Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy is suggesting we include a provision in the Bill for a developer who has 1,000 houses to be given ten years, for example, or similar for a shopping centre of more than X thousand square metres. Is that what he wants to put into the Bill? I do not think it is. With the passing of the Bill, planning departments will very clearly see where they can go further than the five years. The applicant has to actually make that application for a period. Applicants will be the ones going in to say that they want to build a new rail line, for example, and it will take them ten or 12 years or whatever. I genuinely think it is very clear that the best place for those decisions is with the professionals in planning departments in our local authorities and in an coimisiún pleanála. They will be the ones who will make those decisions. The Bill is not the appropriate place to set down the criteria for different developments and what should be in or out.