When I moved the adjournment at 2.30 p.m. I had just described in probably fairly offensive terms — nothing less will draw the requisite attention — the general condition of the capital city which has been reached by a process taking place not just in my lifetime but with great rapidly and acceleration over the past 20 or 25 years. About a year ago we had a chance to discuss this matter in the House, I cannot remember on what Bill or Estimate, and I described the city in similar terms then. I said that it was the scruffiest capital in Europe. I repeat that now; and let me add that it is the scruffiest capital not by a nose or a head but by several lengths.
I was taken to task by a Deputy, a member of my party, outside the House, who either went spontaneously to one of the evening newspapers or was willing to discuss critically something one of his colleagues had said in reply to a telephone call. Because of the strictures I had employed in regard to Dublin he accused me of having and deploying in my criticisms an elitist attitude towards what a city should look like. He mentioned a couple of ancient universities that I had the privilege of attending and he said: "Deputy Kelly seems to think that everything should run according to the architectural standards of these European gems" or something like that. I think I am not substantially misquoting him.
I say to this Deputy — whom I will not name because I do not want to cause more trouble; I have not referred to it in the meantime and I never even remembered it until we started to discuss this Bill this morning — that he or any Deputy who feels that criticism of that kind or expressions of anguish uttered here or elsewhere about the dereliction, dirt and decay all around us in this city reflect an elitist point of view should ask himself whether he has ever walked from Butt Bridge to Kingsbridge along the south quays and from Kingsbridge back to Butt Bridge on the north quays. If not, let him spend some hour and a half — which is what it would take — doing so and instruct himself about what this city looks like at its heart and core. That is one of the areas designated — not under the Bill in front of us but under the Finance Bill — which the Minister proposes, if I understood his speech correctly, to bring under the umbrella of the Urban Renewal Bill which is before us.
I ask the same Deputy whether he has ever gone by train between Amiens Street Station and Westland Row — as they used to be called before we celebrated I have forgotten which anniversary of 1916 since we seem to be celebrating them at the drop of a hat these days — and looked at the backs of the houses, the streets and the buildings all around them. Let me start his journey a bit further out in Drumcondra and go as far as Lansdowne Road. He should then ask himself whether anything similar is to be seen in the heart of a capital city.
I recognise that you seldom see the most flattering aspect of any city from a raised railway line but I am not simply talking about the fact that the back of a house does not look as attractive as the front; it has to accommodate pipes, services and so on. I am just asking whether there is any other capital city in traversing the centre of which you see so many broken down, dilapidated buildings, so many roofs like colanders, so many houses, the demolition of which was begun but never finished or the construction of which was begun but never finished. There is so much rot and decay and any Deputy who thinks I am applying elitist standards by talking like that really ought to ask himself, particularly when he is a member of Dublin Corporation, if he is taking a serious and responsible view of his own duties.
We are much given in this country — I sometimes think so much given to it that probably in an inverted way it conceals an inferiority complex — to saying that this or that Irish item is "second to none" in the world. Irish food is "second to none" Irish music is "second to none". Everything Irish, like everything French, Finnish or Japanese, has a character and value of its own, and there are some dimensions of it which may indeed be world beating, but I object to the automatic asumption — which is not sincerely held but affected, to apply an anaesthetic plaster to a deeply felt inferiority complex — that one is being an elitist, or a West Briton or, as Kevin Boland said, a belted earl or one of the gin and tonic brigade if one says we are not in the same league as other capital cities in western Europe. I do not want to go on about the differences between myself and a colleague as I am sure he was saying no more than many other members of Dublin Corporation would say, all of whom should hang their heads in shame, if they do not hang themselves, over the condition of the city which in a sense they are paid to preside over, not with a salary but with perquisites of all kinds.
I wonder how a Deputy or a councillor who feels that way about "elitist" critiques would be received in Florence or Amsterdam. Admittedly those two cities are world famous for their visual impact. In the case of Amsterdam it is not because of the immense array of magnificent individual public buildings, as its array in that regard is very small, but because of its very carefully preserved character and carefully maintained streets. It is the totality of Amsterdam which creates the impression, not because it has places, it is rather short on these things. The Dutch are frugal, simple and modest, at least that has been their traditional character, but they are also careful and clean and respect things, including themselves. They do not feel that anybody among them who says that somethings is dirty, broken or needs to be maintained, repaired or preserved is an elitist.
I wonder how certain Deputies and councillors would get on not just in Florence or Amsterdam but in the humblest Dutch towns or Italian towns for that matter. How much of the unsightliness which is not only presided over by Dublin Corporation, county council or any other local authority but actually promoted by section 4 directions, would be tolerated by anybody, even by the Communist Party who, to do them justice, are very much to the fore in these countries in trying to maintain the appearance and symbols of the past? You would not get by in Leningrad if you were to propose clearing away the symbols of the Russian imperial past on the grounds that you did not want to be reminded of them.
That point of view has been expressed about many institutions in this city. A Deputy here — he had left the House long before I was heard of — belonging to Clann na Poblachta thought that Trinity College should be turned into a car park because it stood for all he hated. I have no connection with Trinity good, bad or indifferent and I do not hold any brief for it and, even if I shared his feelings about the college, which I do not, I certainly would not take that line about it. It does not matter what its history is. It is part of our history too. We cannot escape or avoid it and we should be civilised enough to respect the environment which has been left to us in order, as Deputy Brady said in a fine speech earlier, to pass it on to those who come after us.
