VIDEO: Poetic justice as protests rain on Kenny’s parade
And in ‘Xanadu’, the Romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote of Kubla Khan’s “stately pleasure-dome”. In the Rebel County, however, Xanadu took on the guise of an anonymous office block as a beleaguered leader sought shelter from a storm brewing, both a literal and a political one.
Around 200 protesters braved the pouring rain yesterday to demonstrate their continued opposition to water charges as Taoiseach Enda Kenny visited Blackpool, Cork, to announce 120 IT jobs at Xanadu, a services provider to the online sports trading market.
Conditions outside Xanadu might have put protesters in mind of the line from Coleridge’s ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ — “Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink” — but few were dissuaded from expressing their dissatisfaction.
John Murphy from Ballyvolane was one of the hundreds hemmed in behind a barrier opposite the ground-floor entrance to the building that hosts Xanadu and a number of other companies in offices in Blackpool Retail Park.
“It’s always going to be peaceful,” said Mr Murphy. “All these allegations from the Government about sinister fringes is a load of bullshit in my opinion, pardon the language. It’s usually peaceful. You’re going to get a loony everywhere you go, you know what I mean?”
He said the climbdown on water charges has not gone far enough.
“They said they were listening to the people,” he said. “If they were listening to the people they would have heard us say ‘abolish Irish Water, no charges’. We want to abolish Irish Water.
“I was on several marches down through the months and years. I never heard anybody say ‘reduce the charges’. Everybody I’ve ever heard at the marches said ‘abolish the charges’. It’s as simple as that. If they were really listening to the people, that’s what they would have done.”
Mr Kenny arrived 20 minutes late, but was left in little doubt as to why the majority of those who greeted him were there, with boos and chants of “No way, we won’t pay” and “out, out, out” only getting louder as he got out of his car.
Inside the more welcoming surrounds of Xanadu’s offices, he welcomed Noel Coonan’s U-turn on his comments comparing the water protesters to Isis, but said he hoped the focus would now shift toward the recovering economy.
“Yes, there have been incidents in the course of the last number of weeks where this might have been a bit rough, but insofar as the language is concerned, I’m glad that Noel Coonan withdrew his remarks and I’d like that people would now focus on what we’re about here,” said Mr Kenny. “What we’re about is obviously announcing more jobs here in Cork.”
Chants of “out, out, out” rang filled the air as the Taoiseach was sped away in a garda car.
Mr Kenny may have hoped the public would forget the water charges and focus on the recovery. Outside Xanadu, however, there’s little evidence that anyone is listening.
120 jobs at ‘market leader’ Xanadu
An Irish startup which provides data analytics, programming, back office, and technical support for online sports betting and trading has announced 120 new jobs at its base in Cork.
Xanadu, founded in 2011 with eight employees, currently employs 111 and is expected to fill the new positions within 12 months.
Taoiseach Enda Kenny announced the creation of the 120 roles at Xanadu’s offices in the Blackpool Retail Centre yesterday.
“Xanadu is a great example of an Irish company that has grown its business to become an international market leader,” he said.
“I am delighted to welcome the creation of 120 new jobs at the company in its Cork HQ. These highly skilled jobs will provide great opportunities for ICT graduates and tech sector workers.”
Xanadu CEO Mark Brosnan said the new positions were needed to meet the growing demand for the company’s services. “Our continued expansion is a reflection of our absolute focus, international customer wins, invaluable client feedback and increasing market demand,” he said.
More than 60 positions will be filled in the coming three months in the areas of programming, data analytics, and marketing. Further positions will open in 2015.
The company now has offices in Cork, London, and most recently Toronto and was founded by Mark Brosnan, Cian Nugent, and Esme O’Flynn in June 2011.
Meanwhile, Mr Kenny was also on hand for the turning of the sod on what will be the biggest office block ever built in Cork.
The developer of One Albert Quay, John Cleary, yesterday confirmed that specialist fire and security company Tyco would occupy 75,000sq ft over four floors of the €50m development, with PricewaterhouseCooper confirmed as second-floor tenants.
There has been strong demand for office space, with the development already more than 60% let.
Both the jobs announcement and the ground breaking on One Albert Quay were welcomed by Cork Chamber president Gillian Keating.
“This is yet another sign of Corks attractiveness for investment, we continue to be a destination of choice for FDI because of our strong skills availability, our great people and the quality of life they enjoy while here,” she said.
“These two announcements added to recent high confidence figures of 92.2% in the future of their businesses, as shown in our quarterly economic trends survey. This shows that our region is on the cusp of great things on the economic development and job creation front.”
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