A couple of years into the present crisis and we’re still trying to get a handle on the extent of the problem. Along with all the other failures, we clearly have a data and evidence deficit. As way of illustration, let’s take the property sector, the root cause of a lot of Ireland’s homegrown problems.
Various estimates suggest that somewhere between 228-280K housing units are vacant excluding holiday homes, and somewhere between 120-170K of these are in excess of an expected base vacancy (some property is always vacant in a normal functioning market). We don’t actually know the real number and all we can do is estimate using CSO and DEHLG data. This is why the DEHLG is in the process of undertaking a national, one-off survey of unfinished housing estates to determine the extent of new build vacancy and ghost estates – there is no other way of discovering such information as beyond connections to the electricity grid there has been little to no monitoring of new housing coming on stream, and no monitoring of existing housing except for the five-yearly census.
With respect to commercial, industrial and agricultural sectors, both buildings and land, we have even less publicly accessible data. At present, such data is periodically and partly generated by the CSO, or is generated by the private sector, such as Frank Knight (agricultural sales), Savills/HOK (office space in Dublin) and CBRE (retail space). This data is released in highly aggregate forms and is often geographically delimited (either a national picture not broken down into smaller spatial scales or restricted to Dublin). It provides a snap shot of a sector with little detail or resolution and is of little use to planners or analysts trying to work out what is happening at a local scale. What we know from such data is the following:
- In Dublin, 23% of office space (some 782,500 sqm) is vacant (see here). As far as I’m aware, we have no idea of office vacancy levels elsewhere in the country.
- By the end of 2010 there will be over 2m sqm of shopping centre space and 1.32m sqm of retail park space in the state, double that of 2005 (see here). We have no central government database of retail space and little idea as to levels of vacancy across the country.
- Agricultural land has more than halved in value nationally (see here). There is a regional breakdown in price falls, but that seems to be about it.
- We have an excess supply of hotels and hotel rooms. At the end of 2008 there were 905 hotels with 58,467 rooms, 15,000 of which are deemed excess to supply (26%) (see here). Again, as far as I can tell, we have no government data on property in this or other commercial sectors.
- Neither is there an open database on the industrial property sector (the CSO census of industrial production gives number of businesses etc, but does not directly cover property or vacancy, sales, etc.)
Recent calls in the media focus on the creation of a house price database. We need much, much more than that. We need a comprehensive system for monitoring all elements of the property sector – housing and commercial, retail, agricultural and industrial property – and various kinds of information associated with them (sale price, rents, size, vacancy, obsolescence, etc). These data need to be generated/updated annually where appropriate (such as new build and sales price), and be at spatial scales that enable local analysis (not simply national and county scales as much of it presently is). Such data generation and dissemination is routine in other European countries and we are lacking someway behind.
We’ve had a situation where we have been planning half-blind, making decisions based on a weak evidence base. We need to rectify this situation as soon as possible to enable everyone involved in trying to rebuild the economy and make long-term planning decisions to be able to undertake robust and sophisticated evidence-informed analysis that might maximise benefits and limit the kinds of mistakes that have been made over the past decade. (We also need to follow this path to comply with the EU INSPIRE directive that dictates what data the government is obliged to generate for EU reporting, at what scales and to what data standards.)
The fact that it is very difficult to determine the exact state of play in the property sector, across all forms of property, speaks volumes. We cannot let such a data and evidence deficit continue if we want to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past few years.
Rob Kitchin
Ireland after NAMA 
August 24, 2010 at 10:54 am
We’ve had a situation where we have been planning half-blind, making decisions based on a weak evidence base. We need to rectify this situation as soon as possible to enable everyone involved in trying to rebuild the economy and make long-term planning decisions to be able to undertake robust and sophisticated evidence-informed analysis that might maximise benefits and limit the kinds of mistakes that have been made over the past decade.
