Cumann na nGaedheal and Private Enterprise, 1924
Jul 4th, 2010 by Conor McCabe
They [the government] had discovered during the last few years that neither municipalities, nor local authorities, nor State organisations were in a position to deal alone in a satisfactory manner with the housing problem. They had come to the conclusion - and he thought it would be subscribed by all who had knowledge of the conditions - that if success in this matter were to be achieved it must become through private enterprise; that is to say, commercial enterprise.”
President W.T. Cosgrave 25 February 1924.
I know I’m supposed to be on a break from the web, but this news-clipping I just love. The non-ideological Irish Free State government. No right-wing or left-wing, just a bunch of guys using ‘common sense’ to give public money to their private business friends and calling it enterprise to sugar the pill.
The rest of it is below the fold.
Enjoy.
Great stuff Conor. I love the bit where it says that private enterprise must be given complete freedom, then immediately that the state would provide a 20% subsidy. The Free State government doesn’t do a total lack of self-awareness, but if it did …
Isn’t it amazing how the mainstream historical narratives of the period have Cosgrave et al as stoic democrats, when really they were little more than grease monkeys for their business and banking friends?
At least they built Ard Na Crusha which must have been a relatively huge undertaking and they did not go to the Brits.What was the equivalent in a % of GDP was it?
If only in the midst of the current depression we had some of that.Funny that a very rightwing, conservative gov.could od that and our current gov. and alternatives would not have the imagination or courage.
Did you just give me an “autobahn” defence?
It is amazing, although perhaps less so when we think that today’s stoic democrats have been exactly the same for decades, and have passed largely unnoticed until it became to blatant to ignore.
Just an aside that at least they had the courage to build a major (very major for the times) infrastructure project which made for many jobs. It is a touch of what have the Romans ever done for us.
I feel that our reformist left would not even do what they did such is the cowardice and lack of imagination around.
It took until later across the water to do much on housing, Wheatley of the Independent Labour Party if memory serves rightly.
The loss of the Civil gutted whatever radicalism existed and the price of power for FF was not to be radical.
Funny you should mention Ard na Crusha - as I always had a (probably misguided) notion that the Marino estate had some link to the building of Ard na Crusha. Perhaps because it’s from around the same time - perhaps due to it all looking a bit German.
Anyone have any background on Marino to prove/disprove ??
From whence the Cumann na nGaedhael kneejerk reaction to 100% state-financed housing ? Pure ideology - or the state being skint at the time ? Not too sure of your ‘lining the pockets of their mates the builders’ approach - as I thought their real mates were the big farmers. Are you not projecting current FG on them ?
Reminds me too of my Da (who has a bit of experience of the building racket from the inside) who has a mantra about the few attempts by public authorities to build housing using their own personnel (60s/70s) as having been catastrophic (er.. inefficiency(ahem) /huge cost overruns/delays). Only anecdotal - I don’t have the specific instances of it to cite.
I’m not projecting current FG on them Sean, unless I’ve somehow worked out how to project evidence back to the past. Wait till I move onto banks Sean, then you’ll really be confused.
The argument that housing schemes built directly by local authorities were damned with overruns and delays while sub-contracted housing estates are paradigms of efficiency is hardly an accurate summary of the Irish construction industry. There are literally hundreds of thousands of empty, badly-built houses across Ireland at this moment, all built with private sector efficiency - and equally there are hundreds of thousands of occupied, badly-built houses and apartments across Ireland, all built with private sector efficiency. The houses in Cabra are till standing after 80 years, and the ones in Edenmore after 50, which is more than we’ll be able to say for Zoe developments or Bellmayne in 50 years’ time. The idea that the Irish construction industry can be divided into public waste and private efficiency doesn’t stand up to the evidence.
Well-spotted with Shannon and Marino Sean. Both built around the same time and both used German engineers and craftsmen.
Local authority schemes were rigourously inspected. I am not sure whether many of them were direct build. I was in Dublin Corpo around 1972 and I think the ones I saw inspected were built on contract.Fado, fado
The houses in Cabra are till standing after 80 years, and the ones in Edenmore after 50
Point taken Conor - but were they built directly by Corpo personnel - or by Private contractors under tender to the Corpo ? A late Uncle of mine used to do this work before emigrating to the US in the 50s - building County Council houses on contract.
The recent shoddily built private sector stuff is probably, in the perverse logic of the baconrollocracy, efficiently built as 1/ they were done too quickly and 2/ they were done too cheaply. No incidence on the inflated prices but hence the fact they’re probably already falling apart.
A mixture of both Sean, especially with Cabra and Finglas, not so much with Edenmore though, where there were three different builders involved, including McInerneys who in all likelihood your uncle worked for in the 1950s as they secured a lot of the public housing contracts (both in the UK and here.) But, the building taking place had to conform to corporation standards and designs. Dublin corporation didn’t have the personnel to build the number of houses needed by the city, so contractors were always a part of the process, going back to the 1920s. direct labour construction on a large scale was never the norm. but where trades personnel were employed on a continuous basis was in maintenance of the rental stock and corporation estates. up to the 1970s all corporation flat complexes had their own caretakers and maintenance men.
and it’s in the maintenance of housing estates and apartment blocks where private sector has really shone in the past ten years, especially through management fees, which is another aspect of housing in Ireland where a generalisation of public sector = inefficient, private sector = efficient is hard to make.
Then of course there’s the Ballymun regeneration project, all sub-contract, and a huge scandal in terms of efficiency. Or the public-private projects where the private builders have decided to shag off as it’s not worth their while anyone. I mean, the regeneration projects are the one area where direct labour makes the most sense, as it’s a continuing, ongoing process. But no. Private sector gets the contracts.
I had a quick look through my files Sean and in terms of large-scale development Whitehall was direct labour. Late 1930s/early 1940s.
Ardnacrusha was also responsible for a number of people from Clare being christened Joachim. If I’m not mistaken were all the housing estates you mention above built under Fianna Fail Conor?
Yep. I think up to the 70s it’s pretty much all FF with social housing.
On Ballymun, Dublin Dilettante did a pretty good photo essay on the dazzling ’success’ of the ‘public-private regeneration’ bolix a few weeks back :
http://circumlimina.wordpress.com/2010/06/16/ballymun-in-june-2010/