Powder keg Politics and Protests

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2:06Today's episode is brought to you by the Greenman Group. A European investment in operations group investing in and operating the essential sustainable assets for our future. The Greenman Group focuses on three pillars, sustainable investing, real assets such as real estate and agriculture, as well as green energy infrastructure. What makes the group unique is its integrated model. It doesn't just finance these assets, through its network of businesses, it builds, manages, and optimizes its pillars for the long term. This approach is designed to create durable value from the ground up. To learn more about investing in, are being involved in the real assets shaping a sustainable future. You can visit the Greenman Group's website at thegreenman.group. Hello and welcome to Pat Tupar. Today we're joined by a former T-Chicken

3:07form, a political correspondent, Lea Veradkar, Anonia Care. Thank you both. Very much to join us to talk about what has been an exceptionally dramatic week. When we did our last Pat Tupar last week, it was Brenda Parr and John DC who were with us. I mean, we had to record on a Thursday morning because I wasn't around on the Friday morning. When we sat down to record the word had just been announced by Jim O'Cala and was sending in the Army. Was that in some respect, you think, going in maybe a little bit of a tipping point and that reinvigorated the protestors and actually also appalled some people that the idea of the Army going in, or was it actually a mistake in a different way that once you promised to send the Army in, you've got to actually do it because later that day I was down in Cork and while the white gate terminal has been picketed, the Army jeeps and lorries had left Collins barracks in Cork, but the defense forces had to put out a statement saying, well, actually no, they haven't gone to white gate. They've gone up to Kilworth in North Cork to do exercises

4:11in preparation for heading off to Lebanon next month. What do you think about how that particular angle perhaps influenced things? I think last week was a reminder of how important language, tone, approach, leadership style is in these moments of conflict where you're trying to deescalate. And I was in a Ryan Tang here in Southern City center and she was in wednesday, generally on the bike at all felt, you know, it was quiet. It was the area's protest because engines were turned off. The city was out of standstill, but there was nice vibes and you felt that there was a lot of collaboration, Gauri D out and about were protesters. You did feel the shift come Wednesday and Thursday in an out of town of fringe groups trying to kind of piggyback off the success as it was perceived of the protests grinding a city to hold on or the parts of the city. And you could probably by Thursday, understand what Jim O'Callum was trying to do in terms to trying to balance public safety with your right to protest, but you don't have a right to blockade and reduce people's ability

5:16to be mobile around the country. But in that moment of trying to balance, I think when you talk about the army, it has to feel like your last resort. It has to feel, I think, in the minds of the public, you've pulled all the levers available to you. You've explored all of your options and scenarios that there has been a lot of work in the background that you've hit this breaking point moment of escalation. So I think when you pull that lever off threatening army, now I know he was careful about language and maybe it is open to interpretation and hindsight of how much he was trying to escalate the language. But when you pull that lever to your point, you have to convert then some of that awareness into action and language measures. And I think in that moment, it probably actually only reads the tempers, the anger of frustration of a lot of protesters around the country that by Friday lunchtime, you had the teacher coming out trying to talk things back a little bit to prepare for negotiations. It could be that he was maybe too formal and legalistic in the way that he expressed that he needed to actually say in plain language, we're not going into remove people. The army has the ability to lift these trucks out of the way in the tractors

6:22and that's why we're calling them in. And I think if he had his time back, this was I think at the time, only a statement that went out. This wasn't followed up at a doorstep where you would have political correspondence, get into ask questions, kind of break it down, find a new ones. And how you communicate verbally is very different often, of course, to the legalistic language of a statement. So I'm sure if he had his time back, you might have done that statement, followed up at a doorstep. So what the public are hearing is that new ones, that wiggle room, where you're trying to demonstrate. This is how far it could go, but we're still here in a process and we're working a process. There's loads to start and points. I've got to chose them, but I just decided we'd go in on this particular one. Because I think it actually has also caused something of a rift between Finaffle and Finnegale. Because it's Finnegale's Helen McIntee, is the Minister for Defence, who would have been required as well to send out the army. And there was a little bit of a feeling that perhaps she was maybe reveling would be too strong a word, but maybe enjoying the discomfort of Jim O'Callaghan, given that she came under a

7:25quite a lot of flack in the way as Minister for Justice. She handled the November 2023 riots when Jim O'Callaghan might not have been particularly kind to her. Yeah, I imagine that's not forgotten either by Helen or within the Finnegale party, but to answer the wider point, when the Guardian went in and broke up the blockades, they did so very efficiently, very effectively and very quickly. I think we're probably focusing too much on Jim O'Callaghan here. When you use language like National Sabotage, which is what the T-Shick said, when you talk about people holding the country to ransom, which is what Sean Canny said, and you talk about bringing the army in, which is what Jim O'Callaghan did. You'd want to be doing it right away. Yeah, immediately. The minute that that was going to happen. Well, maybe you'd even have that operation underway, and you would then go out and say to the people of Ireland, protests are legitimate in a democracy, but blockades that stop people going to school, going to hospital, going to work. That's not acceptable in a liberal democracy. It's a violation

8:30through law, and an operation is now underway, and then you use that language, I think. I think that would have been maybe a different approach. The hindsight of course is wonderful. And you think that these protesters have now essentially been rewarded and will probably feel emboldened to go and do it again if oil prices remain high? Do you remember that the Gilles zone in France, similar thing happened. They won some concessions, and there were on and off protests of a similar nature for three years in France. Really was COVID at the end of that. The BBB burger or whatever in the Netherlands was similar. So I'm not saying that's going to happen here, but that is a risk. And Bear in mind, who a lot of these people were, and they have the legitimate concerns about rising costs and worry about their businesses, I get that. But who are they? They're largely a relatively well-off bunch of people who own businesses, own property,

