Local residents and tenants groups protest at official court opening
Today, Saturday, January 16th, around 50 people took part in an angry protest outside, at the officially opening of the doors of the new Criminal Courts of Justice on Parkgate Street, which was attended by the President Mary McAleese and the Lord Mayor, Emer Costello.
The Public Private Partnership project’s total cost is set to be close to €300 million.Yet the message from this from the government is clear to the people of nearby O’Devaney Gardens- they will not get new housing. While the Fianna Fail/ Green Party coalition government is willing to spend millions on a courts complex, it won’t spend anything on decent housing for ordinary people.
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Last year, developers pulled out of a PPP deal with Dublin City Council leaving local residents of O’Devaney Gardens – and those in the St Michael’s Estate, Dominic Street and Croke Villas communities – high and dry because, as one developer, McNamara said, the housing downturn and the economic slump had “rendered these projects unviable”. When the private partner is afraid they won’t make enough money, they just pull out with minimal consequences.
January 16, 2010
GOVERNMENT FAILURE TO INVEST IN INFRASTRUCTURE HAS CREATED CURRENT WATER CRISIS
In a statement, the People Before Profit Alliance (PBPA) has said that systematic failure on the part of the government to invest in upgrading the water infrastructure, despite knowledge of its perilous condition, is the real reason that the water system has been plunged into crisis by recent weather conditions.
PBPA said the government have been fully aware over recent years of the need to urgently replace water mains across the country with modern and more robust piping and to increase reservoir capacity but had simply failed to provide the resources to do this.
Cllr Richard Boyd Barrett said: “The massive hardship now being experienced by hundreds of thousands of people – particularly families with children and the elderly – is not the unfortunate result of extreme weather conditions; it is the result of systemic government failure.
The government are dishonestly suggesting that the current water crisis is purely the result of freak weather conditions or because of householders irresponsibly running taps. This is pure hypocrisy and dishonesty.
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The government are dishonestly suggesting that the current water crisis is purely the result of freak weather conditions or because of householders irresponsibly running taps. This is pure hypocrisy and dishonesty.
January 16, 2010
