Coup d’Etat in An Taisce?

But you wouldn’t want to ban anyone.

Banning only comes in when there is a conflict of interest between the objectives of the site/organisation and an individual.

I would suspect that anyone who holds a reasoned argument could only be good for the site. As it increases site traffic which is extremely important to all ambitous internet sites.

Even arguments such as Sam Stephonson being “auwful” and not progressive are I suspect welcome.

Originally posted by Diaspora
…………….I would suspect that anyone who holds a reasoned argument could only be good for the site……………

thats my point

on prime time last night a big discussio on an taisce. but i fear the picked the wrong people to argue the president of an taisce..can’t remember his name… they some hippy who only said 1 intelligent thing all night and some people who really hadn’t a clue. a planner who didn’t say much and o’cuiv..absolute muppet who talked around every subject. i suppose he tried his best to sound intelligent but came off sonding like a moron who is only there because of his questionable lineage. there was a guy there which they didn’t tell u what he did.. but he was trying to comment on inaccuricies with an taisce’s policies(regarding planning cos i know disapora that ye do more stuff) and was quite rudely shouted down several times. seems like the president didn’t want that aired that they seem to have no cohesive stragety towards this subject and can’t handle the justified critism and questions involved in making this public.

http://www.antaisce.org/campaigns/policy_statements/rural_built_environment.pdf

Above is the An Taisce rural development policy.

The contentious point was the following “statistics compiled by the DOE from ESB connections indicate theat we are now (foisting) errecting 50 new houses in the countryside per day. 36% of new housing is now in the countryside. Of this 80-90% is one off”

Quote ” Of this 80-90% is one off”

Therefore I suggest that our archeaolist freind Mr Caulfield dig a large hole for himself and cover it until he learns how to read english.

Apart from that I thought it was a good program, the farmer from Ballyhaunis did very well as did the planner and Our own Frank Corcoran.

But Caulfield and The rep from the sustainability something really displayed how much more mature this debate has come in recent years.

And O’Cuiv complimenting Ashling and the Blue flag scheme wonders will never cease!!!!!!!

Quote “… probably lives in leitrim and dreams of catching clouds”

Talking about lotto ads get herself and yourman in the ad featuring the punter in the jeep who wants to develop ‘carparks’ together for a debate it would make great television 😉

She didn’t get a chance to develop any of her points, except when she was rebuking O’ Cuiv that time.
Frank did well, much better than last time, although as usual there wasn’t enough time to develop points, he spent most of it simply trying to clear up statistical issues rather than putting AT’s policies across. In fact, I don’t think in th whole half hour did he have a chance to put forward an AT policy and explain it.
O’ Cuiv – what a fool, he makes me boil with rage “Oh well we keep building more roads and infrastructure in Dublin & the East and are getting nowhere so I think it’s time rural Ireland got the resources for improved infrasructure”
???? YOU’RE THE ONES IN GOVERNMENT! YOU’RE THE ONES NOT GETTING US ANYWHERE IN THE EAST!
And that most ludicrous of remarks I’ve ever heard in my life – one he’s made before – in relation to the fact one off housing generates car dependancy “Well Dublin is choked with cars with wall to wall traffic, so we in Dublin aren’t ones to talk”
Oh of course, so rural Ireland has some catching up to do has it?
How pathetic.

As usual Prime Time failed miserably in the presentation stakes – I was wondering as I watched how many of the 400,000 viewers or so had any idea of what a one-off house is, what it looks like, or indeed what a septic tank is, and the effects they have, esp when not working.
These issues should have been cleared up at the start with an explanitary report. Television is a visual medium, something RTE have yet to cop on to. The debate may have well as been on radio.

Agreed.

Six people was too many though, four contributors would have allowed for a more comprehensive and focused debate, and considering anyone with the slightest interest in this issue was largely concerned with what Frank had to say, it was a shame he didn’t have enough time other than to largely defend AT.

If householders were still paying rates, this issue would be a lot different – the idea that people would be paying for the supplying of water and maintance of roads for others to live in their ‘fancy piles in the hills’ would get the rent-a-crowd and bin charges lobby out like a shot.

And many of these one-off people are the same ones complaining about the centralisation of hospital services and centres of excellence, and how difficult it will be to get to them.
If people were living reasonably close together, infrastructure servicing these areas could be improved dramatically.

Fin said: “on prime time last night a big discussion on an taisce”

Get your act together Fin!! Thursday’s Prime Time was a special on one-off housing, featuring a report, followed by a studio discussion with a panel of six people, one of whom was from An Taisce.

Yes, the usual bungalow defenders (O’Cuiv, Caulfield) didnt come off very well this time. They tried the usual tactics against An Taisce, attacking “its” policies, but Frank Corcoran just calmly and clearly reiterated that An T. simply apply Government policy (contained in the National Spatial Strategy) and that – he was trying to get this in but Miriam O’Callaghan kept talking over him – Government policy is in turn based on European environmental legislation that Ireland has signed up to.

Rachael Kenny (former IPI president) is now a senior planner in Meath County Council so she probably wasn’t the best person to be there for obvious reasons (you can be sure she was told what she can and can’t say).

Emer O’Siochru (somebody described as a hippy) is a well-respected architect who’s been working in the area of built heritage for many years.

As for that guy from ‘Council for the West’ (another IRDA by the sound of things), what can you say? There’s no problem with what’s happening to the countryside as far as these people are concerned, and the already lax rules on the plonking of large pattern-book bungalows everywhere should be completely relaxed.

I wonder if he saw the piece in the Irish Independent on the 2nd of Janary titled ‘Top composer decries new plans to allow one-off houses’?

It said:

‘Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, who has a home in this country, has criticised government plans which will allow thousands of one-off houses to be built in the countryside.

The composer of Cats and Phantom of the Opera told the Irish Independent that Ireland’s landscape was already marred by some of the most “hideous and inappropriate housing anywhere in the world” and that he was “gobsmacked” that regulations would be changed to allow thousands of one-off houses to be built.

Mr Llyod Webber said he realised there were few things more infuriating than “some outsider pontificating about the affairs of another country. But I plead a huge affection for Ireland and it grieves me to see such a special landscape besmirched by houses that have absolutely no sympathy for local vernacular architecture whatsoever”, he said yesterday……’

Fin,

Should that image not be titled ‘ignoring sustainability in the sticks?’

Just to reiterate, Prime Time last Thursday week was about one-off housing, not An Taisce. That’s important.

Don’t shoot the messenger.