I have two main problems with the Bill. One is that in so far as anything except the Custom House Docks site is concerned, the Bill proposes, even with the extension of designated areas under section 6, to do no more than to provide rates remission. I hope I have not misunderstood the Minister in his speech or the explanatory memorandum to the Bill. That, of course, is no good to the residential parts of an area because they do not pay rates any longer anyway. I am not minimising the effect of this on city areas in which there are business premises and naturally the Custom House Docks site will benefit. I am not finding fault with that but the impact of the Bill in so far as it concerns the renewal of residential areas will be exceedingly slight. This city is not really an industrial one, at least the old core is not industrial to any conspicuous extent and, although the relief will benefit the city, it will come nowhere near meeting what it needs.
One thing must be said about the designated areas in the Finance Bill about which I am allowed to speak because it was referred to by the Minister in regard to several points. He specifically said that he intended to make orders which will extend the rates remission benefit to the areas specified in the Finance Bill; but in no other free city in Europe would things have been allowed to go so far. In other words, we are talking about renewal or renovation from a point which no other city in Europe would have let districts reach. What other capital city in Europe can show a gem like the quays to the visitor or indeed to its own people? Incidently, I resist the idea that the only reason for tarting up a city is to attract tourists. The city has a permanent population of its own people and they are entitled to live in decent conditions and to have the amenities which previous generations put there. I do not want to neglect the tourist potential of urban development or renewal but, if there was never a tourist in the country, we are entitled to it in our own right.
I cannot claim the same acquaintanceship with areas in Cork, Galway, Waterford or Limerick, but I do not think any of their areas would have been let go as far down hill as those in Dublin. The quays area, the north inner city area, the Gardiner Street and Mountjoy Square complex and Henrietta Street would not have been neglected in other cities. Henreitta Street was built around 1750 and it has been allowed to deteriorate to the point that it is nearly dangerous to walk along it for fear that some of the buildings might fall on you. In so far as the Minister is concerned we are starting this urban renewal scheme in the humble and not very exciting context of rates remission which will be no good to purely residential areas. We are starting that renewal from a very low point. We have a long way to come from the distance we have gone back and the lesson for us there is not that we may carp about the measures contained in the Bill but to avoid mistakes in the future.
The time to look at urban renewal in the case of districts which are only just beginning the journey downhill is now. They should be renewed now and not when they are like the south side of Mountjoy Square, when they are like an old man's jaw with about two or three teeth left in it and those that are left scruffy enough themselves. That is not what I understand by urban renewal. It may be cheaper and better all round just to bulldoze what is left and start from scratch.
Urban renewal should start from the very moment decay begins to appear in a widespread patterned form all over a district. There are huge areas in Dublin not envisaged in the Finance Bill, or the Bill before us, which are quite outside the Minister's present intentions. I am well aware of the financial dimensions of any sort of scheme for helping people, whether by tax remission, direct grants or anything else, on an enormously large scale, but I should like to draw attention to the alternative. The alternative is that we are going to allow other huge areas of Dublin, mostly residential, to keep running downhill until they are in the same state as Henrietta Street and the other districts which are designated or in mind.
One of the members of the category of buildings which should be renewed now are Government occupied offices throughout the city. That applies not merely to the Civil Service but to local authority or State occupied old-fashioned houses which are being used as offices. There is a phrase in a novel by John Le Carré — it does not matter where it comes from because it stands on its own — in which he describes the espionage or counter-espionage outfit in some distant dismal suburb of London as being housed in an old mansion which "showed that air of controlled dilapidation characteristic of Government buildings everywhere". In other words, they do not quite let the roof fall in or the gutters fall off, the down pipes fall out, or the floors fall through.
The thing is to maintain them at a point below which it is not possible to maintain the building. Then, naturally, the cry goes up that new offices must be obtained, that the old ones are uncomfortable for the staff — I can see that. The building is abandoned and left derelict. Nobody wants to occupy it in that condition and very often it is not suitable any longer for anything except offices. Horrible partitions are put up, the tracks of strip-lighting remain and reconstructions of an interior-type which would be excessively costly to reverse are carried out.
Government offices are prime candidates for a review in this connection. They must represent a very large slice of housing in the inner part of this city between the canals — I am not speaking about the brand new ones — and in general they are only in a state of controlled dilapidation as far as a casual glance can show. Many of them are not much better. I do not know the northside suburbs so well although I have been able to observe fair slices of them. I do not know them as well as parts that were in a constituency I once had the honour to represent, like the Minister of State, Deputy O'Brien. The inner suburbs, those built in the early and middle of the 19th century running southwards from the canals, are in a state of uncontrolled dilapidation. In other words, there is not even a Government Department there making sure that the roof does not fall in or that any of the other features of decay do not gather.
If one took a wide angle green filtered Sunday supplement photographer's picture of the village of Ranelagh no doubt it could be presented photographically, with a bit of October mist hanging around, so as to appear quite attractive. It would awaken in me nostalgia for my early childhood which I spent living near it. However, if one walks up to the place, around it and on the roads near it one will find what I am talking about. Above all one will find the infallible signal of houses on the way down, the ten or 12 electric door bells which spell multiple occupancy in a house never intended for that purpose. I can recall canvassing two storey houses — I am sure Deputy O'Brien is still canvassing them — intended for a middle-class people in 1860 or so which now carry eight or ten doorbells.
One cannot treat an old house like that without signing its death warrant. Very often those houses produce huge rents on which, I have no doubt, frequently no tax is paid. The owners may not be well-off and the house may represent their only investment. The owners may not have the capital to renovate the house properly or be able to afford to reduce the number of occupants to keep it at a certain standard with the result that roads are beginning to sink quietly down. However, they are sinking at a faster rate than Venice is sinking under water. They sink at such a rate that there is quite a perceptible difference between the condition they were in when I was a student in the fifties and that which they are in now.
I should like to remind the House that there are areas such as Rathgar Road — I hope residents there will not be offended if I mention this because I think that is a lovely road——
