The Carlton Site in Dublin City

The following post was originally a comment on the Frank Connolly names the ministers who refused to clarify connections with Anglo thread. I found it interesting that Joe O'Reilly had been one of the 4 named as being members of the Golden Circle group who had used bank loans to buy shares in the bank, using the shares themselves as collateral.

I talk about the latest issue of Village Magazine, but as far as I know, the particular article I refer to isn't online for me to post a link to. The best I can do is to post a link to Village's site, which contains a rather poor quality photo of the article I refer to - my apologies for that. Explosive Allegations of Corruption.

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I was wondering when Mr O'Reilly would be making an appearance in the sordid little tale that is the story of our shame.

Enda will indeed be roasting nuts in the Dáil, if he can begin to unravel what's happened and what's going on here.

There was an article in Village magazine, the last issue, that spoke about a certain Mr. Clinton. The Village didn't do a half bad job either. Pity they didn't dig a bit deeper though. Allow me to stir the mud somewhat. I won't be getting specific with names at this point as that'd spoil the fun that's about to erupt. And it'd definitely inspire an attempt to have our fine community shut down. Course that'd be really stupid, as I can back up everything I'm about to say, and a whole lot more.

Let me put this in perspective by telling a little story and by reminding folks of two predictions I made in our predictions thread.

Once upon a time, there was a man by the name of Clinton. It was his intention to change the Carlton site on O'Connell St. into a development, that, had it happened, would have been worth billions. Mr Clinton teamed up with some friends and formed a partnership. This partnership was formed with the sole purpose of seeing this particular development through to completion. So, the partners started the process and jumped through the appropriate legal hoops - things were looking good and the lads seemed set to be on the road to making billions.

One of the partners was contacted by a certain person from a certain important social group, and was convinced to pull out of the partnership. The partnership thus sundered, the development was cast adrift into legally stormy waters. This particular partner hadn't invested all that much money and Mr Clinton who had invested the lion's share of the capital was quite prepared to invest more and with the remaining partnership, jump through the hoops once more and get the project back onto the straight and narrow. Unfortunately for Mr. Clinton, Dublin City Council had other plans and CPOed his property, claiming a public exigency as opposed a storm in a teacup.

Thus began a struggle through the Courts that took years (still ongoing) and put the idea of a public exigency into perspective. Also, and Village missed this bit, whilst this matter was in the Courts, DCC set up a particular developer in the Carlton and work actually commenced, whilst it was still before the Courts. Of course the same developer had to be hastilly extracted from the Carlton and the shutters raised anew after Cllr. Joan Collins tried to raise this issue at a DCC meeting in the Mansion House. Strangely, Terry O'Keefe, DCC's Law Agent attended this particular meeting and put a stop to Cllr Collins' gallop, by saying that because the CPO of the Carlton was still before the Courts, any raising of legal issues to do with the site would be Sub Judice. So the matter was silenced and the developer quietly exited stage left, from the mess, so it seemed.

The Village spoke of the various threats offered to Mr Clinton. A certain somebody threatened Mr Clinton, this certain somebody told Mr Clinton that another certain somebody wasn't happy that Mr Clinton wasn't pissing off like a good little chap, and that when this other certain somebody was unhappy, it made him unhappy, and that it wasn't wise for Mr Clinton to be making him unhappy. If and when the name of this other certain somebody becomes public, it will tear this country apart. This other certain somebody is a very public figure and is very powerful. Any journalists out there wanting the story of the century, ought to contact Mr Clinton about this - just a thought.

Anyway, Mr Clinton hung on through the High Court and lost his challenge. He then appealed it to the Supreme Court. This pissed lots of folks off and many threats found their ways into Mr Clinton's ear. He eventually lost his Supreme Court effort too. A real shite job by his legal team imo. The Court's order seems surprised that Mr Clinton's team didn't challenge the constitutionality of CPOs and suggests that it might be worth having a hearing on the matter at some point - I kid you not.