Whenever we hear of a solution it is usually in the form of sound bites and more empty rhetoric. Plus the invariable addendum that a solution must include a piece of policy that will improve the lot of the person offering the solution. In the case of the above post the analyst wants to see more funding for analysis:
” We need a comprehensive system for monitoring all elements of the property sector ” A priest would tell us that we need more religion and a chef would tell us the answer is to eat better food (at his resturant preferably)
There was an interesting episode of the Simpsons some time ago. Homer gets his arm stuck in the dispenser of a vending machine. The good townspeople of Springfield do their utmost to release the Don, pulling and mauling him but to no avail. When finally the police and fire brigade arrive upon the seen of a near exhausted Homer, one of the officers asks him if the hand which is stuck inside the machine is still holding onto the can of soda? … At which point Homer releases his grip and he is restored to freedom.
The analogy is perfect to illucidate the difficulties with our economic crisis, with personal happiness and with the impending ecological collapse… we simply cannot let go of the can.
Materialism, greed and institutionalised capitalism. The measure of success in an Irish context is the car one drives the clothes one wears… ones material wealth.
For as long as self interest and materialism dictate the form of the solution.. there will be no solution. When labour TD’s and senators come to work in Audis, designer sunglases and Hilfigger costumes, the solution remains as much a farce as the reality of contemporary politics.
Marcus de Brun
North Dublin GP
August 24, 2010 at 11:29 am
So, what you’re saying is that we’re better off proceeding blindly? I’m sorry, but that path is a nonsense. I think undeniably part of the problem has been a lack of data and evidence to inform decision-making. The solution is surely to make more data available so we know what is going on and can plan more effectively. I can’t see how this is empty rhetoric. Yes, we need to change political cultures, etc., but what is being proposed here is, I think, still a step in the right direction and would need to occur even if the culture was changed.
August 24, 2010 at 12:01 pm
Wow! A Green that has common sense! Well done, Sir!
Banking was the problem, being the actual cause of all our debt. As greed is at the base of our consumer society, the conspiracy between government and business is too deep to disolve at the moment. Starting with banking is timely. The rest of the attitude to more, more more may be dealt with later. Advertizing may then disappear as a phenomenon!
August 24, 2010 at 11:52 am
Rob
All very worthy! More power to your elbow.
However, taxing land adequately would also solve the problem, but I admire your Germanicism!
This, if successful, would mean that people who wished could say that land values are out of whack even more than normal in Ireland. So what? Those who do, will be invited to commit suicide by the political leader of the day!
Even if successful, one day in the future, the banks will lend and lend as fast as they can. What is bought could be bulbs, shares in a secret venture in the South Seas or plastic surgery. The point is that eventually, banks satisfy their market! It takes a long while. But it always has happened. Then, almost suddenly, but inevitably, after unconscionably long inflation, no one borrows and the asset class(es) deflate! The problem is not merely a peasant fetish for “land, more land!”, rather it is greed, lack of regulation and banking!
August 24, 2010 at 12:06 pm
@Rob
I agree entirely with you on the data deficit.
One small point of which you may already be aware is the fact that prior to bulding for which planning permission has been granted, Building Control Regulations specify that the promoters send acommencement notice – together with the fee (or a 7 day notice) to the local authority see here
Click to access FileDownLoad,1594,en.pdf
These control documents and fees are a potential sources of data, which does not have to be collected separately. It just has to be compiled and presented in timely and usable forms.
The absence of up-to-date and proper data allows government, at all levels, to make decisions in whimsical and arbitrary ways ie. as there is no “evidence”, public authorities can decide what it likes.
An example is the ceasing of the compilation of Annual Average Daily Traffic (AADT) on national roads in 2004.
I have never heard a reason for this bizarre decision. See here
http://www.nra.ie/NetworkManagement/TrafficCounts/MeasurementofTrafficFlowonNationalRoads/
I gather that the long running AADT series (based on methods refined over years) has now been replaced by traffic counts from 120 sites and a National Traffic Model built using “synthesized” data from the 2006 Census.
Engineers routinely state that “If you cannot measure it, you cannot control it”. So for the last 5 years NRA has been planning and building with their eyes fixed firmly on a very limited view of the past. They have denied themselves and us one means in which we can have confidence in their assessments of need prior to resource allocation.
