Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We are reviewing the rural planning guidelines. That process is under way at present. However, we must also try to ensure that we create communities and clusters that are much easier to serve in terms of infrastructure, amenity and all the other things that can be done in towns and villages but which are much more demanding of the State in the context of ribbon development. That is not to say there will not be some one-off housing as, of course, there will be. However, when one sees the number of vacant properties in towns and villages across rural Ireland and the demand for housing in those areas, we must try to connect the dots there in a more effective way than we have managed to do in the past. Nevertheless, I take the Deputy's point.

To clarify, Deputy Ó Broin is making an incorrect interpretation of what I am saying. There is no ceiling on any developer regarding the quality of what they produce. The guidelines we have are about having a floor standard in place and where that floor kicks in. If the floor is set significantly higher in one local authority, there are often unintended consequences to that in terms of the cost of building there and potentially not being able to provide affordable homes in certain areas because the only apartments that will be built will be extremely expensive both to build and to buy. We must try to have a housing policy element to ensure that different household types and different mixed tenure and mixed type communities can be facilitated in every local authority area. We should not decide, by making decisions in one local authority area, that only one type of family or person will be able to come into that area. That was our fear in that regard. In fact, the changes here were not about Dún Laoghaire, but about Dublin City Council. That council had decided to set its own size considerations in respect of apartments and we examined that. We did not reduce the national guidelines relating to apartment size. We just asked Dublin City Council to respect them. I remember the conversation the Government had at the time. It was a different Minister.

That was painted by many people as the State requiring smaller apartments but, in fact, the national guidelines remained quite consistent. However, Dublin City Council had gone beyond them and we required it to respect national guidelines. There was also clarity regarding ceiling height, dual aspect and a series of other matters. We have seen a significant improvement in the quality of build, whether it is local authority housing, privately built housing or approved housing bodies housing, be it apartments or family homes. We will improve inspection procedures around that. The building regulations are tighter than ever and we will be introducing a new mandatory registration process for all builders and contractors in the country. At present, it is a voluntary list. We are learning lessons and moving in the right direction. The point I am making here is that the Minister must ensure a minimum standard, on which we can all agree. The question is where that bar is set, whether one allows local authorities to go way beyond it for their local areas and the consequences of that.

My final point is that what we are doing here is establishing a new planning regulator.

If we do not have national policy guidelines for the regulator, it will not have a basis for assessment, decision making or recommendations. If we allow local authorities to do their own thing, there will be no national standard against which the regulator can measure them. The new planning regulator's office needs to have a minimum standard or benchmark by which it assesses decisions. That is why this is important. Otherwise the regulator would only be assessing local authorities against localised decision making. That defeats the purpose of having a national standard and a planning office.

I am always encouraging developers in particular, and the planning system, to make and approve planning applications that go way beyond the minimum standards. I think passive housing is a great thing. We are moving towards nearly zero energy buildings, NZEB, approaches, as well as A energy ratings and so on. The more of that we can do, the better. My job as Minister, however, is to make sure that we have a minimum standard which protects people's quality of life through better design and building, and which is enforced by a regulatory system. By having that at a national level, allowing local authorities to encourage more if they want, the new regulator's office will be able to make sure that those standards are implemented.