therefore, endeavour to ensure that mothers shall not be obliged by economic necessity to engage in labour to the neglect of their duties in the home”. So is the government not behaving in an unconstitutional way? What they want to do is to remove a payment from a parent with a child of 13. Do FF & the Greens think it stops at 13 and that 13 years olds require no further care than school? So where does childhood end and where does adulthood start? Brian Cowen says he wants to reduce our social welfare dependency. This plan ignoes the reality that there are no jobs for single women no more than there are for any other sub group that has been out of the owrkforce for some time. A real question is what about the responisbiltiy of each father in terms of emotional support for their child even if their own income may be marginal in what it can help. A child is better off with both parents, it doesn't always work out like that, but in the physical absence of a father the state surely should step in to help.
What will the government save? Births while still above the European average are well below numbers that they peaked at in the 80’s. True the number of children born to single women are now about 40% of all births but women are having less babies and having them later in their reproductive life than ever before. My point is that the savings won’t be as big as they think.
Many on single parents benefit rely on back to school allowance, child benefit and allowances for rent. Fianna Fail & the Greens tell us that this will only kick in over 6 years but its clear that the allowance will not be paid to those with children now in 3rd level education. My point is that welfare should be about helping a person up the ladder. And in 6 years time being the child of a single parent will act as a break on progressing to second level education. Its likely that the greens don’t connect with many single parents struggling on low incomes. Its clear FF don’t care about them as a group.

Politically let’s compare the response to the recent concern about child benefit. Do you remember last year when the airwaves were filled with discussion as to whether the benefit should be means tested or taxed? In the end, they cut it. Strangely there was no debate now about limiting access to the Single Parent payment. Why? Because the payment is often to women from lower socio economic groupings. Recently the government decided to cut the pensions of elderly women farmers. These women lobbied and made sure the government made a U turn. It seems that the Fianna Fail and the Greens have now found a softer target to hit that will speak out but aren’t as well organised to protest as the farmers.

Into the vacuum will run the FF moralists who’ll nod and wink to those who are prejudiced. Believe me they are still out there a lot older and politically cuter than when they ruled the political roost in the bleak 80’s. So long as we have marginalised sub groups we’ll have them.

Lose your money but don’t lose your business.

Ben Dunne is a hard nose businessman. He know how to make money when times are good and even more he know how to make money when times are bad. In the last few weeks his various ads have hogged the airwaves and he’s been interviewed about the slump in the retail sector. He laughs at the suggestion that the consumers shouldn’t go north to get better value. What drives trade is the customer and competition. I wonder what he’d make of the call by a Wexford town businessman and councillor that Wexford people shouldn’t go shopping in Waterford to avail of reduced parking charges?

Ben sums up his credo as; lose your money but don’t lose your business! He criticises Irish business for failing to pass on the benefit of a strong euro to customers. A Forfas survey last year suggested that the real difference between prices north and south should be just 5%. Yet there’s plenty empirical evidence to suggest that the prices have not dropped as fast or as far as they should. Many people will ignore the advice of the good councillor and shop in Waterford, not because they’ll save much on parking but because they want competition and better prices.

Many people buy electrical items in the run in to Christmas so lets take as an example the price of electrical items. At a time of falling incomes retailers of small household electrical appliances actually jacked up prices in September 2009 by 0.4%! To underline the reality on how little some prices have moved, the cost of electrical repairs on household items like computers has only dropped so far this year by 0.8%, but the CSO kindly give the figures for the drop in price in items such as computers. They’ve fallen by 25% in a year. So where’s the incentive to have something repaired if the price to have something fixed remains high while the cost of replacement is dropping? Moreover where is the value and are there 2 economies in this country, the official one and another for the media?

Its time that those in business woke up and smelt the coffee and stopped whinging about how miserable their trade is. This sector constantly preach to the community about adapt or die. Has the time not come for them to practise what they preach? For the record the above picture is of a car park at a business park in Waterford last August. There’s no charge for parking and yet the car park is empty. The other picture was taken in ASDA in Enniskillen the same week-end. Ben Dunne laughs at his family’s logo; The difference is we’re Irish, and suggests “The difference is we’re cheaper” would be better.

Southern customers have no problem spending their hard earned and increasingly scarce euro when offered value. Why should many have to cross the border to get that value? Sense in the sectors identified above would surely keep some of the money at home. It's time for the councillor concerned to stop grandstanding and see what he can do about delivering better value to Wexford's customers! There's an old adage about business that the customer is always right. Perhaps some in the retail trade may reflect on this in the run in to Christmas and give customers a better deal.
To compare prices between British multiples with outlets in the north check out www.mysupermarket.co.uk