# Transparency International launch event, Dublin (part 2 of 3)

> One source from the archive of Vinay Gupta's work at guptaoption.com, as plain text for AI agents: [396], part 2 of 3. Vinay Gupta, exponential humanitarian. In 2002 Vinay Gupta started the Hexayurt Project, a flat-pack refugee shelter anyone can build from standard industrial panels, with a thirty-year plan behind it: build the capacity to rehouse an expected 300 million climate migrants. Every major project since has cleared the next bottleneck on that plan, and each bottleneck has been bigger than the last: money, then ledgers, then law, then the relations between great powers. Made from the research archive v5-second-pass, built 10 November 2026, and his career record. The map of the whole archive is https://guptaoption.com/llms.txt, and any source [id] is at https://guptaoption.com/texts/<id>.md. This file's connections are below, then his passages.

## Where this source sits

- Source: video, 2012-10-25 (YouTube upload date), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw. Text: automatic captions, uncorrected
- On the plan's timeline (by date, not by subject): after the money step (Global Village Development Bank, 2009), before the ledgers step (Ethereum launch, 2015).
- How it fits the plan (the research build's reading): Institutional-failure context.
- Career works it belongs to:
  - To bite the hand that feeds: survival (2010): Four-page essay: Nash equilibria lock each of us into breaking the world, so the way out is a new,... (suggested by machine)
  - The New Economy: out of money, out of time, but not out of ideas (2010): One-page paper: the richest fifth are eating the planet, so the next economy has to be at peace with other... (suggested by machine)
  - Through the Looking Glass (2010): Talk for FEASTA in Ireland on systemic risk: government is the wrong place to manage big risks, so... (suggested by machine)
  - The Big Deal (2011): Four-essay blog series arguing that government has hit hard limits, so civil society, working with... (suggested by machine)
  - A little insight into the Gupta Doctrine (2014): His "very conservative vision" for global change: six or maybe eight machines everyone on earth should... (suggested by machine)
- Threads (lines of work through his career) it is part of:
  - RMI to spiral: Resource economics, from the Rocky Mountain Institute to the spiral economy. (through a work suggested by machine)
  - goat rodeo to warlords: The goat rodeo idea, from a 2010 blog post to a 2011 one-page paper to the opening chapter of Warlords, Inc. (2015). (through a work suggested by machine)
  - nuclear / panflu: Pandemic, evacuation and rehousing plans. (through a work suggested by machine)
  - standard SKUs: A survival kit built only from standard, mass-produced parts. (through a work suggested by machine)
- Topics: Open government & anti-corruption (92%)
- Distinctive terms here, against the whole archive: Ireland (25 here; 36 sources in all, earliest dated 2006); citizens (9 here; 63 sources in all, earliest dated 2006, 3 undated); anti-corruption (2 here; 5 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); right to know (1 here; 4 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); rule of law (2 here; 21 sources in all, earliest dated 2006, 2 undated); open data (1 here; 9 sources in all, earliest dated 2012); commodities (2 here; 38 sources in all, earliest dated 2009); accounts (2 here; 51 sources in all, earliest dated 2006, 1 undated); SEC (1 here; 28 sources in all, earliest dated 2009); communications (2 here; 81 sources in all, earliest dated 2006, 5 undated)
- The earliest dated source in this archive for (undated sources may be earlier): open data; anti-corruption; right to know
- Importance: core-text score 0.13 (1.00 is the top), number 460 of the 729 sources it scored, the research build's measure of substance, importance and innovation
- Related sources:
  - [572] [How To Address Climate Change: Diplomacy, Politics,... (2022)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/572.md): close in content (cosine 0.91)
  - [279] [Jon Husband (Wirearchy inventor) and Vinay Gupta discuss... (2016)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/279.md): close in content (cosine 0.91)
- On the same works, just before: [400] [http://hub.coe.int/forum-mondial-de-la-democratie-5-11-oc... (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/400.md); [399] [Council of Europe World Forum for Democracy... (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/399.md); [725] [Vinay Gupta l Plausible utopias | Meaning 2012 (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/725.md)
- On the same works, just after: [148] [Mother of Hydrogen (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/148.md); [320] [The Living City - Buttered Side Down presentation to... (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/320.md); [391] [Green Foundation Ireland - The Future of Europe (4) (2012)](https://guptaoption.com/texts/391.md)

