Deputy Penrose was in possession and he has a minute and a half remaining.
Planning and Development Bill, 1999 [ Seanad ] : Second Stage (Resumed).
Question again proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
I was talking about the Labour Party's Planning and Development (Amendment) Bill, 1999, which provided for the standard of work on houses, the completion of roads and footpaths, the provision of public lighting, the taking in charge of estates, the dedication of open spaces and the implementation of the relevant health and safety standards for building workers during the construction period, which would be a necessary part of any planning Bill. That Bill also provided for the condition in a planning permission of payment of a financial contribution to the planning authority for the development of community facilities, including buildings and football pitches, for the benefit of the community of the area within which the proposed development is situated. It also provided for house purchasers, who suffered loss or damage due to the failure of the person who secured the planning permission to comply with the condition of that permission, to bring an action for damages and costs.
The problem of unfinished estates has always been on the agenda of residents' associations and meetings in my constituency since I was elected, and I became a public representative in 1984. There are many good developers, but the few who leave estates finished inadequately or unfinished do a grave disservice to those who do a good job. Young people wonder how a developer can get away without completing an estate within a specified time period and be granted permission on another site shortly thereafter. One of the common problems is that lighting and footpaths are not put in place in time and people with young families are not able to push buggies on those roads.
Section 34(11) is a welcome advance but it is a little diluted in so far as one must seek recourse to the High Court. If a developer does not carry out his work, surely he should be told he will receive no further planning permissions until he completes the work? There is no need for recourse to the High Court in these circumstances.
I wish to share my time with Deputy Michael Ahern.
Is that agreed? Agreed.
I welcome the opportunity to debate the Bill. Planning in general in the Wicklow area is an unbelievable problem and there is much controversy and division over the least matter. Increasingly, individual planning applications are being adjudicated upon by An Bord Pleanála.
Apparently it is the intention of the Bill to adopt a more inclusive approach at draft stage of development plans. I welcome and encourage this measure as it will not only reduce controversy and so-called secrecy around the making of a development plan but I hope it will ease conflict, which can arise quite often due to lack of communication on the part of council officials and members. If we are to be serious about this proposal, however, additional staff will be required.
I read that out of date plans will not be a feature in the future. This is an idealistic statement but it is unrealistic. I do not see how it is possible to consult widely with the public and have development plans adopted within a strict timeframe, and I would like to know how this is to be achieved. With a lack of planning staff in many local authorities, all too often outside consultants are being employed, at the expense of something else within the county, to deal with development plans.
Often public consultation and deadlines do not go hand in hand and if a situation were to arise whereby the elected members of a local authority miss a deadline as a result of a matter of local public interest, an extension should be granted on that occasion. This situation has arisen before with Wicklow County Council in the course of the Greystones town plan, where the members had genuine difficulties with certain aspects of a plan, namely, the population projections for the area, yet we were treated like schoolchildren who had misbehaved when we sought an extension of time.
I note that planning guidelines will be drawn up at regional level, and I welcome that, provided it is not simply further red tape. I need not point out that Wicklow, Kildare and Meath, which is the county of the Minister, Deputy Dempsey, are under extreme pressure at present with planning applications and development needs due to the ever-increasing housing crisis in the greater Dublin area. I want a clear commitment before agreeing to any proposal to draw up regional plans that these plans will not in any way detract from the status of county development plans.
The drawing up of county development plans is practically the only power which county councillors still possess. Given that these are drawn up by local elected members of the area and the public consultation process is to be widened further, county plans will increasingly be drawn up by the public. It would be disingenuous to provide for wide public consultation on county development plans only to find that they are overshadowed by a regional plan.
With regard to An Bord Pleanála, I do not know where to begin. It is a faceless, secretive organisation. The only thing I can say in its favour is that politics has been removed from its decision-making process. It is no longer in touch with the people whose decisions it affects. It ignores county development plans and it assumes the authority of Dúchas, the heritage service. Recently it made decisions on natural habitats in Kilcoole which would conflict directly with Dúchas's decisions and recommendations. What is the brief of these people? Surely they are bound by certain guidelines and codes of conduct. We should use this opportunity to outline exactly what should be their brief and make them more accountable. Surely they should give explanations as to why they overturn recommendations of their own inspectors, as was the case on Bray Head. A great number of planning decisions are made by this secretive organisation, yet it is not accountable to anybody. Many other public bodies are slowly being made more accountable, especially in terms of planning decisions, and rightly so, and An Bord Pleanála also must be made accountable.
I welcome the fact that the right of appeal is reserved for those who have originally objected to the planning application at local authority level as it will accommodate the genuine objector and distinguish him or her from the people who object to planning as a hobby. However, the downside to that decision is that more correspondence will be directed at the county councils. Not all this correspondence will be from those objecting, but many will make an observation at local level because, should the decision affect them, they will want to have their name on the record early. Again, I highlight the fact that more planning staff will be required to deal with this matter.
With regard to charging a fee to people who make an objection at county council level, I am not convinced that a fee should be introduced. I fear the only effect this will have is that county councillors will be put under extreme pressure to object to certain planning, assuming that councillors will not be required to pay such a fee. The excuse being used is that this money will be used to employ enforcement officers, but that is ridiculous. Enforcement officers should be employed by local authorities without charging a fee to help pay their salaries. Surely it is not the responsibility of local people to pay for the policing and safeguarding of planning laws. It is the responsibility of the Department of the Environment and Local Government to ensure that the environment is protected and that people who are flaunting or breaking the planning laws are prosecuted.
The fact that planning decisions are to be made within eight weeks rather than two months will have little impact on delays unless the staffing numbers are dramatically increased. The usual delaying tactics will be used. The only change will be that the letters seeking further information, time extensions etc. will be sent a week earlier. Allowing four weeks to assess further information is impractical. It is crazy to think that planners, health officers, engineers, Dúchas, those in charge of water reservoirs etc. can properly adjudicate on further information in such a limited timeframe. In those circumstances they would be unable to give full consideration to additional proposals in planning cases.
Formal pre-planning discussions would greatly help the planning process in theory, but yet again I stress that these will only work when extra planners are employed.
I welcome the proposed development contribution schemes and I hope that strict guidelines are made and clear commitments given with regard to the spending of these moneys by county councils. The levies and bonds must be realistic and I hope the practice in the past of allowing developers get away without paying the contribution levied will cease.
I welcome the attempt to control builders who failed to comply with previous permissions. I am sure this will cut down on the number of unfinished housing estates and will improve the quality of life for residents. I welcome the proposal that the money from fines imposed by the courts should be put back into the planning area.
I hope the Minister uses this opportunity to clarify the procedure which should be adopted by local authorities when dealing with anonymous letters regarding planning applications. If these anonymous letters contain certain allegations, as has been the case in Wicklow on a number of occasions, surely the county council involved should not be obliged to keep this type of unsubstantiated material on a file, where it is possible for the public to view it.
The lodging of a retention application will not prejudice the taking of enforcement action. This is welcome, but I hope local authorities will be required to exercise common sense in their approach. There would be little point in taking somebody to court over a minor offence when they are making a genuine attempt to rectify the matter through a retention application. I note the Minister's intention to appoint a commissioner to take over the role of the manager or members or both where there is impropriety, serious inefficiency or non-compliance with statutory requirements. I hope this will not be yet more red tape that will further hamper the planning process or erode councillors' virtually non-existent powers.
