Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I apologise for being late to the meeting and I thank the Chairman for allowing me to contribute. I did not hear a lot of what has happened but I am not out of sympathy with what I have heard so far.

Consider the Drogheda-east Meath experience. I referred yesterday to the controversy that arose there between the two statutory authorities having agreed a plan but which did not have statutory powers. The local council overrode that plan. As a result, green belts were no longer green belts, areas that had not been zoned for housing were then zoned, X had land zoned by the county council plan and then it turned out that Y was a beneficiary with regard to zoning. What we are talking about, when one gets down to it, is green belt planning, recreation and amenity planning and zoning. Those are the three issues that have to be transparent, accountable and above board in every respect.

I read through the minutes of Meath County Council and I went back years to look at what was going on. Perhaps some people in the Department may have read them also. The point now is what the Department is proposing to do. Take Drogheda as a model. Drogheda would have three members on the new body and Laytown-Bettystown would have three members. I do not have a difficulty with that. It is a very good thing that they talk to each other because people in one area might have recreational amenities, for example, the Laytown beaches and so on, and the people in those areas may come into Drogheda for their hospitals or education. That is a good synergy. My question is around the county development plan, the zoning issues and the green belt issues. If, as arose before, the county council's view is that the green belt should be from A to B, and if this new committee says the opposite, who is the authority on that planning decision? I believe this is at the heart of the matter.

One of the key problems was illustrated when a group of developers understood from meetings with key people, which were well documented, that they would have zoning for X and they did not get it. This was one of the rows that happened. I and everybody else wants this never to happen again. We need transparency, accountability and a direct line of accountability, with input from wherever it should come from. There must be authoritative, definitive and proper planning in terms of green belt areas, and in recreation and amenity. This is very important. Otherwise we might find vast areas of land rezoned for housing, with no proper amenities put in place. There are a substantial number of houses with very few amenities in the east Meath region. It was done the wrong way. That is being addressed now but I am conscious that this could happen again. Perhaps the Minister of State could come back on those points.