MORE pubs for Dublin is the main new proposal in a charter for the city introduced by the Labour Party but over coffee, bacon and sausage in Bewley's cafe yesterday morning.
The sun was shining and the candidates were beaming as Labour introduced its charter bringing together elements of the party's manifesto and applying them to the problems of the city. Licences for small, local pubs, without car parking facilities, will be sold by local authorities and the money raised spent on better facilities for young people, according to the charter.
Rolled up copies of the charter, tied with red ribbons, nestled among the brown bread and the cafetieres on the tables as the party deputy leader, Mr Ruairi Quinn, spoke of his "30 year love affair" with the city.
He talked of the tradition which all Labour's Dublin candidates were heir to, that of Jim Larkin, Jimmy Tully and Frank Cluskey.
According to Mr Quinn, this was largely an architectural tradition. Jim Larkin and his two sons "worked all their lives to eradicate the tenement conditions in which working people lived" while Jimmy Tully "built award winning houses while others were putting up gerrybuilt blocks".
This commitment to Dublin is now taking the form of the charter, he said, a "contract with the people of Dublin". This will include making the city safe, keeping it clean and ensuring it is always a city for children.
Most of the proposals in the charter have already all featured in Labour's election manifesto: continued action on crime, tackling unemployment blackspots, in creasing educational opportunities for the young, dealing with traffic problems, ensuring equal access, improving the environment.
In addition, the charter promises a suitable commemorative project for the millennium and a major programme of treeplanting, with one broadleaf tree planted for every citizen of the city.