There are many more provisions in the Bill which are long overdue and welcome, such as the 20% contribution requirement on developers for social housing needs. These have been commented on in detail and there is, therefore, no point in dwelling on them. I urge the Minister to ensure that staffing levels are improved because it is the only way to ensure the positive proposals in the Bill are implemented and the position on the ground can be improved.
This Bill revises and consolidates the nine local government planning and development Acts enacted since 1963. It also introduces a sustainable development philosophy to the planning system. It is time the Acts were consolidated and it will make it easier for those involved in planning to follow the terms of the legislation enacted. During the last general election campaign we made a commitment to review the planning code and the Minister is now implementing that promise.
Politicians will confirm that planning problems are high on the list of problems we encounter at our clinics and on the telephone. A problem we face in tackling issues raised is that different planners will give different advice. For example, one planner will advise against a proposal because it will destroy the skyline, another will say it will destroy the colour scheme of an area while another will say it will impinge on density requirements. The application of different standards and criteria is a cause of great distress, not only to public representatives, but to those seeking permission.
The tendency towards uniformity will make the countryside less interesting and destroy its uniqueness. This is not to say that certain uniform conditions should not apply as these are necessary to prevent water pollution or housing developments in the wrong areas.
I am not a member of my local county council, so I must speak as an outsider, as it were. Yet, it is clear to me that many decisions are nonsensical. Cork County Council's previous development plan prohibited permission for development within three miles of a town or a village to cut down on ribbon development. While this was to a certain extent necessary it has been taken to an extreme. The council has recently decided that the provision would not apply to the Bantry area and I understand the next development plan will abolish the provision completely. However, this plan, which was due in 2001, has been deferred to 2002. I do not know why but it is unacceptable. I am glad the Bill provides that development plans will last for no longer than six years and cannot be deferred.
All county councils face staffing problems. I do not blame them for many of their decisions because many of them are under severe pressure as a result of increases in the number of applications for planning permission. While this is a positive reflection of the economic upsurge, staff resources in planning departments have not kept up with the demands made on them. For example, two or three years ago about 50 applications a year were submitted in Youghal, but in the last two years the numbers have increased to over 2,000.
Another problem is the rate at which planners are moving from the public to the private sector. The Construction Industry Federation is advised by a leading planner who is on leave of absence from a local authority – a strange partnership. Another leading planner has left the local authority with which I am familiar to go into a private consultancy. These developments illustrate the demand in the private sector for planners, but it makes it difficult for local authorities to make wise decisions. The problem must be addressed urgently.
Deputy Penrose raised the question of sterilisation of farms. Planners are demanding that if a farmer sells his site or gives it to a son, daughter, nephew, niece, grandson or granddaughter, the rest of his land should be sterilised, even though other family members may be involved. I am not in favour of this and I ask the Minister to consider this aspect.
An Bord Pleanála has caused grief and concern to many people over the years. Do the members of the board have to register their interests in the same way as Members of this House, Secretaries General in the Civil Service, judges and so on? They should be required to do so because of their important role in the development of society. The board made a decision on the proposal by the ESB to erect pylons from Aghada to the island off Cobh and across Cork Harbour. An Bord Pleanála acknowledged at a meeting that it would hold an oral hearing. However, refused to do so and I wonder why. It seems very strange that having said it had no objection to an oral hearing it did not go ahead and hold one.
Another example of why I am concerned about An Bord Pleanála relates to a constituent who sold a property, next to which he had a site worth between £30,000 and £35,000. There was no objection to his application to the county council for development of the site, but there was an appeal to An Bord Pleanála by the person who bought the adjoining property, and the appeal was upheld on the grounds that a house on the site would destroy the skyline. If anybody bothered visiting the area they would have seen there are a number of houses further up the hill behind the site and that development on the site could not have destroyed the skyline. Some public representatives made representations to An Bord Pleanála, but I do not know whether this affected the decision. However, the decision was very unusual, especially as the person who bought one part of the property then offered the ridiculous price of £5,000 for the adjoining site. The site was later sold for a fairly reasonable price. It raises the question of why a person from An Bord Pleanála did not look at the site in question.
There should be regional boards in Munster, Connacht, Leinster and Dublin which would include individuals familiar with the areas in which they are making decisions.
The Deputy forgot to mention our part of the country.
And Ulster. I am constrained in terms of time, but I commend the Bill and ask the Minister to note some of the reservations I and other Members have expressed for Committee Stage.
I wish to share time with Deputy Ó Caoláin. This is a wide ranging Bill and one could speak about it for two or three hours, and I am sure many Members would like even longer. In the context of planning and development there is need for good order, curtailed planning and imaginative development of the places in which people want to live, work and play. Hopefully, this would enhance the environment, thereby enhancing people's lives and reducing the stresses and strains of everyday life, which should be the ultimate goal.
I am the first to appreciate that one man's meat is another man's poison and that often beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I am a member of Galway County Council and only recently we introduced a new five year development plan. We had 30 or 40 meetings in rural Galway, and as many issues came up at the beginning as at the end of the process. Like this Bill, it is a matter of trying to get the various competing and conflicting demands into a sensible arrangement.
As Deputy Ahern said, there is no doubt that some people would build anywhere if they got a chance – they would build in the middle of the high road – while another group would object to any development, no matter what it was. Getting the right balance is a fair job in such circumstances.
I hope the Bill will shorten planning delays, but nobody should think this is a panacea in terms of addressing the housing shortage, particularly for young couples who will be monitoring the progress of the Bill and who might think they will be able to get an affordable house in a place in which they want to live. Unfortunately, I see no end to the housing shortage while there are more buyers than there are houses being built. Little will be achieved unless much greater amounts of serviced land are provided much faster. Like selling cows or sheep, it is a matter of supply and demand, and while there are more people wanting to buy houses than there are houses being built, we will have the huge problem about which everybody in the House knows and speaks.
Regarding delays in planning permission, in a womb to tomb context, that is, from project initiation to project completion, we are talking not about two, four or six months but two or three years. It is remarkable that as a result of all the messing it can take so long to develop a small estate or even a single house. We understand about the two month duration for planning applications, but never in the history of county councils have there been so many applications for planning, and I must say that while sometimes planners get under my skin, something I am not shy of telling them when necessary, they are under a huge pressure of work. Unfortunately, whether they are caught in the middle makes little difference to the people whose lives are affected by delays. The most annoying thing is that a day short of the two month period being up, applicants for planning permission often get a registered letter saying that further information is sought. This can be the result of two things. It is possible that the initial application was not fully complete, something I will return to, but more than likely the planners have not been able to deal with the volume of applications and are forced to say yes or no to the application, and when in doubt they seek further information. This results in more trouble and another two month period. Much of the time a decision is left until the end of the second period. The public deserves a better service from planning offices to ensure that we keep pace with the fantastic development which is taking place, even in many of the small rural areas about which I will speak.
There should be pre-planning advice for all potential buyers and builders, but currently I do not think county councils are in a position to supply it. It is harder to get an opportunity to meet with a planner in many county councils than to submit planning permission given that it can take so long to organise a meeting. On meeting them, the question is whether development can take place in a specific area. Usually the answer is that it looks all right but that a decision can only be made on an application which is submitted, not on what is said at a pre-planning meeting. There is a huge need for an increase in pre-planning consultation. It is also necessary that the interpretation of the county development plan should be uniform. In some counties one group of planners has a different view of the development plan to another and that must be examined urgently.
