Born: 6 February 1923, Ireland
Died: 11 February 2017
Country most active: Ireland
Also known as: Margaret Doherty
This biography is republished from The Dictionary of Irish Biography and was written by Angela Byrne. Shared by permission in line with Creative Commons ‘Attribution’ (CC BY) licencing.
Fagan, Margaret (‘Madge’; ‘Mag’) (née Doherty) (1923–2017), housing and community activist, was born at 6 Reilly’s Cottages, Harold’s Cross, on 6 February 1923, one of twelve children of James Doherty, who worked alternately as a porter, butcher and soldier, and Mary Doherty (née Byrne). She was educated locally and left school at the age of thirteen to train as a tailor. Around 1955 she met and married Anthony (Tony) Fagan, a presser; they had three children: Anthony, who died in infancy, Marie and Rita. They lived on Clanbrassil Street before moving into the Summer Street South–Marrowbone Lane flats c. 1963.
In 1966 Fagan became a founding member of Marrowbone Lane (Corporation) Tenants Association, which later affiliated with the National Association of Tenants’ Organisations (Nato, established in 1967). (One of her fellow committee members in the Marrowbone Lane Tenants Association, Matt Larkin, was secretary general of Nato.) Fagan was active within the Marrowbone Lane Tenants Association, particularly in collecting subscriptions, organising day outings for local children, and providing fuel and hot meals to the elderly. The association’s strong community character was later described by a local resident: ‘All of them lived in the area. All of them paying the same rent. All of them were in the same situation, everybody back then’ (Tubridy, 1036).
Housing in Dublin at this time was a major issue: the collapse of three tenement buildings in Fenian Street and Bolton Street in 1963, killing four people, resulted in an inquiry that exposed the appalling state of housing in the capital city. Hundreds of residents were evacuated from other tenements that were thought to be in a dangerous condition, social housing was constructed in the outer suburbs by the newly formed National Building Agency, and the Housing Act (1966) was implemented, which placed increased emphasis on the private rental sector. In the late 1960s activists and action groups coalesced around local issues: in September 1969 the Marrowbone Lane Tenants Association’s 100 members planned to withhold rents over water shortages, but deferred the action following Dublin corporation promises that new pumps would be installed.
Nationwide, there was growing anger among local authority tenants over the hardship caused by the complicated means by which rents were calculated: the inclusion in income assessments of overtime earnings, social welfare payments, and any income earned by teenagers or young adults in the household. In 1970 the minister for local government, Bobby Molloy, rejected a Nato proposal for an alternative to the 1966 housing act, leading to Nato pickets on Leinster House and local authority buildings across the country. With no engagement from the minister, in May 1971 a Nato special delegate conference decided on a policy of non-compliance with gross income assessments. Events culminated in a national rent strike by more than 100,000 local authority tenants (representing an estimated 400,000 people) from spring 1972 to August 1973, in response to a proposed rent increase by government. In addition, Nato sought the implementation of differential rents capped at ten per cent of a tenant’s income, and the implementation of successive tenancy (on the death of a leaseholder, dependents had to reapply and often their rent would increase). During the rent strike, tenants lodged the equivalent of their rent in Nato-operated bank accounts, and the sums were later transferred to local authorities. Local Nato networks were put in place to prevent attempted evictions, rent offices were picketed, and unionised local authority workers refused to carry out evictions. Fagan collected rents from Marrowbone Lane Tenants Association members for deposit with Nato and, together with other women activists and community leaders, was prominent in physically opposing attempted evictions. Her young daughters accompanied her on the picket lines. The campaign achieved a three-year rent freeze and changes to the calculation of rents, and was later described as ‘the most dramatic and bloodless victory ever achieved this century by tenants versus landlords’ (Irish Times, 17 July 1976).
Fagan continued to work for her community in the following decades, challenging drug dealers operating in her neighbourhood – she stood guard with other local women to prevent dealers entering the flats – and organising community events including seniors’ dinner dances and children’s summer camps. In 2008 she was part of a successful community protest against a proposed Dublin city council regeneration scheme that would have seen her home demolished and replaced by a park, with decreased social housing and displacement of residents. As late as 2016 she participated in local protests against water charges. Alongside her community work, she worked as a caterer and a cleaner. She was a devout catholic, loved dancing and fashion, and rescued many stray dogs.
Fagan remained living in Summer Street South–Marrowbone Lane flats until her death in St James’s Hospital on 11 February 2017. Her funeral took place on 14 February in St Catherine’s church, Meath Street, and she was buried in Mount Jerome cemetery. She is remembered as ‘one of the first working-class women to embrace social activism on behalf of her community … [she] advocated for the rights of local authority tenants for over fifty years’ (Irish Times, 4 Mar. 2017).
Like many working-class activists, Fagan’s work went largely unreported by the mainstream media and until recently little research on Nato or the rent strike was publicly available. The online archive ‘A people’s archive of the housing crisis’ has collected photographic materials, while an oral history project undertaken in 2022 resulted in academic publications and a documentary film (The rent strike, 2024). Fagan’s lifelong dedication to her community is, however, well-remembered in the Liberties. A mural portrait of Fagan was painted by artist Emmalene Blake as part of the ‘Mná Meath Street’ street art exhibition in 2020.