Supreme Court wrote:

I would dismiss the appeal in so far as it relates to grounds other than the challenge to the constitutionality of certain provisions of the Planning and Development Act, 2000. If it is intended to pursue that constitutionality issue, the court will discuss appropriate procedures with counsel.

Full judgement of Supreme Court

This has indeed gone back into the Supreme Court and we're very close to having a judgement. Indeed, the judgement may well be imminent. I've lost track of it over the last few months and am unsure if the matter has been heard yet.

Now for some more scandal. Folks may have heard of the Moore St. Development, where it was intended to tell various folks who've been selling goods on Moore St. for a few generations, to take a hike. I've seen the plans for what's going up and am unimpressed, to put it politely. Imo, it will bottleneck traffic on O'Connell Street as traffic tries to get parking in the totally inadequate parking facilities to be constructed and that's only the tip of the iceberg. On top of this there is a plan to develop the GPO. The Carlton's in the middle of both these two future developments. I have it from the mouth of a certain Councillor that the idea is to not begin the developments at the same time as fighting a united front of those supporting the stall holders and those who support the GPO would not be pleasent. No, the idea is to get it all accepted one stage at a time - have a series of smaller battles. Then when the battles are won, the GPO, the Carlton and Moore St will all be part of the one development.

Follow both the smell and the money on this one, heads will literally roll - and not before time.

Another fine post by Hermes.

"One of the partners was contacted by a certain person from a certain important social group, and was convinced to pull out of the partnership"

When business plans are changed abrutly we can only assume that this man reexamined his relationship with The Lord.

After all,in normal circumstances, one can never know the day or the hour you could be called to your final judgement.

Skin-crawling stuff Hermes. The Supreme Court judgement might have some implications for the Planning and Development Act 2000 - that's sub judice now is it ? What's the constitutionality issue ?

youngdan wrote:

Another fine post by Hermes.

"One of the partners was contacted by a certain person from a certain important social group, and was convinced to pull out of the partnership"

When business plans are changed abrutly we can only assume that this man reexamined his relationship with The Lord.

After all,in normal circumstances, one can never know the day or the hour you could be called to your final judgement.

Thanks Dan.

I'm saying that someone convinced one of the partners to break up the partnership and that it facilitated the CPO by DCC, who later facilitated a developer starting work on a premises before the High Court validated the CPO, indeed whilst the case was actually running.

Auditor #9 wrote:

Skin-crawling stuff Hermes. The Supreme Court judgement might have some implications for the Planning and Development Act 2000 - that's sub judice now is it ? What's the constitutionality issue ?

CPOs might be unconstitutional. I've been making this particular argument for years. There isn't much chance of us discussing anything sub judice in this particular instance. Everything I've said thus far is already in the public domain. It's quite literally the elephant in the sitting room. Everyone knows about the development of the Carlton site and some of the folks involved. It's been in the media. The fact is that this has been before the courts since the time of the initial CPO. It's quite unlawful for any developer to have had anything to do with this development. The media and folks in general seem to have missed this obvious point. All the more surprising as we're dealing with a development that will be worth billions.

I know Toxic kept urging us to start a thread on the Carlton site discussing the Village article. We were caught up in the Libertas article instead. We should probably have a Carlton thread.

CPOs might be unconstitutional ... I'll have to read your post a few times and could be time to have a look at the Village article to quench my curiosity. That's a huge site right in the heart of the city of dublin there - very lucrative. A total goldmine....

edit

do CPOs date from that 2000 Act ?

I know nothing about CPOs Hermes. The tale is probably even better than I thought, if I knew.

I was wondering did somebody make him an offer he could not refuse.

youngdan wrote:

I know nothing about CPOs Hermes. The tale is probably even better than I thought, if I knew.

I was wondering did somebody make him an offer he could not refuse.

