Deputy Hogan was in possession and he has 19 minutes remaining.
Planning and Development Bill, 1999 [ Seanad ] : Second Stage (Resumed).
Question again proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
This Bill is a welcome review of the planning and development code, which was initially enacted in 1963. It will consolidate in one Act all the planning and development legislation enacted since then. The Bill has the stated objective of making the planning system more efficient. With 245 sections arranged in 18 Parts and six Schedules, it presents an opportunity to address the serious deficiencies in the planning system. There are sufficient reasons, of which we are all aware, to update the planning laws. This alone would have made the Bill necessary, without it including a very important and significant section dealing with housing matters.
The legislation proposed by the Minister has attracted considerable interest and controversy. The Long Title is indicative of intent and it will inevitably give rise to debate on the definition of the term "sustainable development". Does it mean that all facilities will be located in the one location or does it propose to set out a way by which people can live and work in the same general area?
When the Bill was published the Minister and the Taoiseach said in a dictatorial tone that the Government was prepared to bulldoze its provisions through, even if it meant constitutional change. Furthermore, the Minister said the legislation would apply to all transactions made after 25 August 1999. This meant that he was prepared to oversee the introduction of retrospective legislation. I doubt if this is possible under law and I look forward to his views on how it can be applied to transactions that have occurred since last August.
Planning should introduce certainty and consistency in the system. Section 4 provides that planning permission will be required for the cutting of turf and the planting of trees. This probably arises following the recent case of the EU Commission v. Ireland where we were deemed to have failed to properly transpose into law the 1985 EU directive. According to an article by James Macken SC, published last December in the Bar Review, the provisions of section 4 dealing with the thinning, felling and replanting of trees, forests and woodlands, will create confusion. The exemptions which apply at present will continue as long as the replacement of broadleaf high forests by conifers is not involved. This will undoubtedly lead to debate and litigation, especially in the midlands and the west. The timing of the initial planting period will also cause controversy and heartache in terms of its implementation.
The current planning process is slow and tortuous. It does not lead to the fast-tracking of major developments contained in the national development plan, published in November 1999. The level of consultation required to deal with and implement some of the major proposals in the plan, especially the roads developments and the advertising of the procedures set out under Part X, will make the planning process very slow and this will be exacerbated by the low staff levels in local authorities, which are not in keeping with the scale of developments and numbers of applications coming before them. There were 1,800 applications to Kilkenny County Council in 1999, three times higher than the number five years ago. Yet, the resources available to the local authority have not increased. If more staff were to be deployed in this area other services would have to be cut back.
The Minister must address the question of resources. How is each local authority to obtain the necessary resources to implement changes in terms of planning staff numbers and responsibilities if the requirements of the legislation are to be implemented? Local authority planning and engineering staff are scarce because of the buoyancy of the private sector. Hardly a month passes without changes in the engineering and planning staff, to the detriment of the service to the community. The Minister should carry out an audit of the difficulties faced by each local authority and the pay and conditions required to ensure that staff stay with public authorities rather than leave to work in the private sector, which is happening at an alarming rate.
The lack of infrastructural investment is a serious matter for local authorities, especially with regard to planning for housing sites. The huge pressure on large urban areas is exacerbated when account is taken of infrastructural short falls. For example, Kilkenny requires approximately £22 million to upgrade the water supply and £12 million is required to improve sewerage facilities in the villages outside Kilkenny city. This puts a huge strain on development requirements in towns and villages around the county at a time when demand by local people to live in their own area is unprecedented. The restrictions in the county development plan are even greater when it is considered that the Southern Fisheries Board rightly keeps a watchful eye on planning applications because of concern about the capacity of sewerage and water facilities to sustain it.
If the Minister is indicating that sustainable development is a prerequisite to good planning and development he has failed in his two and a half years in office to recognise the problems involved in places like Kilkenny. Not a sod has been turned in County Kilkenny to improve the problems relating to water and sewerage services since he took up office. Places such as Graiguenamanagh, Thomastown, Kilmacow, Urlingford, Freshford and Ballyragget are crying out for development, with developers anxious to work and young people seeking planning permission. However, there is a constant refusal by the local authorities to sanction these projects and developments because of the inadequate amount of infrastructure available in these locations, which must be addressed through direct State investment.
