Archive for February 2010
One who undertakes an endeavour
Posted on February 27, 2010
There is a lot of talk at the moment about the need for entrepreneurship to help get our economy growing again. I’ve just learned tonight from Wikipedia that entrepreneur is a French word that means “one who undertakes an endeavour”. I think this means we all are entrepreneurs in our own way. But that’s not the notion of an entrepreneur that is put across by many of those that call for the encouragement of entrepreneurship in Irish Society. I always get the impression that what is being called for are people who will start up a business to make money and as a result create jobs. There was a young man that seemed to be presented in this mould on the Pat Kenny show last week. He had made a million from setting up an I.T. company. The idea being put forward by the programme, I felt, was that this is the type of entrepreneur that should populate our economy and even our parliament. If the young man came up with some scientific or technological innovation that changed people’s lives, that achievement was not highlighted by Pat Kenny, or the young man himself. I do not know what the young man’s company created and I don’t want to judge him as such. Michael D. Higgins T.D. pointed out at an Oireachtas Committee during the week that ‘Frontline’ doesn’t allow for much more than black and white positions to be set out by the panellists and audience. But I felt the idea that was being put forward by the way he was introduced, and even in the way the young man spoke of himself, was that what we mean by entrepreneurs is people that make money and create jobs, and that is about the height of it. Kenny spoke about there not being enough business people in the Dail.
Enhancing the role we play as members of the Oireachtas
Posted on February 19, 2010
Have just discovered that the Oireachtas website allows users to the site to download clips from its video recordings of Dail and Seanad and Committee proceedings. This is how I have created the video clip for this post which is my speech on Labour's private members time last Wednesday when I spoke about my old hobby horse - the need to retain our present electoral system of pr stv in multi seat constituencies. Went a bit of topic but hey - have to take a bit of licence every now and then.
The long haul
Posted on February 09, 2010
What do I think about the resignation of George Lee from the Dail?
I think it is a pity. If he stuck around he could have made a good contribution. I felt he was making an impression and would have expected him to grow into the role of TD. I was very impressed when I was shown a leaflet from George about the budget that was handed to someone I know getting off the LUAS in his constituency on the evening of the Budget. I thought from this leaflet that he would give his Fine Gael constituency Dail colleagues a run for their money in terms of his work on the ground before the next election.
