For the information of the House, it is proposed to take Second Stage to 5 o'clock and to bring the Bill to a conclusion next Wednesday. This is to give Senators a chance to bring in any amendments they may have to the Bill. It will be decided by agreement with the Whips whether there has to be an adjustment of time.
Derelict Sites Bill, 1989: Second Stage.
Question proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
Will the Leader of the House inform the House if it is intended to continue with Second Stage next week and to complete it?
It is intended that we take the Bill until 5 o'clock today and to conclude it next week. I am just giving an indication to Members so that if they have amendments to prepare, they may have time to prepare them. We will conclude the Bill next week.
I would like to welcome the very positive approach of the Leader of the House, particularly with regard to the possibility of preparing amendments. There may be one or two positive but not, I think, contentious amendments I would like to introduce, expanding some of the Minister's intentions and purposes in the Bill.
I am pleased to bring this Bill before Senators. There has been a very useful and constructive debate on it in the Dáil, as a result of which a number of important amendments have been made. In order to reflect these changes fully, and so as to avoid possible confusion, I have had a revised Explanatory and Financial Memorandum circulated for the Seanad discussion of the Bill.
One of the earliest and most enduring concerns of Irish local government has been to minimise and control, in the public interest, the impact of ruin and dilapidation on our cities, towns and villages. The various towns improvement Acts of the last century, and the public health provisions of this period also, all deal with various aspects of what we now know as urban decay and urban blight.
The Housing of the Working Classes Act, 1890 introduced a systematic approach to this question. It provided for the identification of unhealthy areas and for improvement schemes to be undertaken by sanitary authorities in relation to them. This approach was continued in the early housing legislation of the Irish State, and in a 1931 housing act we find specific reference for the first time to the concept of a derelict site.
The concern of these earlier statutes was principally with the physical or health dangers to the public arising from neglected buildings. This focus still survives in sanitary services legislation, which remains the competent code in relation to these non-amenity aspects of land dereliction.
However, with the Acquisition of Derelict Sites Act, 1940 and its successor the Derelict Sites Act, 1961, legislative provisions were designed with a focus primarily on the amenity and visual aspects of land dereliction. Derelict sites were to be cleared and rendered aesthetically acceptable not because of their immediate danger to health or safety, but because they detracted from our enjoyment, and that of tourists, of our cities, towns and villages.
It would be wrong, of course, to give the impression that measures to deal with land dereliction are in Irish law, the sole, or even the principal, preserve of specialised derelict sites legislation. Our physical planning system envisages, as one of its most important objectives, the preservation of amenities by planning authorities and the renewal of obsolete areas. It is mandatory on urban planning authorities to harness all possible effort and resources to achieve these ends. The recently enacted urban renewal legislation is also designed to make more intensive provision for the renewal of certain urban areas, with rates and tax incentives available for this purpose. A £2 million scheme for works of environmental upgrading in designated areas was provided in my Department's Estimate in 1989 and I am pleased to say that a further £2 million has been allocated for this purpose for 1990.
In a sense, derelict sites legislation stands to the planning and urban renewal codes rather as does the Litter Act to more fundamental environmental controls on air, water and waste pollution. In theory, if development plans, planning enforcement and urban renewal incentives were doing their job, we would not have dereliction at all, just as if waste licensing and enforcement were operating perfectly, there might hardly be any need for certain provisions of the Litter Act. Both are necessary fall-back systems to deal with imperfect situations which arise despite the existence of more ambitious legislative provisions.
On the other hand, it would be wrong to build too much complexity into derelict sites or litter legislation. Their basic purpose is to prevent and quickly remedy situations which are immediately and clearly offensive from an environmental point of view. Longer-term measures and structures to secure amenity and development are, by and large, proper to planning, urban renewal and other environmental legislation.
The Acquisition of Derelict Sites Act, 1940 enabled local authorities to secure the clearance of derelict sites but only by acquisition or the threat of acquisition. Apart from the absence of other mechanisms to tackle the problem, the definition of "derelict site" in that Act was also very restrictive. The Derelict Sites Act, 1961 introduced a different approach by widening the scope of this definition and by attempting to facilitate voluntary clearance and improvement of objectionable lands and buildings by property owners. This latter objective was never comprehensively fulfilled and although the 1961 Act provided also for statutory notices requiring the carrying out of works by owners, these were not availed of to any great extent.
Another limitation of the 1961 Act was that it did not apply to dwellings and could only be used when the sites had actually become dangerous or injurious to health or to the amenities of the neighbourhood. In effect, the Act became relevant only when the site was totally derelict, and no mechanism existed for preventing the running down of many a fine neighbourhood.
Before examining the details of the Bill, I wish very briefly to sketch the contemporary background of dereliction against which its main provisions should be viewed.
Dereliction has, unfortunately, become a growing problem in many towns and cities of Ireland and is taking away from their attractiveness to the inhabitants, to tourists and to potential industrialists. While decline and change of individual areas is an inevitable feature of the life of cities and towns, we must do all possible to mitigate its worst effects. The problem in Dublin is extensive. A recent report prepared by Dublin Corporation in connection with the review of their development plan revealed that the total land area derelict within the canal ring was some 160 acres — or almost seven times the size of St. Stephen's Green — and that it numbered some 600 derelict sites in total. While the urban renewal programme is now making considerable inroads into this problem, there is clearly much more work to be done.
There is a need for positive and systematic action if the dereliction is to be overcome in the foreseeable future and a principal objective of the Bill will be to give local authorities a legislative framework within which to develop this. Neither is the Bill insensitive to the unfortunately substantial contribution to dereliction from publicly-owned lands. Accordingly, it will apply both to local authorities themselves and to all other property-owning public bodies.
The main purpose of the Bill is to provide more effective arrangements against land dereliction. The Bill also repeals the Derelict Sites Act, 1961, and restates its relevant provisions, thus consolidating the law on derelict sites, and providing for an annual levy on certain derelict sites in urban areas.
The main new provisions of the Bill are: to require local authorities to maintain a register of all derelict sites; to place a general duty on owners and occupiers of land, including statutory bodies and State authorities, to prevent land from becoming, or from continuing to be, a derelict site; to provide improved enforcement and preventive powers for local authorities in relation to derelict sites; to give the Minister for the Environment reserve powers to direct a local authority to take enforcement action or to improve a derelict site in their own ownerships; to enable the Minister for the Environment, after consultation with the appropriate Minister, to direct any statutory body to dispose of derelict land in its possession which is not necessary for their functions; to improve the procedure for compulsory acquisition of derelict land by local authorities; to provide for an annual levy (based on market value) on certain derelict sites in urban areas; to increase penalties substantially.
I now propose to comment in detail on some of the more important provisions of the new Bill.
Part I contains mainly standard provisions related to the general implementation of the Bill. I should point out that as a result of a Dáil amendment the Bill will now come into operation immediately upon its enactment. Section 3 sets out a new and wider definition of "derelict site". This improves on the earlier definition in a number of ways. It includes dwellings, which as I have said were excluded from previous derelict sites legislation, and it adds to the previous criteria for dereliction considerations, such as the neglected, unsightly or objectionable condition of structures. Taken in conjunction with sections 10 and 11, the new definition of "derelict site" will also allow action to be taken against potential or incipient dereliction, as well as against actual dereliction.
Part II of the Bill deals with the range of measures being provided to prevent and control derelict sites. Under section 8, local authorities will be obliged, within a year of the commencement of the Act, to establish and maintain a register of all the derelict sites within their area. This is a mandatory provision which will secure the active involvement of all local authorities in administering this Bill. It is regrettable that only a minority of local authorities were active in administering previous derelict sites legislation. Some 50 local authorities, in fact, took no action under the 1961 Derelict Sites Act. We cannot afford such an optional approach faced with the importance of the problem which I have earlier outlined.
The register of derelict sites will clearly establish the scale of the problem of dereliction in each area. It will facilitate suitable follow up action, and in the case of relevant urban land, it will provide a basis for applying the derelict sites levy.
Section 9 establishes it as a general duty on every owner and occupier of land to ensure that their land does not become or continue to be a derelict site. This obligation will rest not just on private landowners, but on statutory bodies and State Authorities also, that is, the full range of semi-State and public sector bodies and including Ministers of the Government, the Office of Public Works and of course local authorities themselves.
Section 10 places a concurrent general duty on the local authority to use its powers so as to prevent land within its functional area from becoming or continuing to be a derelict site.
Sections 11 and 12 provide for specific enforcement powers in relation to the general obligations established by sections 9 and 10. The standard method of enforcement will be a notice from the local authority requiring specified remedial works to be undertaken. Failure to carry these out will be an offence to which substantial penalties may apply. If this notice is not complied with, then the local authority will also be empowered themselves to carry out the necessary measures and to recover the costs from the owner. All remedial works of this kind will be exempted development for planning purposes.
Section 12 gives back up powers to the Minister for the Environment to ensure proper enforcement of the Bill. He will be able by direction to require a local authority to issue an enforcement notice in a particular case, to require them to act further on a notice already issued, or to make the local authority remedy a derelict site in their own ownership.