9:30own land, own machinery, already benefit from a whole range of government subsidies, and already benefit from a whole range of tax concessions. The plain people of Ireland are the two million plus POI workers and their families, and maybe they're wondering now what this is all about, and you can see the response from the trade unions already, and a very old stack of response. As we're recording on Friday morning, there is a meeting today with the trade union movement and the government. And yeah, you can see by on Reedy, and others from ICTU are saying, well, we abide by the rules, we abide by the processes, what are you going to do for us? If you're a doctor or a teacher or a farm worker or a factory worker or you work in in Tesco, you have to have a ballast, you have to have seven days notice, you have to provide minimum access for emergency care and so on. And when you see people being treated in a different way, I think a great tricky environment for the government now, both in relation to the next

10:33round of public sector pay, and then also creates difficulties for the budget in October. And it's a very tricky moment for a government where you've had these decades-long conventions, these social partnerships, efforts to lead by listening, to bring your stakeholders in, to do pay deals through the years with public sector, with the IFA, with your lobby groups. But obviously the nature of how all of those conventions work are changing in the era of social media where everyone who owns a device, everyone who can create an account on the platform can go and begin lobbying, put a video on TikTok and rack up 200,000 views in a matter of ours as a singular farmer and lead people to protest. And you look at how the nature of protest has even changed in the last couple of months, I think has to give the government pause because look at the board B of five. Well, what was the lesson there even in January, February? They did a sit-in

11:35protest for five weeks. What was the outcome of that? There's a review now into the governance of board beer. Of course, the chairman there will say I've done nothing wrong and simply executing on a legal contract. But now those that shouted the loudest there, did a disruptive sit-in protest have gotten a win and outcome of sorts. So if we reflect back on the months, like I've been thinking a lot about this moment, we find ourselves in like January, if we think back to our 50 days, a consecutive reign and the frustration and anger of farmers there, we look at inflation, we look at the energy prices, we can all feel this moment of disconnect where online media is removing us further further into our own filter bubbles, we're constantly talking about the advent of AI and how it's going to take over her jobs. And you're leaving very well-meaning. In many cases, people who went out to protest in good faith in the last week, back now looking at the norms and conventions, and it has to be asked by this government, do they need a new approach? We'll probably get on to leadership and all of that. But there is

12:39this question in this moment of in a world that is rapidly changing on a week where the IMF is coming out and saying things of abruptly darkened. There's definitely headwinds around economic change, but you've got these rising levels of anger frustration on the ground. How are those two things going to meet again? That you can come back to a town square of facts, come back to places where you can have stubborn opinions but loosely held and find deals compromise and negotiation. I didn't send it to you because I only got it late last night from core research, some market research they've done on public attitudes, but it quite clearly showed that the rural urban divide, which seems to be emerging in Ireland, that the further away from Dublin, you went, the more the support there actually is for the protesters. And it started to got me thinking as to wonder, do we actually have a split in the way that you know, America, they talk about the flyover states, but all the economic power is concentrated on the eastern west coasts, you know, with some exceptions such as Texas or whatever, but you have in the middle

13:41of the so-called flyover states, it's, and has been there for well over a decade and has contributed to the rise of MAGA, this level of dissatisfaction feeling that people have been left behind and find it difficult in the year of technology and all the rest, but are we actually experiencing something similar to that in Ireland? And I would two things that add to that. When you think of the United States, we've got these so-called news deserts for the last 10, 15 years, when you're small towns and villages, the newspaper is defunct, the radio station has gone out of business because we all know the media journalism model has broken down. So when you don't have, and I see it in Monin, the Norden standard, we've lost that in the last just two months, there is now no centralized local newspaper in Monin. So what happens in these places where you don't, again, have your central archive and resource to go and find fact opinion, but have the freedom to disagree and instead you're being sent more and more through the algorithms, through the filters to confirm your biases. So you look at the United States, news deserts

14:41became hugely problematic, and we see how that's playing out today in terms of a division being sold. And I think secondly, to your point about this rural urban divide, is it by accident or design today when we look at a survey of faint-of-fall TDs in the Irish times? Well, it's urban city TDs who responded, and it's very notable that they TDs, the half who didn't, are your rural TDs down the country. And the longer you respond to the Irish times, there's a dollar in standard. What is the almost a pact of we're holding cancel as your rural TDs on the future leadership of Miehol Martin? I think on your right, one of the big differences between the US and European countries, and it's very evident to me when I'm there, and I make a point of paying attention to US media, because I talk about these things and write about them, so I need to learn about them. What's really absent from in America is any form of public service media, and I think more so than ever in the age of misinformation, disinformation, algorithms that reward engagement and emotion,

15:41not fact or truth, is the need for for public service media and the funding indeed of things like local radio and local media. Well, I could have come back to the rural local urban divide in a minute, because we haven't finished on with that, but you have opened the door to me about Patrick O'Donovan. So what did you make of our minister who has a degree of responsibility for media going a bit like Brendan Carr, the FCC in the United States, a suddenly making comments about the quality of the reporting done by the media on the protests? What did you make of that? Yeah, I think he was wise to walk back from it and he did. I suspect he was told to walk back from it, judging by the comments that Simon Harris made subsequently that there was no need for a review into our tea, but was it not just another example of Patrick O'Donovan been quite unwise, maybe perhaps engaging his mouth before his brain? I'm sure you would have done that on occasion. What do you think, are you?

16:42I would say that more than ever, we need a strong media. I think a free media is the absolute cornerstone of any democracy. And in weeks like this, where you can see some of the fringes of democracy, in picked a way out, we need to be able to come back to places where you have the freedom to debate and disagree with each other to have places like the media where you can have facts and opinion and analysis. We need that more than ever given the stage of social media. And it would seem to me and it's obviously backed up with the National Union of Journalists this week. The minister had no authority under the Broadcasting Act to come out and talk about a review, to talk about the powers of commission, the manner, whether they could investigate and review how the media had treated what he saw, as a quote-unquote, lob-sided coverage and a feeling on his side that there maybe had been more coverage given to the protesters than to have a point. Yeah, so I was going to ask what do you think?