A number of other matters should be examined. For instance, different problems are experienced in rural areas in comparison to those experienced in Dublin, Galway or Limerick. I become upset when I visit isolated areas because the only way to inject life into a small rural parish is to attract people to live there. Once the population of an area falls below a certain level the community becomes untenable because it cannot pay for its services. I am aware of cases where planners have refused permission to people to build a road to their house or use red brick even though there might not be a house for half a mile. If a couple decides to borrow £100,000 and use red brick I do not know who they are upsetting and I cannot understand why permission is refused. It is exceedingly difficult to understand that that is the law. I can understand a refusal if somebody wishes to build a huge house beside a bungalow, for example.
Rural resettlement is another issue. Jim Connolly does a great job assisting people who want to move from urban centres, such as Dublin, to isolated rural areas. He experiences phenomenal problems with the planning system for a variety of reasons and some streamlining should be con sidered for these applications. It is a cardinal rule that the inheritor of a farm should be allowed to build a house on the farm where it is most suitable. It is important that all the loose ends are tied up in this legislation and I hope it will operate in the manner that the Minister intends, but some principles that he espouses in it will not achieve his targets. He must do more.
This Bill will be seen in the future as one of the most important Bills dealt with by this Dáil. It has major long-term implications for the future of the country and will have a direct impact on the shape of the society, environment and the economy in which we will live for decades to come. Its avowed purpose is to revise, extend and consolidate existing planning legislation and to provide for proper planning and sustainable development of all areas. Reform of existing legislation is, undoubtedly, very necessary. Even more necessary is a progressive vision for the planned development of our country and the translation of that vision into sound policies and effective and enforceable legislation.
In the 1970s and 1980s the built fabric of our cities and some of our towns was torn asunder, removing forever not only irreplaceable aspects of our heritage but the potential to develop in a more harmonious and sustainable way. At the same time, unbridled urban sprawl ate up the rural hinterlands of large towns and cities. Damaging development has been facilitated by the always cosy and often corrupt relationship between developers and some of those within the dominant political parties in this State, to which they have been such generous contributors. North county Dublin is only the most notorious example of how this relationship has worked. That in some way is the bigger picture with which people are familiar but they must also be familiar with the smaller one.
Anyone who has had a close up view, as I have had for the past 15 years, can testify to the persistence of the nod and wink, backstairs culture which allows favoured friends of some of those in high office and some of those with elected power in local authorities to undermine, evade and, sometimes, even openly flout the planning laws. The hidden hand of patronage has worked behind the scenes and this still goes on. It will require not only vigorous enforcement of this Bill when enacted but a change in the dominant party political culture in this State for it to be truly eliminated.
That would mean a change in Sinn Féin.
The Bill maintains the current concept of planning as a means whereby the State and local authorities act principally to curb the excesses of market driven development instead of being proactive planners. Such a proactive approach would entail integrated planning which takes into account where people live, work and are educated, how they travel to and from work and school and their need for recreational outlets and the freedom to enjoy both our urban and rural environment.
The kind of thinking that perceives objectors as nuisances and causes of delay has crept into the legislation but democratic participation should be encouraged. A development, once approved and constructed, can last a lifetime or several lifetimes with irreversible consequences. Compared to that, the time taken to process current planning procedures is relatively brief.
As a result of flawed thinking, the Bill contains three measures which will restrict democratic participation in the planning process, rather than enhance it. These measure are the imposition of a fee to make a submission on a planning application, the requirement to make a submission at the initial planning stage in order to appeal to An Bord Pleanála and the further new condition whereby a person will have to prove what is termed "a substantial interest" in the matter in order to seek judicial review of a planning decision. I strongly oppose all of these measures.
The fee will achieve nothing except to act as a deterrent to people participating in the planning process. We have no guarantee that it would remain at the level of approximately £20, which the Minister suggests. I have spoken to people involved in planning in local authorities and they believe this fee will slow the planning process as it will add further administrative costs and bureaucracy to an already overburdened system. The same planners have told me that submissions from local people on planning applications highlight issues of which the planning authority may not be aware and that the task of dealing with objections or submissions is not considered onerous.
The requirement on people to have made a previous submission in order to appeal to An Bord Pleanála is a very bad provision. It is very often the case that concerned individuals or groups do not become aware of proposed developments until after permission has been granted. These are to be excluded from the process and denied their rights as a result of this provision. The third impediment to public participation in the planning process is the restriction of the right to seek judicial review to those with "a substantial interest". The restriction would apply to those who are determined not to have "a substantial interest" by the measure of this legislation. This has the potential to bar access to the courts, which may well interpret "substantial interest" as property and/or commercial interest and, thus, penalise those who take a case on purely environmental grounds.
Such measures are supposedly included to streamline the planning process but restricting public access to it is not the way to make the planning system more efficient and less subject to unnecessary delays. What is needed is increased resourcing of local authorities with the employ ment of more expert and qualified staff. The Bill, when enacted, will make that need more acute. Local authorities will be required to be more vigilant and proactive in enforcing planning regulations and ensuring breaches of them are punished. The reality is that local authorities currently do not have the resources to provide efficient and effective enforcement. Unless they are provided with those resources, the enforcement provisions in the Bill, which I welcome, will remain a dead letter.
Nowhere is the Government's flawed approach to social and economic planning more obvious than in the housing section of the Bill. This is by far the most loudly trumpeted and the best known section. The Minister asks us to place great faith in the capacity of these measures to solve the housing crisis. In the absence of a comprehensive strategy and radical action to address the housing crisis the Government has advanced Part V as the great panacea. It is included in the Bill as a belated response to the biggest social problem facing tens of thousands of people in this State.
Part V includes detailed and complex measures supposedly designed to make land available for what is called social and affordable housing. In fact, the Bill represents a move away from the idea of social housing in its broadest sense. This is a definite move away from the idea that the State and local authorities are directly responsible for housing those who cannot afford to provide it for themselves. Under the Bill, local authorities are required to draft housing strategies for their areas but the Government lacks any clear or coherent housing strategy.
To present Part V of the Bill as the solution to the housing crisis is to attempt to delude over 40,000 households representing about 100,000 people on our current local authority waiting lists. These people cannot and will not be deluded by the measures in the Bill which do nothing to address or redress the current housing crisis. These people demand their right to housing and it is our responsibility to provide it.
I found the contribution of the last speaker extraordinary because not one constructive proposal was laid before the House on how we should address the problem. I accept his central argument that the availability of housing is a basic right which we would wish to have available to all our citizens, and that the right to purchase a house at a reasonable price is one which we must try to protect and advance through our deliberations in this Chamber. The economic reality, however, is that the number of dwellings completed this year was 46,000, the largest number ever in a calendar year since the foundation of the State. In 1993 there were 21,500 new dwellings completed in the State. In 1997, the figure rose to 40,000. It has now risen to 46,000, so there has been a consistent increase in the number of dwellings constructed in the State for occupational purposes.
Despite that consistent increase, however, there has been an alarming and even more dramatic increase in the cost of housing and that has taken place because demand outstrips supply. That is why the problem has arisen, and it is very easy to take refuge in the kind of rhetoric in which Deputy Ó Caoláin has just indulged. He suggests we are making a mistake in this legislation in restricting somewhat the rights of objection when we know that the answer to problems of supply and demand is that we need more land for housing. Unless we supply more land for housing we will not be able to build houses on it. That may be a rather obvious point, but how often do I pick up the newspaper and read about fringe political interests, such as the Deputy's, objecting to new developments? The culture of objection has become strongly rooted in this country and is part of the reason for spiralling house prices. It is not the only reason, however. I accept there are other factors but we must devise practical measures in this House to address the problems that have arisen.