Many statements have been made by the Government relating to the introduction of public private partnerships in order to mobilise private capital to assist local authorities in meeting the huge infrastructural deficit throughout the country. This is a huge challenge for the Government, and I am disappointed the concept of public private partnerships has not been implemented and that there is no indication when they will be fully operational under the Department of Finance. We need to know the criteria by which private investment could be mobilised to implement and build the necessary infrastructure as soon as possible if the objectives of the national development plan are to be implemented.
I am told that 8,000 acres have been zoned in Dublin for housing but that only 2,600 acres are serviced and that it will take three or four years before the remainder is serviced. This is an indication of the problems faced by local authorities in meeting the objectives laid down by the Government in terms of the housing needs of young married couples and in addressing the long housing waiting lists throughout the country.
I have encountered difficulties in terms of planning being caused by Dúchas which in places such as Kilkenny and Thomastown. It is disheartening that there are 3,000 applications with Dúchas and that nothing is being done with them in terms of processing the licensing arrangements required in respect of each application to allow planning and development to take place. This problem has been on the desk of the Minister for Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands for the past two years and she has done absolutely nothing about it. In recent days we were told the Department will take on eight extra staff to deal with the backlog and allow new applications to be taken. How can there be planning and development in towns which have heritage of archaeological and architectural significance if there is insufficient staff to deal with the applications as quickly as possible? Dúchas is holding up essential work in many parts of the country. I am familiar with one such case in Thomastown, County Kilkenny, where a shopkeeper wanted to build a 12 feet by 12 feet extension. The owner applied for the necessary planning permission to the local authority and was told that the cost of an archaeological report, a necessary part of the application, would be £3,000. This is a serious deficiency in the provision of the necessary services required by the general public in relation to planning and development, and a more urgent response is required from the Minister.
I strongly support the strength of legislation protecting our heritage and architecture, but the necessary human resources must be put in place to allow local authorities cope with the additional responsibilities imposed on them through legislation relating to national monuments and our heritage which has been passed in recent years. We have lost too much that is of value from our past over the years and we cannot afford to lose any more. I am very worried that in the planning and development of our motorway system, which the Government is anxious to proceed with as soon as possible, we will have a coach and four driven through many major archaeological sites which have not yet been discovered. I hope the necessary expertise and staff will be deployed to ensure this does not happen, while still allowing for the developments to go ahead as soon as possible.
The Ceann Comhairle will be aware that we can be critical of decisions made by An Bord Pleanála in terms of our planning experience in various off high street locations in Kilkenny city, where a number of historical artefacts were not protected to a sufficient extent. The walls of Kilkenny and buildings behind Patrick Street should have been saved and restored rather than plundered for short-term development gains and opportunities. On the other hand Dúchas is being irresponsible in terms of the undue delays in reaching decisions on planning applications. I ask that the legislation include a timescale setting out the response time of Dúchas to a local authority or planning applicant in relation to sensitive applications.
I welcome Part II of the Bill which clearly pressurises local authorities to regularly review the development plan and which sets time limits of one year for the completion of the draft plan, of 16 weeks for the second round of public consultation and of eight weeks thereafter for the council to adopt the plan. This definitive procedure gives certainty to local authorities and the general public regarding the various stages of the development plan process.
The strength of the economy and the pressure on major urban centres emphasises the need for greater use to be made of local area planning. I fundamentally disagree with the Minister in relation to his controversial objective of providing 20% of land for social housing and the manner in which he wants to implement that objective. Councillors and officials decide the zoning on land when the local authority is developing an area action plan, and they take account of the need for a social mix in terms of local authority or private housing. They also take account of the need for commercial and recreational opportunities in the area. The concept of area action plans must be enshrined more explicitly in the legislation in order to force local authorities and developers who are developing land to produce a strategic development zone for housing, in addition to industry as is proposed in the Bill. Section 190 deals with strategic development zones for industry, and I wonder why such zones for housing are not also included as they would mean that major consortia and developers could come to terms with what is required and be involved in the building a sustainable community. If the Minister is serious about sustainable development in practice, the action area plan process provides an opportunity whereby local representatives and people, in advance of a sod being turned, can be involved from the start to ensure we have sustainable development and a proper social mix. I suggest this approach rather than asking builders, through a sledge-hammer approach, to do something which will do nothing to reduce the price of houses or meet the social objectives of the Minister.
