Ireland Doesn't Have Exclusivity on Rip-Offs

During a recent press trip to Portugal I had the displeasure to visit Faro airport. The airport in general is fine, as airports go - the moving to an overcrowded transition area aside.

I had my son with me and he asked if he could have some nuggets and chips. We toured around the shops on offer and found that the only place offering this delicacy was the 'Food Court'. My God, the prices would make your eyes water - and that's some statement from a citizen of the alleged king of rip-offs, Ireland. Admittedly, prices are up there for all to see, so you have the option of not making a purchase, but if you're in the airport for quite a while, which we were, you have to eat something, somewhere. 

Essentially we purchased a portion of nuggets, a burger and a fish burger - all with chips and a drink - not a very unusual order and one for which you'd expect change from €20 under normal circumstances - not in Faro Airport. The whole lot came to the princely sum of €35 - I kid you not. For that price I would have expected this to be some pretty wonderful fast food - but it wasn't. The nuggets and burger were acceptable - or at least would have been if they had been purchased at a reasonable price - but whatever languished in the fish burger hadn't seen the sea for some time - it was pretty dodgy fare in all honesty.

I think the short term price gouging of the authority running the airport, and consequently the franchisees there, isn't doing a whole lot for tourism on the Algarve. They really could, and should, be doing a lot better. 

Feels good to get all that off my chest. 

Incidentally, the trip to the Algarve itself was very enjoyable, weather was good, plenty to do and Praia da Luz, where we stayed, is a very pretty town well worth a visit. Pity about the airport though. 

On our return we were gouged for €45 to leave our car at Shannon Airport for five days - just in case we'd forgotten that monopolies in Ireland still have the ability to extract maximum cash, for little or no service, given half a chance.

It All Depends on How You Look at Things

Much of what we read, hear and view in the media these days is, you'll probably agree - exceedingly negative. Which has meant that, in everyday life, when you engage people in casual conversation you get an unbelievably negative feeling about the country, its people, their jobs, the world in general, etc.

This has become endemic across the country (I'm talking about Ireland here, it's not quite as bad elsewhere, but not a long way off) and it is now being accepted that things are bad, we are all screwed, we are all going to lose our jobs, none of us will have any money, etc., etc.

I listened to a programme on Today FM over the weekend and a very interesting counterpoint was made in a very short sentence that put all of this into perspective for me so I thought I'd share it with you.

I can't remember the programme in question as I turned on in the middle of this particular discussion. Essentially, one of the usual doom merchants was in there giving it welly. The budget had cut the legs from under the average person, we were all going to have less money and this government has been doing an absolutely awful job. To end his point he said that unemployment had hit the 10% for the first time since the 1980's. 

At this point another contribitor spoke very calmly and said: "Yes, but doesn't that mean that 90% of the workforce is, in fact, employed."

You've got to admit, it's all about how you look at it. 

At this point in time we could do with a few more 'glass half full' and a lot less 'glass half empty' pundits reporting in the media. 

If you're wondering about the origins of the credit crisis, this video outlines it in a very understandable form. Very well worth a watch. 


The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.

Pause, Touch, Engage

It is, indeed, very uplifting to see a group of people such as that assembled by the Irish rugby squad, get their just rewards following years of nearly making it. 

In case you've been living under a stone, or simply have no interest in rugby, Ireland finally won the Grand Slam on Saturday March 21st 2009 by beating Wales by 17 points to 15. It was, in the best sense of the term, a pulsating match which Ireland won in the last minute, and could still have lost with the last kick of the game. 

This was, however, not just the winning of a single game, it was the culmination of up to ten years of solid graft and toil for quite a few players in this uniquely talented squad.

It is to be hoped that this wonderful victory, as well as that of our pocket sized boxing world champion - Bernard Dunne - will be one of those things we look back on in years to come as a turning point.

Our country needs heroes and champions now like it has never done before. Our sporting heroes have shown us the way - now it is up to us to follow. The Irish public must put its shoulder to the wheel and try to get our faltering economy back on track. Like our rugby and boxing champions, it will not be easy - this is going to take a lot of hard work and will not happen overnight. If, however, we stick with it and take whatever pain is necessary in the short term - we will, in the longer term, come out a stronger, leaner and meaner country ready to create a new, and hopefully more sustainable, boom. 

Forbes Rich List Woes for Irish Billionaires

Sure you'd have to feel sorry for them in this time of recession and general hardship. I would imagine that there are very few people who have lost their jobs over the past year who will feel too sorry for our poor misfortunate gang of billionaires who have lost pots of money (mostly theoretically because a lot of it is connected to share values) over the past 12 months.

The most recent Forbes Magazine Rich List reports: "The richest people in the world have gotten poorer, just like the rest of us. This year the world's billionaires have an average net worth of $3 billion, down 23% in 12 months." Sure your heart would bleed for them.