I commend the Minister on introducing this measure because it is a consolidation measure and a fundamental review of the entire planning code as we face into the new century. The Minister, on his appointment, initiated a fundamental study based on essential principles of what the planning system required in the years ahead. This Bill is the fruit of that study. The Bill can be subject to detailed scrutiny and criticism – I have criticisms of the measure – but it is a welcome measure in that it tries to put what we should be doing into statutory focus. I congratulate the Minister for introducing the Bill.
With regard to overall strategy, I welcome the fact that in addition to the development plan local area plans and regional planning guidelines will be put on a statutory basis. Putting the entire matrix of the planning system on a statutory basis is a long overdue step.
What we are facing in the planning system – let us not be under any illusions about it – is an enormous pace of change which has been generated by the economic boom of recent years. We are looking at an enormous pace of new development. I accept that it has put extraordinary strains on the planning system, and two factors in particular which are not dealt with sufficiently in the Bill are public transport and education. The volume of new housing growth is now so substantial that great strain is being put on the capacity of our basic public transportation networks and our education system to deliver the services that have to be provided with such housing development.
I welcome the fact that the regional planning guidelines and the area plans will now be built into the legislation because that puts a clearer focus on those wider infrastructural needs that accompany the extensive development we are seeing, particularly in the suburban areas of the larger cities. We have all had the experience of reading development plans and noting that they often contain a wish list of objectives or desiderata which local planners and elected members would like to see in an area rather than a focused approach which links new development to the availability of these essential infrastructural provisions.
I would like to focus on education in particular because one of the decisions the Government has taken in the sphere of education – a very good decision and I commend the Minister for introducing it – was to increase substantially the amount of capital funding available for the acquisition of sites and for the construction of buildings for primary schools. The old requirement that the patron had to stump up a substantial amount of the moneys under both of those headings was dispensed with. The Minister now acquires the sites and pays up to 90% of the building costs. That has had a significant knock-on effect in this particular area of land use control because, up to now, the sites were obtained on a relatively cheap basis. Until now, the builder was induced or persuaded to part with the site for little or no consideration to the relevant patron setting up the local school but a pattern is beginning to emerge where the owner of the land is demanding a very substantial payment for the provision of a school site. That is something the taxpayer should not be required to stand over, yet this practice is developing because the Department has made the funding available for the construction of the school and the acquisition of the site.
In planning legislation it has always been axiomatic that one cannot condition a person, through a planning permission, to require a transfer of some land for a social purpose. A condition cannot be inserted in a planning permission requiring someone to provide a site for an educational purpose. Equally, while the section 38 agreements, which traditionally have regulated the more substantial type of development, can provide for open spaces – that seems to be envisaged in the legislation and the practice – one cannot provide for a school site. The zoning can state education as a general objective but it does not appear to be a distinct land use category within established zoning practice. The current practice is that the Department of Education and Science advises the relevant local authority to reserve a site. However, that site may be reserved on lands which are reserved for residential use and so the owner of the lands may require of the Department the compensation or payment appropriate to residential development in respect of that site. That is the situation which exists under current legislation and practice and it is not being changed under this legislation. It is an issue at which I urge the Minister to look again on Committee Stage.
If we are talking about realistic planning into the future, we should be looking at proper planning for education and we should not require of the taxpayer payments of money or compen sation for the acquisition of sites for school purposes. If we are now looking at developments where one has up to 1,000, 2,000 or even more houses built as part of one development by a developer, it seems quite reasonable that it should be possible, under the planning legislation, for the local authority to insist that the provision of a site for a school is something for which the taxpayer should not be obliged to pay. That is a matter at which we should look again in the context of this Bill. The key infrastructural gaps now opening in education and public transport have to be addressed. Local authorities, as planning authorities, have not traditionally had a function in this area. We need to tighten up the legislation to ensure that is addressed.
I mentioned education because it is an issue about which I feel strongly. I urge the Minister to look again at the measure on Committee Stage to see whether he can address it. I do not believe the Estimates on which this House votes in regard to the provision of education should be applied to the acquisition of sites or the remuneration of property owners. While it is very clear in the case of a primary school where a site should be in the order of three to five acres, when one moves to a secondary school it becomes more debatable because we are talking about eight acres. It certainly should not apply to the acquisition of lands for a hospital or a third level college where a substantial acreage would be required.
In relation to general housing policy, I come back to the point I raised with Deputy Ó Caoláin earlier. This is a matter of supply and demand. There has been a huge increase in demand and we have to judge the Bill on the basis of whether it will increase supply. Requiring builders to provide for a certain amount of land for social housing, for affordable housing or a combination of both in the format envisaged by the legislation may have a certain effect on the supply of land for building purposes. There is no point pretending otherwise or living in a world of illusion.
On balance, the Minister has made the right judgment on this but it reinforces the point that we have to provide for serviced land and, as Deputy Dukes pointed out at the beginning of this debate and Deputy Ó Caoláin said, give the local authorities and administrations the staff they require to address the problems. I can report from Fingal County Council – I am not a member of the authority but have many dealings with it – that it has considerable staff problems because it has to cope with this huge volume of new housing development.
There are alarming signs in Dublin that there is not very much land left. Already the local authorities in several areas are finding it exceptionally difficult to find any land for social housing. When we are talking about the social housing scheme envisaged in this Bill, we are talking about a scheme which is going to be implemented at a future date.
In my constituency, there were developments in the 1970s and 1980s when attempts were made to form parishes which were mixed – mixed in the sense that there was a mix between local authority and private housing. The formula of a 50:50 balance was used in three parishes, in particular, where this experiment was carried out. It was found that the experiment did not work and that on issues such as school choice and social mixing, a separation took place within the parish. My view is – the Minister has made the right call on this in the legislation – that if one wants to develop that type of desirable social mix, one has to realise that the local authority proportion cannot be increased very far beyond the 20% figure. If one moves beyond that figure, the social mix does not work and one gets a social separation. In fact, one reinforces in close proximity the very social tensions and problems one is trying to reduce and eliminate.
Given the shortage of land in the Dublin local authorities – in Dún Laoghaire and city areas – for social housing, these authorities will have to construct developments outside their own functional areas to meet housing needs. That is inevitable given present trends. Again, we had direct experience of how that particular pattern worked and it was not a happy development. Carrying out developments in another functional area where another functional area provides certain services while the basic housing requirement is met from the distant local housing authority is a difficult approach, yet it will have to be attempted in the greater Dublin area.
There has been an extraordinary increase in demand – an alarming position in this city – and an alarming rise in house prices. The Minister's response in this measure is an attempt to address part of the problem – to plan in the longer term for development, which will contain a desirable social mix, and to attempt to put a brake on the housing market. I do not believe we should delude ourselves into thinking that this Bill will solve the basic problem which has been caused by our economic growth which is that demand for new housing is far outstripping supply. Yet for us to respond to that would require the production of houses on such a scale as to put severe pressure on and create a threat to our infrastructure. That is the reality in the greater Dublin area and the Minister has attempted to address that through this legislation.
Dublin Corporation disposed of huge amounts of its land bank in County Dublin in recent years. However, we now have to introduce a measure to provide that we exact from owners of land, land for social housing. An extraordinary catalogue of mistakes have been made in this area. The corporation had substantial land banks on the periphery of this city which have been lost in recent years. That clearly was a mistake and we are paying the price for that administrative mistake.
When the Kenny committee looked at this problem many years ago, it was realised that the possession of a large land bank by a local authority is the only way to guarantee to keep down land prices. If the local authority has a large land bank, the land can be sold to smaller developers at an economic cost and housing can then be built on it. The present position where a few landowners have a large amount of land around this city is plainly undesirable but it is unavoidable if local authorities insist on divesting themselves of all their land bank and leaving it to the market to acquire land for building purposes.
