Summary of ideas submitted in the Other category…

• One parent at home has the potential to improve the lives of your family members, your community and your own self esteem by getting involved in an area that matches your skills.
• Online barter exchange organised into hubs. A hub would be something like a town. Each hub has a hub administrator that handles membership by deciding who can join or not. Users go in and input sell orders for items they are offering and buy orders for other users items.
• Online education courses.
• Online order for pooled home-cooked meals sourced from different homes at low prices; the menu is from different service homes that make up this large virtual kitchen. An order is made online for simple home-cooked meal.
• Open an Ideas Bank.
• Open up Irish citizenship to those whose great-grandparents had to flee Ireland, and charge €500 for the privilege (plus a €100 annual “tax” to maintain the citizenship privilege).
• Open up our country to all at home and abroad in a consistent and friendly manner - like that of Scotland. Have open access to land and water areas throughout the country - it is our greatest asset
• Our national broadcaster should allocate 10 minutes a week as part of the Six-One News to bring us good news stories.
• Over the summer holidays it would be an idea for each community to come up with a number of projects to complete, to be led and completed by young people. These could be in the area of charity or Tidy Towns.
• Overhaul the food given to patients in hospitals and provide more soups and smoothies instead of heavy food which they are unable to consume.
• Patients admitted to A&Es under the influence of alcohol/drugs, for treatment directly related to the abuse of these substances, should have to pay a substantial fine (e.g. €500) for wasting hospital staff time and resources, on essentially self-inflicted injuries.
• Pay all civil servants, Gardai, teachers, HSE staff etc once a month and not every two weeks. We can continue using existing software systems etc, the frequency is the only thing that changes. The saving will be immediate in terms of admin costs, in addition stationery and postage costs will be halved.
• People donate € a week out of their own money. This money will be collected and donated (or set up a bank account to deposit the money into) to a family in need on a monthly or weekly basis.
• People in any given area could join a co-operative.
• People on social welfare should be analysed as to whether they are working and claiming the dole.
• People should be allowed cash in any paid-up pension plans. This would allow cash strapped people to access funds now and ease the pressure until the economy recovers.
• People should be put on a four or even three day week to ensure that the strain on their employers’ dwindling cash resources is minimised.
• People should learn how to use humour, tell stories, and face their fear of public speaking, i.e. they should learn how to do stand-up comedy.
• People who can afford to do so should donate an interest free loan to the State for a period of three years. There is a vast amount of unproductive wealth in Ireland shared by tens of thousands of our people.
• Place a yearly registration tax on cyclists, similar to motor tax, together with an ID plate. It will generate revenue and enhance road safety by reminding the cyclist that they can be identified if they carry on as many cyclists do.
• Place the prison services up for international tender.
• Pool of experienced business people to help small to medium enterprises who are struggling with the current economic climate.
• Pool of qualified financial advisers who could help those people who are on the breadline.
• Post offices should display and sell post boxes so that delivering post becomes more efficient.
• Pressure the universities to waive their IP rights on all innovation. In other words, they can still have the campus company concept but they must stop claiming a big percentage of ownership.
• Prisoners who do not pose a physical threat to the wider community should be removed from our jails. Instead, they should serve their time by providing professional services to charities and other community work.
• Private individuals and investors should be allowed advance term loans on an interest-bearing contract agreement (similar to bank term loan agreements). There are individuals and investors with money finding it difficult to find an investment.
• Private operators in construction projects put down a deposit which is forfeited in increments, depending on the overrun. If the project is completed on time, they could be paid a completion bonus plus the deposit returned with interest.
• Privatise state bodies.
• Programmes being relayed on all Irish radio and television stations only carry ‘positive’ items.
• Promote business start-ups, particularly among those who are currently out of work. If 5% of all existing welfare payments to adults by the Irish state, excluding child benefit and payments to pensioners, were now diverted into a specific fund on a weekly basis, the fund will have the ability to generate approximately €1 - €1.5 billion of fresh investment capital every three years. If the €7 billion was given to the public by way of paying off their personal mortgages on primary residences only, then everybody would have money in their pocket every month, the banks would also have their money, as the mortgages have been repaid.
• Promote diving tourism.
• Promote mid-level innovation.
• Promote organic produce.
• Promote sourcing from Ireland: Enterprise Ireland website http://www.enterprise-ireland.com/SourceIreland/