I am delighted that the Minister for State is here because I know the interest he takes in these matters and the attention he gives to replies.
The motion is self-explanatory. I am sure the Minister knows that up to 1983 there were no charges. In February 1983 charges were first introduced. I applaud any Government or Department who try to balance their budget and raise much needed revenue. I am not of the school that thinks that money grows on trees and that we can spend recklessly without having to finance the various Departments.
I presume the Minister will tell us the fees were introduced to raise revenue. I would like to make it clear that it is perfectly equitable that a developer when applying for permission to undertake a major development should have to pay fees both to the planning authority for the large amount of work which they have to undertake and to the Department, if there should be an appeal. My remarks this evening do not affect those.
When these charges were introduced in 1983 it was £36 for a third party appeal. That was for an individual who was not party to the appeal. One had to pay £10 to write a letter to the local authority to make a point — to point out perhaps something which in your opinion might be invalid in the application. You might want to bring something to their attention. You might notice, as I did recently, that an application stated that there had been planning permission for a house where in fact there was not. The residents' association wrote to the corporation. At that stage also £10 had to be paid if you wished to bring an observation to the attention of the planning appeals board even if you supported the local authority and were on their side.
These charges, which put a very heavy burden on third party appellants, were considered outrageous by voluntary organisations, resident associations, ACRA, An Taisce and a large number of groups who mounted a fairly sustained protest. Thankfully, we must be grateful for small mercies, in February 1985, about two years after it had been introduced, the £10 charge for making an observation to the corporation was dropped. Those who were involved were very grateful for that although they were very disappointed that all the charges were not dropped.
The situation continued until February 1990. Everything seems to happen in February in the Minister's Department. In February 1990 the £36 fee for an appeal was increased to £50. The £10 fee for an observation made to the appeals board went up to £15. Now £50 has to be paid to request an oral hearing, irrespective of whether you are granted it. I do not know what percentage of requests are granted; by merely asking if they would be prepared to have an oral hearing you have to pay £50.
There were also charges — I will not go into them in too much detail because I am sure the Minister is already aware of them — for making a reference. These are very often of importance. My own residents' association, the Upper Leeson Street Area Residents' Association, being very concerned and distressed to see the great damage to the environment in the city by the introduction of very out of place and incongruous PVC aluminium windows made a reference to the board to ascertain whether the board consider it is exempted development or not. There again there are charges made for that. To my knowledge, those references are made fairly rarely so I would not be as concerned about them. It is the other ones that I want to speak about.
I know that An Taisce, An Bord Fáilte and the fisheries board — I am not sure if there is a fourth one — pay only 50 per cent. They pay only 25 per cent if they want to take an appeal and they do not pay anything for making an observation.
I have been interested in planning for a great number of years and I am, as a community alderman in Dublin City Council for 17 years, very closely in touch with the residents' associations and voluntary groups not only in the Pembroke Ward and perhaps the Rathmines Ward but throughout the city. These charges are a very great burden on local residents' associations, voluntary groups and groups whose prime purpose is to assist the statutory bodies in preserving and protecting our environment. These people are all voluntary workers. They devote a great deal of their spare time to the activities of their local community groups or residents' association or whatever it may be. It is most unfair to expect them now — which is what has happened since the fees were increased — to engage in continuous fund raising. Subscriptions from their members are no longer able to cover all these charges.
These organisations are also involved in a great deal of social activity and good work generally in their areas. They organise oldfolks parties at Christmas and have street parties in the areas in summer time to enhance and develop the feeling of community and closeness in the locality. Last year Sandymount entered the Tidy Towns Competition for the first time and I am very happy about that. To do that successfully involves spending a great deal of money on equipment and so on. Many associations take part in clean-ups. Only last evening the Wellington branch of the Upper Leeson Street Association were out voluntarily tidying the verges, trimming, cutting and so on. In Belgrave and Dartmouth Square the residents were active in pressurising the local authorities to open the parks to the public. That was very worthwhile and much appreciated. They run garden competitions. In Beechwood they have been involved in tree planting. They are also very successfully involved in recycling programmes which the Minister knows are extremely important. St. Mary's Road, for instance, spent a lot of time getting residential parking permits introduced in their area. There are a great range of things which a local association does and they are all, the Minister will agree, immensely beneficial.
