MY MANIFESTO FOR THE BY ELECTION IN SOUTH DUBLIN JUNE 2009
MY VISION FOR IRELAND
Our fathers and grandfathers who struggled for our freedom had a vision of a free and independant people owning their own land, homes and businesses and being in control of their own destiny and making their own choices. They did not struggle for hundreds of years against British domination and exploitation only to have that freedom taken away from us by our very own Irish politicians under the pretense of planning for the common good.
It is now well exposed that the planning laws were nothing more than a recipe for bribery and corruption by greedy landowners posing as TD's, county councillors and auctioneers who control all land use for their own gain and deny the Irish people their rights to full ownership and all that confers on a land owner. I share that vision of the Irish republic which has been perverted by Fianna Fail with the introduction of the1964 and later planning laws and shared by the other political parties who have feasted out of the same banquet in the delusion that they know better than the people, what is good for the Irish people. They have transformed a republic of free people into a socialist republic which is now perilously close to bankruptcy and all because their planning laws have blown up in their faces, but they are in denial of that. They copied the British Town and Country Planning Act of 1948 and put it on the statute books of our republic taking total control of all land use from the hands of the land and home owners and vested it in the hands of bureaucratic planners.
Ireland would be a nation of free and independant people where landowners could build their homes or businesses close to the highways and roads so that from Dublin to Galway and from Cork to Wexford there would be homes and businesses strung out all along the route with concentrations of them in towns and villages which would have a variety of services and amenities as is traditional in all our towns. What we now have is a nanny state where politicians zone specific areas of land for development, allegedly for the common good, but in reality for the enrichment of those who have become known as the cute hoors. Builders buy that zoned land on which they can get planning permission and sell the houses to young people at inflated prices heaping a massive mortgage on the back of these innocent people.
Without that zoning these people could buy a field for a few thousand euros and build a home for a fraction of the price they pay a builder. They could have their unique home where they want it, rather than in a crowded estate of boringly similar houses on the edge of a town many miles from their families or workplace.
Clearly the most valuable sites would be on strategic corners near motorways, towns and cities but the market would find its level without the present distortion.
A rich person could afford to buy a site in a prominent place with a large garden while a poor person would be able to buy his home or land in a cheaper area. In all cases the market would have a level playing field and the market distortion that has caused the present catastrophe in our financial system could never happen.
A person should be free to build his house on a bog if he owns the bog. People have sense and will build where they find a site that suits their taste and their pocket.
Councils could provide cheap houses for people who couldnt afford any home and if they found themselves living next to a neighbour from hell they could easily move out.
Council planners built the Ballymun and Moyross failures to name only two.
If there were no planning restrictions as we have had for forty five years, the towns and villages of Ireland would be developed in a much more imaginative way had they been free of the planners impositions and extremely costly conditions.
Ireland's towns and villages were developed before the planning laws came in.
Young people starting a new business could start up without a mass of red tape that planning laws impose. Many people lose interest when they encounter the bureaucracy that must be overcome to start any business.
If James Gandon were alive in Ireland today he would be packing his bags for Dubai.
Commonsense basic laws should be enacted to regulate all developments. Laws such as no polluting of any watercourses. We know that the councils are the biggest polluters today. Take Galway water for example.
No building should be closer than twenty five yards from the centre of any road, river, railway or canal.
A minimum area of car parking space to be provided in front of all businesses and houses.
No access from lands on to any motorways.
Motorways kept clear of all development including services so that one could quickly travel from city to city if one needed a clear run. On the rest of the roads people would see all the range of businesses as they drove along the roads while today a person has to search through industrial estates in backwater places to find many businesses.
Why should you be prevented from turning your home into apartments if you need the income?
Why should you be prevented from making a car park out of your front garden?
Why should you be prevented from running your business from a garage at the side of your house?
Why should a land owner not be able to build a house for his children on his own land?
