Dundalk Green party councillors have revealed their true nature and colours over the last few weeks and it has become clear that they are anything but Green. Regular readers may recall that recently we have been in contact with Senator Mark Dearey, Marianne Butler and Olan Herr regarding a high court case taking place this month in Dublin.
The case involves McCaughey developments trying to overturn a decision made by councillors in 2009 to retain an area of land on the Navy bank as zoned for natural habitat and amenities. The councillors decided to keep it zoned this way to protect the local nature, to prevent homes being built practically on top of the sewage plant and to ensure that the flood plain continues to prevent flooding in residential districts. All of these reasons are in line with Green party policies.
We contacted all councillors in the area about fighting the case to support their decision. Not one councillor of any colour resonded to our letters. We then proceeded to contact councillors by phone and are grateful to Sinn Fein for hearing us out. Sinn Fein's Jennifer Green and Harry Todd have promised to bring the issue up at the next local party meeting next monday. We hope that they decide to help us to fight the good fight.
We have been most dissappointed with the Green party response in Dundalk. Mark Dearey has stated that he is not willing to get involved even though his affidavit to the high court, which is supposed to be defending the councillors decision, in fact does the opposite. There are false hoods in his affidavit which claims the meeting that decided to retain the land as zoned habitat and amenities was a County council meeting. This is not true, it was a Town council meeting. The affidavit goes on to say that from his recollection there was very little said at the meeting regardinig the zoning issue. Dearey's party colleague's (the only other councillor affidavit in the case) states very clearly that there was plenty of discussion and Mariannes affidavit goes into great detail regarding who spoke and what they said. Both affidavits conflict heavily and we believe that this is the intention of the Town councils legal agent in an effort to lose the case to the benefit of McCaughey developments. The only other affidavit is from John Lawrence, an unelected planning official who stated that there is no foul smell from the sewage plant. What planet is he living on? Why would a legal agent provide two conflicting affidavits when they have the choice to supply, in defence of the councillors, affidavits from all of those that partook in the decision. To say there is something rotten about the whole scenario would be an understatement.
Marianne Butler has not gotten back to us on the issue. Olan Herr, another Green party councillor, has stated that he has other fish to fry and is not willing to get involved. He has also stated that he trusts Senator Dearey's assessment of the situation. We pointed out that this "trust" is not dissimilar to the "trust" placed in the financial regulators by politicians over the last number of years. We highlighted the fact that as Dearey admitted to a number of withnesses that he didn't even read the affidavit that he signed and was unaware of what was in it, he in fact has made his decision not to get involved in an effort to protect himself rather than protect the people that elected him.
The Green party's response to this issue is disgusting. Of all the parties that should be fighting to defend the decisions of the Council, it should be the Greens and yet they won't do so. Indeed, kieran Cuffe, ex Green minister was on TV days before the election boasting about how the Greens had cleaned up local government. This claim, in the light of our recent experiences, is laughable.
We have already secured affidavits telling the full truth from two Town councillors and all going well Sinn fein will soon come on board. If this happens it will mark the beginning of a battle for real democracy and accountability in Dundalk local government. We will keep readers posted on our progress. Meanwhile we would like readers to email or phone Green party councillors to show their disgust and encourage them to become involved. Their email addresses and phone numbers are posted below.
Mark Dearey (no email available) 0872358197
Olan Herr Ollan.herr@dundalk.ie 0429377689
Marianne Butler marianne.butler@dundalktown.ie 0868677672
No comments:
Post a Comment