Consumers haven’t a prayer unless they’re in industry or the Cabinet

THERE are 473 million consumers in the EU and you would assume that such a huge number would make a powerful lobby.

You would assume wrong for the simple reason that they are totally out-lobbied by big business and industry. The sorry fact of the matter is that the EU is more inclined to listen to money.

I didn’t know, and presumably neither did you, that there are 15,000 lobbyists in Brussels paid by big business to cosy up to officials and parliamentarians.

And how many are lobbying on behalf of those 473 million consumers? Just 150.

Yes, a mere 150 or, put another way, one-tenth of those making sure the message is getting across for business. It’s a no-contest, despite the best efforts of consumer lobbyists.

In case you are a bit naive about this, believing the Government looks after the interests of the consumer, I’m afraid you have a very rude awakening in store.

The Government is so worried about the consumer that it really couldn’t care less, to the extent that it leaves 85% of consumer law to the EU.

The National Consumer Agency, which is to take over from the Office of the Director of Consumer Affairs, has yet to be properly established.

So unconcerned is it that it didn’t bother to send a delegate to a recent EU conference on consumer law in Brussels three weeks ago.

And so concerned is that body about consumers that it’s going to cut the budget of its consumer protection division. One of its solutions is that consumers should elect governments that will deliver better consumer legislation.

An example of the EU Commission’s concern for us would be in the area of mobile phones. It took a decision that roaming charges for users would be abolished by next summer.

They got huge credit for it, with headlines screaming that such a charge was about to be dumped.

What this meant was that you didn’t have to ring your super wealthy service provider and tell them you would be in god-knows-where for the next fortnight.

The EU would tell them permanently, and the punter would be happy because, apart from saving money, the well-paid officials of the ubiquitous EU were finally doing something practical, and not just idiotically ordering the straightening of bananas. But the reality is that the EU is better at things idiotic than things practical.

The EU Commission has now watered down its original plans on roaming charges because telecoms operators want to make more money, and they are supported by senior officials in Brussels.

Obviously, the mobile phone industry was opposed to the move, which was described by Vodafone, this country’s biggest operator, as “intrusive and prescriptive”. In other words, they did not like being told what to do because it was intrusive of what they could tell the customer what to pay. But they needn’t have worried. The EU rowed in behind big business and the plans to abolish roaming charges were suitably modified. They are now going to put a ‘cap’ on the charges.

What they intended to do was abolish all charges for consumers receiving a call when travelling in the EU and introduce a ‘home pricing’ scheme, which meant that punters would be charged the same standard rate as applied in their home country.

In plain language, the Brussels bureaucrats buckled under pressure from vested interests.

Naturally, mobile phone customers won’t enjoy the intended savings because the EU didn’t just back down — it backed big business.

Just cast your eyes over what Viviane Reding, the EU Information Society and Media Commissioner, said in announcing those cuts originally.

She said she hoped that new regulation would be in force by the summer of 2007 to ensure that consumers did not face “unjustified” roaming charges while on their holiday next year.

Surprise, surprise — we will. Is it any wonder the mobile phone companies will do anything to hang onto what they have — or most of it — when the Commission for Communications Regulation (ComReg) says that in the last quarter of 2005 there were 4.2 million mobile phone subscriptions in this country.

That’s more than the population, which is officially 4.13 million.

That gives a rate of 102% market penetration, and even at that we are not at the top of the league. Ireland is actually below the EU average of 107% penetration, and that figure is based on the number of active SIM cards.

YET it is a fact that Irish mobile operators earn more money from their customers than any other phone company in the EU, despite the fact that we are not top of the league. We might be below the average for mobile phone ownership, but what we spend on them has the likes of Vodafone laughing all the way to the bank.

It’s not, of course, fair to say that the Government is utterly blind to all consumers.

They are very concerned about themselves, especially the future and their pensions.

At the moment the pension fund that we taxpayers are footing stands at 25 million — and we are just talking about the 15 members of the cabinet.

And those pensions begin on the very first day if they are not returned to power in the general election next year.

The Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, would be eligible for a pension worth €100,000 a year, after his 10 years of ministerial duties and based on his current salary of €160,000 a year.

He’s actually being paid — I nearly said earning — a total of €252,000, made up of his €90,000 as a TD plus his ministerial salary.

There are seven others, including Tánaiste and Health Minister Mary Harney, who will be 10 years in ministerial office after the next election and thus qualify for a pension of 60% of their salary.

On top of that, should they not be returned to government, they would get severance pay of 75% of their salary as ministers.

As well as the pension and the severance payment, they would also be entitled to a TD’s salary if they were returned to the Dáil.

Now I really appreciate the sentiments expressed at a recent pensions forum by Seamus Brennan, the Minister for Social and Family Affairs, especially in relation to non-reliance on the State.

To remove that reliance on the State — apart from himself and the other 14 members of the cabinet — he drew on his international experience to suggest the examination of a compulsory pension scheme for the plebs.

Apparently, that has been very successful in Australia where employers pay 9% of workers’ gross salaries into a pension fund.

For some strange reason it went down like a lead balloon with the employers who were listening to him.

State reliance would appear to them a more preferable and less expensive option.