In another forum, I took a wider view on the need for information and data.
August 24, 2010 at 6:52 pm
Donal, yes we’ve had a look at commencements – in fact we’re in the process of mapping all the housing data we can lay our hands on. My problem is that once commencement has started we seem to have very little further information other than ESB connection point data. That’s why we don’t know what is finished and empty, what is half complete and abandoned, etc. and why the DEHLG are doing their survey. My other big problem is the data is at county level and not village or town scale so we’ve no idea where locally development is occuring. We need data with a much greater spatial resolution.
I’m not sure about traffic count data, although I do know that some counties have quite good data although I’m not sure it is publicly available. I know one county which has 86 ANPR cameras (Automatic Number Plate Recognition) that can track vehicle movements in/out and through the county, and to provide traffic info to people journeying in the county – http://traffic.southdublin.ie/ and http://roads.southdublin.ie/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=257&Itemid=286 – I’m not sure that any of that data is publicly available. South Dublin CC and Fingal CC seem to be leading the way with local data collection and analysis.
August 25, 2010 at 8:08 am
@Rob.
Thanks for that update on road traffic counts.
I thought that many counties were now using Geographic Information Systems (GIS)for development control.
If so, is that not a way of getting at dissaggregated data?
The point of your posting is that such data, if collected systematically and compiled, is not publicly available in ways that you can use it.
Keep up you effort to have such data compiled and publicly available.
It is another means of trying to build a republic of which Madison said “Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men the great difficulty lies in this: first you must enable the government to control the governed and in the next place, you must oblige it to control itself.”
August 24, 2010 at 2:10 pm
proceeding blindly!
What is stated in my reply if you read it is that we need to let go of the can.. the problem is we do not wish to see the can or the problem for that matter.
more data more analysis..? wonderful truly wonderful and we can of course hire some more analysists and politicians because thats what the do nothingers want is analysis.. when what weneed are some people who will act on the endless data which endlessly tells us the same thing.
it is not our government that is corrupt it our national vision.. that is constantly obscureed by data data data
I am not suggesting tat we proceed blindly I am suggesting that we begin to see reality
August 24, 2010 at 8:43 pm
How many road analysts or research grants do we need to extrapolate simple judicious policy from readily available data that is provided in the rarefied form of reality itself?
For example, the world is getting warmer and weather patterns are changing resulting in flooding. Ireland experienced unprecedented flooding last year (data)… what preparations are under way to prevent the inevitable flooding that is approaching in the coming months??
Short answer .. little or nothing.
Unemployment statistics are avalilable and readily accessable.. what is being done to address unprecedented increases in employment? Short answer ..little if anything.
Your suggestion that local authorites and planning have failed because of a lack of data is humourously fallacious.. it is a fallacy that has been reiterated many many times on this site. Local authorities failed because they were influenced by developers and by a national culture of profligate development. Local authorities are the perfect example of an institution which failed in spite of adequate data for no institution other than the local authorities have a better knowledge of local housing needs. Local authorities did not grant permissions on the basis of housing need… this is an easily calculted demographic statistic that an intercert student could accomplish with ease. Local authorities granted planning for 280k empty houses on the basis of GREED rather than need… to suggest they would have done differently if they had more data… flys in the face of fact, reason and logic.
There is an agenda behind the call for more data and there is an agenda behind the denial of the materialism which we all partake in to a greater or lesser extent…
I suggest that the call for more data correlates with the degree of devotion to the materialist ideals that are shielded by the data aquiring excercise.. or defence of failed policy with the “lack of data” defence … which sounds a lot like …. “the dog ate my homework”
When will we start facing facts… or data?
On Achill Island there is a deserted village.. frequented by tourists.. the village was abandoned in the 1840’s because of desperate need… in Fingal there are 17 abandoned ghost estates and the cause is the polar extreme of desperate greed… not a lack of data. The phrase to describe this kind of assertion was coined by J. Heller in Catch 22.. it is called ‘protective rationalisation’
What is the ideology we are protecting.? and Why?