17:43Well, inevitably, when reporters are going out and going to protest and barricades, you're going to hear those voices. But I tried to read a lot this week, I tried to make sure you were listened to a lot of live radio shows. I heard those voices coming through in terms of the stories of people trying to go about their way, the stories of people feeling like that there were people who were blocking the right of passage. You were hearing those stories come through. So I don't know if that's entirely fair. And I think journalists go to huge efforts to try and find balance. But you look at what the NUJ came out this week and said, describing the comments as sinister and deeply disturbing. I am very glad that the Tornish doves, I'm in horror, saw fit to come out. And it would seem the minister himself has rolled back de-escalated it. In fact, you said Torn, what do you think? So I have to ask you what do you think? Well, in relation. So just leaving the science, you know, the Patrieve Donald Trump walked it back and he was wrong to sort of put the pressure on the media like that. At the same time,

18:44was there something that he could say that maybe the media could have performed better in not maybe platforming people who although they were protesting, some of them were pretty vile opinions. And I've had pretty vile social media posts, which would normally disqualify many people from getting an airing if those have been known about in advance. Yeah, like it's hard to judge that because, you know, nobody watches the whole media. We all just look at our phones, are we turn on the radio, we turn the TV and we get a sample of what the media is reporting. I didn't feel personally that it was particularly upset from what I saw, but what I only saw, what I saw was only the sample of what I saw. And to speak to your point, it was actually the media who exposed all those things. You pointed out that one of the leaders had a serious tax conviction, had been guilty of cruelty to animals, that another had talked about not being worried if Greta Thunberg got raped because of reviews on time and action. You know, some of these are pretty unsavory people. How did we know that? It was actually to my knowledge. Work as a media.

19:49The journalists doing their job and in our regard. And I think it's important. We find those voices, like media is there to try and ensure that there's diversity, inclusion that you are trying to bring voices and profiles that represent your communities with that. The job equally of media is to investigate, is to fact check as you go and to try and ensure that there is balance. And I think for the most part, and back to our earlier point, I think we have a very responsible, accurate media in this country that we should be very grateful for on weeks like this when we compare again back to United States. Okay, but let's talk a bit more about this rural urban divide. And it is interesting. I think there is this perception that of deep population of rural Ireland, which actually isn't quite accurate when you look at the figures, then this perception perhaps at all rural Ireland is agriculture based, which again isn't necessarily the case. If you look at the proportion of people who are working in agriculture and infarming as part of the overall population, you start having to wonder that they're getting a disproportionate

20:51influence over political decisions, because you mentioned there on your about the protests with the Board BS situation, but I suppose even more significant, a nitrate directive was put in place for I think it's only about 7,000 farmers who actually benefit from that, but a lot of political capital is used up in the European Union in getting that. You also have, but far more significant, Ireland would benefit enormously from the mercilessor deal, and yet we had the government voting against it, because it had promised that in the programme for government again to keep rural treaties happy. So could it be that we actually, maybe for historical reasons, are maybe giving too much power to the farmers? I think that's actually playing out at the moment. If you look at most of Ireland's history, what was good for farmers and the wide agriculture industry was good for Ireland, so you go back to the land reform movement before independence, what was good for Ireland was crucially tied up

21:52with what was good for farmers, tenant farmers being able to buy their own land, even when we joined the European Union, the huge benefits there were for agriculture, and I think what we've seen happen in the last 10 or 20 years, and it's not really being commented on or written on much, is we're now in a space where things are actually starting to go the other way, is the what's in the interests of farmers and agriculture industry is by a large not in the interests of Ireland as a nation, and that's starting to play out in farmers and people in that sector don't quite realise that yet. They still see themselves as the people who bring money and jobs into Ireland, where actually at the time they bring costs on Ireland. And they also argue that we're the people who are feeding Ireland, and you know, which is also not true. Yeah, 80% of the food that we consume is actually imported, so that means that if you don't have the hauliers bringing the food in, yes, then we suddenly have a problem, Irish farmers cannot feed the country. And it's actually worse than that, we now have so many cattle in Ireland that we can't grow enough grass to feed them, so we bring in grain from South America, from mercilessor countries to feed

22:55the cattle, and we bring in oil-based fertilisers, fertilisers from other parts of the world, and that's that includes our rivers, and then we all paid the bill. But that was predictable. When the cap on dairy production was removed, we knew that was going to happen, we knew the farmers were going to invest in expanding the size of the herd. That's only about a decade ago. And I think they can reasonably turn around and say, you told us to expand dairy production, you told us to go down this route of farming, and now you're changing your mind again, but like the bogie wedding, you told us to drain the bugs, now you're telling us to rewet the bugs, so I can understand those kind of frustrations, but it doesn't change the facts of the truth here. I do think one positive about Ireland, though, is the gap between urban and rural, is not as deep as it would be in the US, or France, for example. You know, I'm a very urban person. I live in a terrorist house inside the canals here in Dublin, but I'm only one generation from the farm, and that's the norm, I think, in Ireland. So, you know, everyone's cousin or everyone's.

23:58Your mother came from the farming community. You waterfront. Yeah, my cousin's a dairy farmer. My uncle and grandfather ran a college business, you know, so even though I'm as urban as they come in some ways, it's not like America or France, where we're remote from each other, and I think that's why we can understand each other better than in other countries. But we also need to be maybe a little bit more honest about each other, and people in rural Ireland are very quick to tell people in urban Ireland, that, you know, we're the real workers, we're the ones paying all the bills, we're the ones eating the country. I think maybe we need to be a little bit more blunt in urban Ireland and say, actually, that's not the case. We're the ones paying all the bills, and you're the ones who are in receipt of a lot of subsidies and a lot of tax benefits that other people don't get, and maybe we need to sit around the table and have an ask discussion about some of that kind of stuff. I think weeks like this expose the tension between a government wanting to do the right thing here in the here and now, because we have such an import dependency when it comes to fuel, and therefore looking at ex-ice duties, et cetera, looking after farmers in terms of their legacy

25:02systemic needs and issues. So you're trying to do the keep the lights on the businesses usual, and yet we have to have an eye to a future that is about renewable energies, that is about sustainability. Like we know that future is the one that we all have to aspire to and have an ambition towards. And it's that classic question of when you look at the farmers this week and trying to kind of help their livelihoods provide those supports and yet have an eye to electrification, renewables, how do you do both? How do you go out every day as a government? How has the crops already sewn that keeps the business as usual on, keeps the lights on? But then sew the fields of the future to make sure that you are creating an Ireland of 2030 and beyond that can withstand future energy shocks like this because that we've got more renewable energies electrification grounded here in the country like this. See, this protestor wasn't just about fuel prices, was it? I mean, I think this tapped into something more that's going on among some people, and it became the relevance of an anti-immigrant protest in this as well, some of the individuals