The Minister has a great opportunity to implement a number of important measures, but he has missed an opportunity, particularly in the area of housing, to draw up a national spatial plan with most development in areas where people live and work being framed along the lines suggested in the Fine Gael document, "The Plan for the Nation", and with public transport services forming a key part of planning and development, whereby pressure would be reduced in places such as Dublin which are already over-congested and where traffic jams are reducing the quality of life for people. The Minister should consider the Fine Gael proposals, which have been endorsed by the ESRI, to develop eight alternative growth centres, one of which I am glad to say is Kilkenny, in order to take the pressure off major urban centres and cities. Strategic development zones for housing and industry should be established and action area plans and indicative planning systems should be introduced so that industrialists and developers will know from the outset where and how they can develop. The community would gain because of the improvements in the quality of people's lives as a result of decentralisation to areas outside Dublin. The maintenance of parks and trade and recreational facilities should form an equal part of the index of quality of life measures which are important in order to keep young people in particular occupied and to reduce the level of crime. Further debate is required and amendments are needed to make the legislation more practical, particularly in regard to the controversial 20% social and affordable housing requirement.
I am delighted to have an opportunity to contribute to this major reforming legislation. There was a real need for this Bill as it consolidates nine Acts which have been introduced since 1963. It is also an essential aid to planners, local authorities, developers, administrators, the legal profession and the public. All of us recognise the need for an effective planning system in a developing economy to reflect the modern investment and development requirements of society.
The Bill is timely as it follows a review and major consultative process with all those affected and it meets a specific commitment made by the Fianna Fáil Party in its programme for Government. I welcome the new and radical measures of this initiative which address major deficiencies in existing legislation, identify shortcomings which currently exist in the planning process and deal with new demands as a result of changed economic circumstances and personal housing preferences, particularly, the need for housing for low income families and social and affordable housing for those seeking home ownership.
The legislation provides more open procedures, which will reduce controversy by responding to the needs of the community and developers and will also involve local consultation. It is important that it is drafted in a manner that is easily understood. General guidelines are necessary to deal with planning at local, regional and national level. However, it is essential that layers of administration are not created because delays, frustration and costs affect the end user. The house owner pays the price for such delays and I have never come across a developer who has borne these costs.
I also welcome the national spatial strategy, which is under preparation, and look forward to the debate which it will generate on how it will influence development plans and regional guidelines. The debate will lead to a national understanding of planning objectives and methods, and not a fragmented and misunderstood set of rules and regulations, which exists currently. I look forward to the Minister outlining the progress of the strategy in his reply to the debate.
I turn to the planning system, which is covered in Part III. The problems faced by planning authorities are appreciated by everybody. Each one receives a huge number of applications, including Mayo County Council. It is also recognised that difficulties and delays are attributable to applicants as a result of inadequately researched and badly presented applications, which are sometimes accompanied by the minimum of supporting material. Such applications are inevitably delayed, but, nevertheless, every effort must be made to improve the operation of the control system. The local authority has a huge role to play in this as it has primary responsibility for the planning system. Representations made to national and local politicians and experience at appeal level provide evidence of the cause of frequent difficulties which arise in the system.
The planning control system must be responsible for the public need and should reflect public aspirations. The community expects that high standards relating to safety, health and amenities will be applied to all new developments and it is entitled to expect that such proposals, regardless of size, will be processed reasonably and expeditiously and that employment opportunities will not be put at risk or deferred because of defects and avoidable delays in the planning system. This is simply not acceptable.
Restrictions and prohibitions may be necessary if orderly development is to be achieved. However, the general approach to development control should not be unduly restrictive and permission should only be refused where there are serious objections on important planning grounds. The circumstances and merits of each case should be considered in the application of planning objectives. The system should also take account of the practical and human problems which arise in any system that affects the property and aspirations of the individual which are relevant to planning. There have been a number of problems in this area in Mayo, especially in regard to SACs where individuals experience difficulties in building a house on the family farm. The planning system does not take significant cognisance of this.
