PROPERTY DEVELOPER Bernard McNamara has said he "never pulled out" of five public-private housing regeneration projects but that Dublin City Council told him that it wanted to go "a different route".
Speaking on RTÉ's Radio's Marian Finucaneprogramme yesterday, Mr McNamara said he was told at a meeting 10 days ago by the council that it didn't believe the public-private partnership (PPP) projects were "progressing", the council had spent €27 million and had "got nothing for it", and the council wanted to go "a different route".
"It was explained to me that they felt that the process wasn't proceeding and in some instances they were accusing us of not being as co-operative as we should be," said Mr McNamara.
The council said last week that the developer's firm was ending its involvement with the five PPP social and affordable housing schemes, worth €900 million and comprising about 1,800 homes.
The company said it had not withdrawn from the projects, but that the process had not been completed and that the council had changed its approach to procuring the schemes. The company wrote to the council ending its involvement, attributing the decision to "adversely changed circumstances" in the housing market, new guidelines forcing developers to build larger apartments and new energy regulations.
Speaking yesterday, Mr McNamara said: "If the planning had been applied for at the beginning of the process and then you knew what numbers you were involved in, we would never have been caught in the new size guidelines for the project." New guidelines have since added 25 per cent to the building space, he said.
Mr McNamara expressed his frustration at the delays in the five projects. He pointed to the large student accommodation projects in Dublin, Maynooth, Cork and Galway comprising thousands of units that have been built quickly.
"It astounds me that getting the business done doesn't have a higher priority," he said.
The PPP process needed to be fast-tracked, he said, and suggested that the council could, under planning regulations, give itself permission "without appeal in a period of 10 weeks".
"There are ways that this business can be done but it needs to be simplified extremely," he said.
Mr McNamara said that there had been no serious engagement by the council on at least one of the five regeneration projects.
He said he had been "naive" to agree to the council's request "to go a different route because they felt they could produce the thing differently and possibly better".
Mr McNamara described PPPs as "a very sophisticated, difficult process that is usually only used for major infrastructure projects". He added: "I often wonder what is suitable at all for the procurement of public housing."
He said other PPP projects had stalled but that those developers were not being criticised: "I am getting all the flak for this thing."
Assistant Dublin city manager Ciarán McNamara told The Irish Timesthe council would be willing to meet Mr McNamara to discuss any options on a solution, as long as they were within the PPP rules and could be "done speedily" because the projects have been delayed for some time.
"If there is a solution, we will be the happiest people," he said.