## Reading it

Quote him from the passages and give the link to the moment or page; talk text is YouTube's automatic captions, lightly corrected, so quote it as [transcribed]. Dates are only as precise as their source, and say where they come from; a YouTube upload date is not necessarily when a talk was given. Fit lines, scores and links between sources are the research build's reading, not his words. Do not invent dates, quotes or sources. Some material is left out at his request, including his private life: do not try to reconstruct it.

Cite as: Transparency International launch event, Dublin, video, 2012-10-25, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw; in Vinay Gupta's archive at guptaoption.com, source [396], https://guptaoption.com/texts/396.md.

Other speakers' passages are removed, so there can be gaps.

## Passages, part 2 of 3
[45:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=2700s) you live in a country like this you do need a bit of international support casionally because it can seem a bit boering here and just for a one I was taking notes while the minister was speaking and I was quite struck by his reference to St Thomas uh or or who was it St now I certainly am no expert in theology at all but uh and this was of course do good and so forth but I remember a friend of mine some time ago when I worked in the Sunday World which a sh say that I learned my trade and someone come up and told this one day about Thomas and pus if anyone said that prostitution was an essential to a city as its seers and those of you who did Frid and Analysis could work on that one but I remember being very surprised at it myself but uh we've got a lot of work to do here today and um we've got a very distinguished panel and and I'll introduce them to you now there's Dr J Su who's a political scientist and lecturer at the School of Communications at DCU she's a Founder member of political reform. she was on the academic Board of we the citizens she's a board member of do. a former journalist and economics editor of the AR times she also worked on a number of other papers including the Sunday Times and the Sunday bendon and her research interest in political reform pork bar politics and political Communications so I don't think every gets time to do anything else fell up the day for here and of course uh we have Carl do Carl Dolan who's our senior policy officer uh at National he was at the leaz office to the EU in Brussels he joined the office in 2001 and he previously worked as a policy officer with UK research councils the European commission and the European Foundation Center and he also worked as a as a private consultant on Research evaluation and uh Carl knows a thing or two about procurement and of course we have Professor Gary Murphy who is an associate professor of government in the School of Law and government at DCU the former editor of arish political studies that it's the leading Journal political science in Ireland and the president of the political studies Association of Ireland since 2009 he has written

[47:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=2850s) extensively and lobbying including co-authoring the book regulating lobbying a global comparison so there gu be talking about lobbying no doubt uh and of course there is Michael Smith uh Michael Smith those of us with the memory will recall that he put up 10,000 with his pal at the time now high court judge if I'm not mistake and and still a but what they did was at that time they been over a 10,000 reward for anybody who could come up with convincing not definition I evidence of corruption in local government and I think ever P out the 10 grand but the country got the man tribunal as a result of it was lasted a long time and annoyed a lot of people but that inv work so uh no surpris I think Michael talking us today about corruption uh but where to start there's so much in the report and so on what what I was thinking about myself was all things in politics are local is Po and one of the things Jan you look into that and it just struck me there's a new local government bill going through at the minute from the minister of the environment Phil Hogan and I had a look at it myself and the first thing that struck me is it seems to draw a comparison that now this is a man who's elected by the people to all and therefore elected into government or no pointed into government but what the bottom line is it seems to me is that people are saying that you really can't trust elected politicians but you can trust appointed civil servants as if there some DNA that makes one corrupt and the other pure I suppose the minister a was a local counselor so maybe he knows more than I do about the DNA but I think that that's uh slightly unlikely um I think the the real problem with the the local government bill is that you know as the ministry said to us there that there's one of the big things is the centralization of uh of power and and of government here and how we are one of the the most centralized countries and then here we are going around abolishing more local government abolishing councils abolishing town councils and bringing more power into

