Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I endorse the point made about not returning the fees. The mind boggles on this. If a person lodges an objection to a planning application in the normal planning application process at the local authority level, and if the application is withdrawn, the person who paid €20 of their hard earned cash for their objection does not get that back. The Construction Industry Federation is written all over this. It is offensive. It costs money to process these applications and the benefit on the other side is generally to the developer. I find it strange and unacceptable.