The document discusses the development of the Irish state in relation to housing policy and ownership. It notes that in the 1920s and 1930s, the Irish government aimed to promote home ownership through building grants and rates remissions for owner-occupiers. In the 1950s and 1960s, there was a push for private home ownership as a way to combat communism and social unrest. The 1966 Housing Act allowed many public housing tenants to purchase their homes, resulting in over 200,000 public units being sold into private ownership by the early 1990s. The global financial crisis that began in 2008 saw overbuilding and overborrowing inflate asset values in an unsustainable way according to the CEO of NAMA in 2011.

1. Irish Political Economy for Trade Unionists and Activists
2. The development of the Irish State

19. “We wish to resuscitate
the speculative builder..”
W.T. Cosgrave, 1925

20. “We wish to resuscitate
the speculative builder..”
W.T. Cosgrave, 1925
Housing Acts, 1924 & 1925
- Building grants for owneroccupiers
- Remission on local
authority rates

22. “I am a firm believer in
private ownership,
because it makes for
better citizens, and there
is no greater barrier
against communism.”
Senator James Tunney, Labour Party, 1952

23. “The man of property is ever
against revolutionary change.
Consequently a factor of the first
importance in combating
emigration and preventing social
unrest, unemployment marches,
and so on, is the widest possible
diffusion of ownership.”
Most Revd Dr. Cornelius Lucey, Bishop of Cork, 1957

24. 1966 Housing Act
- allowed local authority tenants
in urban areas to purchase their
homes
- by the early 1990s, 220,000 of
the 330,000 public housing units
in the state had been sold to

34. NAMA PROPERTIES = c.16,000

35. “The problem here is that, when one looks at the
top 190 debtors in the NAMA universe with
debts of €62 billion, a relatively small number of
people were chasing the same assets and it was
like a Ponzi scheme. They overborrowed and
were overlent to by banks. There was huge
inflation of asset values and this was not
sustainable in the context of the economy.
There was a disconnect between the economy
growing at 8% or 9% per annum and lending by
banks growing at 35% or 40% per year. The
problem was caused by overpaying for assets.”
Brendan McDonagh, Chief Executive, NAMA, in evidence to the Public
Accounts Committee, 26 October 2011