Click here to download the MP3 interview from radio.indymedia.org with Rita Fagan.

Transport and airport workers, along with Aer Rianta and SIPTU officials, may have been dancing a jig of schadenfreudic glee at the clipping of Seamus Brennan's wings from his post as Minister for Transport; but his replacement Martin Cullen, is no stranger to privatising public resources. During Cullen's time as Minister for the Environment, he presided over the M50/Carrickmines saga, and also pursued the construction of the M3 through the Tara Skreen Valley with renewed vigour. His commitment to public transport is minimal. He also undermined the local democratic process in Dublin by imposing a PPP (Public Private Partnership) on St. Michael's Estate in Inchicore, usurping years of consultation and negotiation with the tenants of the estate.

St. Michael's Estate was built in 1969, at the same time that Ballymun rose up on the other side of the city. The community within the estate has a long history pre-dating the construction of the flats. Originally Richmond Barracks during English rule, it was given over to the new Free State Army in 1923. In the 1940's the Army moved out and the land was given to Dublin Corporation (now Dublin City Council). Around this time the area was known as Keogh Square, which was primarily composed of tenements, and had the name of being a slum on the city fringe. When the flats were being built, there was a huge demand of people who wanted to be housed there. There was heating, green spaces, and of course high-rise communities were viewed as the way of the future.

In the late 1970's and early 1980's the social and living conditions on St. Michael's Estate started to decline. Working families were given housing grants of £5,000 by the Council, so many of them simply moved out. Single parents were given flats, and the Council rarely investigated the people it was housing. What was once a traditional stable family society became a single parent society, and this created gaps and imbalances in the social fabric. The long-term residents of the estate were increasingly exasperated with the Council officials making decisions in the city centre without any local consultation, and so in 1986 a group of women set up the St. Michael's Family Resource Centre, which is located in a ground floor flat on the estate.