CPOs - compulsory purchase orders - when they come to build a road through your land they can just take it but have to pay you something.

Isn't this something that might be considered to be in the National Interest Hermes ? There's something in the Constitution where you have to give your belongings if it's in the National Interest or is it just land ?

And did CPOs originate in that Planning Act of 2000 do you know ? I'd say they go back further do they ?

Feel free to correct anything wrong about what I know / think I know about CPOs there.

Auditor #9 wrote:

I know Toxic kept urging us to start a thread on the Carlton site discussing the Village article. We were caught up in the Libertas article instead. We should probably have a Carlton thread.

CPOs might be unconstitutional ... I'll have to read your post a few times and could be time to have a look at the Village article to quench my curiosity. That's a huge site right in the heart of the city of dublin there - very lucrative. A total goldmine....

edit

do CPOs date from that 2000 Act ?

I saw Toxic's posts and was tempted to write something, but I held back, knowing that the snowball was beginning to roll. If you want to do some cutting and pull my comment and smack it into a Carlton thread, feel free to do so.

The CPO issue in this case is very interesting. And I'm going to elaborate in order to bring Youngdan up to speed on CPO's.

A CPO is a compulsory purchase order. According to our constitution a person may only be deprived of his right to private property in a public exigency. An exigency being an emergency. CPO's were around long before 2000. But the 2000 act changed a few things. For example, multinationals like Shell were given the power to CPO people off their land. Try to figure out the exigency to the public in that one if you will.

Anyway, the two sections up for examination are sections 212 and 213. I'd advise folks to read them. If we're to smack all of this into a new thread, I'll post them in full and comment in more detail.

Both these sections deal with the right to acquire property via agreement or compulsorily. They, imo, give a massive amount of lattitude to anyone who would remove the constitutional rights of another to their property and very little to the 'victim.' Where, imo, they particularly come afoul of the constitution is where they allow property to be CPOed for some future purpose. In other words, to facilitate some possible need in the future. The problem here would be to explain how some possible need in the future equates to an existing emergency at present. There are more arguments, but ye get the point.

In Mr Clinton's case, two of the arguments (both really the same argument) were that the ending of the partnership, and Mr Clinton's lack of experience as a developer, constituted a public emergency. Indeed, the CPO move, had it gone smoothly would likely have taken longer than fixing the legal problems introduced by the sundering of the partnership. Also with regard to experience, it's not like Mr Clinton was going to do all the building with his bare hands. The development process is a process mandated by law and procedure and if you've got the money, you can do it, imo.

They have a cuter name for it here. They call it right of emminent domain.

I'll cut this thread into a CPO and Carlton one starting at your first post this morning Hermes. You can modify it to put in an introduction or a link the to Village article if you like and I'll call it something boring so feel free to suggest a more appropriate name for the thread and I'll change that.

Thread locked for cutting.

I don’t know enough about the in’s and out’s of the proposed Carlton redevelopment to give a detailed response to Hermes post except to say that I know DCC gave the proposal a number of years to get off the ground and only got involved after 5 years plus when nothing was happening and that end of O’Connell St was suffering and looking very run down.

Even after 5 or so years of inactivity DCC spent 2 or 3 more years threatening to do something by way of a CPO if the developer did not get on with the job, much to the annoyance of other people involved who felt the developer had already had 5 years and done nothing and that action by DCC needed to be taken sooner rather than later, in the event DCC waited and waited for years before going for the CPO, so much so that as it turns out both they & O’Connell St. may have missed the boat, at least for the time being.

That’s all I know about the matter, but I thought I’d post it anyway just in case it turned out that there were in fact two sides to the story.

tonys wrote:

I don’t know enough about the in’s and out’s of the proposed Carlton redevelopment to give a detailed response to Hermes post except to say that I know DCC gave the proposal a number of years to get off the ground and only got involved after 5 years plus when nothing was happening and that end of O’Connell St was suffering and looking very run down.