Section 13 enables the Minister to require any statutory body to dispose of its interest in any derelict site where he is satisfied that the land is not necessary for the performance of its functions by the statutory body. Before making any such requirement, the Minister would first consult with the appropriate Minister as regards that statutory body. Apart from the blight issue, the holding of land by public bodies can affect the land market in urban areas by restricting the supply and encouraging overpricing of urban land. In their report on urbanisation in Dublin — No. 55 of 1981 — the NESC commented on this aspect in the following terms: "Local authority actions contribute to high values in that the absence of a development or sales policy for derelict sites acts to restrict supply and induce blight"— paragraph 3.10. While urban local authorities have generally developed more active land policies since that report was written the Bill will contain a useful reserve power to ensure that land owned by public authorities is properly utilised and brought forward for development as quickly as possible.
The definition of "statutory body" does not extend to Ministers of Government or the Office of Public Works. It would be inappropriate, and inconsistent with the concept of the collective responsibility of the Government, that the Minister for the Environment should be in the position of issuing formal statutory directions to fellow Ministers regarding disposal of their land interests or any other matter.
Sections 14 to 19 deal with the powers of local authorities to acquire derelict sites outright, whether by agreement or compulsorily. The provisions involved differ mainly in respect of procedural detail from the 1961 Act and do not require comment at this stage.
Part III of the Bill goes beyond previous derelict sites legislation by attempting to deal with the economics or urban dereliction. Environmental economists point out that all pollution involves a degree of market failure, in that the polluter is encouraged to act anti-socially by the fact that he bears no financial responsibility for the external costs which he imposes, through his polluting activities, on others.
This general principle finds ready application in the case of much urban dereliction. Because for economic or other reasons, redevelopment of a site is not attractive to an owner in the short term, he has ready encouragement, reinforced by the fact that unoccupied property cannot be rated, to let his property run down. The public rather than the individual is the loser.
Various proposals have been mentioned over the past 15 or so years for some financial disincentive to be applied which would discourage owners from letting properties run down and so redress the market failure underlying much urban dereliction. The Bill's provisions in this regard are fairly simple ones. In all urban areas, or in such county council areas as the Minister may prescribe, an annual derelict sites levy will be imposed by local authorities on so-called urban land. Urban land is defined in section 2 to mean any derelict site in an urban area which is not in the ownership of the State or the levying local authority, is not an occupied dwelling and is not affected by a CPO or a local authority planning reservation.
All urban land will have a market value placed on it by the local authority, as soon as may be after it is placed in the register and at least once every five years thereafter. A right of appeal to the Valuation Tribunal is provided. The Minister for the Environment will prescribe a proportion of the market value of land for the purposes of the levy, which for the first year of the levy is fixed at 3 per cent. The amount of the levy may be varied in subsequent years by the Minister either nationally or for a particular local authority area but in no case may it exceed 10 per cent. Where the Minister proposes an increase greater than 2 per cent, the necessary regulations will have to be affirmatively approved by both Houses of the Oireachtas.
I must emphasise that the primary purpose of the derelict sites levy is not to create additional revenues for local authorities, but to operate as an efficiency tax and secure better use of urban land. Consistently with this principle, if a site is rendered non-derelict within a particular year, the levy for that year will be refunded or waived. A levy will become and remain until it is paid as a charge on the land.
Special arrangements may also be operated, at the discretion of the local authority, for bona fide site assembly. If the local authority agree, a developer will be able to tender a bond in the amount of the levy of up to five years instead of actually paying the levy. Provided the full development is completed within the period involved, no levy would then be payable for that period. Finally, provision is made for the waiver of the levy by local authorities in cases of hardship.
Superficially, the structure of the new levy may appear to have much in common with site value rating, that is, a system of rating property on the basis of its optimum rather than its actual use. However, the new levy will not pressurise owners to realise the fullest economic development of derelict properties; it will only require them to make their lands aesthetically acceptable and consistent with other sound neighbouring properties. The interdepartmental committee on local finance and taxation rightly concluded in their report — PRL 89, page 83 — of some 20 years ago that "ownership of land in our society does not carry with it the ability or the obligation to realise the full potential profit from that land". The new levy respects this important principle.
Part IV deals with prosecutions and offences. These have in the main been designed to keep within the limits of District Court jurisdiction, given the desirability, which I mentioned earlier, of confining this Bill to fairly simple measures and procedures. However, by virtue of a Dáil amendment, very substantial penalties are provided, on conviction on indictment for non-compliance with a notice issued by the local authority under section 11 (4). Part V deals with miscellaneous and largely routine measures in support of the main provisions I have described.
This Bill is about action on behalf of the community at large to enhance our cities and towns. I am satisfied that it will provide a sound framework within which to advance this important work.
I welcome this Bill, particularly now that the Minister has explained it so fully in relation to the updating of the 1940 and 1961 Acts. The Bill will be as effective as the local authorities are in carrying out their functions and as the Department will be in monitoring those functions. It will be the duty of the Minister to introduce the regulations which will give effect to the provisions of the Bill in relation, first, to the drawing up of the register of dereliction to be completed in one year.
At present I would argue with the Minister that local authority environmental sections do not have the resources, the funding, the manpower or the woman-power to do this. I will give you a microcosm as an example of county councils. I will take Limerick County Council as an example perhaps of the 27 county councils. Within that you have one senior executive engineer, three environmental technicians — that is, a technical staff of four who really are the decision makers on the ground. At present because of the emphasis on air pollution, which thankfully is not a problem in Limerick city— hopefully will not be, nor in Limerick county — monitoring needs to be carried on. We have a tremendous emphasis on water pollution. To take Limerick County Council as an example again, we have 11,000 farm units which have to be monitored for farm pollution. My reason for emphasising that is that the staff, the meagre four I have talked about, have to go out and do onerous tasks already within the environmental section. I am particularly worried as to where they are going to get the time. Has the Minister any hope of improving resources in relation to personnel to take on the dereliction section which, with the new Bill, will mean a tremendous expenditure of time particularly in drawing up the register?
The second point I would like to make is this. I could give the other functions of that environmental section, which is waste disposal and the dispersal of dangerous wastes. I will briefly give the administrative staff, five in all, who are to back up this — two clerk typists, a clerical officer and an assistant staff officer and a staff officer. The housing engineers are called in to do the work of dereliction. Taking that into account, I would hope that an excellent Bill such as this would not be looked upon as: "Well, there is a Bill there, but at the end of the day it will not be enforced through lack of resources". I will mention other things in a moment as regards increased powers to local authorities in other sections.
One point I find difficult to come to terms with here is the lack of emphasis on dereliction in rural areas. I know other speakers will particularly emphasise urban areas. We can talk about Dublin city. We have read and heard a lot about it. As I said, other Senators will debate that inside out and outside in. If we are to consider tourism as an option, I could bring the Minister to County Limerick and I can bring him through County Galway — I am sure he could bring me through it, right through the west of Ireland and give me a far better analysis of the area, an odyssey through it, and he might take me on a scenic route that would have no dereliction. Perhaps the Minister could find one, but I have not been able to find one during my 26 county odyssey on the Seanad trail. There is widespread dereliction in rural areas. It is very difficult to pinpoint owners of houses who have emigrated a long time ago. I would love to see those houses refurbished. They are of fine stone and would certainly be an asset rather than the bungalow blight we have heard about in the last while. I would ask the Minister therefore to tell us why he has not placed emphasis enough on rural dereliction.
As regards the urban area, and taking Limerick as an example, I speak very much of the excellent developments that have taken place there under the urban renewal programme hand in glove with the Civic Trust. As regards the rates and tax incentives, the Minister quoted figures in his speech. Am I to take it that the budget next year will include funding for those developers who could not start immediately because it took them so long to actually get their hands on the sites etc or because the title deeds were lost or difficult to find or because of the slow unwieldy process of compulsory purchase order? Is this an ongoing fund or were the tax incentives given within a particular number of years?
The Minister referred to long-term road widening plans which cause great stretches to be left untended and derelict. I hope there will be a change of attitude on road planners' part and that they will not let their plans hang on for years and so add to that dereliction.
There is another point I am not very clear on. When the Minister spoke about levies was he speaking specifically about levies in urban areas? For instance, would a town like Newcastlewest come under an urban authority where the derelict sites would be levied, because the whole thrust is towards levying derelict sites in cities like Dublin, Cork and Galway. That worries me. It would have to be more explicitly dealt with in the Bill to ensure that small towns, large towns, etc. in our county council jurisdiction area would also get that levy. I know the Minister said that the levy was more an efficiency tax and that it is not necessarily used to fund local authorities, but I hope there would be a certain amount of funding coming from those levies to local authorities in the absence of the funds they need to carry out the work that will be necessary if they are to implement this Bill.
Another point I would like clarified relates to the fact that, because of lack of powers, local authorities could never successfully conclude the process of compulsory purchase orders. I believe that in theory this Bill will speed up that process because of its legislative framework, but in practice will it take an unwieldy length of time to actually serve compulsory purchase orders and carry them through eventually? In other words, I am looking for increased powers for local authorities in the acquisition of the derelict sites. This is not specified in the Bill. The Bill is grand; it is the implementation of it that concerns me. I have to mention over and over again that it requires funding.