Questions have been raised about the constitutionality of these measures. I did not find much reference to it in the debate. As a Member of this House, I am allowed to say that I do not believe it would be desirable for the President to refer this Bill to the Supreme Court because it is a very detailed Bill running to a very large number of sections. Were the President to refer a Bill of this type to the Supreme Court – it is not a money Bill so it would be open to the President to do so – one would again have consideration of a large number of sections. Even taking the sections in the social housing Part, there would be consideration of a large number of sections in the abstract without any real experience of how they have been tested in their concrete application. That would be a very undesirable reference – although it is a power the President has and I do not want to take from that – because it would mean that the Bill would be adjudicated before we saw how its provisions worked out.
A person affected adversely by the provisions of this measure always has the remedy of proceedings in the courts to invalidate the measure if the injustice is so fundamental that it infringes the Constitution. There is no proven injustice in the measure or proven infringement of private property rights which would justify a reference at this stage. The Government has taken advice on the matter and clearly the advice was that the measure was in accordance with the Constitution. If the matter was referred, it would lead to an undesirable state of affairs in that we will not have seen the housing strategy provision implemented. When that is implemented and the Bill is in operation, it will be much easier to identify concrete measures of injustice, if such exist, as result of the operation of the Bill.
There are concerns about the introduction of charges for representations to local authorities on planning matters. The planning code is a public code of which a citizen is entitled to avail. It is undesirable that citizens' rights should be cluttered up by these kinds of charges. I would not like them to be introduced simply as a revenue gathering measure or device. That is not a desirable consideration in a matter of this kind.
The power of the board to award costs against a vexatious appellant should be examined as should the question as to whether An Bord Pleanála should have more power in awarding costs against parties who appeal to the board. If the powers of the board to award costs against a party whom it believed lodged an appeal without any real merit were to be extended, that might operate as a powerful deterrent in relation to vexatious appeals. I do not like the idea of charges being brought in simply to collect a few more shillings for a particular local authority. It is not the way to administer a matter where rights have been conferred on the citizen. There have always been criticisms of stamp duties on certain types of court documents and proceedings. When people are invoking the Constitution and legal rights, they should not be subjected to charges in connection with them.
I am not being critical of the Minister, but of all politicians here over many years, since the foundation of the State. The criticism is aimed primarily at our failure to provide resources so that we can have a co-ordinated series of planning developments here. I am talking, particularly of the Department of the Environment, as it was known for about 20 years up to recently when it became known as the Department of the Environment and Local Government, as the Department with responsibility for building houses, providing water and sewerage and maintaining secondary roads. There is not any co-ordinated and balanced development taking place here. If one were to go to any city in Europe, Britain or even across the Border into Northern Ireland, one would see that balance.
I have been a member of a local authority for the past 33 years and I continuously have arguments with my fellow councillors and officials of the local authority of which I am a member, about the manner in which we build in a centre of a town or a city solidly outwards, thereby creating concrete jungles. When I ask where are the green spaces, amenities, gardens and playing pitches which should be developed and maintained by the local authority, I am told the farmland is our green space. That is a nil answer. We have failed miserly in here where the power lies, to do what needs to be done.
The Minister said this is the most fundamental reform of planning in Ireland since the enactment of the 1963 Planning Act. "Fundamental" is a weak word. What we need is radical reform. The best planning that was done here was probably done by the British when they occupied the country, particularly in the 18th century and the 19th century in terms of all the fine estates in the middle class areas of Dublin. When we got control of our own destiny in the 20th century, we destroyed our environment. The higgledy-piggledy form of planning in many of our towns and villages is appalling. A three storey building may adjoin a one storey building, be it a shop or a residence. Our planning is all over the place. It is no wonder that recently Dublin was deemed to be one of the least attractive capital cities in Europe. We have not learned from our mistakes. We have put up gaudy office blocks next to magnificent period buildings. We continually do that. There is no co-ordination of planning and no town planning here. We do not seem to have or to know anything about town planning. Is there such a person as a town and country planner in this State? Are there green belts on the outskirts of our towns and cities? The answer is obvious. There are not, and there are not any proposals to provide them. I am disgusted that none of us over the years has taken the initiative to do something radical.
A fundamental flaw in our planning laws is our refusal to provide moneys for balanced development, in other words, to provide, lay out and maintain open spaces and amenities in conjunction with the building of houses. In any city or town in Europe, Britain or Northern Ireland, one will see lovely mixed housing developments, including playgrounds for children, bowling greens for older citizens and picnic areas for everybody, but one will not see that here. These should all be provided together with adequate road networks, be they accompanied by flyovers or tunnels, and a proper transport system. I congratulate the Government on pressing ahead with the tunnel planned for the docks, which will remove many of the juggernauts and heavy traffic that are causing problems along the quays and the main thoroughfares of this and other cities in the country. There is a tunnel in Cork and one is planned for Dublin. The sooner it is in place, the better. Also, the sooner the Luas system is up and running, the better, as it will alleviate many of the traffic problems. All these facilities must be taken into account in conjunction with planning.
Dublin city does not rate when it comes to a properly planned, laid out city. The architecture in the business areas, by and large, is dire. The areas of Georgian design are very attractive, but overall the level of planning and the aesthetic values are very low. Ironically the Georgian buildings and the other attractively designed buildings date from the time of British occupation. A recent survey of European capitals rated Dublin very lowly. Our social life may well be the best in Europe or in the world, but we do not feature when it comes to planning. Irish towns in general are affected by a similar malaise, they suffer very much from unco-ordinated planning.
Likewise the planning of most local authority houses and estates up to the past 15 or 20 years was substandard. There has been a vast improvement in recent years with local authority housing competing with private development when it comes to quality of design and excellence of construction. The lack of an overall planning strategy leaves a great deal to be desired. We badly need town planners. Over the years I have claimed that for every pound spent on constructing houses, we should spend a matching pound on the provision of properly laid out open spaces, such as playing fields, gardens, swimming pools and parks, managed and maintained by the local authority. Recreational facilities and amenities should be available to all, young and old. We have a very insular short-sighted series of policies. Our quality of life is suffering immensely as a result, with young people in particular turning to drink, drugs, joyriding and vandalism instead of good healthy pur suits. In a climate such as ours – and I am referring to the weather – it is vital to provide adequate indoor facilities rather than having young people hanging around pubs, pool halls and the streets. It leads to all sorts of social ills and an undesirable lifestyle. Is it any wonder that we have the highest incidence of cardiac disease in Europe and probably in the world?
The Minister and his Department should be advising and assisting local authorities when it comes to contentious issues such as dumps, landfills and telecommunication masts. They should be promoting the positive aspects of wind farms. Unfortunately, the officials of local authorities, and in particular the elected members, are left to their own designs which puts them under all sorts of unreasonable demands by pressure groups which in many cases are uninformed of the consequences of the proposed developments. They do not realise that most of these developments are quite harmless – in particular the erection of masts to assist in telecommunications. It has been clearly illustrated that the radiation from those masts is not dangerous; nevertheless, whenever a mast goes up one has this problem. Similarly, pressure groups say they do not want wind farms in their area. Wind farms are very desirable because they obviate the need to burn fossil fuels which produce gases that deplete the ozone layer.