A reasonable, flexible approach together with consistency and equality of treatment is required in the planning process. Rigidity and uniformity should not be the rule except in the case of clearly stated and understood national guidelines. The Bill needs to improve the reputation of the planning system and to achieve this it is necessary that the approach of all planning authorities to development control in housing and other developments should be consistent at all times. That is one of the most important elements of the planning system.
"The last minute call" in regard to planning applications for more information should be the exception rather than the norm. If a proposal needs to be adjusted to make it acceptable, that is as obvious the first day it is presented in the planning office as it is the day before the expiry of the time limit for a decision. Sadly, even in my county, it appears to be the norm that the day before a planning decision is due a telephone call is made seeking additional information. That causes a great deal of frustration for applicants and indicates that the application is not even examined until the time limit is about to expire. I do not know whether the reason for that is lack of staff or a huge volume of applications but, whatever the reason, it must be addressed.
Early assessment of all applications should be a feature of the control system which would facilitate early discussion to allow for necessary adjustments to satisfy the development objectives of the regional plan. It has always been understood that the control system must be flexible, allowing for reasonable discretion in its operation. In the first instance, the development plan is fundamental and essential in regard to development control. It must be basically sound and practical, clearly stated and presented and, most importantly, understood by the public and generally accepted as fair and reasonable.
The sensible application of the agreed plan is another matter. Private interpretation on either side is divisive and punishes the credibility of the system. It also leads to a lack of harmony in the proper development of an area, which is the basic criterion of planning control. When the system operates properly the applicant or the developer and their advisers know where they stand in terms of proper planning principles, which should be articulated in development plans. It is unfortunate that currently when many applications run into difficulty, the applicants or their advisers seem to have no idea about the cause of the difficulty. If a plan has shortcomings and if the development control system operates in an unreasonable or arbitrary way, the outcome will be unsatisfactory and will result in the following: expensive appeals will multiply; developments will be delayed; overloading of systems will mean further delays; a cynical attitude towards the system will develop and a vicious circle will work to everybody's disadvantage.
Everybody recognises that third party objections to a planning authority in relation to planning applications is an essential safeguard in the fair and equitable application of the planning system. Consideration of objections on reasonable grounds is fundamentally democratic and just. However, it is not the purpose of the planning system to protect the private interests of individuals or provide a mechanism for resolving disputes between individuals about those private interests. The effects of proposed developments on adjoining property is a relevant consideration, but the net question for the planning system is whether the public interest or the common good would suffer if a particular proposal were to go ahead.
Compassionate arguments may arise and relevant personal considerations should be examined, but planning applications should be dealt with on the basis of planning considerations and long-term benefit.
The streamlining and the speeding up of the planning system is desirable to allow the necessary housing, commercial and other developments proceed with minimum delay. The Bill is reasonable and fair in the adjustments it recom mends in dealing with objectors and appeals. The revised provision dealing with outline permissions, if properly used, will be of considerable benefit in helping owners and developers to submit proper applications. The outline permission should be an instrument of certainty in support of the application for full permission and not used as a holding instrument to gain time for the control system by being vague, uncertain and ambiguous. Nothing frustrates the system more than ambiguity.
Outline planning permission should form the basic advice to enable a speedy decision on subsequent proposals. That is not the experience in my county and, from listening to other speakers on both sides of the House, it appears to be the same in many counties. If inspections need to be carried out when a person applies for outline planning permission, the inspection should be carried out at that stage, not later.
We recently had a planning conference in my county during which the county council planners explained a number of matters to us. One of the points raised was the whole area of outline planning permission and we were informed that outline permission was not a guarantee that one would get full permission at a later stage because the rules may have changed in the interim. Everybody knows that outline planning permission lasts for a period of five years, and that has to be borne in mind when outline permission is granted. Applicants go to enormous expense to apply for outline planning permission. The reason they apply for outline permission is to have a virtual guarantee that when they apply for full planning permission, they will get it. That is something that must be examined more seriously by local authorities and they must be aware when granting outline planning permission that a full application will be made on that particular location.