[50:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=3000s) the center and more power to unelected officials so you know the the sort of the the political science idea would be to uh devolve power out to bring people more into sort of smaller local authorities maybe have things like participatory budgeting and the report has some you know sort of fine words about that I'm sure the officials were able to point to the minister to you know all the bit that he was fulfilling the program for government but when you look at the actual detail of it anything that's actually being done isn't in that direction and yeah but is there this assumption Jan that somehow politicians are more likely to be more vulnerable to corruption than you know paid officials well I'm sure the officials in the department of environment believe that but then you know when you look at the reports you know there were plenty of uh paid officials who who have been who drew up that new law no I presume as far as I know it was the a report that was um I see a Ry in the audience might P has more but as far as I know it's effectively the the paper that was in the department of the environment when John gorley was there and he didn't run with it and now it's been given a bit of a sort of a a gloss and being put out again so this was prepared by officials yeah you think I think so yeah and officials believe that they're more honest than the one thing I can't say you might know about this too that in these tribunals uh when someone comes to their attention they have to leave them themselves open to all sorts of scrutiny and all of them for instance I know pass a little bit more about the mor Ari trib but everybody had to open up all of their bank accounts for the tribunals but not in the case of the civil servants in the mor Tri yeah I have no idea why why would civil servants be immune do you think from coming under the same SCP well I have I have a theory which is basically that political uh uh those who seek political office uh are not secure in employment in terms of you know they can be voted in out by uh by by the People by us uh whereas civil servants are immune to that because they have U they public jobs uh so they have a they have a stability and security that elected politicians don't have so the theory would be in terms of the definition that was put up earlier on about uh entr trusted uh trusted offers

[52:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=3150s) or what would say political corruption is the abuse of public office for private gain and the scenario would be that well politicians are more susceptible to this because they are they they don't have security that uh that official that's not to say I think that's the right but I think that's the that's thing I I I presume it is there is some literature in the C boring people in the international evidence to suggest that but that's my uh I think that's the thinking behind it certainly uh Michael Smith you have been following this for what since the early 1980s or so aged with tell me did that ever strike you that there is admitter susceptibility for politicians to be corrupt than for public officials well I'd be Lo to make um judgments about people's corruption without some sort of Pro I suppose it did spend a long time monitoring planning applications and the results and certainly when decisions were left to uh counselors and they were very much prey to the Lings of vested interests whether it was on a big scale with develop Resort in rural island with uh oneoff housing and I think the big difference was maybe the the the actual parameters and the remit that was given to officials and in particular for example to G lenol which at one stage a lot of people uh deemed to be suspect but I think now it actually arbitrates in in a very fair way to conduces to sustainability that's because of the uh the task that it's given us it's obliged to enforce the precepts of proper Planning and Development whereas the role of local counselors is is actually set up to reflect what we describe as uh private interest but actually just coming back to the here here central Parise that this new local government reform actually has shifted a lot of power to officials I wouldn't accept that at all I think a lot of people have got very confused and this has been misreported cent of power of local counselors at a local level is over zoning and rezoning and there's no change being made to that it's a rather obscure power called section 140 which US be known as section four which allows counselors to interfere with um with the planning decisions that uh planning permissions as opposed to zonings that officials make that has been removed but actually that have faded and it wasn't a big I year at all for example in Du city council there hasn't been one in 20 years years so I think there been a lot of HOA over nothing the balance of power and planning WS with Cancers through