We suffer from a series of difficulties by not properly advising or financing local authorities. Such authorities should receive finance not just to provide land for housing but also for open spaces. Legislation should be introduced to ensure that the price paid for land provided for open spaces should be at an agricultural rate rather than the development rate. The fact that all such land is purchased at the development rate is inhibiting the provision of open spaces and amenity areas. If we had a mixture so that land for housing would fetch a development price while land for amenities would sell for an agricultural price, we could have the type of balanced development I am advocating.
The problem of litter impinges on the environment in a big way. I was glad to see Mr. Bill Power, the outgoing president of the Irish Hotels Federation, making a strong statement some weeks ago about the damage litter louts are doing to the tourism industry. People are throwing litter out of car windows and they throw chip bags around the streets at night, while others throw bags of rubbish over fences and down laneways. That is a blight on the nation as a whole. Maybe it is brought about by affluence and lack of education but I do not know what the solution is. There is no easy answer, but one will have to be found.
I welcome the Bill's proposals for the protection of trees. However, the manner in which we have allowed people to destroy trees and wildlife habitats in general has been a serious omission. We have been very backward in providing a proper environment. When I see magnificent rows of beech and other deciduous trees being felled without good reason I get very annoyed. Rather than looking after the beautiful environment with which we were endowed, we are actually destroying it. We are busily constructing concrete jungles but we should make it our business to provide for a co-ordinated and balanced type of development where people can live better and more fulfilling lives. That is not happening at the moment. The Bill will not help us to do so because it does not cover the type of radical reform of planning laws which is needed. The planning laws are outdated and they are not being updated. We compare very poorly with other countries in the civilised world.
The Bill has been a long time coming and, no doubt, by the time it has passed through the House anomalies will be found in it, as is the case with most legislation. It is probably the most comprehensive planning legislation to have come before the House since the 1963 Act. Looking at the overall situation regarding planning and development, many of us could sympathise with much of what Deputy Deasy said. Sometimes one wonders whether we have planning laws at all. Do we really think before granting planning permission? Do local authorities look constructively at planning applications that come before them? As members of local authorities, we have all made representations over the years concerning planning applications. In many cases we have had to try to resolve problems in the course of such applications, whether for individual homes or for commercial development.
In considering the planning laws and the problems that come with them, we must take a much broader view. We cannot look at the issue in the context of where a proposed development may be in the scheme of things; we must look further. In some cases we may even have to look ten, 15 or 20 years down the road to see what will happen with regard to other infrastructure. Is a proposed development likely to threaten future road or other developments needed to improve our infrastructure?
We must also examine the position with regard to water, sewerage and roads. In many cases if a development is not done properly the advantage can be lost. We can end up with watercourses being polluted or with major loss of water supply. Sewerage schemes are very desirable where there is any reasonable density of housing construction or commercial developments. However, in some cases we end up with the syndrome of the continual septic tanks every 200 yards, which is not in the interests either of the occupiers or of an area's total development.
While we often criticise local authorities for seeking treatment units, even for single houses, they are probably the most positive things that can be sought because one is helping an individual. In many cases, especially in my part of the country, it has been found that after eight or ten years many of the septic systems do not work. That can lead to major problems for occupants of houses. Planners are often seen to be cruel by those who are trying to provide houses for the first time, but they are often doing such people a long-term favour. It is something that people often come to accept later.
In many cases, our roads infrastructure on the outskirts of towns is not sufficient to cater for new developments. The position is the same in regard to roads into and out of Dublin. The infrastructure put in place ten or 15 years ago is no longer sufficient to carry the volume of traffic using those roads on a daily basis. If one goes into Dublin at certain times of the day a short journey can take from 45 minutes to an hour and a half. That is in nobody's interest. It is not just those trying to do their business who are affected, but the environment is also affected by the heavy traffic. We might not feel that impact on an individual basis, but traffic pollution must be considered. I hope the proposed Dublin light rail and port tunnel developments will proceed as soon as possible in order to take some of the traffic out of Dublin city centre. Once that is done, people will see the benefit of it.
There is a lack of infrastructure in many of the building developments that have been completed over the years. There are problems in big housing estates all over the country because there are no facilities such as green areas and there are no schools or community facilities in many instances. The provision of proper infrastructure will have to become part of any major development in future. I am not talking about water, sewerage and roads, I refer to schools, shopping and community facilities. These amenities will have to be provided if we are to have integrated communities. Some of the money often seen to be spent on developments would be much better spent on back-up facilities for those developments. The provision of school and community facilities should be compulsory for any development of 400 to 5,000 houses or more. We must be realistic. It is terrible to see young families move into a new housing estate only to discover that their children must travel four or five miles to get to a primary school, or ten miles to a secondary school. That is not in the interests of development of communities. Shopping facilities are also a problem in some areas and we hope to see planners take a positive view when it comes to providing facilities in major developments.
Density has become a problem in many developments and this Bill proposes increasing the allowable density. I have reservations in this regard, perhaps because I come from a county which does not have many density problems. If high density housing and low rise buildings are provided, is that the most efficient use of the land available in an area such as Dublin? I understand that low rise buildings and housing are more important for young families, but if some of the high rise buildings had proper facilities such as lifts they would serve people well, particularly older people. Density will be a major planning problem in future.
We are told that ribbon developments are not desirable in rural areas. That may be so, but in many cases they give people the opportunity to buy their first home or to get off local authority housing lists. A sympathetic view should be taken of people seeking planning permission for single houses in rural areas. Perhaps group applications could be allowed and group facilities could be put in place for water, sewerage and other necessary infrastructural provisions. Older buildings are often knocked down and replaced and we should be more positive about refurbishment. If there is a need to give incentives for refurbishment in some urban areas, that would be preferable to some of the developments we see at present.
The Bill provides for a local authority to take over a certain area of a site proposed for development. That provision has pros and cons. In some cases that will not be of great benefit to the local authority as it may not be able to afford the land it seeks to acquire or, in acquiring it, the authority may not be able to develop the land as speedily as those who have bought houses in the estate would like. It will not always be the best solution. Would it be easier if builders provided a certain number of houses on a site for the local authority at a realistic price? If one has to do double the work in providing facilities for all the sites, one might find that the benefit which would accrue to the local authority in getting the site would be lost in its development. We must also look at the amount of time local authorities have to develop these sites. That time should be limited.
Completion of sites is another bone of contention. Builders in many cases are known to have walked off sites, leaving lights, footpaths and other facilities incomplete. A comprehensive bonding system is needed to deal with this and those found in default should not be granted further permissions. The percentage who are at fault is very small, but it gives those who do a good job a bad name which may be unwarranted.
Some people object to developments irrespective of whether they are affected. In some cases people who object to developments live five or ten miles away, which is wrong. It is worse than the NIMBY attitude, because if someone objects to planning permission for a development next to him or her, one can understand they may have genuine fears, but one often finds people objecting to developments, particularly commercial developments, five or ten miles away, even though these may be attempts to create employment. For their own reasons, some people object without thinking of the costs involving loss of time for the developers. There should be tighter controls for lodging third party appeals to An Bord Pleanála. The Bill will help to speed up the system, but should there be two levels of fees for lodging appeals? If someone has a genuine appeal, they should be charged a nominal fee. However, if someone lodges a spurious or malicious appeal, I agree with Deputy Lenihan that there should be a provision allowing the board to award costs against them. It is terrible to think someone may be held up for six or 12 months in a case where the applicants know their appeal is doomed from the beginning. This is the case also in oral hearings. In some cases oral hearings are sought where there is no need for them and where the cases could have been dealt with more easily and more cheaply through the ordinary An Bord Pleanála mechanism.