Planning has imposed an unnecessary layer of architect and engineer's fees and endless delay and bureaucracy on all enterprising people with plans for innovation, not to mention the huge fees that councils are now demanding for that permission under the guise of a contribution to existing infrastructure. In reality these payments carry and sustain that layer of bureaucrats imposed by the planning laws.
END
MY TRACK RECORD IS CLEAR IN OPPOSING THE PLANNING LAWS.
I TESTED THE LANDOWNERS RIGHTS WHEN I TRIED TO PARK CARS IN DARTMOUTH SQUARE AND I ENDED UP IN THE HIGH COURT. I AGAIN TESTED THE LANDOWNERS RIGHTS WHEN I TRIED TO SELL TILES FROM MY OWN LAND AND AGAIN ENDED UP IN THE HIGH COURT. ONCE AGAIN I TESTED THE LANDOWNERS RIGHTS AND PUT A CARAVAN IN THERE AND THE COUNCIL THREATENED LAW. AFTER THAT I ALLOWED A HOMELESS MAN TO PITCH A SMALL TENT THERE AND I WAS FINED 1,000 EUROS BY MINISTER NOEL DEMPSEY'S BROTHER FOR THAT. WITH DARTMOUTH SQUARE I PROVED THAT THE LANDOWNER CAN DO NOTHING WITH HIS LAND. THE LAW OF THE LAND IS THE SAME OVER THE WHOLE REPUBLIC BUT NOBODY WOULD NOTICE OR CARE IF I PARKED CARS ON LAND IN OUT OF THE WAY PLACES. I WAS ALWAYS AWARE OF WHY THE BIG DEVELOPERS RARELY OPPOSED THE PLANNERS. THEY WERE MUCH TOO BUSY KISSING THE PLANNERS AND TD'S BACKSIDES TO GET MORE AND BIGGER PERMITS AND SO THEY DIDNT CRITICISE THE LAWS. BERNARD MCNAMARA PAID 80 MILLION AN ACRE FOR THE BURLINGTON HOTEL AND DUBLIN CITY COUNCIL OFFERED ME 100,000 FOR THE TWO ACRES WHICH WAS ONLY A FEW HUNDRED YARDS AWAY AND UNDEVELOPED. THAT IS A MEASURE OF THE DISTORTION OF THE MARKET DUE TO PLANNING CONTROLS. MCNAMARA VALUED THE BURLINGTON HOTEL LAND AT 1,600 TIMES MORE THAN LAND FROZEN BY PLANNERS. IN ANY CASE I WOULDNT SELL IT TO THE COUNCIL BECAUSE THEY DONT PAY AND THEY JUST STRING PEOPLE OUT UNTIL THEY ARE DEAD OR JUST GIVE UP, LIKE THE MAN I ACQUIRED IT FROM. |
That was the 2007 general election and the 2009 by election and only a handful voted for me and now what I warned the public about has come to pass. Ireland is in dire straits financially and the politicians who got us into the quicksands dont have the ability to get us out and havent the grace to admit that they are failures.
NAMA was their get out card to temporarily hide their massive losses and keep the banks from total shutdown, and sadly they dont even fully understand what that is all about or how it will impact on the nation.
Facing national bankruptcy back in late 2008 the Fianna Fail government were not capable of putting their tribal differences aside for the good of the nation and meeting with Fianna Gael and the Labour parties to agree a joint national strategy and attempt to hold the confidence of the international creditors. Instead they washed their dirty linen in public for party political gain and the whole Irish economy imploded as a result.
Today we have a republic of supposedly free and independent people who cannot even cut turf on their own boglands to keep themselves warm in the cold Winter days because of our idiotic nanny state bureaucrats.
You cannot own a dog, a radio or tv set without a licence.
You cannot fish in the rivers flowing through your own land without a licence.
Most of all you cant build a house on your own land with your own money without grovelling and paying a large fee for the permission to do what was your right.
These repressive laws have been enacted by our own elected politicians and are enforced with massive fines by judges who are paid inflated salaries to control the people.