I would like to turn to one of the most interesting areas of the Bill, namely, housing. The supply of and demand for housing is the major social question of the decade. Home ownership is a cherished part of the Irish society model, and societal changes, cost and supply and labour force mobility are altering our traditional attitudes to housing. We need to facilitate the new demands of different sectors and to do this we must provide an adequate supply of social and affordable housing and adequate services – infrastructural, public and community – so that communities are better integrated. We must avoid isolation of housing schemes by sectors of the community. We have had some bad experiences of that in the past and they have given us ample reason for the need for lower density schemes and location variety in preference to large, grey, uniform estates.
As a large proportion of planning applications relate to housing, it is important that the same general principles which govern the control of private housing development should be applied also to local authority housing developments. When planning permission is granted for a large estate for the private market, the developers come up with some wonderful ideas in relation to providing a piece of sculpture at the entrance to the estate and plenty of green areas, yet when it comes to building some council estates there appears to be no regard to this matter. It is simply a question of getting as many houses as possible on an area of land. That is unfortunate. The same principles that are applied to private estates must be applied to council estates. That is something local authorities will have to seriously examine in the future.
Seriously prepared and presented proposals deserve the support and advice of the planning system, even if the proposal has planning defects. If the proposal is fundamentally flawed, it must be resisted but if it is not fundamentally objectionable, every effort should be made by the system to overcome the difficulties by advising the applicant as to the changes necessary to make the proposal acceptable. In certain local authorities there is very little communication between the planning authority and the applicant and many of the difficulties that subsequently arise could have been ironed out had all the necessary negotiation and consultation taken place.
It is important also that adequate reason should accompany the advice and every effort should be made to minimise the delays and the costs attached to such advice. There is nothing more frustrating than to be told that one has to put a particular type of house on a site and use particular materials without being given a reason. The changes recommended by planning authorities can sometimes cause enormous expense to the applicant or to a developer, and it is not unreasonable that one would get an adequate reason that the particular change is being sought.
Consultation, discussion, revised plans, modified plans and time extensions all take time and can often be frustrating for individuals and developers. The general principle should be to get it right the first time and avoid protracted negotiations and time and cost penalties. We should remember that in times of escalating prices, every delay has a cost penalty and it is the consumer, the individual home owner-house seeker who is carrying the load. In Castlebar we are experiencing a huge escalation in house prices where a six months delay in a housing application can sometimes add up to £50,000 on the price of a house. I am talking about a typical four bedroom house costing in the region of £150,000 to £200,000 in a small urban centre in a rural county like Mayo. What first-time buyer would be in a position to afford that much money? In many cases, a six months delay to a first-time buyer in those circumstances has put the house outside their reach. That is the reason the local authorities carry a huge responsibility in having applications approved on time.
The system must try to avoid trial and error planning applications – repeat applications to try to find out what is and is not acceptable. The planning authority should endeavour to facilitate the applicant by indicating what is acceptable in accordance with fundamental objectives and not causing delays in pursuit of a simple location alteration on the same site. That is totally unacceptable. The emphasis should be on guiding and encouraging planned development rather than a rigid application of controls. That will require a positive attitude from the planning authority and a clear and unambiguous approach to development control and the works programme of the authority to housing and other developments. It requires a shared understanding between the planning authority and its professional planning office. This is achieved by debate and discussion at official, executive and council level. While development plans will have a six year lifespan, it is desirable that an annual discussion take place at planning authority level to consider progress reports and the implementation of fundamental objectives and output and thereby give full consideration to reviewing proposals rather than rush decisions to meet a statutory deadline. County councillors are democratically elected. They represent all sections of their community and they should have that say on an annual basis.
The demand for housing is affected by a growing economy, growing disposable income, interest rates, supply and cost of land, migration flows and shortages of building workers. We need to stabilise house prices now in advance of an inevitable slow-down of economic growth so as to avoid the possibility of negative equity in the housing market. We need to restore the balance to the housing market which can only be achieved by a significant increase in housing supply. The need is recognised in the national development plan. It is important that the gradual implementation of national plans is resisted. Infrastructural investment and the removal of constraints and delays to developments must be speeded up.
In 1999, the Government spent £500 million on the overall investment in housing. We introduced a multi-annual programme for local authority housing and 22,000 new houses will be started over a four year period. We provided resources for voluntary housing and shared ownership and we introduced the affordable housing scheme. A fundamental objective of this Government is to maximise housing supply in all housing sectors. Therefore, we must accelerate the availability of land for housing and alleviate the constraints on its development.
