Allowing Ryanair Bulk Buying Homes Is Anti-Worker

Earlier this year, MKN properties sold 25 family homes in Swords to Ryanair. Eight months later the houses remain empty. Meanwhile, a record 14,486 people, including 4,419 children, are officially homeless. 

MKN properties are a company based in Clontarf who only care about one thing - lining their pockets and to hell with ordinary working class people.  You don’t sell food to a speculator in a famine and you shouldn’t sell houses to Ryanair in a housing crisis. 

As for Ryanair: they are a poisonous, anti-worker company. We’d like to say we’re surprised that they are rubbing these empty houses in our faces. But we’re not surprised.

Michael O’Leary has only sneering contempt for the working people of Swords, frequently namecalling them “loonies” and riduculing how people in Swords already suffer due to the noise and pollution from the already over-expanded airport. 

He’s now briefing the media that the airport passenger cap is stopping him from using the homes in Swords. We see him and we see his spin. He is using these houses as a bargaining chip in his struggle with the Department of Transport. He is nothing more than a brazen chancer who would hang his head in shame if he had even the faintest trace of conscience.

If O’Leary isn’t going to use these houses then they should be taken into public ownership immediately. MKN are currently building an apartment block on the adjacent site of Holytree House. 

They must not repeat the grossly anti-social act of selling to Ryanair. Right now, there are 4,419 children struggling to get to school every day while living in squalid emergency hotel rooms. 

They deserve a home. There are 85 homes right there in Swords. They should be taken into public ownership to house people who need a home right now.

MKN recently had the good fortune of having An Bord Pleanala reverse a planning decision to impose hundreds of thousands of euros in extra charges for shortfalls in the provision of public and playground space on the site. So they’ve no shortage of cash.

In the near future the Minister for Housing will be looking for votes in Swords. In January he claimed he was “frustrated” by what Ryanair did. He doesn’t really care. Actions speak louder than words. He’s frustrated because the obscenity of 25 empty family homes exposes his utterly failed housing policy.  

In truth, Darragh O’Brien is the minister for landlords and developers. That’s what you will get if you vote for him and his ilk. 

But there is an alternative; don’t let anyone tell you that it’s not possible. It is. If you want a state construction company. If you want a ban on vulture funds. If you want an end to evictions.

If you want a housing system that delivers for ordinary people; not the barbarism of one that guarantees profits, rewards land hoarding, and lets landlords off tax-free, then you need to get out now and get involved with People Before Profit in Fingal.

We have a “Homes for Need” petition calling for the 25 Houses in Fosterstown Place and the 85 Apartments under construction at Holytree House to be taken into public ownership and used to house families in the Fingal County Council Waiting List.

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