It has now reached the stage where these associations find themselves unable to undertake many of these worthwhile projects because they need money to pay the Minister's Department the lousy £50 for the appeal and another £50 for the oral hearing, etc.
Local authorities, and certainly in my case Dublin Corporation, depend very heavily on local knowledge provided by these organisations to — and I do not like to use the word "police" the area — bring to the attention of the local authority if a house is being allowed to decay or to be illegally pulled down, if an office has been illegally put into a building and so on. The Minister knows it is simply not possible for the local authority to have planning inspectors going around day and night watching for these things, so they rely on local associations for information. In the same way when a planning application comes before a local authority, very often they do not have local knowledge and expertise so they depend on letters from residents' associations, which, of course, are received. But when residents' associations want to send in a letter to the planning appeals board they find they have to pay £15.
In Dublin there were eight planning inspectors for the entire city and now there are seven. The situation is becoming more and more difficult. Instead of discouraging these local organisations from assisting the planning appeals board, which is under the Minister's aegis, they should be encouraged to feed information to the planning board. That would save a great deal of money. The Minister will agree that it is very difficult for seven inspectors to do anything worthwhile. Very often these associations have to engage senior counsel or solicitors and go to court. There was a very famous case which I am sure was seen recently about the Richard Crosbie Tavern in Ranelagh where the residents association in east Ranelagh spent £1,500 in 1990 on a court case plus another £700 for an appearance. This year they spent £9,000 trying to prevent this massive pub which can accommodate about 1,000 being granted a licence. They do this not in any way to try to discourage legitimate business but because they know that it would make this an intolerable area in which to live. In my own area every association I know takes an average of two to three appeals, some of them take more. In addition to that I would like to remind the Minister that they have to spend £30 to get the planning list from the corporation. There is a whole range of expenses with which they are involved.
I mentioned how a planning authority depend on a local association for information. When a developer appeals against a decision by the local authority, the corporation attends the planning appeal as does the local residents association. Very often they are able to add considerably to the information available which is invaluable to the inspector making a decision. I remember about 20 years ago when I was a very young girl I went to my first planning appeal. It was in the days when there were three or four planning appeals in one morning. It is quite different now, they have all become so complicated. The solicitor for the corporation had already done three appeals and I suppose he was fairly exhausted. This particular one was the last one and he said to the inspector, "I just want to open the case but there is somebody here beside me who knows far more about this than I do". I was very young and very nervous in those days but he turned to me and I had to literally put the whole case. As it happened, he was quite right, as I knew far more about it and had much more detail. That may be an extreme example but it shows the extent to which the corporation can depend on a local authority.
I trust the Minister will be able to accede to some reduction in this heavy burden of charges. If a residents' association make an observation to a local authority about an application, and if there is an appeal, the local residents association's observations are not sent on, although the public assume that they are. That means that the local association have to make the observation to the planning appeals board and pay £50. I will not go on too long. I am sure the Minister has got the thrust of what I am saying but I hope he will not say, as some of his predecessors have done, that all of this is to deter frivolous appeals being made. I know and the Minister knows that £50 will not deter any genuinely frivolous, if that is not a contradiction in terms, applicant. In 20 years of being involved in planning I have never come across a frivolous appeal. I am aware that they are made and that disgracefully on some occasions people make a frivolous appeal simply so they can go along to the developer and say "pay me so much and I will withdraw the appeal". If those are the sort of people we are thinking about a fee of £50 will not deter them because there is far more at stake. In the planning Acts there is a very strong section which deals with frivolous appeals and they can be thrown out straight away.
We must try to pay our way but I do not think it is reasonable to ask that people pay their way to such an extent that they are denied involvement in the democratic process. What is happening is that these associations are no longer in a position to be involved in the planning process. Even in an extreme moment of wondering where the Minister might get money from, I am sure he would never contemplate asking people to pay to go out and vote in an election, which is also taking part in a democratic process, but he is making people pay to participate in the democratic processes of planning, thus denying them a democratic right. I heard from the Minister, Deputy Flynn, that the Department are anxious that local democracy should get a little airing now — it has not had much for 20 or 30 years. Some very nice things were said. Mind you, we did not see much of it in the recent Bill. If the Minister would like to make one small but significant contribution to local involvement by people this is, I suggest, a good place to start. I thank the Minister for his attention and I hope we will hear a favourable response from him.