Even after 5 or so years of inactivity DCC spent 2 or 3 more years threatening to do something by way of a CPO if the developer did not get on with the job, much to the annoyance of other people involved who felt the developer had already had 5 years and done nothing and that action by DCC needed to be taken sooner rather than later, in the event DCC waited and waited for years before going for the CPO, so much so that as it turns out both they & O’Connell St. may have missed the boat, at least for the time being.

That’s all I know about the matter, but I thought I’d post it anyway just in case it turned out that there were in fact two sides to the story.

That's a bit off the mark Tonys. Though you're right about there being more than one side to this story. There are many versions. But there's a historical record and from it we can piece together a factual account, free from opinion tainted bias.

The Carlton site has been empty since 1979. And it has been empty largely because of the actions of Dublin Corporation and following on from them, Dublin City Council. However, 1999 is where things start to happen, and not in the way you think.

In 1999 An Bord Pleánala upheld planning permission to develop the site. A few months after this a rival developer from a subsidiary of Treasury Holdings judicially reviewed this permission. He held the process up for about a year before the Court tossed it out.

In October of 2001, the partnership problem that I outlined above happened. By December of 2001, the issues had been sorted, Mr Clinton and friends had secured the capital required, were ready to move a builder onto the premises, had a plan that said the development would be finished in 2004 and 8 days after telling the Corporation of their plans, with not a word of dissent from them, the Corporation CPOed the property. The Corporation cited delays and a lack of experience as being the reasons for the CPO.

In 2003, DCC which replaced the Corporation, entered into an agreement with the developer Joe O'Reilly and didn't bother to allow this fact to come to the light of day until some nine months later, in 2004 when the judicial review proceedings were in full swing. And if that wasn't bad enough, the deal arrived at between DCC and Mr O'Reilly, did not arise out of a public tender. This was despite the fact that DCC had said that there was to be a public tendering process, they even printed a glossy brochure (that advertised the "Spire Centre") and said that there was much foreign interest in the site. The site was never advertised publically and neither was there an invitation for public tenders. Indeed the councillors of DCC were to know nothing whatsoever about this agreement with Mr O'Reilly until 2006. After hearing about this agreement for the first time in 2006, many councillors vowed to prevent the project from going ahead.

DCC said that they didn't put the development up for tender and agreed to let Mr O'Reilly be the developer because O'Reilly was experienced.

The agreement between Mr O'Reilly and DCC was disclosed in 2006, as I said and it contained the following two clauses. I'm sure you'll find them interesting.

Quote :

2.6: The Council… agrees that in the event that the CPO is fully confirmed it will acquire the outstanding interests, if any, in the site and will convey those interests to the Developer (Joe O'Reilly). The council agrees it will convey those interests to the Developer at the price it was required to pay under the CPO proceedings in respect of those interests. The Council acknowledges that the obtaining of these interests by the Developer is fundamental and critical to the development of the site, because of the composite nature of the development of the site. Any conveyance of these interests is subject to all statutory consents and approvals being first obtained. The Council will use its best endeavours to transfer an unencumbered fee simple title.

2.7: The Council further agrees and acknowledges that the Developer will, in order to develop the Site in accordance with this Agreement, require to obtain funding for the Development of the Site and the Council agrees that it will give whatever comforts are required to the Developer's bankers to allow them to fund the development of the site...

There's a lot of interesting things that can be said about those two clauses isn't there.

What's very interesting, considering current events, is the agreement to provide comforts for the developer's bankers.

Hermes wrote:

tonys wrote:

I don’t know enough about the in’s and out’s of the proposed Carlton redevelopment to give a detailed response to Hermes post except to say that I know DCC gave the proposal a number of years to get off the ground and only got involved after 5 years plus when nothing was happening and that end of O’Connell St was suffering and looking very run down.