We would all like proper development plans by local authorities. Some local authorities split townlands on the outskirts of towns. It does not make sense that one side of a road, which may have the same facilities as the other side, may not be suitable for housing or commercial activities because of a development plan.
I welcome the proposal that afforestation will now be subject to the planning process. This is long overdue and will help to solve some of the problems relating to afforestation. The damage which can be caused to the environment by afforestation is worrying. In parts of the country water-courses have lost all fish life as a result of acids from indiscriminate planting and where coniferous needles have found their way into the water-courses. People might say this does not happen, but there is proof that it is happening. In the west of Ireland many rivers have been affected by indiscriminate planting. The regulations should make it quite clear that where planting is taking place there should be proper consideration of water-courses and the general environment. It is terrible to think that one can be surrounded by afforestation against ones will. There should be provision whereby people who seek to acquire land proposed for afforestation in order to preserve the amenity value of their property can do so. This is important and should be considered.
I spoke earlier about the provision of proper facilities in developing areas. This cannot be stressed forcefully enough, particularly when one considers the cities and large urban areas, where facilities were not provided and this led to social problems at a later stage. There needs to be more tightening up of the whole planning system. It is ridiculous that a local authority can write to someone seeking further information two days before a decision is due on the planning application. If a planning application is lodged and there is a 14 day waiting period, it should be mandatory for a local authority to seek any further information required within 21 days. It is unacceptable, if one is waiting for a planning decision that within two or three days of the deadline for the decision, further information is requested. This happens continually. Is the reason for this, insufficient staffing or insufficient engineers in planning offices or is it due to carelessness where there is not proper assessment of applications when they are lodged? It should be mandatory that further information is sought within 21 days of an application being lodged. I hope the Minister will try to deal with this issue.
Another great ploy recently is that SACs are used as a means of refusing planning applications. This is something Dúchas does not want, and in some cases local authorities do not approach Dúchas to ascertain the position. As members of local authorities and of this House, we all had to deal with the issue of declaration of interests. That is not a problem. However, those involved in the administrative end should be forced to make full declarations of their interests. This might lead to a more transparent planning system and prevent people from making totally unfounded accusations against planners and staff of local authorities. We have all heard statements about favouritism, therefore the need for transparency in planning is important. There is also a need for more planners in local authorities because at present there appears to be a shortage of qualified planners to deal with planning applications.
The Minister of State has an unprecedented opportunity to put in place planning legislation which will improve significantly the current framework if he listens to and takes on board the distilled wisdom of Members of this House who have 20 and 30 years experience in local authorities. There are Members with legal, technical, engineering, administrative and architectural backgrounds. If the Minister of State had a genuinely open mind on this Bill, that distilled wisdom would result in a truly excellent framework for planning and development into the new century. However, the attitude of "I know best" is by and large what we have heard from the Minister to date. To discard the wisdom and views from all sides of the House that are contrary or additional to what is in the Bill will serve neither the Minister, the Government nor the public.
Part V deals with housing supply, housing strategies, development plans, affordable housing, social housing and so on. It is an unquestionable fact that in the north Cork housing division of Cork County Council fewer houses are being built today than were built during the worst recession in the mid-1980s, despite the Celtic tiger economy and all that orgy of self-congratulations about the Irish economy. That is an undisputed fact at a time when significantly more people are on local authority housing lists. The Minister's figleaf proposal to smash and grab 20% of development land to placate the growing numbers on waiting lists is so transparently inoperable that it defies logic for the Minister to be hell bent on proceeding with it. This will mean the remaining 80% of houses will be more expensive and more and more people will not be able to afford their own houses. These people will tumble on to the already out of control local authority waiting lists. It is estimated that there are approximately 40,000 people nationwide on local authority housing lists. That figure, multiplied by three, which reflects the average family size, brings the number on local authority waiting lists to 120,000 people. That is approximately the equivalent of the population of Cork city on local authority housing lists and living in various types of inadequate accommodation such as high rent accommodation, overcrowded accommodation, unfit accommodation and homeless. This is happening at a time of unprecedented financial wherewithal.
We are building fewer houses in certain local authority areas than we were in the mid-1980s and the proposal from the Minister is simply inoperable. This problem has manifested itself all over my constituency. Parents attempt to help out where they have financial means and assist people to get on the first rung of the ladder. They buy their own site or try to build their own house. In many instances, a mobile home is placed in the back garden and the son or daughter with spouse and child live there because it is quite simply beyond their means to provide accommodation for themselves. That is a sad indictment of society as we congratulate ourselves on record numbers of people at work, interest rates at favourable levels and, despite inflation beginning to raise its ugly head again, by and large a successful economy. More and more people are being pushed to the margins because they cannot afford the basics, the most fundamental of which is accommodation.
This provision, if the Minister proceeds with it, will mean that we will be snarled up in court challenges and in administrative bureaucracy at individual local authority levels, where there are protracted negotiations about the value of the 20%, about which 20 acres of land it should be in, and whether it will be one area of four acres or another. It is inoperable. The wording of the Bill will not deliver the Minister's objective. There is no substitute, in terms of the housing crisis, for a massive financial injection of resources to each local authority so that members can decide how best to tackle the problems in their area, whether by way of serviced sites, buying houses on the side of the street or in private estates, or building small local authority estates and not repeating the mistakes of the past. It was reported in one of the papers today that a crowd gathered at some venue in Dublin where the building mistakes of the 1960s were being demolished. These proposals will be a monumental mistake in the first year of the millennium and I urge the Minister to think again.
The section on An Bord Pleanála also interests me. Much has been said by Members about vexatious appeals. The other side is the issue of vexatious applications. Nothing in this Bill deals with that issue. I can give an instance, chapter and verse, in my own constituency where the local authority has, on three occasions, granted planning approval which has subsequently on all occasions been overturned by An Bord Pleanála. The local authority refuses to implement the decision of An Bord Pleanála because local authorities have discretion. That is absurd. If we write out on foot of planning decisions made by local authorities to either the applicant or the objector and say that if they are not satisfied with the decision of the local authority they have a right to appeal and if the outcome of the appeal is not worth the paper on which it is written because the local authority has discretion, it brings An Bord Pleanála into disrepute. We can discuss at length all the provisions in this Bill to speed up decision making in An Bord Pleanála, to give it additional resources to reduce the timeframe it has to deal with appeals. However, if there is discretion and the decision it makes is not implemented by the local authority, how can one justify the existence of An Bord Pleanála to either an applicant or an appellant?
I know of an instance where that has happened repeatedly. If the Office of Public Works decided to give the two fingers to a decision of An Bord Pleanála and to carry on regardless, there would be a public outcry. If it is John Citizen, not a corporate body, without the sufficient finances to take the next step to the courts to vindicate his rights, we are prepared to ride roughshod over him. It is an outrage and that loophole should be closed. I ask the Minister to respond on that issue when replying and more particularly to consider which amendments are appropriate to the section dealing with An Bord Pleanála and enforcement by local authorities. The current position brings the entire process into disrepute.
Much criticism has been levelled at vexatious appeals to An Bord Pleanála. There are equally vexatious planning applications. In other jurisdictions these can be dismissed out of hand by local authorities but it is not dealt with in this Bill. I would like the Minister to tackle this.
