Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

They may do. Or one may have local authorities that have environmental, passive house or quality of life standards for tenants, which try to provide an even better quality of outcome than central Government policy would do. Within the context of the democratically elected members in a county development plan, that is an important function of our democracy. However, specifically concerning the legislative change that the Minister's predecessor introduced, the Cabinet gave current and future Ministers an even greater level of power than they had previously by the amendment to the Act. I am concerned about how that could be used by future Ministers. We are clearly not going to agree on it but there is a logic in allowing for a degree of upward flexibility in standards. In real terms, this comes into play in higher-density and higher-level apartment accommodation living. That only affects a small number of local authorities, which is why I think they should have a bit more flexibility in improving the standards if such a thing is possible.