Sunday Independent - 17 December 2023

Taxing issue of JP's gifts: Billionaires play by different rules to the rest of us. Their displays of generosity keep us off their backs

"If you suspect that tax is a rigged game, a con, designed to fleece the little guy, you are about to find out how shockingly true that is..."

Taxtopia, The Rebel Accountant

A PR industry has sprung up around billionaires (they make up 0.001 per cent of the world's population) that casts them as humanitarians and heroes. It is important not to rub the little people's noses in it too much. So, you donate a children's hospital wing or support a popular sports star or team and in this way become a national treasure. Except with the bloody lefties and those people before profit commies.

The PR coaxes us not to criticise but to applaud the winners. We are begrudgers if we criticise. We are made to feel spiteful and ungrateful. Why can't you just celebrate the success of these winners? Why are you jealous if their private jets and yachts and helicopters? What the hell is wrong with you?

So, when PBP councillor Madeleine Johansson tweeted "Just pay your f**king taxes," Fianna Fáil TD Willie O'Dea angrily countered, "JP voluntarily donates millions of his own money to good causes. Let's leave the envy to one side and celebrate what's being done."

Or as my good friend Tomás Ó Sé tweeted in 2018 when JP donated €3.2m to the GAA, "Is it an Irish thing or what but the negativity aimed at JP McManus for the gesture he gifted on every GAA club in the country is wrong. He didn't have to do it and does so much no one sees or hears. We should be grateful and let the haters hate!! Míle Buíochas JP."

In this world, billionaires know best how to spend their money. Governments are wasters. Charity, not paying taxes, is the true solution to inequality. The new way of saving the world is private, voluntary and accountable to no one.

Let us imagine for a moment that every citizen of Ireland could register in a tax haven for a nominal fee, say €20. Or that every citizen could simply opt out of paying tax. They could, instead, at their sole discretion, make donations to good causes. It is certain that the vast majority of people would opt out. Within months, without tax receipts, Irish society would collapse. No money for teachers or police officers or bus drivers or schools or hospitals or vital infrastructure. So my question is this: Why should tax be optional for billionaires but not for nurses?

Here is the compromise: Leave us billionaires alone and we will look after you when our winnings are win. We will spend it much more wisely than any government. In this compromise, generosity is a substitute for a fairer and more equal system of living. The winners do not have to make any sacrifices. They do not have to play by the same rules as the rest of us. They are great men and we should be thankful that they sprinkle us with some of the profits of their greatness every now and again. And it works. Their public displays of generosity are enough to keep us off their backs and preserve the status quo.

The trick is to donate in a way that is eye catching and pulls at the heart strings. What better way to achieve it than through a beloved community organisation? This provides moral cover. It feels good. And it does good. As Trump might say, "it really does."

But it is a pleasant fantasy. It means that the billionaire does not have to interact with the messy reality. It avoids the duty of citizenship. It is a dystopian world where the rich and powerful get to decide what is best for the world. And what is best for the world is what is best for them.

But if you are an Irishman, if you have respect and empathy for the people of Ireland, you should pay your taxes here. You should be pulling your weight with the nurses and teachers and firemen. Not counting the days to make sure you don't go over your 182-day residency limit.

John Patrick McManus, pay your taxes here.

Sunday Independent - 17 December 2023

FAI is still making the same mistakes: Hill's idea of staff relations is at odds with reality

The FAI's payments to CEO Jonathan Hill epitomised a familiar form of modern entitlement. Yet again, someone already paid more than enough got to plunge their snout further into the trough.

The Ryan Tubridy deal that almost capsized RTÉ was a classic example. The sums are smaller in Hill's case but the mentality, that fat cats can never have enough cream, is the same.

Former FAI chairman Roy Barrett told last weekend's AGM that he made the extra payment to "incentivise the executive." Seriously? Hill earns €258,000 per annum. Shouldn't that be sufficient incentive for him?

FAI administrative staff, meanwhile, are supposed to stay incentivised on an average wage of €32,000 a year. The figure for development staff is €40,000. Comments that the Hill payment doesn't matter because"€12,000 isn't that much money" is an insult to people for whom it's several months wages.

