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

I acknowledge the extent to which Mr. Cussen and his team have made themselves available to us, not just at the committee but also informally at a variety of meetings since this process started.

That has been very helpful, and I want to record my thanks.

I acknowledge, as I did in the debate, that there have been some changes in the final published version on the earlier draft such as greater inclusion of the north west, a little more on the all-Ireland dimension - Deputy Fergus O'Dowd mentioned the eastern border corridor - and a more balanced approach to regional development. I am still of the view that the plan is deficient, and my questions raise four key strategic concerns about it. I endorse everything Deputy Casey said in terms of the politicking around the vote. Mr. Cussen should be aware that the battle over securing an Oireachtas vote on that is not over. He will be hearing from us soon on the back of the legal opinion the committee got yesterday because many of us are still of the view, notwithstanding that it is a matter for the Minister and not for the witnesses, that given the importance of this plan there must be an Oireachtas vote on it, and we will be pursuing that via the Seanad and when the Planning and Development Bill comes back to the Dáil.

My questions relate to four issues. When the plan was announced, the Minister promised that 75% of the population growth would be outside Dublin and 50% of the population growth would be outside the five major cities, but what many of us raised throughout the consultation process is that more than half the population growth, from objective 1b in the document - between 490,000 and 540,000 additional people - will be in the Dublin eastern midlands region. The question is how we prevent that dramatic population growth from being concentrated in Dublin and the commuter belt and affecting all the commuter belt area. It is all very well to say it is meant to be for a larger area and that we want a significant portion of that to repopulate the urban core of Dublin city, which I support, but the fear is that if the plan at the macro level and the capital programme alongside it do not get a number of issues right, we will have an over-concentration on Dublin, particularly the western suburbs and the commuter belt counties around it. That is a real concern, and I have yet to hear anybody explain to me how that is to be avoided. That is my first question.

The second question is related to that, which is that in the context of that growth, and even if that growth happens in an appropriately planned way, I am very concerned about the weakness of the public transport elements of the plan. To give Mr. Cussen an example, as he is aware, in my constituency of Dublin Mid-West we have the Clonburris strategic development zone, a hugely important master plan for up to 8,000 social and affordable houses to be delivered over a ten-year period. We are expecting that plan to be finalised via An Bord Pleanála at the end of this year. If we look at the public infrastructure element of the framework and the capital plan, the major public infrastructure pieces for that part of the city will not be delivered until after those 8,000 houses have been delivered. For example, in terms of the Lucan Luas, the metro and some of the bus connectivity projects, we are looking at those coming at the very end of the capital plan, and possibly beyond. I raise that issue because it is just one example, and Deputy Casey mentioned another in terms of his constituency, where it seems the public transport infrastructure and the investment associated with it is coming significantly later on in the plan. That is a real concern in terms of how we manage that proper integration of population growth, increased housing supply and adequate public transport.

The third question is about one of the areas in the plan with which I am most disappointed, and I have raised it from our very first meeting. There is a spatial dimension to socio-economic disadvantage. We know that from the census figures. I asked at the outset that just as we have maps for population growth, ageing and employment clusters, we map socio-economic disadvantage. I was told at an earlier meeting that we did not want to do that because we did not want to offend the people who might live in those communities. I represent an area that has very substantial clusters of socio-economic disadvantage and those people would be much more concerned if they were ignored, and in this plan they are ignored in the sense that they are not visible. That is significant, but if someone is making plans, for example, in terms of the location of infrastructure or the jobs targets, if we are not ensuring that, along with population growth, increased investment and job growth, some of that is targeting those areas where there are higher concentrations of socio-economic disadvantage, it will simply repeat the patterns of disadvantage.

If we take the jobs targets, for example, we have a jobs target in 1c for an additional 225,000 people in employment in the south region but, as we know, the south east has a disproportionate concentration of deprivation and unemployment. This is not just a matter for the regional and local authority plans. It is a strategic matter at the top level. How will the Department deal with that?

In terms of my final question, while I acknowledge there are some improvements in terms of the all-Ireland and north west dimension, I still believe it is weak. We talk about the north of our country in a section entitled, Working with Our Neighbours, which is also to do with the European Union, although peripherally. How much contact in the latter phases of the development of the plan did the Department have with civil servants and counterparts in the North? What practical and detailed reassurance can Mr. Cussen give the committee in terms of the level of all-Ireland integration of this plan and the benefits that will be accrued from taking a proper all-Ireland approach because at a strategic level, that is very valuable?

Chairman, I have to leave at 10.30 a.m. as I have another engagement but I will get the answers from the blacks afterwards. I apologise.