26:04and I suppose I can understand and see that there are parts of rural Ireland which feel that they have been left to cope with things like losing the local hotel in the local town or village because it has become an eye pass center. And suddenly seeing a large influx of people from overseas, but it's more visible and more noticeable isn't that then when people are simulated into a city. Like I live very close to an eye pass center in Dublin, literally less than a two minute walk, but because the area is so busy and because it already is a largely multinational area, it isn't as noticeable, but when you do it in a small rural town, it becomes more noticeable. Yeah, no, I think that's a fair point. And again, I live in the south of the inner city. It's one of those areas, you know, in the maps you see online where the majority of the people are not Irish or it's not far off. That's where I live. I'm absolutely fine with that. I like it, but it is a totally different story. Then when you have a small rural town or a small rural village

27:07and then there's this one place in the town or village which now has 60 or 70 people from overseas and of course because it's direct provision and they're not working or they can't work, you know, it's a whole different dynamic and yeah, I can totally understand why people in rural towns and villages don't like that. They see a hotel that provided amenities, that provided employment now being taken up by people who are awaiting a decision on immigration protection. Even though social outlets are, you know, where one particular hotel in my mother lost her military in North Cork, now the hotel, it was slated for an bypass center. It didn't happen because of the change about a year ago in relations they know if it's the only hotel in the town then you actually don't turn it into an bypass center, but the hotel has been shot for quite a while and it has lost its things for things since like funerals, you know, having a thing like a local hotel or any other convenience or all those social things. It's not just business.

28:12When some people are visiting from abroad and where they stay so like I totally get that, now the problem that we had certainly when we were in government is we just needed to find accommodation for people quickly and we got to the point where we couldn't. We actually got to the point where we couldn't no longer provide accommodation for single men and therefore we had encampments on the canal and so on. One thing though I think hopefully it is a positive in terms of public policy and for the government is the numbers are now starting to fall. There's still people coming in but they're coming in at a much lower rate. I remember reading you the day that dozens of hotels now that had been used to accommodate Ukrainians have now gone back to use as normal hotels. Hopefully we're at the peak of that. Of course the big risk is that once again this is not something when we're at control. If for example President Putin is successful in Ukraine and defeats that country we will see millions more refugees coming west and that's why I made this point in my cons on a times last weekend the people who are criticizing the support that we

29:12provide for Ukraine actually are not seeing the bigger picture because it's not just about our international legal obligations and moral obligations and all that stuff and all that stuff is important. International development and supporting Ukraine and all we do is pay our share or one or two percent of the European contribution to Ukraine. If Ukraine is defeated millions more people will flee west. They will not want to live under Russian occupation and tens of thousands maybe hundreds of thousands of them will arrive in Ireland and they'll have to be accommodated for us. So I really think we need to push back against this idea that by providing money for international development by supporting Ukraine that this is just some sort of international legal obligation or some sort of a moral thing we're doing because our main great people we're doing this we're doing this stuff because it's totally in our interest. I think it would be a mistake though to only look at immigration as being one thing that that managed to piggyback off these protests. This did feel

30:13like a perfect storm moment after months of some businesses obviously having to deal with auto pension enrollments and minimum wage increases all which are right and proper but have put burden back on small businesses. We could see the housing issue come through again last week. You could see obviously with an Irish presidential election only months ago the amount of people who spoiled votes like there has been a rising level of discontent on a range of issues and you could see all of those issues starting to piggyback hitched their wagons to that last week. Not just immigration immigration was obviously in there and as we of course we know misinformation disinformation in some instances fueling then some of this anger vulnerability resentment but I worry in all of this that there is a lack of decorum and respect and the ability to debate in a very healthy respectful way is getting lost in the last 10 days and there's going to have to be massive need for retrospection of everybody's behalf. Well we need to take a break. I'm just happening all over the world to say look at the level of discourse now either in

31:17the House of Commons or in the US. Are you a European parliament? Yes it's really descending into. Okay we need to take a break. When we come back I want to talk about how the opposition parties have behaved during all of this. I want to talk about Finafall in particular in Meal Martin's position and also the Helioes and many other things very busy week back after this quick break. Today's episode is brought to you by the Greenman Group. It's answering a critical question how to invest in the sustainable future in real tangible terms. It's answer lies in three areas the energy transition the places we live in shop and the future of our food supply. The Greenman Group strategies to own and operate the physical infrastructure in these sectors from solar energy generation and EV charging to agricultural projects and grocery anchored real estate. By building managing and optimizing these areas via its investment and operational

32:17businesses the group aims to build resilience and deliver long-term value. Explore its approach at the greenman.group. Security program on spreadsheets new regulations piling up an audit thread. It's time for Vanta. Vanta automates security and compliance brings evidence into one place and cuts audit prep by 82% less manual work clear visibility faster deals zero chaos call it compliance or call it calm clients get it join the 15,000 companies using Vanta to prove trust go to vant.com slash calm. Taking care of your eyes shouldn't be a hassle that's why Warby Parker is a one stop shop for all your vision needs. Our prescription glasses and sunglasses are expertly crafted and unexpectedly affordable. Stop by a nearby store or use our app to virtually try on frames and get personalized recommendations. Do we mention we offer i exams and take vision

33:18insurance to for everything you need to see head to your nearest Warby Parker store or visit Warby Parker dot com today. That's Warby Parker dot com. Welcome back to path to par Leo for adka on your care with me. So let's talk about here should let's start with the healy rays. Why are we laughing already the minute we mention the healy rays I wonder. It's such a sense of inevitability to this like you know putting coalitions together it's it's hard fought obviously Leo has a lot of expertise in this so I think anyone who watched politics and current affairs but all of the stuff said there is going to be an exit point there is going to be an off ramp up at some point for the healy rays. I did enjoy Miriam Lorde this week when she called them did the bog off brother is buy one minister get one back bencher free and was always that element of one was going to go overboard you were going to get the second and look still the government has a massive majority I think the vote of