There are a few other points I want to deal with. The Fine Gael Party will be proposing amendments on this next week, To summarise, what I am looking for from the Minister is an answer to the fact that rural areas appear not to be taken into account when it comes to the promotion of tourism and the need for increased powers for local authorities to be able to implement this Bill. I am pleased that the penalties proposed are included in the Bill. I do not have the figures here but why was it necessary to increase penalties from £1,000 to £25,000? Why did the Minister feel initially during the debate in the Dáil that small penalties would have been sufficient and then there was a big increase from £1,000 to £25,000?
I would like to welcome the introduction of the Bill. This Bill represents a very positive step towards tackling what is becoming an increasing problem in many of our cities and towns around the country. The Minister has already mentioned the alarming extent of this environmental problem and the fact that Dublin alone has 160 acres of derelict sites. This scenario is not, of course, peculiar to Dublin; it exists, unfortunately, in every city and town in the country. Given the timely awareness of and sensitivity to environmental issues in this country and in the context of the Government's genuine commitment to improving controls and enforcing procedures in this vital area, this Bill is fully deserving of the support of this House in its spirit and its letter.
The general thrust of the Bill is certainly progressive and will serve as an important vehicle in healing the gaping wounds in our environment. Equally, it has the potential to improve the aesthetic quality of our cities. The social and economic ramifications of such concrete measures need hardly be elaborated on; the result should be self-evident in the course of time. I believe this Bill is a constructive initiative which will form an integral part of the overall long term progress to protect, conserve and enhance the natural and physical environment. Many of our streetscapes, particularly in Dublin's inner city, are spoiled by ugly ruins and scars. These sites lend nothing but an impression of wanton neglect and destruction to a capital city and other cities and towns. Dublin, as well as some of our other cities and many of our towns have extraordinary tourist potential. Corrective measures are now imperative. As the Minister said in the Dáil, the Bill will not do everything. However, a strong economy, which we are now beginning to enjoy, along with the designated areas in many of our cities and towns, this Bill will go a long way to improving the overall situation.
The Government have already signalled their objectives in terms of urban renewal programmes. Such innovative programmes must be given full encouragement and impetus at every level. We must all embrace the whole concept of combating decay and we must redouble our commitment to resuscitating and rejuvenating life and vigour within our areas, particularly our city areas, which appear to have been the victim of abject neglect. In other words, inner city renewal, which I sincerely hope is a high political priority, will represent a great chance in enhancing and augmenting the overall quality of life for our cities.
I am extremely pleased to note that this Bill addresses the despicable ruination and character of our streetscapes while specifically broadening the definition of what actually constitutes a derelict site. It includes various structures, derelict dwellings which are invariably in an advanced state of decay. This is one of the most positive things in the Bill. Unfortunately, many of these dwellings are deliberately allowed to deteriorate and fall into the most appalling disrepair. Frequently they are beyond redemption. One could give examples from every city and town in the country where this has happened in the past. This is particularly insidious where we have buildings which are listed, both themselves and their interiors, which have been allowed fall into such a state that they are beyond repair. This has happened widely in the past in Dublin and in other cities. Unfortunately, we have to put it in the past; but, hopefully, we can save what is left of many fine buildings around Dublin and some of our other cities.
I also welcome the proposal to place an onus on local authorities to compile a specific register of all derelict sites within their areas and to obligate them to take all practical steps to ensure that land is prevented from becoming derelict or, if it is already derelict, that it will be dealt with. The vesting of enforcement powers and the introduction of severe sanctions is also a welcome departure in enabling local authorities to execute their functions in this regard. I am happy to say that Dublin Corporation have already warned various developers and people, the worst offenders, that if and when this Bill becomes law they will be using it against them.
As chairman of the Planning Committee of Dublin Corporation, I am happy to say that we have pre-empted this proposed legislation. I am aware that Dublin Corporation have already begun to compile a register of derelict sites within their area.
Owing to a marked buoyancy and upturn in the construction industry, combined with the attractive tax incentives as part of the urban renewal programme, there has been intense redevelopment and refurbishing in many parts of the inner city. In the past two years Dublin Corporation have disposed of approximately 36 acres in sites and about 12 acres of such sites were located in the designated areas. Undoubtedly, the redevelopment of these sites will greatly advance the process of urban renewal.
The corporation have adopted a positive policy of disposing of sites for redevelopment in a determined effort to expedite this process. To date this attitude has proved to be immensely successful and many prominent sites are now being utilised for high class quality developments particularly in the residential sector. In fact apart from the Custom House Docks site there are schemes costing £140 million. Some of these have begun, other are about to begin and some have been completed.
The increased powers vested in local authorities in respect of derelict sites are to be commended, particularly the capacity to take measures to ensure that land does not become, or does not continue to be, derelict. This provision will be a singularly powerful and effective weapon in deterring prospective developers from hatching sites, which unfortunately is an all to frequent occurence.
In the main I support the broad thrust of this Bill and I welcome the amendments which the Minister has made recently. There is, however, one aspect of the Bill which I am somewhat nervous about. As a local authority member it is my certain knowledge that it is incredibly difficult to actually identify the owner of numerous derelict sites. This is a particular problem in Dublin, because you do not have to register as a land owner. I would be fearful that this difficulty may pose obstacles for the implementation and efficiency of this legislation. If this proves to be an impediment and if it transpires that some aspect of the legislation may become inoperable, I would suggest to the Minister that he consider the introduction of mandatory registration for landowners. Currently registration is not compulsory. This is highly unsatisfactory and should be regularised in due course.
Once again I reiterate my unreserved support for the Minister's initiative. It should make an outstanding contribution towards the overall improvement of our environment. Let us hope it is one of many such proposals.
I, like the other speakers, welcome this Bill and the attempt which it is making to clean up the very many derlict sites not only here in the capital city but indeed all around the country in towns and villages and indeed in rural areas. As a member of Dublin Corporation of 15 or 16 years standing, I am only too painfully aware of the squalid dereliction of this once fine capital city. I became more aware during this year when I toured around every county in Ireland in connection with the Tidy Towns competition, which I headed up with Bord Fáilte. I became aware very intimately of the problems of dereliction in the towns and villages of Ireland and of the frustration and the incapacity, of tidy towns committees particularly who are doing a magnificent job to try to clean up and tidy up, to improve the environment, plant trees, paint buildings and so on. Invariably, you find a couple of derelict buildings dragging down a whole town or village. That is most demoralising. The extent of the dereliction, therefore, is fairly widespread. I hope that the Bill, with its levies and fines, will stimulate owners to get rid of these derelict sites. I am a little doubtful but I do welcome the Minister's initiative and the thrust of the Bill.
I think that the problem to a large extent is that this Bill is trying to deal with the results on the ground and that we have not really addressed the causes of dereliction. Just in relation to Dublin, may I give what I consider a very brief outline, because I think it is important if we really are going to lick this problem once and for all. It probably started here in the city with the slum clearance programme carried out by the corporation after the war when the slums of Dublin were among the most infamous in Europe and a very worthy policy of slum clearance was initiated. It involved clearing out large numbers of people from the centre of the city into the suburban areas. But I believe, sadly, that that clearance programme has continued for far too long and when we should have been starting to improve conditions for people living in the city we continued moving them out to green pastures, eating up valuable agricultural areas in the county, resulting in the very heart going out of the city. This policy of giving tax incentives for new factories, new houses but never for refurbishment or for anything in the city was supported by successive Governments.
There was also the problem of rent control restrictions which exacerbated the problem. We had also a lot of official thinking and official policy. We had it most recently with the findings of the recent URDO report. Once again they were recommending expansion out into the peripheral areas and with very little regard for what was happening in the heart of the city and to what extent some of the 160 acres which the Minister referred to could be used to bring people back into the city. There has been a consistent lack of tax incentives until fairly recently when some of the urban renewal schemes were introduced. I greatly welcome them and hope they will have a real impact in improving the situation.
If this problem is to be tackled fundamentally, we need to have a policy of encouraging people to come to live in the city. We should cherish and protect in every possible way inner city communities. If we have people living in the city they will be the best insurance against dereliction and derelict sites. They simply will not tolerate it and the general standards in the city will go up.
We need to look at the city positively, to make it attractive. We need to look at all the problems for people living in the city, traffic, noise, smog, etc. Where else in Europe would we find a situation where a magnificent 18th Century square like Mountjoy Square is derelict? There would be people paying over the odds in any other European capital to come and to live in those areas. Why not in Dublin? It has been official policy and Government policy over the years that these areas have been allowed to become run down.
The intention of the Bill is good but, as was said earlier on by one of the previous speakers, it will to a very large extent depend on the will and the enthusiasm of the local authority to implement it. It is a fairly massive problem if we think of 160 acres of dereliction. The manager told us recently they reckon there are about 600 derelict sites. I ask the Minister to give the local authorities extra resources to cope with this problem. It is no good dumping a whole extra burden on to a local authority and expecting them to do it when there is a lack of staff, lack of finance. The Dublin City Manager in a reply on 12 June 1989 said: "Even the carrying out of the survey will depend on the availability of the necessary staff to implement it." There seems to be a suggestion there that the resources will not be available and even to get the survey completed may be a problem. What extra resources will the Minister give to the already hard-pressed local authorities to implement the provisions of this Bill?
