Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for attending the committee. The Chairman asked an excellent question at our meeting on Tuesday about why we need fast-track planning and what the evidence base is for it. The representatives from the Dublin Democratic Planning Alliance have also raised the issue that this evidence has not been produced as part of the regulatory assessment. Indeed, the reply the Chairman got on Tuesday from the departmental witnesses indicated that one of the reasons is to answer claims that planning is leading to delays or is part of the problem and that it was not necessary that the evidence be in place.

I reread this morning the research done by Waldron and Lennon on the regulatory capture that led to the disastrous strategic housing development process coming into place. One of the interesting points I noticed in that research is that it refers, near the start, to the development industry identifying the very real problem of getting forward finance and early-stage finance and the risks around buying land, planning and all of that. I have a question for the witnesses from the CIF. Clearly, the solution that was put forward by some of the industry representatives, namely, fast-track planning, absolutely did not work and was disastrous. In the context of identifying planning and fast-track planning as the answer to the problems, has the CIF looked at alternatives such as much more active land management by the State to de-risk that aspect, infrastructure being put in place more quickly and other ways that the early stages of the building process - apart from planning - can be de-risked for the industry, which would bring down financing costs, make finance more available and make homes more affordable?

I thank the Deputy for the question. This ties into what Deputy O'Donoghue has already raised. We need to see available land. As well as available land, there needs to be proper assessment of whether those lands are ultimately capable of delivering homes, as well as the provision of services. Can we activate those lands? Is the critical infrastructure in place to activate those lands? We equally agree that that has been an impediment for a number of years. Unfortunately, as previously mentioned, the separation of water services from the local authorities has meant that the policy, due to lack of funding into Irish Water, now places an unfair onus on the purchaser of a new home or a first-time buyer to pay for that infrastructural upgrade. While that may benefit the wider community, and that is to be welcomed, it puts an unfair onus on the first people into a development in a new area, or an existing area with a new development, to pay for those upgrades. We feel that that should be looked at. We need to see critical investment into infrastructure.