August 24, 2010 at 8:57 pm
From what I can see the whole system is completely rotten.
Most planning professionals I have come across are third rate arts graduates, dross.
No logical or mathematical skills at all, merely the ability to regurgitate buzzwords. To them I never attribute malice when sheer uselessness explains most or all of their machinations.
Sitting over that is a corrupt melange of local government, councillors , developers and senior officials locked in a deathly embrace. Far too many of these altogether.
Up in Dublin is the Borg cube in the DEHLG which quietly makes most of the key decisions on every boreen in Ireland that is resufaced and every water pipe that is replaced. Meter by meter.
We do not actually need local government in Ireland with the Borg cube in charge. I would flatten local government out to 10 local authorities of no less than 400,000 people per authority and no more than 600,000 and would sweep the rest away forever.
We cannot afford it, it is not in any way democratic and it simply does not work.
August 24, 2010 at 9:06 pm
What is needed is a redefinition of revolutionary terms and a political party that is made of intellectuals who are motivated by a desire to do things properly and correctly. This can only become real in a complete and total regection of the mass psychogenic materialistic delusions which define our national psyche.
The sad thing about this site is that it is another takling shop where efete academics want to blow off a bit of steam before they climb into the sleepmaster-pro… and dream of undergraduates.
August 25, 2010 at 7:44 am
Frankly, this comment is offensive and shows contempt for people who are trying to constructively trying to put forward ideas and engage in debate. This site is for constructive debate not name-calling and mudslinging. If you cannot engage in reasonable debate then please do not comment on the blog. You talk about intellectuals doing things ‘properly’ and ‘correctly’; time to practice what one preaches.
August 25, 2010 at 7:57 am
@Marcus
I do not see anything in Rob’s posting to support your assertion that “Your suggestion that local authorites and planning have failed because of a lack of data is humourously fallacious.”
On what basis do you assert that the “world is getting warmer”?
I suggest that if you have any basis for you belief,it relies on years of routine data collection in thousands of places by thousands of people eg. meteorological services, university departments, amateurs of all kinds. The compilation and analysis of such data was done, in all likelihood, by people in similar positions.
Your ranting against such data collection, compilation, analysis and presentation leaves a lot to be desired. Numbers are actually another way of describing reality.
IMO, the situation we are in in this Republic arises from a deliberate and conscious practice of ignoring the realities which numbers (eg. rate of grwoth of Anglo-Irish bank) indicated.
Without comprehensive and timely data, how are we going to know whether the “simple judicious policy” you advocate is
a) being carried out;
b) is achieving the aims of the policy;
c) has been cost-effective.
Just because people either did not use the data available or abused it is no reason to abandon means we need to control government at local and national levels.
Some people abuse syringes, but do we ban them?
People die and are injured in car accidents and car bombs. Do do we ban them?
“a political party that is made of intellectuals who are motivated by a desire to do things properly and correctly. This can only become real in a complete and total regection of the mass psychogenic materialistic delusions which define our national psyche.”
Robespierre or Danton? Lenin? Stalin? Hitler? Mao?
More balance please.
August 25, 2010 at 9:28 am
Asking for “better data” is, in reality, eschewing the state of being “approximately right” and preferring to be wrong with infinite precision. There is a naive presumption in this post that if “evidence” were available during the past decade, then it would have been acted upon so as to prevent disaster.
Are we forgetting Peter Bacon’s 2000 report? In that report he modeled house prices and production and advised Government that the best way to reduce prices was to increase production. But like a good two-handed economist, he also warned that over-production would lead to a price crash; i.e.,
“In other words, getting the supply response wrong might have very serious implications, … supply overshooting underlying demand growth could result in significant price reversal.”
His warning was apposite.
Bacon’s desired scenario was to increase production to about 65,000 units by 2005. In 2005, production measured by ESB connections hit 81,000 units which was 25% above target. Production in 2006 would exceed that target by over 40%.
Now, in 2005, Government was not only in possession of all the relevant facts, but it had the clearest possible warning that if production was not managed, then over-production would lead to disaster.
The problem was very clearly not an information problem.