My greatest concern, however, with regard to the Bill is that the levies which may encourage the owners of private lands to do something with them and not to leave them derelict will not have any effect on the local authorities. In the case of Dublin I have no hesitation in saying that Dublin Corporation are the major contributors to the decay and dereliction of the city. It is for one reason only, because of the monstrous road proposals which Dublin Corporation have had in their various development plans and long before there were development plans going back 40 and 50 years. At that time they simply drew magnificent lines on a map, an engineer's dream, "this is where we want the roads to go" and nobody shouted "stop."
Most of these road plans have not been implemented. They have a policy where they allow the areas to go "soft". I never quite know what soft means but it is a great word with planners and engineers. Clanbrassil Street is a classic example. Road lines were put there, 20, 30, 40 years ago; the area goes soft and when it is in such a decayed, derelict condition they come at that stage to the members of the local authority and ask "Will we go ahead and implement the road plan?" If there is any hesitation by the local authority members to agree, they take them out on a tour so they can see with their own eyes the decay, the rats, the dereliction and of course, they say "what is the point of holding on to this"?
The communities of Dublin have been decimated by these road proposals. The saddest thing of all is that it is Dublin Corporation, who are entrusted with the care of the city, whose job it should be to look after and conserve the city, who have been the greatest offenders. I say it as a member of a local authority for 16 years, and I say it with great regret and very much with a red face. I have done my best during my period there to get them to change their policies.
The worst thing of all is that there is no streetscape. This, Minister, is the nub of the problem. There is no streetscape put back, there is no streetscape reinstated, so when they widen a road the gables of buildings and the sides of buildings that were never supposed to be seen are left bare. The actual streetscape has gone and there is no land reservation to provide a streetscape. That is the nub of the problem with regard to the city of Dublin.
There are, of course many derelict sites still in private hands but they are on the line of long-term road proposals and, therefore, there is no incentive for the owner of these buildings or sites to do anything with them. They know that in the long run if the corporation go ahead with their plans these sites or buildings will be purchased. There may be a Compulsory Purchase Order issued by the local authority. What incentive is there for a private owner of such a building or land to do anything with it? The local authority are the cause of the dereliction but the building may still be privately owned. Is that private owner expected to pay the levy? Is he expected to put good money into what is quite uneconomic because he knows that one day it will probably be the subject of a Compulsory Purchase Order.
There were in the 1980 development plan no fewer than 61 roads in the city of Dublin to be widened during the five years of the plan, that would be 1980 to 1985. Now, of course, we are nearly ten years from that. There were no less than 106 roads to be widened under the long-term plan. This is a massive number of roads in the context of the city of Dublin. It is true that many of these may be dropped. They are being dropped in the draft plan, they may be dropped in the development plan but basically the damage is done.
One has only got to look at a place like the Liffey Quays to see what we are talking about. I begged the corporation in 1980, the night they were adopting the development plan, to drop the 18 long-term road proposals for the Liffey Quays. I was told by the engineer, "Alderman Hederman is misleading the council" which, of course, meant "Alderman Hederman is telling lies"— it is nice way of saying it. They said, "We have no proposals to widen the quays". They had long-term proposals. Their attitude was: "We will not go out and initiate it but we will not let anybody else do anything. We will wait until perhaps there is a fire in a building or until a developer comes in wanting to develop and then we will tell him that he has to wait". At least if Dublin Corporation go out and do the work and implement the road proposals something happens but in the long-term proposals it simply ends up in dereliction. The quays are a classic example of this.
When the Bill was before the Dáil Deputy Alan Shatter moved an amendment. I know this is not the day to discuss details but this is the main thrust of my contribution to date. This amendment was:
to direct the local authority to take such steps as may be necessary so as to ensure that a development objective or objectives for the purpose of reserving land for roads or parking places or for any of the purposes of reserving or preserving lands indicated in Part IV of the Third Schedule of the Local Government (Planning and Development) Act, 1963, does not result in any land subject to any such development objective becoming or continuing to be a derelict site.
Unless something along those lines is implemented this Bill will be virtually useless as far as Dublin is concerned. The Minister, in response, replied:
An interesting remark was made about grandiose road plans and the possibility of those plans creating der-election. I would always have regarded reservations for road development as a normal procedure necessary for proper planning and future infrastructural development.
If that is the Minister's view, that is really saying that he considers that the dereliction of this city, which has been brought about by the roads is perfectly legitimate. I simply cannot accept that.
The Minister is a representative for the Mayo area. I am sure there is not a bog or boreen in Mayo that he does not know like the back of his hand. I am sure there is not a pothole in a road there that he is not familiar with. It is quite unreasonable to expect the Minister to be that familiar with the city of Dublin. The Minister for the Environment has an important responsibility. I would like to ask him, if he can spare 35 or 40 minutes one day, to allow me to take him on a tour of the city. I am afraid we will have to call it a tour of the dereliction of the city. We will not travel in the Minister's state car or on my bicycle; we will go on the top of the Bus Éireann open bus because it is really from that vantage point that the Minister would have a bird's eye view of what I am talking about.
Perhaps we could start at the corner of Lower Leeson Street, a magnificent street scape which has been untouched by the depredations of roads engineers, there has been no road widening. We could proceed along St. Stephen's Green as far as Cuffe Street. There the Minister will see the beginning of the dereliction on the very corner of Cuffe Street and Harcourt Street which is a prime area in the city where tourists arrive to shop. The Minister will see where road widening was implemented in Cuffe Street, with the result that there are exposed fireplaces, corrugated iron shacks at the back, and so on. It is an unbelievable sight and it gets worse and worse as one proceeds. On the other side, the back of the flats can be seen where the Winter Garden Palace once stood. There are unsightly backs of buildings which were never supposed to be viewed by the public. We come to the next corner where the Good Times Bar was only recently demolished. There is simply no corner left, it is just a squalid, visually unattractive area. The pub on the other corner is still there.
We then proceed to Charlemont Street and see what has been done to the entire Charlemont Street, Charlotte Street and Harcourt Street area. It is 40 years since those plans have been implemented. If the Harcourt Street line, where there was very good public transport, had not been closed we would never have to do to the Charlemont Street area what we are proposing to do now. For the whole of the Camden Street, Redmonds Hill, Aungier Street area there is another long-term road proposal which the corporation now say they may drop. Here, again, we see the blight of the roads on the city.
We probably would not have time to go to Clanbrassil Street. We continue into Kevin Street, turn right into Patrick Street, and into High Street. We could show the Minister before and after photographs so that he could get some idea of how magnificant that area was before all the road widening took place. We would then proceed down into the wastelands of Bridge Street which is unbelievable. In that area the Brazen Head used to have a lovely entrance but the whole area is now unbelievably squalid. We approach the Quays and the Minister would see at first hand what I am talking about. The problem is when one drives quickly through the city these things are not noticed. I am proposing that we start at the beginning at the massive dereliction caused by the roads and go through until we arrive at Senator Norris's area in the north side, to Summerhill, to see the environment the people are living in there after the four lane dual carriageway. That is causing the derelection of the city. If the Minister thinks that is normal procedure and that that is what is correct and proper, I do not give this Derelict Sites Bill much hope of solving the problem.
The Minister says the local authority can prevent land becoming or continuing to be a derelict site but can we compel them to develop? Unless we can compel them to develop, unless we can compel them to reinstate a streetscape I do not think we will achieve very much. That is what is important and that is the problem. On the roads there is no provision left for the reinstatement of the streetscapes.
I am glad sections have been introduced with regard to directing statutory bodies to dispose of the derelict sites. The corporation are aware of many of the statutory bodies behaving outrageously in this regard. My colleague, Senator Norris, referred a week ago to the conduct of the VEC and what they have done in Parnell Square, North Great George's Street and in other places. It is simply unbelievable and I would like to think that it is something over which we will have more clout.
I would like to mention the Office of Public Works. In this morning's paper there was a letter about the properties in Upper Merrion Street. They are owned by the Office of Public Works and are being allowed to fall into decay and dereliction. I really want to know, will we be able to compel an owner to restore a building or will we simply be able to tell him to go in and clean it up? Is the Minister saying we will continue to have derelict sites but they will be clean derelict sites instead of dirty derelict sites? That seems to be the thrust of this Bill.
There is one other aspect in section 12 (6) on exempted development I am worried about. It is at the moment possible for the owner of a listed building to allow it to deteriorate and fall into dereliction. We, as a local authority, have no power to force that owner to restore the building. The owner can go to the local authority and if the building gets bad enough under the Dangerous Buildings Act he can seek to get the corporation to compel him to do something. That means by the back door he gets permission to knock it down. I want to know, in view of the fact that any works carried out under this Bill are exempted development, will the same thing happen? Will it facilitate some unscrupulous owners to be able to knock down buildings, perhaps listed buildings or early 18th century buildings? Can the local authority go in and carry out restoration work on a building and charge that against the property? I see the Minister nodding his head but I would like to have a more positive reply. I will leave the rest of my remarks until the next stage.
I would like to congratulate the Minister for this excellent and comperhensive Derelict Sites Bill. It is long overdue. This is a Bill to prevent land becoming a derelict site, to enable local authorities to require owners or occupiers of derelict sites to take measures, to acquire derelict sites by compulsory order, to establish a register of derelict sites and to enable the Minister to give directions in relation to derelict sites. This Bill will be welcomed by all local authorities and, in particular, Bord Fáilte. As one who has been involved in tourism for many years especially in Kerry I am aware of the problem of derelict sites throughout the county. While the local authority have made various efforts over the years they have failed.