Even after 5 or so years of inactivity DCC spent 2 or 3 more years threatening to do something by way of a CPO if the developer did not get on with the job, much to the annoyance of other people involved who felt the developer had already had 5 years and done nothing and that action by DCC needed to be taken sooner rather than later, in the event DCC waited and waited for years before going for the CPO, so much so that as it turns out both they & O’Connell St. may have missed the boat, at least for the time being.

That’s all I know about the matter, but I thought I’d post it anyway just in case it turned out that there were in fact two sides to the story.

That's a bit off the mark Tonys. Though you're right about there being more than one side to this story. There are many versions. But there's a historical record and from it we can piece together a factual account, free from opinion tainted bias.

The Carlton site has been empty since 1979. And it has been empty largely because of the actions of Dublin Corporation and following on from them, Dublin City Council. However, 1999 is where things start to happen, and not in the way you think.

In 1999 An Bord Pleánala upheld planning permission to develop the site. A few months after this a rival developer from a subsidiary of Treasury Holdings judicially reviewed this permission. He held the process up for about a year before the Court tossed it out.

In October of 2001, the partnership problem that I outlined above happened. By December of 2001, the issues had been sorted, Mr Clinton and friends had secured the capital required, were ready to move a builder onto the premises, had a plan that said the development would be finished in 2004 and 8 days after telling the Corporation of their plans, with not a word of dissent from them, the Corporation CPOed the property. The Corporation cited delays and a lack of experience as being the reasons for the CPO.

In 2003, DCC which replaced the Corporation, entered into an agreement with the developer Joe O'Reilly and didn't bother to allow this fact to come to the light of day until some nine months later, in 2004 when the judicial review proceedings were in full swing. And if that wasn't bad enough, the deal arrived at between DCC and Mr O'Reilly, did not arise out of a public tender. This was despite the fact that DCC had said that there was to be a public tendering process, they even printed a glossy brochure (that advertised the "Spire Centre") and said that there was much foreign interest in the site. The site was never advertised publically and neither was there an invitation for public tenders. Indeed the councillors of DCC were to know nothing whatsoever about this agreement with Mr O'Reilly until 2006. After hearing about this agreement for the first time in 2006, many councillors vowed to prevent the project from going ahead.

DCC said that they didn't put the development up for tender and agreed to let Mr O'Reilly be the developer because O'Reilly was experienced.

The agreement between Mr O'Reilly and DCC was disclosed in 2006, as I said and it contained the following two clauses. I'm sure you'll find them interesting.

Quote :

2.6: The Council… agrees that in the event that the CPO is fully confirmed it will acquire the outstanding interests, if any, in the site and will convey those interests to the Developer (Joe O'Reilly). The council agrees it will convey those interests to the Developer at the price it was required to pay under the CPO proceedings in respect of those interests. The Council acknowledges that the obtaining of these interests by the Developer is fundamental and critical to the development of the site, because of the composite nature of the development of the site. Any conveyance of these interests is subject to all statutory consents and approvals being first obtained. The Council will use its best endeavours to transfer an unencumbered fee simple title.

2.7: The Council further agrees and acknowledges that the Developer will, in order to develop the Site in accordance with this Agreement, require to obtain funding for the Development of the Site and the Council agrees that it will give whatever comforts are required to the Developer's bankers to allow them to fund the development of the site...

There's a lot of interesting things that can be said about those two clauses isn't there.

What's very interesting, considering current events, is the agreement to provide comforts for the developer's bankers.

I’ll have a read of your points later, don’t have the time they deserve now. I know someone involved and my post was based on my memory of what they told me was the situation over the years as it was happening and as it was effecting them. As far as I know they were kept up to speed by both the developer & DCC.

I have heard two different versions of what went on, one of them from a trustworthy ex-Dublin Corporation official who got frustrated with Clinton. But it's the names of those mentioned in the Village article, if they are ever to be revealed, that will be interesting. I suspect, if one of them is who I think it is, that things will indeed snowball from there...