Taoiseach keen to kickstart work on delayed Cork Event Centre
The government is working on a solution to kickstart construction on the stalled Cork event centre, the Taoiseach has insisted.
But Leo Varadkar said he can't give a timeline for a resolution because it's not a stand-alone government project.
He was speaking in City Hall after chairing a Cabinet meeting in its historic council chamber.
It was expected the government would be briefed on the status of the project which has been mired in controversy since the sod was turned in 2016.
Three years on from the sod turning, building work on the proposed 6,000-capacity venue earmarked for the former Beamish and Crawford site on South Main St has yet to start, the venue has undergone a complete redesign and been enlarged, costs have soared from €50m to €79m, the funding has yet to be agreed and planning permission has yet to be secured.
With €30m of state-aid pledged since before Christmas, the project has become bogged down again over the insistence by the Department of Arts that €9m of the overall package be classed as a loan.
Cork City Council, which is overseeing the project, has sought legal advice on its classification as a loan.
At the post-Cabinet meeting briefing for the media, Mr Varadkar said the event centre saga wasn't discussed by government ministers.
But he said the government took the opportunity provided by the presence of key ministers and officials in Cork in recent days to organise a series of meetings with the key partners involved in the event centre project. Those meetings have been taking place over the last 48-hours, he said.
"We are working on a solution - it's a project I really want to see happen," he said. "It will be of enormous benefit for the city in terms of tourism and business events and there are so many reasons why the Cork event centre project is a good project and should be supported.
"But it's not a government project on its own. It involves the local authority and the private sector."
And that's why, he said, he couldn't give a precise timeline for when the various issues blighting the project might be resolved.
We're not the only player in this. It's a local authority project with the government involved too and there are two major private companies involved," he said.
"But there have been meetings over the past couple of days, everyone is around the table, everyone wants to make this happen."
Mr Varadkar told the just over two weeks ago that the 2016 pre-election sod turning was a mistake.
Developers BAM have been given until July to respond to planners' requests for further information about various design aspects of the enlarged venue.
It is understood that Live Nation has board approval to invest at least €30m in the project.
BAM has spent up to €10m on the project to date, including site acquisition costs and on the various design and planning processes.
The company has built several student apartment blocks on the site already as part of its Brewery Quarter regeneration.