In 1999 there were nearly 7,000 planning applications to my local authority, Cork County Council, with which I am familiar. In comparison with 1985, when I entered the local authority, there is at least a 100% increase and probably more. Yet we are operating with by and large the same level of staff. Members from all sides of the House have referred to a repeated practice in many local authorities which is becoming more prevalent. Planning applications are submitted, and on the deadline for a decision, rather than granting a refusal or a permission, the local authority sends out a registered letter looking for additional information. The staffing complement are unable to handle the volume of applications. This is a way of obtaining breathing space. It is entirely unacceptable from the point of view of the applicant and the public at large but it is happening. It is an instrument which they use to give themselves more time to come to an informed decision. Undoubtedly the large volume of applications leads to mistakes and the pressure on staff is enormous.
I attended a general purposes committee meeting of Cork County Council today where the final item on the agenda under other business was a tribute to one of its senior planning officers who was leaving to take up a position in the private sector and good luck to him – an excellent plan ner lost to the public service. We are losing the best, most capable and experienced planners to the demands of private developers because of the successful economy. We are not ensuring there is adequate replacement.
The point was made by other speakers that many people involved in making decisions on planning applications are not properly qualified. Engineers are dealing with applications where there should be architects and properly trained town planners. The number of educational establishments turning out properly qualified planners needs to be examined.
Many of my colleagues in Cork County Council have said that with the loss of experienced staff there is an influx of youthful enthusiasm and idealism in many of the new staff members. I welcome that because I would concur with many of the views expressed that planning has been abysmal, the signs of which are all over the country. Kerry County Council is an example of a planning authority that has not acquitted itself with distinction. The national primary road from Killarney to Tralee is littered with development which makes driving on it outrageously dangerous. Rather than in-depth development, there is continual development for four or five miles on the main road from Killarney to Tralee with numerous bed and breakfasts, bungalows and two and three storey dwellings. There is atrocious development. The position is similar in Galway and a number of other local authority areas but I can say, with some degree of pride, that Cork County Council does not have that problem. In the 15 years since I have been a member of the council, I have only ever seen one section 4 motion tabled and that was rejected. This is to the credit of the members and the planning department of the local authority.
However, this mechanism needs to be tightened up because it does not serve proper planning and development. The Ring of Kerry has been virtually destroyed as a tourist attraction because of honky-tonk plastic signs and badly designed developments in poor taste. Commercial facilities selling báinín jumpers and pottery have been added onto filling stations. However, such activities are hopelessly located and badly planned and many of them are the result of section 4 motions. It is a pity because the area was the jewel in the crown of southern tourism and it is much poorer now because of the development that has taken place in haste over the past 20 years. It is regrettable.
The Minister must take account of the pressures under which local authorities operate. This is why registered letters are sent on the last day of the two months available to deal with planning applications. People with appropriate qualifications are beginning to be recruited and they are causing much difficulty in many local authority areas because of their proper approach. This sometimes causes considerable grievances but, in the long run, it will yield benefits because, as Deputy Deasy said, relative to our neighbours and the heritage we inherited from the British, we are making a poor job of planning.
Part IV of the Bill deals with architectural heritage and listed buildings. Section 56 mentions the duties and obligations of owners and occupiers of listed properties. However, it is an outrage to demand that people who own such properties uphold and maintain them to an appropriate degree given the amount of financial incentives available to them. Many of these people have little financial means but they are obliged to spend enormous amounts of money on the buildings. The State makes very little money available for such purposes. A fund has been established by each local authority but that will only scratch the surface.
I am aware of a case where a man living in a listed building had the choice of walking away from it and building a new house but spent over £70,000 putting a new roof on it. Not a brown penny was made available to him for that work. The Bill will place an obligation on people to maintain such houses, but only a pittance will be made available to them. If we are serious about our architectural heritage and listed buildings, it must be matched with financial resources. The State is guilty because listed buildings all over the country, particularly courthouses, are falling down.
District judges are creating a huge controversy about this matter, in addition to other matters about which they are creating controversy. The Bill will place an obligation on private owners and occupiers while the State does not fulfil its own obligations with regard to listed buildings and courthouses in its ownership. A Bill was passed by the Oireachtas under which the State took ownership of court offices from local authorities. However, it is not fulfilling its duties. In addition to putting financial resources into privately owned listed buildings, the State should put its own house in order.
It is important to democratise the planning process as much as possible and to foster public participation in it. This is why I have an abhorrence of the proposal to limit a person's right of appeal. Some of the people who objected to the development in the Burren were from Dublin, Galway and other parts of the country and the decision was correct. Decision making by An Bord Pleanála should be speeded up to ensure decisions are available within two or three months. The main criticism is the delay and not the fact that appeals are being lodged by third parties.
There should be participation by people in all aspects of public life and planning is an integral part of public life. It is essential. We bemoan the fact that only 40% of the electorate turn out in by-elections. However, this is symptomatic of a lack of public confidence in institutions. If it is made more difficult for it to access institutions, it will feed the climate of suspicion which currently exists. The charges and restrictions mooted for appeals of planning decisions are wrong in principle and I ask the Minister to reconsider them.
I compliment Deputy Creed on his contribution. I do not agree with him with regard to Kerry County Council's planning department. We have an excellent planning department and there are some fine developments in the areas he mentioned—
The GAA year is starting early.
—in the Ring of Kerry and along the Tralee to Killarney road. I will refer to that matter during my contribution.
I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the debate on this important legislation. The Minister has put down a challenge to all Members to debate at length the issues in the Bill and the impact it will have on society and on development in every county. However, until the Bill is matched with an outline of how local government will be financed and how the role of public representatives in that structure can be strengthened, local government will not function as it should.
In spite of the increases introduced by the Government in the various sections of the Bill, local government is still not properly funded. There is a huge shortfall in terms of power and the system which operates under the county manager legislation. Local government is not working. In the past it functioned well, but we live in changing times. The public wants the people it elects to take positive steps, make real decisions and do the job for which they are elected, but that is not happening with regard to county development plans. Local authority members can sit around a table and argue about what they want to happen in their towns and counties. However, they no sooner have a development plan in place when an official or officials introduce conditions that can be attached to planning applications which almost nullify the input of the public representatives.
At a time when the Government and its predecessors have been trying to retain the population in rural areas and farming is not doing well, many people on the land want to sell sites to keep the farm alive or to keep a family member on the farm. However, they cannot sell to invest in the land because there is a provision in most local authority areas that a family member must be the first occupier of the house in question. This defeats the purpose of what the land owner is trying to achieve for his or her land or family.
The Bill is lengthy and complex and I cannot do justice to it in the short time available to me. It concerns every citizen in the State and I hope that when it is enacted it will enhance the quality of life for everyone who lives in our communities. The Bill consolidates the Acts from 1963 and updates the planning laws to provide a framework for future development of the island. I like most of what is contained in the Bill, which has 18 Parts and six Schedules. It is the most comprehensive legislation to come before the House. In welcoming it and highlighting certain aspects, one tends to be attracted to areas where one has reservations. That is human nature. However, as we deal with the various sections on Committee and Report Stages, we will be able to address other areas which we fully support.
Part I outlines definitions and I am interested to note that under section 4 the planning of forests is no longer exempt. This was probably anticipated, but I note that felling and thinning are exempt and I wonder if that should be the case.
Part V is most important. It recognises the importance of ensuring that an adequate amount of land is freed up to deal with housing needs. There is an explicit requirement for all future development plans to contain a housing strategy which should result in well thought out plans that provide sufficient and sustainable development. It is a tough task to meet the future housing and industrial needs of an economy that has expanded, and will continue to expand, as fast as ours. This Bill ensures that the mechanism to achieve this aim is enshrined in the planning process. Each plan will contain an estimate of the volume of housing required based on those eligible in that catchment area.
Debate adjourned.