TODAY WE CANNOT BLAME THE BRITISH MONARCHY OR THE LANDED GENTRY WE CAN ONLY BLAME OURSELVES WE ELECTED PARISH PUMP POLITICIANS BECAUSE THEY HELPED TO GET A MEDICAL CARD, THE DOLE OR A COUNCIL HOUSE. THESE EXPERTS AT ELECTIONS HAVE NO BUSINESS BRAINS OR VISION AND THEY HAVE DRIVEN THE IRISH EXPERIMENT AT FREEDOM INTO A BOG HOLE IT IS ABUNDANTLY CLEAR THAT THEY WERE ALL BUSY AT PLANNING THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE COUNTRY WITHOUT KNOWING THE BASIC FUNDAMENTALS OF BUSINESS. THEY HAD TAKEN THAT FREEDOM FROM THE PEOPLE AND GIVEN PERMISSION TO THEIR OWN CHOSEN DEVELOPERS, OFTEN AFTER TAKING BRIBES. THEIR TENURE IS MARKED BY SCAMS CALLED SCHEMES, TAX BREAK SCHEMES, REGENERATION SCHEMES, OVER THE SHOP SCHEMES ETC ETC. THE DUBLIN DOCKLANDS DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY IS THEIR STAR EXAMPLE OF A SCHEME. THEY SIMPLY DESIGNATED A CHUNK OF DUBLIN IN 1997AND FREED IT FROM THE NATIONAL PLANNING LAWS TO FAST TRACK THEIR FRIENDS. ANGLO IRISH BANK WAS HEAVILY INVOLVED IN EVERY ASPECT OF THIS NATIONAL DISASTER. TWO OF THEIR LARGEST DEVELOPERS, LIAM CARROLL AND SEAN DUNNE WENT TO THE HIGH COURT SQUABBLING OVER WHO BUILT FIRST AND HOW HIGH AS THEY BORROWED BILLIONS OF EUROS AND PUT THE JUDGES INTO A TWIST BECAUSE OF THE LIES, THE PROMISES AND THE PLANNING LAWS. IRELAND'S FUTURE GENERATIONS WILL BE PAYING OFF THOSE DEBTS WHILE MANY DEVELOPERS HAVE DEPARTED THE COUNTRY LEAVING PARTLY BUILT MONSTERS IN PLACES UNSUITABLE. THIS WAS PLANNING PERVERSION TAKEN TO NEW LEVELS BY OUR OWN POLITICIANS WHO HAVE NOT BEEN HELD TO ACCOUNT AS YET. THE 25 ACRE SITE IN RINGSEND WAS ALSO INCLUDED IN THAT SCAM. COSTING ALMOST HALF A BILLION EUROS FOR A FORMER SHORELINE DUMP AND ON WHICH NO SENSIBLE BUILDER WOULD EVER CONTEMPLATE SPECULATIVE DEVELOPMENT THE STATE ACTUALLY OWNED THAT LAND AND YET THEY PAID HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS TO BUY OUT THE LEASEHOLDER IN ORDER TO SECURE THEIR COMMISSIONS. MCNAMARA PUT THIS DEAL TOGETHER AND ALONG WITH HIS PLANS TO DEMOLISH THE BURLINGTON HOTEL, ONE OF THE BEST HOTELS IN DUBLIN, HE BORROWED ALMOST ONE BILLION EUROS WHICH HE WILL NEVER PAY BACK AND NOW THAT DEBT IS ON THE NATION'S BACK. THE MEDIA HAVE NOT AS YET FOCUSSED ON THE PLANNING LAWS AS THE ROOT CAUSE OF IRELAND'S FINANCIAL MELTDOWN AND UNTIL THEY DO AND EXPOSE HOW THE RIGHTS OF LAND OWNERS AND PRIVATE DEVELOPERS HAVE BEEN STOLEN BY THE POLITICIANS BY THEIR PLANNING LAWS, THIS COUNTRY WILL NEVER RECOVER. CONCEALED LOANS TO THE DIRECTORS OF