Had this legislation been in the Statute Book before now we would have far fewer shabby buildings, many of which have been lying derelict for years. Many of our excellent Tidy Town Committees have made very serious efforts over a long period of time to rid their towns of these eyesores but their efforts in many cases failed. However, with this legislation they will now have the support they have been seeking and in all cases the full backing of the local authority. There is no doubt that one of our greatest potentials for job creation is tourism as our countryside is the envy of many nations. Our urban and rural environment, lakes and landscapes and beautiful, pollution free beaches encourage many visitors to our country. These visitors are the best ambassadors we have to boost our tourist trade.
The Bill gives much needed power to local authorities. These provisions will enable them to deal with offenders immediately. Hopefully, the Bill will help to eliminate the many black spots in our cities, towns and villages and throughout the country. A minority of unscrupulous developers have in the past not co-operated but, thankfully, under this legislation they have no choice. We have seen where roofs were removed in the guise of public safety, and if it were a commercial property to have it relisted for a reduced valuation. This also has the effect of reducing property values in the area. This has subtly spread to other property within that particular area.
Local authorities now have the power to eliminate this problem. Under section 8 every local authority shall, within one year after the commencement of this Act, establish and thereafter maintain a register to be known as "the derelict sites register." The Minister has not indicated how that list should be compiled. That is very important. Subsection (2) states the local authority must give notice to any owner and occupier of their intention to include a site on the register and may consider any representations any owner or occupier may make in writing before deciding to include the site. Efforts to put a stay on this, should not be entertained by the local authorities because if any effort is made to stall this particular register, the whole purpose of the Bill will have failed.
The local authority must also send a copy of the register to the Minister on request. Here again, I hope the Minister will insist on getting this register on a yearly basis. There is a duty placed on the local authority to take all reasonable steps to ensure that any land does not become or continue to be derelict. It would mean that a particular individual, especially within the planning section, should be assigned to this work with the co-operation of the engineers throughout the various districts.
In section 1 the local authority have the power to prevent land becoming or continuing to be a derelict site by serving notice on the owner, specifying steps to be taken by the owner to prevent the site being derelict. These steps should be set out in detail, without fear of criticism. Here again there will be political interference — possibly we are all responsible for that — but there should be no deviation from that principle. The local authority may take steps to effect the terms of the notice to prevent the site being derelict. There is a period of time mentioned, and that should be the minimum time.
Under section 14 a local authority may acquire by agreement or compulsory order any derelict sites in their area. The Bills sets out the procedure to follow in acquiring the land and, where this has been followed, may make a vesting order to acquire the site. Then there is the question of the value of the property or interest held on it. How is it proposed to decide on the actual value or the market value? Will it be by arbitration?
Under section 20 the local authority may use a site acquired for any purpose connected with their functions. If they do not want the site, they may dispose of it and let it. Will this be a managerial function or will the members of the local authority have an input? Section 22 states that the local authority shall determine the market value of urban land, enter it in the register and update its value every five years. The owner of the property shall be served with a notice informing him of the decided valuation and he may appeal to the valuation tribunal within 28 days of the notice.
Section 31 states that every sum the local authority receive for the sale or the lease of a derelict site acquired by them shall be used by them with the Minister's consent in such manner as they think proper. I hope the Minister will decide that the many local bodies who have shown an interest over the years, especially the various tidy town committees who are starved for funding, will qualify for some of this.
The Minister may direct a local authority to serve a notice under section 11 in relation to a derelict site which is included in the register or direct a local authority to take such steps as he considers reasonable to give effect to the terms of the notice served under section 11. I certainly welcome this because the statutory bodies and local authorities hold sites. I will say here without fear of contradiction, that this does not apply to Kerry. During my recent Seanad campaign I saw a number of sites throughout the country, and when I inquired I was told that such a site was owned by a local authority. This is an absolute disgrace and I hope the Minister will take this up.
I appeal to the Minister to consider creating an incentive for the development of derelict sites by way of special tax concessions, and further, ten year remission on rates. This would be complementary to the present Bill and would also lead to much needed job creation. In the past many people who had decided to develop derelict sites which had a nominal value found that no sooner had they developed them — or even before they were fully developed — than they were listed by the local authority and valued for the coming year. I appeal to the Minister to take steps to rectify this situation because at the moment — and this applies to all local authorities — in County Kerry only 12 per cent of the people pay rates, and every chance the local authority get, as soon as any improvements are carried out on a property — they have them listed by 15 December each year. Something has to be done about this. Certainly where there has been a development of a derelict site, some incentive should be given.
The Minister referred to the recently enacted urban renewal legislation and the extension of same to many urban areas. I have seen the benefits of this scheme, especially in my home town of Tralee where, as a result of this Bill, we now have a very modern conference centre, which opened in August 1988. Already we have had close on 50 top conferences, something we would not have had but for the urban renewal scheme. I thank the Minister for this. Would the Minister consider extending the provisions under the urban renewal legislation to derelict site development? This would be an added incentive.
I wish to congratulate the Minister. Only good will come from the Bill. At this time, world attention is focused on the quality of our environment and it is timely that such a Bill should come onto our Statute Book.
I am glad of the opportunity to contribute to the Second Stage on this measure. I notice that practically all the previous speakers warmly welcomed the measure. Mine is a welcome with conditions. I am conscious of the fact that the Minister we have with us this evening has the capacity for assuring and reassuring legislators who might be doubtful about certain aspects of legislation, that their fears are unfounded. If that is possible at the end of the Second Stage, then I will welcome that.
I accept the objectives of the Bill. I accept the necessity of dealing with the problems that exist, but my reservations - I will stick with these — are that the Bill applies throughout rural Ireland as well as the towns and cities. There are powers within that Bill that have not been discussed as much as they should, because they may cause problems. They might be problems of interpretation, but if they are problems of enforcement, then we could have difficulties in rural areas.
There are enough of my colleagues here to deal adequately with the Dublin situation and both here and in the other House it largely monopolised the discussion on this measure. I am sure there is justification for that. I do not represent the city, I do not represent any of the other cities. I could say, though, that I represent a large town in the south west of Ireland. Those who have firsthand knowledge are the people best equipped to deal with the problems that exist in the towns and cities.
As somebody who travels to this city and, indeed, to other cities. I am conscious there is dereliction there. I am also conscious of the fact that much of it is the result of inadequate powers to deal with it. I am also conscious that a certain amount of it is the outcome of the activities of speculators and so forth. Many of the problems have been created by these people and it is necessary that powers exist to deal with that position as it affects Dublin and other large centres of population. The powers intended to be given to local authorities are very substantial powers: the power to prepare a register of derelict sites; the power to serve notice on the owners and occupiers; in particular, the power to charge a levy. Some of my colleagues express reservations as to whether there will be the financial wherewithal for local authorities to operate the powers under this legislation. They will have the necessary funding because of the power to levy charges on derelict property. This will generate its own income and will in part go to financing the operation of the Act when it is on the Statute Book. There is also the additional power, very necessary in the centres of population, to acquire property when everything else has failed, to remove the dereliction from the site so that it will be acceptable in the locality concerned. All that is necessary in centres of population is to clean up the mess and to improve their appearance and image.
Briefly, I want to refer to a provision in the Bill which extends the power of local authorities to deal more effectively with the litter problem. I was here in 1981 when the Litter Bill was enacted and we were reassured at the time that there was adequate power to deal with the litter problem in the countryside and in towns and so on. Events have proved that that has not been the case. In my local authority area I have been informed by the manager that there is a grey area where proof is concerned in relation to the implementation of that legislation. I welcome the fact that in this measure the Minister is attempting to resolve the problems. At least there will be greater powers to deal with them.
I understood the Minister to say that the levy would have application in urban areas only. He is neither nodding nor responding otherwise to that. I assume that at the conclusion of the debate he will do so. I was not sure as to whether the levy would apply in rural areas. I understand from the Minister's speech that that may not be the case.
One final point in relation to urban decay: a very useful job has been done in many of our town by Tidy Towns committees. It has been a great community operation. It has lifted the appearance, the image and the atmosphere in many towns. In many others, unfortunately, the worth-while community effort has been set at nought by the presence of derelict sites and neglected areas. What will emerge from this legislation will assist many of these community-based organisations who have done so much to improve the visual aspect of their local town or community.
I want to turn now to those parts of the measure that are causing me some concern. I refer first to what I would describe as rural decay. This is a very serious matter for which there are many reasons. Perhaps some of the responsibility rests with many of us in the Houses of the Oireachtas. Much of the rural decay consists of the remains of what were once family homesteads. They are widespread in many parts of the countryside. It has to be accepted that there is an emotional attachment to them by their former owners. It is undying ambition on the part of those who have emigrated to return and to reconstruct and to live once again in their original homestead. It is in that connection that we could have difficulties in relation to the power that local authorities are being given in the Bill, that is, the power when all else has failed, when contact is impossible to establish and so on, compulsorily to acquire the site, to move in and eliminate these remains. That is a negative approach. I would prefer that consideration be given to a positive approach. There were positive measures not so many years ago where grants were available in relation to the restoration of pre-1940 houses. That is the positive way to approach this difficulty in many areas.