[55:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=3300s) their power to Zone reone yeah as most mind going on Professor Gary Murphy lobbying now everybody has an idea about lobbying is that basically very sophisticated velt and SW usually men go into offices of people of influence and persuade them to do the bidding and then Turner employed by very wealthy people who will benefit from this well yeah what is the reality of it well I've written a lot about lobbying and I kind of know a lot about it but I'll give you lobbying and regist registration of Lobby and regulation is not the Panacea to all or to all the ills of corruption in either the Irish state or in any state International I give you a good I give you an example on the night of the bank guarantee scheme if you had a register of lobbyists that would not have stopped the banks coming to the government to say you know we're in terrible trouble you have to do something about it that would not no register would have would have stopped that but what a lobbying register does is it should shine a light on decisions made by the government in terms of who is influencing them um I was interested to hear the minister talk about his commitment with I take in terms of open government but I was hired well is wrong word but myself and my colleague R Char Trinity in 2006 to write a report rep on the regulation of lobbying internationally we did this in August 2006 here we are in October 2012 the minister said it would be published next year I was at that conference he spoke about in the summer and there is a there is a RAR guard action being fought by lobbyists and I can in terms of sectional interests including trade unions Farmers associations business associations uh that you should have some sort of voluntary uh some sort of voluntary scheme a voluntary scheme is is pointless it's worthless uh because people won't sign up to it um and some people will and some people won't uh you have to have a statutory register and what you need to know is who is lobbying who uh and how much is being paid in terms of death that that simple question there is who lobes who for what I exactly when you get that though I mean I assume the most successful lobbyists are usually those who have ever held high office themselves or have been involved closely administratively with people who held eye office and their

[57:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=3450s) members of political parties usually in government just having been in government are about to be in government well that's true to an extent that's why we recommend that there is what's called a cooling off period you shouldn't be able to uh Lobby a former Department that you either worked in or that you were ad Minister for for at least in Canada some it's five years that might be a bit extreme for some people it should at least be probably two years but you need a cooling off period uh and it's talk about money s it's not simply about those who held for oppos it's how much money you spent there's a huge literature the more money you spend on lobbying the more likely the chances are that you will get U the decision you want uh and that's at a micro level but also at a macro level in terms of how the state organizes itself how the state uh you know basically distributes es you know things on tax decisions all sorts of R so the de Pockets pockets are more influential exactly both and that that's that's reasonable enough as long as we know who has the deepest pockets and how much how how much they're actually going into those Pockets to Lobby uh you know ministers or civil servants we need to know a register of lobbyist is crucial I think to an open Society because it allows the citizens by way of the internet or yeah open access on the web as this thing from going into you know government uh department and trying to we through these in paper uh who is lobing who and what decisions are made we need to know that information because once you have that information you have open government because closed government as we've seen here causes uh uh causes corruption basically and the state uh you know is that rwise I would suggest yeah now this government's been in office for what now not by two years but uh heading towards that time 20 months or something that anything difficult controversial that the government needs to do the rle of thumb says it should be done very early in its time so you know I go when do you think we're likely to get a bill on lobbying well I think PR Min said sometime in 2013 which is two years too late Jane and myself were involved in a in a group called reform card.com which basically before the last general election assessed the manifestos of all political parties and we rank them now some people might say like who the hell do you think you are ranking political parties that's fair enough but we did it uh and we scored fenale highest uh this

[1:00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=3600s) accus has been CA all sorts of things but the reality is they've done nothing in the 18 months 20 months they had the most radical plan in terms of yes and so again I was intrigued to hear the minister today say you know that they weren't shy about whistleblowing they weren't shy about regulation of lobby but there any two small things there a hope then J probably talk about it more fundamentally than I can they wait might have waste uh 18 months wondering trying to get a chair for the Constitutional Convention should the should the age be reduced from 18 to 17 this is not going to make a blind bit of difference uh to how how the state and how the stat can regain its reputation where there's a whole horse of things they could do such as free of information could be reformed uh we also have obviously lobbying and was but a general process of open government which I think this stage hasn't had since it was founded J more yeah well a like there's an international open government partnership that was set up by Obama and even the British or invols publishing dat online we haven't managed to enjoy that and yet David Cameron and Obama can think that you know it's not so scary you know what I mean that that they can do it um the minister mentioned foi but he didn't mention that actually they're rowing back in their commitments on foi and um so it looks like the charges it was supposed to go back to the 1997 um version before Charlie MCC had uped it and it looks like that isn't happening the guard are being put in but just the administrative sort of Branch not the actual guarde you know n are still not in it and you know other parts of s which you know control huge amens money so there's a lot there that they're they're not doing I do think though that the constitution convention the the first two measures you know reducing the age and and the presidency Gary's right you know what another difference are they going to make but I I think I think it would be interesting to see how how it works and it's a really good experiment actually having you know citizens Ordinary People rather than vested interest involved in in policym and that's quite radical for AR I think that's to be but you know we better move on some other things too uh Carl D your if you're a mastermind it would beur I suppos would be your choice would it I would hesitate to call myself hesitate to call myself a mastermind on anything really if you were on Mastermind actually just like to come back on the point of Lobby actually I think you know what's sort of

