“If the leaders of a society are not prepared to hold themselves accountable or there are not the institutions which are sufficiently independent to hold them accountable, then I think you have a very serious problem on your hands.”
Mr Fitzgerald.
The Irish Times - Saturday, March 6, 2010
Is Poolbeg Incinerator Affair Complicit With Recklessness?
Is there a serious problem with the Poolbeg Planning process? That underhand and predetermined process was rubber stamped by these politically controlled and possibly unaccountable institutions:
Here are a few questions on the apparently rigged Poolbeg Incinerator Hearings. They attempt to emulate the views on business in Ireland as expressed by Niall Fitzgerald, former chairman & CEO of Unilever, chairman of Reuters.
- In order to pursue a consulting career in Ireland's waste industry is it necessary to compromise one's principles?
- Are the promoters of the proposed Poolbeg Incinerator aware of the health and financial risks that will be taken and are they thus “complicit with recklessness”?
- Or are they unaware of what is going on and are thus failing to discharge their responsibilities as public servants?
Here are some pointers for your own research to answer these questions:
The Ignored McKechnie Judgement
RPS Spin on Health
CBRE Spin on Property
Professor Dr Staines Health Study Request Ignored
Air Quality "Errors" by Expert DCC Consultant
Taxpayer Financial Intimidation by City Manager
Covanta Record of Pollution Violations
Bankster Politicians Jumping In Front of Parades
IGB Poolbeg: Dodgy DDDA & Reckless Anglo-Irish Bank
The Boomtown Rats
____________________
“unless I was prepared to engage more directly with politicians . . . and at some point be ready to compromise on my own principles, that that would restrict my abilities to develop a business career in Ireland”.
Mr Fitzgerald.
The Irish Times - Saturday, March 6, 2010
Mr Fitzgerald left Ireland in 1970 and went on to become chairman and chief executive of the giant conglomerate Unilever and chairman of the global media agency Reuters.
Top Irish businessman rails at 'intertwining with politics'
FINTAN O'TOOLE [Emphasis added in this blog posting]
ONE OF Ireland’s most successful businessmen, Niall Fitzgerald, has told The Irish Times he did not feel that he could have pursued a business career in Ireland without compromising his personal principles.
Mr Fitzgerald left Ireland in 1970 and went on to become chairman and chief executive of the giant conglomerate Unilever and chairman of the global media agency Reuters.
In an interview published today, Mr Fitzgerald suggests that “many people in domestic Irish business succeeded because they were intertwined with politics” and that “unless I was prepared to engage more directly with politicians . . . and at some point be ready to compromise on my own principles, that that would restrict my abilities to develop a business career in Ireland”.
Mr Fitzgerald is critical of what he calls the “claustrophobia” of Irish business. He says “that very intimacy, the knowledge that you can take one small envelope and write all the names that matter on the back of it” militated against independent jjudgment and high ethical standards, contributing to the current crisis in the Irish economy.
Recalling a dinner last summer with friends who had served on the boards of Irish banks, Mr Fitzgerald (himself a director of Bank of Ireland during the 1990s) says he posed a question: Were they aware of the risks that were being taken and thus “complicit with the recklessness”? Or were they unaware of what was going on and thus failing to discharge their responsibilities as directors? The question, he says, prompted a “very ferocious conversation”.
Mr Fitzgerald is also critical of the argument that banks must continue to pay very high salaries to retain senior managers. “You mean, these terribly valuable people who either didn’t understand the risks they were running or understood them and continued anyway without thought for the consequences? You know what? I could do without those valuable people.”
He also criticises high-level business people and bankers who are going into exile in tax havens such as Switzerland. He is, he says, “deeply sad” that some seem obsessed with “how you avoid at almost any cost to yourself and your family being a supportive member of the wider society in which you live”.
Mr Fitzgerald expresses concerns about the ability of those in positions of power to take responsibility for what has happened. “If the leaders of a society are not prepared to hold themselves accountable or there are not the institutions which are sufficiently independent to hold them accountable, then I think you have a very serious problem on your hands.”
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2010/0306/1224265713249.html?via=mr
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