Dr. Mary Kelly:

With regard to legal representation, we have used the same firm for the past number of years. We are looking at what we are going to do there. We do not have our own in-house solicitors; we use an external firm. They are expert in planning law and are successful for us. We have to look at whether we need to tender that work.

With regard to variance by part of the country, I refer to the appendices. One has to be careful about how one interprets the chart, as it can be misleading, because while 75% of decisions were overturned in County Leitrim, only six applications had been made and, therefore, in other counties where there are larger numbers of applications, the percentage evens out. We do not draw big conclusions from that.

Land use and transportation are big. Decisions are made on the basis of zoning in terms of residential and higher density.

The Deputy asked about online planning applications. The board does not have the facility to do this, although most of the local authorities do at this stage. We are in the process of completing a needs and feasibility study and we hope if we get funding for it to put in a new system that will allow us to do that. It would be more effective and efficient. One will probably always need a set of physical maps but, nevertheless, one can do a lot on a computer screen. One can also employ geographical information systems and make one's processing more automated and efficient.

On the strategic infrastructure development, we require everybody applying for that to set up their own website with the planning application and all the documentation on that which would mean anything that comes in a complex case can be viewed through that even though it is not the An Bord Pleanála website.