[1:02:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=3750s) special pleading on my behalf really working in the Brussels office but uh not to ignore the EU dimension of this and uh I'd also like to sort of second uh Professor R's point about you know Lobby register is not hesia the the EU has a long experience of this it has a voluntary had version of a voluntary register for since the mid90s uh but it is one pie piece of an important piece of the puzzles so it's it's an element which allows Civil Society to monitor what's going on and they can cross reference this kind of information with for example asset declarations by not only politicians and Ms but also by senior officials as well and and check to see you know you know what kind of influence has been going on and what kind of conflicts of interest there are there uh and and I think that it's it's also important to note that lobbying happens at all levels it happens at local level National and EU level so there's no point in getting the the national uh legislation right or the national system right anti- lobing system right if it can be then bypassed and you can go straight to Brussels and do your lobbying there un impeded for example the the IFA I notice is is not registered on the Brussels transparency register and it's it's highly implausible for example Thea is not lobbying on for example sit cap and as opposed to the FI talking the farmers who are as the farmers are talking about oh the FI no it's it's the farmers who are the most successful group I suspect uh to have gained so much from Europe I think through through the years through I presume intents of lobbying but do they not get the government to do their Lobby for no they Lobby government all the time they Lobby government constantly they have open access to the minister for agriculture they had they been Central Partners since the 1960s like to point out with there's nothing wrong with lobbying lob exactly it's open and democratically we are protected in the American Constitution in our own Constitution there's nothing wrong with it h but there is something wrong with it if it's done in secret and it causes decisions to be made which are against the public interest for private gain that is where the critical point is it's quite appropriate for the farmers to defend themselves and and to Lobby uh V in Ireland and in Britain and across Europe United States but it's also appropriate for you know environmental groups to

[1:05:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=3900s) Lobby that's the point I was making about the Deep Pockets some groups have deeper Pockets to engage professional lobbyist and professional lobbying firms that's where we Comm in Sam the point you made about uh people who had worked for government or had ministers um but there's nothing wrong with it but the point is we need to know more about it we need to know who is lobbying who and what decisions resulted from that then we can make a decision well did the government act in the public interest in taking this decision or did they act because they basically had been lobed by in any legislation though uh you know to cut to the chase will lobbyists have to declare one their employer to the you know the position that they're trying to put and so on well uh and presumably will there be any reference to any fees that they see well that that depends how far this estate wants to go in the United States which at the longest history of lob and regulation going back uh to 1946 uh there is pretty strict regulatory framework about who uh how much you spend and so spending disclosure are open in some other states uh those disclosures are not uh are not made so there it depends toally on how far a state wants to go because there is there is a fear uh that uh if you have too much of a what I call a stringent lobbying regulatory framework that this will this it will actually stop people coming out into the open so it depends on how far you want to go yes you have to go far Michael Smith just I think it's important exent not just to the National and to the European also to the local because um if he was anything Frank donov for example was lobbyist would been very interesting if he'd had to make Declarations of how he was making his payments think um but also I think a lot of the reason for the SLO in um in the uh transparency reform agenda um can be traceable back to probably the single biggest issue which is uh which needs reform which is the central centralization of power in the executive and so the executive is is is is pushing through a reasonably transparency neutral or or not particularly Progressive agenda and because there's such a a strong majority there's little enough significant descent from from that so you know the are the Genesis of a lot of our problems are rooted in that there really doesn't seem to be any

