Tathony House tenants protest outside City Hall Dublin

New Anti-Eviction Guide Is Essential Reading

Ollie Power

16 July 2024

The 2nd of June 2023 was a beautiful summer’s day in Dublin. Around 200 people had gathered outside Tathony House, an apartment block in Dublin 8, to show their solidarity with the 34 families living there who were due to be evicted. Emotions were running high – feelings of fear and anger could be seen on the faces of the tenants waiting to speak.

And because eviction is a trauma that affects people very personally, many of those affected must have been struggling with feelings of shame and despair, even though none of the tenants had done anything wrong.

They had all paid their rent but were being evicted anyway by a greedy millionaire slumlord, Ronan McDonnell. James O’Toole, one of the tenants, took the microphone and spoke:

“When I see you standing here today it gives me the confidence to fight on. And I can tell you this: I don’t care if private security thugs come to my door, I’m going to tell them to get lost, I’m not leaving my flat. And I don’t care if the county sheriff, with bailiffs and the police, knock on my door, I’m going to tell them to get lost, because I WILL NOT volunteer for emergency accommodation. And I don’t care if the four horsemen of the f**king apocalypse knock on my door, I’m not backing down and I’m not leaving my house. When I say “Eviction Day!” you say “No Way!”

The assembled crowd cheered and chanted, banners and flags were waved and the mood of the crowd soared: despite the legalised thuggery of this landlord’s attempt to evict 34 hard working families, despite the deep personal insult felt by each and every one of those people, they were united by a profound and palpable sense of hope.

After an 18-month campaign, the Tathony House residents have published a pamphlet about their heroic struggle.

It is an important document and one that will be useful and inspirational to anyone involved in a personal housing situation or public housing activism.

If you are facing eviction, you need knowledge, you need a plan, you need friends and above all, you need hope. The pamphlet has all of these and has passages about:

How ordinary people can organise a media and protest campaign – you can do it!

“When you fight you feel better.”

Tenants’ rights in relation to residential tenancies law.

The RTB dispute resolution process.

Resistance across a broad front - community, political and media.

The underlying cause of the housing crisis: the neoliberal housing system that has created an artificial scarcity of supply that drives up profits.

20,000 eviction notices were served in 2023. Each family facing eviction will go through the same trauma that was experienced by the residents of Tathony House. With the help of this pamphlet, each one of these families can successfully resist and, at least, postpone their eviction.

The lane running alongside Tathony House used to be called ‘Murderers’ Lane’ or ‘Cutthroat Lane’. It was renamed ‘Cromwell’s Quarters’ in the 19th Century, after Henry Cromwell, the son of the mass murderer, Oliver Cromwell.

Henry, like his father, held the ordinary people of Ireland in utter contempt; between them they left a legacy of genocide that stains our history till this day.

Another father and son duo - Brendan and Ronan McDonnell - were until recently the owners of Tathony House. They have done little to raise the lane or the building out of the mire of infamy associated with the name Cromwell.

At least Oliver Cromwell is on record as having once paid £5 rent for a night’s lodging.

The slumlord of Tathony House, Ronan McDonnell, is a “nepobaby” who doesn’t pay rent or work much. He spent decades pulling in €700,000 per year in rent from workers for flats that were in such poor condition that they were once described as “Ireland’s shame” in a report from 1999. He ludicrously claimed “hardship” as his reason as to why he was mass-evicting families from Tathony House.

The Tathony House campaign pamphlet calls for ordinary people to join the struggle against greedy operators such as McDonnell, never to blame immigrants for the “shortage” in housing and to build and fight for socialism instead of the barbaric neoliberal economic policies of successive Fine Gael/Fianna Fáil/Green & Labour governments that bring ruin to ordinary working-class families’ lives.

The pamphlet - written by South Dublin County Councillor Madeleine Johanssen and James O’Toole - concludes with a rousing hope-filled call to arms:

“There’s a lot of work ahead. Take a lead in your apartment block, your community but most importantly in your workplace and let’s fight for a better life for all workers. We need you. Join us.”

You can order copies from our bookstore or simply contact us here at rednetwork.net