34:20confidence in the t-shirt was 92 to 78 in the end but it is a reminder like I think what got lost this week was that IMF signaling there are dark headwinds ahead and here we've had headlines about healy rays. There's a couple of things that Michael healy ray said one of his shall we say exit interviews conducted I think with virgin media television outside a dialer and um he's sort of indicated he was minister for the people to carry at no you're a minister for the people of Ireland when you become a junior minister but he also said you know we talk about rainy day funds and the rain is pouring down now and my major reactions that is no it's not Michael you know yes there's a bit there's been showers rainy days when there's a quarter million people on employed yeah and instead of them paying taxes you have to find money to yeah to actually that's a rainy day so I thought he actually completely misjudged where we are economically in relation to I mean I wonder as well how much of that was down to do Michael healy ray really want to resign

35:22and is Michael healy ray actually feel that he didn't want the 505 million package that's been put in place I think he was having his cake and eating it to a certain extent wasn't he you know and that he was trying to be a minister in one hand and he was trying to be the populist on the other hand and I think his hand may have been forced by his brother Danny that he realized that his position would have become untenable if he had gone in and vote a conference in the t-shirt and Danny had gone to the benches opposition benches and said no conference that he was then left and he was probably forced by Danny's actions to resign his position and and the answer is we may never know because I think how the orchestra is it and pulled it off not element of surprise and therefore being able to get to walk out the plant and do your fist pump and think you're right he was trying to wear two caps in in many respects and for some time you know what your government minister cap but then your your people of carry and always trying to kind of watch for for the headwinds and find the pulse of of of the public and obviously

36:24there's a calculation being made by the healy rays of where representing our constituents those who vote for us this is the right thing and timely thing to do but you are right on this thing the word surplus like when you watch a lot of online commentary people are able to quote the surplus very very quickly but we all remember in 2008 2009 how quickly all of this can change and I certainly as a political correspondent back at that time I've had the muscle memory kicking in a lot this week off we're getting distracted here we're solving problems by throwing money out isn't there are times where that's right and appropriate but is now a time where you should be using your surplus though for long term strategic planning that futuristic piece as opposed to the day-to-day tactical throwing money a problems when if you could get up ahead look around corners scenario plan you could actually be future-proofing a little bit more I'm I'm surprised to this Sonya given that I've sort of would have been working at that stage right in a couple of books about what happened and that time I think this time is different in that it's a different

37:24set of circumstances but also we don't have the fundamental problems the likes of the banks yeah we don't have a property bubble well prices are elevated shall we say we've got to yeah but we don't have the vulnerability it is not that one no no we had then was a credit boom yes and we don't have that so we've it's the corporations yeah so I would like to think as a country and as a people we've built up a resiliency since 2009 we've spreader options we've got start-up scale-ups we've local sustainable jobs but where we have a weakness is incorporation tax as we worry about at times we've been hearing about windfall taxes for years and they're vulnerable and they have if anything they just kept increasing and I think we'll continue increasing all these multinational are committed to Ireland it makes sense for them to be in Ireland and even what Trump has done in relation to tariffs and taxation

38:26has not had an impact I think I think I think you're right and there is a report out from the IMF deal today and nobody can predict the future but the IMF aren't the worst at us and they were saying that I think Ireland and Cyprus and maybe Sweden were the only countries that would still have a budget surplus through to about 2030 and the view that I've actually always taken on the corporate tax issue is we're in a sweet spot it's actually going to last for quite some time but it won't last forever and the point at which we start to we start to see that that fall off in my view is probably in the early 2030s so I would suggest that we should be using the services from that know for capital investment rather than current investment and current spending and that is that in recent years we've repeated the mistakes of the past in not using unexpected revenues for actually investment in infrastructure yes no we spend it instead of current expenditure yes I know a lot of it is going into the future Ireland fund you know for future capital spending so we don't have to have that stop start investments like we've had too much

39:30you know in the past in Ireland metro on metro off that type of thing and also funding for future pensions and costs as our population ages the difficulty ramping up capital spending more and it has been ramped up a lot I can't remember these act figures but I think when I started off as T-Shick it was something like three to six billion year and now it's like 13 to 16 billion year like it has been ramped up a lot you get into capacity constraints there's only so many people who you can get to build your houses your metros your schools your everything well we would have to get to the point where all you do by spending more is make things more expensive if you don't actually get anywhere infrastructure and I think we probably are not off not off that point but getting back to being a minister and Michael H. D. Ray resigning like it in order to be a minister you know I think it's a great T. D by the way look at the vote he gets he gets back to people he works really hard he's on the phone all the time getting back to people he clearly services consistency really well he's a great advocate for

40:30his decisions and carry but that's the job of a T. D. To be a minister you have to be willing to be unpopular because a minister has to be willing to say no to most people most of the time and to disappoint your own supporters pretty regularly and there's probably never been easier time in Irish history than to be a minister now and that was standing social media and all the rest of us because they don't have to make cuts I think the next government the one that gets in in 29 or whenever that's the government that's going to be in a very different place in the current government because that's when the corporate tax receipt start to run out and that's when you get into having to make the kind of decisions that we would have made in that and the Kenny A. McGillmore governments like I remember my first budget I cut 400 million euros out of my department spending there's almost nobody in the doll except maybe Bill Martin who is the memory of making those kind of decisions and people are now in the opposition benches if they have the fortune to be in government in in 29 30 31 they're gonna they're gonna have a rude awakening I think and just on the point about the bubble and multinationals where I would have a worry if if AI automation and

41:35all of that works and where this huge investment but potentially over leveraging and that works right high rates of profitability more corporation tax but equally if it works you were going to see job displacement there are just a lot of jobs in this country in tech multinationals these huge organizations that will be replaced by AI so that's where I do think we have to have a lens on the speed of evolution and innovation when it comes to AI and where that potentially has opportunities for career success yeah I mean there was a report recently an estimate I think by the Department of Finance 200,000 jobs been vulnerable because of AI and those are jobs which tend to be high taxpayers there's an income tax hit of a common relation to that as well but those people won't be going out protesting and they won't be blocking the roads and all the rest of it yeah so let's talk about the other parties that were involved what about the behavior of the likes of independent for change or sorry independent Ireland so I keep the word salad of all these independence independent Ireland in particular and then the likes of people before profit I see Paul

