Education minister, Mary Hanafin, provoked a storm last week when she said “I really wish parents who are choosing to move house within term time would make arrangements for their children to be in a school at the beginning of the term”.

She dug herself in deeper by saying “parents moving house are more concerned with the colour scheme of their new bathroom than making provision for their children’s place in school”.

But she’s right! Okay, there is a census taken every five years and population and demographics are constantly monitored in the hope of predicting an area’s requirements in advance. But this is not an exact science and in recent years there have been population explosions in certain areas, such as Kildare, which could not have been envisaged.

When a family arrives in an area and finds the school cannot admit their child there are three entities to blame:

The local county council. Why do they give planning permission for new developments without spare school capacity in the area when the dogs on the street know the majority of tenants will be young families, now or in the near future? And why do they refuse planning for new schools? A typical example of this lack of common sense on behalf of a county council is Kill village.

The estate agents. Why are they allowed to advertise a development’s local amenities when these amenities, while they may be close, are not accessible? Is this not false advertising?

The family: Why do they not research the area first? Properly. Are they taken in by the glossy blurbs the agents give them?

My advice to people who intend moving is to ask questions first. Not just about schools.

• Is there a place for my little Johnny at the local school?

• At what time of the night is the Red Cow Roundabout “just a 10 minute drive”?

• At what time in the morning will I have to be at the station to be sure of getting a seat on the train?

• Does the local doctor/dentist have room on their books for another family?

• How many arms and or legs will the crèche charge for little Molly?

Bottom line: Mary’s right. Think before you leap.

It as been said that 99% of taxi drivers give the rest a bad name and this continues to hold true despite the efforts of the Taxi Regulator, in particular the introduction a National Maximum Taxi Fare in September this year.

In the lead up, and after, the taxi drivers took to the streets in hoards, Parisian style, to protest the new regulations. There was plenty of shouting, waving of banners, blocking of streets and even some violence. We’ve come to expect this. What we have also come to expect is the leaders ranting and raving in grating Dublin accents about how their livelihoods were being destroyed once again. How? We weren’t really sure. Sifting through their ineloquent rants we guessed it was something about charges at Dublin airport. (The full list is available here but is really boils down to airport charges).

The so called National Taxi Drivers Union is in effect a Dublin union with lip service paid to Cork, Galway and Limerick cities.

Anyway, the regulator didn’t give in, and rightly so. And customers in these cities are no longer being treated as cash cows.

But what of the rest of the country? Well, not so good for customers there.

Prior to this, almost all drivers charged agreed-fares with their regulars. Unfortunately, these agreed fares were less than the national maximum and the drivers, with faux tears in their eyes, explained to their regulars that these increased fares were being forced on them. Boo hoo!

It was pointless for customers to point out that the new regulations explicitly state that

• A discount can be given at the discretion of the driver
• When a journey is pre-booked, customers may waive their right to have a particular journey charged on the meter
• The booking fee of €2.00 for pre-booked journeys is charged at the driver’s discretion

Bottom line: They could continue to charge the old agreed-fares without breaking any laws.

So why didn’t they?

Simple. Money. More of it. This was a great chance to overcharge. The city drivers had for years been able take circuitious routes, charge for luggage etc. etc. etc. Now the rural drivers could load fares and make it appear fair and legal.

And what happened? Rural customers refused to pay the excess. In most cases they simply couldn’t afford to. They used the service less or stopped using it altogether.

To date, only the drivers in the town of Ennis have come out publically and said they have ceased charging call out charges as their business was being hurt. I’m not paying them kudos - It is basic economics.

However, the rest of the rural drivers are holding tight in the hope that customers will eventually relent and go back to using them as they had. I don’t see this happening soon. It has already been weeks. And unlike in the cities, taxi drivers are faces not numbers, and the one-to-one relationships have been broken.

99% of taxi drivers are still giving the rest a bad name.