“Banks are now putting properties and farms up for sale on the web at midnight or 11 o’clock at night. The first the owners know of it is when a neighbour sees it and rings them up, then it is gone and sold to a vulture fund.”
That was the message Independent TD, Mattie McGrath, delivered in the Dáil earlier this week. He spoke as Sinn Féin brought forward what is now a bill to amend the Private Security Act 2005 and the Enforcement of Court Orders Act 1926.
The deputy said people are “being turfed out of their homes down in the courts” and this has activity has continued throughout the Covid-19 pandemic.
“This is a brazen sell-out of our people, who Dan Breen, Seán Treacy, Seán MacDermott and Pádraig Pearse fought for,” he told the Dáil.
“The Government should be ashamed to claim to represent a democratic Ireland under this kind of watch. It welcomes in all these gangsters and funds that are plundering our country.”
He said prices are spiralling for people who want to build their own houses. Furthermore, he highlighted that the cost of insulation has spiralled “because of the carbon tax the Government has imposed”.
Deputy McGrath outlined the government “has had the cover of the famous pandemic for the last 13 months”.
“It thought it could extend it and hide everything behind it but now it is being found out because the foxes, bears and otters are inside the hen house and all the hens are being plucked. The Government will be plucked too,” he added.
‘They waited for the farm to go up for sale’
His fellow Rural Independent Group member, Richard O’Donoghue, also shed light on the issue. He told the Dáil of a particular case whereby a farm had been put up for sale.
“We are going to see people falling into financial debt because of Covid-19. We are going to see farms being sold without the farmers’ knowledge.”
“I know of one case in particular, where a farmer was losing his farm. People in the area came together, said that they would buy the farm, and supported the farmer’s son to buy back the farm.”
“They waited for the farm to go up for sale. The farm went on sale at a minute after midnight and was sold and taken off the system by 12.05 a.m. That is what needs to be regulated,” he concluded.