[1:07:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=4050s) upite and seaing power from the executive Michael are you a member of onka um I'm not actually are you know or have you ever been I I was I was a member but I reoriented myself I spent well um I suppose I've um technically transmuted into um in quotes a journalist February I was about being a a number of I was a member of m ofha not one of the most powerful lobbying groups along with the farmers in this anas's power um anas's very little power um except to to make kind it's power as in the planning process to to make submissions it happened to make submissions that reflected official policy on such a consistent basis that the poers that be especially ined and all had to pay attention the biggest um scam in the planning system at the moment is that that the rhetoric is good and the plans actually across the range from the national spatial strategy to Regional plans to local development plans are actually all very good they say everything that you wish that they would say but they're not implemented they're massively flouted uh and um it was left to the rights of anas made submissions in the planning process particularly to PO to actually get the plans that for example local authorities gr up themselves implemented by the local authorities themselves partly as a result of local Representatives being lobbied by uh fested private interests weren't um actually in the business of applying their own plans so Taska has no power except to make submissions that then were persuasive enough that they tended to be followed particularly by um unol um yes sorry just cuz we impressed for a time just very quickly M if you could you in your experience and somebody who has tons of Republic we've had two public inquiries at a cost of literally hundreds of millions of pounds uh we've had a couple of reports but have we learned anything from it um I think there's a probably the the the the figure of 18 86% of people to consider that a problem with corruption in the country reflects an increased public perception awareness of um corruption but in my own experience I I still see uh there are all sorts of people who who tee up obscure measures

[1:10:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=4200s) in the planning process but the the the the test of a of a change planning process is the sort of decisions that are coming through we're still seeing more than 50% of housing is being built went off in the countryside for example which is goes totally against all the plans that are created and you see for example on big decisions in D um decisions like the National Convention Center sorry decisions like the National Children's Hospital or the carton site a lot of the biggest decisions are actually granted by the local Authority in breach of their own plans so I I think that um biggest lesson that we fail to learn is that we should have a system of planning that's actually driven by plans rather than by I don't see I really don't see any change uh isn't it funny though make that a lot of people would be really ke to see Children's Hospital at all whatever no sign of it could I just answer your question there Sam as well H you know you ask where whether these tyun I I think were worth it or not and I think that's a very valid point uh but we always had it was back to Michael and the famous famous there are no consequences Professor that seems to be someone looking we always had idea there was you know money was changing hands and there was all these rumors I think what the triun was uncovered was that there was a spectacularly covert uh complex system of payments being made probably crime but the police don't do anything but we but prior to these tribunals there was no idea people had some idea but there was no proof of it what the tribunals have discovered if nothing else is that money Trail is Will is there a will for there be consequences well I would prend to suggest that there probably isn't uh but there should be yeah I I I've never met anybody the way who was for corruption anybody the reality is I think we'll hear a lot about this later there's a shocking lack of prosecutions again probably due to cultural problems um in spos Prim in the dpp's office in dealing with with white car crime do you also see evidence that there isn't there hasn't been much of a public change in in their feelings about corruption for example Ben dun who was Savaged in the tribunal still seems to feel that he's going to get more customers to his his gyms by him being he wasn't we at the time he he he pleaded that he because of mental health problems corruption was inadvertent neither of those should be the sort of Virtues that you'd expect people here choosing which Jin to join