That is not the sum total of my reservations. This is probably a Committee Stage point but, nonetheless as the Minister has referred to it, I want to raise it here also. Section 3 defines a derelict site as meaning any land which detracts, or is likely to detract, to a material degree from the amenity, character or appearance of land in the neighbourhood of the land in question. Unquestionably that refers not to derelict sites but to the fields of rural Ireland. Land is land and you cannot depart from that.
In the Minister's own constituency just as in my own, when we refer to rural homesteads we are on familiar ground, we know what is involved and what we are talking about. We also know that attached to the remains of these homesteads are fields or areas of land. Who defines the measure of neglect that constitutes dereliction in these fields? Some of the people I am now about to refer to do a very worthwhile job in regard to the environment, clean air and a clean countryside but some of them even with the best intentions in the world, are inclined to go a little bit over the top. Their interpretation of neglected land becoming derelict might be slightly different from the Minister's or mine. Nonetheless, if they could convince a bureaucrat in the local authority that their interpretation was correct, let us visualise for a moment the difficulties that could be created.
I said at the beginning I had reservations and I wish to point them out. The Minister — and I am tying this in with the observations I am making — spoke about potential or incipient dereliction. That is a very widespread, very general provision. In my view, it is too widespread and too dangerous to allow it to stand without further interpretation. I said earlier, as indeed did other Senators, that some of the dereliction in towns and cities is the result of speculators — and this is a term I dislike using — acquiring property with the sure expectation of realising a windfall profit a few years later. That does not happen in rural areas. Therefore, if there is neglect or dereliction in rural areas, the likelihood is that it has been caused through social and economic circumstances. Those circumstances should be a factor that is measured by the appropriate authority, be it the elected members, as Senator Foley suggested, or the executive of the local authority. The conditions that caused the dereliction or neglect should be taken into account when dealing with the problem.
The Minister in his reply to the Second Stage debate in the Dáil, left nobody in any doubt about the application of this Bill to empty rural homesteads if I might put it that way. He said — and I quote from his Second Stage Dáil speech: "I will highlight the need in my instructions to local authorities." There will be the difficulties which I have referred to and I accept the need to deal with them. I am not for a moment advocating that rural Ireland should be derelict or neglected or that unsightly ruins should remain on the landscape but I am putting to the Minister of State who is present now, that there is a positive way of dealing with derelict rural homesteads.
I spoke of the pre-1940 house reconstruction grants. That is a more suitable way to go about it, a way that will get a far better response than compulsion, which to me is negative. Involuntary emigration is at the root of some of the rural dereliction I am talking about. Something similar to the pre-1940 grant scheme should be considered as an incentive to restore and maintain these homesteads. That would be a positive road to take. I know one townland where the key has been turned on four bungalows that are practically new, where entire families have left and are in the UK, the USA and maybe Australia. They are not derelict at present but in ten or 15 years they will deteriorate. The families concerned, because of economic circumstances — maybe the very fact of incurring the cost of these new bungalows — had to leave the country. Unless we are aware of the problem I am referring to, I can visualise a situation where these bungalows could in somebody's interpretation, become derelict sites ten years in the future.
There is another aspect to the measure that I am a little bit uncertain about that is, the application of the measure to the property of statutory bodies, local authorities and so on. My reading of the Bill is that it does have application here. The Minister, on the other hand, says that it would be entirely inappropriate that he should direct his colleagues in Cabinet as to what they should do. I am sure that there is a way of reconciling that and clearing the air and a response to the following four questions would clear the air as far as I am concerned.
Will the Bill have application to CIE property? Some of the eyesores of the countryside are abandoned tracks and station-houses. For example, will the Bill have application to the wrecks of abandoned boats in many of the most scenic inlets around our coasts? Will the Bill have application to what remains of mines from which was extracted some of the finest wealth of this country with little or no benefit to the people of this island and which have been left as unacceptable eyesores? Again, in relation to mining, what are the Ministers' thoughts about resolving that situation. My fourth point is, will the Bill have application to Bord na Móna because, again, some of the activities of Bord na Móna have not been conducive to leaving the countryside in an acceptable state?
I dwelt on the reservations and worries I had in relation to the Bill. I do not wish for a moment to suggest that there is no value in the measure to the areas to which it applies. I am interested in the appearance of the countryside including our towns and villages, and I accept that there has been deterioration there but I am making the point that the deterioration in many cases is due to social and economic circumstances. I accept the need to eliminate what is, in many cases, a depressing aspect. There is another query but I think I will leave it until Committee Stage.
The final point I want to make is in relation to land owned and acquired by local authorities for road widening purposes and left in a most neglected state over the years. I hope and expect that the application of this Bill will eliminate these eyesores which in many cases have been created by local authorities.
It is easy to be simplistic about the reasons for dereliction as they are many and complex. A site may become derelict because of legal problems on the death of the owner. A building may become ruinous because of its age and the effect of matters such as dry rot. The cost of putting the defects right, if they can be put right, may be beyond the capacity of the owner. A site may be derelict but this may be because it is part of a larger site which is being developed, perhaps a desirable development, or it may be that a site is vacant because funding is not available to develop it. It may simply be that the owner is holding on to the site until market conditions improve. This is not an exhaustive list of all the reasons properties are unused, but I do want to make the point that the fact that lands lie unused or derelict can arise from a complex set of different circumstances.
The best thing that can be done to reduce the number of derelict sites is to get these developed by creating economic circumstances which generate confidence among investors. Similarly, there is a good case to give advantage by way of tax incentives et cetera to developments in the more difficult or unattractive areas. The raising of the level of the surrounding environment is a great stimulant.
Those of us living in Dublin have seen over the past few years how these factors have operated and on the environmental side there has been a tremendous improvement in the inner city area to main shopping streets, the mushrooming of pieces of sculpture and trees and the investment by businessmen in improving and floodlighting their premises. All of these have contributed markedly towards making everybody who lives or works in Dublin more proud of the city. Is there a more attractive street in Europe than Grafton Street? The effects of the favourable economic conditions, the improvements I have mentioned and the tax incentives can be seen in the number of new developments which are springing up in Dublin's inner city. I went to the trouble of asking the corporation if they had any development sites along the Liffey. Their answer was that virtually all the properties which they own have been disposed of for development and the remaining small area is under negotiation.
I have noticed a recent report that the capital value of the developments taking place, or planned for sites in the designated areas of Dublin, is well in excess of £300 million. This is probably the most practical example of the effects of the factors I have mentioned on sites heretofore derelict, as most of them were. In addition to being a tribute to the corporation, this is also a tribute to the economic circumstances which have brought about this massive investment.
Having said all that, it seems that there are cases where people are in possession of sites which are eyesores and which they seem to be prepared to do nothing about. Perhaps they intend to hold them and hope that their nuisance value, or demands for development of adjoining properties, will eventually lead to a better price. In cases like that, I hope local authorities and the Minister in exercising his powers of direction under the Bill, will pay particular attention to them when the Bill is enacted.
I congratulate the Minister on the Bill.
This is a very welcome Bill, although I have some hesitations of a technical nature about it. I have no doubt about the intention of the Bill. Generally speaking I have some reservations about the intentions as I may interpret them in a slightly sinister fashion but I am sure the Minister will be able to reassure me on this.
I would like to say what a pleasure it is to take part in a debate in which the Minister, Deputy Flynn, and the Minister of State, Deputy Connolly, are involved, because they are two people who are usually so much in command of the brief that they are able to go outside the drafted script and answer — with the assistance, of course, of their colleagues — some of the questions that are put at this stage of a Bill. I sincerely hope that this will be the case.
I would like to make some general prefatory remarks referring to the general connotation of the Bill and to some of the previous speeches, and then to look in succession at three documents I have before me. First, the Minister's speech itself, then the explanatory memorandum to the Bill and then apply what I understand from these two documents to the third, which is the Bill itself. I speak, not from a position of authority — because I am not a parliamentary draftsman, I am not an architect, I am not a surveyor — but in a sense I am, I hope, a gifted amateur. I may have isolated problems from my direct practical experience of rehabilitation within the inner city, and I speak particularly of derelict sites and buildings within the inner city rather than land, which was a subject extensively explored by one of the previous speakers. Perhaps my direct experience may have unearthed some problems which I hope the Minister, or Ministers, will be able to address when the Bill comes before the House.
This is a welcome and innovative step. The intention is clearly to give some kind of teeth to existing legislation, which is notoriously weak and under which it is quite impossible to do anything to discourage the increasing dereliction of our cities, and, as the Minister I am sure is aware, even the limited powers that existed up until about 1963 for the corporation to go in and do remedial works, were removed in or about 1963 by amendments to Local Government Acts. That is something that may be addressed by the Bill.
Having paid a certain tribute to the two Ministers involved, I would like, to say on this occasion, without I hope being patronising — because I am sure it is possible to patronise a distinguished Member of this House who is a former Lord Mayor of Dublin — how very impressed indeed I was by the speech of my colleague, Alderman Carmencita Hederman, who also speaks from direct experience of restoration work, in this instance on the south inner city. It was a very carefully thought out, very concise and very direct contribution to the debate, one I think that is valuable and with most of what she said I heartily agreed and I will want to amplify some of those points.
