Night of the long knives for quangos
The big story today will be the publication at noon of the Public Service Reform document at an event in Government Buildings with Taoiseach Enda Kenny, Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore, Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Brendan Howlin and Minister of State with special responsibility for Public Service Reform and the OPW, Brian Hayes.
Doesn’t sound that exciting when you put it like that, but what in fact you can expect is an end to decentralisation, the merger or closure of several quangos and state agencies, and the loss of several thousand public sector jobs. Ciaran Hancock revealed this morning that the Irish Aviation Authority and the Commission for Aviation Regulation are likely to be merged. Merging the regulator into the body it regulates is an interesting challenge and gives you some sense of the difficult choices on the table. Here’s a full preview of what we expect.
Elsewhere this morning the European boss of the IMF has quit, citing personal reasons, media group UTV has seen 2 per cent revenue growth in the first 10 months of the year, and make sure your sitting down for this one, Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary and BA boss Willie Walsh have come together to ask the British government to axe air passenger duty.
In the newspaper today Simon Carswell got hold of David Drumm’s defence documents in his US bankruptcy case. Drumm is claiming that the Anglo Irish Bank board and Financial Regulator knew all about Sean Fitzpatrrick’s warehousing of his directors loans as well as the Maple 10 loans to customers to buy shares, both of which are the subject of investigations.
