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GERMAN MPS HAVE voted to back to a second EU-IMF bailout for Greece in the Bundestag today.
Chancellor Angela Merkel urged parties to back to the deal despite warning that there was no guarantee it would prevent Greece from defaulting at a later date.
The idea of bailing out Greece has remained very unpopular in Germany, Europe’s biggest economy, among the public and many politicians. Today the popular BILD newspaper plastered the word “STOP!” over its front pages, telling lawmakers: “Don’t keep on going the wrong way.”
While earlier today the country’s Interior Minister suggested that Greece should be encouraged to leave the eurozone. However, in the end two opposition parties supported the government as the parliament voted 496 to 90 to back the deal.
Several MPs in Merkel’s CDU party had been against the deal although it is not clear if they ended up voting against the government or not, BBC News reports.
The approval of the €130 billion package for Greece comes after weeks of brinkmanship among EU leaders amid concern that the country would be unable to meet the terms of the second bailout programme.
The rescue package is Greece’s second in less than two years and involves private-sector investors accepting total losses of more than 70 per cent on the bonds they hold, along with tough new austerity measures including cuts to wages and pensions.
Greece has been surviving since May 2010 on an initial €110 billion package of rescue loans from other eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund.
But more than two years of harsh austerity implemented to secure the rescue funds have left the economy in freefall, with businesses closing in the tens of thousands and unemployment at a record high 21 per cent in November.
“The road that lies in front of Greece is long and truly not without risk,” Merkel told lawmakers before the vote. “That also goes for the success of the new program — no one can give a 100 percent guarantee of success.”
The parliaments of Finland and the Netherlands, where skepticism for bailouts also is high, are to debate the package this week. However, it isn’t expected to face problems in either country.
- additional reporting from AP
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Are charges ever brought against these drivers?
Licence points?
Fines?
Almost every week I get delayed on the Dart due to a bridge strike and it affects 100′s of other commuters too. I would like to know that something is being done.
@Conor Loney: And who takes the blame when the bridge height is lower than than what the sign says?
@Roy Dowling: what bridge is out there thats lower than the sign says .because if thats the case, if you hit the bridge with the right height vehicle for that bridge you could sue the ass off the company
@Roy Dowling: The council engineer who actually measured it in the first place with a steel measuring tape is whipped in his underwear with the aforementioned offending tape until he admits wrongdoing, and then he is forced to wear a sandwich board saying “I am a mathematically illiterate idiot” for a week on the platform of the station.
@Roy Dowling:
Surely you have evidence of this?
@Conor Loney: he was that engineer!
@Roy Dowling: don’t think that happens very often
Laser level on bridge that sets off banks of red flashing lights when a high vehicle approaches.
@Clancy: Belay that competence! Such logical suggestions would never get past SIPTU
“er ouar membars are bein asked to perferm duties dat are outside der contract dere now, so derz gonna have te be an allowance written inte de contract for dah, or else we’ll strike”
@Ryan Carroll: your SIPTU is coming along excellently, though I note you failed to use the % increase phrase. Good work all the same, keep it up and you’ll have many a free dinner ahead.
@Brown Boots: He could throw in a few more “comrades” too.
Surely a type of say limbo bar of same height should be placed on aproach to such bridges. ( as in a fixed bar. Not one that will fall down if truck strkes it. ) Exactly like the ones as you enter some car parks to stop caravans and the likes entering.
@The Viking: but you’d have lads limbo-ing under on the way home from the pub. Also boss, why bring our heritage into it!
@The Viking: I’m afraid you’re very much mistaken. Those bars are not to stop caravans from entering, since such measures would be discriminatory against a minority population in this country. What they are actually are bars for breeding crows to hang out on and find a mate for the breeding season. Although I believe starlings have been know to use them from time to time too – cheeky little monkeys.
Surprised someone hasn’t yet developed an APP to warn drivers they’re approaching a non negotiable bridge.
@Emmet Dillane: They have, it’s called eyesight!
@Emmet Dillane: They have – they’re called road signs. You should keep an eye out for them – they big and yellow and shaped like a diamond.
@Emmet Dillane:
And would the APP be installed on a phone. And what happens if the driver changes vehicle to one which is higher. Onus on the person to change the App setting? If they forget to do this would this create a new problem in which drivers rely on an APP and ignore the road signs? Possible creating more collisions with bridges
@Nick Allen:
All perfectly manageable Nick.
@Emmet Dillane:
Nearly as manageable as getting the driver to read the height sign on every bridge in the country. Should there be an APP for all street signs and should we remove them all?
This subject is brought up regularly on the Journal after each bridge hit and the bars the same height as the bridge and so many meters from each side are usually suggested so why don’t they get the finger out and implement this cheap solution.
@winston smith:
Cheap solution?
How many bridges in Ireland?
Design of said structure?
Cost of manufacture?
Are they vandal proof?
Cost of installation?
Ongoing maintenance and replacement?
Update rules of road
Update driving theory test
Update driving test
A train is delayed and this is national news?? LOL!
@Kieran Conroy:
The journal is a web APP so technically this is global news as opposed to national
“We could be lifted, lifted, lifted. Oh, we could be lifted…” (Lighthouse Family.)
…sighed the bridge.
It really is ridiculous the amount of times the trains are delayed due to bridge strike. I would have thought every truck driver should be well aware of height restrictions on their route. I had something pointed out to me recently though which I never really noticed. In a lot of cases by the time you see the height of the bridge it is too late. After it was pointed out to me I kept an eye open as well and did notice that in some cases you will only see the height of the bridge ON the actual bridge but not before and then there is no way around. We do have a hell of a lot of bridges and I cannot understand why there is no driving app out there which truck drivers can use to calculate the route and which takes into account low bridges and roads with weight restrictions
@sue: bridge strike…train strike… what’s the difference?
I interviewed one of the chiefs in the NRA many year ago as part of a Uni dissertation that I was doing for on bridge management in Ireland, and One of the issue here is that nobody ( Gov depts) wants to manage these existing Bridges because they don’t have the budget to do so. Also there is a debate on who should manage the bridge, whether it is Irish Rail, Local Council or NRA or Waterways Ireland. Political debates as usual.
Use tunnel safety technology
have your say