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LAST UPDATE | 29 Dec 2021
NEW YEAR, NEW you, new finances? It might not have a great ring to it but there’s truth in it. The fresh start of a new year sparks plans for self-improvement with the focus usually on healthier lifestyles. Getting financially fit should also be part of that plan.
Now that Christmas Day has passed and the excesses that come with it are mulled over, many of us will turn our attention to our bank balance and wonder how we’re going to get a bit more organised for 2022.
People in Ireland are by and large great savers – recent figures from the Central Statistics Office showed a record €135 billion in deposits from Irish households. While some in the last two years during Covid managed to save money through working remotely and not socialising, it must be acknowledged that others in certain sectors of the economy have faced financial peril.
Not everyone is sitting on a pile of savings, but the good news is that even if you’ve been living month to month up until now, there are little changes you can employ to help yourself become more financially secure. The most important thing is that you can get to a point where you feel you’re in control of your money.
The links between finances and wellbeing
Research shows a strong link between healthy finances and good physical and mental wellbeing. There is also said to be a strong link between positive mental health and healthy finances.
In London, a pilot scheme called Financial Shield, which has 2,000 participants in Lambeth and Southwark boroughs, is running until September 2022. The pilot involves GPs prescribing financial advice sessions for people with long-term health conditions.
Under the scheme, financial support link workers will help patients claim benefits, grants and manage debts. The scheme will include a cost-benefit analysis to measure outcomes and an independent review to encourage a national rollout across the UK. So, it makes sense that if you want to improve your health and wellbeing for 2022 you should also review your financial fitness.
How do I get there?
But what does being financially fit mean? It involves:
If you think there might be room for improvement in your financial fitness here are some ways in which you can tackle that:
1. The first step is to set financial goals for the year ahead. Keep them simple and achievable and make sure they are linked to your life goals. For example, instead of simply deciding ‘I want to invest/save for the future’, be specific such as ‘I want to invest my savings to grow them by X% within the next 10 years’.
Being exact with your goals will make it easier to put a workable plan in place to achieve them and make your journey towards those goals measurable. Being able to measure and track your progress will help to keep you on track and motivated.
2. Don’t worry about short term success during January, which is a tough month to get through anyway. Any realistic financial fitness review should take a medium to long term approach. Use January as a time to set goals, establish plans and put direct debits in place.
3) Assess all your financial spending – savings, investments, pensions, insurance, life assurance. Review each and shop around as they come up for renewal. You can do this yourself or engage an independent (non-commission based) financial advisor to do it for you.
I always advise people to make sure any financial advise is fee-based and non-biased. Far too often financial advice is commission-based which can muddy the waters, meaning brokers are not always operating solely in the interests of their customers.
Commissions incentivise brokers to encourage their client to invest in particular products which may mean a better deal for the broker, not necessarily the client. Investors rarely know how much they are paying in commissions as these are presented in a very complex manner.
4) Direct debits are a no-brainer and hugely helpful in establishing good savings or pension habits. The money is gone from your account before you can spend it. This is far easier than trying to do a detailed budgeting exercise. The direct debit amounts can be reviewed over time up or down depending on your income level.
5) Have a look at your tax payments. Can you save some tax, especially if you are self-employed or a business owner? Is your salary at the right level, and are you benefitting from all the reliefs and tax refunds available?
Maintenance is key
Just like maintaining physical health and fitness, achieving your financial goals does require consistency and focus. Often it involves a re-framing of your thinking and incorporating best practices into your everyday transactions.
It’s about building resilience into your finances for the benefit of your current and future self – and that of family or dependants. Being financially fit will help you to feel positive and confident about your current financial situation and your future.
Really, it boils down to peace of mind, knowing your money is working as hard as it should do. And once you’ve mastered financial fitness the next step is financial freedom. Plan your financial fitness today and your future self will thank you.
David Quinn is Managing Director, Investwise Financial Management offering financial planning, pension and investments advice to people wishing to invest in their future.
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Genuine question for those who voted for it: why did you want to keep the Seanad?
@Sean Murphy: The problem was with the question, people hoped for reform of the senate, not the abolition of the senate. Also there is a certain % of voters that will always vote against the government regardless of what’s put to the people. I also think people like Norris and wanted to keep him in the senate and so voted no.
@Sean Murphy: in order to maintain a bicameral legislature.
As the other commentator pointed out, I believe many wanted serious reform.
If the Seanad was abolished the executive (government) may have gotten even more control.
@Sean Murphy: the seanad was kept for one reason and that is because everything that’s passes in the dail in legislation has to pass through the seanad it stops the dail from passing their legislation basically it’s a second opinion and that’s how it should work but we all know it doesn’t work like that.the seanad should be made up of unelected citizens not politicians.the seanad was supposed to be reformed according to ends Kenny but never happened surprise surprise.. kept the votes coming and the pay increases wink wink…!!!
