Famed developer and face of Treasury Holdings, Johnny Ronan, concluded his written submission to the Banking Inquiry with an extraordinary reference to the slogan above the gates of many Nazi concentration camps. Bad taste aside, his submission, some of which has been redacted by the Oireachtas, makes for interesting reading and we look forward to how some of his claims will shake out. For example: “That NAMA was leaking selective, … Read More
Wallace Tale of Bagmen Drives Enda BaNAMAs.
Mick Wallace has upset the cronies with more revelations on the “inner workings of this secret organisation” – NAMA. Addressing the hapless Enda Kenny at Leaders’ Questions today Wallace, who has done for NAMA what Catherine Murphy TD did for Irish Water, claimed that one NAMA insider provided favour for a developer in exchange for €15,000 in a bag. “There are many concerns, Taoiseach around the workings of NAMA. Cerebus … Read More
Grangegorman Resists Eviction.
The moment an eviction contractor smashes a resident's leg with a metal bar in #Grangegorman @WSMIreland @wearerabble pic.twitter.com/VpDTKhylE5 — Julian Fitzsimons (@fitzsij) March 23, 2015 The residents of the Grangegorman squat in Dublin 7 are winding down around the heat of their bonfire following a day that lurched from apparent defeat and loss of their home to apparent victory – for the time being at least. Bailiffs … Read More
Nama’s Cultural Dividend.
Not content with inflating rent prices across Dublin by selling off apartment complex after apartment complex to our new absentee landlords – Real Estate Investment Trusts – NAMA is now in frightening the bejaysus out of Cork’s artistic community. The people involved in the Camden Palace arts centre are urgently seeking public support and are fearful for the survival of their building. NAMA has recently become the new landlord of their … Read More
Juking The Stats 2
Above: A photograph of some urban dereliction by Paul Reynolds. Minister Jan O’Sullivan’ Housing Assistance Payment Bill will remove people receiving rent assistance from the housing waiting list. SF TD Dessie Ellis outlined the implications of removing tens of thousands (many of whom have been on it for over a decade) from the housing list. ‘This means they will find it almost impossible to get a council house, to buy … Read More
Gerry And The Namechangers
Gerry Gannon has council heritage officer’s approval to change Priory Street in Clonskeagh, south Dublin to Park Street. Priory Street sounds too close to ‘Priory Hall’ the evicted development that brought shame to Irish construction and government oversight. Gannon, well there’s no shame in that name it seems. The Maple (Anglo) 10 developer, Gerry, owes us over €1bn although his lifestyle doesn’t seem to have been pinned back as much … Read More
#rabbleRaker: Mission Accomplished
It has been three years since Jonathan Sugarman first left comments below an article on the Guardian website. His story has since been raised in the Irish and Austrian parliaments, covered in publications across the EU, German, Belgian and Australian network television, reports have occasionally dotted the Irish media. Simon Price looks at the legal and media response. The facts; Sugarman resigned as Risk Manager at Unicredit Ireland in … Read More
#lookUp: The Limerick Go-Go Club
In Limerick The Post Office Lane passageway is one of the arteries in which trade coursed through the i9th century City. Over decades the paths have settled into anonymity as the storehouses they once serviced disappeared. Paul Tarpey explores one of the dramatic and quietly significant stories they hold. One well known one surrounds the famed Hanging Gardens, adjacent to the lane from Henry St. This was an exotic … Read More
Up Up And Away: What’s Going On With Dublin’s Property Prices?
With everyone seemingly going ga-ga over the rise in house prices, it’s like Ireland has made a miraculous recovery. Hold off on buying that champers-fuelled jetpack just for a moment though, as Stephen Bourke looks into the housing crisis that is still very much in existence. The great big Bank of Ireland ad on Manor Street says something like, “I thought I’d be renting for the rest of my … Read More
New Art Territory
Paul Tarpey examines how artists and activists are dealing with the idea of the non-place – a space with which we have all become unconsciously familiar. Pound shops, petrol stations and piss-stinking out-of-town shopping centres. This is the sprawl of the post-apocalypse we call ‘after the Tiger’. The unplanned, the undesigned is our new state. We no longer blink as we pass ghost estates and cow-shit stained forecourts. These non-places … Read More