The planning guidelines on residential density, which were introduced at the end of September, will help efficient use of serviced land. It is important to look at the capacity of the building industry at present. There are serious labour shortages which are critical to the success of building objectives. We cannot build without labour. We have to examine building apprenticeships, what FÁS is doing and the Construction Industry Federation initiatives. We must take account of emigrants returning and where they are going to live.
The shortage of serviced land is key to the housing situation. An initiative was introduced in 1997 and £100 million was provided. Some £39 million was provided by the Government while the balance was made up from development levies. This initiative will yield 100,000 sites by the end of 2000. Housing development should proceed in parallel with the land servicing initiative. Investment in programmes for water and sewerage in 1999 was £275 million. Some £930 million is at planning and construction stage nationally.
I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to this important Bill. As every public representative knows, planning occupies a significant and increasing portion of their available time. This Bill is probably one of the key pieces of legislation to come before the House which will impact on the quality of our lives well into this century.
The Planning and Development Bill is effectively two Bills in one. It is a reforming Bill but it is also a planning Bill with a housing Bill tagged on at Part V which deals with social and affordable housing. It has been tagged on to the Bill despite having its own distinct subject matter and a concise definition portfolio.
This Planning and Development Bill will decide what this country will look like as it progresses through the first half of this new century. It will determine whether people will be in a position to access jobs and services in the areas in which they live or whether they will have to travel for hours each day just to get to work or to go to the local supermarket. The Bill lacks sufficient vision to ensure planning in the future takes account of the need to integrate housing with services and adequate infrastructure. It fails to address the serious quality of life issues which are under severe strain because of the pressure we are placing on our existing infrastructure.
In the past 40 years or so we have moved from a predominantly rural based society to an urban based one. However, we are not equipped to support a heavily urbanised society. The general quality of life for the majority of people, particularly those living in large urban centres, has declined. We now spend longer going to and from work. Traffic problems have become so chronic that we must now endure traffic jams on Saturdays when people go to shopping centres or swimming pools.
Meanwhile, as urban society battles for a house in which to live and a parking space for their cars, some parts of rural Ireland are closing down because they do not have the industry, the infrastructure or the services to sustain the population. The critical question is, what will this Bill do to rectify this glaring imbalance? The Bill does not provide a solution to the diverse problems of urban and rural society. There are no safeguards to ensure communities can continue to live in a safe clean environment where there will be a complete integration of the service and leisure facilities which they require.
The Bill is restrictively confined in its understanding of planning to a purely physical aspect. No effort is made to integrate the physical planning with the wider social, economic and environmental objectives. It is based on an antiquated concept that we live in one place, work in another and play somewhere else and travel by car between them. The new challenge will be to integrate these functions of living and to bring work, living and leisure closer together. This requires the elimination of the onerous task of travelling long distances and bringing about the necessary improvements in the quality of life. This essential ingredient of integration is missing from the Bill – the integration of the physical planing concept, building and development, with transport.
The railways provide an important link and we had a discussion on them earlier. In my county, we had a rail link between Mullingar and Athlone, the two principal towns, but it was closed some years ago. It should be reopened as it is only natural link between the two principal towns of the county. We have the MullingarDublin railway line and all we have to do is to reopen the small stations. We have a reasonably good service, although it could be improved. By reopening the small stations such as Killucan, Hill of Down and others along that line, we could take hundreds of cars off the road. This would have considerable positive implications and would help to alleviate the build up of traffic at Lucan and the M50 coming from the west to the east. The Minister of State, Deputy Moffatt, would be very aware of that. If that was integrated in this Bill, we could make a positive contribution to eliminating the worst aspects of environmental pollution and help to ensure people would not be stuck in traffic jams and would get to their place of work more easily. It would make it easier and much more pleasant for people from Counties Westmeath and Meath to travel virtually danger free to work in Dublin and the eastern counties generally.
