Irish Life said yesterday it had no plans "at the moment" to sell a 260-year-old listed Georgian house on Dublin's St Stephen's Green and insisted the four tenants living there, including two elderly women, could stay on in their flats.
A spokesman for Irish Life denied any pressure was being put on the tenants of No 100 St Stephen's Green to leave their apartments and stressed the company was determined not to repeat the Mespil flats controversy. This arose when the company sold 300 flats at Mespil Road in 1992 to a consortium assembled by New City Estates. Several of the tenants, including elderly people, were asked to leave while others were asked to sign new leases with rent increases of up to 25 per cent.
"We learned lessons from that and that is why we are being very clear that the choice is for the tenants to make and we will respect that choice," the spokesman said.
The tenants were not being given the option to buy their apartments because the units were, in the company's view, "unsuitable". However, they had the option to buy an apartment in the nearby Russell Court complex at a 10 per cent discount. The tenants also had the option to remain, under the terms of their existing lease. The spokesman said the rents were about 20 per cent less than the market rate and these would be increased to the market level in time.
He was reacting after some of the tenants, and the St Stephen's Green Protection Association, expressed concern about the fate of No 100, which is part of a large office/residential development on the corner of the Green and Harcourt Street.
Recent approaches to the tenants of No 100 by Irish Life representatives, and a planning application by Marske Ltd for construction of a six-storey office block at the rear of No 99, and to increase the height of other blocks, sparked concerns about the future of No 100 and its tenants.
One tenant, Ms Sheila O'Hagan, a poet, said she wanted the option to buy her own apartment but had not been given that choice.
Dr Maureen Concannon of the association said she and others living on the Green were keeping a balanced living environment in the city centre, adding a social and cultural dimension and maintaining the last permanent residential section of the Green. "If we are removed, the future of these houses is unknown."