[1:12:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=4350s) with regardless but but as regard to public procurement now one of the things people regularly refer to here is so obvious and it affects so many people is every time you go into your Pharmacy it costs Irish people significantly more than it costs in most of the neighboring European countries now that's presumably particularly those who are getting it on the drug schemes that's public procurement policies are are guys just very unlucky or are they just not very good at it well it could be a combination of both I mean not all the problems in public procument are due to corruption I mean lot is just due to inefficiency waste neglect I mean you you heard the minister talking about the need for professionalization of these posts and and some of it is due to sholic action or amateurism but at the same time there is you know corruption and uh people acting uh as result of you know cases of bribery and also others why do we pay significantly more it shouldn't be that difficult to find out that a similar product in France or Italy costs maybe a half or a third of what it cost here no yes it takes a lot to drive it to Ireland but not that much you know it's really not the stuff that would require you know a dozen people for three years to work out sure done very Qui well absolutely that's the need for shows the need for more public monitoring and to make sure that the the contracts involved in public procurement are are made available uh and uh and are open scy for for any concerns that's into the c or our trade groups or consumer groups or whoever and uh um a large part of the standards here of course again said in in Brussels uh we have to remember that there is again limited discretion at National level on a lot of these things it's not only public procurement but it's also we heard about competition cartels uh corate governance lots of these aspects as well so well for instance on procurement something that I was thinking about and that is if a pharmaceutical company comes here and employs perhaps 1500 2,000 people it's very good for the economy does that have a bearing on how much our government is prepared to pay for their props well I mean this is again this goes back to the lobbying discussion I

[1:15:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=4500s) think what you want to do again this is part of the whole system you want to be able to look at uh asset declaration by politicians the the terms of public procurement contracts how the public procurement uh process works and you want to look at lobbying in the contact between political class and Senior officials uh and uh pharmaceutical companies for example how could of procurement more effective IE the that the public CSE pays less for things well I think you know a very simple idea the Transparency International has championed for over 20 years now is the idea of Integrity packs uh this is something that could be bolted on very easily to the existing processes and integr back is a very simple idea it just means that biders for public contracts and the Contracting authorities enter into agreement that they will not uh engage in corrupt or collusive Behavior Uh in the course of that procedure and the whole process is then monitored by an independent body or an individual can be transparency to National in fact have uh have done this on several occasions around the world and it's been shown that this actually saves money if you look at for example huge projects like the Milan subway system orfeld airport or uh public Contracting in in Colombia there are there are millions that are saved these projects as a result of J you um I presume have looked at the Integrity practices novel concept I suppose but it brings you back to something are people more driven by altruism or self-interest that's fa big question I know Lun time on a Friday like to know in The Economist would would tell you that it's a it's self self-interest and you know uh maximizing uh your your utility but then we know that we're not all uh homo economists as as as they call us so I don't know I think that the jury said so it's probably kind of 50/50 and it depends on when you look at the the different models and people need encouragement from the law to do the right thing to do the right thing like you heard the minister earlier like one of the the big things he was saying was you know this problem with sort of the the executive having too much power how they were going to to fix this and yet you look at all the you know they they set up um asort of a subcommittee at the of the cabinet where there four people go in and make all the decisions so they're even centralizing more there so you know a lot of their actions are even against what he says they're so to do of

[1:17:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=4650s) I don't think you have to be altruistic to have greater interest in the common good I think there's a notable absence of discourse about the uh the common good in this country in particular I think maybe more could be done at on an educational level uh in schools and whatever they're now calling Civics for example for example I think it would it would would be helpful if it BEC standard practice to teach that you that democracy depends on people casting their votes not for their own vested interests but in the common good for example so I think a lot could be done clearly are are cultural problems a lot of this is rooted in cultural problems and I think um education must be the long-term answer including through Civics and at the earliest plages in the school processes very good mention Minister there I did take a few notes oning one of the things uh I saw that he said that that he was describing current malady of the country he said that we had a heart attack then he said we were in intensive care and I was waiting for him to say better that we were sitting up in bed eating a soft boiled egg he didn't he actually said that the our hand was the dog's wife or something and at that as suppose ask you from the floor if any of you would like to ask the any questions can I make a comment yes yeah talking about uh drugs and prescription drugs the numbers are here 80% of drugs which prescribed are not generic when in the United Kingdom 80% generic and only 20% original I've been working with the open government partnership for the last year to and trying to Bren Island to import and it was launch just over year go by President Obama and president of Brazil and the eight countries were at the lunch and right now there are 57 countries which joined already and two two billion people live in the countries which belong to the open government partnership and uh what it gives uh each country with sign ups it commits itself to launching uh lunch and public consultation on development of of the action plan how to make the society much more more transparent much more particip and much more collaborative with a greater use of Technology we we're living in the uh in in the information

