There’s been a some media coverage of the land being transferred from local authorities to DEHLG (€650m worth, 2000 hectares, see here) and from developers/banks to NAMA (€several billion, thousands of hectares). The state is rapidly gaining a concentrated control of a massive land bank. The priority for NAMA is to make sure that the loan is paid back, or its sold on and a profit is realised. At the same time, the state controlling so much land offers some opportunities with respect to mid-to-long term spatial planning, especially infrastructure developments, including public utilities such as schools, etc, and IDA-backed ventures (and the state has paid huge sums for such land over the past decade, especially through NRA, etc). It also offers potential for thinking about leasing schemes, where the state realises an income over 50-100 years or more, rather than off-loading back to the private sector at the earliest opportunity. This is an idea forwarded by Eoin O’Cofaigh in the letter to the Irish Times.
It seems to me that there is much to be explored here as to what might be the best strategy with respect to managing land for the public good, land that has fallen 75-95% in value and will realise little back in the short term if sold on other than to put huge chunks of land back in the hands of investors who can then realise huge profits when the state looks to use it in the future. DEHLG and NAMA need to start a dialogue about plans for such land, especially concerning local authority and private land that is contiguous, and this conversation needs to have the long term public good at its heart. In my view, this dialogue should not be limited to DEHLG and NAMA, but there should be a wider a public debate.
So, what’s your view about what the state should do with the massive land bank it now controls?
Rob Kitchin
Ireland after NAMA 
September 13, 2010 at 7:03 pm
The state already had an ample oversupply of land for educational purposes before they forced themselves into “the only game in town” situation to relieving firstly, developers and then, insolvent and incompetent councils of their land banks. Councils also thought it was a great idea to grab apartments and houses from the wide-boy developers and even got the law changed to facilitate this. Not looking like such a smart move now as they service mortgages on these developments that nobody wants to move into.
There are schools all round the country waiting up to 20 years for improvements to be made or a new school built. Meanwhile, last week I see that the government are still buying new prefabs. Wonder why? The best use this land could be put to is forestry! Plant deciduous trees on the lot and have it as a condition of planting that it will not be touched for at least 75 years so that the generation that are going to pay for this mess, at least have something nice to look at instead of the crony capitalist black spots on the urban and rural landscapes.
The first thing that needs to be done is that this land needs to be ring-fenced to stop it ending up in the hands of any of the people who brought us here. Bankers, developers, estate agents, barristers, big accounting firms and finally friends of those in power and who will assume power after we are ‘allowed’ to have a general election. I suppose my above paragraph is nonsense since NAMA is all of the above.
I believe that all county and city councils that are insolvent must be wound up. They are a business that have not conducted their affairs in a prudent fashion and the axe has to fall where it needs to fall Same goes for the DDDA which can only stay in business compliments of yet another tax payer bailout.
The country is awash with apartments and houses what would professor Kitchin
suggest be done with this land build schools. They are already there they just need to be repaired and rebuilt on their existing sites.
September 13, 2010 at 9:31 pm
Schools is just an example (and we are building lots of new schools at the minute – I think 20 this year to match up provision to pattern of population and more planned – I wonder how much the land for those cost; and yes, lots other schools need to be extended or rebuilt). The point is that there is an opportunity to use the land for public infrastructure provision. Forestry or parks is one possible use. I’m sure there are lots of different uses. Alistair, below, is right. There is lots of scope for normative thinking here, it’s more constructive than trying to score cheap points.
September 13, 2010 at 7:41 pm
A good question, Rob.
And a great idea, Robert: convert the land into arboreal monuments to excess, hubris, idiocy!
Shifting the debate a wee bit, I do think it’d be useful for the public to at least see where all the sites are i.e. on a map (which is desperately needed to inform the debate about NAMA). Maybe each nearby community could then have some input into what should be done with the sites e.g. a park, a running track, public housing, etc.
More broadly, there’s nothing at all wrong with asking ‘what should be done?’ Of course, few of us have much confidence that good ideas will be implemented, and like Robert, I’m sure many fear that lots of bad decisions will be made again. But at least let’s use IAN for some normative thinking!
