Political reporter Liam Reid outlines the background to the purchase of a farm for €30 million for a new Dublin prison.
After a summer of the Government taking a battering on what many see as wasteful public spending, it is easy to see why Enda Kenny and Pat Rabbitte chose the purchase of a farm for €30 million for their first joint setpiece since the summer holidays.
The two leaders braved the squally autumn weather on Kildare Street yesterday afternoon to greet the residents of St Margarets in north Dublin, where Thornton Hall, the controversial prison site, is located.
For the Opposition, the purchase bears the hallmarks of the type of case they have made political hay out of. That is, it pushes their agenda that this is a Government that has "more money than sense", as one backroom adviser put it.
In the Dáil, TDs from both Labour and Fine Gael launched a joint Dáil motion, asking for an independent evaluation of the purchase of the farm.
Their essential point last night in the Dáil was that the Government paid €30 million for unzoned agricultural land worth no more than €6 million, and rushed through the deal in less than eight days without examining other potential options.
In response, Minister for Justice Michael McDowell mounted a robust defence, describing their motion as "a farce".
He accused both Opposition parties and a recent RTÉ Primetime programme of misleading the public and claimed the site was the cheapest available, at a cost per acre of less than €200,000 - a third less than its nearest rival.
He said the purchase of a site at agricultural land prices was also never a realistic option. He also rejected claims that the Government had approached the owners of Thornton Hall, saying the opposite was the case.
Although there was considerable dispute between the Government and Opposition parties on some central points, documents released provide some basic facts as to the events leading up to the sale.
Following a Government decision in principle on replacing Mountjoy, a committee of senior civil servants began their search for a new replacement site for the Dublin prison in earnest in July last year.
Having employed the services of a land agent, Ronan Webster of CBRE Gunne, the committee first advertised and received 31 expressions of interest from landowners in Meath, Wicklow and Dublin who had sites to sell.
Officials then began to rank the sites on a range of measures, including cost, topography, the effect on local communities and the need to be within a a relatively short distance of the M50.
After some of the most suitable sites were excluded due to price, the committee then changed their evaluation measures, removing cost as a criterion.
The omitted sites were then reintroduced, and the list whittled down to five.
By late November the committee had one site in mind in north Dublin, not too far from the eventual site at Thornton Hall, close to the proposed M50 motorway, south of Ashbourne.
This site was then "taken from under our noses" according to one official, when the State was outbid by a property developer.
The committee then began to focus on a site farther north at Coolquay, four miles south of Ashbourne.
In December an agreement was almost completed, when the vendor pulled out of the deal. It emerged in recent days that the vendor had issues regarding potential capital gains tax on the proposed sale.
In the week before Christmas, according to the Prisons Service, it was approached by an independent land agent, who had acted for other failed vendors, with the site at Thornton Hall, owned by the Lynam family. A deal was done within four weeks, despite the Coolquay vendor saying he might be willing to re-enter negotiations.