New court challenge on Tara
national | miscellaneous |
news report
Wednesday August 29, 2007 22:28 by
M. Ni Bhrolchain - Campaign to Save Tara
Launched by Campaign to Save Tara
CST launched a new court challenge today
in the EU offices - the litigant is Michael Canney, former spokesman for
the Campaign.
Here follows a press release, a statement from Michael
and a statement of support from our primary poet: Seamus Heaney.
I'm
hoping that there will photographs to follow.
Laoise Kelly opened
the event with some wonderful Harp Music -
Mary Lou McDonald also
came along and spoke
CAMPAIGN TO SAVE TARA - PRESS RELEASE
FRESH LEGAL
CHALLENGE TO M3 ANNOUNCED
The Campaign to Save Tara today announced
details of a legal challenge to the
proposed M3 Motorway through the
Tara/Skryne Valley in Co. Meath. The Campaign
claims that this case is
being taken in the public interest and only after all
other democratic
avenues have been exhausted.
In a message of support read out at
today’s launch, Seamus Heaney said, “It
could be said that the Campaign
to Save Tara is putting its case in ‘the name
of dead generations’: for
the past two millennia those generationS regarded Tara
as a place
invested with sacred as opposed to secular value. Protest against
the
loss of this value remains an imperative.”
At the launch of
the legal challenge today were prominent archaeologists Joseph Fenwick and
Professor George Eogan, MEP Kathy Sinnott, celebrated author
Morgan
Llywelen, as well as members of the Campaign’s legal team. Among
the
groups represented were An Taisce and the Meath Archaeological and
Historical
Society.
The named plaintiff is Michael Canney, a
prominent member and former
spokesperson of the Campaign. Among the
named defendants are the Minister for
the Environment, the Minister for
Transport, the National Roads Authority and
Eurolink Ltd., The
consortium awarded the construction and tolling contract.
The
action, by means of a plenary summons which was served on the
named
defendants last week (see details attached), is seeking a ruling
that
construction should be halted on the M3 pending the outcome of a
case at present
before the European Court of Justice relating to the
Lismullen National
Monument.
A number of other claims are made
including a ruling that the Minister for the
Environment has failed in
his duty to protect Irish National Heritage as
required under Article
five of the Constitution. Additionally there are a
number of claims
relating to the procedures adopted in relation to
Environmental Impact
Assessments.
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
Here
is Michael Canney's statement read out at the launch today
Statement by
Michael Canney, plaintiff, Save Tara/M3 Legal Case
29th August
2007
It has never been my ambition to put my name forward in a
legal challenge, especially a challenge against such a seemingly
impregnable array of powerful political and economic forces. I have done
so only as a last resort, and only because it is absolutely essential that
the silent majority who oppose this road are given a final chance to have
their concerns heard before the courts. While the political and commercial
backers of this enterprise have seen fit to ignore public opinion up to
now – they cannot so easily dismiss the judiciary.
The debate which
has raged unevenly between heritage and economics since the Wood Quay
protests of the eighties have finally reached its’ nadir at Tara, a
low-point that even the most pessimistic among us could not have
anticipated. The Tara landscape – the cradle of our civilization, an icon
of our nationhood, the mythical heart of our country is to be defaced in
the name of private profit and political expediency.
The damage
already wrought on the landscape cannot be undone; and the destruction of
individual sites over the last six months are individual and collective
acts of vandalism. However, the integrity of the landscape as a whole, its
stillness and physical beauty are still to be preserved and so this
struggle will be conducted by any means and through any mechanism
available to the Save Tara Campaign.
No matter how much damage has
been done up to this point the road remains totally unacceptable along its
present alignment. Over the last few months people say to us ‘but they are
going to build it anyway’, or ‘sure isn’t the damage already done’. In
reply we argue that this road, like Tara itself is a signifier – a
signifier of values and attitudes –this debate embodies not only the value
we place on our heritage and history, but also signifies how we might deal
with the challenges of an energy-poor future and the massive sociological
changes that are necessary in order to meet these challenges.
The
placing of economic and sectoral interests, above those of the wider
environment and society, is one of the main reasons we find ourselves in
the environmental mess we are in. Unregulated and profit-driven property
development, both residential and commercial, is the primary cause of the
transport crises facing the people of Meath. A shocking fact, little
reported in the acres of coverage of this issue is that the route of this
road was chosen to increase traffic volumes, and therefore tolling
profits. This road is engineered to increase car-dependecy. Could our
transport planners possibly get any more cynical and
profit-driven?
Our friends and neighbours in the European Union
have voiced grave concerns about this motorway. To deal with one specific
concern – the Commission have questioned how the Lismullen National
Monument, a massive structure over 80 meters in diameter could have been
missed during surveying. The EU maintains that, having missed the
structure initially, it’s subsequent discovery should automatically lead
to a new Environmental Impact Assessment. There would seem to be a prima
facia case that the EIA process is inadequate at best. A less benign
interpretation is also possible; our summons maintains that in only
carrying out a EIA on one route – the so-called ‘preferred route’ through
the Valley, the EIA process is actually subsumed to a function of the
route selection process, as opposed to an objective basis upon which to
decide upon one route as opposed to another.