Yet what the post is saying is;
“Well if Local Authorities had the relevant information, then they could have done Government’s job for it and they could have prevented this disaster. The fact that the Local Authorities failed to prevent the disaster is down to bad planning which in turn is caused by poor information and local corruption”
But the collective mind of Local Authorities is made up for them by Government. So what additional or new information could have induced government to do something differently?
Would a database of house-prices have helped?
Would a month-by-month count of housing production by DED have helped?
No one in 2005 questioned the approximate data that were available and Mr Bacon had made the consequences of failing to control the tiger as clear as he possibly could. Yet Government failed to govern and all the information in the world wouldn’t have prevented that failure.
Why?
I think John Le Carre put it best through the character of George Smiley in “The Secret Pilgrim”
“Fashion may dictate priorities, but foresight doesn’t.”
And we are allowing Government to drive its priorities by fashion.
August 25, 2010 at 1:41 pm
“There is a naive presumption in this post that if “evidence” were available during the past decade, then it would have been acted upon so as to prevent disaster.”
No, this might be your reading of it, but there is no naivety about this on our behalf. However, good, strong data would have certainly helped with creating a more rigourous counter-discourse that couldn’t simply dismissed and its protagonists told ‘to go and commit suicide’. There is a strange fatalism in your response, which basically seems to run – what’s the point of trying to get good data and understand what’s happening because it won’t make a blind bit of difference. I would see good data and analysis – and strong evidence informed policy formation – as part of the process of trying to move to good governance and open democracy. I don’t see that in some kind of rose-tinted, idealistic, naive way, but a messy, contingent, relational process infused with politics, etc. Having good data can do little harm, having poor data certainly can.
August 25, 2010 at 3:32 pm
I fear that I must not have made my point with sufficient clarity.
Everything that was needed to be known to prevent disaster, was known in 2005/2006, if somewhat imperfectly. Yet no action was taken by Government.
You have to ask; why was this?
It should be equally clear that “more” information – whether you measure “more” in terms of accuracy or spatial articulation – would not have changed Government inaction one whit!
It is far too convenient an excuse for Government to be able to say; “We didn’t have the right information” and I would be frankly annoyed if a seeming-consensus amongst quantitative researchers such as your good selves were to conclude that “lack of information” was the substantive problem.
So while I support your appeal that Planning should be based on better information I must also contribute to this debate in order to point out that mere possession of information alone is an insufficient condition to avoid disaster. There has to be a willingness to use that information in the public interest.
It may be a little known fact, but from 1999 to 2008, Government sought and received from Local Authorities, six-monthly detailed reports on the floorspace, numbers of units and costs of all developments in Tax exempt urban renewal areas. Did the receipt of this highly detailed and timely information forestall, diminish or moderate what is now known to be the overproduction of Offices, Shops, Hotels or Apartments? Clearly not.
You say that I may be fatalistic. I have to answer; “Not yet!” The disease is a progressive one. So far I have merely reached the stage of “Skepticism”. I am told that “Cynicism” is the next stage and after that, “Fatalism”.
August 25, 2010 at 10:15 am
@Richard
“There is a naive presumption in this post that if “evidence” were available during the past decade, then it would have been acted upon so as to prevent disaster”
Taking action on the basis of data is a different matter altogther. In response to the 1980s crisis, some friends and I considered this. see “Need Government Fail?” from Business&Finance May 1987
Click to access Need%20Government%20Fail%20Business&Finance%2021May1987.pdf
“Dual aspects of power — politics and governing
Any democratic political system muse be able to marshal and control both elements. Our current system cannot handle the
complexity of the modern world because it cannot acquire sufficient authority and know-how at the same time.”
This is a lighter version of a set of ideas published under the title “A Design for Democracy” see here
Click to access design-for-democracy.pdf
Your John Le Carre quote is apt.
August 27, 2010 at 7:25 am
Donal
“It is the thesis of this article that the ‘know-how’ function needs
to be separated from the ‘authority’ function. It should be
fostered by having carefully defined legal powers which would
enshrine its relationship with the other elements of the government
without undermining the democratic nature of our
existing system.”