The Bill is essentially about the regulation of the building component and transport remains the responsibility of somebody else. That this Bill attempts to consolidate numerous Acts – nine in all – European directives and various planning regulations introduced over the years is a welcome development for all concerned. It is better to have cohesive legislation. As a barrister, I know it is extremely difficult going from the 1963 Act to the 1976 and 1997 Acts and so on. All laws should be consolidated; it is an anachronism and an antiquated concept to have people going from one Act to another. A legal person may have the ability to do so but what about lay people? They have rights and should not have to go to the local solicitor or whoever to establish their rights. They should be in black and white in consolidated legislation. Many of the legal anachronisms and the antiquated language is also a bar to people establishing and asserting their rights.
Decisions on planning applications are effectively made by the individual planner who has considerable power. Often a decision is made on a planning application which is totally at variance with what the public representative, who participated in the drawing up of the county development plan, would expect. One might be compelled to ask how can this happen. The answer is that the planner is omnipotent in expressing a personal or a subjective view of what constitutes proper or appropriate planning and development for that area despite the fact that the public representative and the public would have had a major input into the country development plan. That is the nub of much of the dissatisfaction with planning decisions. It is the people who help to formulate the county development plan, the public representatives and the public. It constitutes an environmental contract with the people, but it can be circumscribed. As the planners will say, they have to have recourse to the planning legislation and to the 1963 Act, as the base legislation.
An aspect of this Bill about which I have a concern relates to the erosion of the role of elected members of local authorities. In the new procedures for the preparation of draft development plans, elected representatives will have the right only to make recommendations to the manager. In the consideration of the draft plan, the council will no longer be supplied with copies of the submissions and observations made by the public but only with a summary of these submissions prepared by the manager, who will submit them to the council in what is called a manager's response.
Time limits are being imposed on councillors in other sections of the Bill. Some of these are as little as one week and various penalties can be imposed where these limits are not met. The manager, for example, is given the right to make the plan without the approval of the council and, in certain circumstances, the council can be removed from office by the Minister and replaced by a commissioner. These provisions have the most profound implications for local democracy and are the equivalent of the imposition of a top down planning code rather than a bottom up one with the Minister having an excessive level of input.
National spatial plans are important in overall development. How will the country develop in terms of housing, infrastructure and linkage with the national rail network? How will growth centres be designated? That is a critical question. I was at a very interesting conference in Kiltimagh last Friday at which there was a very lively discussion on this topic. My own capital town of Mullingar, situated in the centre of the country, is an ideal strategic location with an excellent and improving road network, including the N4, N6 and N52. That town should be selected as a growth centre to take pressure off the larger urban areas. All the facilities in such growth centres must be developed. I call on the Government to consider building a regional airport in the Mullingar-north Westmeath area.
The idea of growth centres is useful, but only provided they do not lead to an over concentration of resources in one area at the expense of or to the detriment of the surrounding areas. There must be a proper coherent, strategic and complementary plan to ensure a significant increase in infrastructural resources for rural areas and the areas that surround such growth centres.
How will development in rural areas be managed? What transport links will be created? How should smaller towns and rural villages be developed? How can we plan for the development of airports for regions such as the one I proposed for the Mullingar-north Westmeath area?
A spatial plan is being considered and we got the initial documents on that. However, it should have been initiated within the past two years and at least have preceded the publication of the national plan and it could have been considered in the context of the blueprint plan, which was the national plan for infrastructural expenditure and development.
The House should have direct responsibility for drawing up the spatial plan. One of the committees of the House should hear submissions on it from the public to ensure a proper public consultation process as in the case of local development plans and county development plans. I understand my colleague, Deputy Gilmore, will initiate a procedure on that. It is important that this Bill represents a blueprint on planning.
We are living in a rapidly changing society where infrastructure cannot keep pace with the demands for housing, services and transport. A new planning and development Bill should address the needs of people and offer new ways to structure transport services, facilities and building programmes to meet those needs in a way that respects the environment and offers people maximum convenience in gaining access to a service and to their places of employment.
The way we plan and develop our country needs to be underlined by a new vision, one which is underpinned by a will to address quality of life issues for people living in rural and urban Ireland. My home county of Westmeath provides some of the best examples of urban pressures and rural depopulation. Planning and development strategies of the past did not adequately address the need to make rural Ireland more accessible by means of better transport and new incentives. Addressing that need would remove some pressure from urban centres, which do not have the necessary infrastructure, facilities and services to support the rapid growth of population.
