I move amendment No. 3:
In page 5, between lines 18 and 19, to insert the following:
"(3) The provisions of this Act shall apply to a claim for compensation made, or which has arisen, prior to the coming into operation of this Act—
(a) where no determination has been made, as to the sum, if any, payable in respect of such claim, and/or
(b) where the claim for compensation was made after October 20th, 1988.".
We had a lengthy debate on Committee Stage on a number of amendments tabled by me and Deputy Shatter on the transition period. At the conclusion of that debate the Minister gave an undertaking to give some consideration before Report Stage to the transition period. Therefore, I had expected the Minister to put down an amendment on this issue and I am somewhat disappointed that he has not done so.
On Committee Stage I sought to include a provision in the Bill so that it would apply to compensation claims which have already been served on local authorities. I was informed that there would be a constitutional difficulty with that because it would mean applying the Bill retrospectively. I take that point.
Deputy Shatter in his amendment sought to draw a distinction between the different stages a compensation claim can be at — the stage when a claim would be made on a local authority; the stage when the court would actually decide that compensation should be paid and the final stage when the amount of the compensation would be determined presumably by arbitration.
Amendment No. 3 is a repeat of Deputy Shatter's original amendment but with the further proposal that it should also take account of claims which were made after 20 October 1988. I have proposed 20 October 1988 because it is the date on which the Bill was originally published and anybody who made a claim subsequent to that date would have been aware that new legislation was being contemplated and the position in regard to compensation claims would be different.
My motivation for dealing with this issue has been strengthened somewhat since Committee Stage. I am a member of Dún Laoghaire Borough Council and Dublin County Council. Since Committee Stage, claims totalling £20 million have been served on Dún Laoghaire Corporation, in my view, for the express purpose of the claimants getting in before the new legislation comes into effect. The first claim is for £2 million in respect of the Ibex site in Dún Laoghaire which had been zoned as industrial and was in use as an industrial site for many years. A planning application which was made for commercial and other developments on that site was refused by Dún Laoghaire Corporation. There was an appeal to An Bord Pleanála and an oral hearing was held recently. The outcome of that appeal is not yet known and the developers concerned lodged a claim with Dún Laoghaire Corporation for £2 million. Dún Laoghaire Corporation gave an undertaking to grant a certain type of planning permission for industrial purposes on that site but the claim has not to date been withdrawn.
The second claim which was in two parts related to the St. Helen's lands in Booterstown. The first claim was for £6 million in respect of a half acre reservation for a travellers' halting stop which was being made on the 71 acres site. The owners of the site felt that a travellers' halting stop would devalue the property which they intended to develop and sell for £6 million. The net result of that aspect of the claim is that Dún Laoghaire Corporation have now abandoned their intention to put a halting stop for travellers on the site. At a meeting of the borough council last Monday evening I was informed that the legal advice available to the borough manager and the advice from valuers was that while the claim was for £6 million the corporation might ultimately have to pay in the region of £500,000 compensation for that site.
The second part of the same claim was for £12 million in respect of a road reservation which is being made through the grounds. I have to confess that I have somewhat mixed feelings about this claim because I opposed the making of the road reservation in the first instance. Nevertheless this decision was arrived at democratically by the borough council and I do not think the owners of the site should claim in the order of £12 million for it.
I want to put this total claim of £12 million in context. St. Helen's lands were sold three years ago by the Christian Brothers for £6 million and resold, I understand, for around £10 million. Yet a claim for compensation has been made for three times the amount for which the land was sold originally. I believe those two claims — I am speaking of those two; I do not know whether there are others which have managed to slip in under the wire since we began debating the provisions of this Bill — were lodged at this time, one before the decision of An Bord Pleanála is known, the developer having participated in an oral hearing, the other in circumstances in which we are dealing only with outline planning permission. I believe those claims were lodged to beat the deadline in the Bill. There is a necessity to build into the Bill a provision to deal with the transition period which will endeavour as far as possible to protect the public purse against claims already in the pipeline.
I appreciate there are legal difficulties involved, particularly in regard to the application of legislation retrospectively. The amendment originally tabled by Deputy Shatter, having listened to the debate on Committee Stage, perhaps constituted a better approach than my original amendment. I was seeking to extend that somewhat in the amendment I have tabled on Report Stage.