September 13, 2010 at 9:33 pm
As soon as we get the data it’ll be georeferenced and mapped. Trying to get the data is another issue. We have been trying, but no joy so far.
September 16, 2010 at 9:47 am
Over 30 millions worth of data in respect of the banking crisis… looking forward to what will come of that…..
does data come in brown envelopes?
September 16, 2010 at 11:20 am
Ireland After Nama
A modest proposal.
I would like to propose a solution to the present economic and social crisis that the Irish state presently finds itself in. The solution may appear radical, however as our present economic crisis, consequent unemployment, and increasing exposure to the corrupt and materialist ideals that have undermined the state’s economic, social and environmental stability, become more apparent, the solution will appear less radical and more of a political imperative, if national sovereignty and the constitution of Ireland are to be preserved.
The solution takes its precedent from the activities of Sin Fein in the 1920’s and their ultimately successful attempts at securing Irish independence. The first step in this solution is the recognition of the abject failure of government to govern. This failure is clearly exemplified by the squandering of national resource during the decade prior to 2007, and the corrupt relationship between government and private vested interests. This relationship is typified in the absence of regulation of Banks and private enterprise to the extent of some 30 to 70 billion Euro, which is presently being transferred from the public purse to the banking and private sector.
A government that is in contravention of the Constitution of Ireland is no longer fit to govern and should be removed from office. The government of Ireland has proven itself to be in contravention of the following articles of the Constitution.
Article 6:
All powers of government, legislative, executive and judicial, derive, under God, from the people, whose right it is to designate the rulers of the State and, in final appeal, to decide all questions of national policy, according to the requirements of the common good.
In the past decade the common good has not been the object of Governmental authority. The financial good of the few has been grossly promoted to the detriment of Ireland to the fiscal tune of some 30-70 billion euro.
Article 8
1. The Irish language as the national language is the first official language.
The Irish language is not the national language and no attempt has been made by The Dail to introduce the language as the language of Dail Eireann. The absence of the will of the government of the state to use the language in its own dealings renders attempts at preservation of the language by the nation as hypocracy. Hypocracy that is typified by the government’s self exemption from the laws to which all citizens are expected to adhere.
Article 28A
1. The State recognises the role of local government in providing a forum for the democratic representation of local communities, in exercising and performing at local level powers and functions conferred by law and in promoting by its initiatives the interests of such communities.
The granting of planning permission by local authorities to the tune of some 280,000 vacant dwellings (excluding those declared as holiday homes) bears concrete testimony to the failure of local and national government to promote the interests of local communities.
Article 29
2. Ireland affirms its adherence to the principle of the pacific settlement of international disputes by international arbitration or judicial determination.
The Governments decision to grant the United States permission to use Shannon Airport during the American led war in Iraq, remains in direct contradiction to Irish Neutrality. A similar act by the Oireachtas during world war two, whereby German planes were allowed to re-fuel in Irish territory would have been viewed as an act of war and would have certainly brought retaliation from the United Kingdom.
Aritcle 42
2° The State shall, however, as guardian of the common good, require in view of actual conditions that the children receive a certain minimum education, moral, intellectual and social.
The gross disparity between the material wealth of Irish society and present Government willingness to tolerate in excess of thirty children per classroom ensures that minimal education is not being provided by Irish schools. This situation results in the preservation of an education system which reinforces the existing class structure and allows for minimal movement through the class system via the educational apparatus of the state. It remains a fact that the address of a child and the educational standard of her parents are the crucial determinants of educational attainment. This is as a result of the state’s failure to provide for proper class sizes and the appropriate education of children.
Article 43
1° The State acknowledges that man, in virtue of his rational being, has the natural right, antecedent to positive law, to the private ownership of external goods.
2° The State accordingly guarantees to pass no law attempting to abolish the right of private ownership or the general right to transfer, bequeath, and inherit property.
2. 1° The State recognises, however, that the exercise of the rights mentioned in the foregoing provisions of this Article ought, in civil society, to be regulated by the principles of social justice.
2° The State, accordingly, may as occasion requires delimit by law the exercise of the said rights with a view to reconciling their exercise with the exigencies of the common good.
