Thursday 24 June 2010

Opposition to Mayoral pact is in defence of democracy

Commenting on Thursday night's (June 24th) election for Lord Mayor of Cork at City Hall, Workers Party councillor Ted Tynan said that comments from the pact candidate Michael O’Connell that he would “take politics out of the Mayoralty” were a total contradiction of the process that would elect Cllr. O’Connell where a three party pact would once again claim the office of Lord Mayor and deny almost one third of councillors their say in the election.

Cllr. Tynan said that it was not politics that needed to be taken out of the office of Lord Mayor but party politics. “The office of Lord Mayor of Cork is a deeply political office and is one the people of Cork are very proud of. One could hardly say that Lord Mayors such as Tomás Mac Curtain and Terence McSwiney were not political when in fact every fibre of their bodies were full of politics but they did not engage in the politics of self-promotion and exclusion of all other points of view”.

“It is a great pity that those members of the pact parties, and indeed some in the media see the nomination of candidates for the position of Lord Mayor and Deputy Lord Mayor by those of us outside the pact as some kind of nuisance. We do so in defence of the democracy that people like Mac Curtain and McSwiney fought for. To do otherwise would be a denial of the democratic votes of the thousands of citizens who voted for non-pact candidates”, said Cllr. Tynan.

Cllr. Tynan said he will be supporting the nomination of Independent Councillor Chris O’Leary for Lord Mayor and would propose Cllr. Jonathan O’Brien of Sinn Féin for the position of Deputy Lord Mayor.

Sunday 13 June 2010

New Stadium elsewhere in Docklands is best solution to Páirc Uí Chaoimh dilemma says Tynan

Speaking in advance of Monday night's (Jun 14) City Council vote in relation to the redevelopment of Páirc Uí Chaoimh, Workers’ Party Councillor Ted Tynan has said that a solution must be found that will satisfy the needs of the GAA to expand and the competing need for a major public park for the citizens of Cork.

Cllr. Tynan said he believed that a totally new stadium within the South Docklands area was the best solution and that he would be opposing the proposal that is before the council, but strongly urging the City Manager to do a swap with the GAA for another site within docklands.

The Workers’ Party councillor said, “The GAA’s proposal envisages the demolition in stages of most of the existing Páirc Uí Chaoimh. This will involve considerable disruption to the stadium’s fixtures with inevitable restrictions on crowd capacity and safety issues for several years. I am proposing that an entirely new stadium, incorporating the proposed Centre of Excellence, be built within a few hundred yards of Páirc Uí Chaoimh. This will preserve the proposed amenity park and give the GAA even more space to expand.”, said Cllr. Tynan.

“The City Council will have to accept that the docklands plan is not a Holy Grail. The economy is a very different animal now to what it was when the lofty plans for docklands were drawn up. It is inevitable in my view that the docklands development will have to be scaled down. This gives the council scope to make plenty of space available to the GAA within a puc fada of its historical home. It can be achieved if people are willing to open their minds and move from their entrenched positions”.

Cllr. Tynan said that the Workers’ Party was fully supportive of the GAA’s plans but that the opportunity to give the people of Cork a magnificent new public park close to the city centre might not arise again for generations. Both of these plans could be achieved if people were prepared to think outside the box and consider his proposal.