‘It’s underhand, it’s disgusting’

DAUGHTER SPEAKS OUT AFTER LATE FATHER’S NAME AND ADDRESS USED FOR PLANNING ENFORCEMENT COMPLAINT

“THE cheek to use a dead person’s name and address – it’s underhand, and it’s disgusting.”

That was the view of Caroline Murphy after a complaint into an alleged unauthorised development in Lios Póil was made using the name and address of her deceased father – John Murphy – less than 10 months after he had passed away.

Mr Murphy was buried on New Year’s Eve 2018, shortly after being told by medics that he had about three weeks left to live. Caroline said her family was slowly returning to some kind of routine and preparing for her father’s first anniversary when two letters arrived to her house in quick succession from Kerry County Council, in which the local authority said it had received correspondence from Mr Murphy and was investigating the complaint ‘he’ had made in relation to a development elsewhere in his home parish, Lios Póil.

“The first letter [dated October 8, 2019], I wasn’t sure what it was talking about, I thought it might be a mistake,” Caroline told The Kerryman, speaking to this newspaper after an investigation by Radio Kerry’s Eamonn Hickson brought the matter to public attention. “Then I got the second one dated October 9, and they were actually proceeding with an investigation... I said, jeepers, I have to stop this now.

“When Dad died, the support we got from everyone in the whole Lios

Póil context – neighbours, friends, old school friends – was amazing: cards, mass bouquets, everything. Even when he was in hospital, the amount of people who visited him in palliative care was incredible. There were music sessions, neighbours went in, we had huge support.

“I would have hated, then, for anyone to think our family was behind this. To use Dad’s name to hurt someone else from Lios Póil because they don’t have the neck to stand up to be counted – it annoyed us, upset us as a family. It galled me.”

When Ms Murphy contacted Kerry County Council, she claimed that the local authority initially said it could only speak to Mr Murphy about the matter – but quickly accepted that the report could not have come from him.

She also spoke to the person subject to the complaint to reassure them it had not come from her family.

Ms Murphy has also claimed that she has not received any written correspondence from the local authority since she made a number of requests in response to the incident.

“I wanted the name taken off it, I wanted it quashed, that it had no basis in the beginning because my father never wrote it,” she said. “I didn’t want it going online. I wanted the person subject to the complaint to be informed we had nothing to do with it. I had a list of issues I wanted them to clarify, and they never came back to me... I get all my father’s post, nothing for him, either.

“We’d have liked a written apology to us, and to Dad for taking his name in vain, essentially.”

The local authority does not comment on individual planning-enforcement files, but told The Kerryman “Kerry County Council does not verify nor are we required, under the law, to verify the identity or authenticity of a complainant” in such matters.

The local authority is, also, obliged to accept anonymous complaints and is required to investigate alleged unauthorised developments when made aware of them. This differs from a submission or objection to a planning application, which cannot be made anonymously. Ms Murphy, however, has called for reform.

“When someone puts in a complaint such as this, it should be verified the person exists; they’re at the given address; that what they’re writing is legitimate,” she said. “Any slip of paper, from any individual, dead or alive, anywhere in the world, cannot just be accepted without checks. Verify before taking the complaint on board.

“And to anyone who does something like this: if you have an issue, put your name to it instead of hiding behind someone who has died… The cheek to use a dead person’s name and address – it’s underhand, and it’s disgusting.”

The Kerryman also spoke to the person subject to the complaint, who insists the development – a farm building – is eligible as a planning exemption was granted.

They claimed Kerry County Council has contacted them in writing but, “to my knowledge”, no site inspection has taken place.

They added that the structure has appeared in a subsequent planning application and that the local authority must have been aware of it.

“I’m more than covered for that shed,” they said. “There was no objection at the time, the exemption went through, the council got their drawings and maps from me... The shed is there since 2016 and nothing said about it.

“Whoever wrote this famous letter, they complained about an entrance off the road, an access road into where the shed is, and the shed itself. When I went about it first day, I was advised by an engineer to apply for an exemption. It’s a farm building, it’s so many metres from the nearest road, the nearest house, the stream, I was within the limits for the exemption.

“I was good friends with Johnny Murphy! I knew well it wasn’t him objecting!”

Kerry County Council said the matter remains under investigation.

“The issue at hand here is the alleged use of a deceased person’s name on a complaint which is not a matter for Kerry County Council in the context of the above,” a council spokesperson added.