Your words not mine. Words which I not only agree with wholeheartedly but words which represent a logical and pragmatic approach to addressing not only our economic crisis but the underlying pathology behind many if not most of our problems.
Yet for the love of God, Buddha, Allah.., or this country …could you kindly tell me who you hope to put this ideal into practice? And how you justify the intellectual cowardice which allows Irelands intellectuals to hand over the precious infant of truth to the baby-eating criminals who call themselves our politicans?
August 25, 2010 at 11:32 am
I do not see anything in Rob’s posting to support your assertion that: “Your suggestion that local authorites and planning have failed because of a lack of data is humourously fallacious.”
On the same page as Rob’s contribution is the following from Cormac Walsh.
“Is it a lack of strategic policy direction, an inconsistency between local, regional and national policies, clientelist and corrupt practices at the local level or the influence of perverse financial incentives or a combination of the above?
….Professor Louis Albrechts of the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium argues that ‘planning is in politics, and cannot escape politics but is not politics’. He contends that the process of spatial planning involves defining the ‘values and images a society wants to achieve’. Any evaluation of the planning system in Ireland must take full account of the scalar and territorial dimensions of decision-making on planning issues and recognise the nature of planning policy and practice as a (legitimately) politically contested activity.
Cormac Walsh Ireland After Nama Aug 10
Two analysts posting on this website… neither of which mention a ‘lack of demographical data as the cause of our catastrophic planning failure’ Both commentators recognise political activity as the crucial element of failure.. I have no data to hand to point out that the pollitical element in ireland was and remains corrupt to the core but this you might find as dubious as Global Warming.
I suspect that the only convincing ecological data which some will accept is the demise of our species… but then who will compile the evidence to convince the sceptics?
Where is your evidence to coroborate the patently ludicrous suggestion that planning failure was caused by a lack of demographic data? Do you suggest that the practices at Anglo also were the fault of a lack of data??
“On what basis do you assert that the “world is getting warmer”?”
On the basis of the observable reality of climate change… and the basis of the exingincy of an ineffectual Kyoto Protocol which has been ratified by 162 nations.
The general will rules in society as the private will governs each separate individual.
Maximilien Robespierre
My assertion on this website is that the intellectual classes of this country are defined by a political cowardice that runs and hides behind the ephemeral need for research and more data, when in reality we live in an age of data overload. What is needed are some data collecters (intellectuals) who will apply the data which they have collected in accordance with the dicates of reason and the data itself. The problem with ou=r nation is that the application of data is being left to people like Bertie Ahern and his croonies who have nothin more than a superficial if not wholly artifical appreciation for unbiased analytical data. Apologies if some find this offensive. However as the Slovanian philosopher Slavov Zizek has often stated… the greatest compliment one can pay to a philosophy is to be brutally critical of it. My intention is not to insult the contributors to this site but to remind them that they have an obligation to the data which they gather.. if that data is representative of the truth then those collecting it cannot simply place that truth in the laps of those who have proven themselves to have little interest in truth. This website takes contributions from some of the best minds in our nation. What our nation needs is those minds to have the courage to apply the data which is being voraciously collected. To say here is the truth but it is somone elses job to do something with that truth is worse than the inital ignorance present before the truth or data was uncovered. At least in ignorance the researcher has the defence of ignorance.
Ireland needs statisticians who have the courage to be implementicians as well.. Who better to implement the data than those who have collected it and truly understand it. If the assertion that data collection or truth… comes with an obligation to those truths is offensive then I would reply that the defence that political action is somone elses job… is equally if not more offensive.. not to me but to the truth itself.
What we all know is that evil triumphs when good men do nothing. If the best minds in the country are in the fields measuring the petals on buttercups, or counting cars on the roads… what hope is there that the country will not cease to be gioverned by fools.
Apologies for any offence caused
August 25, 2010 at 12:37 pm
@Marcus
“What is needed are some data collecters (intellectuals) who will apply the data which they have collected in accordance with the dicates of reason and the data itself….Ireland needs statisticians who have the courage to be implementicians as well.. Who better to implement the data than those who have collected it and truly understand it…”
So you do not accept a division of labour?