However, with regard to the Minister, I endorse very much the suggestion that the Minister may like to come on a brief tour — and I will certainly take up Senator Hederman's invitation myself to participate in this and perhaps we can share the city between south and north of the Liffey. However, I am aware of the Minister's good intentions in this regard. I remember very early in his appointment to the Department of the Environment under a previous Administration he made it perfectly clear that he intended to be a Minister for the Environment not just for, or indeed from, the rural areas, from the country, but also very much a Minister for Dublin, and he underlined at that time the fact that he, as a public representative, had lived for nearly ten years in the area of Dublin between the two canals and frequently walked around the city to have a look at what was going on there in terms of dereliction. So, he may, in fact, know quite a considerable amount about it.
Reference was made to the absence of tax breaks which are important. They are not directly dealt with in this Bill and there is no reason they should be but since they were referred to, perhaps I might refer to them myself because I like to be positive even about Fianna Fáil, and say that some small move was made in this direction in the last budget. A beginning was made there where three and a half pages of amendments were written into the budget, giving for the first time tax incentives to those who renew, rehabilitate or refurbish houses of artistic, historical or cultural importance which also happen to fall within the designated areas. That is a welcome indication, as is this Bill, that the Government have decided it is time something should be done about this problem. It was done in response to popular demand. It is not something that originated instinctually with politicians.
Senator Hederman referred to the ERDO report. There is no question of doubt that the Government were fully committed to the ERDO report; in fact, several Governments were, and what actually derailed it was the Dublin crisis conference that was held, the second mass meeting of which was cunningly timed to coincide with an election. On that occasion we had both the Taoiseach and the Leader of the Opposition in attendance to hear the outrage of the risen people of Dublin at this appalling example of reactive planning without any direct intervention by the State to stem the flow from the inner city, to plan for ribbon development all along the coast and so on. The response to the ERDO report and its subsequent dropping is an important indicator of change, but of change that comes from the bottom up, as I think the sensitivity towards the problems of the city of Dublin in particular have also come.
Turning directly to the Minister's speech I note in his introduction that he refers to the debate in the Dáil, although he has not shown any real willingness to take on board amendments that were proposed in the Dáil, and I hope that perhaps if these are substantially reinforced in the Seanad, he will perhaps think again.
There are a number of points that worry me with regard to the limitations of the Bill as I understand them but I could possibly be wrong on this. First, and this is not really directly adverted to in the Minister's speech, I see from learned comment in the newspapers that, for example, the proliferation of car parks within the city is not brought under the control of the civic authorities by this Bill. In other words, where an area has been cleared, levelled, tarmac surfaced and fenced for use as a public car park, this Bill will in fact not have any legal effect. I wonder if this is the case, because car parks are not an adornment to the city. In my opinion there are far too many privately operated car parks which can be a very considerable eyesore, as well as being a major collecting point for rubbish during the day and an assembly point for drunkards and undesirables at night. The kind of fencing that is placed around them does not inhibit their use either as assembly points or, not to put too fine an edge on it, as public lavatories late at night. Often these places are not just unpleasant and unseemly to look at but they actually constitute a considerable health risk.
In the section where the Minister deals with the history of the derelict sites code he cites the Acquisition of Derelict Sites Act, 1940, which enabled local authorities to secure the clearance of derelict sites by acquisition or by the threat of acquisition. This is an interesting beginning, but if one looks at the situation in Dublin throughout the 1940s when there was a major period of slum clearance, one is struck by the fact that this instrument was directed against the 18th century core of the city. I remember, for example, in particular, the way in which an enormous swathe was cut, beginning in about 1949 with Dominick Street through some of the finest aspects of our architectural heritage.
I have to agree with Senator Hederman when she says that one of the problems with this Bill is that there can be no question of doubt that the principal culprit in the city of Dublin is the local authority itself. Dublin Corporation has under a number of headings, created the vast preponderance of urban blight in this city. I say this, not intending to cause any bitterness, but simply to place on record what is the fact. First, as happened in Dominick Street where a very important street was levelled and a totally unsympathetic acontextual local authority development of housing was set in place instead of the 18th century buildings, Gardiner Street, and Sean MacDermott Street, were all areas which were blighted and destroyed by clumsy and ill-advised attempts to destroy the core of the city and replace it by the very necessary development of local authority housing. I have to say that although I am critical of Dublin Corporation, I accept absolutely that if an opposition is raised between buildings on the one hand and people on the other, in the mind of the ordinary citizen of this country there is no question of doubt that the rights of people to have a decent environment, a decent place to live, will always be upheld and that is quite proper. Both Ministers and their advisers are subtle enough to understand that in other countries these two objectives have not been found to be in conflict and they can be resolved within the scope of public policy.
I also have to join with other Senators who pointed to the devastation caused by what is known as motorway blight. Again, we isolate the motor car as a principal enemy of the city. What a pity we do not learn from the experience of other cities. Urban planning and inner city redevelopment is one area in which I am profoundly glad that in some aspects at least we are ten years behind most of the continental cities because we at least had the opportunity to learn from them but we show no sign of doing so at all. I could list 20 major cities in Europe who wish they had the opportunity to undo their road development of the 1960s and yet here we are in Dublin refusing to learn from their mistakes.
I remember, as will the Minister who is involved with the environment, I am sure, that a number of us were issuing warnings in the 1970s when the back boiler grants were being introduced we predicted that there was going to be a problem. Other cities had found this and yet they went helter-skelter and created the situation that we have got with regard to smog, despite the warnings that were given. Now, of course, everybody is falling over backwards to try and do something and all are being super-virtuous about the situation.
I would like to put it to the Minister that with regard to motorway blight, and this kind of dereliction which was detailed by Senator Hederman, we still have some opportunity to do something. It is for this reason that I, and Senator Hederman, are concerned at section 2 (1) where there is the specific exclusion of local authorities from the operation of this Bill:
"urban land" means a derelict site in an urban area which has been entered on the register but does not include any occupied dwelling or land owned by a State authority or by the local authority in whose functional area the land is situated or land in relation to which ...(b) a development objective exists for the purpose of reserving the land for roads or parking places or for any of the purposes of reserving or preserving land indicated in Part IV of the Third Schedule to the Local Government Planning and Development Act, 1963.
It is regrettable that this clause is contained because it simply allows irresponsible local authorities to continue with the process of blighting which has been a notable feature of this city.
Again, reference was made to the absence, for example, of things that any ordinary person can notice, the absence of corners, the absence of streetscapes, simply because these have been obliterated in the pursuit of road development. On this subject I am not going to be tedious because I am sure the Minister is well aware of the very valuable work done in a series of intensively researched articles by The Irish Times environmental correspondent, Frank McDonald.
The Minister continued by referring to the Derelict Sites Act, 1961, which widened the scope of original definitions by attempting to facilitate voluntary clearance and improvement of objectionable lands and buildings by property owners. I am not sure that it actually succeeded in doing anything like that, nor am I convinced, for some technical reason that I will come to later, that this Bill actually manages to go very much further. One of the reasons is that although — and I will come back to this if I may — the Explanatory Memorandum suggests that the intention is to extend the definition of derelict site to include certain buildings, I am not convinced, and perhaps the Minister can convince me, that it actually succeeds in doing so. There is another technical point which perhaps I will have an opportunity to say a little bit about when I look at the section of the Bill, I am not sure that sufficient understanding exists in the mind of the framers of the Bill of the facts on the ground with regard to property ownership, because several sections speak, for example, about action being taken against the owner of the land, in many situations, particularly within the inner city, the ownership of the land is quite different from the ownership of the building that is placed upon it. I could instance a large number of inner city areas where there is very considerable blight and dereliction of buildings visible from the street, where the ground rent is held by somebody quite separate from the person who is the owner or the proprietor or the occupant of the building. There is a difference between the owner of the building and the owner of the ground rent. In fact, owners of ground rents can in some instances be extremely difficult to trace. They very often have extra territorial residence. I am not sure how this Bill addresses that point because it appears to direct itself principally to the owner of the land. For this reason the question of the relationship between land and buildings upon that land has not been sufficiently worked out. The Minister, of course, makes the point that he sees it as an improvement, because previously Acts that were enforced only became relevant when the site was totally derelict and no mechanism existed for preventing the running down of many a fine neighbourhood.
With regard to the Minister's remarks about urban dereliction generally, I heartily applaud the context within which he places this because he indicates that he is aware — as the Taoiseach, Deputy Haughey, has also shown himself to be aware — that the decline in the attractiveness of our inner cities and urban areas is a major problem with regard to the capacity that organisations like Bord Fáilte have to market Ireland as a tourist resort. I have said many times, repeating the words of the Taoiseach, that it has come to the attention of most people in this industry that tourism is one of the most significant income generators in the country, that it has shown a capacity to expand, although proportionately Ireland's share of the tourist market is declining globally. Nevertheless that is the section within the tourism section that has the maximum capacity for development and has shown the greater capacity for growth in what is known as cultural tourism. That means writers like James Joyce, Jonathan Swift, Sean O'Casey et al, on the one hand and architecture, either the medieval architecture of the great ruined abbeys and so on, the cathedrals, the beehive oratories at Gallarus and so on, or on the other hand, principally the great 18th century streetscapes and squares of the cities, like Dublin, Limerick or Waterford. It is important that this should be recognised and I am pleased that the Minister has done so.