42:39Murphy was in the oil on Thursday advocating more radical protests and all the rest of it despite the fact that when he went down to join the protesters on our country he was sent away with a flee in his ear by them what did you make of the performance of the various opposition parties and will they end up maybe perhaps some of them regretting getting into bed with these people oh there's so much in that isn't there um I think certainly for independent Ireland which is you know a right-leaning populist outfished um I'm not sure how much of a party it is yet but they latched on to the protests and the protesters latched on to them so they're certainly political beneficiaries from this um that form of populism um I think for the left-wing populists like Paul Murphy and others it's a really a case of e-report you so increasingly people um of the radical left are seen to be part of the great focus establishment um it's weird that

43:40this has happened but but it has happened and the people who would have been out with Paul Murphy protesting against water charges um are probably no longer supporting him they're now angry about fuel prices migration and so on and that again you saw that in the election really struggled to get elected barely got elected barely won the last seat so did the shift in Ireland the angry populist group have moved from voting using their protest vote to vote for far left or even should change and now to connect to now go for populist right i think the opposition parties um struggle to communicate two things being true at the same time you know expressing your right to peaceful protest but not your right to blockade uh people's right of movement and mobility and it was very hard to get very clear succinct concise answers for members of the opposition of times this week and of course you have an opposition of moments like that where it's like through the balance sheet added um but again it's the question of well is that sustainable given

44:45the headwinds we've talked about but we've created on this culture i think on government and opposition a culture of expectation and an expectation of intervention and so even after a 500 million package being announced and you could argue some of that obviously we just swept out and wiped away given events uh abroad with the the straight and is the the straight open or closed in your notifications changing our by ours you could see a government effort and yet an opposition saying right if if we're postponing a carbon tax what does that mean for future packages you could say shin fein laborer sock dams and others question well where's the help for the 750 households on home eating oil you could see that opposition trying to cut through on the 350,000 people who are dealing with arrears and then all of that then we saw the moments in the door so there was healthy debate lots of solutions questions happening but on a week where social media ran rampant and a lot of peruse of language and terminology by some protesters and in the minority it has to be said you would expect your elected representatives come to come into the door

45:51and not speak in the oil caps not speak in the ways that might not be deemed appropriate online and now are in the door shouting each other down and you could argue that's always been the way of the dog chamber but something has changed in the tone and approach it's got a lot worse yeah well you see that a lot worse and I don't understand to social media because people you know people now go into the doll into the doll not in the hope of getting the clip on the news you know on the artee news whatever they now go into the doll and they make their impassionate statement are there on hinge ranch depending on your view things in the hope of getting a social media clip that yeah that's so that's that's that's different yeah and sometimes it does so what's there rewarded is not is not not echo here in statement that gets on the news what's rewarded is a angry rant which goes viral online and that's you know that is a diminution of the type of political debate and discourse we have now well we get to

46:52me hallmark and fiend falls position in a moment but just on the behavior in the oil a number of female tds from a number of parties and it's not just government parties the social democrats in particular are fed up with what they see as the misogynistic behavior and that's why they're very much looking at the independent island males as well in relation to this the guys who were down supporting the people who had the country by the balls are also inside in the dial talking over various female tds yeah it was a rare moment of consensus i thought this week where in the moment you had government ministers mail to their credit calling it out you had hallmark and tea mary bottler on on the government benches aligned with social democrats on the other side saying we have got to have a way where we can have respectful debate where you can have your stubborn opinions maybe sometimes they can be loosely held and people can have the right to change their mind but these moments this week where women it would seem as a pattern of behavior just being shouted down to the point where the opposition couldn't hear answers to the

47:57questions they had just posed to the ministers and i just i just discussed back to the election of her own murphy is keon corolla as well when there was as well as an originally behavior there was also misogynistic behavior i think towards our which i think there was some other mean i can only imagine how mary new my donald and shin fein would have reacted if she was been treated in the way that for on a murphy country is about that and unfortunately there there is an unfortunate legacy again in the minority of women being purely treated in the dual chamber we can remember instances of miss peggy there was lapgate there was moments where you had a politician talking about rein her in so this kind of language unfortunately has existed through the decades and what i'm happy to see at least this week is men rallying and saying and calling it out in the moment because it has to be done in the moment it there's little point in the days after calling it out as as a reflection and retrospective to see the social democrats this week lodge a formal complaint

48:57to the keon corolla about the pattern of interruptions as they see it particularly as they see a coming from members of independent island it is important to say spokesperson for independent island said the party strongly rejects allegations that its tds engaged in misogynistic behavior in the dual chamber but i do think again if if the doll is going to be the place where you come to represent the views of your constituents and you're coming with your approach to solutions and approaches and some creativity and innovation it can't be a place where it is again now back to only the loudest his scream are actually going to be the ones then heard yeah look i i think think the keon corolla needs to do her job and she is herself a woman and has been elective that role and when you're in the doll chamber you're supposed to address the chamber through the chair and that has totally fallen apart when i was the first time td it was still the norm to address the chamber through the chair through the keon corolla now they kind of hurl abuse at each

49:59other and call each other by their first name that was not the case i sound like an old fart now but that was not the case when i was the first time td 20 years ago it would not have been tolerated by Sean bearish who we who we buried this week so what's required i think is strong chair that says you know just like if somebody who's a good chair of a meeting that says you will address the chamber through the chair you will not use certain language um you're not going to call each other by your first name that is not how parliamentary debate is supposed to work yeah there has to be rules of engagement yeah process protocol such as those who break us and this is a work face yeah like that's not forget this this is a work face and these are people who are entitled to some form of basic workers right so you would not be able to conduct yourself like that in most workplaces and aren't you because also if the opposition parties were to find themselves and power the next time we're on after the next session they wouldn't want

