Author Archives: Bodger

Yesterday.

Daft.ie published its latest House Price Report for the third quarter of 2019.

From the report:

There were almost 20,000 homes built between the middle of 2018 and the middle of 2019, twice the number built during the twelve months of 2016.

Just under two thirds of that increase in building activity has been in the Greater Dublin Area and, for the moment at least, the new homes built have been concentrated in the owner-occupied sector.

But new housing supply is not the full story of what’s going on. The elephant in the room, for the Irish economy, is Brexit.

To understand how that something that has not happened yet could affect housing prices now, it is important to remember a key difference between the sale and rental segments.

Across both segments, fundamentals of supply and demand matter. If more homes are built for a particular segment, this will lower prices everything else being equal.

If incomes rise or if the numbers at work increase, this will increase prices, both sale and rental.

However, for sale properties, the purchaser is committing to hold the asset and thus they have to pay attention to its future value too.

This difference also means that credit is prevalent in the for-sale market, due to its much higher price level, but not the rental market.

Therefore, both credit conditions and expectations about future prices are key factors in converting ‘real demand’ into effective ‘on the ground’ demand in the sales market.

If Brexit, in whatever form it takes, reduces Irish employment and incomes, this will be seen in the rental market.

If Brexit is expected to affect Irish employment and incomes in the future, this will be seen in the sales market.

The report can be read in full here.

Meanwhile…

An Garda Siochana tweetz:

Dublin Traffic: There is currently a skip in the middle lanes of the M50 Northbound at J4 Ballymun. Emergency services are currently en route. Please approach with extreme care.

Jay.

Kers.

UPDATE:

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar speaks to journalists ahead of the UN Summit on Climate Change in New York

Meanwhile…

Varadkar to tell UN that carbon tax revenue will be ring-fenced for climate action (RTE)

Previously: Religious Fervour

Pic: Cormac Quinn

The Today Show’s Maura Derrane and Dáithí O’Sé

They’re back.

Sinead Harrington writes:

Ireland’s most watched daytime show  – Today with Maura and Dáithí, which is broadcast live from RTÉ Cork, returns this afternoon for a brand new season.

Presenters Maura Derrane and Dáithí O’ Sé will bring their infectious blend of fun to brighten everyone’s afternoon and …as well as a brand new set this season there will be new roving reporters as part of the team.

Presenter Bláthnaid Treacy will join Pat Fitzpatrick on the couch each Thursday to discuss all the latest entertainment news. Other new reporters include Keith Walsh and Ciara King as well as returning reporters Brenda Donohue, James Patrice and Trishauna Archer…

Today with Maura Derrane and Dáithí airs Monday to Friday at 3.30pm on RTÉ One.

Paul Graham, 80, (right and above) met his brother Rodney Whittaker, 75, for the first time on Saturday

Via BBC:

A survivor of an Irish mother and baby home has said he is “at peace with the world” after meeting his elderly brother for the first time.

Paul Graham, 80, travelled to London from Australia to meet his half brother Rodney Whittaker, 75, on Saturday.

He said meeting his first blood relative was almost indescribable.

Mr Graham spent his early years at the Bethany Home in Dublin, which was a place for unmarried Protestant mothers and their children.

“I held his hand for nearly half an hour. It was like holding the hand of the one you love,” he told BBC Radio Ulster’s Sunday News.

“He turned around and smiled at me, it broke my heart.

“We just connected and that was just wonderful. I always wanted to belong.”

Mr Graham was adopted by a wealthy family in Belfast in 1944, but ran away from his home at the age of 14 to join the Royal Marines. He later emigrated to Australia with his young family.

He only recently realised he had a brother after discovering Mr Whittaker’s signature on his mother’s death certificate.

He said the meeting allowed him to forgive his mother, from Castlederg in County Tyrone, for leaving him as an infant in Bethany Home, which closed in the 1960s.

Bethany Home survivor meets elderly brother for the first time (BBC)

Pics: Paul Graham

Thanks Derek Linster

previously: Bethany Home on broadsheet

Public Services Card; Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection Regina Doherty

Further to the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection and Minister Regina Doherty publishing the Report of the Data Protection Commission on the Public Services Card last week…

And her department’s intention to challenge the DPC’s findings on the card based on “incredibly strong legal” advice…

Dr Eoin O’Dell, a Fellow and Associate Professor at the School of Law, Trinity College Dublin, wrote in yesterday’s Sunday Business Post:

The government’s misguided approach has the capacity to do great damage to Ireland’s reputation as a good location for international tech companies to establish their European headquarters.

A government in such open conflict with the DPC [Data Protection Commission] can have no credibility in seeking to ensure that such companies comply with the commission’s decisions.

Worse, it risks fostering the view that a company unhappy with an unfavourable DPC decision could seek government help to resist that decision.

…This is not the first time that government departments have run afoul of data protection laws.

In 2011, the commission found that blood samples from babies’ heel-prick tests were being unlawfully retained, but in 2013 the Minister for Health ordered the HSE not to comply with the commission’s determination.

The Department of Education has continued with its controversial plans, unveiled in 2014, to collect extensive profiles of all children in education and store that data until they turn 30, notwithstanding the commission’s misgivings.

Dealing from bottom of the deck on the Public Services Card (Eoin O’Dell, The Sunday Business Post)

Previously: The Regina Monologues

Rollingnews

Alpaca Man.

A mini documentary about Joe Phelan, an ex-bank worker turned full-time Alpaca farmer in Wicklow.

Colin Brady writes:

In this mini-documentary we visit Joe as he introduces us to his alpacas Ted, Ted 2, Gene Simmons and Katiet to name a few. Joe names every alpaca and his first few were named after his own children. It turns out most people LOVE these weird and wonderful creatures.

Taller Stories (Facebook)

At Sean Walsh Memorial Park in Tallaght

This morning.

In The Irish Times.

Brian Hutton reports:

Thousands of creatures have been killed during the unexplained destruction of a “unique little gem” of a nature reserve in south Dublin, conservationists have said.

A parcel of wetland at Sean Walsh Memorial Park in Tallaght, used for decades as a dumping ground for silt, had rewilded itself into a “little miracle” that was home to several protected species, including frogs, newts, eels and bats, according to experts.

…On a trip to the wetland on Saturday to carry out a new survey of the wildlife he [Collie Ennis, a research associate at Trinity College Dublin and science officer with the Herpetological Society of Ireland] found that the entire reserve was “flattened like a carpark” and covered in heavy machinery tracks.

“It had completely gone. It was like the surface of the moon. Just blank. Flattened,” he said.

Anyone?

Ecologists outraged as Dublin nature reserve is ‘flattened like a car park’ (The Irish Times)

Padre Pio, relics of whom, including his mitten, will go on display in Limerick this evening

Speaking to the Leader, organiser Fergal Golden said that there are number of relics touched, worn, and blessed by Padre Pio on display.

According to Mr Golden, there are three distinctions of relics. First-class relics are parts of the Saint’s body, so a mitten that was worn on his left hand, and a heart bandage when he bled from a side wound are on display.

Second-class relics are items worn by a Saint, such as a Habit, and third-class relics are items touched by a Saint.

Padre Pio relics to be displayed in Limerick hotel (Limerick Leader)

Pic: Padre Pio Devotions

Yesterday.

College Green, in Dublin 2, was closed to cars from 7am until 7pm, as part of Dublin City Council’s Car Free Day.

The event was held as part of European Mobility Week.

Pics: Ciaran Cuffe