Hill claims he has a good relationship with Siptu, who represent many of those workers. But Siptu Services Division Organiser Teresa Hannick doesn't agree: "We would like to clarify that relations in terms of dealing with management have broken down to such a degree that the employees are bringing management to the Workplace Relations Commission. Both parties have agreed to attend."

Hannick insists Hill misled Wednesday's Dáil Committee hearing by describing their members as merely, "a small cohort," within the organisation. She says Siptu has, "a sizeable membership within the FAI."

Hill has caused, "extreme annoyance" by failing to recognise the union for collective bargaining purposes. "The staff are continuously told 'we are one' but this is far from the truth," laments Hannick.

What also rankles is the double standard operated as regards pay. While the CEO's pay is benchmarked against the public sector, the FAI refused to do the same for staff. The result is that while Hill's pay has risen by 22 per cent in the last years, some employee's with over 10 years experience have seen their pay rise by just three per cent compared to 2011 figures.

This is a poor reward for people who agreed to pay cuts so the Association could stay afloat during the Delaney era. It's a classic example of the modern trend where those at the top are afforded every consideration, but those lower down must like it or lump it. It's Class War.

Four years ago, Siptu asked for a worker director position to be made available on the board. The request, which still stands, was turned down. The workers apparently aren't qualified to deal with the really important issues.

Corporate Ireland's values were writ large in the Hill payment saga. Barrett implied that he didn't tell the FAI board about the payments in case media leaks led to the public finding out. That's a strange attitude for an organisation in receipt of public money.

Sunday Independent - 3 December 2023

So they're trying the Great Replacement theory on us

They are in too deep to see themselves as suckers, the kind of people who trashed the US Capitol for Trump - many of whom have gone to jail for a long time, while their main man is still out there, denying all responsibility. They are McGregor without the money - and when you consider how angry he is despite all that opulence, the mind boggles at how angry they are without it.

Yet because they live in a world of Steve Bannon's bullshit, somehow they will never be angry about the right things.

I keep going back to the great film Nomadland, about this world of people abandoned for the greater good of Corporate America, and that moment when it hits you: that the evil genius of the far right is to persuade such victims of the oligarchs that their problems are caused by those who have even less money than they do.

And that those with the most money - Trump, Musk, Carlson, McGregor - are somehow on their side.

They're not... obviously.

Sunday Independent - 3 December 2023

Icons of hope have much more to offer: McGregor's brand of Irishness is fuelled by hate

Much condescending rubbish was written about the authentically proletarian nature of McGregor's behaviour by those apparently convinced that working class life consists solely of telling people to f**k off and punching them in the mouth.

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Some Irish people would like to disown McGregor, but to a certain extent he both embodies and magnifies the worst elements of the national character. Take his declaration to Mayweather that he didn't need to be told about racism because, "My people have been oppressed our entire existence. And still very much are."

This particular trope proved popular with the right-wing Yanks who during the Black Lives Matters protests never tired of saying that African Americans had nothing to complain about because Irish people had it just as bad. The same belief, that Irish history is so uniquely harrowing it's made us experts in suffering, is common here too.

In reality we enjoyed a much less terrible 20th century than most European nations by dint of avoiding World War II. But much of the commentary on the immigration issue suggests we still feel so sorry for ourselves there's not much sympathy left for anyone else.

A man who says he loves his home city shouldn't want to see it in flames.

The riot was greeted with barely concealed glee by people who oppose curbs on hate speech yet seem fine with the harassment of library staff by homophobic cranks, use women's sport as a vehicle for attacking trans people and hint that climate change doesn't exist. They highlight crimes by immigrants while ignoring crimes against them, admire Trump and Musk, never stop banging on about Wokeness and will have got a kick out of Russia banning the gay rights movement. When called out, they affect indignation like footballers rolling on the ground feigning injury.

There are those too who, while disapproving of the riot, will be happy if it results in the Government adopting a draconian immigration policy. By showing just how ugly this stuff is when you strip away the veneer of respectability, McGregor might actually have done Ireland a favour.

Well done champ.