THE STATE had been trying to purchase the Great Blasket Island so it could manage it properly as a historic park for "years and years and years" and though not perfect, the current position was "the best deal" it could get, an oral hearing was told yesterday.
Under this agreement the OPW would purchase most of the holdings from the company that owns most of the island. The contract with the company An Blascaod Mór Teo (BMT) was not completed because it was subject to the outcome of the Bord Pleanála hearing, commissioner with the Office of Public Works David Byers said.
The island was "entirely privately owned" and there was no guarantee that the applicant, An Blascaod Mór Teo, which owned most of it, would sell the majority of its stake to the State even if planning permission for the services building was granted, Mr Byers said.
Ruairí Somers, the planning inspector in charge of the oral hearing, was forced to intervene a number of times yesterday. He asked contributors to steer clear of "personalised" remarks during heated exchanges on the second day of the hearing into the development of a cafe, wildlife ranger and services building on the historic island off the Kerry coast.
John O'Sullivan, barrister for BMT, accused appellants of making remarks bordering on slander, and in one of the exchanges Peter Callery, director of BMT, accused appellant and island weaver Sue Redican of telling a barefaced lie.
In turn Ms Redican accused BMT of employing "bullying tactics" throughout the process.
BMT in its submission said the cafe proposal was a considerable improvement on its first application, refused by An Bord Pleanála in 2005.The building was located in a way that would be least intrusive. Some 95 per cent of its other property on the island would be sold to the State subject to the granting of planning permission for the services building, Mr O'Sullivan said.
He added that BMT had no intention of seeking to carry out further development. "It [ the building proposal] contains nothing contrary to the published conclusions of the Blasket Forum and the area plan, debated worldwide. The only persons to object are four individuals who clearly from their own evidence have vested interests in delaying or preventing the development."
Kerry County Council senior planning engineer Tom Sheehy strongly rejected an allegation by appellant and ferry operator Michael Shearan of "collusion" between the council and BMT, after it emerged that the island had been reduced from an area of prime special amenity to a secondary amenity in the council's plans to facilitate the development of a cafe and other facilities in 2003.
Mr Sheehy said in the Blasket Island Forum report of 2002 that there was agreement on the need for a cafe and toilets. The widely based forum had involved 63 parties and bodies including island descendants in the USA.
Gabriel Gleeson of the OPW said the site chosen for development was suitable and the original scale of the development had been reduced considerably to take its concerns into account.
The hearing continues.