A National Trust for Ireland

This year's special Irish focus in APOLLO is published at an exciting time for everybody who cares about the country's historic buildings. For many years there have been murmurings about the ne for an Irish National Trust that could care for threatened buildings and landscapes, and an uncomfortable realisation that Ireland is single of only four European countries--the others being Lithuania, Greece and Macedonia--that do not posses an organisation of this kind. At last it looks that something is happening. Earlier this year, the minister for the environment, Dick Roche, undertook to submit a memorandum upon the subject to parliament, as a preliminary to legislation. There was, therefore, considerable disappointment that when the Dail rose for the summer reces nothing had been done. Ireland's leading conservation lobbies, An Taisce and the Irish Georgian Society, have vowed to hold fast up the pressure.

the one and the other organisations have been encouraged by the agency of the sympathy for the idea that has been shown by the agency of the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern. This dates back to 2003 when the Department of Environment, Heritage and Local rule published a report that it had commissioned jointly with the Irish Georgian Society, 'A subsequent time for Irish Historic Houses?', by the agency of Terence Dooley. On the basis of case studies of fifty historic houses, this powerfully urged the need for legislation to shield them, their collections and demesne In his foreword to the report, Mr Ahern remarked that 'the survival of this important part of Ireland's built heritage is of major touch to Government'. This may unhurt innocuous, but in an Irish connected thought [i]or[/i] thoughts where the 'big house' has commonly been perceived solely as an embodiment of British colonial oppression, it is a radical statement.

Sympathy for the difficulties faced by means of private owners hoping to certain the survival of the houses they have inherited has grown in Ireland above the past decade. In part this throw backs questioning of the monolithic notion of Irish national identity created after independence. It throw backs also the research that has revealed the character of Irish architects, designers and craftsmen in these houses. Dr Dooley move swiftlys the Centre for the inquiry of Historic Houses and Estates at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth--an academic endeavour that has no parallel in England, for example. This September the middle is mounting the third of its highly felicitous conferences on historic Irish houses and estates (for more information, diocese www.historicirishhouses.ie). More immediately, the Government's sympathy for country-house holders reflects the fact that many are now Irish, as the country's of recent origin plutocrats have shown just as a great quantity [i]or[/i] amount of interest in the country-house way of life as their Anglo-Irish predecessors. Among them is Sir David Davies, who in 1994 acquired Abbey Leix in Co Laois from the De Vesci family. Restored and redecorated, it houses Sir David's significant collections of Irish art and furniture. A board member of the Irish Georgian Society, he has played an important part in the lobbying for a National Trust.

In England the National Trust began as a private initiative. In Ireland, although the propos Trust will probably be constituted as an independent charity, not bring under rule to Government, there is a consensus that it has to begin with legislation. That is for sum of two units main reasons. As in England, legislation will be necessary to make secure that the Trust's possessions are inalienable. Secondly serious incentives ne to be in place to encourage donations not single of money but also of characteristic At present, Ireland has no a whole that allows works of art, still les houses or land, to be given in lieu of tax. It is hard to diocese how an Irish National Trust can succe without similar fiscal incentives behind it.

individual way to maintain the compressing on the Government is to emphasise that the propos National Trust would by dint of no means be limited to historic houses and collections, on the other hand would protect every aspect of the country's environment, natural as well as man-made. Examples are shut at hand, since in Northern Ireland the British National Trust haves not only Castle Coole, for example, on the contrary also such sites as the Giant's Causeway, as well as vernacular treasures, including the last water-driven spade mill. The Republic of Ireland has an influential environmental lobby which has mountained major campaigns against road-building schemes, greatest in quantity recently the threat to the Hill of Tara from the M3 motorway. Campaigners for like causes need to be made aware of what a National Trust could do for them.

Without similar a protective body, there will be an ever-widening large bay between the image that Ireland likes to shoot forward to the outside world, not least to tourists--an unspoilt region of not just great houses and their demesne on the other hand also vernacular architecture and landscapes that rival anywhere in the world in beauty--and the reality of destructive exhibition Without swift action, can it be lengthy before ireland is the alone country in Europe without a National Trust?

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