Americans now account for 44% of the money in the world's rich list and 45% of the slots on the list. Poor old Bill Gates, he lost $18 billion but, on the upside, regained his title as the world's richest man. Warren Buffett, the fabled 'Sage of Omaha' took a proverbial beating as well. He was riding high at No. 1 last year but saw his fortune decline $25 billion in the past 12 months as shares in his Berkshire Hathaway vehicle fell nearly 50%. Mexican telecom titan Carlos Slim Helú maintains his spot in the top three but lost $25 billion.

In total the Forbes list reckons that there were 1,125 billionaires in the world 12 months ago, today there are a mere 793. Times are, indeed, tough.

In Ireland it will come as no surprise that Seán Quinn has lost his top spot in the ranks of Irish-born billionaires. It is estimated that Quinn lost a whopping $4.5 billion in the past year to reduce his fortune to a mere €1.5 billion. His dalliance with Anglo Irish Bank would appear to have put paid to the good times. Still, it's an ill wind, etc. and, for Denis O’Brien, that summer breeze is his ascendancy to the number one spot as both Quinn and Tony O'Reilly's fortunes plummet. Mr. O'B is estimated to have retained his personal fortune at around $2.2bn.

Horror of horrors, O’Reilly has actually been dropped from the latest list of world billionaires completely as his Independent News & Media group has capitulated in the current economic environment.

The wealthiest Irish citizen (not necessarily Irish born) is an Indian-born businessman called Pallonji Mistry (I know, I never heard of him either), who is a real blow-in, only receiving an Irish passport two years ago. His worth apparently stands at $2.5 billion. In second spot comes John Dorrance III, US-born heir to the Campbell’s soup fortune. His fortune is estimated at $2.3 billion, down from $2.7 billion. He'd better be careful, Din is coming up on the inside railings.

If you've lost your job, have taken a severe pay cut or, heaven forbit, have taken a a haircut in your investments, you'll no doubt take solace in the fact that, of those who did make the billionaires list for 2009, 87 per cent lost money in the past year.

Ulick McEvaddy and the Swingers

You have to hand it to Ulick McEvaddy, you might not agree with his political views, you may even think he's lost the plot a bit lately (his lauding of the 10 in the 'Golden Circle' as 'not having done anything wrong' in 'supporting the bank [Anglo] in its hour of need' is particularly off the wall), but in these straitened times, he does help put a bit of a smile on our faces.

McEvaddy is quoted on the Sunday Business Post as having said of the current state of the Irish banking system:

‘‘Someone described it like this. If you go to a swingers’ party with 30 couples and you know that two of those couples have sexually transmitted diseases, it’s not going to be much of a swingers’ party, is it?”

I'm glad he prefaced it with "Someone described it like this", God I'd hate to think that Ulick would be up to that type of stuff. You have to hand it to him though, it's a pretty good analogy of what's going on in the Irish banking sector at the moment. At least Anglo has been outed as the 'clap ridden whore' that it is, but the problem is, nobody now knows who it has infected along the way (OK, so we know that it has diddled IL&P, but we're not sure beyond that) and who else may have been infected elsewhere.

Until all this is sorted out and they've all had full medicals and a range of shots, I'm afraid our banking system, and consequently our economy, is shot.

Good man Ulick.

Who Shall Guide Us?

I had a very interesting conversation, in an X-Files kind of way, with a colleague late last week. I am a freelance writer and work for myself as a consultant, therefore I don't, as such, have a presence in anybody's office. It is amazing the things you miss out on when you don't have this 'office presence' to call on and relate to. I'm sure I don't know the half of it, as I've never really had an office presence anywhere, but this conversation last week was a real show-stopper in terms of understanding office politics.

I rang the colleague about an upcoming press trip to the US. It looks like a pretty attractive trip, taking in investment product in Boston and New York, two of very few areas which still hold some attraction for Irish property buyers and thus worthy of coverage. The colleague seemed quite upbeat about the potential for such a trip, particularly seeing as things are, apparently, so depressing in the office at the moment - must be listening to Irish radio a bit too much.

An hour later I received a phone call from the same person, incorporating a real Jeckyll and Hyde transformation. The outlook on the proposed trip had completely transformed. Word on the street, apparently, is that newspaper bosses are looking for heads to roll to cut back their costs. If your particular head, heaven forbid, happened to be enjoying itself on a press trip rather than being in a position of 'high visibility' at your desk in the office, it could well be the one to roll.

The colleague admitted that the argument was very paranoid and alarmist, but it was nevertheless subscribed to.

The problem I have with all this is not that this particular individual is worried about job status, that is very understandable. It's more that journalists are paid (most of them very poorly I may add) to lead us in our reading and analysis of what is going on around us. If these journalists are this terrified about their jobs, how can we possibly lift ourselves from the wallowing pit of despair in which Ireland currently resides?

I guess you get the media reporting for which you pay and, as far as I can ascertain, newspaper coverage of our economic woes is likely to be long, laborious and very, very depressing. We are also, it would appear, flocking to the most depressing ones we can find in our time of greatest need.