@Robert Phelan: Because we wanted to keep checks and balances in place but in a reformed Seanad with more democratic representation through open, free and fair elections.
@Sean Murphy: because people were niave into thinking the government would reform it. Had the wool pulled over their eyes. We should just get rid of it like they did in Australia.
@Sean Murphy: Because Kenny wanted it gone.It was a loaded choice we were offered at the time.Ask us again.
@Robert Phelan: it should be made up of unelected citizens? Really, how is that going to work? Hardly a democratic body, all be it not fully democratic at present, if its unelected?
@Sean Murphy: I want Seanad reform, not abolition. I want a version of the Citizens Assembly to suggest laws and to approve laws made by the Dail. I want the existing structure which is simply a parking lot for failed politicians to be torn down and replaced. The vision for the Seanad was an apolitical assembly of conservatives who would rein in the worst excesses of enthusiastic populists.
Few years ago a failed Labour politician who was given a senate seat wrote on Oirecthas paper/envelopes to every voter in the estate I live in she was delighted through her help the roads in our estate were being finished after the builders went bust, to our knowledge she did nothing it was a Sinn Féin councilor who did all the work to get this done, the management company wrote to her asking her exactly what did she do, an incredible and dishonest waste of money.
@Brianán McBride: It’s a funny thing about Labour politicians , I saw Brendan Howlin and Joan Burton outside the Dail supporting the hospital workers on the news and I thought,how the hell have they the neck when they voted to cut all workers wages when in government, brass neck or what…
@Honeybee: Joan Burton had the audacity as the Minister for Social Protection to stand for a photo op as she cut the ribbon at the opening of a food bank which was required as a result of the austerity laid down by her government of Fine Gael and Labour, and Fianna Fáil before them… Pure sick and twisted.
@ObsidianShine: It follows the same ideology of her political mate Pat Rabbitte , you will recall his famous speech about telling the electorate lies
Pat Rabbitte: a man who couldn’t fill his own shoes – Independent.ie
https://www.independent.ie/…/pat-rabbitte-a-man-who-couldnt-fill-his-own-shoes-313.
@Honeybee: He was good at talking through his burrow to be fair Honeybee.
@Honeybee: link down…
@Declan Edward: That’s so strange,why I wonder did the Journal take down the link, it is not as though it was not true and can easily be googled by anyone with an interest.
@Honeybee: But they asked us to take down our adblocker.
@Brianán McBride: around the last local election time we had 5 flyers from three different parties all claiming that they personally were responsible for the maintenance and setup of a new park in our area despite the fact it was being set up by the county council office of public works… It’s the exact same way that ffg are claiming any and all responsibility for any improvement or upturn in the economy and jobs market (as negligible and artificial is that is) thanks to their wonderful “head in the sand” management
Genuine query.
How can the cost of secretarial assistance to TDs be higher than the salaries of those TDs?
@KeenOnKeem: Because there is obviously more assistants than TDs
@KeenOnKeem: I had the same thought. Clearly there must be multiple upon multiple secretarial assistants to each individual TD to account for that bill. Of course they would all be needed and do vital work in helping those TDs run our country and it’s definitely not a case of TDs giving jobs to family members and friends even though there isn’t the need for them to have so many secretarial assistants
@León O’Keeffe: there are loads of admin staff who do things in the Oireachtas that have nothing to do with any specific TD or senator. This is why the secretarial bill appears high. These people are needed as otherwise there would be nobody answering the phone when people call Leinster House in general or nobody ordering stationary for the whole parliament or nobody making sure that debates in committees and the Dail and Seanad are minuted and typed up and there would be nobody ordering the grass be cut or the cleaners given supplies etc etc etc
@Bernard Cantillon: plus they also have a secretary in the Dail office and one in the Constituency office. There is money included for the cost of having a constituency office.
FFG truly laughing at the people..
@Willy: do the rest of the TDs work for free? Good on them!!
Good money for half the year off and a 3 day week good times are well and truly back.
How could anyone not see an additional €8m spend on office equipment and IT services coming, especially when this represents an overspend of 50% of budget?
@GrumpyAulFella: That would be the “Digital Transformation” project. Replacing loads of perfectly fit for purpose systems for no real reason.
The headline is not the 19 million salary. They get the majority of their money from everything else. The total oireachtas cost was 134 million. Total cost of funding the tds was 43 million, over double their salary. 22 million on office equipment and it services. Total costs was 19% more than 2017. So 4.5% my backside, it was 19%, they just used other ways than salary to pay themselves more.
Its not a 4.5% increase, its a 19% increase. Their salary just increased by 4.5% so they could make their argument to prevent the rest of the public sector workers from getting any pay rises according to their public sector pay agreement.
We must be Gobshxxx to fund these Wasters and their extented Families, at least close the Dail Bar.