The Minister also refers to the extensive dereliction that has been allowed within what he calls the canal ring, 160 acres, seven times the size of St. Stephen's Green. Who is responsible? The local authorities. Does the Bill do anything about the local authorities? No. It goes out of its way to exempt them in terms of road development. It makes it perfectly clear that the local authority are the people vested with the responsibility for taking prosecutions or initiating actions under this Bill. Does the Minister seriously suppose the local authorities are going to place themselves in the dock?
I wish that there was a mechanism in this Bill which allowed the individual citizen recourse to some legal agency so that they could bring a defaulting land proprietor before a tribunal of some kind rather than leaving it to the local authority. I say this with some passion because I happen to live next door to a house in decay. It is one of a series of several hundred houses assembled by an absentee property owner in this city. The house is falling down, the back wall is held up by rack shores. Do I, as somebody who has to live next door to this, despite the fact that I have, spent considerable sums of money restoring my own house, have any recourse to the law? Can I drag these people before some kind of agency? Has it all got to be left to a local authority, that may be reluctant to do so for one reason or another — one reason I have no doubt would be a kind of a gap in finances.
If remedial works are carried out by local authorities, even if they recoup this expense later from the defaulting proprietor of the land or building, there will certainly be a gap in the time before they are able to do this. I would like to ask the Minister a very specific question on this: has he given any consideration to the institution of a new officer of central government, who could be known as a "receiver of derelict buildings"? This is an idea I understand was mooted. I would like to hear if there is any intention to contemplate this, because this would be effective, this would give teeth to this kind of legislation with regard to buildings. The intention behind the establishment of such an office, the "receiver of derelict buildings," would be that an individual like myself, for example, or many other people who are placed in this situation, could apply to have a building brought into receivership through the appointment of the receiver of derelict buildings, so that he or she could come in, take over a building that was either derelict or in the process of going derelict, refurbish that building and then offer it back to the original owner for the cost of the remedial works, and if this was not acceptable, place it on the market with a reserve price set at the cost of the rehabilitation.
I hope that the Minister will consider this since it is clear that one intention at least is to suggest to the public that this Bill addresses that problem. Unfortunately, in my opinion it does not. The fact that it does not is underlined by the existence of quite considerable confusion between "land" on the one hand, which is referred to occasionally and "sites" on the other. To me, reading it as a layman, the Bill and Explanatory Memorandum, and the Minister's speech, all seem to use these terms, almost as if they were interchangeable. There is a kind of a haphazard quality about the choice of the occasion on which the words "land" or "site" are used. Perhaps there is some specific legal intention behind the choice of those occasions on which the word "land" is used and the occasion on which the word "site" is used. I would like some clarification from the Minister on this.
I welcome the section which will give to the Minister for the Environment reserve powers to direct a local authority to take enforcement action or to improve a derelict site in their own ownership. This goes perhaps some small way towards rectifying the situation I have pointed out, but I do not believe that it is, in any sense, strong enough.
The paragraph that follows that says it is intended to enable the Minister for the Environment, after consultation with the appropriate Minister, to direct any statutory body to dispose of derelict land in their possession which is not necessary for their functions. Again, I wonder why on this occasion the Minister in his speech chooses the word "land". Although land is important, so are the buildings and I would have to say that some statutory bodies in the city of Dublin, and I am sure within other cities, are notoriously neglectful.
I have to reinforce once more what Senator Hederman said about the Dublin Vocational Education Committee. They are a public disgrace. I could instance a number of cases in which they have contributed, if not deliberately, by monstrous neglect to the destruction of our architectural heritage. I could mention, for example, Nos. 18 and 19 Parnell Square, which they appeared deliberately to neglect, despite the warnings that were given by public figures, that were offered by An Taisce and by individuals concerned with the preservation of this section of our heritage which is vested in those statutory bodies as a public trust. The committee allowed the roofs to be interfered with, lead taken away and valuable 18th century fireplaces were stolen. The fireplaces were subsequently found on a lorry that was stopped as it crossed the Border. Those two houses were devastated.
There is also No. 20, North Great George's Street, the home of Sir Samuel Ferguson who wrote the "Lark in the Clear Air", a house with some of the finest ceilings on the north side of Dublin in the classical Adam manner. The Dublin City Vocational Education Committee are refusing to give that house to an agency such as Dublin Tourism, who intended to refurbish it as an 18th century townhouse complete with furniture and apparel of the period — an exercise which I may remind the Minister was extraordinarily successful in tourism terms just across the square here, thanks to the ESB. The VEC refused to allow this process to occur because they wanted to flatten the last remaining 18th century garden on the north side of the city, flatten a very fine range of Gothic outbuildings, devastate the lower section of the building, interfere with the plasterwork, and so on, all in the interest of providing a car park for their officials in Parnell Square, for the bureaucrats. The building is continuing to decline. Missiles are fired at people from the top windows and it is almost dangerous to pass it. There is the nuisance of noise, dirt, squalor and dereliction.
I hope that the word "land" in this section is also extended to buildings. I urge the Minister to bear in mind what I have had to say about the Dublin Vocational Education Committee, particularly with regard to Parnell Square and North Great George's Street.
I would like to turn to the Minister's script where he notes the comment in the NESC report, that local authority action contributes to high values in that the absence of a development or sales policy for derelict sites acts to restrict supply and induce blight. I have no doubt that this is true. It is also true that they contribute to low values in certain instances by blight; the high values only occur when there is a kind of an accumulation of land that restricts land supply, but they can also affect the situation in a markedly different way, although I have to be reasonable and fair-minded, and say that the policy of the corporation at present and of the Government in encouraging the development of special incentive areas, particularly in the north inner city of Dublin, is a welcome development and is beginning to be successful. I trust it will be continued.
I have some concerns when the Minister says that the definition of "statutory body" does not extend to Ministers of Government or the Office of Public Works because he says it would be inappropriate and inconsistent with the concept of the collective responsibility of Government that the Minister for the Environment should be in the position of issuing formal statutory directions to fellow Ministers regarding disposal of their land interest or any other matter. Why be so lily-livered? I am sure Ministers frequently bully their colleagues and I wish him to have the opportunity so to do in this matter. I accept, of course, the concept of Cabinet responsibility, collective responsibility and all the rest of it but I would like to ask the Minister if the collective responsibility of the Government, which is after all a political consideration, really comes before the public good. If there is a scandal with regard to the abuse of buildings held in trust by one section of Government, why should the Minister who is charged with responsibility for the Environment not issue an order against the other Minister concerned? I realise it might not be all that popular but people who are prepared to be a little unpopular with their colleagues are frequently very popular with their voters. I recommend the Minister to consider the appropriateness of this attitude as expressed in his speech.
I accept absolutely what the Minister says with regard to the levy. I very much welcome the imposition of a levy on derelict sites. I accept that it is not the intention to create additional revenue for local authorities in this way but to have the levy act as an efficiency tax and to secure better use for urban land. I believe this will be its operation. However, I regret the Minister appears to leave it very much at the discretion of functionaries, including himself, as to the purposes to which the money may be applied. I wish there was greater care because nothing disillusions people more than the feeling that money is exacted by levy in one area and then applied to something totally different. There should be a kind of correspondence. If money is levied from people who are in flagrant abuse of their responsibilities in terms of the environment that money should be applied to the amelioration of the problem in the area concerned.
I would like in my final comment on the Minister's speech to say I greatly regret the sentence, that "special arrangements may also be operated at the discretion of the local authorities for bona fide site assembly". What is bona fide site assembly? Who decides that? There are many instances in this city of where sites have been assembled quite unscrupulously and the decay of buildings encouraged and facilitated by the owners in order to ensure the clearance of the site and its availability for redevelopment, despite the existence on the site of listed buildings. I am horrified that exemption should be considered precisely in the area where the greatest damage is being done.
This is why, although I welcome the general intention and scope of the Bill, I feel that it is flawed. I am not saying that this is a direct illustration of it, but I would like to point out to the Minister the situation along the quays and a particular problem that has been emerging over the past few months; I speak about Nos. 5, 6 and 7 Bachelors Walk. Up to about 18 months ago those three houses were perfectly sound. They were assembled as a site by a bona fide speculator. Within a short time No. 5 was vandalised to such a degree — it was set on fire — that it had to be demolished. That was on foot of a northside planning permission on the basis of the provision that where a building is acquired, a listed building, but is allowed to go derelict, a Dangerous Buildings Order can be sought so that it can be demolished on foot of that order. That was done with regard to No. 5.
The demolition of No. 5 destabilised No. 6 and now there is apparently a problem with regard to the finest building, No. 7, which has a uniquely rich panelled interior and staircase.
As I understand the operation of this provision of the Minister's, this is precisely the kind of thing that would be excluded from the operation of the Bill. It seems to me, on reading the Minister's speech, let alone the Explanatory Memorandum or the Bill, that the intentions of the Bill are frustrated by its content. I think that is greatly to be deplored although, as I say, in general terms I welcome the Bill.
Debate adjourned.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Will the acting Leader of the House tell us when it is proposed to sit again?
It is proposed to sit at 2.30 p.m. on Wednesday, 13 December 1989.