The state has failed in its obligations to limit the unbridled acquisition of private wealth far in excess of what an individual or family might require to live a healthy and enjoyable life. This fact is borne out by the state sanctioned salaries of executive bankers, some of whom were and remain in receipt of salaries of between 50-90,000 Euros per week. Had the state adhered to this article and limited the greed of the banking sector in the manner required by the constitution the present banking crises would have been diminished or averted.
Article 45
2. The State shall, in particular, direct its policy towards securing:
i. That the citizens (all of whom, men and women equally, have the right to an adequate means of livelihood) may through their occupations find the means of making reasonable provision for their domestic needs.
ii. That the ownership and control of the material resources of the community may be so distributed amongst private individuals and the various classes as best to subserve the common good.
iii. That, especially, the operation of free competition shall not be allowed so to develop as to result in the concentration of the ownership or control of essential commodities in a few individuals to the common detriment.
iv. That in what pertains to the control of credit the constant and predominant aim shall be the welfare of the people as a whole.
v. That there may be established on the land in economic security as many families as in the circumstances shall be practicable.
The government’s relationship with the corporate and banking sectors, its lack of control of the banking sector and the subsequent collapse of the Irish economy as a result of the government supported behaviours of “a few individuals” is a clear constitutional violation and requires no further clarification here. Present corruption is exemplified by the reality that no politician or banking official has been made accountable for their actions.
2° The State shall endeavour to secure that private enterprise shall be so conducted as to ensure reasonable efficiency in the production and distribution of goods and as to protect the public against unjust exploitation.
That present government is in contravention of each of the above articles is not hypothesis or opinion but established fact, as such Government should be removed from office at the earliest possible opportunity.
The manner by which government can be removed.
1 The establishment of an alternative executive committee. This committee should be drawn from academia and from those commentators with proven and qualified expertise in their respective fields who wish to see the preservation of the constitution, and the remediation where possible of the corruption and the failings of the present political establishment.
A new executive could be easily drawn from the academic and intellectual circles. Should a new executive base its principles of governance upon a rejection of material greed and self interest and an adherence to the principals outlined in the constitution of Ireland, the work of stabilizing the economy and devoting executive functioning to the improvement of society as a whole, can be begun in earnest.
Once an executive is established it can function in the capacity of an alternative government and the people of Ireland can decide if they wish this alternative to replace the present corrupted model.
Intuition, and common sense instructs that alternative government is not only the wish of the Irish people, but essential to the survival and future prosperity of the state.
Anybody who recognizes this as a potential move forward.. may contact me at drmdebrun@gmail.com
September 16, 2010 at 2:36 pm
Rob,
Sustainable Energy Ireland are currently developing a really useful mapping system that pinpoints areas of the country that are suitable for growing bioenergy crops – miscanthus, short rotation coppice willow and oil seed rape. They look at key factors such as soil type, height, slope, aspect and rainfall to generate a final suitability grid.
It would be interesting to overlay this with a spatial distribution of the NAMA land bank to see if there is a match. As a lot of NAMA land will not have any real residential, retail or service potential (schools etc) for the considerable future one option may be to grow bio-energy crops.
http://www.seai.ie/Renewables/Bioenergy/
Justin
September 16, 2010 at 5:14 pm
Justin
The application of such a mapping system to overlay with spatial distribution of the NAMA land.. sounds more like an example of specific counterproductivity. This was defined in 1976 by Ivan Ilych in his interesting text Medical Nemesis. The definition runs as follows:
“Specific or paradoxical counterproductivity is
a negative social indicator for a diseconomy which remains locked within the system that
produces it. It is a measure of the confusion delivered by the news media, the incompetence fostered by educators, or the time-loss represented by a more powerful
car. Specific counterproductivity is an unwanted side-effect of increasing institutional outputs that remains internal to the system which itself originated the specific value. It is
a social measure for objective frustration.”
September 20, 2010 at 1:29 pm
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September 24, 2010 at 8:46 am
[…] one possible use for the landbank being assembled by NAMA and the DEHLG would be to use it for the building of new schools and for other public infrastructure. The Irish Examiner reports today that the Department of […]