Not everyone has the talent, skill, training, experience and time to gather sufficient data to be credible for any particular cause they may wish to advocate.
What we lack in this Republic are checks and balances on the exercise of power and influence by elected and appointed officials, public and private.
IMO, this and other sites like it, generate more light than heat. In that context, I believe that these sites are parts of checks and balances. These are citizens who are being active in providing fora to inform other citizens (eg you and I). This in turn may yet lead to changes in values and as a consequence to changes in how we govern ourselves.
It is easily stated, but not simply done!
August 25, 2010 at 3:35 pm
No I’m afraid I dont accept your “division of labour” in the context of obligation to the truth.
Democracy to my knowledge is not a hyphenated word.
August 25, 2010 at 1:37 pm
AND SO THE STAUS QUO
August 25, 2010 at 2:14 pm
“Talent skill training, experience and time…”
Where is your data to back up your assertion that these are the qualities of our present implementicians?
I would suggest that you yourself have more of the above in your big toe than the present corrupt establishment.
The day we will see change is when we loose the religious or paternal baggage which informs us that we are lacking in the qualities you have generously assigned to our present leadership.
Getting the finger out and standing for election is as simply done as it is easily stated.. (I intend to do so myself next GE) the dificulty is merely belief in ones self and belief in ones data or the truth whichever you want to call it.
If this website is about providing the information in the hope that someone else will do the work.. then it facilitates not the data or the truth but those who continue to ignore it.
Knowledge brings obligations, you chose to abrogate those onbligations to others… in the face of evidence which implicates those others as little more than suited criminals.
To my mind that is neither science nor research it is either cynicism or fear. In which case shame on academia and shame on research…
Give me blind ignorance any day for at least ignorance is a plausible defence.
As a matter of interest whom do you hope will act on all of this data? God? Buddha? Fianna Fail.. or idealistic idiots such as myself??
August 27, 2010 at 6:33 am
” “Talent skill training, experience and time…” Where is your data to back up your assertion that these are the qualities of our present implementicians? “”
I have never asserted that which you ascribe to me.
August 27, 2010 at 8:13 am
“Not everyone has the talent, skill, training, experience and time to gather sufficient data to be credible for any particular cause they may wish to advocate.”
Donal .. it would be a great help to Ireland after Nama, to me and to this Great little nation of ours… if you could inform us where the people you refer to in the baove quote might be found? Perhaps if we did some research and data gathering we might be able to locate these people… and then ask them in as nice a possible way.. why they have allowed and continue to allow the political establishment to be defined by inpetitude, nepotism, profligate waste, greed and utter incompetence?
My guess is that some are in the fields measuring the petals on buttercups … but many are posting on this website.
I would gladly make a contribution of 1000 euro from my own funds to establish a research project that will help us find these people… for it is my assertion that they are perhaps even more accountable than our politicians who posses none of the aforementioned qualities.
August 25, 2010 at 2:34 pm
Richard Tobin
Commendable, and moving words… where will your finger be at the next GE?
August 25, 2010 at 3:40 pm
If I were religious I would say that my fingers are joined in prayer that none of them will be on the button of an Electronic Voting Machine. But they will be holding a “stupid auld pencil” and voting for responsible government.
August 25, 2010 at 3:46 pm
Sure thats grand then.. a nice little vote.. the job, as they say on the Northside is Oxo!
Tis a good job you are not religious for if there is accountability in the hereafter.. the Boss of everything might possibly expect a little more from them who are aprently capable of it.
August 25, 2010 at 2:45 pm
From Marcus
Good Lord, are we heading for a “Smart” “Green” Year Zero then ????
“What is needed are some data collecters (intellectuals) who will apply the data which they have collected in accordance with the dicates of reason and the data itself”
What an awful thought.
We broadly have the data we need but sadly Ciarán Cuffe has been told to synthesise a plan from this data. Therefore there shall be no plan shall there???