51:00and to find themselves yeah and the other rules that the rule that i think would be useful change and this is the case in other parliaments uh it is that if you're suspended from the chamber you're not paid for the period of suspension uh in Ireland if you're suspended from the dollar chamber uh you get the great publicity of having been suspended and you get paid to do no work for a few days in other parliaments if you're suspended from the chamber you you're not getting paid okay is it ever been considered as a penalty to the best you're not they too i don't know who's gonna know who's gonna vote for it in any other workplace if you behave like that yeah you would be sanctioned you and you would probably face some form of you'd be put on a form and some proof in plan and give him tree warnings anger anger magic lessons all right the final training i have to ask you of what's going on in fina fallen the three young men James O'Connor Albert Dolan and Ryan O'Mara uh who uh wrote indicating real and deep concern with the government's response to the fuel protests did you have memories

52:03based on your own behavior within fina gale as a young td yeah i did her last night with this indecriting and we would have been the young turk and the gale back ventures are t young tds anyway once upon a time and yeah i was reflecting on the fact that maybe that would have been the kind of letter that i would have written and you know we'd the five aside in in fina gale before it's of course i i was not part of um but i couldn't just remember my people this five that the young tds all feel a few lads yeah who would have been regarded as maybe as a thorn in it i can't say it but i i did notice one big difference and i read their statements well written you can feel their frustration that they're not part of the decision making process they feel they're just out there to explain the decisions that are made by ministers i get the frustration what i thought was really absent though from their letter and wouldn't have been absent from the kind of letters that we would have written back then or the five aside might have written was any policy substance uh like what were they actually calling for were they calling for a mini budget where

53:04five billion euros is spent to please everyone in the audience for a few months you know back to the fina file the Celtic tiger is that actually their vision for for fina file is to go back to that or are they just saying that they want more involvement in the decision making process which is a very different thing what did you make was um i think for mihil martin this is someone who's obviously a hugely experienced politician um a long time in power if he obviously and i think only last night back i'd say my position is not under threat in any shape or form i thought it was interesting i think it was this morning and burlin or last night he's he talked about how the government would evaluate concerns about the language used last week and how people perceived the government was approaching things and in a moment like this it doesn't matter if you're in business charty small large organization when you have people coming to you and saying the approach has to change you do normally have to look within yourself and go right the leadership style or the ways of working that got me here are not going to be the things that got me there and i do think

54:08while leo was right about the the statement lacking you know a substantive policy issues i think they felt compelled to react to that given the protesters had gotten by ten to two i think it was last fried a ten minutes out from these negotiations starting in agriculture has they were starting to call for mihil martin's head so this had started to become a theme over the weekend obviously the three fina followers felt they had to take it head on but as we know there's been the the litany of issues there going back to the jim gavin presidency and the with the question of is this getting closer to a breaking point for mihil martin i think if he reflects he's going to say there's a communication style there's a leadership style that he probably has to now pull a different lever to meet this moment ultimately though you would think this is not an endangered leadership you're heading into the european presidency for the next six months you've got two by elections nobody is going to mount a heave when you've got two very precarious by elections ahead for fina fall and the government also is it that there is no alternative

55:09obvious alternative within fina fall jim mo calahen has been spoken about but talk about bad timing going back to where we started and the embarrassment to him in relation to the issue with the army i think perhaps there's quite a few people in fina fall would think now's not necessarily the time to be putting jim mo calahen in instead of mihil martin yeah months ago jack chambers seem to be the the preferred candidate then we had a presidential election that went a certain way and he was director of elections then jim mo calahen seems to have been the the popular consensus and and we've seen her last week has played out that lazy with dara brine uh and dara cleary those seem to be the four names mentioned uh that's our dara brine after the housing debacle under his watch yeah but is there a perception there of that he has the legacy is somewhat intact he did his thing and has moved on to a different portfolio and doesn't seem to have the long tail effect that maybe other ministers have had coming out of health and housing i don't know i just wonder is there a perception piece that he's been able to kind

56:12of over optimize and overcorrect and kind of quickly move on from it but i think you're right there is a massive question of timing for them as individuals would also with by elections only weeks as a european presidency i would think the leadership question is don't you to 2027 i think that the government it should actually shut up to a large screen about the european presidency people in this country will not care a damn about the care about it if there's protests and blockades being mounted again when you have european ministers and representatives in and out the country that's where everyone's going to be potentially talking about the european presidency not about the substantive issues or i don't think they want to hear like or we're very proud to be european president the president very important business to be done very important meetings to be at i think the general public won't give a damn about that yeah well i was a minister for the last european presidency and nobody cared about it then so i don't see um i don't see why people care about it now um and it's great to be the minister chairing the meeting for six months push when you knock down doors that side of the morning nobody even knew or are cared so um i think

57:15i think you're you're right in that point um there's one that one thing though i i think we shouldn't forget though about right to teach you about me ill martin um he took over fina fall when they had twenty something seats their party was in third place and there were serious questions as to whether fina fall was a long term decline sorry just to correct us slightly he took over before the election yeah but the election result was was was an apple was an apple at that point um where he's brought them to is where in an election not that long ago they won the popular vote and i know the biggest party in the doll and deep down fina fall members know that and i think if there is any sort of he begins to it would be badly defeated and fina fall members on the ground would actually turn on those tds okay right okay i think that's coming towards a conclusion less as anything else that you can actually think of that we need to discuss some relation to this is all going to be quite fluid isn't we we will wonder about if we see i was actually in portugal last weekend petrol prices are higher as i was actually filling the

58:18whole story to be written about portugal in spain and and the different people often use spain as these ample of fuel prices being lower than Ireland right next door is this country called portugal where they're much higher yeah and um i'm sure the people started giving out all looking easy for you off for a weekend in portugal but the reiner flight was full going out and was full coming back as well lots of Irish people are still actually in a position to take the list actually there is one other thing should the government if it needs to claw back the money for paying for these new measures should it abandon the vat caught for the hospitality sector in July which will cost about 500 million a year i don't don't think they can do that now especially given those businesses are facing the same rising costs of labor it wasn't a good decision but i mean in one of the things and i've argued this previously on this podcast was last year's budget you know we come to what was it nine to one ratio between using the surface for increased spending

