Cllr. Ted Tynan

Workers’ Party Councillor, Ted Tynan, has accused Cork City Council management of slavish adherence to the government’s Rebuilding Ireland housing policy and a deep antipathy towards the public provision of housing.

Cllr. Tynan will tonight (Monday) call for a pilot programme of 100% public, mixed income housing on council owned lands at Boherboy Road, Mayfield on the Northside of Cork city.  He pointed out that this land was bought specifically for the purpose of public housing construction to address the city’s large housing list. Now, however Cork City Council is proposing to sell it off to a private developer.

Cork City Council management have recommended rejection of Cllr. Tynan’s motion and have cited government policy and changing demographic factors in support of their position. Cllr. Tynan described this response as offensive and not in accordance with the facts. Demographics only affected the type of housing units being built, not the manner in which they were provided.

Cllr. Tynan said, “The response from the Housing Department indicates a complete shift away from local authority provision of housing in a way that goes beyond even the policies of the right wing Fine Gael government. It displays an astounding level of arrogance on the part of management and shows an ideological hostility towards the public provision of housing”.

The Workers’ Party councillor accused the CEO and her team of rejecting his proposal out of hand, just as a similar motion by the Workers’ Party which was passed by Dublin City Council last year was hit by a sledgehammer of resistance by the unelected management team which caused it to be overturned.

Cllr. Tynan said: “This is not merely about officials implementing government policy, it is a complete refusal on the part of the management to countenance any alternative proposal which might actually provide a realistic solution to the depth of the housing crisis. Meanwhile 100,000 people across this state are suffering in misery on housing lists while Ireland’s landlord class cream off hundreds of millions of euro in subsidies every year. Clearly some do not want a solution to the housing crisis because such a solution would overturn a very lucrative gravy train while others see no alternative other than the house of cards fancifully entitled Rebuilding Ireland”