Open letter to councillors supporting motion for public mixed income housing on O’Devaney Gardens, gets backing of 11 TDs, Peter McVerry, Erica Fleming, SIPTU rep
Proposals for 100% mixed income, public housing on the O’Devaney Gardens site have been given a boost today, receiving the backing of leading housing activists, TDs, trade unionists and academics.
The open letter circulated to Dublin City Councillors, was signed by TDs from People Before Profit, Anti-Austerity Alliance and Independents4Change, along with Fr. Peter McVerry, homeless rights activist Erica Fleming, and SIPTU trade unionist Ethel Buckley.
Cllr. Éilis Ryan (Workers’ Party), successfully passed a motion in July calling for 100% mixed income, public housing on O’Devaney Gardens. However since then, council officials, other councillors and Minister for Housing Simon Coveney, have indicated they do not plan to implement the motion.
Speaking ahead of tonight’s city council meeting, Cllr. Ryan said:
“The breadth of signatories supporting keeping O’Devaney Gardens public speaks for itself. It is particularly significant to have received the backing of respected housing activists such as Peter McVerry and Erica Fleming, who know firsthand what is needed to tackle our housing crisis – and its not more private developers.”
Cllr. Ryan said she hoped the scale of political support demonstrated by the letter will ensure no further efforts are made to undermine her motion, saying:
“I would ask the Minister, and my fellow councillors – in light of such broad support for public housing, are you really willing to force through unwanted, damaging privatisation? Minister Coveney wants O’Devaney Gardens to be a flagship – let’s make it a flagship for decent, affordable public housing for all.”
For information contact Cllr. Éilis Ryan (086-3108553)
The full text of the letter, circulated to all city councillors this morning, and all signatories, is pasted below
An open letter to Dublin City Councillors: don’t undermine local democracy – resist the privatisation of public land.
To Dublin City Councillors,
We are in the midst of a dire housing emergency. Nationally there are over 100,000 households on council waiting lists for public housing, with many more in insecure private rental accommodation or carrying unsustainable mortgages. The crisis has been driven by successive governments’ reliance on the private market as a housing provider. A public solution to the housing crisis is vital if we are to take families out of emergency accommodation and overcrowded houses.
In this context, Workers’ Party councillor Éilis Ryan put forward a motion to Dublin City Council on July 25th that the council develop land it owns at O’Devaney Gardens in Dublin 7 itself, as a mixed-income public housing development, modelled on the Party’s new policy, Solidarity Housing. This motion was passed by 25 votes to 21, with votes from councillors from People before Profit, Sinn Féin, Social Democrats, and a number of Independent and Labour councillors, and the support of the Anti-Austerity Alliance who were absent on the night.
By developing its own lands itself, Dublin City Council can ensure more families on the housing waiting list are given homes than a private development would allow. Additionally, it can build an inclusive, mixed income community by providing public housing to those whose income is above social housing thresholds, but who also have a need for housing. This solution puts public land and money to use in a cost-effective and just manner – prioritising people’s housing needs over the profits of private developers. “This is not just an issue for the O’Devaney Garden Site but is much broader as the Lands Initiative Proposals relate to other significant DCC owned lands across the city.”
Almost immediately after the passing of the motion, unelected Dublin City Council officials moved to undermine it, using spurious legal interpretations of existing planning permission for the site and pointing to planning requirements for mixed private/public development. The officials also argue that public development of the site is not financially viable.
None of these arguments stands up to reason.
Legal advice received by the Workers’ Party shows that there is no issue with planning permission on the site, and no contrary legal advice has been provided by the council. And while mixed income communities are important, there is no reason why this must require a giveaway of public land to private developers. Indeed, the requirement for ‘mixed tenure’ housing is regularly ignored when it comes to building unaffordable private housing.
As to financial arguments, to date Dublin City Council have provided no financial assessment of the value of the land which they propose to hand over to private developers. Surely nothing is worse value for money than giving away uncosted, public assets to private profiteers.
Off the back of the council’s response, right-wing councillors on Dublin City Council are now attempting a vote to rescind the Workers’ Party motion and reinstate the previous plan for private development of this public land. This attempt, if successful, will result in prime public land being handed over to private developers and landlords.
We ask that all councillors who support a programme of public housing construction as the solution to the dire housing situation facing the country resist any attempt to overturn the democratically-agreed plan to develop the O’Devaney Gardens site publicly, and vote to keep public land public.
As academics, activists and trade unionists keeping O’Devaney Gardens public is in line with the right to housing we work for. As politicians from the Workers’ Party, AAA-PBP, Independents4Change and Indepdents, our own housing policies are fully supportive of removing housing from the grasp of private developers once and for all – and opposing any land sell off.
Signed,
Cllr. Éilis Ryan (The Workers’ Party)
Joan Collins, TD
Clare Daly, TD
Mick Wallace, TD
Thomas Pringle, TD
Catherine Connolly, TD
Cllr. Pat Dunne
(Independents4Change)
Paul Murphy, TD
Mick Barry, TD
Richard Boyd Barrett, TD
Bríd Smith, TD
Ruth Coppinger, TD
Gino Kenny, TD
Cllr. Michael O’Brien
Cllr. John Lyons
Cllr. Tina McVeigh
Cllr. Hazel de Nortúin
Cllr. Andrew Keegan
(Anti-Austerity Alliance-People Before Profit)
Cllr. Cieran Perry (Independent)
Ethel Buckley (SIPTU Services Division Organiser)
Fr. Peter McVerry (Housing Rights Activist)
Erica Fleming (Housing Rights Activist)
Louise Bayliss (SPARK, Lone Parents Activist)
Andrew Leavitt, HIV activist
Dr. Michael Byrne (School of Social Policy, UCD)
Dr. Cian O’Callaghan (Dept of Geography, TCD)
Dr. Niamh Moore-Cherry (Deputy Head School of Geography, UCD)
Dr. Mary Gilmartin (Dept of Geography, NUI Maynooth)
Dr. Tom Strong (Dept of Anthropology, NUI Maynooth)
Dr. Philip Lawton, (Dept of Geography, NUI Maynooth)
Dr. Eoin O’Mahony (Urban Geographer)
Dr. Vicky Conway (School of Law & Government, UCD)
Dr. Harry Browne
Cian McMahon (Dept of Economics, NUI Galway)