The only way to ensure performance related accountability re Governments would be to pay Government TDs a much lower basic salary but with potential for performance related bonuses for adequately tackling their various Departments & ensuring no crisis or emergencies develop,etc!
Money for Jam
I wonder what it would actually take for us as a nation to say…’enough is enough’
‘Use your vote!’….’we’ll get them in the elections’
How many times have you heard this!!!????
We doomed as a herd of servile sheep in the wild west of europe!
Wouldn’t mind an extra 4.5% myself.
Can I bid on the contract for the recovery arrangement?
What a bloody disgrace considering the average take home pay in this country, still the sheep deserve what they get considering they vote FFG.
@Charles Coughlan: cost of living going up.. Minimum pricing on alcholol soon to come in… Tds getting pay increases, yet the majority of people in the country are on minimum wage.. How can things keep going up in price yet wages and salary aren’t reflected in the same way?
@Chonky Racoon: The system is designed that way. They want the majority of people in this kip to be on barely enough to live on. The people are seen as cash cows who are not entitled to have a decent quality of life. Just work, pay taxes to keep them in their lifestyles and shut up. It is as simple as that.
@Charles Coughlan: if you factor in the hours most TDs work, the take home pay hour isnt that high; also many professional occupations pay higher salaries for a fraction of the hassle and hours
@Stephen Kearon: Compare the output of both groups you mention and tell me if we are getting value for money Stephen.
@Chonky Racoon: “majority of people are on minimum wage”? What utter nonsense, the factual position is that just 7.6% are on minimum wage, see https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/cso-more-than-137000-earn-the-minimum-wage-920323.html
@Stephen Kearon: How do you know how many hours they actually work,being present in the Dail or claiming hours is not proof of work, judging by the expensive televised proceedings listed above,the Dail chamber is fairly empty at the best of times,perhaps they are ‘working out’ in the Dail gym or Dail bar or whatever. In any event their claims for expenses outway their salaries , and judging their staff payments then the burden of work is on others, what hassles do you think they endure being wined, dined and accommodated at the taxpayers expense?not to mention the extended holidays and short Dail terms. If it was so trying then why would intergenerational political families try their darndest to get elected, I think we all have a fair idea as to the answer to that.
@Stephen Kearon: Go away out of that, professional workers actually earn their money. Attending this funeral, that funeral, this opening, that opening, holding constituency clinics once a week and stepping in and out of the Dáil chamber or the Seanad is not what I’d consider value for money, they’re not getting things right, and very rarely do… They’re not worth the salaries they get… Professionals are.
@Honeybee: what a load of populist bull, I’ve personal experience of the hours TDs work, its probably double or more the standard 40 hour week; equating non Dail sitting days with holidays is nonsense; expenses aren’t income, should be all vouched and published. Try going to your local TDs clinic to observe and also ask them what they did for each of the last 7 days, the facts many surprise you
@Stephen Kearon: Don’t ride the wave Stephen, I too have experienced and dismissing what is true does not make it less so. You are entitled to cheer lead as you choose ,that is for you but if government worked efficiently and accordingly then there would be no need for ‘clinics’, for citizens to obtain services which they are rightly entitled to but which they are often left to grovel for in desperation. I spent today ensuring a woman of 90 years of age qualified for an entitlement which was refused to her by a government incompetent, it makes me sick to think what people endure at the hands of our TD’s,no applause from me.
@Stephen Kearon: They voted to keep their expenses secret. Some TD’s do all they can to maximise their expenses. It is income. You’re a supporter of the FF part of the undemocratic cabal ruling the country. They certainly do not govern. And the cabal is not worth one cent of the money they get.
@Stephen Kearon: had to laugh at francis fitz and mcentee when they were out canvassing before the recent elections, interviewed and there was some survey out at the time, so they were asked how much sleep they get. And they both answered as proud as punch and as alert as ever, “oh, i got about 4 hours last night, i’d say the same the night before, and same before that, yea we work so hard, we don’t get any sleep”!
@Stephen Kearon: With all of your personal experience as a Fianna Fáil insider could you tell us how many hours a week TD’s work on actual legislation?
The Guillotine ??????
@M Stuart: With their necks .. It wouldn’t work.
S cumbags
€135 million to run the houses of the Oireachtas proves we have to many politicians ( for a small country ) and they have no respect on what they get or spend.
Its not right
Well earned!!!
Yes Alan and a lot of it goes on people who do not get paid enough in regard to the cost of living. There are hundreds of thousands of people working now who qualify for FIS. In regards to the homeless and health system the govt are doing f- all so what’s your point?
Get rid of the Dail, and just use the Senate. Far cheaper and a lot less hot air
Before the dramatics begin about the homeless and the health system it’s worth noting we spend 20 billion a year on welfare in this country. Salaries have to be paid!
have your say