Market traders unite to resist rent proposals

TRADERS in one of the country’s most historic food markets said they will fight plans tonight to almost double rents over the next three years.

Business owners in Cork’s historic English Market said the significant rent increases, which will be proposed by city manager Joe Gavin at tonight’s council meeting, will put the very tradition of the city-owned market in jeopardy.

Most of the market’s 42 tenants — the older and more established businesses — pay an annual rent of between €8 and €10 per square foot.

Nine tenants pay between €11 to €20 per square foot and a small number of the newer tenants pay between €35 and €42 per sq ft.

New rents were to be negotiated in 2004. But despite almost a year of negotiations between city officials and traders in an effort to avoid arbitration, agreement has not been reached.

“Unfortunately agreement was not reached with the traders who proposed that the increases should be no more then the consumer price index for the period 1999 – 2004 (approx 28%),” Mr Gavin said.

He will present councillors with a report tonight outlining how he thinks a standard rent of €20 per sq ft would be applied to those currently below that level by 2009.

There will be no increases for 2004 and 2005, he said.

However, the rent for 2006 will rise to €13 per sq ft, €16 per sq ft in 2007, €18 per sq ft in 2008 and €20 per sq ft in 2009.

Increases in subsequent years will follow the consumer price index, he said.

“In the absence of agreement by any individual trader, each case will be referred to arbitration in accordance with the letting agreement and the finding will be binding on both parties,” he said.

Mr Gavin said the council recognises that the English Market is a unique and historical market but he said rent hikes were needed to secure reinvestment in the market.

“It is hoped that traders will reconsider their view as the rents proposed are regarded as very reasonable,” he said.

But Mary Rose Daly, a second generation English Market trader who runs Coffee Central and who is chairperson of the English Market Traders Association, said her fellow traders are determined to fight the proposals.

“We will lose something very valuable in Cork if we go down this route,” she

“What’s worrying me is that we have very small traders, family-owned businesses working here and these new rents will put that tradition, the tradition of the market, at risk,” she added.

Traders accept the need for rent increases, she said, but not at the level being proposed by Mr Gavin.

“They settled for 33.3% the last time. Why is that not good enough for them again this time. They’re looking for something like 128% now,” she said.

Rentals in nearby Oliver Plunkett St are between €72 and €102 per sq ft per annum and go up to €350 per sq ft on St Patrick’s Street.

Labour Cllr Ciaran Lynch said the proposed rent hikes could turn the English Market into just another ‘high street’ market.

“The manager’s report puts the traditional trading aspect of this market under threat and measures must be in place to ensure that this type of trading goes on for centuries,” he said.