59:18as to tax measures many of the tax measures were caught up in this vat for the hospitality sector and maybe one of the reasons why a lot of people are fed up is that they got no indexation in their income tax last year which meant that theoretically there were there were worse off unless as they were encouraged to go seek a bigger pay increase from your employer and is that not something the government is going to have to address in the forthcoming budget i think that's why the tarnished uh is is right and you know i've heard Simon Harris on number of occasions now committing to the fact that there would be a decent income tax package uh in in the budget and we'd see how do you see a certain i-factor may say otherwise but yeah and i think again this is the long tail blowback we're seeing from a budget last year that was perceived at least to be answering the demands of the sector such as the restaurants and businesses when it came to vat we've now seen another sector now remedy true this five five hundred which amounts to 750 million i think the chorus around public sector pay was ultimately then the everyday worker comes to 750,000 on the home

1:00:26heating oil those in a rear those who need energy credits and interventions that is where the chorus will now grow as it happens on the pat pat on the pat to power podcast for subscribers this weekend friend and ogle will be joining us to talk about protests because he's a veteran in relation to the right to water campaign the appala house a campaign in relation to homelessness and even going back to the old days of the Irish locomotive drivers association strikes you're too young to remember that liarius for the turn of the century never that you've never heard oh my god friend i was around the tyrannous entry so you don't remember the train strikes why do you yeah yeah so we've been talking to him i don't think he was in charge of using back at that point and actually there's also a part to power america so let's just hear a little clip of marrying mccone talking in the current edition about balania trump but let's unpick this a little bit

1:01:26so melania um the reason for this now this every thought this was a panic spur the momenting it wasn't because the day before about 26 hours before i'm still on the the melania mailing list and so i got melania mailing list for the press the media mailing list so anyway she um i got an email saying the first lady will be making an announcement tomorrow at whatever time i think with three p.m. over the other time was in the white house foie um if you'd like to be here in person please apply for your credential now you know okay so this was planned it wasn't off the cuspontaneous which then with tali with trump saying i knew she was going to say something i just didn't know what i was yes although you would have thought his people would be going well balania please what do you want to say what says about yes and you see the things she couldn't do it from the east wing because the east wing is now demolished yes so her venue normally east wing is you know hard hard hard hard hard hard and west wing is trumps but but apparently there's no communication between their two teams anyway they're they're they're disaster but what happened to us

1:02:29they don't talk about us when they went to bed at night together and i'm out stop that you're just being mischievous but anyway so what happened what's behind all of this was um a 41-year-old Brazilian former Brazilian model called Amanda Ungara now this is a horrible story okay and nobody reflects well in this and that's where the story will be picked up if you listen to part-to-par American edition is when mad hasn't been watching what's going on she effectively brought the Epstein files back front and center yeah but again if these things move on so quickly because instead it's trump's battle with the pulp which has been dominating the headlines and it still remains unclear what was she trying to get ahead of was it an interview in el país that nice seems a little bit more diluted or is there something else still to come with the the launch publication of a book but yeah the time where Donald Trump seems to be going to huge lengths to say look over here at Iran and Ukraine and and peace deals that he's trying to

1:03:29negotiate and instead his very wife brought back to no look back here at the Epstein files and obviously and obviously in the heart of all of this are victims who are looking for their voices and justice and speaking their truth but it's yeah and this every day feels chaotic right now and it's a reminder in a world that feels very chaotic and ever changing and a lot of ambiguity that we have to kind of come back here in a place like Ireland of strong media strong debate but let's try and find ways to do it in respectful way the future breaks the country strangely other this could be the best recruitment drive for the Catholic church in a long time I know you know I'm a I'm a confirmed Catholic but one that doesn't practice very much and I like Pope Leo more and more and I like Pope Francis too for lots of reasons and at a time when religious leaders really aren't standing up for peace and justice look at patriarchal in in rush for example there are examples of other other religious leaders who

1:04:35really aren't doing what I feel they shall be doing and we have a Pope who's standing up for the message of the gospel and yeah you're I think you're right and it seems like such a strange fight to pick for Trump in the year of midterm elections and the AI doctored images where he would seem to be portrayed as Jesus Christ and then comes out and says no I thought it was me being portrayed as a doctor or as we discussed with Marion in our turns out that apparently he was told to say that there were doctors doctors and he misunderstood the instructions but why pick this fight with the Pope at a time where you need that conservative evangelical base where you still have Catholics obviously voting Republican like months out from critical congress senate elections for Trump it seems like an unnecessary own goal and what is own constituents it shows a difference though between Catholics even evangelicals that doesn't you know if you look if you read the words the gospel Jesus says nothing about abortion or gay

1:05:35marriage he talks about welcoming the stranger he says that rich people he says it's easier for a camel to get through the Ivan Edeland for a rich person to enter heaven you know the message of the gospel the words of Jesus which I now study because of my my work in no today in the Catholic University are so divorced from the ideology of the religious right so divorce if Jesus was around today he would be considered to be be woke can you imagine how woke he was 2000 years ago so these people who are on the religious right who are obsessed with you know sex and gender and gender roles see nothing wrong with bathing migrants are displaying their wealth to to antagonize other people they're so divorced from the actual words of the gospel and the words of Jesus and yet isn't there such a weird time to be alive where you have the vice president JD Vance lecturing the Pope on scripture and what the Bible says and doesn't say and and see in this back and forth like it is extraordinary and that he's been mansplained to the best bit is Pete

1:06:39Hegs of the defense secretary quoting scripture and then discovering afterwards that he was actually quoting script from a pulp fiction that's the best bit of all okay and a line that was news to you Leo is that true yes it is he texted the other day he went on one of his religious as he thought and statements and it turns out he was quoting pulp fiction could it could it possibly get more weird and on that note thank you very much Leo for alcohol and on your care we will be back with more part to part next week and don't forget the subscription editions but marrying michael on part to us and also with Brendan Olga which will be available from Sunday security program on spreadsheets new regulations piling up an audit dread it's time for Vanta

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