ANGLO IRISH BANK MUST HAVE BEEN KNOWN TO ALL THE DIRECTORS. IF THE AUDITORS HAD NOT NOTICED SUCH MATERIAL AMOUNTS OF MONEY COMING AND GOING THROUGH THE BOOKS THEY WERE INCOMPETANT. THE AUDITORS HAVE TOTAL ACCESS TO THE BOOKS AND OFFICES AT ANY TIME AND DIRECTORS MUST ANSWER AND EXPLAIN ALL ENQUIRIES. THE AUDITORS DUTY WAS TO REPORT FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE SHAREHOLDERS AS TO THE SOUNDNESS OF THE COMPANY. IN THAT DUTY THEY FAILED THE SHAREHOLDERS WHO LOST EVERYTHING. THOSE AUDITORS ERNST AND YOUNG WERE CRITICAL SUPPORTS TO THE SYSTEM BUT THEY WERE DISMAL FAILURES NOT YET RECOGNISED AS SUCH. THEY PROVIDED CLEAN AUDIT REPORTS FOR THOSE YEARS OF FRAUD WHICH PROBABLY IN TURN INFLUENCED AND SATISFIED THE REGULATOR'S CONCERNS. THE SMALL CAPITAL BASE OF THE BANK SET AGAINST IT'S MASSIVE BORROWINGS AND ADVANCES SHOULD HAVE GIVEN RISE TO CONCERN IN ANY AUDIT.
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THE POLITICIANS WERE VERY QUICK TO BLAME THE BANKS LENIHAN AND COWAN IN PARTICULAR DID THIS TO DEFLECT THE BLAME FROM THEMSELVES. THEY WERE THE GOVERNMENT AND SUPPOSED TO BE WATCHING OVER THE WHOLE NATION. WHEN THEY RECOGNISED THAT THE NATIONAL ECONOMY WAS IN BIG TROUBLE THEY FAILED TO CONSULT WITH THE OPPOSITION TO FORM A GOVERNMENT OF NATIONAL UNITY IN ORDER TO RIDE OUT THE CRISIS AND AS A RESULT IRELAND'S DIRTY LINEN WAS WASHED IN THE PUBLIC GLARE AND THOSE NEGATIVE HEADLINES ERODED THE CONFIDENCE NEEDED TO ENSURE THE SUPPORT OF INTERNATIONAL INVESTORS AND CREDITORS. THAT FAILURE IS ON THE HEADS OF ALL THE POLITICIANS. THEY WERE TOTALLY INVOLVED IN PLANNING SCHEMES AND FAILED TO DO THEIR REAL JOB OF MANAGING THE ECONOMY BANKERS GOT ALL THE BLAME BUT THEY JUST FOOLISHLY PROVIDED THE FINANCE FOR THE PLANS PUT FORWARD BY THE PLANNERS AND POLITICIANS. ANGLO AND IRISH NATIONWIDE WERE CRIMINALLY RECKLESS AND FRAUDULENT. AIB AND BOI WERE RECKLESS IN TRYING TO CATCH UP BUT THE POLITICIANS WERE CALLING THE SHOTS. THEY WERE THE REAL CULPRITS WHO WRECKED THE NATION MCCREEVY AND AHERN WERE MAJOR PLAYERS WHO SET THE ROT IN PLACE BANKERS LENT MONEY IN THE MAIN TO FINANCE NEW HOUSES AND LAND HOLDING PLANNING PERMISSION THOSE COVETED PERMISSIONS WERE APPROVED BY PLANNERS AND POLITICIANS PERSONS SEEKING FINANCE FOR OTHER BUSINESS PROJECTS HAD A HARD TIME GETTING FINANCE. THE BANKS WERE FACILITATING THE DEVELOPMENTS BUT NOT INSTIGATING THEM |
Noel O'Gara on the Late Late Show with Pat Kenny.
MANIFESTO IN THE 2007 ELECTION
LETTER TO MINISTER LENIHAN IN JANUARY 2009