It is in the public
interest that the procedural and legal shortcomings of the M3 debacle be
further examined in the courts. It is in the public interest, not only
because of the importance of the Tara landscape in and of itself, but also
because this private motorway is iconographic of future planning,
transport and environmental policy in this country. Who can look at the
Dublin Civic offices now and not regret the lost opportunity of a public
park; sweeping up from the river Liffey to the Christchurch Cathedral, a
potential resource of immeasurable cultural, educational and aesthetic
value? At a time of unprecedented prosperity, who can say that the M3 will
be anything but a source of bewilderment and regret to future
generations?
The preservation of the Tara landscape can our moment
of reflection and renewal, a moment when we realised that our environment
is a finite resource and also an opportunity to take strength from a proud
and ancient past to meet the challenges
ahead.
///////////////////////////////////
Statement from Seamus
Heaney
It could be said that the Campaign to Save Tara is putting its
case ‘in the name of the dead generations’: for the past two millennia
those generations regarded Tara as a place invested with sacred as opposed
to secular value. Protest against the loss of this value remains an
imperative.
Fundamentally you are acting for the preservation of dúchas
as an aspect of our national life. Dúchas has been defined as
‘inheritance, patrimony; native place or land; connection, affinity or
attachment due to descent or long-standing; inherited instinct or natural
tendency.’ Even more importantly, however, it is an elevation of these
things to what Breandan Ó Doibhlin has called ‘a kind of ideal of the
spirit’. It seems to me the Campaign is taking a stand on behalf of that
ideal.
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Laoise Kelly who played the harp, a piece by Carolan.
Dr. Muireann Ní Bhrolcáin
Mary Lou McDonald MEP and Michael Canney
Michael Canney under the Halo of the EU
Dr. Muireann Ní Bhrolcáin and Kathy Sinnott MEP
The campaigns are outside the Gresham at the moment, if anyone wants to come down and support
the Conference attendees within are paying 4 euros for a cup of tea. Some interesting chats with the
director of the Cork NRA. will add in later.
http://www.tarapixie.net/
http://www.savetara.com/
http://www.tarawatch.org/
It seems to me there was a desperate need (in terms of the "common good" mentioned in the Preamble of our Constitution) for a new challenge in the Republic of Ireland's courts regarding the Hill of Tara / PPP M3 Toll Road issue; and, like a great many other people I suspect, I'm really pleased to see it's now actually happening. Many thanks to all involved.
Not knowing anything of this new challenge at the time, I sent a letter through the registered post to our Chief Justice John L. Murray last Tuesday. Among other things, it outlines a number of very strange aspects of this particular PPP (Public Private Partnership) toll road project: among them the fact that our National Monuments (Amendment) Act 2004, which is being used to drive the project forward, is in all probability UNCONSTITUTIONAL (and consequently unlawful).
In support of this view, and as some readers will already know, the following statement emerged from one of Mr Murray's judicial colleagues around the time of the EUROS 600,000 High Court challenge in 2006: "Justice Laffoy (High Court Judge) had stated in her High Court opinion that there was in fact a constitutional imperative' to protect these assets (in the Hill of Tara area)".
In spite of the huge expenditure involved in the 2006 challenge, of both time and money, it appears that no useful progress at all was made regarding the crucially important matter of determining whether or not our National Monuments (Amendment) Act 2004 is in fact constitutional. I sincerely hope this second try will not leave any such doubts remaining.
Breaking European Union law is bad enough, but violating Bunreacht na hEireann (Constitution of the Republic of Ireland) is much, much worse in my view. Not only does unconstitutional legislation undermine our Constitution, but it also of course undermines the sovereignty of the Republic of Ireland as an independent nation state: the ONLY fully independent Celtic nation state in the world as far as I know.
For anybody interested, a scanned copy of the registered letter I sent to Chief Justice Murray last Tuesday (i.e. August 28th 2007), together with a copy of the associated Post Office receipt, can be viewed at http://www.europeancourtofhumanrightswilliamfinnerty.com/ChiefJusticeMurray/28August2007/Letter.htm .
Page 1 (of the four-page letter to Chief Justice Murray at the above address) is largely taken up with the truly amazing and growing array of unresolved legal problems I have been saddled with as a direct result of attempting to challenge the constitutionality of our "Waste Management (Amendment) Act 2001" (which I believe is almost certainly unconstitutional as well), during the run-up to the General Election in May 2002. The several "extremely serious" Hill of Tara issues (as I see them) appear on pages 3 and 4.
According to the Post Office's Internet "Track & Trace" Service, the above mentioned letter to Chief Justice Murray was successfully delivered yesterday morning (i.e. August 29th 2007).