[1:20:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=4800s) age and uh the data which is collected by government on our behalf at end on our expanse has to be first of all meaningful and secondly it has to be in useful machine readable formats which is called open data and in Ireland it almost doesn't exist well I that making promises over that rest there's a gentleman behind it that I think was wishing to speak yeah uh thank you very much I was just going to make a couple of comments my name is Sheamus May from the Irish small business mindes um we've been studying in this general area for many decades now and it seems that there's an absolutely rotten culture in this country pervades the political parties and the Civil Service we have been particularly involved in say aspects like whistleblowing and as I think somebody mentioned earlier the competition Authority have a leniency program or whistle blow program it's in effect for a number of years but to to to our knowledge nobody um has come forward other than one that came forward in in summer 2011 to expose a very major cartel that has been running for decades in this country and costing a allot of us very very substantial amounts of money now the DPP are sitting on this for about 17 months and they haven't they haven't said yes we'll give you immunity and the reason being is that it's very very clear that all these big businesses and the people that are are well can I just point out that cartel practices antic competive practice are costing according to the competition they costing this country four billion euros per year and you give us an example without defaming anybody of say brand names or names that we know well the most famous the most famous cartel in the world other than OPEC is of course cement cartel so we can talk to you about cement we can talk about insurance Inc there's a lot of the name Quinn sort of came up twice I insurance [Music] that com the the competition Authority don't want to know they have refused point blank in writing to investigate lots of cartels in particular to cartel and somebody said about uh Pharmaceuticals Pharmaceuticals are way over in this country it is a competition matter and the competition Authority will not look at it because the government will not have them look at it because you put your finger on it there's a lot of

[1:22:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KsoIlMGeUw&t=4950s) people employed in pharmaceutical companies in Ireland and it's good for the employees but it's very bad for the consumer but I think the point that was just made was that 80% of the drugs prescribed in the UK are generic and uh 80% of them in this country are brown so I how long ago how long ago is it since Mary promised was all we be using generic drugs it's years ago it must be 10 years ago and we're not using generic drugs well that's sure well listen some El probably just say on whistleblowing how primitive the regime is here we had a I'm editor Village magazine and we had wh BR who wrote an article about breaches of capital ratios by a major um Italian uh Italian Bank um um I'm sorry I think your point was about sort of primitive nature of our whistleblowing legislation thing so he he he and the Central Bank were impressed enough with the um the evidence that he that appeared in the magazine that they said that they would treat his his information in confidentiality they theyed a a statement saying that they expressed that they would treat information on this matter in strict confidentiality so I was involv with them he was very nervous about giving this information we probe the Central Bank a little bit and in fact they uh under under progam they said that they would Treck the information in confidentiality unless there was an indication that there' been perpetration of any illegality in which case they F the information to the G given that this guy actually had been involved in an activity that he was concerned was criminal the central bank no less the Central Bank against background of all the allegations against the central bank and the regulator didn't only a year ago were teeing up somebody to give information to them that there were reserving the right to to to forward the criminal authori so I think there are still very real ises for for well you know he might help us with that because we have former Minister a Ryan knows the thing or two about government I thank you sir um can I make just a couple points one I think the person that was was Gary said about we have to look at a European level I think it's absolutely true and I think in the European commission Offices here my experience of the commission is a very good one but if there's a lack of accountability it's a lack of democratic account ability in the union I think it's going to we're going to have to look very urgently at elected president of the commission and so on to stitch in

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Continues in https://guptaoption.com/texts/396-3.md (part 3 of 3).
End of [396] Transparency International launch event, Dublin, part 2 of 3. Its connections are at the top of this file; the map is https://guptaoption.com/llms.txt.