In many respects, this Bill updates the existing planning laws by giving effect to new practices that have been introduced as a result of local area plans and so forth. The effect of tidying up existing practice in legislation is welcome in so far as it will assist in making the planning process more efficient and, I hope, more effective. However, the biggest barrier to ensuring the efficiency and effectiveness of the planning process is the lack of staff and resources in local authorities. Will the Minister of State confirm if the number of planning staff in local authorities has been increased in line with the increase in the number of planning applications? From my experience it appears that staff resources, particularly in the area of planning, are far from adequate to cater for the current demands of the planning process. Morale and pressure of work in planning offices throughout the country has become a serious issue. The major increase in the volume of work with which they are expected to deal is forcing qualified and experienced planners to move to the more lucrative private sector. One could not blame them for moving to that sector as salaries there are significantly higher. This is a critical issue. Approximately 300 professional planners are currently employed by local authorities. There is no point in enacting legislation that will impose more obligations and allow for greater participation, which we all support, if we do not also make provision for increasing the number of staff in local authority planning offices to deal with same.
While 774 planning applications were submitted to Westmeath County Council in 1994, almost 2,000 planning applications were submitted in 1999. The staff in the local planning office are working flat out to deal with them. I pay tribute to the planning officials of Westmeath County Council planning office for the courtesy with which they deal with that significant amount of work under pressure.
Our vision for planning and development should be underlined by a rural and urban plan which should be within the remit of each county council to prepare. Young couples, in particular, who wish to live in rural Ireland can find it difficult to get planning permission. Planners often have a subjective view of what they consider would be right for a particular area, which would often be in marked contrast to what I, as a spokesperson on agriculture and rural development, consider would be right. For example, a farmer would often be prepared to sell a site to a young person at a reasonable price because he knew that person's father or mother and would like that person to stay in rural Ireland to help build up a football team or contribute in some other way to the local community. Some farmers may have to sell sites to ensure the rest of their holding is viable. When such a planning application is submitted, a planner may grant permission on one site for a family member but stipulate that the rest of the farmer's land is subject to a section 38 agreement, a sterilisation agreement.
Planning authorities have too much liberty to utilise the section 38 procedure to prevent developments in rural areas. In their own way they have contributed to the increase in the cost of sites and of houses which must be borne by young people, in particular, who want to live in rural Ireland. We must examine the section 38 procedure to ascertain if some restriction can be imposed on the ability of planners to utilise it almost at will to restrict development in areas. There has been a 30% fall in the population in some areas in north Westmeath, yet the section 38 procedure can be used to further restrict development in such areas.
I wish to raise once again the issue of providing some form of grant assistance to people who move to a rural area and who invest in refurbishing a derelict house. I propose a once off grant of £15,000. The purchase of unoccupied homes in rural Ireland would go some way towards alleviating the housing crisis faced particularly by first time buyers who are being priced out of the market in urban centres. It would also act as a further important measure to prevent rural depopulation in areas, which the last census highlighted suffered a substantial population decline. This issue should be examined.
Section 208 of Part XV deals with the licensing of events. While that section may have some merit, it fails to distinguish between the licensing of large sponsored events such as a major rock concert and a small local event such as the Mullingar International Bachelors Festival, the proceeds of which after covering expenses are donated to charity. That event is organised by a local group and provides local entertainment for the local community, especially young people. It would be scandalous if an activity such as that could not be held because it was circumscribed by a set of regulations. There is no point in the Minister telling me such regulations would apply only to this or that because, as a lawyer, I know that once regulations are imposed and archaic language is used, they discourage people from undertaking such activity in a community. The Minister should take careful note of that point. Such a licensing procedure could be used by local authorities to gain revenue, but it could discourage local events. I want to ensure that the Mullingar International Bachelors festivals and other festivals around the country of that ilk are protected.
Section 34(11) deals with developers who have not completed work on estates. That section had its origins in the Labour Party Planning and Development (Amendment) Bill, 1999, proposed by my colleague, Deputy Ryan, in May. That Bill, if enacted at that time, would have facilitated a refusal of planning permission if in the opinion of the relevant planning authority previous contracts were not fulfilled and completed within a specified period and in accordance with all conditions in the planning permission. This obviously included a standard of work on the houses, the completion of roads and footpaths and the provision of public lighting.
Debate adjourned.